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.
I’m back on line, trying to get through about 600 e-mails (lucky I did a few hundred while away.) Will post a few things, but swamped, so not every day. Some of these are old, and you may have seen. Your purchase price cheerfully refunded.
U.S. tightens no-fly rules after suspect in failed Times Square attack succeeds in boarding plane
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/05/05/AR2010050501536.html?wpisrc=nl_pmheadline
Excerpt: The U.S. government on Wednesday began requiring airlines to check no-fly lists much more quickly as a way to screen out terrorist suspects, officials said, after revelations that the man suspected of trying to detonate a car bomb in Times Square was able to board an international flight even though his name was listed. Until now, airlines have had 24 hours to check the government's no-fly list after they are notified that a name has been added to it through a special, expedited process that indicates a high level of potential risk. Starting Wednesday, they must check within two hours. In Pakistan, meanwhile, authorities were looking for connections between Faisal Shahzad, the 30-year-old Pakistani American arrested for Saturday's bombing attempt, and terrorist organizations operating in the country. According to an FBI complaint, Shahzad admitted involvement in the Times Square plot and said he received bombmaking training in Waziristan, a tribal area along the border with Afghanistan that harbors Taliban and al-Qaeda militants. Shahzad was placed on the expedited no-fly list Monday at 12:30 p.m. But he was able to purchase a one-way ticket to Pakistan shortly after 7:30 p.m., a little more than four hours before the flight was scheduled to leave. After he boarded the Emirates airline flight at John F. Kennedy International airport, federal officials were alerted to his presence and entered the plane to escort him off.
Forcing out Dave Obey
http://voices.washingtonpost.com/right-now/2010/05/forcing_out_dave_obey.html?wpisrc=nl_pmpolitics
Excerpt: What do we know about the retirement of Rep. David Obey (D-Wis.)? Why would one of the most powerful men in Congress, elected in 1969, in a district that went for the Obama-Biden ticket, bail out of reelection? Republicans point to the campaign of Sean Duffy, a telegenic (literally) district attorney who raised a lot of money, built a following among national conservatives and, according to everything I'm hearing, was giving Obey a real battle in his internal polls. I've talked to Duffy several times and been so impressed -- and so convinced that this was the sort of race that would determine this was a good or a watershed year for Republicans -- that I dubbed him the No. 3 conservative to watch this year. He made an early bet against the stimulus package, coming out hard for repeal and blaming Obey, the chairman of the House Appropriations Committee, for not writing a more stimulative bill. When I asked him whether he thought government spending could dig us out of the recession, here was his response: Dave Obey believes that, but give me an example of when that’s worked. I haven’t seen where that’s worked. If it did, that would be the economic plan for countries all around the world.
Rational Risk Pools
http://www.john-goodman-blog.com/rational-risk-pools/?utm_source=newsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=HA#more-10423
Excerpt: Today’s subject title is an oxymoron. But before getting into that, note two things: (1) the Obama Administration’s approach to health reform envisions the creation of risk pools for otherwise uninsurable people — to bridge the gap from where we are now to 2014, when health plans will have to accept everyone, regardless of health condition; and (2) almost every feature of these risk pools defies rational explanation. For starters, note that the Obama risk pools plan to charge people the same premiums that healthy people pay for insurance. This is in contrast to existing state risk pools which charge 125% or 200% of market rates. Also in contrast to existing risk pools, the new Obama risk pools will have no waiting period. You get full coverage from day one. As Grace-Marie Turner pointed out in The Wall Street Journal the other day, the new risk pools will be cheaper and more generous than what the states currently have. So is that good news to the 199,000 people who are currently enrolled in a state risk pool? Actually, no. The new law is explicitly designed to keep that from happening. Specifically, you cannot enroll in an Obama risk pool unless you’ve been uninsured for at least six months. So if you have a health problem and you have been “doing the right thing” and trying to stay in the insurance system — say, by making COBRA payments or paying premiums to a conventional risk pool — you are flat out of luck. But if you have been so antisocial as to have been willfully uninsured for a long period of time and suddenly discover you have a serious health problem, then the Obama pools are made-to-order for you. There are other irrationalities. Although the newly enacted health reform legislation has allocated $5 billion for this project, the Medicare Chief Actuary says this is way too little money to meet the need. The Administration is asking the states to take their share of the money and operate the pools. Eighteen states are refusing the grant. They have decided the money is probably insufficient and that if they refuse the grant and do nothing the federal government itself will set up and fund the pools and inadequate financing will be a federal problem rather than the state’s problem.
18 states refuse to run insurance pools for those with preexisting conditions
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/05/03/AR2010050304072.html
Excerpt: Eighteen states have said they will not administer a stopgap program to provide insurance coverage to people whose preexisting conditions have left them uninsured, forcing the federal government to do the work. The states' decisions increase the challenge the government faces as it sets out to translate the far-reaching health-care legislation into action, and they hint at the complexities to come. At issue is a provision to extend temporary relief to people with preexisting medical conditions beginning this year, instead of making them wait until 2014, when insurers will be prohibited from turning people away or charging higher premiums based on health status. The health-care law sets aside $5 billion for the "high-risk pools."
The War on a Weed Killer
http://www.ncpa.org/sub/dpd/index.php?Article_ID=19303&utm_source=newsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=DPD
$2B is nothing compared to the millions of third world kids who have died since we banned DDT. Excerpt: There is an agenda here far more ambitious than getting one chemical banned, says the Journal. The environmental lobby wants more farmland retired to "nature," and one way to do that is to make farming more expensive. The EPA notes that eliminating atrazine would cost $2 billion annually in lost crop yields and substituting more expensive herbicides. Some farmers would go out of business or ask the federal government for more subsidies.
Greece and the myth of the easy economic fix
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/05/04/AR2010050405128.html?wpisrc=nl_headline
Excerpt: For the past year, I've been warning that the imbalances underlying the financial crisis -- the explosive growth of credit, the mispricing of risk, the mispricing of real estate and other assets, the overcapacity in the global economy -- were so huge that a quick and easy economic recovery was highly unlikely. And for much of that time, it has looked as though I was dead wrong. Stocks rebounded, credit markets revived, corporate profits returned and bank balance sheets have been repaired. But the nagging suspicion is that too much of this rebound is the result of the massive fiscal and monetary stimulus that not only did its job of reversing what was a dangerous downward spiral, but also made it possible for many countries to delay dealing with those fundamental economic imbalances. No better proof exists than the financial drama now unfolding in Western Europe, where for many years countries from Ireland to Greece used the financial cover offered by a new continental currency to overspend, overborrow and overexpand. In the case of Greece, the government took on so much debt during the bubble years that there is almost no way out of its predicament. If Athens manages to make good on its promises to cut spending and turn a nation of tax cheats into taxpayers, there's a good chance it will trigger a vicious deflationary spiral -- falling prices, falling employment and falling government revenue -- that will make it impossible to repay debts. Or Greece could renege on its promises and find itself shut off from further borrowing. Either path leads to some sort of default.
N.Y. plot brings the politics of terrorism to the forefront
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/05/04/AR2010050402000.html?wpisrc=nl_pmpolitics
Excerpt: As the U.S. government begins to build its case against Faisal Shahzad in the attempted New York car bombing, the politics of terrorism are sure to swell quickly in Washington as well. For a White House that has been seeking a new relationship with the Islamic world, the prospect of another terrorist plot that appears to be connected to Pakistan will present a series of complicated -- and politically treacherous -- issues to confront. High on the list of political questions is what impact the apparent plot will have on the controversial issue of whether Khalid Sheik Mohammed -- the avowed mastermind of the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks -- should stand trial in a federal courtroom in Manhattan.
A Connecticut Taliban in Bloomberg's Court
http://www.thenation.com/node/34636
Excerpt: The y arrested the guy quickly, but not fast enough to stop the left from blaming…the Tea Parties! Excerpt: It may be that the Pakistan-based Taliban, the Tehrik-e Taliban Pakistan (TTP), has quietly established a Connecticut franchise while we weren't looking. That's possible. But it seems far more likely to me that the perpetrator of the bungled Times Square bomb plot was either a lone nut job or a member of some squirrely branch of the Tea Party, anti-government far right. Which actually exists in Connecticut, where, it seems, the car's license plates were stolen.
Is Greece Just Tip Of The Iceberg?
http://www.investors.com/NewsAndAnalysis/Article.aspx?id=532120
Kicking the can down the road. Excerpt: Fiscal Crisis: Now it's a done deal: Greece got its $146 billion bailout, which the U.S. will help pay for. But anyone who believes the Western world's financial crisis is over doesn't understand what's really happening. That may sound like a collective sigh of relief coming from Europe. After all, it appears that with Greece's pledge to mend its fiscal ways, the European Union might have turned a corner when it comes to its chronic deficits and exploding debt. But no problem has yet been solved, and more problems likely loom — not just in Europe, but in the U.S. and Asia as well. We'd like to be more upbeat, but the fact is Greece will have to undergo pretty tough financial treatment to get a clean bill of health. Its citizens, who are among the most coddled in the Western world, will see their retirement age jump to 67 from the current 53. At the same time, government workers' pay will be frozen for three years, and they'll no longer collect annual bonuses worth two months' pay. Taxes on liquor, cigarettes and gasoline will rise while the value-added tax increases to 23% from 21%. Pretty bitter medicine, and gauging from the riots and demonstrations that have taken place, we're not sure average Greeks will swallow it. But even if it works, as we said, this doesn't take the sting out of the reality Europe faces. Virtually every country in the EU spends more than it takes in and has made long-term fiscal promises to an aging work force that it can't keep. A little over a year ago, economist Jagadeesh Gokhale, writing for the National Center for Policy Analysis, produced a pithy — and scary — summation of the fiscal challenges faced by Europe. Don't read it if you have trouble sleeping.
Obama National Security Policy: Hope Their Bombs Don't Work
http://www.humanevents.com/article.php?id=36861
Excerpt: It took Faisal Shahzad trying to set a car bomb in Times Square to get President Obama, Attorney General Eric Holder and Secretary of Homeland Security Janet Napolitano to finally use the word "terrorism." (And not to refer to Tea Party activists!) This is a major policy shift for a president who spent a month telling Americans not to "jump to conclusions" after Army doctor Nidal Malik Hasan reportedly jumped on a desk, shouted "Allahu Akbar!" and began shooting up Fort Hood. After last weekend, now Obama is even threatening to pronounce it "Pack-i-stan" instead of "Pahk-i-stahn." We know Obama is taking terrorism seriously because he took a break from his "Hope, Change & Chuckles" tour on the comedy circuit to denounce terrorists. In a bit of macho posturing this week, Obama declared that -- contrary to the terrorists' wishes -- Americans "will not be terrorized, we will not cower in fear, we will not be intimidated." First of all, having the Transportation Security Administration wanding infants, taking applesauce away from 93-year-old dementia patients, and forcing all Americans to produce their shoes, computers and containers with up to 3 ounces of liquid in Ziploc bags for special screening pretty much blows that "not intimidated" look Obama wants America to adopt. "Intimidated"? How about "absolutely terrified"?
The smell of our fear
http://www.nypost.com/p/news/opinion/opedcolumnists/the_smell_of_our_fear_mYzCYnFsrWpPfJv2p8lcyN
Excerpt: Appeasement doesn't work. It doesn't work with dictators, and it doesn't work with terrorists. The attempted Times Square bombing was yet more proof. We've allowed Islamist extremists to dictate what we can say, print or portray. We don't want to offend them. The First Amendment bows before Islam. The Obama administration has ducked all unwelcome evidence that such appeasement doesn't work. Instead, it goes to absurd lengths to convince Muslim radicals that we respect their views. Our counterfactual assumption is that, if we're really, really nice, the fanatics will stop being grumpy and blowing us up. But Islamist extremists haven't read our actions (or inactions) as an admirable exercise in tolerance. They read our bowing and scraping and apologizing as weakness. The mean-dog law applies: Let that pit bull sense that you're afraid, and you're going to feel its teeth.
Black Hopefuls Pick This Year in G.O.P. Races
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/05/05/us/politics/05blacks.html?ref=politics
Excerpt: Among the many reverberations of President Obama’s election, here is one he probably never anticipated: at least 32 African-Americans are running for Congress this year as Republicans, the biggest surge since Reconstruction, according to party officials.
FCC Chairman Genachowski expected to leave broadband services deregulated
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/05/02/AR2010050203262_pf.html
Excerpt: The chairman of the Federal Communications Commission has indicated he wants to keep broadband services deregulated, according to sources, even as a federal court decision has exposed weaknesses in the agency's ability to be a strong watchdog over the companies that provide access to the Web. The FCC currently has "ancillary" authority over broadband providers such as Comcast, AT&T and Verizon and must adequately justify actions over those providers. Last month, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit said the agency had exceeded its authority in 2008 when it applied sanctions against Comcast. The ruling cast doubt over the FCC's ability to create a "net neutrality" rule that would force Internet service providers to treat all services and applications on the Web equally.
Iran navy plane was filming US carrier
http://www.khaleejtimes.com/DisplayArticleNew.asp?col=§ion=international&xfile=data/international/2010/May/international_May156.xml
Excerpt: An Iranian navy plane that came close to a US aircraft carrier in the Gulf was filming the vessel, the Fars news agency quoted Iran’s naval chief as saying on Tuesday. “The F27 plane of the navy flew above this aircraft carrier and took a thorough film. Despite the carrier’s objection we insist that this is our right,” the agency quoted Rear Admiral Habibollah Sayari as saying. On April 21, the Iranian aircraft came as close as 1,000 yards (915 metres) to the USS Eisenhower in the international waters south of Iran, a senior US military officer said, adding that nothing had come of the incident.
U.S. scraps Kandahar assault due to weak Afghan partnership
http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/127297531166.htm
Excerpt: NATO commanders scrapped a helicopter assault by hundreds of U.S. and Afghan troops last week because the Afghans weren't able to take charge, a U.S. military officer familiar with the planning said. The decision to cancel the assault, designed to prepare the ground for the biggest offensive of the nearly nine-year-old war, has frustrated U.S. officers on the ground who say their local partners are not ready to lead. "It wasn't Afghan enough ... approval was denied," a U.S. Army officer with knowledge of the plans told Reuters. "The implication is that the Afghans are in the lead. The bottom line is we're nowhere near the stage where they can be in the lead." The assault in a rural part of Kandahar -- due to take place in March and repeatedly postponed -- would have been one of the biggest operations so far in the province, where U.S. troops are massing to carry out a major offensive beginning in June. Its abrupt cancellation exposes limitations of the Afghan security forces and raises doubts over whether they are ready to start taking control of the country's security this year. The U.S. officer, who asked not to be identified while discussing the cancelled operation, said approval for it had been blocked by a senior NATO commander in the south. The commander, a general, stood up during a planning briefing and told the U.S. officers to come back once the Afghan army was in charge of the operation, he said.
Check out the Carbon Footprint of Al Gore's New Ocean-View Mediterranean Villa
http://directorblue.blogspot.com/2010/05/exclusive-estimate-carbon-footprint-of.html
Not clear this is true. But if so he can just buy more carbon offsets from the carbon offset companies he owns.
Nuclear Equivalence
http://www.commentarymagazine.com/blogs/index.php/boot/289076
Excerpt: I don’t want to make too big a deal of what is a relatively small point in and of itself, but this seems to demonstrate an odd belief that U.S. military capacity is part of the problem, not the solution, to the world’s problems. Implicit in Madam Secretary’s statement is a sort of moral equivalence, which suggests that our nukes are, at some level, just as problematic as those of, say, North Korea, and that if we show the right path toward transparency and arms control, rogue states will follow our lead.
Black Americans and Liberty
http://cnsnews.com/news/article/65158
Excerpt: Contempt or misunderstanding of the principles of personal liberty and faith in government by no means make blacks unique among Americans, but the unique history of black Americans should make us, above all other Americans, most suspicious of any encroachment on personal liberty and most distrustful of government. Let's look at it. The most serious injustices suffered by blacks came at the hands of government, at different levels, failure to protect personal liberty. Slavery was only the most egregious example of that failure. Congress and the courts supported the injustice of slavery through the 1850 Fugitive Slave Act and the Dred Scott decision. After emancipation, there were government-enforced Jim Crow laws denying blacks basic liberties and court decisions such as Plessy v. Ferguson that reinforced and gave sanction to private acts that abridged black people's liberties.
