.
Thomas, Editor at Large with Newsweek after stints as Assistant Managing Editor and Washington bureau chief, contended“Rush Limbaugh is good” for the Republican Party since he'll “take it down as low as it can go” so Republicans “make complete fools of themselves” and “then maybe,” Thomas yearned, “a moderate can come in and rescue them.”
[The campaign to convince the right that it needs move left continues en masse. Still, he's half right: the Republican party needs a savior - it just won't come from a 'moderate', that way lies doom {hence the avalanche of 'advice' by everyone on the left on the Republicans' 'problem'}]
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Tuesday, May 19, 2009
Thomas & Totenberg Excuse Pelosi; Thomas Hopes 'Moderate' Will Save GOP from Limbaugh
Three Things Obama Could Learn from Thatcher
When Margaret Thatcher, then 53, appeared at the door of 10, Downing Street exactly 30 years ago today, hubris and self-doubt were not things that worried her.(Snip)Thatcher's true genius was her relentless focus on making policy in support of a remarkably prosaic goal:
to let middle-class folk feel that hard work would be rewarded in a better future for their children...
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Washington State Bails Out Media: Newspapers Get Tax Cut
Isn't this marvelous?
Americans are struggling to keep their jobs and pay their bills; the White House and a Democrat-controlled Congress want to impose a carbon cap-and-trade scheme along with universal healthcare, both destined to dramatically raise taxes from current levels, and; struggling newspapers in Washington state are getting a 40 percent reduction in business taxes.
I guess preserving liberal media is much more important than the best interest of citizens as reported by the Seattle Times Tuesday...
[Amazing how when liberals want to help a company they don't hesitate to implement the obvious-well-proved tactic of tax cuts - but resist it for all else. {And then there's the question of why the want to save the old media...}].
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Official English plan clears Oklahoma Senate panel
Legislation for a statewide vote on making English the official language of Oklahoma has cleared a Senate Committee. The vote was 9-6 Wednesday for the Republican-sponsored proposed constitutional amendment
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Actress Angie Harmon's Favorite Website Is NewsBusters
Model and actress Angie Harmon, who was part of a group of Hollywood celebrities that supported John McCain last year, loves NewsBusters.
In fact, she told In Style magazine that NB's her favorite website (from June 2009 edition via LexisNexis, no link available, h/t NBer Stacy Bergfeld)
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>wow - that kind of intelligence in that kind of package... oops - was that out loud?<
Monday, May 18, 2009
Speaker Pelosi Lied? N.Y. Times Puts It On Page A-18
The top of the front page of Friday’s Washington Post was all about House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s press conference in which she accused the CIA of deliberately misleading her in 2002 about waterboarding. There were two stories up top and a box promising two more stories inside. So what about the New York Times? There was no Pelosi story anywhere on Page One, just a plug to a story inside – on page A-18.
"For Frozen Entrees, ‘Heat and Eat’ Isn’t Enough."
It came complete with a photo of a Banquet chicken pot pie box.
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CBS and NBC Spike Panetta's Rejection of Pelosi's Smear of the CIA
After ignoring for three weeks House Speaker Nancy Pelosi's denial she was briefed by the CIA about how water-boarding was being used, only to decide it was news on Thursday when Pelosi at a press conference accused the CIA of “lying” and of “misleading” the Congress, on Friday the CBS and NBC evening newscasts fell silent again despite the backlash from CIA Director Leon Panetta, a former Democratic Congressman.
He issued an emphatic statement about how “it is not our policy or practice to mislead Congress” and declaring: “CIA officers briefed truthfully on the interrogation of Abu Zubaida, describing the 'enhanced techniques that had been employed.'”
That was enough of a news hook for ABC's World News to make it the Friday night lead,“It is important to point out that those who briefed Speaker Pelosi at that September [2002] briefing were career intelligence officers, these were not political operatives from the Bush administration.”
Yet not even that mendacious blame-shifting prompted a single syllable from CBS or NBC.
