Happy Patriots Day! (Hint: By the rude bridge…) ~Bob.
Don’t miss the funny Democratic-Fundraising-Letter Mad Lib By Jim Geraghty at the end of today’s digest. ~Bob.
Information on my seven books
Obama flips, re-labels likely foe Romney as hardcore conservative
Excerpt: In a bid to win independents, President Obama’s campaign is ramping up efforts to label Mitt Romney a hardcore conservative. Out is the emphasis on Romney as a centrist flip-flopper with “no core,” a tag useful for Democrats as they attempted to hurt Romney with Republican voters and lengthen the primary season.
Kelly wins GOP primary in contest for former Rep. Giffords’s seat
Excerpt: Jesse Kelly won a special primary election in Arizona on Tuesday, securing the Republican nomination to replace former Rep. Gabrielle Giffords (D-Ariz.). Kelly, an Iraq War veteran and project manager, edged out three other Republicans all vying to finish the term of Giffords, who stepped down in January – one year after an assassination attempt in her Tucson, Ariz. district left her critically wounded.
Several nations trying to penetrate U.S. cyber-networks, says ex-FBI official
Excerpt: At least half a dozen countries with offensive cyber-capabilities are probing U.S. corporate and military computer systems, looking for data and a toehold should they one day want to disrupt or destroy the networks, according to the FBI’s former top cyber-sleuth.
Worth Reading: Why Congress Must Confront the Administrative State
Excerpt: Over the course of the last century, the United States slowly emerged as a formidable administrative state -- one that is run by unelected federal government bureaucrats instead of the elected representatives of the people. This trend manifests itself in the enormous centralization of power in the executive branch, its cabinet departments and regulatory agencies, says Robert Moffit, a senior fellow with the Heritage Foundation. President Obama's administration serves as the keystone example of how far this change has come: during his three years as president, the executive branch has grown dramatically and has begun overreaching for power. This is demonstrated first by the unprecedented legislation that has originated from the White House and been pushed through by the bully pulpit: Within weeks of his inauguration, the president signed into law a major expansion of the state-based Children's Health Insurance Program and Medicaid. He quickly followed this up with the enactment of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009. In 2010, Congress passed the Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act, providing for massive and far-reaching financial regulation. And on March 23, 2010, he signed into law the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act. This legislative agenda was accompanied by unprecedented regulatory action: In 2009 and 2010 alone, federal agencies issued 7,076 final rules. Since 2009, federal agencies have issued 75 major regulations (those with an economic impact of $100 million or more) with an annual additional cost to the economy of $38 billion. Taken altogether, the Small Business Administration last year estimated that the total cost of America's regulatory burden reached $1.75 trillion.
Rethinking America’s Energy Policy By Rep. Fred Upton
Excerpt: President Obama continues this policy today. During his recent energy public relations tour, he repeatedly referred to Republicans as subscribers to the “flat earth” worldview because we do not share his affinity for massive taxpayer spending on more expensive energy sources. But if anyone is stuck in the past, it’s President Obama, as he has refused to acknowledge the great potential of America’s energy resources thanks to new technologies that help us unlock them. New discoveries and production of resources like shale oil and gas are dramatically altering our energy supply outlook and the entire global geopolitical landscape.
Ray Kelly for mayor?
Excerpt: New Yorkers got welcome news yesterday: Police Commissioner Ray Kelly might run for mayor next year after all. Our advice: Go for it, Ray! (Marine Vietnam vet. ~Bob.)
Obama's New Gas Price Scapegoat
Excerpt: High gas prices are not a president's friend, especially in an election year, so it's not surprising that President Barack Obama is trying his darndest to shift the blame for record-high fuel prices onto something other than his failed energy policies. Yesterday he made a desperate attempt to distract from those failures and redirect America's gas price rage with a flawed proposal to punish speculators for supposedly driving up the cost of energy. (First he blamed turmoil in the middle east. Then evil oil companies, who, if taxed more, would naturally bring the price down. Now speculators. Nothing about appointing an Energy Secretary who said that we need prices like Europe. ~Bob.)