Democrat Arizona Congresswoman: Deputy's Shooting a ‘Wake Up Call,’
http://cnsnews.com/news/article/65162
Excerpt: Declaring that the shooting of a Pinal County, Ariz., sheriff’s deputy by suspected illegal-alien drug traffickers should be a "wake-up call" for politicians in Washington, D.C., Rep. Ann Kirkpatrick (D-Ariz.) said the “border region is out of control” and called for immediate deployment of the National Guard there.
Palin and the Leftist Elites
http://www.americanthinker.com/2010/05/palin_and_the_leftist_elites_1.html
Excerpt: The left can't stand the fact that Palin, like Reagan, isn't one of them. Like Reagan, she is not an "intellectual." She doesn't share what Thomas Sowell dubbed "the vision of the anointed" -- progressive elitists' unshakable faith in their grandiose plans for regimenting our lives. To leftist intellectuals, it's okay to have a president who thinks he visited 57 states, a vice president who has claimed that Franklin Roosevelt went on television to calm the people after the stock market crash of 1929 (no TV yet, and Hoover was president) and a Speaker of the House who has insisted that we must switch from fossil fuels to natural gas. All ignorance, error, and mental dullness can be forgiven as long as one subscribes to the political catechism, "The government must control economic activity." What is unacceptable, even evil, to them is someone like Palin who doesn't subscribe to the same catechism, who just doesn't "get it."
Update From Cochise County, Arizona
http://www.americanthinker.com/2010/05/update_from_cochise_county_ari_1.html
Excerpt: I had hardly received word from the editor that my first report from south east Arizona would be published before more excitement occurred here -- this time even closer to home. Saturday morning the headlines in all the area papers covered the shooting of a Pinal County Deputy by drug smugglers. The reports indicated the officer was ambushed by drug smugglers using AK-47 rifles. How do we know these things? This time the ambush failed and the officer survived. But there is a lot of news in this report that destroys the liberal reports of those grandmothers crossing the border so they can make beds in cheap hotels.
Leaked tapes show EU leaders' frustration at climate summit
http://euobserver.com/9/29990
Excerpt: Leaked tapes from the failed climate summit in Copenhagen published in German weekly Der Spiegel have documented a deeper rift between France, Germany and the US and China and India than previously thought. The tapes were recorded "accidentally" on 18 December 2009, during a meeting of 25 leaders, including Germany's Angela Merkel, France's Nicolas Sarkozy, US President Barack Obama and the representatives of China and India, Der Spiegel reports.
12 Experts To Review U.N. Climate Panel's Work
http://thegwpf.org/ipcc-news/909-12-experts-to-review-un-climate-panels-work.html
Excerpt: Dr. Shapiro, an economist, will lead a group that was assembled by the InterAcademy Council, an organization of the world's leading scientific academies, at the request of the United Nations secretary general, Ban Ki-moon. It will look into the management and review policies of the I.P.C.C. that led to errors in the panel's most recent report, including a faulty estimate of the rate of melting of the Himalayan glaciers and several smaller mistakes. The I.P.C.C. has been faulted for failing to consider alternate views of climate science, sloppy citation of sources and for reliance on some research that was not properly peer-reviewed. The panel will make recommendations on how to avoid such problems and how to identify and quickly correct errors in future reports.” We approach this review with an open mind," Dr. Shapiro said in a statement. "I'm confident we have the experts on this committee necessary to supply the U.N. with a stronger process for providing policymakers the best assessment of climate change possible."
Witnesses of Earlier Climate Change
http://thegwpf.org/the-observatory/911-witnesses-of-earlier-climate-change.html
Excerpt: Glaciologist Schlüchter knows almost exactly the point in time when the trees were growing and the turf was created because specialist laboratories have determined the age of many of his objects. This is possible by using carbon isotopes contained in the finds. This enables Professor Schlüchter to determine when and where the organic material originates from.... Several times in the last 10,000 years the glaciers pulled back and melted down to pitiful remnants - for centuries or even millennia. Some individual trees at these heights grew even over 600 years old. According to estimates, the so-called equilibrium line, which forms the border between the zones of accumulation and ablation of a glacier, was up to 300 meters higher than today at certain times. For many years glacier research only explored the advances and the maximum extension of the glaciers, says Schlüchter. Why nobody has been interested in how far they were retreating between the advances is a mystery for him. What exactly led to the sometimes spectacular and rapid glacier melting in recent millennia cannot be said with certainty.... It is striking that times... with little ice in the Alps coincided with periods of great solar activity.... The findings of Schlüchter expose not only the image of the glacier-covered Alps as a mirage. Rather more, the observed retreat of glaciers today seems perfectly normal. And the current temperature increase seems to be hardly extraordinary. When asked whether his research results qualify the fuss about climate change, Professor Schlüchter hesitates with an answer: "It is simply much controlled by the sun." How did other scientists react to his findings? Schlüchter does not want to talk about it. He suggests, however, that there were negative reactions....
The May Day angry mob you won’t see
http://michellemalkin.com/2010/05/03/the-may-day-angry-mob-you-wont-see/
Excerpt: They came, they saw, they threatened or committed violence in the name of open borders and workers’ rights. But alas, Frank Rich and Paul Krugman’s columns decrying the insane rage and hate of the May Day angry mob got lost in the mail. In Santa Cruz, they carried torches and vandalized at least 18 businesses:
US had burn-off plan for oil spills but the equipment wasn’t there
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/us_and_americas/article7115273.ece
You’re doing a heck of a job, Bammie! Excerpt: The White House faced claims last night that the Gulf Coast oil spill could have been contained and kept far from land within days of the Deepwater Horizon explosion if oil from the gushing wellhead had been burnt off in line with a plan drafted by the US Government for precisely this sort of disaster. The plan requires the immediate deployment of specialised “fire booms” capable of burning 95 per cent of a slick— but not one boom was available on the Gulf Coast at the time of the blast, according to a supplier who eventually provided one eight days later. “The whole reason the plan was created was so that we could pull the trigger right away,” Ron Gourget, a former federal oil spill response coordinator and one of those who drafted the document, said yesterday.
Two different wars in Viet Nam
http://www.americanthinker.com/2010/05/the_two_vietnam_wars.html
Excerpt: On Friday of last week, much of the establishment media reminded us of the awful 35th anniversary of the so-called "End of the Vietnam War" -- on April 30, 1975. This is only partly true, and now we need to know what the late commentator Paul Harvey would correctly call "the rest of the story." On Friday and throughout the weekend, familiar pictures were shown of American helicopters lifting people off the roof of the U.S. Embassy in Saigon as the South Vietnamese government was collapsing to the invading Communists from the North -- and this was dutifully labeled again as the "first war ever lost by America." Since this snapshot of so-called "history" is highly misleading, it becomes vital that the entire story of Vietnam and its Cold War aftermath be clearly understood -- so that today's partisan politicians, media commentators and far-Left "Progressives" cannot scam the American public with a variety of false "lessons" of that long-ago conflict and its far-reaching consequences. Unfortunately, we live in an age when far too little attention is paid to history -- real history. What actually happened back then is often rewritten to satisfy political or ideological appetites of "Scamalot" revisionists -- who may be journalists, or academics, or deceitful governments, or religious zealots, or even occupants of high political office.
The Global Crisis of Legitimacy
http://www.stratfor.com/weekly/20100503_global_crisis_legitimacy?utm_source=GWeekly&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=100504&utm_content=readmore&elq=dd0b8824b2b541d7b7ee617709df55f2
Excerpt: This is not something that is confined to the United States by any means, although part of this analysis is designed to explain why the Obama administration must go after Goldman Sachs, Lehman Brothers and others. The symbol of Goldman Sachs profiting from actions that devastate national wealth, or of the management of Lehman wiping out shareholder value while they themselves did well, creates a crisis of confidence in the political and financial systems. With the crisis of legitimacy still not settling down after nearly two years, the reaction of the political system is predictable. It will both anoint symbolic miscreants, and redefine the structure of risk and liability in financial corporations. The goal is not so much to achieve something as to create the impression that it is achieving something, in other words, to demonstrate that the political system is prepared to control the entities it created. We see a similar crisis in Europe. The financial institutions in Europe were fully complicit in the global financial crisis. They bought and sold derivatives whose value they knew to be other than stated, the same as Americans. Though the European financial institutions have asserted they were the hapless victims of unscrupulous American firms, the Europeans were as sophisticated as their American counterparts. Their elites knew what they were doing. Complicating the European position was the creation of the economic union and the euro by the economic and political elite. There has always been a great deal of ambiguity concerning the powers and authority of the European Union, but its intentions were always clear: to harmonize Europe and to create European-wide solutions to economic problems. This goal always created unease in Europe. There were those who were concerned that a united Europe would exist to benefit the elites, rather than the broader public. There were also those who believed it was designed to benefit the Franco-German core of Europe rather than Europe as a whole. Overall, this reflected minority sentiment, but it was a substantial minority. The financial crisis came at Europe in three phases. The first was part of the American subprime crisis. The second wave was a uniquely European crisis. European banks had taken massive positions in the Eastern European banking systems. For example, the Czech system was almost entirely foreign (Austrian and Italian) owned. These banks began lending to Eastern European homebuyers, with mortgages denominated in euros, Swiss francs or yen rather than in the currencies of the countries involved (none yet included in the eurozone). Doing this allowed banks to reduce interest rates, as the risk of currency fluctuation was pushed over to the borrower. But when the zlotys and forints began to plunge, these monthly mortgage payments began to soar, as did defaults. The European core, led by Germany, refused a European bailout of the borrowers or lenders even though the lenders who created this crisis were based in eurozone countries. Instead, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) was called in to use funds that included American and Chinese, as well as European, money to solve the problem. This raised the political question in Eastern Europe as to what it meant to be part of the European Union. The third wave is represented by crisis in sovereign debt in countries that are part of the eurozone but not in the core of Europe — Greece, of course, but also Portugal and possibly Spain. In the Greek case, the Germans in particular hesitated to intervene until it could draw the IMF — and non-European money and guarantees — into the mix. This obviously raised questions in the periphery about what membership in the eurozone meant, just as it created questions in Eastern Europe about what EU membership meant.
Race and Resentment by Thomas Sowell
http://townhall.com/columnists/ThomasSowell/2010/05/04/race_and_resentment
Excerpt: Recent stories out of both Philadelphia and San Francisco tell of black students beating up Asian American students. This is especially painful for those who expected that the election of Barack Obama would mark the beginning of a post-racial America. While Obama's winning the majority of the votes in overwhelmingly white states suggests that many Americans are ready to move beyond race, it is painfully clear that others are not. Those who explain racial antagonisms on some rationalistic basis will have a hard time demonstrating how Asian Americans have made blacks worse off. Certainly none of the historic wrongs done to blacks was done by the small Asian American population who, for most of their history in this country, have not had enough clout to prevent themselves from being discriminated against……In our own times, especially, this is not just a spontaneous reaction. Many of our educators, our intelligentsia and our media -- not to mention our politicians-- promote an attitude that other people's achievements are grievances, rather than examples. When black school children who are working hard in school and succeeding academically are attacked and beaten up by black classmates for "acting white," why is it surprising that similar hostility is turned against Asian Americans, who are often achieving academically more so than whites? This attitude is not peculiar to some in the black community or to the United States. The same phenomenon is found among lower-class whites in Britain, where academically achieving white students have been beaten up badly enough by their white classmates to require hospital treatment.
Did Obama administration tell GM to lie about its TARP repayment?
http://www.examiner.com/examiner/x-12977-Car-News-Views-and-Reviews-Examiner~y2010m5d2-Car-views-Did-Obama-administration-tell-GM-to-lie-about-its-TARP-repayment
Excerpt: General Motors chairman Ed Whitacre made news last week with a series of national television advertising spots in which he claimed the company has repaid its government bailout loans in full, ahead of schedule and with interest. Unfortunately, according to Neil Barofsky, the Inspector-General for the Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP) under which the federal loans were made to GM, the repayments cited by Whitacre were simply made with other tax dollars made available to the automaker in its bailout deal with the government. So in effect GM was repaying one government loan with another government loan. Now Whitacre is not a dumb guy, nor are there any ethics scandals in his previous record as a very successful CEO at AT&T. He was even the national head of the Boy Scouts of America, so why all of a sudden is he making a transparently false statement in a GM TV spot?
Climate Debate Running Out Of Steam
http://thegwpf.org/opinion-pros-a-cons/908-climate-debate-running-out-of-steam-.html
Excerpt: In Petersberg, near Bonn, heads of state and government are discussing the future of international climate policy. Angela Merkel has been forced to recognise that the fretfulness about global warming catastrophe is being replaced by sensible pragmatism. Only the benefactors of climate hysteria still resist. At other times, when climate catastrophism was still a booming enterprise, a climate conference such as this would have attracted massive media attention for days on end. The leaders of 45 countries are meeting at the Hotel Petersberg near Bonn from today until Tuesday.... Even within the European Union there is little willingness to shift billions of euros in subsidies and transfers to poor countries for the complete reconstruction of the world economy that would be necessary for decarbonisation.... The wind in the climate debate has changed direction - and it is becoming much weaker. As it stands, Angela Merkel is therefore looking to discreetly abdicate from her throne as the world’s climate saviour on which she can no longer shine and on which no leader can gleam anymore. The discussions at Petersberg summoned by Merkel in order to sort out the mess after the Copenhagen and to show a way forward, however, are purely informal.
What If Arizona Were Quebec?
http://www.americanthinker.com/2010/05/what_if_arizona_were_quebec_1.html
Excerpt: Suppose for a moment that 15 million Americans -- the population of Massachusetts, Maine, New Hampshire, Vermont, Rhode Island, and Connecticut combined -- sneaked across the border into Quebec. Suppose that these illegal immigrants refused to learn to speak French, that they applied for Canadian welfare, that they reproduced at a rate higher than Quebec's residents, and that they bankrupted Canada's socialized medical system. Suppose that they sent their children to Canadian schools in such large numbers that Quebec's school system had to teach "French as a Second Language" courses.
On Becoming an Un-Hyphenated American
http://www.americanthinker.com/2010/05/on_becoming_an_unhyphenated_am.html
Excerpt: I (would) cheapen the value of America and give credit to a sorry chapter in our family's history by insisting on hyphenating my nationality. Unfortunately, the American government now thinks differently. The census taker repeated his question. I replied, "I would rather be just an American, but I suppose technically I am a Latino of European origin." "I do not have a box for Latinos of European origin," he said. I just shrugged. "And your daughter, is she a Latino of European origin?" I shook my head. "No, you don't understand. The reason we came to this country was so she could be an American. She is a good one, too. She has the poise, the confidence, the sense of fair play, the optimism, the drive to succeed, and the tolerance that marks America."
US Gulf units may not fire on Iranian military without White House say-so
http://www.debka.com/article/8747/
Glad I’m not in the fleet. Excerpt: The US Fifth Fleet and US aircraft carrier USS Eisenhower in the Gulf of Oman were not allowed to shoot at an Iranian Fokker F27 aircraft which on April 21 hovered for 20 minutes 900 meters over the carrier and no more than 250 meters away, even though they saw its flight crew gathering intelligence on the Eisenhower and its warship escorts. DEBKA-Net-Weekly's military sources report that the US Persian Gulf command went public on the incident on April 28, a whole week later, only after Gulf military circles, amazed at the American naval and air units' passivity in the face of hostile surveillance, threatened to break the story to local media. This striking restraint indicates that the US Gulf and Arabian fleets are under orders to take no action - certainly not to open fire - against Iranian naval or air units, with first obtaining permission directly from Washington.
Gulf States and a Nuclear Iran
http://www.commentarymagazine.com/blogs/index.php/boot/288361
Excerpt: There is a lot of support, albeit beneath the surface, for American military action against Iran, which, in the Gulfies’ view, could deal a decisive setback to the “Persians.” An Israeli strike, on the other hand, they fear, would not inflict much damage and would only allow the mullahs to rally the Arab street behind them. They are also “deathly afraid” (in the words of one American ambassador) that the U.S. will sell them out by reaching a deal with Iran.
NPT Mischief-Making
http://www.commentarymagazine.com/blogs/index.php/rubin/288441
Excerpt: This aptly illustrates the many deficiencies with Obama’s Middle East policy and nuclear-proliferation approach. By elevating the non-proliferation gambit, he has given a forum to distract and complicate reasonable measures focused on the only nuclear threat that matters right now — Iran. By ingratiating himself with Arab states and savaging Israel, he has only encouraged the former to do the same. And by taking the nuclear-free Middle East pipe dream seriously, we only encourage further mischief.
