Wednesday, July 15, 2009




Sotomayor's Unconvincing Backpedalling

I'm surprised and disturbed by how many times today Sonia Sotomayor has backed off of or provided less-than-convincing explanations for some of her more controversial speeches about the role of gender and ethnicity in judicial decision-making. Sotomayor's most quoted comment is,

"I would hope that a wise Latina woman, with the richness of her experiences, would more often than not reach a better conclusion than a white male."

she essentially disavowed...

[Because in today's media 'climate' {talk about warming}, it will work - despite all video evidence to the contrary.]

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Sotomayor on Sotomayor: Revises, extends her words

It's a good thing Sonia Sotomayor speaks Sotomayoran. The Supreme Court nominee at last got a chance to deconstruct her own words Tuesday before the Senate Judiciary Committee.

Fingers splayed, palms flat, hands bouncing up and then deliberately pressing down to the table, Sotomayor elaborated, clarified, expanded, retracted. She drew loopy circles on her paper; she ran rhetorical circles around her past words...

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Sotomayor hearings: Is judge a temperamental bully?

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Supreme Court by President Obama, an article in the New Republic appeared to damage her chances critically.The article, quoted the Almanac of the Federal Judiciary, a guidebook to federal judges.

Sotomayor was a "bully" and a "terror" on the bench, suggested she wasn't "that smart" and was rude to lawyers who made arguments she didn't like...

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image toon - 1st bbro legal = Sotomayor re batting firefighter

WaPo Insists Sotomayor Is 'Mainstream' -- But Doesn't Say Study Proving It Came from Liberals

The Washington Post’s Saturday story on the approaching Sonia Sotomayor confirmation hearings tried to suggest that conservative allegations that the New York appeals judge is a liberal activist who rules with her feelings have been crushed.

The trio of reporters Robert Barnes, Michael Shear, and Perry Bacon cited "one recent study" that readers might suppose is nonpartisan – but the cited study came from a very liberal, pro-Sotomayor source, the Brennan Center for Justice at New York University -- a think tank named after liberals' favorite activist justice.

Here’s where that study emerged:

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image toon - 1st bbro legal = Sotomayor's pledge upholding empathy

Former CIA Director: No One Told Me Not To Tell Congress

NPR finds the one person the New York Times should have interviewed.

The man who ran the CIA from 2006 through January says he wasn't told by then-vice president Dick Cheney not to brief Congress about a covert program aimed at members of al-Qaida, NPR's Mary Louise Kelly reports.

Gen. Mike Hayden's statement is at odds with a New York Times report Sunday that said the CIA: Withheld information about a secret counterterrorism program from Congress for eight years.

Now we know...NY Times employees don't even read their own paper.

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If Cheney Really Had 'Assassination Squad'

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Fox New's Bill O'Reilly has a fabulous response to Seymour Hersh's most-recent conspiracy theory about former Vice President Dick Cheney having an executive assassination squad responsible for covertly wiping out America's enemies:

"If Cheney really had such a crew, Hersh would have been dead a long time ago, and so would most everybody at MSNBC."

So wrote O'Reilly in a fabulously tongue-in-cheek column Sunday entitled "Coming Soon to a Lefty Rag Near You."

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The Cheney "Scandal"

"Please don’t look at the socialized medicine in the corner, we’re hunting Cheneys."

Okay, so I’ve had internet problems and staying abreast of the news has been a problem. So, I’m willing to concede that maybe I’m missing something. But, from what I can tell this Cheney scandal story (much hyped in our little New York Times digest thingamajig), is the mother of all nothingburgers.

It’s hard for me not to see it as a ploy by Democrats to distract from the fact that the stimulus bill is a dud...

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image toon - mny fnn 1st = Oby assure stimulus working - pass on in unemployment line

Iraq seeks to buy US-made F-16 fighter jets

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Iraq wants to buy an initial squadron of American F16 fighter jets this year to help to guard against perceived threats from Iran and Syria after US forces leave, the head of the Iraqi Air Force said yesterday.

Lieutenant-General Anwar Ahmed said that he hoped to sign a contract for 18 F16s, manufactured by the technology company Lockheed Martin, as the centrepiece of billions of dollars that Iraq is expected to spend on arms in coming years.

“This is very important to us,” he said during a visit to Washington. “It is a priority.”

He said that if funds were made available by the Iraqi parliament his goal was to acquire up to 96 F16s by 2020. The US is also producing the fighter jets for Israel, Pakistan, Poland and Greece.