Worth Reading: CNN analyst on Obama’s oil-speculation crackdown: What is he talking about?
Excerpt: What you’re seeing here, a la the Buffett Rule, is the White House hyping a small part of a potential solution with undue fanfare to get voters’ attention. Obama himself admitted recently that the Buffett Rule won’t do much to reduce the deficit but that didn’t stop him and Biden from delivering four speeches on it in four days. The public tends to assume, I think, that when the president carves out time to address a policy matter publicly, that matter must be important and pressing. If he addresses it repeatedly in a short span, imagine how much more important it must be. That’s why, I think, Paul Ryan described the Buffett Rule as “pixie dust” when it comes to deficit reduction: Obama’s never presented it as a magical solution but a low-information voter who isn’t tracking his every word may very well think it’s a magical solution given how much attention O seems to be paying it. Same thing here. We’ve got a Rose Garden ceremony, we’ve got Holder and Geithner standing beside the podium — obviously, to borrow a phrase from Biden, this is a big effing deal. But … it really isn’t. It’s just basic retail stagecraft designed to show that Obama’s doing something about gas prices, the 2012 equivalent of “message: I care.” Presumably Reid will push a vote on it sooner rather than later and the GOP will filibuster, and that’ll hand O a new talking point about the “party of oil speculators” or whatever.
North Korea Says It Will Abandon Deal With U.S.
Excerpt: North Korea said on Tuesday that it was abandoning an agreement it made in February with the United States, in which it promised to suspend uranium enrichment, nuclear tests and long-range missile tests. (Anyone surprised by this is too mentally negligible to be allowed out without a minder. ~Bob.)
Sierra Club, big green groups to endorse Obama
Excerpt: President Barack Obama will receive endorsements Wednesday from the Sierra Club, League of Conservation Voters, Clean Water Action and Environment America, according to an environmental political operative and a House Democratic source. (No surprise. Big Green knows which side its Solyndra-style boondoggles are buttered on. They want more of your dollars. ~Bob.)
Excerpt: Parenthetically, I find that it’s not that hard for economists on the left and right to agree on health reform. The reason: economists are naturally sensitive to incentives. They don’t like reforms that leave people with perverse incentives to do antisocial things. Once you are determined that the incentives have to be right at every margin, a lot of things begin to quickly fall in place.
Excerpt: The left has had a field day with this. But then the Romney campaign struck back. Barack Obama is a dog eater. Well, he was as a boy. The weed and cocaine tries were in high school and college. Eating dog was in his youth. All are documented in his autobiography, Dreams of my Father. This caused a stir on twitter with conservatives participating in a twitter hashtag game: #ObamaDogRecipes. My personal contributions were Escar-Bo and Bo Mein. I was pretty fond of Hound Cake and German Shepard Pie too.
Obama Dines out – funny satire pic.
If I had a dog, it would look like Obama’s dinner. ~Bob.
Excerpt: If states are really the laboratories of democracy, then apparently Wisconsin is the place where all the mad scientists go to cook up the latest abomination of science with which to terrify the populace. And one case in point is the way that the Democratic party in Wisconsin has decided to run with the novel platform of explicitly offering to raise other people’s taxes in order to maintain certain Democratic cronies’ current-but-threatened standard of living. I simply cannot come up with a sarcastic comment worthy of that particular brainstorm. Sorry.
Who Has a Florida Gun Permit?
Excerpt: The profile of card-carrying concealed gun permit owners in Florida are males over 50. They number nearly 1 million. (Okay, who is the most danger to the country........the one with the permit or the one who can vote several times because they don't need to show identification? –LK. It’s racist to require permits to carry, as blacks can’t get IDs, remember? ~Bob.)
Excerpt: One of the most appalling features of Obama’s presidency is the expansion of green venture socialism on behalf of corporate cronies who helped finance his campaign. Obama’s use of stimulus funds to distort the energy market with subsidies and loans to unprofitable solar energy companies has become the hallmark of his presidency, and it has theoretically provided us with a potent political weapon. Yet for some reason a bunch of Republicans – many of whom reside in red states – are doing the same thing on behalf of Big Wind. Has anyone explained why picking Solar as a winner is liberal, while picking Wind is conservative?