The coming catastrophe
http://www.boston.com/bostonglobe/editorial_opinion/oped/articles/2010/04/30/the_coming_catastrophe/
Excerpt: This week, Rudolph Penner and Robert Reischauer, both former directors of the Congressional Budget Office, briefed the National Commission on Fiscal Responsibility and Reform about the challenges they’ll face in finding ways to cut the federal budget deficit to a sustainable level. That task is so difficult that some fear it can’t be accomplished in today’s polarized Washington. Len Burman, the former director of the Tax Policy Center and now a professor at Syracuse University, worries that little will be done until calamity looms. “Our history is that we are good at crises, but we are not good at dealing with long-term problems,’’ notes Burman, whose article “Countdown to Catastrophe’’ in the latest issue of the Milken Institute Review should be required reading in Washington. “But if we wait until a crisis happens, it will be too late because the consequences will be disastrous.’’ Oddly, says Penner, who led CBO from 1983 to 1987, foreigners tend to be more optimistic that the United States will summon the resolve to fix the problem. In his remarks to the panel, he used a Winston Churchill quote to sum up the mood he finds abroad: “You can count on Americans to do the right thing after they have tried everything else.’’
Congressional Research Service memo raises fresh constitutional questions about Obamacare
http://dailycaller.com/2010/05/02/crs-memo-raises-fresh-constitutional-questions-about-obamacare/#ixzz0msXxjzxR
Excerpt: A just-released memo from the Congressional Research Service (CRS) raises fresh constitutional concerns about a provision in President Obama’s health-care law that could impose tens of millions of dollars in fines on Congress, state and local governments. As reported by The Daily Caller, Congress could be fined up to $50 million annually by its own health-care law if low-level aides apply for government subsidies to help pay their health-care costs. The new memo from Congress’s research arm states that state and local governments would be on the hook for such fines as well – but argues those fines may be unconstitutional under Supreme Court precedents on federalism. The issue is important because a slew of states are challenging the health-care law’s legality in court. If governments were found to be exempt in court, a ruling could establish one set of rules for the private sector and another more lenient set for the rapidly expanding public sector.
The Fall of Saigon, the stories of the boat people --Minh Pham
http://media.www.thespartandaily.com/media/storage/paper852/news/2010/04/29/Opinion/The-Fall.Of.Saigon.The.Stories.Of.The.Boat.People-3914902-page1.shtml
Excerpt: This Friday will mark the 35th anniversary of a day that changed the lives of millions of Vietnamese families, including my own. On April 30, 1975, the North Vietnam Communist party captured Saigon, the capital of South Vietnam, ending a war that tore the country apart for more than 15 years. The evening before that day, my grandmother's sister's family committed suicide. The family of nine all drank poison and the father, a lieutenant in the Southern army, secured their fate with a gunshot to each member's head. explained that, for their family, it was either death at their own hands or at the hands of the Viet Cong, the term given to the North Vietnam Communist party. I hear stories about whole families committing suicide now and I've judged those people, thinking it was such a crazy thing to do. But hearing my aunt tell stories about the cruelty of the Viet Cong and of all the people she knew who committed suicide on April 30, the lines between what is right, wrong, sane and crazy become blurred.
China-Russia Competition Opens A Door For America
http://www.forbes.com/2010/04/22/china-russia-politics-tension-markets-economy-oil-gas.html?boxes=marketschannelnews
Excerpt: For the past two decades, many in the West have worried about the growth of Russo-Chinese influence over the newly independent states of Central Asia. Through the mutual-security group called the Shanghai Cooperation Organization and in scores of joint military exercises, counter-terrorism maneuvers and energy projects, the two great powers collaborated closely in order to keep these buffer states peaceful, compliant and relatively free of American penetration. Lately, however, a perceptible shift has overtaken the region. In 2010, the biggest threat to China and Russia's Central Asian interests may now be each other. Fueling these growing Sino-Russian tensions are the divergent prospects of the two economies. China's economy grew by 8.7% in 2009, despite the global slump, while Russia's economy contracted by 7.9%, with foreign direct investment (FDI) plummeting by nearly half. With Russia's prospects continuing to dim, China has accelerated its courtship, rapidly replacing Russia as the principal source of foreign investment and aid in Central Asia. In the past year alone, China National Petroleum Corporation completed a deal to buy a 50% stake in Kazakhstan's largest oil company, outbidding Russia's Gazprom, while China's State Development Bank invested $4 billion in Turkmenistan's largest gas producer, allowing it to stay afloat during a "gas war" instigated by Moscow.
Report from Cochise County, Arizona
http://www.americanthinker.com/2010/05/report_from_cochise_county_ari.html
Excerpt: I moved to Cochise County after retiring from the Army in 2008 to take a position working at Fort Huachuca (pronounced "wa-choo-ka," an Apache word meaning "place of thunder" and referring to the time after the summer monsoon season). Having lived here in 1991 for eight months while attending an Army school, I soon realized that the place had changed considerably in the eighteen years of my absence. The first thing I noticed was how many border patrol vehicles were on the roads in the city of Sierra Vista. The Border Patrol has a large station near here in the city of Naco. There are far more Border Patrol vehicles in the area than SV police cars. They come in many forms -- trucks for off-road work, trailers carrying all-terrain vehicles, pickups with capacity for carrying large numbers of people once apprehended, and even a staff car for the area chaplain. The Border Patrol presence has grown substantially, so one would think the border area was nice and safe. Not so. Within a short time after arriving in southern Arizona while on my way to work, I noticed eight illegal immigrants on the side of the road. Fortunately, they were in the custody of capable and attentive Border Patrol agents. Unfortunately, they were less than a hundred feet from my daughter's bus stop. She gets personal service to school now, as the school district refuses to enter the gated community in which we live. There is a nice wash, a valley into which the rainwater drains during the monsoons, which provides a nice route for the illegals to follow into the city, and therefore into their locations for pickup by the vehicles that will get them farther north.... Working on a U.S. Army fort, one would think we were fairly secure from these threats. Just not true. Reading the Fort Huachuca newspaper one morning, I noticed an interesting part of the "community" page. It asked for volunteers to assist in cleaning up "dumps" on posts where the illegals would drop their supplies used to cross the border and change clothing. They do this in order to blend in and not look like they just spent a day or two crossing the border in the dust and heat of southern Arizona. The most frightening part of this is that Fort Huachuca is the U.S. Army Intelligence Center, where the Army trains its intelligence soldiers -- analysts, interrogators, radio intercept specialists, and counterintelligence agents -- for operations overseas. If we can't secure the fort we use to train our intelligence soldiers, how can we secure anything else?
US may stop using UN veto on resolutions targeting Israel
http://www.jpost.com/Israel/Article.aspx?id=174389
Excerpt: In an attempt to launch indirect proximity talks between Israel and the Palestinians, the US has given private assurances that it would consider not using its veto power against UN Security Council condemnations of any significant new settlement activity, the Guardian reported. A Palestinian source quoted by the UK paper said David Hale, a deputy of US Middle East envoy George Mitchell, told Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas last week that if there was "significantly provocative settlement activity," including in east Jerusalem, Washington may consider allowing UNSC resolutions censuring Israel to pass. According to the paper, the source said "it was understood that meant the US would abstain from voting on a resolution rather than use its veto." State Department officials, however, denied a similar report in The New York Times this week. Chief Palestinian negotiator Saeb Erekat also said such assurances were not given. "It's not true," he said, according to the Guardian. "We are still talking to the Americans."
Wednesday, May 5, 2010
Tea Party? Maybe not
I was sent this photo, cannot vouch for it. (Photoshop can do anything.) But if true, I suspect this wasn't one of those nutty Tea Party people the media is worried about.
I’m Dying (Updated May, 2011)
Update May, 2011: My pulmonologists now thinks I have the NSIP (Non-Specific Interstitial Pneumonitis) version of Pulmonary Fibrosis, which is less aggressive than standard IPF. That’s a good thing, probably why I’m still alive past my five-year sell-by date. On the other hand, he thinks I have the more aggressive fibrotic version of NSIP rather than the cellular-version, so that’s bad. My oxygen needs have stayed stable for a year, so that’s good.
Original Post with O2 update at the end:
Well, maybe (I'm not dying) right away, so my liberal friends shouldn't get their hopes up. And, no, not over the latest bad news out of Washington.
Sure, I realize that every adult is technically “dying,” having started the long deterioration process that leads to dusty death. I mean I have a diagnosis of a terminal illness. Actually, I had the first diagnosis in June of 2006, about six months after the symptoms started. (Sorry I didn’t tell you before, but it slipped my mind.)
It started with a cold and a cough that I couldn’t shake, on December 31, 2005. I’ve pretty much had that cough every day since. It didn’t worry me too much at first, as I have a history of lingering coughs, going back at least to collage. Finally, I ended up at the pulmonologist. He did a CT scan, a pulmonary function test and diagnosed “early interstitial fibrosis.”
That got my attention, as my mother died of pulmonary fibrosis at age 69, in 1995, less than six months after her diagnosis. (They don’t know what causes PF, but heredity is considered a strong factor, and probably there is a gene. My exposure to secondary smoke over the years may be a factor as well.) He said he didn’t think I was at high risk of developing full blown PF, but not at average risk, either. He suggested some therapies they hoped would slow the advance of the disease, with which I was compliant. So I lived with the (productive, which is atypical for IPF) cough and went on with life.
In October of 09 I went to Colorado Springs on business, and the altitude knocked me for down and sat on me. Even after returning home, I started to be short of breath after exertion. If I carry stuff up the stairs, or walk too far or fast, I pant like I’m back on the parade deck at Parris Island after a long run. A bronchoscopy in January confirmed that I have Idiopathic Pulmonary Fibrosis.
All you really need to know is that there is no cure for IPF, and it’s eventually fatal, except for a small number of people who are lucky enough to get and survive lung transplants. (I’ve met a couple, which is encouraging.) About 85% survive the transplant operation, and the 5-year survival rate is between 70% and 50%, my doc tells me. The catch is that you have to be a lot sicker than me to get on the transplant list. And if you are too sick, you don’t survive the process. IPF can apparently stabilize for years, then take a sudden drop. It makes life interesting.
So, most people who have IPF eventually die from it. The question is when “eventually” is. About 50% of those with IPF are dead at my point. But I’ve talked to or know of people who are still trucking along at seven or ten years, and met one who was diagnosed in 1982, been on oxygen since 1999, but is still getting around. The idea is to stretch it out so that something else gets you.
You probably haven’t heard of IPF (there are a lot of variations. A lung biopsy might narrow mine down further—but that carries its own risks.), so you are thinking it’s pretty rare, even though Robert Goulet, Evil Knievel and Liam Clancy died from it. And WD-40 doesn’t cure it—John Barry died from it too.
Actually, the estimates are that 40,000 to 45,000 Americans die every year of PF, and that anywhere from 200,000 to 500,000 people are living with it nationwide. It is under diagnosed and the death rate is also hard to pin down. For example, if I exert myself too much and my “sats” (oxygen saturation levels) drop below 90 too often or too far, it can damage my heart, and I could die of congestive heart failure. (I carry a meter to check my pulse and my sats.) So my death might be classified as “heart disease,” though it would be the PF that caused it. (When I was single, I was hoping cause of death would be, “Shot be a jealous husband at age 100,” but Bonnie has kind of ruled that out. And wheezing and coughing are hardly going to get you one of Tiger’s girls.)
This death rate is believed higher than the Breast Cancer death rate. Breast Cancer now is estimated to claim slightly under 40,000 lives a year. The reason you don’t know about IPF is that you don’t turn on your TV and hear about pink ribbons, postage stamps or the latest high hype “Race for the Cure” for IPF, because it hits both men and women. So it gets only a tiny fraction of the research funds that Breast Cancer gets. Breast Cancer is, of course, an elite, political disease. It gets six to ten times the research dollars per death as even lung cancer.
What is IPF? Basically, the sacs in your lungs that transfer oxygen to your blood become scar tissue and cease to function. If you listen to me breath with a stethoscope, you hear a “cracking” sound—the scar tissue trying to flex. When you can no longer get enough oxygen, you smother. Oops--too blunt. I mean you “expire from respiratory failure.”
Note that I’m not a doctor and don’t play one on TV, so you should double check any facts I give you here.
I’m pretty lucky among those who have IPF. I’m past the 50% survival rate line, still able to work full time, and not yet on oxygen. I have the type of job that I can do even when I do have to be on oxygen, and the surgeons I work for are classy folks and very supportive. My wife Bonnie is also a tower of strength and help.
There are a lot of folks ten or twenty years younger than me with IPF, who are in worse shape. And, having won the lottery of birth and been born in the United States, I’ve benefited from the political and economic freedoms we were bequeathed by those who went before us. I’ve already lived longer and better than 98% of the people who have ever lived. Not that I’m giving up—I’m shooting for 99%. But when I do croak (I hate “Pass away.”), I won’t really have a complaint coming.
I’m in very good spirits, not depressed, and very much enjoying life and my job. I’m still writing, still learning; recently read Thomas Sowell’s Applied Economics and as I write am re-reading Hogan’s Kicking the Sacred Cow about controversies in science, both of which I highly recommend.
I do laugh when fans of my blog write and say I should run for president. Along with no money, base or name recognition, I hardly have the ability to campaign and give speeches. I also laugh when critics write and say I’m an old fart and should die and let the younger generation take over. Not just yet, thank you. I hope I have several years of productive work in me. I don’t know, of course, there are those “sudden declines.” But none of us is promised tomorrow. And I volunteered for Vietnam when I was twenty, had an easy tour and was lucky enough to come home in one piece, so the past 44 years have been gravy. (No, I don’t think my IPF was caused by Agent Orange—or George Bush.)
I didn’t write this because I’m looking for sympathy, so spare me. As my old Gunny used to say, “If you want sympathy, Hall, you can find it in the dictionary between shit and syphilis!” And I have a Marine bumper sticker that says, “Don’t you quit on my, Maggot!” to motivate me just like my DIs did. So I’m doing fine.
I wrote this post because I’ve become active in IPF support groups and the Pulmonary Fibrosis Foundation to educate myself. Their biggest hurdle to fighting the disease is that few people know about it, while everyone knows about Breast Cancer and AIDS, which get the lion’s share of research dollars.
I can’t educate the whole country. But I felt I should do my part—and now you know about IPF. Thanks for reading. If you want to know more, there are some websites linked below. Semper Fi. ~Bob
http://noairtogo.tripod.com/ild.htm#What
http://www.pulmonaryfibrosis.org/
http://www.coalitionforpf.org/index.php
Updates
6/9/10
Well, time to go on Oxygen
I gather I’ll have a concentrator in my home and tanks. I told the pulmo tech I preferred liquid, but don’t know if that translated. Also found out that I can rent a portable concentrator from them for $75 a week to take when I fly or on vacation. I understand it only goes to 3 LPM, but think that will do for short periods if I don’t overdue it.
I had a sleep study May 25, 2010, then was called back Friday, June 4 for one with a CPAP, as my O2 saturation levels were dropping into the high 70s late in the night. They didn’t get the results to the Pulmo doc in time for my appointment on 6/8, but I’m sure a CPAP is in my near future, not sure with or without O2.
The pulmo doc ordered a 6-minute walking test. The tech quickly stopped me to add O2, then to increase it twice. The verdict is I need 4 LPM of O2 when walking or in other exertion, but am okay without when sitting. They did a flight simulator test and said I need 1 LPM when I fly.
The pulmo doc reviewed the CT scan they did. He said it shows some increase in the fibrosis, but not a lot, however, the O2 sats and the shortness of Breathe indicate it has gotten worse. He said five different Thoracic Radiologists had reviewed my CT scans. The first three thought UIP-usual interstitial pneumonia. The last two think NSIP-non-specific interstitial pneumonitis, which would be good as he says UIP is more aggressive. He is “cautiously optimistic” that it’s NSIP. I would need a lung biopsy to be sure, but I’m not up to the time out of work and the risks. I hear it’s a tough go. Given that there are no good treatments either way, I’m going to sit tight and use the O2 and probably the CPAP.
Update 6/17/10
Using the O2. hate the tether, but it does make me feel and sleep better.
