I post articles because I think they are of interest. Doing so doesn’t mean that I necessarily agree with every—or any—opinion in the posted article.
Little-known Republican taking on big government
http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/columnists/chi-kass-27-sep27,0,3471207.column
Conservative hope in Blagobamaville?
Un-elect Reid Rally
http://congressontrial.com/Searchlight%20Rally.html
Excerpt: “Reid represents not only the state of Nevada as Senate Majority Leader, but voters from Maine to Hawaii and We the People have had enough” said Chairman Harvey Jackson, former Mayor of nearby Lake Havasu City, Arizona. “We have unbelievable support from Republicans and Democrats alike, from California, Arizona and Reid’s home state of Nevada”. “This is truly a grassroots effort holding the event in his hometown” Jackson went on to say.
Congress bails out high-end auto maker
http://www.examiner.com/x-2879-Austin-Gun-Rights-Examiner~y2009m9d27-Congress-bails-out-highend-auto-maker
Lately, Congress has been opening their wallets to fund production of high-end sports cars that will cater to wealthy people who desire a guilt-free driving experience. Furthermore, as part of the new globalism espoused by President Obama, this bailout money will create jobs in Finland. (your tax dollars at work.)
Census asks about health insurance
http://legalinsurrection.blogspot.com/2009/09/census-adds-question-about-health.html
Excerpt: The Census document listing the questions which will be asked reflects a new multi-part question (beginning at page 68), which collects information regarding health care insurance coverage. Question 15 on the new Census asks whether each of the following forms of insurance apply to each person in the household:
Hannah Giles Defense Fund
http://www.2dialog.com/freemarket/main.php/micro_sites/actionpage/id/96/page_number/1/ref_codes/Motive:139
ACORN suing Hannah is like Nixon suing Woodward and Bernstein.
Lt. Colonel Allen West's Position Paper on Israel
http://atlasshrugs2000.typepad.com/atlas_shrugs/2009/09/lt-colonel-allen-wests-position-paper-on-israel.html
Excerpt: Now we face the resurrection of the original enemy of the Jewish people, a resurgent Islamic fundamentalism evidencing itself in totalitarian, imperialist design. This time it has morphed itself using 21st century technologies still retaining a 7th century mentality, utilizing terrorism internationally to promote its perverse aims. One of those objectives is the destruction of the State the world agreed to support in creating, Israel. In keeping with previous traditions established by Muhammad, the modern Islamic warriors promote taquiyya, lying to promote Islam. They also, just as Muhammad, use the Treaty of Hudabiyya as a model to delay and deceive their enemies until they are ready to strike. Under Yasser Arafat some 200 agreements were never honored.
Poll: Big Majorities Say Objective Journalism Is Dead and that Media Back Obama
http://ow.ly/r5Yp
Excerpt: Two-thirds (67.9 percent) of Americans surveyed think that “objective and fair journalism is dead,” while an overwhelming 89.3 percent believe the news media played a role in the election of President Barack Obama. That is what a poll conducted earlier this month by the Sacred Heart University Polling Institute showed. The survey, “Trust and Satisfaction with the National News Media,” polled 800 people nationwide and revealed that only 24.3 percent of Americans believe all or most reporting. The poll also showed that over half of Americans – 56.4 percent – think the media are promoting the Democratic health care reform package without objective criticism, while 57.6 percent of those surveyed believed the news media tried to diminish the record of former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin, the 2008 Republican vice presidential nominee. Ultimately, 86.6 percent of the people surveyed think that journalists strongly or somewhat have their own political and public policy positions and attempt to influence public opinion. (You can fool some of the people….)
Dog-Feces Ice Cream
http://article.nationalreview.com/print/?q=ZjdjNjhkOTI1NDBhNGY4MzJjMGUxYmYzYjM4N2NiMjE=
The always-entertaining Mark Steyn. Excerpt: Half a decade or so back, I wrote: “It’s a good basic axiom that if you take a quart of ice-cream and a quart of dog feces and mix ’em together the result will taste more like the latter than the former. That’s the problem with the U.N.” Absolutely right, if I do say so myself. When you make the free nations and the thug states members of the same club, the danger isn’t that they'll meet each other half-way but that the free world winds up going three-quarters, seven-eighths of the way. That’s what happened in New York last week. Barack Obama is not to blame for whichever vagary of United Nations protocol resulted in the president of the United States being the warm-up act for the Lunatic-for-Life in charge of Libya. But it is a pitiful reflection upon the state of the last superpower that, when it comes to the transnational mush drooled by the leader of the free world or the conspiracist ramblings of a terrorist pseudo-Bedouin running a one-man psycho-cult of a basket-case state, it’s more or less a toss-up as to which of them is more unreal. To be sure, Colonel Qaddafi peddled his thoughts on the laboratory origins of “swine flu” and the Zionist plot behind the Kennedy assassination. But, on the other hand, President Obama said: “No nation can or should try to dominate another nation.” Pardon me? Did a professional speechwriter write that? Or did you outsource it to a starry-eyed runner-up in the Miss America pageant? Whether or not any nation “should try” to dominate another, they certainly “can,” and do so with effortless ease, all over the planet and throughout human history.
Iran tests short-range missiles amid nuclear tension
http://edition.cnn.com/2009/WORLD/meast/09/27/iran.missile.test/
BO said it’s up to Iran to respond to his tough talk. Guess they did.
EDITORIAL: At the president's pleasure
'Safe school czar' encouraged child sex with an older man
http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2009/sep/28/at-the-presidents-pleasure/?source=newsletter_opinion_headlines
Excerpt: A teacher was told by a 15-year-old high school sophomore that he was having homosexual sex with an "older man." At the very least, statutory rape occurred. Fox News reported that the teacher violated a state law requiring that he report the abuse. That former teacher, Kevin Jennings, is President Obama's "safe school czar." It's getting hard to keep track of all of this president's problematic appointments. Clearly, the process for vetting White House employees has broken down. In this one case in which Mr. Jennings had a real chance to protect a young boy from a sexual predator, he not only failed to do what the law required but actually encouraged the relationship.
Religion and Politics Mix at Islam Rally on Capitol Hill
http://townhall.com/columnists/JillianBandes/2009/09/26/religion_and_politics_mix_at_islam_rally_on_captiol_hill
Excerpt: A Muslim prayer gathering on Capitol Hill on Friday was attended by maybe a tenth of the 50,000 people organizers were expecting. The event's PR was even less successful than its attendance, with conservative media outlets claiming that the event's two main organizers had a history of defending terrorism, making anti-Semitic comments, and expressing anti-American views. (Surprise, surprise, surprise.)
Hamas TV show teaches kids to kill Jews
http://www.jihadwatch.org/2009/09/hamas-tv-show-teaches-kids-to-kill-jews.html
And our tax dollars support these advocates of “the Religion of Peace.”
Taliban threatens Germany ahead of vote
http://www.france24.com/en/20090926-taliban-threatens-germany-ahead-vote-official
Excerpt: In the new video, a man calling himself "Ajjub" and speaking in German said: "Because of your commitment here against Islam, attacking Germany has become an attractive idea for us, the mujahideen," according to the spokesman. The militant said it was only a matter of time "before jihad destroys German walls. "Photos of famous German sites and events then appear, including Brandenburg Gate, Munich's Oktoberfest beer festival and Cologne Cathedral. (But why attack? Given the disparate birth rates, German will be Muslim in a generation. Then they can resume seeking “The Final Solution to the Jewish Question.”)
Crowder at Berkeley
http://www.pjtv.com/video/Louder_With_Crowder/AS_SEEN_ON_FOX_NEWS_Crowder_Does_Berkeley%3A_How_the_%231_Public_University_Produces_First-Rate_Idiots/2468/
Funny - like Jay-Walking.
ACORN & SEIU Shakedown
http://biggovernment.com/2009/09/27/acorn-and-seiu-anatomy-of-a-shakedown/
Excerpt: As various charges and complaints have materialized over the years, it seems that ACORN uses the communities in which they are located as staging grounds for national power grabs. With multiple states and entities receiving federal funds, ACORN plays to win. Aiding ACORN are groups like DEMO’s, the Democracy Alliance, Soros Open Society Institute, and the Service Employees International Union (SEIU). The Washington Examiner has covered ACORN’s: “Muscle for the Money” program: “ACORN’s so-called ‘muscle for money’ strategy extorts ‘donations’ from targeted government and corporate officials by offering them Mafia-like protection from protests by the group’s own paid thugs, many of them convicted felons. ACORN has also blocked bank mergers until the targeted financial institutions agreed to change their lending policies to ACORN’s satisfaction.
Troops 'release half of Taliban prisoners after four days'
British troops have to release captured Taliban militants after only four days because of Nato rules limiting the time they can be held.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/asia/afghanistan/6236476/Troops-release-half-of-Taliban-prisoners-after-four-days.html
We should have done this with Nazi prisoners in WWII—to give Hitler a sporting chance to win.
Nevada Attorney General indicts ACORN after raiding offices.
http://www.aipnews.com/talk/forums/thread-view.asp?tid=8368&posts=2
Excerpt: News just on FOX: An Acorn Field Director has "flipped", is now working with Nevada Attorney General on case against ACORN. Nevada Acorn offices raided, field manuals on how to commit Voter Registration Fraud seized.
Showing posts with label ACORN. Show all posts
Showing posts with label ACORN. Show all posts
Monday, September 28, 2009
Friday, September 25, 2009
Political Digest September 25, 2009
I post articles because I think they are of interest. Doing so doesn’t mean that I necessarily agree with every—or any—opinion in the posted article.
Warriors—Watch this
http://www.warriorsthefilm.com/Movie.html
www.warriorsdvd.com
In my old age, increasingly I wonder if America still deserves such men and women.
Marines in Afghanistan
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VkrgsJGZQeI
Road of Appeasement - Citizens United Ad
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hqmM4GvrpPE&feature=player_embedded
Good video—couldn’t agree more.
Iran loses its only AWACS as Ahmadinejad threatens the world
http://www2.debka.com/headline.php?hid=6280
Only seen on blogs. Hope it’s true and the Leftstream media is just ignoring it.
It’s OFFICIAL – Obama’s The WORST President EVER
http://www.galganov.com/editorials.asp?id=1159
Excerpt: He said: We’ve got to stop living in the past and stop blaming others for what happened yesterday. We must all work for tomorrow. And not play the BLAME-GAME…He contradicts point 2 when he made clear that we have to stop living in the past and playing the BLAME-GAME as in the same breath he BLAMES America for everything. I guess it’s OK to live in the past and play the BLAME-GAME if you’re Barak Obama, since 9 months into his Presidency; he’s still BLAMING former President George W Bush for the economy, healthcare, the worldview of the USA and the War in Iraq. His comment about not doing Israel any favors for supporting Israeli bad behavior is as condescending and patronizing as it gets. (A bit over the top. Worse than Jimmy Jihad’s-Friend Carter? Already?)
Ohio couple giving up baby after clinic mix-up
http://www.comcast.net/articles/news-general/20090923/US.Wrong.Embryo/
Welcome to the 21st century. Can I go home now? Excerpt: The Savages say the fertility clinic transferred the wrong frozen embryo to Carolyn's womb in early February. Ten days later, Sean Savage got a call from a doctor saying his wife was pregnant with someone else's child.
Democrats nix putting pre-vote health bill online
http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5jlMpJGn28kqCcgU-aGcYE_ZHW-ywD9AT460O0
Who says liberals can’t learn? They learned from the Town Halprotests that it’s dangerous to let folks read the bills.
ACORN and the AGs
http://www.americanthinker.com/2009/09/acorn_and_the_ags.html
Excerpt: The reasons for inaction by state attorneys general may explain why ACORN is such a problem. ACORN has developed close ties, to put it mildly, with many state attorneys general as well as others deep in the Democrat establishment. The relationship between ACORN and Democrats may be described as symbiotic. (Gee, ya think?)
Sheriff's police raid dogfighting ring at day care home
http://www.chicagobreakingnews.com/2009/09/dog-fighting-operation-in-suburban-day-care-home.html?track=email-alert-breakingnews
Chicago Chapter, Michael Vick fan club. But, hey, who are we to judge their culture—all cultures arte equally valid in today’s brave new world, right? Excerpt: In the garage at Anderson's home, police said they found an 18-month-old pit bull with three 4-week old puppies. They were all kept in a wire cage soaked in feces and urine, with no signs of food or water for them, Dart said. "All were severely emaciated," his office said in a release. Police said they believe the puppies were already being used in fights, possibly as "bait dogs." One puppy had its left eye ripped out and had several puncture wounds to its face.
New squalid migrant camp pops up in Calais hours after the Jungle is razed
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/worldnews/article-1215568/New-squalid-migrant-camp-pops-Calais-hours-Jungle-razed.html
Excerpt: Squalid camps next to the derelict Hoverport in Calais are in danger of mushrooming into a new ‘Jungle’ full of Britain-bound illegal migrants, it was claimed today. Just 24 hours after a mile-square stretch of wasteland was cleared of hundreds of mainly Afghan young men, the town’s mayor said she had ‘spotted between fifteen and twenty squats’ nearby.
The Smart President Has a Brain Problem (interesting science)
http://www.politicsdaily.com/2009/09/23/the-smart-president-has-a-brain-problem/
Excerpt: It's ironic that a president as smart as Obama has a brain problem, but that's just what's going on. The president and his advisors have laid out a disciplined and intense media strategy for selling reform. Since Labor Day it's been all Obama all the time, culminating in the "Full Ginsburg," a shameless visibility tactic named for William Ginsburg, who as Monica Lewinsky's lawyer, was the first to appear on five Sunday talk shows, on the ancient morning of February 1, 1998. But there are fundamental realities about the role of emotion in decision-making, about the brain and its unconscious processes that are being overlooked, and that can derail even the most carefully calibrated political strategy. So there are deep biological and psychological consequences to the president's ubiquity. Are he and his advisors focused too much on political science and not enough on neuroscience? They are. I spoke to Dr. Joel Weinberger -- professor at the Derner Institute for Advanced Psychological Studies at Adelphi University -- about where Obama stands now. He told me that the framing of the health care debate has already been locked into the brains of voters. "A neural network has been established, that Obama is an ultra-liberal, that he will increase the deficit, that he will kill old people." That means every time the president goes on TV with the intention of dismissing those charges, "he is speaking into the network and reinforcing it."
Family gift that keeps giving finds son paving easy street
http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/columnists/chi-kass-24-sep24,0,1898337.column
Chicago Politics, from the sewer of which we are to believe our President emerged unsullied. And since he has spoken out against corruption ever place but Chicago, unknowing. Just as he sat in Wright’s church for 20 years and never heard what was said, so he participated in Chicago politics and never noticed the corruption. Like his chief of staff Rahm Emanuel who was elected to Congress and never noticed the flood of illegal city employee campaign workers who made it happen.
Northern Exposure: Obama is Peddling Bad Medicine
http://www.cdobs.com/archive/featured/northern-exposure-obamas-peddling-bad-medicine,68658
Excerpt: If you want to experience the joys of socialized medicine firsthand, you need not travel to Canada or the United Kingdom. Simply pay a visit to the John H. Stroger, Jr., County Hospital as the former Cook County Hospital is now called. If you do so, you may never squawk about paying your own health insurance premiums again. This taxpayer funded hospital for the indigent has been plagued by political scandals and epidemic mismanagement for more than a century and a half. While many capable physicians have worked at the hospital, political interference and ineptitude have been the distinguishing characteristics of this institution. If President Obama were a bold and visionary leader, he would propose immediate tort reform legislation that would place a cap on non-economic damages for intangible injuries such as pain and suffering and loss of normal life activities. Such reforms would lower the costs of medical care across the board by allowing doctors opportunities to stop practicing “defensive medicine” and ordering numerous tests solely to avoid running the risk of being sued for medical malpractice. That, of course, is highly unlikely to happen since trial lawyers contribute so generously to Democratic politicians and committees. The Democratic party has a vested interest in seeing that the medical malpractice litigation industry continues unabated while we pay the freight.
The UN loves Barack Obama because he is weak
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/northamerica/usa/barackobama/6221379/The-UN-loves-Barack-Obama-because-he-is-weak.html
The view from the UK: Barack Obama’s Gallup approval rating of 52 percent may well be lower at this stage of his presidency than any US leader in recent times with the exception of Bill Clinton. But he is still worshipped with messiah-like adoration at the United Nations, and is considerably more popular with many of the 192 members of the UN than he is with the American people….It is not hard to see why a standing ovation awaits the president at Turtle Bay. Obama’s popularity at the UN boils down essentially to his willingness to downplay American global power. He is the first American president who has made an art form out of apologizing for the United States, which he has done on numerous occasions on foreign soil, from Strasbourg to Cairo. The Obama mantra appears to be – ask not what your country can do for you, but what you can do to atone for your country. This is a message that goes down very well in a world that is still seething with anti-Americanism.