It's a pretty sad state of affairs when the newscast anchored by a former Democratic political operative is the one willing to highlight news deleterious to a top liberal Democrat.
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SF Chronicle Reporter: Pelosi 'Torture Woes' Politically Motivated
So how does the Washington correspondent for Nancy Pelosi's hometown newspaper, the San Francisco Chronicle, explain away Nancy Pelosi's disastrous news conference on Thursday in which she accused the CIA of lying?
Simple. Blame it all on the evil Republicans and portray the House Speaker as the victim of political gamesmanship.
Such was the laughable premise of Carolyn Lochhead in her Chronicle article:
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China deploys secure computer operating system
China has installed a secure operating system known as "Kylin" on government and military computers designed to be impenetrable to US military and intelligence agencies, The Washington Times reported on Tuesday.
The newspaper said the existence of the secure operating system was disclosed to Congress during recent hearings which included new details on how China's government is preparing to wage cyberwarfare with the United States.
Kevin Coleman, a private security specialist who discussed Kylin during the April 30 hearing of the US-China Economic and Security Review Commission, said its deployment is significant because it has "hardened" key Chinese servers.
"This action also made our offensive cybercapabilities ineffective against them, given the cyberweapons were designed to be used against Linux, UNIX and Windows" [snip]
Coleman said Chinese state or state-affiliated entities are on a wartime footing in seeking electronic information from the US government, contractors and industrial computer networks.
The Chinese have also developed a secure microprocessor that, unlike US-made chips, is known to be hardened against external access by a hacker or automated malicious software, Coleman said.
"If you add a hardened microchip and a hardened operating system, that makes a really good solid platform for defending infrastructure ... In the cyberarena, China is playing chess while we're playing checkers"
[I.e., our assumed supercity and/or naivety re: our enemies' intentions will be our ruin, as we again chose to ignore all evidence of a coming war and prepare. Recommended > ]
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U.S. Has Plan to Secure Pakistan Nukes if Country Falls to Taliban
The United States has a detailed plan for infiltrating Pakistan and securing its mobile arsenal of nuclear warheads if it appears the country is about to fall under the control of the Taliban, Al Qaeda or other Islamic extremists.
American intelligence sources say the operation would be conducted by Joint Special Operations Command, the super-secret commando unit headquartered at Fort Bragg, N.C.
JSOC is the military's chief terrorists hunting squad and has units now operating in Afghanistan on Pakistan's western border. But a secondary mission is to secure foreign nuclear arsenals -- a role for which JSOC operatives have trained in Nevada.
The mission has taken on added importance in recent months, as Islamic extremists have taken territory close to the capital of Islamabad and could destabilize Pakistan's shaky democracy.
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Joe Biden on U.S. aircraft carrier: Mission Accomplished (secretly)
The voluble Vice President Joe Biden was in San Diego today and visited the USS Ronald Reagan, its crew and their families.
We have the full text of the vice president's remarks below. But you should know that they require a certain security clearance to read them. And if you don't have that clearance, then you shouldn't read them.
That's because Biden shared a secret story with the crowd about a recent mission accomplished by the bravery of Navy personnel in general and Navy Seals in particular. But he and we can't tell you about it because it's still classified.
And no one in this country remembers any recent military activity involving Navy Seal snipers blowing holes in the heads of three Somali pirates ship hijackers. So that can't be it.
Anyway, on with the Vice President's secret public speech...
[Worthless, but I wanted to post the photo of
'Obama endangering Israel'
[HT:DT]
Former US House speaker Newt Gingrich on Sunday blasted the Obama administration for setting itself on a collision course with Israel and endangering the Jewish state, ahead of his address that day to the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) Policy Conference.
"There's almost an eagerness to take on the Israeli government to make a point with the Arab world," he said.
He called US President Barack Obama's program of engagement on Iran a "fantasy," and his Middle East policies "very dangerous for Israel." He summed up Obama's approach as "the clearest adoption of weakness since Jimmy Carter."