Update 7/21/10
Here's a good clip on IPF:
The Most Deadly Disease You've Probably Never Heard Of
http://www.kmir6.com/global/Category.asp?c=169134&topVideoCatNo=169134&autoStart=true&clipId=4931685
Monday, May 3, 2010
Why Obama is Bad For America
This is an unfinished work. I had more sources to research, but was too time starved and too depressed to go on. Please feel free to add comments.
I am traveling with limited time or computer access, and left this to post.
Many of these are pulled from e-mails or posting on the web. Some large, some small, some new, some old, and in no particular order:
He promised that “people making under $250,00 a year won’t pay a penny more in taxes.” Then:
• He raises cigarette taxes $101 a pack, which hits the poor hardest, as they smoke more.
• He supported a healthcare bill that has a tax on “Cadillac” plans that will eventually tax about 20% of the people making between $50k and $75k. http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9C02E0DE1638F93AA15751C1A96F9C8B63
• The Healthcare bill has other taxes as well, in violation of his promise. http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2009/dec/27/harrys-dream-come-true/?feat=article_top10_shared
• He supports letting the Bush tax cuts expire which, contrary to the narrative they sold the media, will increase everyone’s taxes. http://blog.heritage.org/2010/01/01/morning-bell-happy-tax-year/
• He supports a healthcare reform bill that will charge married people more than single people living together. http://online.wsj.com/article/SB126281943134818675.html
• We are learning the healthcare bill has many new taxes in violation of his promises to the American people.
He promised transparency in the negotiations for the Healthcare bills, and that they would be on C-Span (many times), then conducted all negotiations in secret.
http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/opinion/Time-for-sit-down-protests-by-Hill-reporters-8727555-80808097.html
http://www.breitbart.tv/the-c-span-lie-did-obama-really-promise-televised-healthcare-negotiations/?utm_source=Illinois+Policy+Institute&utm_campaign=e3d3e6c07c-Nov+19%2C+2009+E-letter&utm_medium=email
When John McCain called him on it at the so called “Healthcare Summit,” he said, ‘The election’s over, John.” Translation: They promises were to get votes from the rubes, I never meant to keep them.
He sealed many of his college and other records, so Americans would know little of his past.
He comes from Chicago politics, and appointed many members of the Chicago Machine and Illinois Combine (including Republicans) to his administration.
He bought his home with the assistance of a corrupt, convicted political fixer, Tony Rezko.
He supports Cap and Trade bills that will kill the American Economy and raise costs for everyone, based on increasingly-challenged bad science.
At the bidding of the unions, he opposes free trade agreements that have always helped the economy. It was anti free trade in the form of Smooth-Hawley that locked in the great depression, because trade collapsed. The rest of the world seems to have learned that and is going forward with it.
He is an enemy of economic freedom and is a supporter of government planning, at a time when India and China have become economic powerhouses by opening up their economies to free markets. http://ow.ly/TkSV
He killed the Charter school program in DC which gave poor black families the right to choose their kids schools as he has for his kids, at the behest of teachers’ unions.
Worked for and supported ACORN, a criminal organization involved in tax evasion and voter fraud.
He revealed his true leaning by hanging a decoration showing mass-murderer Mao on the White house Christmas Tree. Hitler would have been better—Mao killed three times as many people.
He is the 1st president in 110 years to miss the annual Army-Navy Football Game.
He is the 1st president to not attend any Christmas religious observance.
He is the 1st president to stay on vacation after a terrorist attack.
Add to that he’s the first President not to stay in Washington for Christmas for the last 20 years. Past Presidents did not leave Washington for Christmas vacation until after Christmas. This was done so that their staff (Secret Service, Air Force One Crew, Limousine transport, Presidential advancing logistics etc.) could be with their families for Christmas.
He appointed Janet “the System Worked” Napolitano as Secretary of Homeland Security. She focused the department of watching American veterans as potential terrorists, rather than Islamic militants.
He appointed Erroll Southers as TSA head. He’s a former FBI agent who lied to Congress about his having misused the system to search records.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/01/06/AR2010010604499.html?wpisrc=nl_pmpolitics
He went to Rev. Wright’s church for 20 years without every discovering that Wright was anti-American and a racist.
He promised “bi-partisanship” and an end to Washington as usual. Then shut out Republicans and every Republican suggestion from the Healthcare Bills. He supported a process avoiding a conference committee, so no Republican would have a say.
Despite some lip service, he opposes tort reform, which would lower the cost of healthcare (rather than shift it to other people like taxpayers) because the Trial Lawyers are major Democrat contributors and almost all Democrat leaders are lawyers.
He declared that “we are at war with al Qaeda,” but treated the al Qaeda attacker on Christmas day 2009 as a criminal, rather than a POW, assuring that we would get no information from him to prevent future attacks.
He allowed his Attorney General, eric Holder, to schedule the trial of Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, the 9/11 mastermind, as a civilian trial in New York, opening up the opportunity for al Qaeda to stage a terrorist attack to demand his release.
He decided his political appointee should control how much bankers get in bonuses, but approved limitless bailouts for Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, with large bonuses for their executives, despite these agencies’ role in triggering the housing bubble and economic collapse.
He engineered the government and union takeover/bailout of GM and Chrysler. Spent $3B on the cash-for-clunkers programs, in which future taxpayers help people buy cars now they were likely to buy anyway.
With almost no facts, he called the Cambridge police “stupid” for arresting a belligerent supporter of his, but said we shouldn’t “jump to conclusions” when a Muslim murdered 14 Americans while shouting “Allah Akbar.” He called the al Qaeda Christmas Crotch-Bomber an “Isolated Incident.”
Betrayed his lack of understanding of foreign countries when, during the campaign, he complained that Iraq was soaking up translators needed in Afghanistan, where they speak different languages than Iraq.
He changed the name of the “War on Terror” to “Overseas contingency operations.” Since the failed al Qaeda Christmas Crotch-Bomber attack was in Detroit, seems to be slowly sliding back to ‘war on Terror.”
He gave Interpol diplomatic immunity, abrogating American’s constitutional rights.
He appointed Kareem Shora, a devout Muslim, who was born in Damascus, Syria as ADC National Executive Director and as a member of the Homeland Security Advisory Council.
He made a deal with the drug makers association. They spend millions supporting his healthcare takeover and he took reducing drug costs out of the bill. http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/politics/Once-Obama_s-target_-lobbyist-Tauzin-now-his-pet-8722075-80746897.html
He gets a lot of campaign funding and funding to support his agenda from big unions. Then he rewarded them with our dollars. http://commonamericanjournal.com/?p=8800
He supports taking the secret ballot away from working people in union elections, leaving them open to intimidation and violence by union thugs.
He blames Bush for everything that happens.
He thinks he deserves a Peace prize for being him.
He appointed a new commander in Afghanistan in March, 09, and announced a New Strategy. When the new strategy required more troops needed for that strategy, he wobbled for three months, gave the commander half of what he needed, and told the Taliban if they just hold out until July of 2011, we’ll go home and they can go back to abusing women.
He tried to interfere in the Democratic process in Honduras when they threw out a leftist for violating their constitution. But when the Mullahs in Iran murdered democratic protesters in the streets, he was silent.
He thinks the president should bow to foreign leaders.
His crack on Leno about the Special Olympics tells you what kind of person he is, and who he looks down on. And his Chief of Staff uses “retarded” as a pejorative, so it’s ingrained in this administration.
His answer to every problem is “a review.”
His healthcare bill will cause many seniors to lose private coverage.
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748703510304574626441126356878.html
By putting the blame on the CIA for the crotch-bomber, he strained an already bad relationship, which needs to be good for our safety. http://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2010/01/obamas_problems_with_the_intel.html
Voted for the 2007-08 deficits he criticizes Bush for, and in his first year, ran up a larger deficit than all 8 Bush years put together, with no end in sight. http://hotair.com/archives/2009/12/08/wapo-repeats-inherited-deficit-fallacy/
Imposed a deadline on Iran about nukes that was meaningless, and they knew it.
http://www.nypost.com/p/news/opinion/opedcolumnists/day_of_reckoning_hHNtbO7IbHnphV3rxxYZ8N
Rewarded his Wall Street donors with bailout money.
http://canadafreepress.com/index.php/article/18464
He lied or was wrong about Islamic history in his Cairo speech, crediting Islam with things that pre-dated Islam.
Has shifted US policy away from Israel, our only Ally and the only democracy in the region. He showed great disrespect for Israel’s PM.
His appointees dropped a voter-intimidation case against Black Panthers caught on tape threatening white voters in Philadelphia to prevent them from voting. They denied requests from the US Civil rights Commission about the case. In Obama’s America, it’s okay to intimidate voters if blacks do the intimidating.
Obama mentor Jeff Jones helped author the ObamaCare bill. Jones co-founded the Weathermen, led the Days of Rage in Chicago in 1969, and then went underground for the next eleven years with fellow revolutionary and current wife Eleanor Stein (who teaches "climate change" at Albany Law School). Jeff Jones tried to reconstitute the SDS just two years ago.
http://www.israel-commentary.org/archives/2010_01.html#001318
More than any other President, he’s used the “Friday News Dump” to try to hide bad news. http://www.pjtv.com/v/2841
He promised to allow five days public comment before signing bills. He broke that promise.
He promised to end no bid contracts. He broke that promise.
He promised not to have lobbyists in his administration working on the things they lobbied about. He broke that promise.
http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/politics/Obama_-who-_excluded-lobbyists__-has-appointed-50-89531802.html
He promised to end earmarks, but has signed bills full of them.
He promised to recognize the Armenian genocide. He broke that promise.
He has proposed a tax on banks that got bailouts that will discourage lending and be passed on to customers. This will apply even to banks that didn’t get, or didn’t want bailout money, or that paid it back with interest. It will not apply to the union-controlled car companies we bailed out. Nor will it apply to Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, who helped start the housing collapse, and for whom the Obama administration has guaranteed unlimited bailouts.
He’s so convinced of his star power, he thought he could tame Iran with words, bring home the Olympics and get an agreement in Copenhagen, despite the ClimateGate revelations that much of the global warming “science” is hype..
He supported the failed stimulus package. Taking money from the economy, raking off the bureaucrats share, them putting the rest back in to favored constituencies doesn’t create wealth, though it redistributes it.
Obama’s childhood mentor, Frank Marshall Davis, spied on U.S. military installations in Hawaii for the Soviet Union , edited a communist newspaper, and wrote poetry in praise of mass-murdered Joseph Stalin.
His academic records are sealed from kindergarten through law school. Why?
He arrived in New York in June of 1981 without enough money to get a hotel room, but one month later flew to Indonesia and Pakistan ... Why did he go? Who paid his expenses?
He traveled to Pakistan when it was illegal for U.S. citizens to do so. So what country's passport did he use?
His Law School Admission Test scores and grades at Columbia University are known to have been mediocre, but he was admitted to Harvard Law School through the intervention of a Saudi named Khalid al-Mansour.
He was a law review editor who never published an article in any law review.
He thinks "water boarding" terrorists is immoral, but that partial-birth abortion is fine.
He publicly laments slavery in America -which was abolished 150 years ago-but praises Islam, which still practices both slavery, oppression of women, child rape, and the sexual mutilation of young girls.
He has never created a job, met a payroll, or even operated a lemonade stand, but wants to tell Detroit how to make cars.
He is a President who has never before served as an executive in either the private or the public sector.
His health records are sealed from childhood to the present day.
He cheated GM's bondholders by giving their property to the UAW in a political payoff.
He is a “constitutional scholar” who expressed disdain for the U.S. Constitution on a Chicago radio station because it limited the government's ability to "redistribute wealth."
His Secretary of the Treasury cheated on his taxes---as did several other appointees and advisors.
He downgraded our intelligence gathering activities from China.
http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2010/jan/20/china-removed-top-priority-spies/?source=newsletter_must-read-stories-today_headlines
He promised to end no-bid contracts, but awarded one for $25M to a campaign supporter.
http://www.redstate.com/mark_i/2010/01/25/no-bid-barack/
He doesn't know enough about the military to say "Corpsman" correctly. He can hardly speak off a teleprompter.
He said it's embarrassing that Americans only speak one language. He only speaks one. George Bush speaks two.
He’s a “constitutional scholar” who doesn’t know the constitution. In his State of the Union address, Obama stated that "We find unity in our incredible diversity, drawing on the promise enshrined in our Constitution: the notion that we are all created equal...." "the notion that we are all created equal" is not "enshrined in our Constitution" -- it's from the Declaration of Independence.
He claimed to be open to offshore drilling for oil, but was lying.
http://biggovernment.com/vhaley/2010/02/09/drillgate-internal-emails-shows-obama-team-lying-to-public/
His new drilling plan is set up to be blocked by bureaucrats at every turn.
His knowledge of history is so poor he thought that Emperor Hirohito signed the Japanese surrender. Guess they don’t teach American history much in Indonesia
He lies casually, just to sound good. During the campaign, he said his parents got together because of the ML King march in Selma. The march took place four years after he was born. In Russia he told a class of students that he met his wife in class. Actually, she graduated from Harvard before he got there—but it sounded good.
He lied about his relationship with ACORN
http://commonamericanjournal.com/?p=10801
He claimed to be a professor of constitutional law, when actually he was only a lecturer. Big difference at a university.
His wife received a VERY large raise when Obama was elected to the US Senate, and in return he got her University a nice earmark, a good return on their investment. Since she left the position to move to Washington, they have decided it wasn’t valuable enough to fill.
He increased the National Debt by $2 Trillion in his first 421 days as President.
He made it safer to attack America:
Obama Limits When U.S. Would Use Nuclear Arms
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/04/06/world/06arms.html
He has acerbated racial tensions in America by constantly using his surrogate to suggest that any disagreement with his policies is racist.
http://townhall.com/columnists/ThomasSowell/2010/04/06/race_and_politics
List of Obama scandals. If half true...
http://conservativeamerican.org/obama-administration-scandals-list/obama-administration-scandals-list/page-25-1301-1400/
He…oh, the hell with it. Drink your Kool-Aid and shut up.
I am traveling with limited time or computer access, and left this to post.
Many of these are pulled from e-mails or posting on the web. Some large, some small, some new, some old, and in no particular order:
He promised that “people making under $250,00 a year won’t pay a penny more in taxes.” Then:
• He raises cigarette taxes $101 a pack, which hits the poor hardest, as they smoke more.
• He supported a healthcare bill that has a tax on “Cadillac” plans that will eventually tax about 20% of the people making between $50k and $75k. http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9C02E0DE1638F93AA15751C1A96F9C8B63
• The Healthcare bill has other taxes as well, in violation of his promise. http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2009/dec/27/harrys-dream-come-true/?feat=article_top10_shared
• He supports letting the Bush tax cuts expire which, contrary to the narrative they sold the media, will increase everyone’s taxes. http://blog.heritage.org/2010/01/01/morning-bell-happy-tax-year/
• He supports a healthcare reform bill that will charge married people more than single people living together. http://online.wsj.com/article/SB126281943134818675.html
• We are learning the healthcare bill has many new taxes in violation of his promises to the American people.
He promised transparency in the negotiations for the Healthcare bills, and that they would be on C-Span (many times), then conducted all negotiations in secret.
http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/opinion/Time-for-sit-down-protests-by-Hill-reporters-8727555-80808097.html
http://www.breitbart.tv/the-c-span-lie-did-obama-really-promise-televised-healthcare-negotiations/?utm_source=Illinois+Policy+Institute&utm_campaign=e3d3e6c07c-Nov+19%2C+2009+E-letter&utm_medium=email
When John McCain called him on it at the so called “Healthcare Summit,” he said, ‘The election’s over, John.” Translation: They promises were to get votes from the rubes, I never meant to keep them.
He sealed many of his college and other records, so Americans would know little of his past.
He comes from Chicago politics, and appointed many members of the Chicago Machine and Illinois Combine (including Republicans) to his administration.
He bought his home with the assistance of a corrupt, convicted political fixer, Tony Rezko.
He supports Cap and Trade bills that will kill the American Economy and raise costs for everyone, based on increasingly-challenged bad science.
At the bidding of the unions, he opposes free trade agreements that have always helped the economy. It was anti free trade in the form of Smooth-Hawley that locked in the great depression, because trade collapsed. The rest of the world seems to have learned that and is going forward with it.