Cheer up: the world has plenty of oil
Excerpt: As more and more people within the oil industry have come to realize in recent years, the world has plenty of oil that can be produced at competitive prices for a long, long time to come. This means the world does not face inevitable "energy poverty" and there is no reason to be afraid of unavoidable "energy wars". (This detailed report (with footnotes, even!) is well argued and, I think, if not exactly correct, will be very close to it. Keep in mind prices at the pump reflect the supply, not of raw product straight from the well-head, but of refined product that can be delivered to your gas station on a few hours notice. It takes between two and ten years to explore, locate and bring a well on-line. That means today’s energy decisions will still be effecting us a decade from now. Since most economic decisions imply political decisions to support them, you can help move us in the direction of cheaper oil at the ballot box in November by voting for candidates that support more economic freedom rather than more regulation and restriction of supply. Ron P.)
Ping supplies golf clubs to wounded vets
92% Favor Strict Limits on Government To Protect the Individual
Excerpt: Voters believe too much government power is a dangerous thing and put a very high value on protecting the rights of the individual. Sixty-five percent (65%) of Likely U.S. Voters agree with the statement that a government powerful enough to do everything you want is also powerful enough to take away everything you have. A new Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey shows that only 23% disagree with that statement.
Quotes from The Patriot Post
"Democratic advisor Hilary Rosen is under fire for saying Ann Romney, quote, 'Never worked a day in her life.' Hey, if she really never worked a day in her life, Ann Romney would be endorsing Obama." --NewsBusted's Jodi Miller
"If I had a daughter, she would look like Ann Romney." --radio talk-show host Rush Limbaugh
"The thing I hate most about taxes is that the more money they take, the more government we get. It's the worst possible trade off imaginable." --humorist Frank J. Fleming
"President Obama released his tax returns. It turns out he made $900,000 less in 2011 then he did in 2010. You know what that means? Even Obama is doing worse under President Obama." --Jay Leno
Pakistan school grenade attack kills 6 year old boy By Shaan Khan
Another dead Muslim child from Allahmurder by someone who didn’t get the “Islam is a Religion of Peace” memo. ~Bob. Excerpt: A suspected militant tossed a hand grenade into a school in northwest Pakistan, killing one child and wounding two others Monday, police said. The attack took place at a co-educational school on the outskirts of Peshawar, said police official Tahir Ayub.
Arab seller of Hebron house said sentenced to death
Excerpt: Jewish leaders in Hebron have called for international intervention to help the Palestinian man sentenced to death for selling a home near the Cave of the Patriarchs to Jews. (In keeping with both the Qur’an and the racial laws promulgated by the National German Socialist Workers Party in the 1930s. ~Bob.)
Trial opens for alleged New York bomb plotter
Didn’t get the memo. ~Bob. Excerpt: The high-profile trial began of a man accused of being part of a New York trio that was only "days" from launching suicide bombs in the city's crowded subway to take revenge for the US war in Afghanistan. The trial in Brooklyn features New York immigrant Muslims who became radicalized in the feverish post-9/11 atmosphere and allegedly became homegrown terrorists with a plan to cause carnage in America's biggest city.
Why Bush Isn’t Responsible for Today’s Debt Crisis
Excerpt: We get it, the last thing President Obama wants is to be blamed for is the nation’s growing debt—or anything else, actually. But the statute of limitations on blaming President George W. Bush for everything—anything—must have run out by now. On the debt in particular, it’s sort of a hard thing to avoid considering President Obama is the first president in history to preside over four years of deficits in excess of $1 trillion.