Independents desert Obama, putting 2010 in play
http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/politics/Independents-desert-Obama_-putting-2010-in-play-8284762-60716767.html
Excerpt: Independent voters are turning away from President Obama and his fellow Democrats in droves. And if they can't find a way to get them back, the party could be in deep trouble for 2010 and beyond. Independents gave Obama the White House last year with a vote for pragmatic competence. They have been repaid with partisanship and dithering. And unlike liberals who Obama has quickly re-energized after their summer doldrums, independents are devilishly hard to win back once they lose faith. The latest Wall Street Journal/NBC News poll, the Rolls-Royce of public surveys, showed that for the first time, independents disapproved of the president's performance, 46 percent to 41 percent.
Ex-Kennedy Aide Is Seen as Likely Interim Senator
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/09/23/AR2009092304470.html?wpisrc=newsletter&wpisrc=newsletter
Excerpt: The Massachusetts legislature on Wednesday gave final approval to a bill that would allow Gov. Deval L. Patrick (D) to appoint an interim U.S. senator, and he is leaning heavily toward naming Paul Kirk, a longtime aide to the late senator Edward M. Kennedy, to the position, according to a source familiar with the machinations.
The Truth about Income Inequality
http://www.realclearmarkets.com/articles/2009/09/24/the_truth_about_income_inequality_97427.html
Excerpt: Ask almost any Democratic politician the most important economic facts about income distribution in America, and you are almost certain to hear the following three points: (1) incomes have fallen substantially over the past ten years; (2) labor's share of income has fallen significantly behind the pace of new productivity and innovation; and (3) income distribution has worsened dramatically over the past generation and over the past decade in particular, with people at the top getting a bigger fraction of total personal income. Many Democrats believe that these three points are the economic equivalent of the "gospel truth." When politicians see truth, legislation is not far away. Thus, members of Congress have proposed new taxes redistributing income from richer to poorer Americans, new middle-class entitlements such as a public health care program, and the Employee Free Choice Act, which attempts to increase unionization by effectively taking away secret ballots in union elections. A new economic study reveals that each of the three points of the politicians' economic "gospel truth" is grossly exaggerated and perhaps entirely wrong.
Great video clip exposing the left’s hypocrisy
http://politicalintegritynow.com/2009/09/still-think-socialist-is-the-new-n-word-watch-this-video-and-you-wont/
Our Own Worst Enemy
http://www.frontpagemag.com/readArticle.aspx?ARTID=36420
Excerpt: When enemy action kills our troops, it's unfortunate. When our own moral fecklessness murders those in uniform, it's unforgivable. In Afghanistan, our leaders are complicit in the death of each soldier, Marine or Navy corpsman who falls because politically correct rules of engagement shield our enemies.
Is the U.S. Losing the Pacific?
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970204488304574424500351199212.html
Excerpt: From the tranquil vantage point of Pacific Command's headquarters here at Camp H.M. Smith, overlooking Pearl Harbor, it's hard to recall the postcards from China that have jolted this command's peace of mind. Yet they are there: in 2004, when a Chinese Han-class nuclear submarine was spotted cruising near Japan's Miyako island; in 2006, when a Chinese Song-class submarine, armed with torpedoes and antiship cruise missiles, surfaced less than five miles from the USS Kitty Hawk carrier battle group off Okinawa; and in March, when a coterie of Chinese ships harassed the USNS Impeccable, an unarmed U.S. Navy surveillance ship operating in international waters off Hainan Island…. Yet the trend is not in America's favor. The Obama administration has curbed the Navy's expansion plans and sent signals that it doesn't believe in expanding missile defense. Beijing has meanwhile poured money into access denial capabilities, including antiship ballistic missiles, cyberwarfare and antisatellite weapons. The American Enterprise Institute's Dan Blumenthal estimates that China has added around three submarines to its fleet every year since 1995. The U.S. submarine fleet, by contrast, is shrinking. It's the same story for fighter jets: China is ramping up its fifth-generation technology, while the U.S. has capped the production of stealth F-22 fighters. The Iraq and Afghanistan engagements are also sapping personnel normally assigned to PaCom.
Difference Between Muslims and Jews
http://muskegonpundit.blogspot.com/2009/02/difference-between-muslims-and-jews.html
Interesting facts.
Egyptian would-be burner of Jewish books, defeated in bid to head UNESCO, whines -- and blames the Jews, of course
http://www.jihadwatch.org/2009/09/egyptian-burner-of-jewish-books-defeated-in-bid-to-head-unesco-whines----and-blames-the-jews-of-cour.html
Excerpt: But the campaign met strong opposition from US and French commentators as well as from Auschwitz survivor and Nobel laureate Elie Wiesel, who said appointing Hosni would "shame" the global community…. In his lengthy political career, Hosni has often been accused of promoting anti-Semitism, in particular in 2008 when he told the Egyptian parliament: "I'd burn Israeli books myself if I found any in libraries in Egypt."
Author warns of the ‘silent Jihad’
http://www.thesuburbannews.ca/content/en/2277
Excerpt: The author of a number of books on religious fanaticism, his most recent work is Surrender: Appeasing Islam, Sacrificing Freedom. Bawer argues that Europe is currently falling victim to a “silent Jihad,” a hidden holy war perpetrated by radical Islamists on Western, social-democratic values. Speaking at a conference last week organized by Islamist watchdog group Point de Bascule, Bawer warned Canadians to not be as complacent as their counterparts across the pond. Radical Islam “is a subject that a few years ago, wasn’t on my radar. My goal was to write a book celebrating The Netherlands and Amsterdam,” Bawer told the audience. What he saw in major European cities were enclaved communities, ghettos, where residents were “subject to seventh century Islamic law. They could barely speak the language of the country they were born in, thanks to the generosity of the European welfare state.”
Jihadists kill peacekeepers
http://www.jihadwatch.org/2009/09/jihadists-kill-peacekeepers.html
Guess no one told them Islam is a “Religion of Peace.” Excerpt: MOGADISHU -- At least eight civilians were killed in Mogadishu when Islamist insurgents attacked African peacekeepers prompting an exchange of gun and artillery fire that hit civilian targets, officials and witnesses said on Wednesday.
Schoolchildren indoctrinated to praise Obama
http://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2009/09/shock_video_schoolchildren_ind.html
Can the “Ministry of Truth” be far behind? Imaging the reaction if Bush supporters did this?
More on indoctrinating kids
http://newsrealblog.com/2009/09/23/indoctrinating-kids-with-socialism/
FCC's Diversity Czar: 'White People' Need to be Forced to 'Step Down' 'So Someone Else Can Have Power'
http://newsbusters.org/blogs/seton-motley/2009/09/23/fccs-diversity-czar-white-people-need-be-forced-step-down-so-someone-0
Excerpt: "It should be clear by now that my focus here is not freedom of speech or the press. This freedom is all too often an exaggeration. At the very least, blind references to freedom of speech or the press serve as a distraction from the critical examination of other communications policies.”
GOP ad
http://viralfootage.com/?p=3471
Quotes
For Majority Leader Reid, it seems that 'oversight' is a selective responsibility, and the misuse of taxpayer dollars by a fraud-ridden organization does not qualify as a priority in his purview as the Leader of the U.S. Senate. –Sen. John Cornyn (R-Texas)
If the Arabs put down their weapons today, there would be no more violence. If the Jews put down their weapons today, there would be no more Israel. –Benjamin Netanyahu
Warriors—Watch this
http://www.warriorsthefilm.com/Movie.html
www.warriorsdvd.com
In my old age, increasingly I wonder if America still deserves such men and women.
Marines in Afghanistan
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VkrgsJGZQeI
Road of Appeasement - Citizens United Ad
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hqmM4GvrpPE&feature=player_embedded
Good video—couldn’t agree more.
Iran loses its only AWACS as Ahmadinejad threatens the world
http://www2.debka.com/headline.php?hid=6280
Only seen on blogs. Hope it’s true and the Leftstream media is just ignoring it.
It’s OFFICIAL – Obama’s The WORST President EVER
http://www.galganov.com/editorials.asp?id=1159
Excerpt: He said: We’ve got to stop living in the past and stop blaming others for what happened yesterday. We must all work for tomorrow. And not play the BLAME-GAME…He contradicts point 2 when he made clear that we have to stop living in the past and playing the BLAME-GAME as in the same breath he BLAMES America for everything. I guess it’s OK to live in the past and play the BLAME-GAME if you’re Barak Obama, since 9 months into his Presidency; he’s still BLAMING former President George W Bush for the economy, healthcare, the worldview of the USA and the War in Iraq. His comment about not doing Israel any favors for supporting Israeli bad behavior is as condescending and patronizing as it gets. (A bit over the top. Worse than Jimmy Jihad’s-Friend Carter? Already?)
Ohio couple giving up baby after clinic mix-up
http://www.comcast.net/articles/news-general/20090923/US.Wrong.Embryo/
Welcome to the 21st century. Can I go home now? Excerpt: The Savages say the fertility clinic transferred the wrong frozen embryo to Carolyn's womb in early February. Ten days later, Sean Savage got a call from a doctor saying his wife was pregnant with someone else's child.
Democrats nix putting pre-vote health bill online
http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5jlMpJGn28kqCcgU-aGcYE_ZHW-ywD9AT460O0
Who says liberals can’t learn? They learned from the Town Halprotests that it’s dangerous to let folks read the bills.
ACORN and the AGs
http://www.americanthinker.com/2009/09/acorn_and_the_ags.html
Excerpt: The reasons for inaction by state attorneys general may explain why ACORN is such a problem. ACORN has developed close ties, to put it mildly, with many state attorneys general as well as others deep in the Democrat establishment. The relationship between ACORN and Democrats may be described as symbiotic. (Gee, ya think?)
Sheriff's police raid dogfighting ring at day care home
http://www.chicagobreakingnews.com/2009/09/dog-fighting-operation-in-suburban-day-care-home.html?track=email-alert-breakingnews
Chicago Chapter, Michael Vick fan club. But, hey, who are we to judge their culture—all cultures arte equally valid in today’s brave new world, right? Excerpt: In the garage at Anderson's home, police said they found an 18-month-old pit bull with three 4-week old puppies. They were all kept in a wire cage soaked in feces and urine, with no signs of food or water for them, Dart said. "All were severely emaciated," his office said in a release. Police said they believe the puppies were already being used in fights, possibly as "bait dogs." One puppy had its left eye ripped out and had several puncture wounds to its face.
New squalid migrant camp pops up in Calais hours after the Jungle is razed
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/worldnews/article-1215568/New-squalid-migrant-camp-pops-Calais-hours-Jungle-razed.html
Excerpt: Squalid camps next to the derelict Hoverport in Calais are in danger of mushrooming into a new ‘Jungle’ full of Britain-bound illegal migrants, it was claimed today. Just 24 hours after a mile-square stretch of wasteland was cleared of hundreds of mainly Afghan young men, the town’s mayor said she had ‘spotted between fifteen and twenty squats’ nearby.
The Smart President Has a Brain Problem (interesting science)
http://www.politicsdaily.com/2009/09/23/the-smart-president-has-a-brain-problem/
Excerpt: It's ironic that a president as smart as Obama has a brain problem, but that's just what's going on. The president and his advisors have laid out a disciplined and intense media strategy for selling reform. Since Labor Day it's been all Obama all the time, culminating in the "Full Ginsburg," a shameless visibility tactic named for William Ginsburg, who as Monica Lewinsky's lawyer, was the first to appear on five Sunday talk shows, on the ancient morning of February 1, 1998. But there are fundamental realities about the role of emotion in decision-making, about the brain and its unconscious processes that are being overlooked, and that can derail even the most carefully calibrated political strategy. So there are deep biological and psychological consequences to the president's ubiquity. Are he and his advisors focused too much on political science and not enough on neuroscience? They are. I spoke to Dr. Joel Weinberger -- professor at the Derner Institute for Advanced Psychological Studies at Adelphi University -- about where Obama stands now. He told me that the framing of the health care debate has already been locked into the brains of voters. "A neural network has been established, that Obama is an ultra-liberal, that he will increase the deficit, that he will kill old people." That means every time the president goes on TV with the intention of dismissing those charges, "he is speaking into the network and reinforcing it."
Family gift that keeps giving finds son paving easy street
http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/columnists/chi-kass-24-sep24,0,1898337.column
Chicago Politics, from the sewer of which we are to believe our President emerged unsullied. And since he has spoken out against corruption ever place but Chicago, unknowing. Just as he sat in Wright’s church for 20 years and never heard what was said, so he participated in Chicago politics and never noticed the corruption. Like his chief of staff Rahm Emanuel who was elected to Congress and never noticed the flood of illegal city employee campaign workers who made it happen.
Northern Exposure: Obama is Peddling Bad Medicine
http://www.cdobs.com/archive/featured/northern-exposure-obamas-peddling-bad-medicine,68658
Excerpt: If you want to experience the joys of socialized medicine firsthand, you need not travel to Canada or the United Kingdom. Simply pay a visit to the John H. Stroger, Jr., County Hospital as the former Cook County Hospital is now called. If you do so, you may never squawk about paying your own health insurance premiums again. This taxpayer funded hospital for the indigent has been plagued by political scandals and epidemic mismanagement for more than a century and a half. While many capable physicians have worked at the hospital, political interference and ineptitude have been the distinguishing characteristics of this institution. If President Obama were a bold and visionary leader, he would propose immediate tort reform legislation that would place a cap on non-economic damages for intangible injuries such as pain and suffering and loss of normal life activities. Such reforms would lower the costs of medical care across the board by allowing doctors opportunities to stop practicing “defensive medicine” and ordering numerous tests solely to avoid running the risk of being sued for medical malpractice. That, of course, is highly unlikely to happen since trial lawyers contribute so generously to Democratic politicians and committees. The Democratic party has a vested interest in seeing that the medical malpractice litigation industry continues unabated while we pay the freight.
The UN loves Barack Obama because he is weak
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/northamerica/usa/barackobama/6221379/The-UN-loves-Barack-Obama-because-he-is-weak.html
The view from the UK: Barack Obama’s Gallup approval rating of 52 percent may well be lower at this stage of his presidency than any US leader in recent times with the exception of Bill Clinton. But he is still worshipped with messiah-like adoration at the United Nations, and is considerably more popular with many of the 192 members of the UN than he is with the American people….It is not hard to see why a standing ovation awaits the president at Turtle Bay. Obama’s popularity at the UN boils down essentially to his willingness to downplay American global power. He is the first American president who has made an art form out of apologizing for the United States, which he has done on numerous occasions on foreign soil, from Strasbourg to Cairo. The Obama mantra appears to be – ask not what your country can do for you, but what you can do to atone for your country. This is a message that goes down very well in a world that is still seething with anti-Americanism.
Independents desert Obama, putting 2010 in play
http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/politics/Independents-desert-Obama_-putting-2010-in-play-8284762-60716767.html
Excerpt: Independent voters are turning away from President Obama and his fellow Democrats in droves. And if they can't find a way to get them back, the party could be in deep trouble for 2010 and beyond. Independents gave Obama the White House last year with a vote for pragmatic competence. They have been repaid with partisanship and dithering. And unlike liberals who Obama has quickly re-energized after their summer doldrums, independents are devilishly hard to win back once they lose faith. The latest Wall Street Journal/NBC News poll, the Rolls-Royce of public surveys, showed that for the first time, independents disapproved of the president's performance, 46 percent to 41 percent.
Ex-Kennedy Aide Is Seen as Likely Interim Senator
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/09/23/AR2009092304470.html?wpisrc=newsletter&wpisrc=newsletter
Excerpt: The Massachusetts legislature on Wednesday gave final approval to a bill that would allow Gov. Deval L. Patrick (D) to appoint an interim U.S. senator, and he is leaning heavily toward naming Paul Kirk, a longtime aide to the late senator Edward M. Kennedy, to the position, according to a source familiar with the machinations.
The Truth about Income Inequality
http://www.realclearmarkets.com/articles/2009/09/24/the_truth_about_income_inequality_97427.html
Excerpt: Ask almost any Democratic politician the most important economic facts about income distribution in America, and you are almost certain to hear the following three points: (1) incomes have fallen substantially over the past ten years; (2) labor's share of income has fallen significantly behind the pace of new productivity and innovation; and (3) income distribution has worsened dramatically over the past generation and over the past decade in particular, with people at the top getting a bigger fraction of total personal income. Many Democrats believe that these three points are the economic equivalent of the "gospel truth." When politicians see truth, legislation is not far away. Thus, members of Congress have proposed new taxes redistributing income from richer to poorer Americans, new middle-class entitlements such as a public health care program, and the Employee Free Choice Act, which attempts to increase unionization by effectively taking away secret ballots in union elections. A new economic study reveals that each of the three points of the politicians' economic "gospel truth" is grossly exaggerated and perhaps entirely wrong.