He is an enemy of economic freedom and is a supporter of government planning, at a time when India and China have become economic powerhouses by opening up their economies to free markets. http://ow.ly/TkSV
He killed the Charter school program in DC which gave poor black families the right to choose their kids schools as he has for his kids, at the behest of teachers’ unions.
Worked for and supported ACORN, a criminal organization involved in tax evasion and voter fraud.
He revealed his true leaning by hanging a decoration showing mass-murderer Mao on the White house Christmas Tree. Hitler would have been better—Mao killed three times as many people.
He is the 1st president in 110 years to miss the annual Army-Navy Football Game.
He is the 1st president to not attend any Christmas religious observance.
He is the 1st president to stay on vacation after a terrorist attack.
Add to that he’s the first President not to stay in Washington for Christmas for the last 20 years. Past Presidents did not leave Washington for Christmas vacation until after Christmas. This was done so that their staff (Secret Service, Air Force One Crew, Limousine transport, Presidential advancing logistics etc.) could be with their families for Christmas.
He appointed Janet “the System Worked” Napolitano as Secretary of Homeland Security. She focused the department of watching American veterans as potential terrorists, rather than Islamic militants.
He appointed Erroll Southers as TSA head. He’s a former FBI agent who lied to Congress about his having misused the system to search records.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/01/06/AR2010010604499.html?wpisrc=nl_pmpolitics
He went to Rev. Wright’s church for 20 years without every discovering that Wright was anti-American and a racist.
He promised “bi-partisanship” and an end to Washington as usual. Then shut out Republicans and every Republican suggestion from the Healthcare Bills. He supported a process avoiding a conference committee, so no Republican would have a say.
Despite some lip service, he opposes tort reform, which would lower the cost of healthcare (rather than shift it to other people like taxpayers) because the Trial Lawyers are major Democrat contributors and almost all Democrat leaders are lawyers.
He declared that “we are at war with al Qaeda,” but treated the al Qaeda attacker on Christmas day 2009 as a criminal, rather than a POW, assuring that we would get no information from him to prevent future attacks.
He allowed his Attorney General, eric Holder, to schedule the trial of Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, the 9/11 mastermind, as a civilian trial in New York, opening up the opportunity for al Qaeda to stage a terrorist attack to demand his release.
He decided his political appointee should control how much bankers get in bonuses, but approved limitless bailouts for Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, with large bonuses for their executives, despite these agencies’ role in triggering the housing bubble and economic collapse.
He engineered the government and union takeover/bailout of GM and Chrysler. Spent $3B on the cash-for-clunkers programs, in which future taxpayers help people buy cars now they were likely to buy anyway.
With almost no facts, he called the Cambridge police “stupid” for arresting a belligerent supporter of his, but said we shouldn’t “jump to conclusions” when a Muslim murdered 14 Americans while shouting “Allah Akbar.” He called the al Qaeda Christmas Crotch-Bomber an “Isolated Incident.”
Betrayed his lack of understanding of foreign countries when, during the campaign, he complained that Iraq was soaking up translators needed in Afghanistan, where they speak different languages than Iraq.
He changed the name of the “War on Terror” to “Overseas contingency operations.” Since the failed al Qaeda Christmas Crotch-Bomber attack was in Detroit, seems to be slowly sliding back to ‘war on Terror.”
He gave Interpol diplomatic immunity, abrogating American’s constitutional rights.
He appointed Kareem Shora, a devout Muslim, who was born in Damascus, Syria as ADC National Executive Director and as a member of the Homeland Security Advisory Council.
He made a deal with the drug makers association. They spend millions supporting his healthcare takeover and he took reducing drug costs out of the bill. http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/politics/Once-Obama_s-target_-lobbyist-Tauzin-now-his-pet-8722075-80746897.html
He gets a lot of campaign funding and funding to support his agenda from big unions. Then he rewarded them with our dollars. http://commonamericanjournal.com/?p=8800
He supports taking the secret ballot away from working people in union elections, leaving them open to intimidation and violence by union thugs.
He blames Bush for everything that happens.
He thinks he deserves a Peace prize for being him.
He appointed a new commander in Afghanistan in March, 09, and announced a New Strategy. When the new strategy required more troops needed for that strategy, he wobbled for three months, gave the commander half of what he needed, and told the Taliban if they just hold out until July of 2011, we’ll go home and they can go back to abusing women.
He tried to interfere in the Democratic process in Honduras when they threw out a leftist for violating their constitution. But when the Mullahs in Iran murdered democratic protesters in the streets, he was silent.
He thinks the president should bow to foreign leaders.
His crack on Leno about the Special Olympics tells you what kind of person he is, and who he looks down on. And his Chief of Staff uses “retarded” as a pejorative, so it’s ingrained in this administration.
His answer to every problem is “a review.”
His healthcare bill will cause many seniors to lose private coverage.
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748703510304574626441126356878.html
By putting the blame on the CIA for the crotch-bomber, he strained an already bad relationship, which needs to be good for our safety. http://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2010/01/obamas_problems_with_the_intel.html
Voted for the 2007-08 deficits he criticizes Bush for, and in his first year, ran up a larger deficit than all 8 Bush years put together, with no end in sight. http://hotair.com/archives/2009/12/08/wapo-repeats-inherited-deficit-fallacy/
Imposed a deadline on Iran about nukes that was meaningless, and they knew it.
http://www.nypost.com/p/news/opinion/opedcolumnists/day_of_reckoning_hHNtbO7IbHnphV3rxxYZ8N
Rewarded his Wall Street donors with bailout money.
http://canadafreepress.com/index.php/article/18464
He lied or was wrong about Islamic history in his Cairo speech, crediting Islam with things that pre-dated Islam.
Has shifted US policy away from Israel, our only Ally and the only democracy in the region. He showed great disrespect for Israel’s PM.
His appointees dropped a voter-intimidation case against Black Panthers caught on tape threatening white voters in Philadelphia to prevent them from voting. They denied requests from the US Civil rights Commission about the case. In Obama’s America, it’s okay to intimidate voters if blacks do the intimidating.
Obama mentor Jeff Jones helped author the ObamaCare bill. Jones co-founded the Weathermen, led the Days of Rage in Chicago in 1969, and then went underground for the next eleven years with fellow revolutionary and current wife Eleanor Stein (who teaches "climate change" at Albany Law School). Jeff Jones tried to reconstitute the SDS just two years ago.
http://www.israel-commentary.org/archives/2010_01.html#001318
More than any other President, he’s used the “Friday News Dump” to try to hide bad news. http://www.pjtv.com/v/2841
He promised to allow five days public comment before signing bills. He broke that promise.
He promised to end no bid contracts. He broke that promise.
He promised not to have lobbyists in his administration working on the things they lobbied about. He broke that promise.
http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/politics/Obama_-who-_excluded-lobbyists__-has-appointed-50-89531802.html
He promised to end earmarks, but has signed bills full of them.
He promised to recognize the Armenian genocide. He broke that promise.
He has proposed a tax on banks that got bailouts that will discourage lending and be passed on to customers. This will apply even to banks that didn’t get, or didn’t want bailout money, or that paid it back with interest. It will not apply to the union-controlled car companies we bailed out. Nor will it apply to Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, who helped start the housing collapse, and for whom the Obama administration has guaranteed unlimited bailouts.
He’s so convinced of his star power, he thought he could tame Iran with words, bring home the Olympics and get an agreement in Copenhagen, despite the ClimateGate revelations that much of the global warming “science” is hype..
He supported the failed stimulus package. Taking money from the economy, raking off the bureaucrats share, them putting the rest back in to favored constituencies doesn’t create wealth, though it redistributes it.
Obama’s childhood mentor, Frank Marshall Davis, spied on U.S. military installations in Hawaii for the Soviet Union , edited a communist newspaper, and wrote poetry in praise of mass-murdered Joseph Stalin.
His academic records are sealed from kindergarten through law school. Why?
He arrived in New York in June of 1981 without enough money to get a hotel room, but one month later flew to Indonesia and Pakistan ... Why did he go? Who paid his expenses?
He traveled to Pakistan when it was illegal for U.S. citizens to do so. So what country's passport did he use?
His Law School Admission Test scores and grades at Columbia University are known to have been mediocre, but he was admitted to Harvard Law School through the intervention of a Saudi named Khalid al-Mansour.
He was a law review editor who never published an article in any law review.
He thinks "water boarding" terrorists is immoral, but that partial-birth abortion is fine.
He publicly laments slavery in America -which was abolished 150 years ago-but praises Islam, which still practices both slavery, oppression of women, child rape, and the sexual mutilation of young girls.
He has never created a job, met a payroll, or even operated a lemonade stand, but wants to tell Detroit how to make cars.
He is a President who has never before served as an executive in either the private or the public sector.
His health records are sealed from childhood to the present day.
He cheated GM's bondholders by giving their property to the UAW in a political payoff.
He is a “constitutional scholar” who expressed disdain for the U.S. Constitution on a Chicago radio station because it limited the government's ability to "redistribute wealth."
His Secretary of the Treasury cheated on his taxes---as did several other appointees and advisors.
He downgraded our intelligence gathering activities from China.
http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2010/jan/20/china-removed-top-priority-spies/?source=newsletter_must-read-stories-today_headlines
He promised to end no-bid contracts, but awarded one for $25M to a campaign supporter.
http://www.redstate.com/mark_i/2010/01/25/no-bid-barack/
He doesn't know enough about the military to say "Corpsman" correctly. He can hardly speak off a teleprompter.
He said it's embarrassing that Americans only speak one language. He only speaks one. George Bush speaks two.
He’s a “constitutional scholar” who doesn’t know the constitution. In his State of the Union address, Obama stated that "We find unity in our incredible diversity, drawing on the promise enshrined in our Constitution: the notion that we are all created equal...." "the notion that we are all created equal" is not "enshrined in our Constitution" -- it's from the Declaration of Independence.
He claimed to be open to offshore drilling for oil, but was lying.
http://biggovernment.com/vhaley/2010/02/09/drillgate-internal-emails-shows-obama-team-lying-to-public/
His new drilling plan is set up to be blocked by bureaucrats at every turn.
His knowledge of history is so poor he thought that Emperor Hirohito signed the Japanese surrender. Guess they don’t teach American history much in Indonesia
He lies casually, just to sound good. During the campaign, he said his parents got together because of the ML King march in Selma. The march took place four years after he was born. In Russia he told a class of students that he met his wife in class. Actually, she graduated from Harvard before he got there—but it sounded good.
He lied about his relationship with ACORN
http://commonamericanjournal.com/?p=10801
He claimed to be a professor of constitutional law, when actually he was only a lecturer. Big difference at a university.
His wife received a VERY large raise when Obama was elected to the US Senate, and in return he got her University a nice earmark, a good return on their investment. Since she left the position to move to Washington, they have decided it wasn’t valuable enough to fill.
He increased the National Debt by $2 Trillion in his first 421 days as President.
He made it safer to attack America:
Obama Limits When U.S. Would Use Nuclear Arms
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/04/06/world/06arms.html
He has acerbated racial tensions in America by constantly using his surrogate to suggest that any disagreement with his policies is racist.
http://townhall.com/columnists/ThomasSowell/2010/04/06/race_and_politics
List of Obama scandals. If half true...
http://conservativeamerican.org/obama-administration-scandals-list/obama-administration-scandals-list/page-25-1301-1400/
He…oh, the hell with it. Drink your Kool-Aid and shut up.
Sunday, May 2, 2010
I'm Away
I'm traveling on business and then family matters. Was suposed to be away until May 6. withlimited/no time and limited/no computer access while away. Now not sure. Just check back.
I will leave a couple of things to post.
I'll resume regular Political Digests when I get caught up, after deleting a thousand e-mails or so. (Yes, I know the jokes were funny, the animals cute, the computer virus devastating, that that e-mail I've already received 23 times is a "must read," and you're not breaking this chain if you have to forward it 1,000 times. Anyone that forwards the same e-mail 1,000 times is an idiot. Sorry.) ~Bob
I will leave a couple of things to post.
I'll resume regular Political Digests when I get caught up, after deleting a thousand e-mails or so. (Yes, I know the jokes were funny, the animals cute, the computer virus devastating, that that e-mail I've already received 23 times is a "must read," and you're not breaking this chain if you have to forward it 1,000 times. Anyone that forwards the same e-mail 1,000 times is an idiot. Sorry.) ~Bob
Saturday, May 1, 2010
What Prop 100 Really Means
Posted with the author's permission. (Given by her brother!) ~Bob
What Prop 100 Really Means
by Sherry Hollenbeck
We all want the best things possible for our children, including the best educational plan money can buy? Maybe that's the root of the whole problem, "money". As our country has prospered we threw more and more money at education, actually thinking that would solve the problem. What in fact it did was, create an avenue for corruption. Money has that effect even for the well educated. In 1979 Jimmy Carter threw even more money at education forming "The Department of Education." Since this department was formed to date, studies show a steady decline in the national academic averages. This has to show one important thing in my mind, "throwing money at a problem doesn't guarantee a fix."
Case in point:
We have approximately 58 school districts in Maricopa County . Approximately 47 of these districts supports a "Superintendent" drawing a salary of between $100,000. & $200,000., and most if not all will have 2 to 4 "Assistant Superintendents" making between $80,000 & $125,000. Lets just calculate on the conservative side and say each Superintendent makes $140,000 with salary and perks times 47 districts = $6,580,000., while also being conservative listing 47 districts that have 2 Assistant Superintendents at a salary & perks of $100,000. =$9,400,000. for a grand total of $15,980,000 to the tax payer. Keep in mind this total is low because there are some districts that have 4 to 7 Assistant Superintendent's and even more administrative "Directors" that put the actual totals closer in the range of $35,000,000. This money is simply skimmed off the top of all school funding. Also keep in mind, every two years each district also skims more money from the tax payers in yet another rouse through bond money. Each district devotes an entire department year round to promote propaganda to get "overrides" passed so these "fat cats" can confiscate yet more tax dollars from us for that special product they provide, "inefficiency and underachievement."
There is not much difference in what Bernie Madoff did and what these guys do everyday, it's just they have better cover. These guys use our kids as cover. They parade them out in informercials and convince the parents and the public that the kids will suffer without "more money." "Show me the money."
"Here's a red flag for you, our academics are not improving, they are on a steady decline." We have traded quality for quantity and accountability for bureaucracy.
"No amount of money will generate creativity, an ingredient that a "true teacher" must inspire in a student to help them reach their true potential." "No big salary administrator or the Department of Education, or the "Whitehouse" or any other bureaucratic entity will ever replace the "teacher student" relationship that ultimately will define our children. We have to change that mindset of throwing money at a problem instead of resolve.
You want real solutions to fixing some real problems, lets start with closing the check book. If I hire someone to provide a service, I might want a plan that actually fixes the problem before I write that check.
Lets be our own "contractor", because we are actually paying these people. Let's start by cutting the overhead, the dead weight that serves no real purpose, and let the money actually make it to the class room, then there would be no need to continually pilferage more tax money through yet another tax hike that will only "delay" the inevitable. If we don't change the habits, we can't change the behavior and the problem still exists to appear another day further down the road.
We only need "1" school district per county. "1" Superintendent of schools state wide with a department set up to monitor curriculum and another for budgets. The real result will be accountability and less spending. More money can be spent in search of quality teachers instead of spending $20,000. as one district did on a nationwide search for an "administrator". "Really?" We can do better than this.
My advise to all is to take the initiative to cut spending by actually closing the check book and vote "NO" on prop 100. It will have some cuts to first responders, but there are areas they can cut to balance the shortfall without putting the public at risk, they have already admitted that. Will people lose their jobs, yes. Many Americans have already lost their jobs, and no extra tax hikes will help that either. "Growth will help that, and growth in the economy will only come from "less taxes." Our city government as well as our state government as it exists today, have budgets that reflected better times. We now need to readjust and slim down to meet our current conditions. "Adapt and overcome."
What Prop 100 Really Means
by Sherry Hollenbeck
We all want the best things possible for our children, including the best educational plan money can buy? Maybe that's the root of the whole problem, "money". As our country has prospered we threw more and more money at education, actually thinking that would solve the problem. What in fact it did was, create an avenue for corruption. Money has that effect even for the well educated. In 1979 Jimmy Carter threw even more money at education forming "The Department of Education." Since this department was formed to date, studies show a steady decline in the national academic averages. This has to show one important thing in my mind, "throwing money at a problem doesn't guarantee a fix."