Dems kill crackdown on teacher-student sex
Excerpt: Majority Democrats on a California state legislative committee have decided to kill a plan that would have cracked down on intimate relationships between school teachers and their students, prompting a pro-family organization to warn that it is just another reason for parents to pull their children from the government education industry. “This is yet another reason for conscientious parents to flee the dysfunctional, immoral, and imploding government school system for church schools and home schools, which are much safer physically, emotionally, mentally, and spiritually,” said Randy Thomasson, president of SaveCalifornia.com. (I assume this is Teachers Unions protecting members right to have sex with students. Prohibiting sex with students is, I guess, “union busting.” ~Bob.)
Special Report: Tax time pushes some Americans to take a hike
Excerpt: Last year, almost 1,800 people followed Superman's lead, renouncing their U.S. citizenship or handing in their Green Cards. That's a record number since the Internal Revenue Service began publishing a list of those who renounced in 1998. It's also almost eight times more than the number of citizens who renounced in 2008, and more than the total for 2007, 2008 and 2009 combined.
Possible Russian Responses to an Attack on Iran
Excerpt: As international activity surrounding the Iranian nuclear program intensifies, it seems that the question of a possible war on Iran is taking center stage on Russia's agenda as well. There is evidence of heightened diplomatic activity, along with military preparations and an expanded public debate reflecting differences of opinion within the Russian establishment.
Helter Skelter Manufactured Crisis = Manufactured Race Wars
Excerpt: As the economic pressures increase in the United States and across the world, people have a tendency to retreat into tribal, ethnic and racial groups. That tendency is amplified by radical groups on both the right and the left , who seek to use racial conflict as a means to maintaining and acquiring political power. The stage is being set by the media and other powers in the United States for all-out class warfare. It started months ago with powerful television images of gangs of African American girls brutally beating up a white girl in a fast food restaurant.
Action Alert – Best Buy: TV's, Computers and Hamas by Marc J. Fink
Excerpt: Think again before buying your next flat-screen television or computing device from Best Buy. The struggling retail giant recently used profits from American consumers to fund the annual banquet of a group closely linked to Hamas.
The incredibly shrinking swing vote
Excerpt: The simple fact is that — as we have written before — Obama is one of the most polarizing presidents ever. (In that, he has much in common with George W. Bush.) It’s not just loyal Democrats who love him, and base Republicans who loathe him. Even those who loosely identify with either party have been driven into their respective ideological camps by the last three-plus years.
Boehner: AWOL Obama 'shrinking from his responsibility to lead' http://thehill.com/homenews/house/222261-boehner-awol-obama-shrinking-from-his-responsibility-to-lead
Excerpt: Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) on Wednesday accused President Obama of “shrinking from his responsibility to lead” and going “AWOL,” placing full blame for Washington’s dysfunction at the doorstep of the White House. The Speaker opened his weekly press briefing with a withering assessment of Obama’s job performance, leaving no doubt that the 2012 campaign has now overtaken the legislative session in Congress.
Boehner: Obama Has 'Lost His Courage' and 'Checked Out' as Leader
Excerpt: Speaker of the House John Boehner says President Obama “lost his courage” over an agreement on spending and charged that Obama has “checked out” of any efforts to work with Congress to instead concentrate on his re-election. “It’s shameful,” Boehner declared in an interview with “CBS This Morning” co-host Charlie Rose that aired on Wednesday.
Prostitute numbers rocket in Geneva
Excerpt: An explosion in the number of prostitutes across Switzerland has led to fierce competition and dramatic price reductions, with Geneva seeing a 24 percent rise in a single year. (The Free Market at work, in the midst of European Socialism. ~Bob.)
Illinois Bishop: Obama ‘intent on following a similar path’ as Hitler, Stalin http://dailycaller.com/2012/04/17/illinois-bishop-obama-intent-on-following-a-similar-path-as-hitler-stalin-audio/#ixzz1sPjMLpea
Excerpt: The church will survive the entrenched corruption and sheer incompetence of our Illinois state government, and even the calculated disdain of the president of the United States, his appointed bureaucrats in HHS and of the current majority of the federal Senate,” he continued. “May God have mercy on the souls of those politicians who pretend to be Catholic in church, but in their public lives, rather like Judas Iscariot, betray Jesus Christ by how they vote and how they willingly cooperate with intrinsic evil.