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CNN: U.S. 'Cannot Win the War in Afghanistan

Despite the change in administration, CNN’s Michael Ware, who regularly issued doom-and-gloom reports on Iraq in past years, bluntly stated during a report on Thursday’s Anderson Cooper 360 that

"To put it simply, America cannot win the war in Afghanistan. ... Right now, there’s as many as 100 Taliban on that mountaintop between the snowcapped peaks and amid those trees. They’re currently under siege from local villagers, who are driving them from their bunkers.

But at the end of the day, it’s the Pakistani military who tolerates the presence of groups like the Taliban, and it’s not until America can start cutting deals with these people that there’s any hope of the attacks on American troops coming to an end."

[So, villagers are kicking their asses out of towns, but the US military can't win the war. He seems to have forgotten that the US accomplished in months what Russia failed to do in a decade. I.e., it most certainly can do so again - provided it retains the will to do so.

But the MSM will do its best to defeate it, as always.]


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image toon - gwot islm = 8000 more troops to Afghanistan = surge
[Please don't use the word 'surge', that's a Bushism]

Panel dropped after invitation of Islam critic


The American Library Association has canceled a panel discussion on Islam planned for its annual conference over the weekend, after three speakers withdrew in protest at the inclusion of the fourth, a critic of the Muslim religion...

[25% dissenting opinion - can't have that]

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Death toll in Urumqi [China] riots may hit 258

BEIJING - The death toll in ethnic clashes in China's Xinjiang Uighur Autonomous Region a week ago may climb to 258, China Daily reported on Monday.

Chinese authorities said the official death toll from July 5 riots in Urumqi, capital of China's northwest region, has increased to 184 and another 939 people have been hospitalized, with 74 of them in a critical condition.

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China is now an empire in denial

When the Soviet Union collapsed in 1991, it suddenly became obvious that the USSR had never been a proper country. It was a multinational empire held together by force.

Might we one day say the same of China?

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Russia's New Useful Idiot

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Let's review recent events:


This dangerous increase in Russian bellicosity, described by many as a reheating of the Cold War, stems less from some new destructive capability on Russia's part than it does from a lack of resistance on the part of the American government.

The United States has for the last two decades engaged in an unnecessary experiment in "multilateralism" which has cost us critical strategic position with a weakened but potentially dangerous enemy. A dying bear can still inflict fatal wounds on the unwary.

Peace through strength, a tried and tested policy, has been replaced with the less potent "peace through lots and lots of talk." It's the UN way:

"If you don't stop manufacturing WMDs, we'll send you a letter telling you how very angry we are, and then we'll give you more time. If you're smart you'll ship the weapons to Syria." [snip]

Russia is weaker now than it was at the end of the Cold War, and is running a very transparent bluff to test the state of American will-power. If we listen to President Obama and the defeatist elites that still dominate American government, we will do the very thing that would have spelled our defeat in the Cold War. Putin knows this. This time he's Reagan and Obama is Gorbachev. If we give ground now, it will without a doubt have disastrous consequences for American influence and power.

Russia understands strength; therefore we must be strong. As a great American once said,

"Freedom is never more than one generation away from extinction. We didn't pass it on to our children in the bloodstream. It must be fought for, protected, and handed on for them to do the same, or one day we will spend our sunset years telling our children what it was once like in the United States when men were free."

Let's make sure the "evil empire" knows we're still alive.

[Recommended > ]

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image toon - intl russia china msm - China says US down Russia up

It's worse than we think

Mort Zuckerman writing in the Wall Street Journal gives us 10 reasons why the unemployment numbers indicate the economy is in even worse shape than we believe.

A few of Mort's valuable observations:

- No fewer than 1.4 million people wanted or were available for work in the last 12 months but were not counted. Why? Because they hadn't searched for work in the four weeks preceding the survey.

- The number of workers taking part-time jobs due to the slack economy, a kind of stealth underemployment, has doubled in this recession to about nine million, or 5.8% of the work force. Add those whose hours have been cut to those who cannot find a full-time job and the total unemployed rises to 16.5%, putting the number of involuntarily idle in the range of 25 million.

This is why people are getting angry at Obama. He globetrots around the world being adored by foreigners while sticking to his plan to remake America by taxing and spending us into oblivion.