Great video clip exposing the left’s hypocrisy
http://politicalintegritynow.com/2009/09/still-think-socialist-is-the-new-n-word-watch-this-video-and-you-wont/
Our Own Worst Enemy
http://www.frontpagemag.com/readArticle.aspx?ARTID=36420
Excerpt: When enemy action kills our troops, it's unfortunate. When our own moral fecklessness murders those in uniform, it's unforgivable. In Afghanistan, our leaders are complicit in the death of each soldier, Marine or Navy corpsman who falls because politically correct rules of engagement shield our enemies.
Is the U.S. Losing the Pacific?
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970204488304574424500351199212.html
Excerpt: From the tranquil vantage point of Pacific Command's headquarters here at Camp H.M. Smith, overlooking Pearl Harbor, it's hard to recall the postcards from China that have jolted this command's peace of mind. Yet they are there: in 2004, when a Chinese Han-class nuclear submarine was spotted cruising near Japan's Miyako island; in 2006, when a Chinese Song-class submarine, armed with torpedoes and antiship cruise missiles, surfaced less than five miles from the USS Kitty Hawk carrier battle group off Okinawa; and in March, when a coterie of Chinese ships harassed the USNS Impeccable, an unarmed U.S. Navy surveillance ship operating in international waters off Hainan Island…. Yet the trend is not in America's favor. The Obama administration has curbed the Navy's expansion plans and sent signals that it doesn't believe in expanding missile defense. Beijing has meanwhile poured money into access denial capabilities, including antiship ballistic missiles, cyberwarfare and antisatellite weapons. The American Enterprise Institute's Dan Blumenthal estimates that China has added around three submarines to its fleet every year since 1995. The U.S. submarine fleet, by contrast, is shrinking. It's the same story for fighter jets: China is ramping up its fifth-generation technology, while the U.S. has capped the production of stealth F-22 fighters. The Iraq and Afghanistan engagements are also sapping personnel normally assigned to PaCom.
Difference Between Muslims and Jews
http://muskegonpundit.blogspot.com/2009/02/difference-between-muslims-and-jews.html
Interesting facts.
Egyptian would-be burner of Jewish books, defeated in bid to head UNESCO, whines -- and blames the Jews, of course
http://www.jihadwatch.org/2009/09/egyptian-burner-of-jewish-books-defeated-in-bid-to-head-unesco-whines----and-blames-the-jews-of-cour.html
Excerpt: But the campaign met strong opposition from US and French commentators as well as from Auschwitz survivor and Nobel laureate Elie Wiesel, who said appointing Hosni would "shame" the global community…. In his lengthy political career, Hosni has often been accused of promoting anti-Semitism, in particular in 2008 when he told the Egyptian parliament: "I'd burn Israeli books myself if I found any in libraries in Egypt."
Author warns of the ‘silent Jihad’
http://www.thesuburbannews.ca/content/en/2277
Excerpt: The author of a number of books on religious fanaticism, his most recent work is Surrender: Appeasing Islam, Sacrificing Freedom. Bawer argues that Europe is currently falling victim to a “silent Jihad,” a hidden holy war perpetrated by radical Islamists on Western, social-democratic values. Speaking at a conference last week organized by Islamist watchdog group Point de Bascule, Bawer warned Canadians to not be as complacent as their counterparts across the pond. Radical Islam “is a subject that a few years ago, wasn’t on my radar. My goal was to write a book celebrating The Netherlands and Amsterdam,” Bawer told the audience. What he saw in major European cities were enclaved communities, ghettos, where residents were “subject to seventh century Islamic law. They could barely speak the language of the country they were born in, thanks to the generosity of the European welfare state.”
Jihadists kill peacekeepers
http://www.jihadwatch.org/2009/09/jihadists-kill-peacekeepers.html
Guess no one told them Islam is a “Religion of Peace.” Excerpt: MOGADISHU -- At least eight civilians were killed in Mogadishu when Islamist insurgents attacked African peacekeepers prompting an exchange of gun and artillery fire that hit civilian targets, officials and witnesses said on Wednesday.
Schoolchildren indoctrinated to praise Obama
http://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2009/09/shock_video_schoolchildren_ind.html
Can the “Ministry of Truth” be far behind? Imaging the reaction if Bush supporters did this?
More on indoctrinating kids
http://newsrealblog.com/2009/09/23/indoctrinating-kids-with-socialism/
FCC's Diversity Czar: 'White People' Need to be Forced to 'Step Down' 'So Someone Else Can Have Power'
http://newsbusters.org/blogs/seton-motley/2009/09/23/fccs-diversity-czar-white-people-need-be-forced-step-down-so-someone-0
Excerpt: "It should be clear by now that my focus here is not freedom of speech or the press. This freedom is all too often an exaggeration. At the very least, blind references to freedom of speech or the press serve as a distraction from the critical examination of other communications policies.”
GOP ad
http://viralfootage.com/?p=3471
Quotes
For Majority Leader Reid, it seems that 'oversight' is a selective responsibility, and the misuse of taxpayer dollars by a fraud-ridden organization does not qualify as a priority in his purview as the Leader of the U.S. Senate. –Sen. John Cornyn (R-Texas)
If the Arabs put down their weapons today, there would be no more violence. If the Jews put down their weapons today, there would be no more Israel. –Benjamin Netanyahu
Monday, September 21, 2009
Political Digest September 21, 2009
Thanks to all who help feed the blog. It’s a hungry critter. Doesn’t like pork, though.
Competing Worldviews
"The Obama Inauguration left in its wake 100 tons of trash on the Mall that required herculean efforts by the District and the Park Service to clean up. And it devastated the grass surfaces of the Mall that necessitated budgeting millions of dollars to repair. September 12th's Teapartyers left behind a west lawn and Mall that could be used for the U.S. Open. The sparse trash that was left was neatly stashed in and closely around the too few receptacles provided. And police reported zero arrests." (William Campenni, "Human Events", Sept. 16, 2009)
Bob’s note: This is not because the Obama supporters are bad people, and the anti-Obama protesters are good. It’s simply a different world view. Obama supporters are statists, who expect that government is supposed to take care of things for them, like pick up their trash. So they left it where it fell, and, sure enough, they were right. The government did pick up their trash. That the taxpayers paid to do that worried them not at all, since so many of them fall into the lower 50% of incomes, who only pay 3% of the taxes. So taxes have a relatively smaller impact on them, certainly smaller than cleaning up their own trash.
The world view of the anti-Obama protesters is profoundly different. They believe in individual responsibility as well as individual rights, and see it as their responsibility to pick up their own trash.
How To Find Millions of Racists
http://www.americanthinker.com/printpage/?url=http://www.americanthinker.com/2009/09/how_to_find_millions_of_racist.html
Excerpt: How do you create millions of white racists? I have a theory. I say you can do it by accusing a few million white folks who are not racists and just continue to accuse them of being racists on a daily basis. Keep doing it day after day and week after week, and pretty soon you might just have what you want. The human spirit cannot absorb but so much of this before the inclination to hate the accusers gains traction. What do you expect from just a bunch of "typical white people." What do you think will happen if you (the liberals) just keep on doing this? What will happen if you keep calling us this every time we object to the President's Marxist agenda? Or every time we dare show a little emotion or frustration? Or you keep inserting phantom words into our quotes to make your point? What are we to make of this if you do it every time "one of us" catches an ACORN office on tape promoting crime as standard operating procedures? Or when we catch some large males dressed up like Malcom X's personal jack booted nightstick carrying security guards in front of a polling place? It seems to me you used to call this journalism. You used to call it "60 Minutes." Now you call it racism.
Obama’s Regulatory Czar Cass Sunstein: Obama, Not Courts, Should Interpret Law, Beliefs of Nation’s Leader Should Supersede Judges
http://commonamericanjournal.com/?p=2514
Can’t recall the left saying this during the Bush years….
Unhappy with Congress?
http://flipthishouse2010.com/
Bosnia and Afghanistan
http://townhall.com/columnists/GeorgeWill/2009/09/20/been_there,_didnt_do_that
Excerpt: Between 1996 and 2007, Bosnia received $14 billion in international aid from 17 foreign governments, 18 U.N. agencies, 27 intergovernmental organizations and approximately 200 nongovernmental organizations, plus the presence of 60,000 troops from 36 countries. It was, McMahon and Western say, "arguably the most extensive and innovative democratization experiment in history." On a per capita basis, reconstruction of Bosnia -- population, fewer than 4 million -- "made the post-World War II rebuilding of Germany and Japan look modest." The $14 billion was $300 per Bosnian per year. Since 2002, international donors have pledged $65 per Afghan per year. Today, the centrifugal forces of the rival ethnic nationalisms of Bosnia's Muslims, Croats and Serbs have, McMahon and Western say, stalled reform and the economy -- unemployment is 27 percent, 25 percent of Bosnians live in poverty, and the public sector, with a ludicrous 160 ministers, swallows almost half the GDP. International organizations, suffering Balkan fatigue and eager to declare "mission accomplished,'' are withdrawing, leaving Muslims isolated and vulnerable, and, as Bosnia is, McMahon and Western say, "drifting toward chaos." (Note: Bosnia and Afghanistan have only one thing in common: Islam.)
Taking the Right Seriously
Conservatism is a tradition, not a pathology
http://chronicle.com/article/Taking-the-Right-Seriously/48333/
Excerpt: It's not even clear that the faculty members involved have figured out what terms like "right wing" and "conservative" might mean. The Web-site blurb introducing the center describes anti-Communism as the "transcendent" issue for the right for most of the 20th century, and says that since the end of the cold war, right-wing groups have "spun on to the political stage with centripetal energy," whatever that means. This statement does not inspire confidence. In fact, the right-wing political parties in Europe have much older pedigrees, going back to the 19th-century counterrevolution. So do American and British conservatism, which came onto the political scene at least a century before 1989. In his recent book, The Conservatives: Ideas and Personalities Throughout American History (Yale University Press), Patrick Allitt, a professor of history at Emory University, explores the full range of conservative concerns: states' rights, religion, the corruptions of urban life, immigration, the League of Nations, mass democracy, creationism, the New Deal, free markets, race, and so on. It is a convenient left-wing dodge to reduce 20th-century American conservatism to cold-war politics, since it implies that conservative ideas are embedded in a world that no longer exists and never should have. In fact, in the 1930s American conservatives were far more obsessed with Franklin D. Roosevelt and his domestic legacy than with Joseph Stalin, and looked askance at all foreign entanglements, including the Second World War. The anti-Communist cause was first conceived by cold-war liberals, not by conservatives.
Chipping Away at Free Speech
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/09/14/AR2009091402705.html
Excerpt: Item Two: Pick up a copy of the September issue of GQ magazine. Buried deep inside is an article titled "Vladimir Putin's Dark Rise to Power," by Scott Anderson. The article, based on extensive reporting, argues that Russian security services helped create a series of bomb explosions in Moscow in 2000 -- explosions that were blamed on Chechen terrorists at the time. But you will not find this article in GQ's Russian edition. As of this writing, you will not find this article on GQ's Web site either: Conde Nast, the media company that owns GQ, has ordered its magazines and affiliates around the world to refrain from mentioning or promoting this article in any way.
Gays Murdered
The Week newsmagazine (which I recommend) for September 25 carries a report from the London Observer that more than 130 Gay men have been murdered in Iraq this year by hard line Islamic Groups. Why no outcry here? There’s certainly not the rage that came down on a beauty pageant winner when she said that she, personally, didn’t believe in Gay marriage. While I, personally, think that Gays getting married doesn’t hurt me, my marriage or traditional marriage at all, the effort to silence her, because of her Christian beliefs, while ignoring the extensive persecution of Gays in Muslim countries under Shari’a law says something ugly about the left’s willingness to tolerate any outrage in the name of their religious dogma of multiculturalism. Search for “Hanging Gays” or “Stoning Women” on Google images and review the pictures of the efforts of the regime the administration is talking to without pre-conditions. You won’t find any pictures of the much-dreaded Christian fundamentalists. Will Obama raise the question of human rights with Iran?
These links might work:
http://images.google.com/images?hl=en&source=hp&q=Stoning+women&btnG=Search+Images&gbv=2&aq=f&oq=&aqi=
http://images.google.com/images?gbv=2&hl=en&sa=1&q=hanging+gays&btnG=Search+images&aq=f&oq=&aqi=&start=0
In most Islamic countries, gay men and women are ostracized, persecuted and in some cases even murdered
http://www.jihadwatch.org/2009/09/in-most-islamic-countries-gay-men-and-women-are-ostracized-persecuted-and-in-some-cases-even-murdere.html
Excerpt: Repressive regimes are often fanning the flames of hatred in a bid to outdo Islamists when it comes to spreading "moral panic." Bearded men kidnapped him in the center of Baghdad, threw him into a dark hole, chained him down, urinated on him, and beat him with an iron pipe. But the worst moment for Hisham, 40, came on the fourth day of his ordeal when the kidnappers called his family. He was terrified they would tell his mother that he is gay and that this was the reason they had kidnapped him. If they did he would never be able to see his family again. The shame would be unbearable for them.
Sowing the seeds of destruction
http://www.nypost.com/p/news/opinion/opedcolumnists/sowing_the_seeds_of_destruction_rhxjpV4D6z3WEgITKiPxrL/0
Excerpt: Just how nutty is ACORN?
Very, say longtime watchers of the extreme leftwing group that sprouted out of a radical 60s anti-government movement. For decades ACORN has presented itself as a grassroots network dedicated to improving the lives of the poor. But there's more to ACORN than its do-gooder veneer. Just ask the banks, corporations and politicians who've been the target of ACORN's shameless shenanigans over the past 40 years. Here's how the tiny seed of 1960s radicalism blossomed into a well-funded, national organization with political connections reaching all the way to the White House:
Obama to Peterson: Don’t run
http://commonamericanjournal.com/?p=2650
Say, isn’t Peterson black? Then isn’t asking him hot to run, well racist?
Obama’s Blame Game Reveals True Character
http://www.newsmax.com/kessler/obama_bush_wright/2009/09/17/261269.html
Excerpt: As we see with Obama’s finger-pointing at the Bush administration, the politics of victimhood requires concocting misinformation. In his speech on race, for example, Obama excused the Reverend Wright’s world view—including his claim that America created the AIDS virus to kill off blacks—by saying that for the “men and women of Reverend Wright’s generation, the memories of humiliation and doubt and fear have not gone away; nor has the anger and the bitterness of those years.” In fact, while Wright no doubt had brushes with discrimination growing up in Philadelphia, he lived in an integrated neighborhood, and his parents had good jobs. Wright attended the elite Central High, comparable to the Bronx High School of Science and Boston Latin School. Ninety percent of the students were white. Condi Rice, in contrast, grew up in segregated Birmingham, Ala. Rice had to sit at the back of buses. When more whites got on, the driver would move a “Colored” sign farther back in the bus, making less room for blacks. Rice could not eat at the same restaurants as whites unless the restaurant had a separate room with a separate entrance for blacks. But Condi Rice never carried a chip on her shoulder.
Bring Back DDT!
http://www.21stcenturysciencetech.com/articles/summ02/DDT.html
Excerpt: Sixty million people have died needlessly of malaria, since the imposition of the 1972 ban on DDT, and hundreds of millions more have suffered from this debilitating disease. The majority of those affected are children. Of the 300 to 500 million new cases of malaria each year, 200 to 300 million are children, and malaria now kills one child every 30 seconds. Ninety percent of the reported cases of malaria are in Africa, and 40 percent of the world’s population, inhabitants of tropical countries, are threatened by the increasing incidence of malaria. (Thank you Rachel Carson, author of Silent Spring, and the liberal environmentalists. But if liberals get to feel warm and fuzzy for saving birds, who cares about a few million dead black kids?)
Normandy then and now
http://acidcow.com/pics/3772-normandy_1944_then_and_now_204_pics.html
Great pictures, and a reminder of what statism, the doctrine that the individual must be subsumed for the “common good”—as defined by the all knowing leaders—can do to the world. The statist doctrine is called many things: fascism, communism, National Socialism and other gentler names. It can be seductive and mild at first, until the silken threads become steel chains. The major requirement is to obey, obey the Fuehrer, Allah, the Party, the Leader. And criticism of the Fuehrer, the Party, the ones who interpret Allah’s will or the leader becomes first socially unacceptable and, when the majority accept that, a crime for the minority.