IRS responds to NOM, is taking alleged leak ‘very seriously’ By Alexis Levinson
Excerpt: In response to allegations that the Internal Revenue Service improperly leaked financial information about the National Organization for Marriage (NOM), the IRS told The Daily Caller that it takes the laws requiring it to protect the confidentiality of documents submitted to it seriously.
John Cusack rips Obama: He ‘continued that imperial presidency of the Bush administration’ By Jeff Poor
Excerpt: On CBS’s “This Morning” on Tuesday, in an appearance promoting upcoming movie “The Raven,” actor John Cusack said that he was troubled by President Barack Obama and Attorney General Eric Holder, accusing them of continuing the “imperial presidency of the Bush administration with these claims to executive privilege.” Cusack, whose politics are distinctly left-leaning, complained that the Obama administration was overstepping the boundaries of due process….
DC fires 61 city employees for collecting unemployment while working
Excerpt: Mayor Vincent C. Gray’s administration has fired 61 city employees for collecting unemployment benefits while working for the District government, city officials said Tuesday. (Let me get this straight. They make twice what I do and they put in for unemployment while working? I hope they are terminated without benefits….Barb.)
Walking Papers? The Incredibly Thin, Speculative Zimmerman Affidavit By Bob Owens
Excerpt: Last week, Florida prosecutor Angela Corey stunned many within the legal establishment when she announced her office was filing a second-degree murder charge against George Zimmerman. The four-page affidavit of probable cause filed by Corey’s office shocked legal experts, ranging from liberal Harvard law professor Alan Dershowitz and liberal law blogger Jeralyn Merritt to conservative former prosecutor Andrew McCarthy and talk show host Mark Levin, among others.
MA School Removes ‘God’ From Lee Greenwood‘s ’God Bless the U.S.A’ During Assembly
Excerpt: Is God under attack in Massachusetts? This is a question that some of the state’s residents may be asking after the Stall Brook Elementary School in Bellingham removed the word “God” from Lee Greenwood’s, “God Bless the U.S.A.” The song was reportedly changed to, “We love the U.S.A.”
Jim Webb: Health-care law represents a leadership failure for Obama
Excerpt: President Obama’s new health-care law will be his greatest liability as he attempts to once again win the critical swing state of Virginia, Sen. Jim Webb (D-Va.) warned Wednesday. “I’ll be real frank here,” Webb said at a breakfast organized by Bloomberg News. “I think that the manner in which the health-care reform issue was put in front of the Congress, the way that the issue was dealt with by the White House, cost Obama a lot of credibility as a leader.”
Judge quits Trayvon Martin case, cites conflict
Excerpt: The Florida judge presiding over the Trayvon Martin shooting case removed herself Wednesday after the attorney for defendant George Zimmerman argued she had a possible conflict of interest that related to her husband. Judge Kenneth M. Lester Jr. will preside over the case. The next judge who would be in the court rotation, John D. Galluzzo, also cited a conflict, so Lester was selected, according to a news release from the court. (Safe at home! This case will be the graveyard of legal reputations. You read it here first. ~Bob.)
56 courtrooms in L.A. County -- 9 in San Fernando Valley -- to close, more than 168 workers to be laid off
Excerpt: A state-ordered cut of $30 million to the L.A. Superior Courts budget will prompt the closure of 56 courtrooms countywide, and result in the "erosion of access to justice," an official said Tuesday. The cuts, the largest in memory, will mean the closure of 24 civil, 24 criminal, three family law, one probate and four juvenile delinquency courtrooms, according to Judge Lee Edmon, presiding judge of L.A. County Superior Court.
Here’s Why Some People Should not be Permitted to Vote
Excerpt: George Washington said, “Government is not reason; it is not eloquent; it is force. Like fire, it is a dangerous servant and a fearful master.” People who vote for a more powerful government are more dangerous than government itself. (Extreme. But so were the 37% of Germans who voted for the NDSAP in 1932 or 33. ~Bob.)