Case in point:
We have approximately 58 school districts in Maricopa County . Approximately 47 of these districts supports a "Superintendent" drawing a salary of between $100,000. & $200,000., and most if not all will have 2 to 4 "Assistant Superintendents" making between $80,000 & $125,000. Lets just calculate on the conservative side and say each Superintendent makes $140,000 with salary and perks times 47 districts = $6,580,000., while also being conservative listing 47 districts that have 2 Assistant Superintendents at a salary & perks of $100,000. =$9,400,000. for a grand total of $15,980,000 to the tax payer. Keep in mind this total is low because there are some districts that have 4 to 7 Assistant Superintendent's and even more administrative "Directors" that put the actual totals closer in the range of $35,000,000. This money is simply skimmed off the top of all school funding. Also keep in mind, every two years each district also skims more money from the tax payers in yet another rouse through bond money. Each district devotes an entire department year round to promote propaganda to get "overrides" passed so these "fat cats" can confiscate yet more tax dollars from us for that special product they provide, "inefficiency and underachievement."
There is not much difference in what Bernie Madoff did and what these guys do everyday, it's just they have better cover. These guys use our kids as cover. They parade them out in informercials and convince the parents and the public that the kids will suffer without "more money." "Show me the money."
"Here's a red flag for you, our academics are not improving, they are on a steady decline." We have traded quality for quantity and accountability for bureaucracy.
"No amount of money will generate creativity, an ingredient that a "true teacher" must inspire in a student to help them reach their true potential." "No big salary administrator or the Department of Education, or the "Whitehouse" or any other bureaucratic entity will ever replace the "teacher student" relationship that ultimately will define our children. We have to change that mindset of throwing money at a problem instead of resolve.
You want real solutions to fixing some real problems, lets start with closing the check book. If I hire someone to provide a service, I might want a plan that actually fixes the problem before I write that check.
Lets be our own "contractor", because we are actually paying these people. Let's start by cutting the overhead, the dead weight that serves no real purpose, and let the money actually make it to the class room, then there would be no need to continually pilferage more tax money through yet another tax hike that will only "delay" the inevitable. If we don't change the habits, we can't change the behavior and the problem still exists to appear another day further down the road.
We only need "1" school district per county. "1" Superintendent of schools state wide with a department set up to monitor curriculum and another for budgets. The real result will be accountability and less spending. More money can be spent in search of quality teachers instead of spending $20,000. as one district did on a nationwide search for an "administrator". "Really?" We can do better than this.
My advise to all is to take the initiative to cut spending by actually closing the check book and vote "NO" on prop 100. It will have some cuts to first responders, but there are areas they can cut to balance the shortfall without putting the public at risk, they have already admitted that. Will people lose their jobs, yes. Many Americans have already lost their jobs, and no extra tax hikes will help that either. "Growth will help that, and growth in the economy will only come from "less taxes." Our city government as well as our state government as it exists today, have budgets that reflected better times. We now need to readjust and slim down to meet our current conditions. "Adapt and overcome."
Political Digest May 1, 2010
My travel plans have been disrupted, so not sure when I’ll be posting.
Utah Conservatives sing chorus of 'Bye bye Bennett' with glee
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/04/30/AR2010043000770.html?wpisrc=nl_politics
Excerpt: Delivering the opening prayer of the Beaver County Republican Convention recently, cattle rancher Gilbert Yardley prayed for Utah to elect "honest" people to Congress -- anybody to replace "the bunch we have in there now." Sen. Robert F. Bennett was in the room, hoping to persuade state delegates to nominate him at the May 8 GOP convention. A friend seated next to Bennett leaned in to whisper the obvious: "I don't think he's one of yours." It's no surprise that anger at Washington and Congress is coursing through Republican circles. What took party leaders by surprise is that the anger here is directed not at President Obama, but squarely at Bennett. And with a flurry of state primaries scheduled in the coming weeks, a Bennett defeat could become a rallying point for anti-incumbent fervor elsewhere.
Organized labor begins $1 million ad campaign against Blanche Lincoln
http://voices.washingtonpost.com/thefix/morning-fix/1-2-3-2.html?wprss=thefix
Above and here—the left and right attacking not each other, but towards the center. Excerpt: The Service Employees International Union will launch a series of television and radio ads taking Sen. Blanche Lincoln (D) to task for her record on trade, the leading edge of a seven-figure expenditure from the union in advance of her May 18 primary showdown against Lt. Gov Bill Halter. The SEIU television ad is a testimonial from Greg Knowles, an employee at Cooper Tires in Texarkana, who says that Lincoln has "a lot of nerve" for claiming in a television ad that she saved 1,700 jobs at the company. "We saved our own jobs and we had to take big pay cuts to do it," said Knowles. We would not have to have done that if Miss Lincoln had not voted for all those unfair trade deals."
Charlie Crist to run for Senate as an independent
http://voices.washingtonpost.com/thefix/senate/charlie-crist-to-run-for-senat.html?wprss=thefix
Florida voters will now choose between two Republicans and one Democrat for the senate, putting the Dem back in the race. May hurt GOP chances to take control of the senate. On the other hand, if it develops into a two-way between Crist and Rubico, Democrats and centrist independents might support Crist. Excerpt: Florida Gov. Charlie Crist announced this afternoon he will run for the Senate as an independent, breaking with the Republican party and setting up a three-way battle in the fall fraught with national political implications. "Our political system is broken," said Crist at a rally in St. Petersburg. "I believe in democracy and the right to choose." Crist, who will remain a registered Republican, repeatedly cast his decision as in the best interests of Floridians, saying at one point that the easiest course for him would be to run for re-election as governor but that people across the state had urged him to pursue an independent Senate bid. "I was never one who sought to hold elective office to demagogue or point fingers," said Crist. "For me, for me, public service has always been about putting the needs of our state and our people first; and every single day, as your servant, I have tried to do exactly that." In reality, however, Crist's hand had been forced by a national conservative groundswell that had lit upon the Florida Senate primary as a chance to send a message to Republican leaders that the status quo was no longer acceptable. In the immediate aftermath of Crist's announcement, his entire campaign team -- manager Eric Eikenberg, media consultants Russ Schriefer and Stuart Stevens, pollster Public Opinion Strategies, communications director Andrea Saul and press secretary Amanda Hennenberg all resigned. "It has been an honor to work for Governor Crist, and I wish him all of the best," said Saul…..A recent Quinnipiac University poll showed Crist leading a three-way race with 32 percent followed by Rubio at 30 percent and Meek at 24 percent.
Response to “I’m Tired” posted on this blog:
http://buddha-on-a-stick.blogspot.com/2010/04/sick-and-tired-of-patriotic-whiners.html
Excerpt: Maybe if we spent more time thoughtfully reading newspapers and magazines, or quietly immersed in books, and less time receiving our opinions from TV and radio, maybe we'd actually be able to grasp what is happening to our country, and ourselves as a people. We are changing, we are evolving -- and you can either get with the fish whose feet are carrying them onto land where there is a better chance of survival. Or you can hang in the water with the Robert A. Hall's, Rush Limbaugh's, Glenn Becks and Sarah Palins -- or anyone you want to mention from the left, right or center. Evolution knows no ideologies, no human fears nor dreams. It just is. And it is all that there is. (I just hope Rush, Glenn and Sarah note I was given pride of place!)
Must Read: Why Arizona Drew a Line
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/04/29/opinion/29kobach.html
Excerpt: Predictably, groups that favor relaxed enforcement of immigration laws, including the American Civil Liberties Union and the Mexican American Legal Defense and Education Fund, insist the law is unconstitutional. Less predictably, President Obama declared it “misguided” and said the Justice Department would take a look. Presumably, the government lawyers who do so will actually read the law, something its critics don’t seem to have done. The arguments we’ve heard against it either misrepresent its text or are otherwise inaccurate. As someone who helped draft the statute, I will rebut the major criticisms individually: It is unfair to demand that aliens carry their documents with them. It is true that the Arizona law makes it a misdemeanor for an alien to fail to carry certain documents. “Now, suddenly, if you don’t have your papers ... you’re going to be harassed,” the president said. “That’s not the right way to go.” But since 1940, it has been a federal crime for aliens to fail to keep such registration documents with them. The Arizona law simply adds a state penalty to what was already a federal crime. Moreover, as anyone who has traveled abroad knows, other nations have similar documentation requirements. “Reasonable suspicion” is a meaningless term that will permit police misconduct. Over the past four decades, federal courts have issued hundreds of opinions defining those two words. The Arizona law didn’t invent the concept: Precedents list the factors that can contribute to reasonable suspicion; when several are combined, the “totality of circumstances” that results may create reasonable suspicion that a crime has been committed. For example, the Arizona law is most likely to come into play after a traffic stop. A police officer pulls a minivan over for speeding. A dozen passengers are crammed in. None has identification. The highway is a known alien-smuggling corridor. The driver is acting evasively. Those factors combine to create reasonable suspicion that the occupants are not in the country legally. The law will allow police to engage in racial profiling. Actually, Section 2 provides that a law enforcement official “may not solely consider race, color or national origin” in making any stops or determining immigration status.
How Arizona became center of immigration debate
http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5hSQsFGWm5S9wHor0EpRyHxLk8YFgD9FBN88O0
Excerpt: The frustration had been building for years in Arizona with every drug-related kidnapping, every home invasion, every "safe house" discovered crammed with illegal immigrants from Mexico. The tensions finally spilled over this month with passage of the nation's toughest law against illegal immigration, a measure that has put Arizona at the center of the heated debate over how to deal with the millions of people who sneak into the U.S. every year. A number of factors combined to produce the law: a heavily conservative Legislature, the ascent of a Republican governor, anger over the federal government's failure to secure the border, and growing anxiety over crime that reached a fever pitch last month with the slaying of an Arizona rancher, apparently by an illegal immigrant….Arizona is the biggest gateway into the U.S. for illegal immigrants. The state is home to an estimated 460,000 illegal immigrants — a population larger than that of entire cities such as Cleveland, St. Louis and New Orleans.
Is Obama Inciting Racial Violence in Arizona?
http://www.newsrealblog.com/2010/04/29/is-obama-inciting-racial-violence-in-arizona/
Hope this is over-reaching. But there is no question that Democrats will benefit if there is any tea party, or anti-illegal immigration violence. The media will gloss over pro-illegal-immigration violence. Excerpt: Is it possible President Obama is inciting violence in Arizona? Could he, some in his party and in liberal media be using racial bating to do it? I think you could make that case. So why aren’t the mainstream media and level-headed Democrats in Congress criticizing the President, others in their party, and some in the media for stirring up possible aggression in Arizona? Arizona’s recent law cracking down on illegal immigration has had an immediate backlash from those on the Left. The state is being flooded by angry protesters, many of whom are not only holding angry signs, but have even been filmed throwing water bottles at police and others. One organizer reportedly did not excuse the violence but did defend the reasoning behind it. Sadly, he put it all in racial terms.
Mexico's Drug War Leaves 22,000 Dead as Violence Spreads to U.S.
http://directorblue.blogspot.com/2010/04/mexicos-drug-war-leaves-22000-dead-as.html
Excerpt: 22,000 dead. Beheadings. Hangings. Mass-murders. Bodies sliced into pieces. Killings of cops, government officials, judges, and innocents -- with the violence spreading daily into the U.S. and beyond. Remember. Remember this as the open-border Democrats pander to illegal aliens while they throw the legal residents of Arizona -- of all races, creeds and colors -- to the wolves.
Brown, Cameron hit 'amnesty' for illegals
http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2010/apr/30/brown-cameron-hit-amnesty-for-illegals/?utm_source=newsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=newsletter_must-read-stories-today
Not just Arizona! Excerpt: British Prime Minister Gordon Brown and his Conservative Party challenger, David Cameron, on Thursday opposed giving amnesty to illegal immigrants, saying that would send the wrong message to people looking to sneak into Britain. A question on immigration turned into a flashpoint in the third and final televised debate among Mr. Brown, Mr. Cameron and Liberal Democratic candidate Nick Clegg in Birmingham. Mr. Brown's Labor Party slipped in the polls this week after the prime minister was caught on an open microphone describing a longtime party supporter as "bigoted" after she expressed concern about the influx of Eastern European immigrants.
Economic Freedom Matters
http://www.ncpa.org/sub/dpd/index.php?Article_ID=19289&utm_source=newsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=DPD
Excerpt: There is a link between economic freedom and employment growth, according to a new study published by the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis, called "Economic Freedom and Employment Growth in the U.S. States." Other studies have come to the same conclusion; however, one of the things that makes this study different is its findings on labor markets, says Michael D. LaFaive, director of the Mackinac Center's Morey Fiscal Policy Initiative. The authors write: "In addition, we find that less restrictive state and national government labor market policies have the greatest impact on employment growth in U.S. states." That conclusion doesn't bode well for Michigan, says LaFaive, which is known for having a relatively hostile labor climate and which over the last 10 years has seen its overall national economic freedom ranking tumble according to the periodic "Economic Freedom of North America" report, published by the Fraser Institute in Canada, and the "U.S. Economic Freedom Index" published by the Pacific Research Institute in California:
Dealing with the TeaParty (Video & photos)
http://biggovernment.com/jhoft/2010/04/29/obama-sniper-teams-ordered-to-rooftops-to-quash-radical-tea-party-protest-video/
Excerpt: On Wednesday Team Obama called in the riot squad to deal with the Quincy Tea Party patriots outside the Oakley-Lindsey/Quincy Community Center.
Response from a retired (conservative) cop to yesterday’s post on this
Did you watch the videos? The text you forwarded is a complete mischaracterization of what the police did. The writer says, “Illinois sent in the riot squad to stop the couple hundred peaceful protesters from … doing what it isn’t exactly clear”. But the “riot police” didn’t have any contact with the protestors. The officers in question didn’t even speak to the protestors. What you saw was a completely reasonable police response to the presence of the President in Quincy. There were hundreds of tea party protestors, and the police have to be ready if some of them get out of hand (it happens). The guys in riot gear marched in and stood across the street from the demonstrators. They never came near the demonstrators. And when they weren’t needed any more, they left. There is absolutely nothing to complain about in those videos.
House in Georgia, heart in Vietnam
http://www.cnn.com/2010/US/04/28/vietnam.immigrant/index.html
Excerpt: The Vietnam War ended with the fall of Saigon 35 years ago this week, but Hong Nguyen will never surrender. Nguyen's story is just one among millions from Vietnam's tragic war era, but it's also one that ultimately resolves in triumph. Nguyen was a Republic of Vietnam army major stationed in Da Nang when the port city was bombarded by the enemy North Vietnamese army in late March 1975. Commanders in Saigon, 380 miles to the south, offered no guidance or information, he said.
Fancy Nancy
http://www.americanthinker.com/2010/04/fancy_nancy.html
Excerpt: However, now that I think about it, this picture is more than a vanity portrait. It is a tool intended to send a message to a specific audience. Capitol File magazine's primary circulation area is Washington, D.C. The audience is very select. This cover photo is so outlandish in its visual flattery that it can be seen only as a warning directed to the lobbyists and vendors and supplicants who travel to our nation's capital. It communicates to them that Nancy Pelosi can command how others should see her -- as Our Glorious Speaker, and you'd better not laugh or you'll be on the next plane back to Palookaville. Gone are the wild eyes. Gone are the grasping facial expressions. Gone is any hint that she habitually accuses Tea Partiers or others who challenge her of being "violent" and "Nazis". For the next two months, Capitol File magazine will sit on coffee tables in reception areas throughout Washington. All the people who are not insiders, who have to wait, who are not whisked past the desk directly through to meetings, will sit in lobbies and see Nancy Pelosi's picture smiling at them from the coffee table as if there's nothing wrong.
Oh, Mann: Cuccinelli targets UVA papers in Climategate salvo
http://www.readthehook.com/blog/index.php/2010/04/29/oh-mann-cuccinelli-targets-uva-papers-in-climategate-salvo/
Excerpt: In papers sent to UVA April 23, Cuccinelli’s office commands the university to produce a sweeping swath of documents relating to Mann’s receipt of nearly half a million dollars in state grant-funded climate research conducted while Mann— now director of the Earth System Science Center at Penn State— was at UVA between 1999 and 2005. If Cuccinelli succeeds in finding a smoking gun like the purloined emails that led to the international scandal dubbed Climategate, Cuccinelli could seek the return of all the research money, legal fees, and trebled damages.