Good collection of 9/12 pictures
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3PF70cjfjAg&feature=related
Boy, that’s a lot of Astroturf & insurance company stooges!
Hi-Ho, the Derry-O
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/09/17/AR2009091703679_pf.html
Excerpt: Let's say you're preparing dinner and you realize with dismay that you don't have any certified organic Tuscan kale. What to do? Here's how Michelle Obama handled this very predicament Thursday afternoon: The Secret Service and the D.C. police brought in three dozen vehicles and shut down H Street, Vermont Avenue, two lanes of I Street and an entrance to the McPherson Square Metro station. They swept the area, in front of the Department of Veterans Affairs, with bomb-sniffing dogs and installed magnetometers in the middle of the street, put up barricades to keep pedestrians out, and took positions with binoculars atop trucks. Though the produce stand was only a block or so from the White House, the first lady hopped into her armored limousine and pulled into the market amid the wail of sirens. Then, and only then, could Obama purchase her leafy greens.
Obama feeds allies to bear
http://www.nypost.com/p/news/opinion/opedcolumnists/obama_feeds_allies_to_bear_PMpzvTatl7WiRqyYL3ZtvJ
Excerpt: STILL determined to "push the reset button with Russia," President Obama hit the delete key on our allies in Eastern Europe.
Obama's decision to abandon missile defense as we know it, cutting the throats of Poland and the Czech Republic, handed Moscow's hard-liners their biggest win since the collapse of the Soviet Union. Russian strongman Vladimir Putin insisted all along that we'd never be permitted to deploy an anti-ballistic missile system in the former Soviet empire. He was right. And Obama got nothing in return. No Russian commitments on Iran's nuclear program. No sovereignty guarantees for Georgia. No restrictions on arms sales to Venezuela. Not even a bear hug.
Toppling Terrorism
http://www.ibdeditorials.com/IBDArticles.aspx?id=338167089209530
Excerpt: Noordin Mohammed Top, diabolical mastermind behind every major terror attack on Indonesia since 2002, got the death he deserved — cowering in a toilet as the edifice around him exploded and burned.
Federal court: Arguments of L.A. Community College District ‘scattershot and disjointed’
http://www.adfmedia.org/News/PRDetail/3080
Excerpt: “Christian students shouldn’t be penalized for expressing their beliefs at a public college,” said ADF Litigation Staff Counsel David Hacker. “The college has failed to make any convincing arguments that a policy which clearly violates the constitutional rights of students should be allowed to continue. If they truly care about the free speech rights of their students, they should not desire to pursue enforcement of such a bad policy.”… ADF attorneys filed the lawsuit Lopez v. Candaele with the U.S. District Court for the Central District of California after a professor censored and threatened to expel student Jonathan Lopez following a speech he gave about his Christian faith during an open-ended assignment in a public speaking class. The professor interrupted and ended Lopez’s presentation mid-speech, calling him a “fascist bastard” in front of the class. Refusing to grade the assigned speech, the professor wrote on Lopez’s speech evaluation form, “Ask God what your grade is,” and later threatened to expel the student.
Weather Underground
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OZkXM4jqJpg&feature=fvwl
Here’s what they still think. BO supporters all.
Are the News Media Scared of ACORN
http://townhall.com/columnists/FloydBrown/2009/09/18/are_the_news_media_scared_of_acorn
Excerpt: Is ACORN Intentionally Structured As a Criminal Enterprise?" is the title of a July 2009 U.S. House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform report by Congressman Darrell Issa. The report draws some shocking conclusions: "The Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now has repeatedly and deliberately engaged in systemic fraud. Both structurally and operationally, ACORN hides behind a paper wall of nonprofit corporate protections to conceal a criminal conspiracy on the part of its directors..." It is a shocking statement to absorb: "to conceal a criminal conspiracy." Yet you won't see this on your TV unless you happen to be watching Fox News. Others are refusing to report this corruption.
Competing Worldviews
"The Obama Inauguration left in its wake 100 tons of trash on the Mall that required herculean efforts by the District and the Park Service to clean up. And it devastated the grass surfaces of the Mall that necessitated budgeting millions of dollars to repair. September 12th's Teapartyers left behind a west lawn and Mall that could be used for the U.S. Open. The sparse trash that was left was neatly stashed in and closely around the too few receptacles provided. And police reported zero arrests." (William Campenni, "Human Events", Sept. 16, 2009)
Bob’s note: This is not because the Obama supporters are bad people, and the anti-Obama protesters are good. It’s simply a different world view. Obama supporters are statists, who expect that government is supposed to take care of things for them, like pick up their trash. So they left it where it fell, and, sure enough, they were right. The government did pick up their trash. That the taxpayers paid to do that worried them not at all, since so many of them fall into the lower 50% of incomes, who only pay 3% of the taxes. So taxes have a relatively smaller impact on them, certainly smaller than cleaning up their own trash.
The world view of the anti-Obama protesters is profoundly different. They believe in individual responsibility as well as individual rights, and see it as their responsibility to pick up their own trash.
How To Find Millions of Racists
http://www.americanthinker.com/printpage/?url=http://www.americanthinker.com/2009/09/how_to_find_millions_of_racist.html
Excerpt: How do you create millions of white racists? I have a theory. I say you can do it by accusing a few million white folks who are not racists and just continue to accuse them of being racists on a daily basis. Keep doing it day after day and week after week, and pretty soon you might just have what you want. The human spirit cannot absorb but so much of this before the inclination to hate the accusers gains traction. What do you expect from just a bunch of "typical white people." What do you think will happen if you (the liberals) just keep on doing this? What will happen if you keep calling us this every time we object to the President's Marxist agenda? Or every time we dare show a little emotion or frustration? Or you keep inserting phantom words into our quotes to make your point? What are we to make of this if you do it every time "one of us" catches an ACORN office on tape promoting crime as standard operating procedures? Or when we catch some large males dressed up like Malcom X's personal jack booted nightstick carrying security guards in front of a polling place? It seems to me you used to call this journalism. You used to call it "60 Minutes." Now you call it racism.
Obama’s Regulatory Czar Cass Sunstein: Obama, Not Courts, Should Interpret Law, Beliefs of Nation’s Leader Should Supersede Judges
http://commonamericanjournal.com/?p=2514
Can’t recall the left saying this during the Bush years….
Unhappy with Congress?
http://flipthishouse2010.com/
Bosnia and Afghanistan
http://townhall.com/columnists/GeorgeWill/2009/09/20/been_there,_didnt_do_that
Excerpt: Between 1996 and 2007, Bosnia received $14 billion in international aid from 17 foreign governments, 18 U.N. agencies, 27 intergovernmental organizations and approximately 200 nongovernmental organizations, plus the presence of 60,000 troops from 36 countries. It was, McMahon and Western say, "arguably the most extensive and innovative democratization experiment in history." On a per capita basis, reconstruction of Bosnia -- population, fewer than 4 million -- "made the post-World War II rebuilding of Germany and Japan look modest." The $14 billion was $300 per Bosnian per year. Since 2002, international donors have pledged $65 per Afghan per year. Today, the centrifugal forces of the rival ethnic nationalisms of Bosnia's Muslims, Croats and Serbs have, McMahon and Western say, stalled reform and the economy -- unemployment is 27 percent, 25 percent of Bosnians live in poverty, and the public sector, with a ludicrous 160 ministers, swallows almost half the GDP. International organizations, suffering Balkan fatigue and eager to declare "mission accomplished,'' are withdrawing, leaving Muslims isolated and vulnerable, and, as Bosnia is, McMahon and Western say, "drifting toward chaos." (Note: Bosnia and Afghanistan have only one thing in common: Islam.)
Taking the Right Seriously
Conservatism is a tradition, not a pathology
http://chronicle.com/article/Taking-the-Right-Seriously/48333/
Excerpt: It's not even clear that the faculty members involved have figured out what terms like "right wing" and "conservative" might mean. The Web-site blurb introducing the center describes anti-Communism as the "transcendent" issue for the right for most of the 20th century, and says that since the end of the cold war, right-wing groups have "spun on to the political stage with centripetal energy," whatever that means. This statement does not inspire confidence. In fact, the right-wing political parties in Europe have much older pedigrees, going back to the 19th-century counterrevolution. So do American and British conservatism, which came onto the political scene at least a century before 1989. In his recent book, The Conservatives: Ideas and Personalities Throughout American History (Yale University Press), Patrick Allitt, a professor of history at Emory University, explores the full range of conservative concerns: states' rights, religion, the corruptions of urban life, immigration, the League of Nations, mass democracy, creationism, the New Deal, free markets, race, and so on. It is a convenient left-wing dodge to reduce 20th-century American conservatism to cold-war politics, since it implies that conservative ideas are embedded in a world that no longer exists and never should have. In fact, in the 1930s American conservatives were far more obsessed with Franklin D. Roosevelt and his domestic legacy than with Joseph Stalin, and looked askance at all foreign entanglements, including the Second World War. The anti-Communist cause was first conceived by cold-war liberals, not by conservatives.
Chipping Away at Free Speech
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/09/14/AR2009091402705.html
Excerpt: Item Two: Pick up a copy of the September issue of GQ magazine. Buried deep inside is an article titled "Vladimir Putin's Dark Rise to Power," by Scott Anderson. The article, based on extensive reporting, argues that Russian security services helped create a series of bomb explosions in Moscow in 2000 -- explosions that were blamed on Chechen terrorists at the time. But you will not find this article in GQ's Russian edition. As of this writing, you will not find this article on GQ's Web site either: Conde Nast, the media company that owns GQ, has ordered its magazines and affiliates around the world to refrain from mentioning or promoting this article in any way.
Gays Murdered
The Week newsmagazine (which I recommend) for September 25 carries a report from the London Observer that more than 130 Gay men have been murdered in Iraq this year by hard line Islamic Groups. Why no outcry here? There’s certainly not the rage that came down on a beauty pageant winner when she said that she, personally, didn’t believe in Gay marriage. While I, personally, think that Gays getting married doesn’t hurt me, my marriage or traditional marriage at all, the effort to silence her, because of her Christian beliefs, while ignoring the extensive persecution of Gays in Muslim countries under Shari’a law says something ugly about the left’s willingness to tolerate any outrage in the name of their religious dogma of multiculturalism. Search for “Hanging Gays” or “Stoning Women” on Google images and review the pictures of the efforts of the regime the administration is talking to without pre-conditions. You won’t find any pictures of the much-dreaded Christian fundamentalists. Will Obama raise the question of human rights with Iran?
These links might work:
http://images.google.com/images?hl=en&source=hp&q=Stoning+women&btnG=Search+Images&gbv=2&aq=f&oq=&aqi=
http://images.google.com/images?gbv=2&hl=en&sa=1&q=hanging+gays&btnG=Search+images&aq=f&oq=&aqi=&start=0
In most Islamic countries, gay men and women are ostracized, persecuted and in some cases even murdered
http://www.jihadwatch.org/2009/09/in-most-islamic-countries-gay-men-and-women-are-ostracized-persecuted-and-in-some-cases-even-murdere.html
Excerpt: Repressive regimes are often fanning the flames of hatred in a bid to outdo Islamists when it comes to spreading "moral panic." Bearded men kidnapped him in the center of Baghdad, threw him into a dark hole, chained him down, urinated on him, and beat him with an iron pipe. But the worst moment for Hisham, 40, came on the fourth day of his ordeal when the kidnappers called his family. He was terrified they would tell his mother that he is gay and that this was the reason they had kidnapped him. If they did he would never be able to see his family again. The shame would be unbearable for them.
Sowing the seeds of destruction
http://www.nypost.com/p/news/opinion/opedcolumnists/sowing_the_seeds_of_destruction_rhxjpV4D6z3WEgITKiPxrL/0
Excerpt: Just how nutty is ACORN?
Very, say longtime watchers of the extreme leftwing group that sprouted out of a radical 60s anti-government movement. For decades ACORN has presented itself as a grassroots network dedicated to improving the lives of the poor. But there's more to ACORN than its do-gooder veneer. Just ask the banks, corporations and politicians who've been the target of ACORN's shameless shenanigans over the past 40 years. Here's how the tiny seed of 1960s radicalism blossomed into a well-funded, national organization with political connections reaching all the way to the White House:
Obama to Peterson: Don’t run
http://commonamericanjournal.com/?p=2650
Say, isn’t Peterson black? Then isn’t asking him hot to run, well racist?
Obama’s Blame Game Reveals True Character
http://www.newsmax.com/kessler/obama_bush_wright/2009/09/17/261269.html
Excerpt: As we see with Obama’s finger-pointing at the Bush administration, the politics of victimhood requires concocting misinformation. In his speech on race, for example, Obama excused the Reverend Wright’s world view—including his claim that America created the AIDS virus to kill off blacks—by saying that for the “men and women of Reverend Wright’s generation, the memories of humiliation and doubt and fear have not gone away; nor has the anger and the bitterness of those years.” In fact, while Wright no doubt had brushes with discrimination growing up in Philadelphia, he lived in an integrated neighborhood, and his parents had good jobs. Wright attended the elite Central High, comparable to the Bronx High School of Science and Boston Latin School. Ninety percent of the students were white. Condi Rice, in contrast, grew up in segregated Birmingham, Ala. Rice had to sit at the back of buses. When more whites got on, the driver would move a “Colored” sign farther back in the bus, making less room for blacks. Rice could not eat at the same restaurants as whites unless the restaurant had a separate room with a separate entrance for blacks. But Condi Rice never carried a chip on her shoulder.
Bring Back DDT!
http://www.21stcenturysciencetech.com/articles/summ02/DDT.html
Excerpt: Sixty million people have died needlessly of malaria, since the imposition of the 1972 ban on DDT, and hundreds of millions more have suffered from this debilitating disease. The majority of those affected are children. Of the 300 to 500 million new cases of malaria each year, 200 to 300 million are children, and malaria now kills one child every 30 seconds. Ninety percent of the reported cases of malaria are in Africa, and 40 percent of the world’s population, inhabitants of tropical countries, are threatened by the increasing incidence of malaria. (Thank you Rachel Carson, author of Silent Spring, and the liberal environmentalists. But if liberals get to feel warm and fuzzy for saving birds, who cares about a few million dead black kids?)
Normandy then and now
http://acidcow.com/pics/3772-normandy_1944_then_and_now_204_pics.html
Great pictures, and a reminder of what statism, the doctrine that the individual must be subsumed for the “common good”—as defined by the all knowing leaders—can do to the world. The statist doctrine is called many things: fascism, communism, National Socialism and other gentler names. It can be seductive and mild at first, until the silken threads become steel chains. The major requirement is to obey, obey the Fuehrer, Allah, the Party, the Leader. And criticism of the Fuehrer, the Party, the ones who interpret Allah’s will or the leader becomes first socially unacceptable and, when the majority accept that, a crime for the minority.
Good collection of 9/12 pictures
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3PF70cjfjAg&feature=related
Boy, that’s a lot of Astroturf & insurance company stooges!
Hi-Ho, the Derry-O
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/09/17/AR2009091703679_pf.html
Excerpt: Let's say you're preparing dinner and you realize with dismay that you don't have any certified organic Tuscan kale. What to do? Here's how Michelle Obama handled this very predicament Thursday afternoon: The Secret Service and the D.C. police brought in three dozen vehicles and shut down H Street, Vermont Avenue, two lanes of I Street and an entrance to the McPherson Square Metro station. They swept the area, in front of the Department of Veterans Affairs, with bomb-sniffing dogs and installed magnetometers in the middle of the street, put up barricades to keep pedestrians out, and took positions with binoculars atop trucks. Though the produce stand was only a block or so from the White House, the first lady hopped into her armored limousine and pulled into the market amid the wail of sirens. Then, and only then, could Obama purchase her leafy greens.
Obama feeds allies to bear
http://www.nypost.com/p/news/opinion/opedcolumnists/obama_feeds_allies_to_bear_PMpzvTatl7WiRqyYL3ZtvJ
Excerpt: STILL determined to "push the reset button with Russia," President Obama hit the delete key on our allies in Eastern Europe.
Obama's decision to abandon missile defense as we know it, cutting the throats of Poland and the Czech Republic, handed Moscow's hard-liners their biggest win since the collapse of the Soviet Union. Russian strongman Vladimir Putin insisted all along that we'd never be permitted to deploy an anti-ballistic missile system in the former Soviet empire. He was right. And Obama got nothing in return. No Russian commitments on Iran's nuclear program. No sovereignty guarantees for Georgia. No restrictions on arms sales to Venezuela. Not even a bear hug.
Toppling Terrorism
http://www.ibdeditorials.com/IBDArticles.aspx?id=338167089209530
Excerpt: Noordin Mohammed Top, diabolical mastermind behind every major terror attack on Indonesia since 2002, got the death he deserved — cowering in a toilet as the edifice around him exploded and burned.