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'40.5% of Israeli Arabs deny Holocaust'
As many as 40.5 percent of Israeli Arabs believe that the Holocaust never happened, up from 28% in 2006, a new study released by Haifa University on Sunday stated. According to the research, Holocaust-denial was present in all class sectors, with about 37 percent of respondents having studied beyond high school.
Only 41 percent of Arab Israelis recognize the right of Israel to exist as a Jewish and democratic state...
[The consequences of the West's refusal to aggressively counter the war of ideas the the aggressive extremist Islam: increasing belief in an alternative history. These are Arabs within Israel - so by all means let's follow a 'peace' plan that calls for a 'right of return' of hundreds of thousands of non-Israeli Arabs...]
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Questionnaire for Palestinian Advocates
If you are so sure that "Palestine, the country, goes back through most of recorded history," I expect you to be able to answer a few basic questions about that country of Palestine :
1. When was it founded and by whom?
2. What were its borders?
3. What was its capital?
4. What were its major cities?
5. What constituted the basis of its economy?
6. What was its form of government?
HINT: Can you name one Palestinian leader before Arafat?...
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Biased UN Report on Gaza Operation
[HT:DT]
The Foreign Ministry expressed outrage Tuesday in response to a United Nations report that accused the IDF of deliberately targeting United Nations buildings during Operation Cast Lead in Gaza.
The report was "unbalanced, biased and ignores the facts," Israel said in its rejection. It called on the U.N. to take a second look at the "complex reality in which a terror organization operates in proximity to its facilities. [snip]
Two weeks ago, Israel completed its own independent investigation into allegations that the IDF fired at a UNRWA (United Nations Relief and Works Agency) compound during the war.
"The findings of these inquiries… proved beyond doubt that the IDF did not intentionally fire at the U.N. installations," said the Foreign Ministry in a statement."One must wonder why the report assigns no blame to the Hamas organization, which placed its installations and dispatched its men to confront the IDF in proximity to the U.N. installations. It is very regrettable that this pattern, as well as the responsibility of Hamas for harming Israeli and Palestinian civilians, was disregarded by the [U.N.] investigators." [snip]
The [UN] report did not mention - even once - the circumstances that led to the counterterrorist operation – eight years of increasing rocket and missile attacks on civilians in southern Israel. Nor did it include any evidence provided by Israel that would have supported the IDF's claim that it had not deliberately targeted U.N. facilities.
It did, however, rely on evidence provided by Hamas...
[The organization is worse than worthless. Recommended > ]
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Social Pathology
Social pathology: crack and heroin epidemics, family violence, out-of-wedlock births, abortion as "just another option," alcoholic mothers having brain-damaged babies, violent and uncontrollable schools, constantly irresponsible and self-destructive behavior, endemic crime.
Obama has seen that for twenty years in South Side Chicago, and it is well-established that social pathology is directly responsible for the failure of the "structurally poor" to rise out of their misery. Obama seems to be in denial of the obvious. His own life is entirely middle class. Married, career-oriented, successful, steadily rising income, two daughters born in his marriage.
Obama could be teaching all these obvious rules of behavior, which have worked so well over two centuries since the Industrial Revolution, to bring people out of poverty. They know, just like white liberals, what works in their own lives.
But they will not draw the obvious conclusions: That would be "conservative." Almost a kind of treason to the sacred doctrine of state control... [snip]
The biggest question to ask liberals is: Why don't you support those solutions that have worked so well in your own life?
It is hard to avoid the feeling that the Left is endemically racist and classist: That they have simply decided that what works in their own lives will never work to raise poor blacks, Hispanics and whites out of poverty.
If that's not true, I would like to hear from liberals: Why don't you just encourage all the people you feel sorry for to adopt those work and life habits that made your own friends and families successful?
I'm ready to hear the answer.
Do I hear anything?
[Recommended > ]
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The Nation Mag: Time for Socialist Intervention for an 'Independent' Media
If these names are not familiar, they are certainly well known on the radical left. Together, they wrote a book called Tragedy and Farce lamenting coverage of Iraq and the re-election of George Bush: they argued
"that during the 2004 election and throughout the Iraq war and occupation, Americans have been starved of democracy’s oxygen: accurate information.