Meanwhile, unemployment is spiraling out of control and he doesn't seem to be doing anything about it. In fact, he says that he's done everything he plans on doing because the stim bill is going to work - despite the fact that unemployment has already exceeded the percentage he set as the ceiling if we passed the bill.

Read the rest of Zuckerman's piece to get an eyeful of why things are probably only going to get worse.

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A Lesson in Stupid Tax Policy

North Carolina is a state with a huge budget deficit. It is one of the worst state deficits in the nation at $4.6 billion or 21% of the general fund budget for fiscal year 2010. In addition, North Carolina has the 5th worst unemployment rate in the country at 11.1%, and just missed the top 10 lists of the worst states in the country for business (39th here, and 38th here).

So how has the Tar Heel State proposed it solve its budget crisis and spur economic growth? Not by cutting spending of course. Governor Beverly Perdue has proposed $1.5 billion in tax increases, much of which will come from taxing online retail sales from companies that have no physical presence in the state.

So instead of angering the education lobby that helped her get elected, Governor Perdue is pursuing more taxes that will only cause further damage to North Carolina's suffering economy.

Amazon has already put affiliates on notice that they will be terminated once the law is enacted.

This means that not only will North Carolina once again be unable to collect the sales tax from Amazon, but also now they won't even be able to collect the income taxes from affiliates who profited from their relationship with Amazon in the past. That is a net loss in tax revenue resulting from a bill that was supposed to increase taxes by $1.5billion.

In short it is a recipe for disaster... [snip]

The one benefit the Amazon Tax has brought about is a wonderful teachable moment on stupid tax policy. Conservatives have espoused for decades that raising taxes actually reduces revenue coming into a government, and the example of the Amazon Tax illustrates that point perfectly.

States with serious economic problems right now should not be looking for more tax opportunities to artificially sustain bad spending habits. Instead they should take this time to prioritize their expenditures and make cuts as necessary...

[But first we need elect 'representatives' that understand this, or nothing will change.]

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Lincoln: how to manage government

[HT:GC]
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You cannot help the poor by destroying the rich.
You cannot strengthen the weak by weakening the strong.
You cannot bring about prosperity by discouraging thrift.
You cannot lift the wage earner up by pulling the wage payer down.
You cannot further the brotherhood of man by inciting class hatred.
You cannot build character and courage by taking away people's initiative and independence.
You cannot help people permanently by doing for them, what they could and should do for themselves.

.....Abraham Lincoln
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Clearly It's Al Gore Who's In Denial

In the past we’ve questioned former Vice President Al Gore’s honesty (Gore's Deceptive Rolling Stone Interview); his use of intimidation tactics and character assassination to promote his lies (Gore's Grave New World); his proclivity for championing policy based wholly on erroneous facts (Gore Celebrates Israel's 60th With Whoppers) and, ultimately, his very soundness of mind (Al Gore's Global Warming Therapy). So comments he made to an Australian reporter last weekend which betrayed an evident disconnect with reality, while certainly mind-boggling, were by no means astonishing.

During a Melbourne interview discussing his trip down-under to pressure the Rudd government toward carbon emissions trading legislation (h/t Climate Depot), Australian Broadcasting Corporation’s Heather Ewart forced Gore to do something from a distance he has steadfastly refused to do face-to-face --- address his growing hordes of detractors:

HEATHER EWART: When you were last visiting Australia, you were riding high on the success of your documentary 'Inconvenient Truth'. What has happened since then though is there have been a number of respected scientists who have suggested that perhaps you've been a little too alarmist and loose with the facts. Has that dented the credibility in any sense of what you're on about?

AL GORE: I don't agree with that assessment. I think that the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, which is the world scientific authority on this issue, has been saying exactly the same things that I have been saying.

Of course, as a colossal group of U.N. bureaucrats controlling a substantially smaller group of rented scientists, the only thing the IPCC is the world authority on is the corrupting of climate science for political gain. As we’ve reported time and time again, the latest IPCC synthesis report, much-hyped-and-hallowed by alarmists and media-drones alike, represents the combined work of only 52 UN scientists -- as carefully cherry-picked as they were micromanaged.

Surely, the 255-page U.S. Senate Minority Report containing the IPCC-countering findings of more than 13 times that number (now over 700 dissenting -- including many current and former U.N. IPCC -- scientists) holds more authoritative weight to climate realists.