Federal court: Arguments of L.A. Community College District ‘scattershot and disjointed’
http://www.adfmedia.org/News/PRDetail/3080
Excerpt: “Christian students shouldn’t be penalized for expressing their beliefs at a public college,” said ADF Litigation Staff Counsel David Hacker. “The college has failed to make any convincing arguments that a policy which clearly violates the constitutional rights of students should be allowed to continue. If they truly care about the free speech rights of their students, they should not desire to pursue enforcement of such a bad policy.”… ADF attorneys filed the lawsuit Lopez v. Candaele with the U.S. District Court for the Central District of California after a professor censored and threatened to expel student Jonathan Lopez following a speech he gave about his Christian faith during an open-ended assignment in a public speaking class. The professor interrupted and ended Lopez’s presentation mid-speech, calling him a “fascist bastard” in front of the class. Refusing to grade the assigned speech, the professor wrote on Lopez’s speech evaluation form, “Ask God what your grade is,” and later threatened to expel the student.
Weather Underground
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OZkXM4jqJpg&feature=fvwl
Here’s what they still think. BO supporters all.
Are the News Media Scared of ACORN
http://townhall.com/columnists/FloydBrown/2009/09/18/are_the_news_media_scared_of_acorn
Excerpt: Is ACORN Intentionally Structured As a Criminal Enterprise?" is the title of a July 2009 U.S. House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform report by Congressman Darrell Issa. The report draws some shocking conclusions: "The Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now has repeatedly and deliberately engaged in systemic fraud. Both structurally and operationally, ACORN hides behind a paper wall of nonprofit corporate protections to conceal a criminal conspiracy on the part of its directors..." It is a shocking statement to absorb: "to conceal a criminal conspiracy." Yet you won't see this on your TV unless you happen to be watching Fox News. Others are refusing to report this corruption.
Saturday, September 19, 2009
Political Digest September 19, 2009
Single Payer System
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MQ_tAe87ELo
Too funny.
Talking Crap
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RRRy-QlQyUw
More pointed humor. Enjoy.
May the farce be with you, Obama and Daley
http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/columnists/chi-kass-17-sep17,0,2815845.column
John Kass’s column is worth the price of a subscription to the Chicago Tribune. Excerpt: Because, after a 20-year spending spree, the money is finally gone. Daley is now so desperate for cash that he allowed parking meter rates to be increased, knowing there would be a public backlash. Now he needs that Olympic gold, to pass it out among the hungry interests and maintain control. His Olympic push is not about sport. It's never been about sport. The Olympic theme song and wondering who might carry the torch down Michigan Avenue has been part of the children's fairy tale. But grown-ups know that the Chicago Olympics are about keeping Daley in power. Period. It began four years ago, just as big business and labor and the guys behind the guys started wondering if Daley was weakening. A boss thought to be weak is a boss in danger. So just getting to this point has been a masterful political stroke on the part of the mayor….That was Daley's brilliance. The 2016 Olympics became the mortar keeping his brick house from collapsing. If he wins the Olympics, he'll stay boss for years. Even the president, who once vowed to transcend the cynical politics of the past, jumped on board. Why not? The guys running the Obama White House come direct from Daley's City Hall. (Bob’s Prediction: If Chicago gets the 2010 Olympics, there will be the biggest scandal in Olympic history, as the boys wet their beaks in the Olympic gold pond.)
House Votes to Defund ACORD
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20090917/ap_on_go_co/us_congress_acorn
Except for 75 Democrat members of the Child Prostitution Caucus. Excerpt: The House voted Thursday to deny all federal funds for ACORN in a GOP-led strike against the scandal-tainted community organizing group that comes just three days after the Senate took similar action. "ACORN has violated serious federal laws, and today the House voted to ensure that taxpayer dollars would no longer be used to fund this corrupt organization," said second-ranked House Republican Eric Cantor of Virginia. The vote, on a provision attached to a student aid bill, was 345-75, with Democrats supplying all the "no" votes.
The $1,300 Mission to Fell ACORN
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/09/17/AR2009091704805.html?wpisrc=newsletter
Excerpt: The proposition was outrageous, outlandish, and right up James E. O'Keefe III's alley. Hannah Giles was on the phone from the District, and she was asking him to dress like her pimp, walk into the offices of the ACORN community activist group, openly admit to wanting to buy a house to run as a brothel, and see what happened…. Republicans accused ACORN of voter-registration fraud in last year's presidential race. As a community organizer, President Obama worked for a group affiliated with ACORN and once represented ACORN as a lawyer. This week White House spokesman Robert Gibbs said that "obviously the conduct that you see on those tapes is unacceptable." (Gives you hope for the younger generation.)
An open letter to Maxine Waters
http://posuerpresident.blogspot.com/2009/09/open-letter-to-maxine-waters.html
Excerpt: I have read with interest reports that you want those who attend various "Tea Bag" protests to be "investigated." The reports are unclear. I cannot tell whether you mean "investigate" in the "Nixonian" sense - as a thinly veiled form of intimidation - or whether you were taking a more generous approach, such as "Let's find out what their concerns are and address those concerns forthrightly." It would be helpful for all if you would clarify your meaning. Assuming you genuinely seek to engage with critics of the Administration, permit me to introduce myself and summarize my concerns.
Historical Cycles and Public Amusement
http://www.familysecuritymatters.org/publications/id.4293/pub_detail.asp
Excerpt: It is certainly the case that young people are more likely to know the names of the four finalists on “American Idol” than four Cabinet members in present administration. As I see it, there is a correlation between the preoccupation with amusement and the dumbing down of the population. If bread and circuses, or the contemporary equivalent, fill one’s day, there simply isn’t time for serious pursuits. If this seems exaggerated, ask how many serious words are exchanged in texting or how many ideas are explored on Facebook. Which magazine sells more copies, The Star or Commentary? The obvious answers reveal some aspect of the truth. Of course, this is not to suggest that entertainment is wrong. It surely has a role in the culture. But at a time when critical, alas monumental, issues face the nation one might assume that amusement would be relegated to a backseat, however temporary that condition might be. Yet it seems as though the public is addicted to fun and games. Jay Leno, of late night talk show fame, has created a regular segment of his program making fun of undisguised ignorance. So penetrating is that ignorance that when I’ve seen it on display, I don’t know whether to laugh or cry….If my hypothesis is correct, it bodes poorly for the future. It is conceivable that the tradeoff for continual entertainment is the incremental loss of personal liberty. So subtle will that loss be at first, that it will hardly be recognized. And when recognition does take place, it will be too late to undo the structural damage. This contest between amusement and government intrusiveness and power accretion may be the most telling aspect of the Obama era. Will Americans wake up from the intoxication of sensate pleasure before liberty is lost? What a demonic question and what a potentially fearful and provocative response.
Obama’s Headwind on Healthcare
http://www.vote.com/mmp_printerfriendly.php?id=1633Excerpt: It is no surprise that a nationally televised presidential speech can move support for the chief executive's program by 7 points. But it is shocking that - in the absence of any other major independent negative event - these new supporters would flee in the space of one week and that three percent more would move against him. That spells big trouble for Obama. It means that the wind is blowing in his face as he tries to make headway for his health care program. This seven point post-speech slippage in seven days indicates that all the breakfast tables and lunch counters, and medical examining rooms are abuzz with conversation about health care changes, most of it negative to the president's wishes.
The Line: A Resurgent Republican Party
http://voices.washingtonpost.com/thefix/the-line/the-line-a-resurgent-republica.html?wprss=thefix
Excerpt: So this week we are doing two Lines -- one today looking at the ten most influential Republican leaders in the party and then one tomorrow ranking the ten Senate races most likely to switch parties in 2010. Republicans have seen something of a reversal of fortune since we last penned a Line looking at their relatively meager list of leaders. The debate over health care has tapped into a broader discontent among the Republican base -- and many independents -- regarding the amount of spending that has gone on during the first eight months of the Obama Administration. The passion stirred by the health care debate -- and evidenced in a series of town halls across the country over the August congressional recess -- has led GOP leaders (in and out of Congress) to grow more bold in their criticism of President Obama and his policies.
Dem Senator Warns of 'Big, Big Tax' on Middle Class in Baucus Bill
http://blogs.abcnews.com/thenote/2009/09/dem-senator-warns-of-big-big-tax-on-middle-class-in-baucus-bill.html
But BO promised!
Obama’s unhealthy speech
http://thehill.com/opinion/columnists/dick-morris/58871-obamas-unhealthy-speech
Excerpt: These are code words for rationing. The panel will “encourage” doctors to adopt the “best practices” the panel recommends by limiting reimbursement rates or banning alternatives. Likely guidelines will govern who can get elective surgery like hip replacements or new knees based on the number of “quality adjusted remaining years,” the patient has. In Canada, the drug Avastin is barred by such a panel despite its proven record as the most effective anti-colon cancer drug. The ban is due not to safety concerns but solely to its $50,000 annual cost. As a result, 41 percent of Canadians with colon cancer die, compared to 32 percent of Americans. These are the kinds of “best practices” that the panel will have to impose to pay for Obama’s plan.
The Devil is in the Details: How a Sleeper Provision in Obamacare Could Bust Illinois's Budget
http://www.illinoispolicy.org/news/article.asp?ArticleSource=1426
Excerpt: According to a report from the Federal Funds Information for States, the additional “state share” cost to Illinois for immediately expanding Medicaid to uninsured individuals who earn up to 133 percent of poverty level would cost $1.391 billion (FY 2009 numbers, at regular Medicaid reimbursement rates). It would take Illinois’s Medicaid enrollment from 2.4 million enrollees to 3 million enrollees, a 25 percent increase. However it’s fashioned, a large-scale expansion of Medicaid will come with a significant price tag, which will be difficult to reconcile with the looming deficits in the federal government’s budget and Illinois’s state budget. (This will, of course, apply to other states as well. But not to worry. “If (Barack Obama) is elected president, no one making under $250,000 will pay a penny more in taxes.” He promised.)
Imposition of “Buy American” Provisions of the Recovery Act
http://www.uschamber.com/international/trade_study_provisions.htm
Excerpt: We estimate that any net increases in U.S. employment resulting from the new “Buy American” provisions will quickly evaporate as other countries implement “buy national” policies of their own. In the event that retaliation causes U.S. companies to lose just 1 percent of potential foreign stimulus procurement opportunities, the net employment loss to the United States from the Recovery Act’s “Buy American” (Have I said before that trade barriers kill jobs?)
Stadium Subsidies Continue Despite Economic Downturn
http://www.ncpa.org/sub/dpd/index.php?Article_ID=18455
Good politics, though: welfare for the rich, bread and circuses for the poor, hose the taxpayers.
Separating 'He Lied' From The 'Elides'
http://www.ibdeditorials.com/IBDArticles.aspx?id=338077721221686
Excerpt: You lie? No. Barack Obama doesn't lie. He's too subtle for that. He . . . well, you judge. Herewith three examples within a single speech — the now-famous Obama-Wilson "you lie" address to Congress on health care — of Obama's relationship with truth… Obama doesn't lie. He implies, he misdirects, he misleads — so fluidly and incessantly that he risks transmuting eloquence into mere slickness. Slickness wasn't fatal to "Slick Willie" Clinton because he possessed a winning, near irresistible charm. Obama's persona is more cool, distant, imperial. The charming scoundrel can get away with endless deception; the righteous redeemer cannot.
China Puts Up a Fighter
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970204731804574385490799825598.html
Excerpt: Exhibit A is Beijing's long-running effort to build a fifth-generation fighter plane equivalent to the U.S. F-22 and F-35. Such planes use extensive stealth and advanced radar and can usually "supercruise," or fly supersonically for extended periods without using fuel-guzzling afterburners. In what may be the only public reference to the program by a Chinese official, the Commander of the People's Liberation Army Navy mentioned their requirement for a fighter capable of "supersonic cruise" during 60th anniversary celebrations in April. Today this can only be achieved by the U.S. F-22A Raptor, the world's only operational fifth-generation fighter.
America's Air Supremacy Allowed to Evaporate
http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/politics/America_s-air-supremacy-allowed-to-evaporate-8209192-57657387.html
Excerpt: So what's gone wrong? To begin with, our enemies, current and potential, have taken note and taken steps particularly to try to neutralize the effects of American air power. The closest student has been the Chinese People's Liberation Army. Almost since the ink was dry on Cohen's essay, the PLA has both been devising ways to limit the U.S. ability to use its air power in East Asia. The Chinese have invested heavily in long range, land-based air defenses, but perhaps the most challenging Chinese capabilities are those that attempt to restrict American access to air bases in the region or to effectively employ carrier-based aviation.
Real racism?
http://nicedoggie.net/index.php/archives/2953
Excerpt: “This seat was set aside for people who look like me,” said Mr. Herenton’s campaign manager, Sidney Chism, a black county commissioner. “It wasn’t set aside for a Jew or a Christian. It was set aside so that blacks could have representation.”
Pakistan human rights group says police colluding with jihadists who are murdering Christians with impunity
http://www.jihadwatch.org/2009/09/pakistan-human-rights-group-says-police-colluding-with-jihadists-who-are-murdering-christians-with-i.html
Excerpt: The Joint Action Committee for People's Rights (JAC), a group of Pakistan-based non-governmental organisations operating in the human rights field, has expressed concern over "increasing incidents of violence" that have taken in recent months against religious minorities, especially Christians. Their concern also includes the apparent "collusion" of some officials in the police and the prison system with "fanatics and extremists" in perpetrating crimes against members of religious minorities. According to JAC activists, anti-Christian violence in Gojra in early August and the murder of a young Christian man in prison in Sialkot show that the "government's record of protecting religious minorities [. . .] is disappointing to say the least."
Top jihadist, mastermind of Indonesia and Bali jihad attacks, dead
http://www.jihadwatch.org/2009/09/top-jihadist-mastermind-of-indonesia-and-bali-jihad-attacks-dead.html
Today’s feel-good news story.
Doctors will quit if HCR passes
http://commonamericanjournal.com/?p=2419
Sure it’ll improve healthcare.
Obama’s ties to ACORN
http://commonamericanjournal.com/?p=2411
Like we didn’t know.
Under fire, Democrats abandon ACORN in droves
http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/politics/Under-fire_-Democrats-abandon-ACORN-in-droves-8260728-59676847.html
Like rates leaving a sinking ship! Excerpt: Back in February, during the Democrats' frenzied rush to pass the $787 billion economic stimulus bill, Republican Sen. David Vitter offered a simple, 28-word amendment: "None of the funds appropriated or otherwise made available by this Act may be used directly or indirectly to fund the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now." Vitter's amendment was shot down, 51-45, with all the votes coming from the Democratic majority.
FBI begins probe into federal stimulus fraud http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/local/crime/FBI-begins-probe-into-federal-stimulus-fraud-8260724-59676832.html
Excerpt: "Experience tells us that there's a good chance that some of the money could end up in the hands of a few unscrupulous government officials and others seeking to line their own pockets," the agency said in a statement Thursday. (Gee, ya think?)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MQ_tAe87ELo
Too funny.
Talking Crap
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RRRy-QlQyUw
More pointed humor. Enjoy.
May the farce be with you, Obama and Daley
http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/columnists/chi-kass-17-sep17,0,2815845.column
John Kass’s column is worth the price of a subscription to the Chicago Tribune. Excerpt: Because, after a 20-year spending spree, the money is finally gone. Daley is now so desperate for cash that he allowed parking meter rates to be increased, knowing there would be a public backlash. Now he needs that Olympic gold, to pass it out among the hungry interests and maintain control. His Olympic push is not about sport. It's never been about sport. The Olympic theme song and wondering who might carry the torch down Michigan Avenue has been part of the children's fairy tale. But grown-ups know that the Chicago Olympics are about keeping Daley in power. Period. It began four years ago, just as big business and labor and the guys behind the guys started wondering if Daley was weakening. A boss thought to be weak is a boss in danger. So just getting to this point has been a masterful political stroke on the part of the mayor….That was Daley's brilliance. The 2016 Olympics became the mortar keeping his brick house from collapsing. If he wins the Olympics, he'll stay boss for years. Even the president, who once vowed to transcend the cynical politics of the past, jumped on board. Why not? The guys running the Obama White House come direct from Daley's City Hall. (Bob’s Prediction: If Chicago gets the 2010 Olympics, there will be the biggest scandal in Olympic history, as the boys wet their beaks in the Olympic gold pond.)