World Rethinks Climate Legislation
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704423504575212991625192482.html?mod=WSJ_Opinion_LEFTTopBucket
Excerpt: It was always going to be an uphill battle for the U.S. Congress to pass comprehensive climate and energy legislation in an election year. But with Senator Lindsey Graham's likely decision to withdraw his support from the landmark bill, the prospects are now virtually zero. That is not just because Mr. Graham had been the only Republican senator to endorse a broad approach to tackling global warming. It's because the climate, politically speaking, has changed....
Obama's fatal flinch on immigration reform
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/04/30/AR2010043001389.html?wpisrc=nl_pmpolitics
Excerpt: Air Force One was about seven miles over Appalachia this week when President Obama dropped a bomb on his party. Senate Democrats had that very day circulated an immigration reform proposal, and the Associated Press, receiving a leaked copy, reported on the "draft legislation." But as Obama returned to Washington from Illinois Wednesday night, he walked back to the press cabin on the presidential aircraft and, in an impromptu Q&A, essentially declared immigration reform dead. He said "there may not be an appetite" for it. Obama's retreat -- after encouraging senators only weeks ago to take up immigration reform -- clotheslined Senate Democrats. Since their proposal had already leaked, they had no choice but to go ahead with the rollout of the plan Obama had just doomed. "I don't know in what context the statement was made last night," Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid told reporters at Thursday night's rollout. Well, Mr. Leader, the context is fear.
Strikingly Unpresidential
http://www.creators.com/opinion/david-limbaugh/strikingly-unpresidential.html
Excerpt: How the president presents himself does matter for all the obvious reasons, but I believe Obama's behavior and the public's perception of it are relevant for other equally important reasons. He came into office with a reputation for being sophisticated, gentlemanly, above the political fray and open-minded. But it was a facade, facilitated by good looks, a seemingly pleasant demeanor and an extraordinarily fawning — and forgiving — media. He has been getting a pass on his unseemly conduct for way too long, which partially explains the disconnect between his personal likability and the unpopularity of his socialist agenda. I believe that if the public were fully attuned to how unpresidentially he has consistently behaved, it wouldn't be as approving of him personally, and in turn, politicians wouldn't be so afraid to call him out on his Machiavellian and brutish behavior, the exposure of which would have an electoral impact. If more people understood what I believe to be this man's actual character, they wouldn't — in the face of his consistently highhanded tactics in pushing each and every one of his destructive agenda items — reflexively assume he's such a nice guy who means well. Then, they might be more vigilant, and heaven knows we need megadoses of vigilance these days. I have theories about why Obama is consistently getting a pass, beyond the media's corrupt liberalism and the allies he's created through his racial and class warfare, but that's another column. The point for now is that he is getting a pass, and his behavior is increasingly indefensible.
Creators of carbon credit scheme cashing in on it
http://www.canadafreepress.com/2007/cover031307.htm
Shocked, I am. Excerpt: With little media monitoring, both Strong and Gore are cashing in on the lucrative cottage industry known as man-made global warming. Strong is on the board of directors of the Chicago Climate Exchange, Wikipedia-described as "the world's first and North America's only legally binding greenhouse gas emission registry reduction system for emission sources and offset projects in North America and Brazil." Gore buys his carbon off-sets from himself--the Generation Investment Management LLP, "an independent, private, owner-managed partnership established in 2004 with offices in London and Washington, D.C." of which he is both chairman and founding partner.
The $10 Trillion Climate Fraud
http://www.investors.com/NewsAndAnalysis/Article.aspx?id=531731&p=2
Excerpt: So lucrative does this market appear, it attracted the attention of London-based Generation Investment Management, which purchased a stake in CCX and is now the fifth-largest shareholder. As we noted last year, Gore is co-founder of Generation Investment Management, which sells carbon offsets of dubious value that let rich polluters continue to pollute with a clear conscience. Other founders include former Goldman Sachs partner David Blood, as well as Mark Ferguson and Peter Harris, also of Goldman Sachs. In 2006, CCX received a big boost when another investor bought a 10% stake on the prospect of making a great deal of money for itself. That investor was Goldman Sachs, now under the gun for selling financial instruments it knew were doomed to fail. The actual mechanism for trading on the exchange was purchased and patented by none other than Franklin Raines, who was CEO of Fannie Mae at the time.
Barack Obama, America’s Selective Salary Policeman
http://www.cnsnews.com/news/article/65013
Excerpt: Fundamental lesson of Capitalism 101: Governments and bureaucrats don’t make what people want and need. They only get in the way. It is individuals, cooperating peacefully and voluntarily, working together without mandate or central design, who produce the world’s goods and services. They make what people desire and demand for themselves, not what Obama and his imperial overlords ordain that the masses should have.
Space Wars: Circa 1959 to 2010
http://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2010/04/space_wars_circa_1959_to_2010.html
Excerpt: I noted with interest President Obama's April 16 visit to Cape Kennedy to rally the "workers". Certain reports have it that there were few in any "workers" invited to hear the speech. There did seem to be a lot of applause from people who were about to lose their jobs. Then on April 22 I noted the launch of an Atlas/X-37 "space plane" combination on a "secret" mission. Had I seen this before? The Atlas/X-37 stirred my memory. In June of 1959 the Eisenhower administration awarded a contract to Boeing for a project called Dyna-Soar. This also was an Atlas/Space Plane combination very closely resembling the current configuration. The intended offensive purpose of the 1959 system sounds remarkably similar to the theories put forth for the X37. Also remarkable is the involvement of the same contractor and booster. But is there a more over-riding theme in both of these events?
Retaking the Offensive in the Illegals Fight
http://www.americanthinker.com/2010/04/retaking_the_offensive_in_the.html
Excerpt: Short-term, Mr. Obama and his handlers are trying to leverage the new Arizona law to gin up Hispanic votes this November. In states with larger concentrations of Hispanic voters, Mr. Obama and his handlers wish to more than offset an expected surge in voters disgruntled with Mr. Obama's big-government raw deal. Perhaps Mr. Obama's ploy will work, but it's guaranteed to work if conservatives and Republicans fail to contest Mr. Obama in Hispanic communities. Despite the left's propaganda, there is an abundance of Hispanic Americans who are offended by and worried about the violations of law that illegals present. Hispanics see and fear the disruptions that illegals -- especially the criminal element -- are bringing to their neighborhoods.
DOJ Subpoenas NYT's Risen re CIA Leaks
http://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2010/04/doj_subpoenas_nyts_risen_re_ci.html
Excerpt: Risen was originally subpoenaed about this matter by the Bush administration, fought the subpoena and now it has expired. The Obama Administration has apparently revived it. While Risen had revealed in the paper a NSA program respecting transmissions into and out of the U.S., this matter involved something different--- a very embarrassing incident for the CIA. In 2000, under Clinton, the agency had given to the Iranians, through a Russian scientist working for it, plans for a nuclear bomb. The blueprint to be handed over had a deliberate error in it. The scientist, thinking the error was so obvious it would diminish his credibility, told the Iranians about it and, therefore, made the entire cockamamie plan falter in its purpose.
U.S. Subpoenas Times Reporter Over Book on C.I.A.
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/04/29/us/29justice.html
Excerpt: The second chapter in Mr. Risen’s book provides a detailed description of the program. But Mr. Kurtzberg said the Justice Department was seeking information only about Mr. Risen’s sources for the ninth chapter, which centers on the C.I.A.’s effort to disrupt Iranian nuclear research. That material did not appear in The Times. The book describes how the agency sent a Russian nuclear scientist — who had defected to the United States and was secretly working for the C.I.A. — to Vienna in February 2000 to give plans for a nuclear bomb triggering device to an Iranian official under the pretext that he would provide further assistance in exchange for money. The C.I.A. had hidden a technical flaw in the designs. The scientist immediately spotted the flaw, Mr. Risen reported. Nevertheless, the agency proceeded with the operation, so the scientist decided on his own to alert the Iranians that there was a problem in the designs, thinking they would not take him seriously otherwise.
When Will They Take Us Seriously?
http://www.americanthinker.com/2010/04/when_will_they_take_us_serious.html
Excerpt: When it comes to the economy, a recent CNN poll shows, as usual, that the economy remains the most important factor in how respondents will vote this year. The pollster then concludes that "[i]f conditions stay bad or get worse, that benefits Republicans. Improving conditions may help the Democrats hold onto more seats." Let me sum this up. Charles Krauthammer believes that if congressional Republicans don't come up with their own version of financial reform, then they'll take a hit in November. The left-wing media thinks that it doesn't matter that the Democrats used reconciliation to pass a monstrous health care bill as long as they won. Dana Perino characterizes what Arizonans are feeling concerning illegal immigration as "frustration." And as far as the economy is concerned, if the numbers start going up, voters will return home to the Democrats. What do they think of us in Washington, D.C.? Not much.
Bill would require banks to track, report to Feds on all personal checking acc'ts
http://biggovernment.com/capitolconfidential/2010/04/29/bailout-bill-would-require-banks-to-track-and-report-personal-checking-accounts-to-feds/
If Bush…oh, never mind. Excerpt: Subtitle G of the Dodd discussion draft bill requires that records be maintained and reported “for each branch, automated teller machine at which deposits are accepted, and other deposit taking service facility with respect to any financial institution, the financial institution shall maintain a record of the number and dollar amounts of deposit accounts of customers.” What’s worse, banks will be required to submit these records to the new super regulatory agency called the Consumer Financial Protection Agency (page 1041). The CFPA will be allowed to use this information for any purpose “as permitted by law” under CFPA rules—rules set by CFPA themselves. So, lets get this straight—the law requires banks to snoop on its customers MOST PERSONAL INFORMATION and submit it to another government agency so it can be used anyway the CFPA see’s fit.
Utah Conservatives sing chorus of 'Bye bye Bennett' with glee
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/04/30/AR2010043000770.html?wpisrc=nl_politics
Excerpt: Delivering the opening prayer of the Beaver County Republican Convention recently, cattle rancher Gilbert Yardley prayed for Utah to elect "honest" people to Congress -- anybody to replace "the bunch we have in there now." Sen. Robert F. Bennett was in the room, hoping to persuade state delegates to nominate him at the May 8 GOP convention. A friend seated next to Bennett leaned in to whisper the obvious: "I don't think he's one of yours." It's no surprise that anger at Washington and Congress is coursing through Republican circles. What took party leaders by surprise is that the anger here is directed not at President Obama, but squarely at Bennett. And with a flurry of state primaries scheduled in the coming weeks, a Bennett defeat could become a rallying point for anti-incumbent fervor elsewhere.
Organized labor begins $1 million ad campaign against Blanche Lincoln
http://voices.washingtonpost.com/thefix/morning-fix/1-2-3-2.html?wprss=thefix
Above and here—the left and right attacking not each other, but towards the center. Excerpt: The Service Employees International Union will launch a series of television and radio ads taking Sen. Blanche Lincoln (D) to task for her record on trade, the leading edge of a seven-figure expenditure from the union in advance of her May 18 primary showdown against Lt. Gov Bill Halter. The SEIU television ad is a testimonial from Greg Knowles, an employee at Cooper Tires in Texarkana, who says that Lincoln has "a lot of nerve" for claiming in a television ad that she saved 1,700 jobs at the company. "We saved our own jobs and we had to take big pay cuts to do it," said Knowles. We would not have to have done that if Miss Lincoln had not voted for all those unfair trade deals."
Charlie Crist to run for Senate as an independent
http://voices.washingtonpost.com/thefix/senate/charlie-crist-to-run-for-senat.html?wprss=thefix
Florida voters will now choose between two Republicans and one Democrat for the senate, putting the Dem back in the race. May hurt GOP chances to take control of the senate. On the other hand, if it develops into a two-way between Crist and Rubico, Democrats and centrist independents might support Crist. Excerpt: Florida Gov. Charlie Crist announced this afternoon he will run for the Senate as an independent, breaking with the Republican party and setting up a three-way battle in the fall fraught with national political implications. "Our political system is broken," said Crist at a rally in St. Petersburg. "I believe in democracy and the right to choose." Crist, who will remain a registered Republican, repeatedly cast his decision as in the best interests of Floridians, saying at one point that the easiest course for him would be to run for re-election as governor but that people across the state had urged him to pursue an independent Senate bid. "I was never one who sought to hold elective office to demagogue or point fingers," said Crist. "For me, for me, public service has always been about putting the needs of our state and our people first; and every single day, as your servant, I have tried to do exactly that." In reality, however, Crist's hand had been forced by a national conservative groundswell that had lit upon the Florida Senate primary as a chance to send a message to Republican leaders that the status quo was no longer acceptable. In the immediate aftermath of Crist's announcement, his entire campaign team -- manager Eric Eikenberg, media consultants Russ Schriefer and Stuart Stevens, pollster Public Opinion Strategies, communications director Andrea Saul and press secretary Amanda Hennenberg all resigned. "It has been an honor to work for Governor Crist, and I wish him all of the best," said Saul…..A recent Quinnipiac University poll showed Crist leading a three-way race with 32 percent followed by Rubio at 30 percent and Meek at 24 percent.
Response to “I’m Tired” posted on this blog:
http://buddha-on-a-stick.blogspot.com/2010/04/sick-and-tired-of-patriotic-whiners.html
Excerpt: Maybe if we spent more time thoughtfully reading newspapers and magazines, or quietly immersed in books, and less time receiving our opinions from TV and radio, maybe we'd actually be able to grasp what is happening to our country, and ourselves as a people. We are changing, we are evolving -- and you can either get with the fish whose feet are carrying them onto land where there is a better chance of survival. Or you can hang in the water with the Robert A. Hall's, Rush Limbaugh's, Glenn Becks and Sarah Palins -- or anyone you want to mention from the left, right or center. Evolution knows no ideologies, no human fears nor dreams. It just is. And it is all that there is. (I just hope Rush, Glenn and Sarah note I was given pride of place!)
Must Read: Why Arizona Drew a Line
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/04/29/opinion/29kobach.html
Excerpt: Predictably, groups that favor relaxed enforcement of immigration laws, including the American Civil Liberties Union and the Mexican American Legal Defense and Education Fund, insist the law is unconstitutional. Less predictably, President Obama declared it “misguided” and said the Justice Department would take a look. Presumably, the government lawyers who do so will actually read the law, something its critics don’t seem to have done. The arguments we’ve heard against it either misrepresent its text or are otherwise inaccurate. As someone who helped draft the statute, I will rebut the major criticisms individually: It is unfair to demand that aliens carry their documents with them. It is true that the Arizona law makes it a misdemeanor for an alien to fail to carry certain documents. “Now, suddenly, if you don’t have your papers ... you’re going to be harassed,” the president said. “That’s not the right way to go.” But since 1940, it has been a federal crime for aliens to fail to keep such registration documents with them. The Arizona law simply adds a state penalty to what was already a federal crime. Moreover, as anyone who has traveled abroad knows, other nations have similar documentation requirements. “Reasonable suspicion” is a meaningless term that will permit police misconduct. Over the past four decades, federal courts have issued hundreds of opinions defining those two words. The Arizona law didn’t invent the concept: Precedents list the factors that can contribute to reasonable suspicion; when several are combined, the “totality of circumstances” that results may create reasonable suspicion that a crime has been committed. For example, the Arizona law is most likely to come into play after a traffic stop. A police officer pulls a minivan over for speeding. A dozen passengers are crammed in. None has identification. The highway is a known alien-smuggling corridor. The driver is acting evasively. Those factors combine to create reasonable suspicion that the occupants are not in the country legally. The law will allow police to engage in racial profiling. Actually, Section 2 provides that a law enforcement official “may not solely consider race, color or national origin” in making any stops or determining immigration status.
How Arizona became center of immigration debate
http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5hSQsFGWm5S9wHor0EpRyHxLk8YFgD9FBN88O0
Excerpt: The frustration had been building for years in Arizona with every drug-related kidnapping, every home invasion, every "safe house" discovered crammed with illegal immigrants from Mexico. The tensions finally spilled over this month with passage of the nation's toughest law against illegal immigration, a measure that has put Arizona at the center of the heated debate over how to deal with the millions of people who sneak into the U.S. every year. A number of factors combined to produce the law: a heavily conservative Legislature, the ascent of a Republican governor, anger over the federal government's failure to secure the border, and growing anxiety over crime that reached a fever pitch last month with the slaying of an Arizona rancher, apparently by an illegal immigrant….Arizona is the biggest gateway into the U.S. for illegal immigrants. The state is home to an estimated 460,000 illegal immigrants — a population larger than that of entire cities such as Cleveland, St. Louis and New Orleans.