More than anything John Kerry, George Bush, or even Karl Rove did, the media’s miscoverage of the campaign and war decided the election."
[No, you read it right: these media luminaries seriously contend that the media's coverage of the Iraq war, by 2004, was an aid to getting Bush re-elected. Cue alternate-universe music {I've no idea what that is, but these folks are obviously hearing it}]
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WaPo Declares 'Historic Low' in Tax Burden, But Leaves Out More Than Half the Burden
The Washington Post carried this headline in a text box at the top of Page One: "Tax Burden Near Historic Low: The average family sent about 9 percent of its income to the IRS, with the middle-class faring especially well, according to federal data. A12." (The D.C. tea party was noted at the bottom of the page, and readers were sent to B-1, the front of Metro.) But how do the Post’s "tax burden" claims stand up?
Inside the paper, there’s a chart, and the source is the "nonpartisan" Congressional Budget Office, now controlled by the Democratic majority. It measured only the "Effective individual income tax rate."
The Post is measuring less than half the federal "tax burden".
Here’s what the CBO director’s blog on the study reported: ...
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New data suggest the Maldives may not sink beneath the sea
Maldives - Since climate change fears first gripped the globe, tourists have flocked to the Maldives to enjoy the islands' spectacular vistas before they vanish.
Do they really need to rush?
Scientists have long warned that the Maldives, an archipelago nation of nearly 1,200 islands in the Indian Ocean, will be wiped out by rising sea levels in the coming decades.
But recent data challenge the widespread belief that the islands are destined to disappear - and a few mainstream scientists are even cautiously optimistic about their chances for surviving intact beyond the next century.
[Another claim bites the dust.]
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Bogeymen of the C02 hoax losing ground
You can discover what your enemy fears most by observing the means he uses to frighten you.
James Hansen, head of NASA Goddard Institute of Space Studies (GISS), and Andrew Weaver, lead author of the UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) Reports, made statements clearly designed to frighten people.
”All those fossil fuel emissions need to be eliminated. And we must do so quickly if we are to have any chance of stabilizing the climate and maintaining human civilization as we know it.”
Hansen increases urgency for action claiming we are on the verge of a tipping point, defined as follows.“Tipping points can occur during climate change when the climate reaches a state such that strong amplifying feedbacks are activated by only moderate additional warming.”
We’re reaching a tipping point, but it’s not the one Hansen anticipates. We’re close to the point where the public and politicians realize they have been totally deceived about the nature and cause of climate change. Even before a shift to concern about the economy polls showed a growing shift in public opinion...
[It would be a good trend if we lived in a democracy. Still, Recommended > ]
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81% Oppose Gas Tax Hike To Encourage Sales of More Efficient Cars
Just 10% of adults think the federal government should increase the tax on gasoline by a large amount as a way of encouraging people to buy more fuel-efficient cars, according to a new Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey.
Eighty-one percent (81%) oppose a large tax hike for that purpose, and eight percent (8%) are undecided.
These sentiments remain largely unchanged from nearly two years when 86% said they opposed the idea of raising gas taxes by 50 cents a gallon as a result of congressional legislation that would encourage the development of more fuel-efficient cars.
In April of last year, 60% of Americans favored suspending the federal gas tax completely for the summer to offset soaring gas prices.
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Al Sharpton vs. Sheriff Joe: The Hypocrite vs. The Patriot
The Reverend Al Sharpton must be running out of things to protest. Last month he went after Sheriff Joe Arpaio. According to a report by Reuters, the opportunist Sharpton, called on Sheriff Joe to resign accusing him of racially profiling Hispanics because of his attempts to enforce US immigration laws:
Under a deal allowing them to enforce federal immigration laws, the deputies have arrested more than 1,500 people who they determined were in Arizona illegally, triggering street protests and condemnation from Latino activists who accuse him of racial profiling." I am first calling for the resignation and or removal of Sheriff Arpaio ... harassment based on color is nothing short of racial profiling, which many of us ... helped to fight to make against the law," Sharpton told reporters.