House Votes to Defund ACORD
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20090917/ap_on_go_co/us_congress_acorn
Except for 75 Democrat members of the Child Prostitution Caucus. Excerpt: The House voted Thursday to deny all federal funds for ACORN in a GOP-led strike against the scandal-tainted community organizing group that comes just three days after the Senate took similar action. "ACORN has violated serious federal laws, and today the House voted to ensure that taxpayer dollars would no longer be used to fund this corrupt organization," said second-ranked House Republican Eric Cantor of Virginia. The vote, on a provision attached to a student aid bill, was 345-75, with Democrats supplying all the "no" votes.
The $1,300 Mission to Fell ACORN
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/09/17/AR2009091704805.html?wpisrc=newsletter
Excerpt: The proposition was outrageous, outlandish, and right up James E. O'Keefe III's alley. Hannah Giles was on the phone from the District, and she was asking him to dress like her pimp, walk into the offices of the ACORN community activist group, openly admit to wanting to buy a house to run as a brothel, and see what happened…. Republicans accused ACORN of voter-registration fraud in last year's presidential race. As a community organizer, President Obama worked for a group affiliated with ACORN and once represented ACORN as a lawyer. This week White House spokesman Robert Gibbs said that "obviously the conduct that you see on those tapes is unacceptable." (Gives you hope for the younger generation.)
An open letter to Maxine Waters
http://posuerpresident.blogspot.com/2009/09/open-letter-to-maxine-waters.html
Excerpt: I have read with interest reports that you want those who attend various "Tea Bag" protests to be "investigated." The reports are unclear. I cannot tell whether you mean "investigate" in the "Nixonian" sense - as a thinly veiled form of intimidation - or whether you were taking a more generous approach, such as "Let's find out what their concerns are and address those concerns forthrightly." It would be helpful for all if you would clarify your meaning. Assuming you genuinely seek to engage with critics of the Administration, permit me to introduce myself and summarize my concerns.
Historical Cycles and Public Amusement
http://www.familysecuritymatters.org/publications/id.4293/pub_detail.asp
Excerpt: It is certainly the case that young people are more likely to know the names of the four finalists on “American Idol” than four Cabinet members in present administration. As I see it, there is a correlation between the preoccupation with amusement and the dumbing down of the population. If bread and circuses, or the contemporary equivalent, fill one’s day, there simply isn’t time for serious pursuits. If this seems exaggerated, ask how many serious words are exchanged in texting or how many ideas are explored on Facebook. Which magazine sells more copies, The Star or Commentary? The obvious answers reveal some aspect of the truth. Of course, this is not to suggest that entertainment is wrong. It surely has a role in the culture. But at a time when critical, alas monumental, issues face the nation one might assume that amusement would be relegated to a backseat, however temporary that condition might be. Yet it seems as though the public is addicted to fun and games. Jay Leno, of late night talk show fame, has created a regular segment of his program making fun of undisguised ignorance. So penetrating is that ignorance that when I’ve seen it on display, I don’t know whether to laugh or cry….If my hypothesis is correct, it bodes poorly for the future. It is conceivable that the tradeoff for continual entertainment is the incremental loss of personal liberty. So subtle will that loss be at first, that it will hardly be recognized. And when recognition does take place, it will be too late to undo the structural damage. This contest between amusement and government intrusiveness and power accretion may be the most telling aspect of the Obama era. Will Americans wake up from the intoxication of sensate pleasure before liberty is lost? What a demonic question and what a potentially fearful and provocative response.
Obama’s Headwind on Healthcare
http://www.vote.com/mmp_printerfriendly.php?id=1633Excerpt: It is no surprise that a nationally televised presidential speech can move support for the chief executive's program by 7 points. But it is shocking that - in the absence of any other major independent negative event - these new supporters would flee in the space of one week and that three percent more would move against him. That spells big trouble for Obama. It means that the wind is blowing in his face as he tries to make headway for his health care program. This seven point post-speech slippage in seven days indicates that all the breakfast tables and lunch counters, and medical examining rooms are abuzz with conversation about health care changes, most of it negative to the president's wishes.
The Line: A Resurgent Republican Party
http://voices.washingtonpost.com/thefix/the-line/the-line-a-resurgent-republica.html?wprss=thefix
Excerpt: So this week we are doing two Lines -- one today looking at the ten most influential Republican leaders in the party and then one tomorrow ranking the ten Senate races most likely to switch parties in 2010. Republicans have seen something of a reversal of fortune since we last penned a Line looking at their relatively meager list of leaders. The debate over health care has tapped into a broader discontent among the Republican base -- and many independents -- regarding the amount of spending that has gone on during the first eight months of the Obama Administration. The passion stirred by the health care debate -- and evidenced in a series of town halls across the country over the August congressional recess -- has led GOP leaders (in and out of Congress) to grow more bold in their criticism of President Obama and his policies.
Dem Senator Warns of 'Big, Big Tax' on Middle Class in Baucus Bill
http://blogs.abcnews.com/thenote/2009/09/dem-senator-warns-of-big-big-tax-on-middle-class-in-baucus-bill.html
But BO promised!
Obama’s unhealthy speech
http://thehill.com/opinion/columnists/dick-morris/58871-obamas-unhealthy-speech
Excerpt: These are code words for rationing. The panel will “encourage” doctors to adopt the “best practices” the panel recommends by limiting reimbursement rates or banning alternatives. Likely guidelines will govern who can get elective surgery like hip replacements or new knees based on the number of “quality adjusted remaining years,” the patient has. In Canada, the drug Avastin is barred by such a panel despite its proven record as the most effective anti-colon cancer drug. The ban is due not to safety concerns but solely to its $50,000 annual cost. As a result, 41 percent of Canadians with colon cancer die, compared to 32 percent of Americans. These are the kinds of “best practices” that the panel will have to impose to pay for Obama’s plan.
The Devil is in the Details: How a Sleeper Provision in Obamacare Could Bust Illinois's Budget
http://www.illinoispolicy.org/news/article.asp?ArticleSource=1426
Excerpt: According to a report from the Federal Funds Information for States, the additional “state share” cost to Illinois for immediately expanding Medicaid to uninsured individuals who earn up to 133 percent of poverty level would cost $1.391 billion (FY 2009 numbers, at regular Medicaid reimbursement rates). It would take Illinois’s Medicaid enrollment from 2.4 million enrollees to 3 million enrollees, a 25 percent increase. However it’s fashioned, a large-scale expansion of Medicaid will come with a significant price tag, which will be difficult to reconcile with the looming deficits in the federal government’s budget and Illinois’s state budget. (This will, of course, apply to other states as well. But not to worry. “If (Barack Obama) is elected president, no one making under $250,000 will pay a penny more in taxes.” He promised.)
Imposition of “Buy American” Provisions of the Recovery Act
http://www.uschamber.com/international/trade_study_provisions.htm
Excerpt: We estimate that any net increases in U.S. employment resulting from the new “Buy American” provisions will quickly evaporate as other countries implement “buy national” policies of their own. In the event that retaliation causes U.S. companies to lose just 1 percent of potential foreign stimulus procurement opportunities, the net employment loss to the United States from the Recovery Act’s “Buy American” (Have I said before that trade barriers kill jobs?)
Stadium Subsidies Continue Despite Economic Downturn
http://www.ncpa.org/sub/dpd/index.php?Article_ID=18455
Good politics, though: welfare for the rich, bread and circuses for the poor, hose the taxpayers.
Separating 'He Lied' From The 'Elides'
http://www.ibdeditorials.com/IBDArticles.aspx?id=338077721221686
Excerpt: You lie? No. Barack Obama doesn't lie. He's too subtle for that. He . . . well, you judge. Herewith three examples within a single speech — the now-famous Obama-Wilson "you lie" address to Congress on health care — of Obama's relationship with truth… Obama doesn't lie. He implies, he misdirects, he misleads — so fluidly and incessantly that he risks transmuting eloquence into mere slickness. Slickness wasn't fatal to "Slick Willie" Clinton because he possessed a winning, near irresistible charm. Obama's persona is more cool, distant, imperial. The charming scoundrel can get away with endless deception; the righteous redeemer cannot.
China Puts Up a Fighter
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970204731804574385490799825598.html
Excerpt: Exhibit A is Beijing's long-running effort to build a fifth-generation fighter plane equivalent to the U.S. F-22 and F-35. Such planes use extensive stealth and advanced radar and can usually "supercruise," or fly supersonically for extended periods without using fuel-guzzling afterburners. In what may be the only public reference to the program by a Chinese official, the Commander of the People's Liberation Army Navy mentioned their requirement for a fighter capable of "supersonic cruise" during 60th anniversary celebrations in April. Today this can only be achieved by the U.S. F-22A Raptor, the world's only operational fifth-generation fighter.
America's Air Supremacy Allowed to Evaporate
http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/politics/America_s-air-supremacy-allowed-to-evaporate-8209192-57657387.html
Excerpt: So what's gone wrong? To begin with, our enemies, current and potential, have taken note and taken steps particularly to try to neutralize the effects of American air power. The closest student has been the Chinese People's Liberation Army. Almost since the ink was dry on Cohen's essay, the PLA has both been devising ways to limit the U.S. ability to use its air power in East Asia. The Chinese have invested heavily in long range, land-based air defenses, but perhaps the most challenging Chinese capabilities are those that attempt to restrict American access to air bases in the region or to effectively employ carrier-based aviation.
Real racism?
http://nicedoggie.net/index.php/archives/2953
Excerpt: “This seat was set aside for people who look like me,” said Mr. Herenton’s campaign manager, Sidney Chism, a black county commissioner. “It wasn’t set aside for a Jew or a Christian. It was set aside so that blacks could have representation.”
Pakistan human rights group says police colluding with jihadists who are murdering Christians with impunity
http://www.jihadwatch.org/2009/09/pakistan-human-rights-group-says-police-colluding-with-jihadists-who-are-murdering-christians-with-i.html
Excerpt: The Joint Action Committee for People's Rights (JAC), a group of Pakistan-based non-governmental organisations operating in the human rights field, has expressed concern over "increasing incidents of violence" that have taken in recent months against religious minorities, especially Christians. Their concern also includes the apparent "collusion" of some officials in the police and the prison system with "fanatics and extremists" in perpetrating crimes against members of religious minorities. According to JAC activists, anti-Christian violence in Gojra in early August and the murder of a young Christian man in prison in Sialkot show that the "government's record of protecting religious minorities [. . .] is disappointing to say the least."
Top jihadist, mastermind of Indonesia and Bali jihad attacks, dead
http://www.jihadwatch.org/2009/09/top-jihadist-mastermind-of-indonesia-and-bali-jihad-attacks-dead.html
Today’s feel-good news story.
Doctors will quit if HCR passes
http://commonamericanjournal.com/?p=2419
Sure it’ll improve healthcare.
Obama’s ties to ACORN
http://commonamericanjournal.com/?p=2411
Like we didn’t know.
Under fire, Democrats abandon ACORN in droves
http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/politics/Under-fire_-Democrats-abandon-ACORN-in-droves-8260728-59676847.html
Like rates leaving a sinking ship! Excerpt: Back in February, during the Democrats' frenzied rush to pass the $787 billion economic stimulus bill, Republican Sen. David Vitter offered a simple, 28-word amendment: "None of the funds appropriated or otherwise made available by this Act may be used directly or indirectly to fund the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now." Vitter's amendment was shot down, 51-45, with all the votes coming from the Democratic majority.
FBI begins probe into federal stimulus fraud http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/local/crime/FBI-begins-probe-into-federal-stimulus-fraud-8260724-59676832.html
Excerpt: "Experience tells us that there's a good chance that some of the money could end up in the hands of a few unscrupulous government officials and others seeking to line their own pockets," the agency said in a statement Thursday. (Gee, ya think?)
Friday, September 18, 2009
Political Digest September 18, 2009
Obama Associate Implicated in Murder Plot
http://www.aim.org/aim-column/obama-associate-implicated-in-murder-plot/
Excerpt: The sub-headline over the article says it all: "The investigation into a cop killing in the '70s leads to a law professor who helped launch Barack Obama's political career." The law professor is former Communist terrorist Bernardine Dohrn, a leader of the Weather Underground known for praising mass murderer Charles Manson. Writer Peter Jamison, who is based in San Francisco, where the cop killing occurred, spent months working on the story and developed many different sources of information. Jamison, who can't be dismissed as a right-winger pursuing a partisan agenda designed to make Obama look bad, examined the evidence in the 1970 Park Police Station bombing case. He finds that it goes straight to Dohrn and other members of the Weather Underground, including her husband, fellow terrorist Bill Ayers, now a professor of education at the University of Illinois. His article is being syndicated by Village Voice Media, a source of news and information for newsweeklies in several major U.S. cities. The outlets include the SF Weekly in San Francisco, the Miami New Times, and the St. Louis Riverfront Times. The story is actually an old one, and Accuracy in Media had publicized some of the evidence in the case before the 2008 presidential election, when the media were repeating the lie that the Weather Underground had never killed anyone with their campaign of violence.
OJ Out
Heard on the radio Thursday that OJ was getting out of jail. Suppose, as Skip Gates woul say, This is what happens to a black man in America.” They said he’s had a girlfriend for 13 years, was 19 when she got involved with him, right after the jury acquitted hi, What’s up with her?
Morning Fix: ACORN -- How Much Danger for Democrats?
http://voices.washingtonpost.com/thefix/morning-fix/morning-fix-3.html?wprss=thefix
Excerpt: …but it's clear from the reaction of the White House that leading Democrats understand that being seen as defenders of the community group is political suicide. White House press secretary Robert Gibbs called the tapes "completely unacceptable" during his daily briefing on Wednesday, adding "the administration takes accountability extremely seriously." Doug Schoen, a Democratic pollster, said the ACORN controversy poses a "huge risk" to the Democratic party. "Swing voters are almost certainly going to put off by the constant barrage of stories about their abuses, the videos, and their unrepentant approach to the way they operate," he added. (ACORN may now be the best-funded criminal organization in the country. Except Congress, of course.)
Acorn: Creature of the CRA
http://www.frontpagemag.com/readArticle.aspx?ARTID=36330
Excerpt: Acorn found its way into the mortgage business through the Community Reinvestment Act, the 1977 legislation that community groups have used as a cudgel to force lenders to lower their mortgage underwriting standards in order to make more loans in low-income communities. Often the groups, after making protests under CRA, were then rewarded by banks with contracts to act as mortgage counselors in low-income areas in return for dropping their protests against the banks. In one particularly lucrative deal, 14 major banks eager to put CRA protests behind them in 1993 signed an agreement to have Acorn administer a $55 million, 11-city lending program. It was precisely such agreements that helped turn Acorn from a network of small local groups into a national player. And Acorn hasn't been alone. A U.S. senate subcommittee once estimated that CRA-related deals between banks and community groups have pumped nearly $10 billion into the nonprofit sector. Given the economic fallout from the long efforts by advocacy groups to water down mortgage lending standards, as well as the controversy surrounding Acorn's mortgage counseling methods, you would imagine that politicians in Washington would be eager to narrow the scope of the CRA and reduce the leverage that community groups wield under it. But to the contrary, Washington is actually looking to expand the CRA once again. On Capitol Hill today the House Committee on Financial Services under Chairman Barney Frank is holding hearings on legislation supported by the Obama administration that would bring insurance companies and credit unions under the umbrella of CRA, placing new lending demands on these groups and opening them up to protests and pressure tactics by organizations like Acorn. As proof that Washington is a looking-glass world where basic values and logic get perverted, proponents of the new legislation claim we need more CRA to rein in the bad practices of the housing bubble, which is sort of like arguing that the cure for alcoholism is another martini. Any review of the history of the affordable mortgage movement in America demonstrates the power that CRA had in helping to shred mortgage underwriting standards throughout the industry and exposing us to the kind of market meltdown we've experienced.
Tangled Web of Corruption: Obama, TIDES and ACORN
http://atlasshrugs2000.typepad.com/atlas_shrugs/2009/09/obamas-white-house-acorn-crime-covered-up-by-tides.html
Excerpt: "Keep your yaps shut." That's what people working for two left-wing groups were told when word started to filter out that the head of another benefactor of "progressive" causes was going to bail out one of the groups stung by an embezzlement scandal. Drummond Pike, the founder and CEO of the Tides Foundation, agreed to buy a nearly $1 million promissory note from the family of Wade Rathke, founder and recent leader of ACORN, the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now, reports The New York Times. Wade Rathke sits on the Tides Foundation board. (And Pittsburgh's Heinz Endowments, chaired by ketchup heiress Teresa Heinz Kerry, wife of U.S. Sen. John Kerry, funded Tides with more than $8 million between 1994 and 2005.)
Jon Stewart on ACORN
http://www.thedailyshow.com/watch/tue-september-15-2009/the-audacity-of-hos
Too funny. A must watch.