Is Obama Inciting Racial Violence in Arizona?
http://www.newsrealblog.com/2010/04/29/is-obama-inciting-racial-violence-in-arizona/
Hope this is over-reaching. But there is no question that Democrats will benefit if there is any tea party, or anti-illegal immigration violence. The media will gloss over pro-illegal-immigration violence. Excerpt: Is it possible President Obama is inciting violence in Arizona? Could he, some in his party and in liberal media be using racial bating to do it? I think you could make that case. So why aren’t the mainstream media and level-headed Democrats in Congress criticizing the President, others in their party, and some in the media for stirring up possible aggression in Arizona? Arizona’s recent law cracking down on illegal immigration has had an immediate backlash from those on the Left. The state is being flooded by angry protesters, many of whom are not only holding angry signs, but have even been filmed throwing water bottles at police and others. One organizer reportedly did not excuse the violence but did defend the reasoning behind it. Sadly, he put it all in racial terms.
Mexico's Drug War Leaves 22,000 Dead as Violence Spreads to U.S.
http://directorblue.blogspot.com/2010/04/mexicos-drug-war-leaves-22000-dead-as.html
Excerpt: 22,000 dead. Beheadings. Hangings. Mass-murders. Bodies sliced into pieces. Killings of cops, government officials, judges, and innocents -- with the violence spreading daily into the U.S. and beyond. Remember. Remember this as the open-border Democrats pander to illegal aliens while they throw the legal residents of Arizona -- of all races, creeds and colors -- to the wolves.
Brown, Cameron hit 'amnesty' for illegals
http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2010/apr/30/brown-cameron-hit-amnesty-for-illegals/?utm_source=newsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=newsletter_must-read-stories-today
Not just Arizona! Excerpt: British Prime Minister Gordon Brown and his Conservative Party challenger, David Cameron, on Thursday opposed giving amnesty to illegal immigrants, saying that would send the wrong message to people looking to sneak into Britain. A question on immigration turned into a flashpoint in the third and final televised debate among Mr. Brown, Mr. Cameron and Liberal Democratic candidate Nick Clegg in Birmingham. Mr. Brown's Labor Party slipped in the polls this week after the prime minister was caught on an open microphone describing a longtime party supporter as "bigoted" after she expressed concern about the influx of Eastern European immigrants.
Economic Freedom Matters
http://www.ncpa.org/sub/dpd/index.php?Article_ID=19289&utm_source=newsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=DPD
Excerpt: There is a link between economic freedom and employment growth, according to a new study published by the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis, called "Economic Freedom and Employment Growth in the U.S. States." Other studies have come to the same conclusion; however, one of the things that makes this study different is its findings on labor markets, says Michael D. LaFaive, director of the Mackinac Center's Morey Fiscal Policy Initiative. The authors write: "In addition, we find that less restrictive state and national government labor market policies have the greatest impact on employment growth in U.S. states." That conclusion doesn't bode well for Michigan, says LaFaive, which is known for having a relatively hostile labor climate and which over the last 10 years has seen its overall national economic freedom ranking tumble according to the periodic "Economic Freedom of North America" report, published by the Fraser Institute in Canada, and the "U.S. Economic Freedom Index" published by the Pacific Research Institute in California:
Dealing with the TeaParty (Video & photos)
http://biggovernment.com/jhoft/2010/04/29/obama-sniper-teams-ordered-to-rooftops-to-quash-radical-tea-party-protest-video/
Excerpt: On Wednesday Team Obama called in the riot squad to deal with the Quincy Tea Party patriots outside the Oakley-Lindsey/Quincy Community Center.
Response from a retired (conservative) cop to yesterday’s post on this
Did you watch the videos? The text you forwarded is a complete mischaracterization of what the police did. The writer says, “Illinois sent in the riot squad to stop the couple hundred peaceful protesters from … doing what it isn’t exactly clear”. But the “riot police” didn’t have any contact with the protestors. The officers in question didn’t even speak to the protestors. What you saw was a completely reasonable police response to the presence of the President in Quincy. There were hundreds of tea party protestors, and the police have to be ready if some of them get out of hand (it happens). The guys in riot gear marched in and stood across the street from the demonstrators. They never came near the demonstrators. And when they weren’t needed any more, they left. There is absolutely nothing to complain about in those videos.
House in Georgia, heart in Vietnam
http://www.cnn.com/2010/US/04/28/vietnam.immigrant/index.html
Excerpt: The Vietnam War ended with the fall of Saigon 35 years ago this week, but Hong Nguyen will never surrender. Nguyen's story is just one among millions from Vietnam's tragic war era, but it's also one that ultimately resolves in triumph. Nguyen was a Republic of Vietnam army major stationed in Da Nang when the port city was bombarded by the enemy North Vietnamese army in late March 1975. Commanders in Saigon, 380 miles to the south, offered no guidance or information, he said.
Fancy Nancy
http://www.americanthinker.com/2010/04/fancy_nancy.html
Excerpt: However, now that I think about it, this picture is more than a vanity portrait. It is a tool intended to send a message to a specific audience. Capitol File magazine's primary circulation area is Washington, D.C. The audience is very select. This cover photo is so outlandish in its visual flattery that it can be seen only as a warning directed to the lobbyists and vendors and supplicants who travel to our nation's capital. It communicates to them that Nancy Pelosi can command how others should see her -- as Our Glorious Speaker, and you'd better not laugh or you'll be on the next plane back to Palookaville. Gone are the wild eyes. Gone are the grasping facial expressions. Gone is any hint that she habitually accuses Tea Partiers or others who challenge her of being "violent" and "Nazis". For the next two months, Capitol File magazine will sit on coffee tables in reception areas throughout Washington. All the people who are not insiders, who have to wait, who are not whisked past the desk directly through to meetings, will sit in lobbies and see Nancy Pelosi's picture smiling at them from the coffee table as if there's nothing wrong.
Oh, Mann: Cuccinelli targets UVA papers in Climategate salvo
http://www.readthehook.com/blog/index.php/2010/04/29/oh-mann-cuccinelli-targets-uva-papers-in-climategate-salvo/
Excerpt: In papers sent to UVA April 23, Cuccinelli’s office commands the university to produce a sweeping swath of documents relating to Mann’s receipt of nearly half a million dollars in state grant-funded climate research conducted while Mann— now director of the Earth System Science Center at Penn State— was at UVA between 1999 and 2005. If Cuccinelli succeeds in finding a smoking gun like the purloined emails that led to the international scandal dubbed Climategate, Cuccinelli could seek the return of all the research money, legal fees, and trebled damages.
World Rethinks Climate Legislation
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704423504575212991625192482.html?mod=WSJ_Opinion_LEFTTopBucket
Excerpt: It was always going to be an uphill battle for the U.S. Congress to pass comprehensive climate and energy legislation in an election year. But with Senator Lindsey Graham's likely decision to withdraw his support from the landmark bill, the prospects are now virtually zero. That is not just because Mr. Graham had been the only Republican senator to endorse a broad approach to tackling global warming. It's because the climate, politically speaking, has changed....
Obama's fatal flinch on immigration reform
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/04/30/AR2010043001389.html?wpisrc=nl_pmpolitics
Excerpt: Air Force One was about seven miles over Appalachia this week when President Obama dropped a bomb on his party. Senate Democrats had that very day circulated an immigration reform proposal, and the Associated Press, receiving a leaked copy, reported on the "draft legislation." But as Obama returned to Washington from Illinois Wednesday night, he walked back to the press cabin on the presidential aircraft and, in an impromptu Q&A, essentially declared immigration reform dead. He said "there may not be an appetite" for it. Obama's retreat -- after encouraging senators only weeks ago to take up immigration reform -- clotheslined Senate Democrats. Since their proposal had already leaked, they had no choice but to go ahead with the rollout of the plan Obama had just doomed. "I don't know in what context the statement was made last night," Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid told reporters at Thursday night's rollout. Well, Mr. Leader, the context is fear.
Strikingly Unpresidential
http://www.creators.com/opinion/david-limbaugh/strikingly-unpresidential.html
Excerpt: How the president presents himself does matter for all the obvious reasons, but I believe Obama's behavior and the public's perception of it are relevant for other equally important reasons. He came into office with a reputation for being sophisticated, gentlemanly, above the political fray and open-minded. But it was a facade, facilitated by good looks, a seemingly pleasant demeanor and an extraordinarily fawning — and forgiving — media. He has been getting a pass on his unseemly conduct for way too long, which partially explains the disconnect between his personal likability and the unpopularity of his socialist agenda. I believe that if the public were fully attuned to how unpresidentially he has consistently behaved, it wouldn't be as approving of him personally, and in turn, politicians wouldn't be so afraid to call him out on his Machiavellian and brutish behavior, the exposure of which would have an electoral impact. If more people understood what I believe to be this man's actual character, they wouldn't — in the face of his consistently highhanded tactics in pushing each and every one of his destructive agenda items — reflexively assume he's such a nice guy who means well. Then, they might be more vigilant, and heaven knows we need megadoses of vigilance these days. I have theories about why Obama is consistently getting a pass, beyond the media's corrupt liberalism and the allies he's created through his racial and class warfare, but that's another column. The point for now is that he is getting a pass, and his behavior is increasingly indefensible.
Creators of carbon credit scheme cashing in on it
http://www.canadafreepress.com/2007/cover031307.htm
Shocked, I am. Excerpt: With little media monitoring, both Strong and Gore are cashing in on the lucrative cottage industry known as man-made global warming. Strong is on the board of directors of the Chicago Climate Exchange, Wikipedia-described as "the world's first and North America's only legally binding greenhouse gas emission registry reduction system for emission sources and offset projects in North America and Brazil." Gore buys his carbon off-sets from himself--the Generation Investment Management LLP, "an independent, private, owner-managed partnership established in 2004 with offices in London and Washington, D.C." of which he is both chairman and founding partner.
The $10 Trillion Climate Fraud
http://www.investors.com/NewsAndAnalysis/Article.aspx?id=531731&p=2
Excerpt: So lucrative does this market appear, it attracted the attention of London-based Generation Investment Management, which purchased a stake in CCX and is now the fifth-largest shareholder. As we noted last year, Gore is co-founder of Generation Investment Management, which sells carbon offsets of dubious value that let rich polluters continue to pollute with a clear conscience. Other founders include former Goldman Sachs partner David Blood, as well as Mark Ferguson and Peter Harris, also of Goldman Sachs. In 2006, CCX received a big boost when another investor bought a 10% stake on the prospect of making a great deal of money for itself. That investor was Goldman Sachs, now under the gun for selling financial instruments it knew were doomed to fail. The actual mechanism for trading on the exchange was purchased and patented by none other than Franklin Raines, who was CEO of Fannie Mae at the time.
Barack Obama, America’s Selective Salary Policeman
http://www.cnsnews.com/news/article/65013
Excerpt: Fundamental lesson of Capitalism 101: Governments and bureaucrats don’t make what people want and need. They only get in the way. It is individuals, cooperating peacefully and voluntarily, working together without mandate or central design, who produce the world’s goods and services. They make what people desire and demand for themselves, not what Obama and his imperial overlords ordain that the masses should have.
Space Wars: Circa 1959 to 2010
http://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2010/04/space_wars_circa_1959_to_2010.html
Excerpt: I noted with interest President Obama's April 16 visit to Cape Kennedy to rally the "workers". Certain reports have it that there were few in any "workers" invited to hear the speech. There did seem to be a lot of applause from people who were about to lose their jobs. Then on April 22 I noted the launch of an Atlas/X-37 "space plane" combination on a "secret" mission. Had I seen this before? The Atlas/X-37 stirred my memory. In June of 1959 the Eisenhower administration awarded a contract to Boeing for a project called Dyna-Soar. This also was an Atlas/Space Plane combination very closely resembling the current configuration. The intended offensive purpose of the 1959 system sounds remarkably similar to the theories put forth for the X37. Also remarkable is the involvement of the same contractor and booster. But is there a more over-riding theme in both of these events?
Retaking the Offensive in the Illegals Fight
http://www.americanthinker.com/2010/04/retaking_the_offensive_in_the.html
Excerpt: Short-term, Mr. Obama and his handlers are trying to leverage the new Arizona law to gin up Hispanic votes this November. In states with larger concentrations of Hispanic voters, Mr. Obama and his handlers wish to more than offset an expected surge in voters disgruntled with Mr. Obama's big-government raw deal. Perhaps Mr. Obama's ploy will work, but it's guaranteed to work if conservatives and Republicans fail to contest Mr. Obama in Hispanic communities. Despite the left's propaganda, there is an abundance of Hispanic Americans who are offended by and worried about the violations of law that illegals present. Hispanics see and fear the disruptions that illegals -- especially the criminal element -- are bringing to their neighborhoods.
DOJ Subpoenas NYT's Risen re CIA Leaks
http://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2010/04/doj_subpoenas_nyts_risen_re_ci.html
Excerpt: Risen was originally subpoenaed about this matter by the Bush administration, fought the subpoena and now it has expired. The Obama Administration has apparently revived it. While Risen had revealed in the paper a NSA program respecting transmissions into and out of the U.S., this matter involved something different--- a very embarrassing incident for the CIA. In 2000, under Clinton, the agency had given to the Iranians, through a Russian scientist working for it, plans for a nuclear bomb. The blueprint to be handed over had a deliberate error in it. The scientist, thinking the error was so obvious it would diminish his credibility, told the Iranians about it and, therefore, made the entire cockamamie plan falter in its purpose.
U.S. Subpoenas Times Reporter Over Book on C.I.A.
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/04/29/us/29justice.html
Excerpt: The second chapter in Mr. Risen’s book provides a detailed description of the program. But Mr. Kurtzberg said the Justice Department was seeking information only about Mr. Risen’s sources for the ninth chapter, which centers on the C.I.A.’s effort to disrupt Iranian nuclear research. That material did not appear in The Times. The book describes how the agency sent a Russian nuclear scientist — who had defected to the United States and was secretly working for the C.I.A. — to Vienna in February 2000 to give plans for a nuclear bomb triggering device to an Iranian official under the pretext that he would provide further assistance in exchange for money. The C.I.A. had hidden a technical flaw in the designs. The scientist immediately spotted the flaw, Mr. Risen reported. Nevertheless, the agency proceeded with the operation, so the scientist decided on his own to alert the Iranians that there was a problem in the designs, thinking they would not take him seriously otherwise.
When Will They Take Us Seriously?
http://www.americanthinker.com/2010/04/when_will_they_take_us_serious.html
Excerpt: When it comes to the economy, a recent CNN poll shows, as usual, that the economy remains the most important factor in how respondents will vote this year. The pollster then concludes that "[i]f conditions stay bad or get worse, that benefits Republicans. Improving conditions may help the Democrats hold onto more seats." Let me sum this up. Charles Krauthammer believes that if congressional Republicans don't come up with their own version of financial reform, then they'll take a hit in November. The left-wing media thinks that it doesn't matter that the Democrats used reconciliation to pass a monstrous health care bill as long as they won. Dana Perino characterizes what Arizonans are feeling concerning illegal immigration as "frustration." And as far as the economy is concerned, if the numbers start going up, voters will return home to the Democrats. What do they think of us in Washington, D.C.? Not much.
Bill would require banks to track, report to Feds on all personal checking acc'ts
http://biggovernment.com/capitolconfidential/2010/04/29/bailout-bill-would-require-banks-to-track-and-report-personal-checking-accounts-to-feds/
If Bush…oh, never mind. Excerpt: Subtitle G of the Dodd discussion draft bill requires that records be maintained and reported “for each branch, automated teller machine at which deposits are accepted, and other deposit taking service facility with respect to any financial institution, the financial institution shall maintain a record of the number and dollar amounts of deposit accounts of customers.” What’s worse, banks will be required to submit these records to the new super regulatory agency called the Consumer Financial Protection Agency (page 1041). The CFPA will be allowed to use this information for any purpose “as permitted by law” under CFPA rules—rules set by CFPA themselves. So, lets get this straight—the law requires banks to snoop on its customers MOST PERSONAL INFORMATION and submit it to another government agency so it can be used anyway the CFPA see’s fit.
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