Okay, so Ewart wasn’t about to challenge the exalted IPCC’s scientific standing, but she did indirectly challenge Gore’s claim that the U.N panel was on board with the imminent planetary destruction depicted in his film:

“There was also, though, a British judge who ruled that there were in fact, I think, nine errors when it was challenged in court?”

And Gore’s response was that of a man in complete denial:

Well, the ruling was in my favor. There have been a number of deniers trying to say that this isn't real. Of course there are always going to be that, but the overwhelming majority of the scientists who've looked at this have said, ‘We've got to confront this.’"

In his favor? In October of 2007, the British High Court found that Gore’s film “represents 'partisan political views' and must be treated as such by teachers in British schools.” The judge mandated that teachers wishing to project the film in class must inform students that “some of Mr. Gore's views were not supported or promoted by the Government, and there was ‘a view to the contrary’".

The decision was based on Mr. Justice Burton’s assessment that the film included at least nine errors “in which statements were made that were not supported by the current mainstream scientific consensus.”

The IPCC agrees with him? The British Court ruling was in his favor?

From where does he muster the unmitigated gall to refer to tens of thousands of skeptical scientists and a growing majority of unalarmed Americans as the deniers?

[Highly Recommended > ]

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image toon - grn owg - Gore re global governance

Palin makes the case against cap and tax


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Sarah Palin makes a well argued case against Obama's cap and tax in an Op-ed in today's Washington Post:

There is no denying that as the world becomes more industrialized, we need to reform our energy policy and become less dependent on foreign energy sources. But the answer doesn't lie in making energy scarcer and more expensive. Those who understand the issue know we can meet our energy needs and environmental challenges without destroying America's economy.

Job losses are so certain under this new cap-and-tax plan that it includes a provision accommodating newly unemployed workers from the resulting dried-up energy sector, to the tune of $4.2 billion dollars. So much for creating jobs.

In addition to immediately increasing unemployment in the energy sector, even more American jobs will be threatened by the rising cost of doing business under the cap-and-tax plan. For example, the cost of farming will certainly increase, driving down farm incomes while driving up grocery prices. The costs of manufacturing, warehousing and transportation will also increase.

The ironic beauty in this plan? Soon, even the most ardent liberal will understand supply-side economics.

The Americans hit hardest will be those already struggling to make ends meet. As the president eloquently put it, their electricity bills will "necessarily skyrocket." So much for not raising taxes on anyone making less than $250,000 a year.

It will be very interesting to see how Sarah Palin uses her position as one of the big Republican names not in office.

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'Hardball' Promotes Ted Kennedy HBO History, Which Completely Leaves Out Death at Chappaquiddick

On Friday night’s Hardball, guest host Lawrence O’Donnell enthusiastically promoted HBO’s new, glowing Ted Kennedy documentary.

He began by declaring "There‘s so much ground to cover. We don‘t have enough time for this. And I want to show the people out there, people under 60, who don‘t know the early Ted Kennedy, don‘t remember the early Ted Kennedy, I want to show what you have got in this movie."

But O’Donnell’s interview completely left out the biggest scandal of Kennedy's career – the death of Mary Jo Kopechne at Chappaquiddick.

[Our 'professional' media. Typical.]

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Judge rules L.A. Unified can fire special ed teacher paid to stay out of schools

A Los Angeles Unified School District special education teacher who has been paid to stay away from classrooms for more than seven years while the district tried to fire him for alleged sexual harassment should be dismissed, a county Superior Court judge has ruled.

[After seven years on the payroll. What's it going to take to privatize our education system?]

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Public Protests Slowing Down Health Care Takeover

It appears that moderate Democrats in Congress are getting nervous. The public doesn't like the idea of wrecking the economy in the name of stopping warming, especially when the climate hasn't actually warmed any for a decade.

People aren't responding any better to the idea of turning hospitals into the medical equivalent of the post office. Reports Roll Call.

Call it the hangover effect...


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[We can stop it, if we act now...


"OPPOSE GOVERNMENT RUN HEALTH CARE"


House-Pelosi: http://speaker.house.gov/contact/
YOUR Congressman: https://forms.house.gov/wyr/welcome.shtml

or: Speed Message them with your personal distribution list...

and as always, pass it on...
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Oh shut up

The Washington Post has a long and unfortunate piece today on how very hard it is to work at the White House. I know a lot of infantrymen who would love to have the soft life these people have.

I think this sort of mewling is what happens when you staff the White House mainly with people who think the hardest thing you can do in life is take the bar exam...

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