See my blog last night on racism
Scroll down.
Former President calls Barack Obama a “black boy,” says Obama not qualified.
http://goodtimepolitics.com/
Or:
http://www.nmatv.com/video/3390/Archives:-Jimmy-Carter-Calls-Obama-a-
Guess racism still alive with some folks.
Jimmy Carter's Ill-Advised Effort to Atone
http://townhall.com/columnists/MattTowery/2009/09/17/jimmy_carters_ill-advised_effort_to_atone
Excerpt: There isn't a living political expert from that bygone era who doesn't know that gubernatorial candidate Carter -- running against the progressive Carl Sanders -- said many times in public appearances that he was a Lester Maddox Democrat. That doesn't mean Carter was spewing racial epithets. It does mean that he "played the race card" himself to get elected. What's unfortunate is that Carter now has chosen to flip that race card over and play it for the opposite effect he sought a generation ago. Though no racist himself, Carter now perhaps is seeking atonement for his campaign rhetoric of years past.
Jimmy Carter's racist campaign of 1970
http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/opinion/blogs/beltway-confidential/Jimmy-Carters-racist-campaign-of-1970-59499482.html
Excerpt: Readers should refer to Stephen Hayward's The Real Jimmy Carter if they want a taste of the out-and-out racism that Carter employed in order to defeat moderate former Gov. Carl Sanders for the Democratic nomination that year. As Hayward's book points out:
· Carter's top campaign staffers were spotted distributing grainy photographs of Sanders arm-in-arm celebrating with two black men. Sanders was a part-owner of the Atlanta Hawks, and in the photograph he was celebrating a victory with two players who were pouring champagne over his head. Carter's leaflet was intended to depress Sanders's white vote.
· "The Carter campaign also produced a leaflet noting that Sanders had paid tribute to Martin Luther King, Jr."
· Carter criticized Sanders, a former governor, for preventing Alabama Gov. and notorious segregationist George Wallace from speaking on Georgia state property. "I don't think it was right for Governor Sanders to try to please a group of ultra-liberals, particularly those in Washington, when it means stifling communication with another state," said Carter.
· "'I have no trouble pitching for Wallace votes and black votes at the same time,' Carter told a reporter. Carter also said to another reporter, 'I can win this election without a single black vote.'"
· Upon receiving the endorsement of former Democratic Gov. Lester Maddox, Carter responded by praising the life-long segregationist: "He has brought a standard of forthright expression and personal honesty to the governor's office, and I hope to live up to his standard." Maddox had not only refused to serve blacks in the restaurant he once owned, but he had also greeted civil rights protestors with a gun, and made sticks available to his white customers with which to intimidate them.
Democrats Jumping the Race-Card Shark
http://www.americanthinker.com/2009/09/democrats_jumping_the_racecard_1.html
Excerpt: Tuesday, a Congressman from my home state of Georgia, Rep. Hank Johnson said that if the House didn't censure Joe Wilson, then folks would "put on the white hoods and roam the countryside." Congressman Johnson seems to have forgotten that most of the KKK men, to whom he is referring, were Democrats, the architects and masters of real Southern Apartheid, Jim Crow. Heck, Senator Byrd is still there and he was one. A rather inconvenient fact, however, is that the only reported act of racial violence so far happened on Tuesday on a public school bus in St. Louis and the offenders were black, the victim white. An apparently unprovoked attack on a high school student took place over - get this - a seat on the bus. The irony is downright nerve-wrenching. A black student beat the white student to the cheers of his black classmates and the bus driver supposedly did nothing to intervene. KKK in reverse? That's a lot more violence than Rosa Parks got over her seat on the bus. In fact, Rosa Parks wasn't on the receiving end of anything more than arrogant stares. Police suspect race was the motivating factor in the St. Louis school-bus attack. Now, it's pretty darned hard to polarize the entire white-conservative citizenry in pure Alinsky fashion. Evidently, though, this is going to be the line of attack. What's obvious, however, is that this is the most desperate move yet to shore up the failing grades of a president in over his head. And it certainly does appear orchestrated. DNC, anyone?
The Clinton Tapes
http://men.style.com/gq/blogs/gqeditors/2009/09/secret-history.html
Excerpt: Meeting late at night and sometimes through the night, Clinton and Branch embarked on a series of seventy-nine conversations about politics, the presidents, the Whitewater investigation, and yes, even Monica—recording every word for posterity. Acutely aware that their tapes could be subpoenaed at any moment and desperate to avoid making them public, Clinton squirreled away the cassettes in his sock drawer and has never spoken of them nor made them public. But this month, Branch releases a 670-page mammoth tome, The Clinton Tapes, that mines those conversations and delves into Clinton’s presidency and state of mind through a tumultuous and historic eight years. (Ah, yes, the transparent Democrats. And another book by a Clinton sycophant. Ho hum.)
DeMint Calls for an End to Murtha Airport Waste
http://voices.washingtonpost.com/capitol-briefing/2009/09/demint_calls_for_an_end_to_mur.html?wprss=capitol-briefing
Excerpt: Sen. Jim DeMint (R-S.C.) said the John P. Murtha Airport in the congressman's hometown of Johnstown, Pa., rivaled the famous "Bridge to Nowhere" in Alaska for the amount of federal dollars it had wasted, and offered an amendment to stop an annual $1.4 million subsidy for airport traffic there. The airport has received $200 million in federal funds in the last 15 years. Most of those funds were steered there by Murtha, including more than $25 million for stronger runways to handle heavy military planes, which don't fly there; $8 million for a radar system, which isn't used; and $800,000 in new stimulus funds to repave an alternate runway. (Meantime, I can’t figure out why there’s a deficit, with both parties against deficits. Weird, huh?)
Obama Scraps European Missile Shield Plan
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/09/17/AR2009091700639.html
Obama caves to Putin, throws allies out of the boat. Surprise, surprise, surprise. Maybe ACORN will stop Iran’s missiles, if we give them a few billion dollars more of tax money.
Obama lied and the Congress cried
http://www.redstate.com/erick/2009/09/16/barack-obama-did-lie-in-his-speech-he-got-the-facts-wrong-in-his-tear-jerker-story/
Washington Two Step
http://www.redstate.com/erick/2009/09/16/harry-reid-plays-washington-two-step-and-gets-caught/
Reid tries to have it both ways.
Obama and the politics of demonization
http://www.redstate.com/streiff/2009/09/16/obama-and-politics-of-demonization/
Excerpt: There have been three salient features thus far of the Obama Administration. The first is its secretive nature, elevating to the status of quasi state secrets information that has been readily available in previous Administrations. The second is a Carteresque level of incompetence which spans the gamut from economic to foreign policy. The third is simple nastiness when confronted with opposition.
Good aerial view of the 9/12 DC Protest
http://iowntheworld.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2009/09/capitol-view-lo-res.jpg
Public strongly supports tort reform
http://www.philipkhoward.com/images/uploads/CommonGood_PPT_Clarus-poll-sept10-09_ppt.pdf
But Congress is run by the League of Leftwing lawyers
Spreading terror
http://www.mererhetoric.com/archives/11275886.html#moreChavez
Excerpt: Two related items that should give the Obama administration pause as it seeks ways to engage Venezuela's Hugo Chávez and other countries in Venezuela's sphere of influence (Bolivia, Nicaragua, Ecuador primarily). The first is the new Memorandum of Understanding signed between the militaries of Venezuela and Iran. According to the official FARS News Agency, Iran's defense minister, in a visit to Caracas, "underlined Tehran's all-out efforts to help Venezuela promote its defense capabilities and bolster its power of deterrence through bilateral Memoranda of Understanding (MoUs) on military cooperation." Chávez, for his part, stated that "The Bolivarian and the Islamic Revolutions have a lot in common and these commonalities have consolidated the two countries' bonds."... At the same time, 17 people were arrested in the small Caribbean island (and Dutch territory) of Curacao on charges of transporting several tons of cocaine and sending some of the money to Hezbollah. "We have been able to establish that this group has relations with international criminal organizations that have connections with the Hezbollah," prosecutor Ludmila Vicento said.
The need for medical liability reform (Sen. John Cornyn)
http://thehill.com/blogs/congress-blog/healthcare/58771--the-need-for-medical-liability-reform-sen-john-cornyn
Excerpt: The CBO estimated that the federal government would directly save about $5.6 billion dollars from the types of reforms enacted in Texas, and that total health care spending could be reduced further if these reforms reduced the practice of defensive medicine. Other academic studies have concluded liability reform could save between 5 and 9 percent of health care costs. These reforms will also increase access to health care, especially to high-risk medical specialties. (Hummmm. Help taxpayers, reduce the cost of health care, but hurt lawyers. What will Congress do? Hummm.)
Obama Admin: Cap And Trade Could Cost Families $1,761 A Year
http://www.cbsnews.com/blogs/2009/09/15/taking_liberties/entry5314040.shtml
“If (Barack Obama) is elected president, families making under $250,000 a year won’t pay a penny more in taxes.” (We’ll gouge the lower and middle classes through health care reform, cap and trade and deficit-driven inflation. No need to tax them. Except smokers.)
Public Option Lite
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970204518504574416930475823324.html
Excerpt: The centerpiece of the Obama-Baucus plan is a decree that everyone purchase heavily regulated insurance policies or else pay a penalty. This government mandate would require huge subsidies as well as brute force to get anywhere near the goal of universal coverage. The inevitable result would be a vast increase in the government's share of U.S. health spending, forcing doctors, hospitals, insurance companies and other health providers to serve politics as well as or even over and above patients.
Medical-Device Makers Scramble to Avert New Fees in Health Bill
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB125297599091410349.html
Excerpt: A draft of a broad health-overhaul bill in the Finance Committee calls for device makers to pay $40 billion in fees over 10 years, with the specific amount based on each company's market share. The relatively high fees resulted from a lobbying move that some senior congressional aides and industry officials say represented a strategic error on the device industry's part. Device makers were among the health-related industries that went to the White House this spring to volunteer financial concessions as part of an overhaul. They were then asked to offer a dollar amount in savings, representatives of the device industry and congressional aides said. Instead, the companies suggested that the government levy a tax on their adversaries: hospital-purchasing groups that negotiate for lower prices on medical supplies and some devices. Some senators, including Finance Committee Chairman Sen. Max Baucus (D., Mont.), were troubled that the device makers were "offering up other people's money," said a person close to the negotiations. This person cited a line that has come to represent the maneuvering among health-care industries, the White House and Congress: "You either come to the table early, or you end up part of the dinner." (And the manufacturers will pass the taxes on to the patients, who will pay more for health care.)
Failure to Implement U.S.-Korea and U.S.-Colombia Free Trade Agreements
http://www.uschamber.com/international/trade_study_agreements.htm
I’ll say it again. Free trade improves the economies of the countries involved, trade barriers—popular with unions, protected industries and economically-ignorant voters—hurts the economy. India used to have huge trade barriers. It greatly reduced them in the 1990s—and took off as a new economic powerhouse. But as long as the voters are stupid, folks like Obama can win votes by promising to call up the presidents of Mexico and Canada (sic) to renegotiate NAFTA.
Lower Your Taxes: Move to Switzerland
http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/09_38/b4147062134006.htm
Excerpts: "There is a lot of interest from companies looking to shift their taxable profit to countries with lower rates," says Andreas Müller, an international corporate tax partner at KPMG in Zurich. Meanwhile, Britain and Ireland are increasing personal income tax rates for top earners. In the U.S., tax hikes seem inevitable. Switzerland has no such plans, says Stéphane Garelli, professor of competitiveness at IMD Business School in Lausanne. (Tax the rich & big business, lose the jobs. Duh.)
Obama’s retreat in Afghanistan
http://www.redstate.com/streiff/2009/09/16/obamas-retreat-in-afghanistan/
Excerpt: My analysis was flawed because I failed to take into consideration the chutzpah required to break out of this binary scenario. We are on the cusp of a campaign by the White House to convince us that Afghanistan simply isn’t important.
Dutch court blocks "football chant" of "Hamas, Hamas, Jews to the gas"
http://www.jihadwatch.org/2009/09/dutch-court-blocks-football-chant-of-hamas-hamas-jews-to-the-gas.html
Excerpt: The Dutch High Court ruled on Tuesday that the chant 'Hamas, Hamas, Jews to the gas' is punishable by law because it is insulting to Jews, reports broadcaster Nos.
The case was brought before the High Court by a football supporter who had been sentenced to 80 hours community service and probation of two years by the lower court.
The man refused to accept the judgement saying the chant forms part of the culture surrounding football. 'It is not used with the intention of insulting Jews but to provoke other supporters,' he said in his defence...
America’s Imperial President
http://www.newmediajournal.us/staff/l_boyland/2009/09162009.htm
Paranoid. But even paranoids have enemies.
Word of the Day
Coulrophobia. Noun. Fear of Congress. Real word. Look it up.
Quotes of the day
After President Barack Obama gave a speech to a joint session of Congress last week passionately defending his national health care plan, the Democrats were agog at the brilliance of the speech. Nancy Pelosi was so thrilled, her expression almost changed. --Ann Coulter.
How dreadful are the curses which Mohammedanism lays on its votaries! Besides the fanatical frenzy, which is as dangerous in a man as hydrophobia in a dog, there is this fearful fatalistic apathy. The effects are apparent in many countries, improvident habits, slovenly systems of agriculture, sluggish methods of commerce, and insecurity of property exist wherever the followers of the Prophet rule or live. A degraded sensualism deprives this life of its grace and refinement, the next of its dignity and sanctity. The fact that in Mohammedan law every woman must belong to some man as his absolute property, either as a child, a wife, or a concubine, must delay the final extinction of slavery until the faith of Islam has ceased to be a great power among men. Individual Moslems may show splendid qualities, but the influence of the religion paralyses the social development of those who follow it. No stronger retrograde force exists in the world. Far from being moribund, Mohammedanism is a militant and proselytizing faith. It has already spread throughout Central Africa, raising fearless warriors at every step; and were it not that Christianity is sheltered in the strong arms of science, the science against which it had vainly struggled, the civilization of modern Europe might fall, as fell the civilization of ancient Rome. --Sir Winston Churchill; (The River War, first edition, Vol. II, pages 248-50 London, 1899)
http://www.aim.org/aim-column/obama-associate-implicated-in-murder-plot/
Excerpt: The sub-headline over the article says it all: "The investigation into a cop killing in the '70s leads to a law professor who helped launch Barack Obama's political career." The law professor is former Communist terrorist Bernardine Dohrn, a leader of the Weather Underground known for praising mass murderer Charles Manson. Writer Peter Jamison, who is based in San Francisco, where the cop killing occurred, spent months working on the story and developed many different sources of information. Jamison, who can't be dismissed as a right-winger pursuing a partisan agenda designed to make Obama look bad, examined the evidence in the 1970 Park Police Station bombing case. He finds that it goes straight to Dohrn and other members of the Weather Underground, including her husband, fellow terrorist Bill Ayers, now a professor of education at the University of Illinois. His article is being syndicated by Village Voice Media, a source of news and information for newsweeklies in several major U.S. cities. The outlets include the SF Weekly in San Francisco, the Miami New Times, and the St. Louis Riverfront Times. The story is actually an old one, and Accuracy in Media had publicized some of the evidence in the case before the 2008 presidential election, when the media were repeating the lie that the Weather Underground had never killed anyone with their campaign of violence.
OJ Out
Heard on the radio Thursday that OJ was getting out of jail. Suppose, as Skip Gates woul say, This is what happens to a black man in America.” They said he’s had a girlfriend for 13 years, was 19 when she got involved with him, right after the jury acquitted hi, What’s up with her?
Morning Fix: ACORN -- How Much Danger for Democrats?
http://voices.washingtonpost.com/thefix/morning-fix/morning-fix-3.html?wprss=thefix
Excerpt: …but it's clear from the reaction of the White House that leading Democrats understand that being seen as defenders of the community group is political suicide. White House press secretary Robert Gibbs called the tapes "completely unacceptable" during his daily briefing on Wednesday, adding "the administration takes accountability extremely seriously." Doug Schoen, a Democratic pollster, said the ACORN controversy poses a "huge risk" to the Democratic party. "Swing voters are almost certainly going to put off by the constant barrage of stories about their abuses, the videos, and their unrepentant approach to the way they operate," he added. (ACORN may now be the best-funded criminal organization in the country. Except Congress, of course.)