Your ongoing Obama green energy disaster of the day: Fisker Automotive: The death watch begins. by John Hayward
Excerpt: Fisker got $529 million of your money from the Obama Administration, producing 500 manufacturing jobs. Unfortunately, those manufacturing jobs were in Finland, not America. Fiskers executives were quite proud of their wise decision to keep those jobs overseas.
Elizabeth Warren’s Wall Street Money Machine; She doesn’t rely on Wall Street bankers; she relies on Wall Street lawyers. By Kevin D. Williamson
Excerpt: Senator Brown shares with President Barack Obama the distinction of being a recipient of very generous campaign donations from Goldman Sachs, his third-largest contributor behind two Massachusetts mainstays: Boston-based Fidelity and Boston-based Liberty Mutual. If these donations make Senator Brown the “poster child for Goldman Sachs,” then we must think of a comparable epithet for Professor Warren, whose campaign also takes in a great deal of money from Wall Street — or, in the interest of more precise metonymy, from the sewers beneath Wall Street.
Teacher Upset She Can't Retire at 47: MEA member says reform bill calling for teachers to contribute minimally to retirement is unfair By Tom Gantert
Terri List says she would tell her students not to become a teacher in Michigan.
Why? One of the reasons is because the Saginaw Township Community School District English teacher won’t be able to retire at age 47 as she has hoped.
Too Funny: The Democratic-Fundraising-Letter Mad Lib
From NRO Newsletters Morning Jolt with Jim Geraghty (with his kind permission.)
Dear [Insert Donor Name Here],
Our fundamental values are at risk/endangered/under attack/being swiped out from under our noses/being eaten like never before.
The Republicans/Tea Party/Mitt Romney/Sarah Palin/Rush Limbaugh/Emmanuel Goldstein are tearing apart/destroying/exploiting/stealing/lying about/winning our nation's most basic sense of fairness/equality/honesty/separation of church and state/goodness/kumbaya-nitude.
And you and I know who's really behind this: The Koch Brothers/Rupert Murdoch/Big Oil/Wall Street/Neocons/The Koch Brothers' Pet Octopus Named 'Squeezy'/The Richest 1 Percent/Cthulhu.
They're doing this because they really want to steal the election/start a war/enrich the rich/steal all the oil/exploit the proletariat/impurify our precious bodily fluids.
And no one would be hit harder by this than women/minorities/the most vulnerable/ordinary Americans like you/extraordinary Americans like you/25-34-year-old suburban moms with domestically manufactured automobiles in exurban counties.
As we all know, President Obama is in no way responsible for anything in modern America that bothers you, and in fact he is responsible for everything in modern American life that pleases you. What's more, it's time for the tired partisanship, finger-pointing, and the same old Washington blame game to come to an end.
The best way to stand up for our values/candidates/elected offices that we consider our birthright/cushy perches/efficient system of transferring taxpayer money to our preferred interest groups is to send money now/send money now/send even more money now/no really, send money now.
After all, it takes money to fight for our values. Your donation will go to voter outreach/attack ads/staff expenses/more attack ads/transportation/even more attack ads/mostly overhead/hiring somebody to write better fundraising e-mail text than this and other important needs!
Even as little as $3/$30/$100/$1,000/the legal maximum of $30,800/an untraceable FedEx package of large non-sequential bills can make a big difference in our nation's future. Remember, the next quarterly FEC reporting deadline is only three/two/one month away!
Best, Your Friendly Neighborhood Democratic Political Action Committee
P.S.: Remember, not only do we know who donated and who didn't, but all donations are public record, so our less refined friends in the unions and Occupy movements will know if you donated or not, too. And as President Obama said to a House Democrat who had the audacity to vote the wrong way, "Don't think we're not keeping score, brother."
--
Robert A. Hall
Amazing how simple it can be to communicate with people and have them understand a certain topic, you made my day.
ReplyDeleteBanquet Halls in San Fernando Valley