Acorn: Creature of the CRA
http://www.frontpagemag.com/readArticle.aspx?ARTID=36330
Excerpt: Acorn found its way into the mortgage business through the Community Reinvestment Act, the 1977 legislation that community groups have used as a cudgel to force lenders to lower their mortgage underwriting standards in order to make more loans in low-income communities. Often the groups, after making protests under CRA, were then rewarded by banks with contracts to act as mortgage counselors in low-income areas in return for dropping their protests against the banks. In one particularly lucrative deal, 14 major banks eager to put CRA protests behind them in 1993 signed an agreement to have Acorn administer a $55 million, 11-city lending program. It was precisely such agreements that helped turn Acorn from a network of small local groups into a national player. And Acorn hasn't been alone. A U.S. senate subcommittee once estimated that CRA-related deals between banks and community groups have pumped nearly $10 billion into the nonprofit sector. Given the economic fallout from the long efforts by advocacy groups to water down mortgage lending standards, as well as the controversy surrounding Acorn's mortgage counseling methods, you would imagine that politicians in Washington would be eager to narrow the scope of the CRA and reduce the leverage that community groups wield under it. But to the contrary, Washington is actually looking to expand the CRA once again. On Capitol Hill today the House Committee on Financial Services under Chairman Barney Frank is holding hearings on legislation supported by the Obama administration that would bring insurance companies and credit unions under the umbrella of CRA, placing new lending demands on these groups and opening them up to protests and pressure tactics by organizations like Acorn. As proof that Washington is a looking-glass world where basic values and logic get perverted, proponents of the new legislation claim we need more CRA to rein in the bad practices of the housing bubble, which is sort of like arguing that the cure for alcoholism is another martini. Any review of the history of the affordable mortgage movement in America demonstrates the power that CRA had in helping to shred mortgage underwriting standards throughout the industry and exposing us to the kind of market meltdown we've experienced.
Tangled Web of Corruption: Obama, TIDES and ACORN
http://atlasshrugs2000.typepad.com/atlas_shrugs/2009/09/obamas-white-house-acorn-crime-covered-up-by-tides.html
Excerpt: "Keep your yaps shut." That's what people working for two left-wing groups were told when word started to filter out that the head of another benefactor of "progressive" causes was going to bail out one of the groups stung by an embezzlement scandal. Drummond Pike, the founder and CEO of the Tides Foundation, agreed to buy a nearly $1 million promissory note from the family of Wade Rathke, founder and recent leader of ACORN, the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now, reports The New York Times. Wade Rathke sits on the Tides Foundation board. (And Pittsburgh's Heinz Endowments, chaired by ketchup heiress Teresa Heinz Kerry, wife of U.S. Sen. John Kerry, funded Tides with more than $8 million between 1994 and 2005.)
Jon Stewart on ACORN
http://www.thedailyshow.com/watch/tue-september-15-2009/the-audacity-of-hos
Too funny. A must watch.
See my blog last night on racism
Scroll down.
Former President calls Barack Obama a “black boy,” says Obama not qualified.
http://goodtimepolitics.com/
Or:
http://www.nmatv.com/video/3390/Archives:-Jimmy-Carter-Calls-Obama-a-
Guess racism still alive with some folks.
Jimmy Carter's Ill-Advised Effort to Atone
http://townhall.com/columnists/MattTowery/2009/09/17/jimmy_carters_ill-advised_effort_to_atone
Excerpt: There isn't a living political expert from that bygone era who doesn't know that gubernatorial candidate Carter -- running against the progressive Carl Sanders -- said many times in public appearances that he was a Lester Maddox Democrat. That doesn't mean Carter was spewing racial epithets. It does mean that he "played the race card" himself to get elected. What's unfortunate is that Carter now has chosen to flip that race card over and play it for the opposite effect he sought a generation ago. Though no racist himself, Carter now perhaps is seeking atonement for his campaign rhetoric of years past.
Jimmy Carter's racist campaign of 1970
http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/opinion/blogs/beltway-confidential/Jimmy-Carters-racist-campaign-of-1970-59499482.html
Excerpt: Readers should refer to Stephen Hayward's The Real Jimmy Carter if they want a taste of the out-and-out racism that Carter employed in order to defeat moderate former Gov. Carl Sanders for the Democratic nomination that year. As Hayward's book points out:
· Carter's top campaign staffers were spotted distributing grainy photographs of Sanders arm-in-arm celebrating with two black men. Sanders was a part-owner of the Atlanta Hawks, and in the photograph he was celebrating a victory with two players who were pouring champagne over his head. Carter's leaflet was intended to depress Sanders's white vote.
· "The Carter campaign also produced a leaflet noting that Sanders had paid tribute to Martin Luther King, Jr."
· Carter criticized Sanders, a former governor, for preventing Alabama Gov. and notorious segregationist George Wallace from speaking on Georgia state property. "I don't think it was right for Governor Sanders to try to please a group of ultra-liberals, particularly those in Washington, when it means stifling communication with another state," said Carter.
· "'I have no trouble pitching for Wallace votes and black votes at the same time,' Carter told a reporter. Carter also said to another reporter, 'I can win this election without a single black vote.'"
· Upon receiving the endorsement of former Democratic Gov. Lester Maddox, Carter responded by praising the life-long segregationist: "He has brought a standard of forthright expression and personal honesty to the governor's office, and I hope to live up to his standard." Maddox had not only refused to serve blacks in the restaurant he once owned, but he had also greeted civil rights protestors with a gun, and made sticks available to his white customers with which to intimidate them.
Democrats Jumping the Race-Card Shark
http://www.americanthinker.com/2009/09/democrats_jumping_the_racecard_1.html
Excerpt: Tuesday, a Congressman from my home state of Georgia, Rep. Hank Johnson said that if the House didn't censure Joe Wilson, then folks would "put on the white hoods and roam the countryside." Congressman Johnson seems to have forgotten that most of the KKK men, to whom he is referring, were Democrats, the architects and masters of real Southern Apartheid, Jim Crow. Heck, Senator Byrd is still there and he was one. A rather inconvenient fact, however, is that the only reported act of racial violence so far happened on Tuesday on a public school bus in St. Louis and the offenders were black, the victim white. An apparently unprovoked attack on a high school student took place over - get this - a seat on the bus. The irony is downright nerve-wrenching. A black student beat the white student to the cheers of his black classmates and the bus driver supposedly did nothing to intervene. KKK in reverse? That's a lot more violence than Rosa Parks got over her seat on the bus. In fact, Rosa Parks wasn't on the receiving end of anything more than arrogant stares. Police suspect race was the motivating factor in the St. Louis school-bus attack. Now, it's pretty darned hard to polarize the entire white-conservative citizenry in pure Alinsky fashion. Evidently, though, this is going to be the line of attack. What's obvious, however, is that this is the most desperate move yet to shore up the failing grades of a president in over his head. And it certainly does appear orchestrated. DNC, anyone?
The Clinton Tapes
http://men.style.com/gq/blogs/gqeditors/2009/09/secret-history.html
Excerpt: Meeting late at night and sometimes through the night, Clinton and Branch embarked on a series of seventy-nine conversations about politics, the presidents, the Whitewater investigation, and yes, even Monica—recording every word for posterity. Acutely aware that their tapes could be subpoenaed at any moment and desperate to avoid making them public, Clinton squirreled away the cassettes in his sock drawer and has never spoken of them nor made them public. But this month, Branch releases a 670-page mammoth tome, The Clinton Tapes, that mines those conversations and delves into Clinton’s presidency and state of mind through a tumultuous and historic eight years. (Ah, yes, the transparent Democrats. And another book by a Clinton sycophant. Ho hum.)
DeMint Calls for an End to Murtha Airport Waste
http://voices.washingtonpost.com/capitol-briefing/2009/09/demint_calls_for_an_end_to_mur.html?wprss=capitol-briefing
Excerpt: Sen. Jim DeMint (R-S.C.) said the John P. Murtha Airport in the congressman's hometown of Johnstown, Pa., rivaled the famous "Bridge to Nowhere" in Alaska for the amount of federal dollars it had wasted, and offered an amendment to stop an annual $1.4 million subsidy for airport traffic there. The airport has received $200 million in federal funds in the last 15 years. Most of those funds were steered there by Murtha, including more than $25 million for stronger runways to handle heavy military planes, which don't fly there; $8 million for a radar system, which isn't used; and $800,000 in new stimulus funds to repave an alternate runway. (Meantime, I can’t figure out why there’s a deficit, with both parties against deficits. Weird, huh?)
Obama Scraps European Missile Shield Plan
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/09/17/AR2009091700639.html
Obama caves to Putin, throws allies out of the boat. Surprise, surprise, surprise. Maybe ACORN will stop Iran’s missiles, if we give them a few billion dollars more of tax money.
Obama lied and the Congress cried
http://www.redstate.com/erick/2009/09/16/barack-obama-did-lie-in-his-speech-he-got-the-facts-wrong-in-his-tear-jerker-story/
Washington Two Step
http://www.redstate.com/erick/2009/09/16/harry-reid-plays-washington-two-step-and-gets-caught/
Reid tries to have it both ways.
Obama and the politics of demonization
http://www.redstate.com/streiff/2009/09/16/obama-and-politics-of-demonization/
Excerpt: There have been three salient features thus far of the Obama Administration. The first is its secretive nature, elevating to the status of quasi state secrets information that has been readily available in previous Administrations. The second is a Carteresque level of incompetence which spans the gamut from economic to foreign policy. The third is simple nastiness when confronted with opposition.
Good aerial view of the 9/12 DC Protest
http://iowntheworld.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2009/09/capitol-view-lo-res.jpg
Public strongly supports tort reform
http://www.philipkhoward.com/images/uploads/CommonGood_PPT_Clarus-poll-sept10-09_ppt.pdf
But Congress is run by the League of Leftwing lawyers
Spreading terror
http://www.mererhetoric.com/archives/11275886.html#moreChavez
Excerpt: Two related items that should give the Obama administration pause as it seeks ways to engage Venezuela's Hugo Chávez and other countries in Venezuela's sphere of influence (Bolivia, Nicaragua, Ecuador primarily). The first is the new Memorandum of Understanding signed between the militaries of Venezuela and Iran. According to the official FARS News Agency, Iran's defense minister, in a visit to Caracas, "underlined Tehran's all-out efforts to help Venezuela promote its defense capabilities and bolster its power of deterrence through bilateral Memoranda of Understanding (MoUs) on military cooperation." Chávez, for his part, stated that "The Bolivarian and the Islamic Revolutions have a lot in common and these commonalities have consolidated the two countries' bonds."... At the same time, 17 people were arrested in the small Caribbean island (and Dutch territory) of Curacao on charges of transporting several tons of cocaine and sending some of the money to Hezbollah. "We have been able to establish that this group has relations with international criminal organizations that have connections with the Hezbollah," prosecutor Ludmila Vicento said.
The need for medical liability reform (Sen. John Cornyn)
http://thehill.com/blogs/congress-blog/healthcare/58771--the-need-for-medical-liability-reform-sen-john-cornyn
Excerpt: The CBO estimated that the federal government would directly save about $5.6 billion dollars from the types of reforms enacted in Texas, and that total health care spending could be reduced further if these reforms reduced the practice of defensive medicine. Other academic studies have concluded liability reform could save between 5 and 9 percent of health care costs. These reforms will also increase access to health care, especially to high-risk medical specialties. (Hummmm. Help taxpayers, reduce the cost of health care, but hurt lawyers. What will Congress do? Hummm.)
Obama Admin: Cap And Trade Could Cost Families $1,761 A Year
http://www.cbsnews.com/blogs/2009/09/15/taking_liberties/entry5314040.shtml
“If (Barack Obama) is elected president, families making under $250,000 a year won’t pay a penny more in taxes.” (We’ll gouge the lower and middle classes through health care reform, cap and trade and deficit-driven inflation. No need to tax them. Except smokers.)
Public Option Lite
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970204518504574416930475823324.html
Excerpt: The centerpiece of the Obama-Baucus plan is a decree that everyone purchase heavily regulated insurance policies or else pay a penalty. This government mandate would require huge subsidies as well as brute force to get anywhere near the goal of universal coverage. The inevitable result would be a vast increase in the government's share of U.S. health spending, forcing doctors, hospitals, insurance companies and other health providers to serve politics as well as or even over and above patients.
Medical-Device Makers Scramble to Avert New Fees in Health Bill
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB125297599091410349.html
Excerpt: A draft of a broad health-overhaul bill in the Finance Committee calls for device makers to pay $40 billion in fees over 10 years, with the specific amount based on each company's market share. The relatively high fees resulted from a lobbying move that some senior congressional aides and industry officials say represented a strategic error on the device industry's part. Device makers were among the health-related industries that went to the White House this spring to volunteer financial concessions as part of an overhaul. They were then asked to offer a dollar amount in savings, representatives of the device industry and congressional aides said. Instead, the companies suggested that the government levy a tax on their adversaries: hospital-purchasing groups that negotiate for lower prices on medical supplies and some devices. Some senators, including Finance Committee Chairman Sen. Max Baucus (D., Mont.), were troubled that the device makers were "offering up other people's money," said a person close to the negotiations. This person cited a line that has come to represent the maneuvering among health-care industries, the White House and Congress: "You either come to the table early, or you end up part of the dinner." (And the manufacturers will pass the taxes on to the patients, who will pay more for health care.)
Failure to Implement U.S.-Korea and U.S.-Colombia Free Trade Agreements
http://www.uschamber.com/international/trade_study_agreements.htm
I’ll say it again. Free trade improves the economies of the countries involved, trade barriers—popular with unions, protected industries and economically-ignorant voters—hurts the economy. India used to have huge trade barriers. It greatly reduced them in the 1990s—and took off as a new economic powerhouse. But as long as the voters are stupid, folks like Obama can win votes by promising to call up the presidents of Mexico and Canada (sic) to renegotiate NAFTA.
Lower Your Taxes: Move to Switzerland
http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/09_38/b4147062134006.htm
Excerpts: "There is a lot of interest from companies looking to shift their taxable profit to countries with lower rates," says Andreas Müller, an international corporate tax partner at KPMG in Zurich. Meanwhile, Britain and Ireland are increasing personal income tax rates for top earners. In the U.S., tax hikes seem inevitable. Switzerland has no such plans, says Stéphane Garelli, professor of competitiveness at IMD Business School in Lausanne. (Tax the rich & big business, lose the jobs. Duh.)
Obama’s retreat in Afghanistan
http://www.redstate.com/streiff/2009/09/16/obamas-retreat-in-afghanistan/
Excerpt: My analysis was flawed because I failed to take into consideration the chutzpah required to break out of this binary scenario. We are on the cusp of a campaign by the White House to convince us that Afghanistan simply isn’t important.
Dutch court blocks "football chant" of "Hamas, Hamas, Jews to the gas"
http://www.jihadwatch.org/2009/09/dutch-court-blocks-football-chant-of-hamas-hamas-jews-to-the-gas.html
Excerpt: The Dutch High Court ruled on Tuesday that the chant 'Hamas, Hamas, Jews to the gas' is punishable by law because it is insulting to Jews, reports broadcaster Nos.
The case was brought before the High Court by a football supporter who had been sentenced to 80 hours community service and probation of two years by the lower court.
The man refused to accept the judgement saying the chant forms part of the culture surrounding football. 'It is not used with the intention of insulting Jews but to provoke other supporters,' he said in his defence...
America’s Imperial President
http://www.newmediajournal.us/staff/l_boyland/2009/09162009.htm
Paranoid. But even paranoids have enemies.
Word of the Day
Coulrophobia. Noun. Fear of Congress. Real word. Look it up.
Quotes of the day
After President Barack Obama gave a speech to a joint session of Congress last week passionately defending his national health care plan, the Democrats were agog at the brilliance of the speech. Nancy Pelosi was so thrilled, her expression almost changed. --Ann Coulter.
How dreadful are the curses which Mohammedanism lays on its votaries! Besides the fanatical frenzy, which is as dangerous in a man as hydrophobia in a dog, there is this fearful fatalistic apathy. The effects are apparent in many countries, improvident habits, slovenly systems of agriculture, sluggish methods of commerce, and insecurity of property exist wherever the followers of the Prophet rule or live. A degraded sensualism deprives this life of its grace and refinement, the next of its dignity and sanctity. The fact that in Mohammedan law every woman must belong to some man as his absolute property, either as a child, a wife, or a concubine, must delay the final extinction of slavery until the faith of Islam has ceased to be a great power among men. Individual Moslems may show splendid qualities, but the influence of the religion paralyses the social development of those who follow it. No stronger retrograde force exists in the world. Far from being moribund, Mohammedanism is a militant and proselytizing faith. It has already spread throughout Central Africa, raising fearless warriors at every step; and were it not that Christianity is sheltered in the strong arms of science, the science against which it had vainly struggled, the civilization of modern Europe might fall, as fell the civilization of ancient Rome. --Sir Winston Churchill; (The River War, first edition, Vol. II, pages 248-50 London, 1899)
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