"Arpaio needs to be confronted, he needs to be removed. ... We also need to suspend the law that he is using. We must stand with our brown brothers and sisters," Sharpton said.
It's ironic that Sharpton is fighting Arpaio's efforts to rid his county of people who are there illegally especially when you consider that Sharpton once incited a deadly riot to rid Harlem of a Jewish store owner who had the nerve to operate at the same location for over 40 years.
The store was called Freddie's Fashion Mart. Sharpton decided that Harlem should be segregated and decided that the Jewish owned store should close even though it had been there for decades. Jeff Jacoby wrote this account:
When the United House of Prayer, a large black landlord in Harlem, raises the rent on Freddy's Fashion Mart, Freddy's white Jewish owner is forced to raise the rent on his subtenant, a black-owned music store. A landlord-tenant dispute ensues; Sharpton uses it to incite racial hatred. "We will not stand by," he warns malignantly, "and allow them to move this brother so that some white interloper can expand his business." Sharpton's National Action Network sets up picket lines; customers going into Freddy's are spat on and cursed as "traitors" and "Uncle Toms." Some protesters shout, "Burn down the Jew store!" and simulate striking a match. "We're going to see that this cracker suffers," says Sharpton's colleague Morris Powell. On Dec. 8, one of the protesters bursts into Freddy's, shoots four employees point-blank, and then sets the store on fire. Seven employees die in the inferno.
Those seven lives are just a few of the deaths caused by the Reverend Al and his hypocrisy; he also helped incite a pogrom in Crown Heights, Brooklyn that resulted in the death of Yankel Rosenbaum. You won't read anything about it in the MSM when they talk about Sharpton's latest hypocrisy; they are too intimidated by this press hungry hypocrite.
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68% of Arizona Voters Favor Sheriff Who Gets Tough on Immigration
Sixty-eight percent (68%) of Arizona voters have a favorable view of Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio, whose aggressive enforcement of laws against illegal immigration have triggered an investigation by the U.S. Department of Justice. Forty-six percent (46%) view the sheriff very favorably.
Just 26% have an unfavorable opinion of Arpaio, including 16% who are very unfavorable, according to a new Rasmussen Reports telephone survey of Arizona voters. Seven percent (7%) are not sure.
Arizona voters also strongly approve of some of the tactics the sheriff employs to fight illegal immigration and crime related to it.
Seventy-four percent (74%), for example, believe that when a police officer pulls someone over for a traffic violation, they should automatically check to see if that person is in the country legally. Twenty-one percent (21%) disagree. These numbers are virtually identical to national findings on the same question.
Sixty-three percent (63%) say that if law enforcement officers know of places where immigrants gather to find work, they should sometimes conduct surprise raids to identify and deport illegal immigrants. Thirty-one percent (31%) oppose those raids. Voters nationally are a bit more supportive of this tactic to fight illegal immigration.
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The Mandate Trap
The New York Times reports on a series of regular health care policy meetings that have been taking place in the Senate between insurers, doctors, hospitals and business groups and staffers for Ted Kennedy. According to the article, there is an emerging consensus forming around the need for an individual mandate requiring that all Americans obtain health insurance.
An individual mandate is the most controversial and unpopular element of any universal health care proposal, and it makes it harder to argue that you aren't supporting government-run health care when you are having the federal government require that everybody purchase health insurance.
It can also be attacked as a giant handout to big insurers, since government is requiring that Americans purchase their product...
[Read the list of attendees again, and ask who's interests are being served.]
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SOME IMPORTANT FACTS TO KEEP IN MIND
Americans are subjected to a stream of opinion deriding as utterly miserable the U.S. health-care system compared to the rest of the developed world. But it may be a good time to consider a few unheralded facts about America's health-care system:
- Americans have better survival rates from both common and rare cancers than Europeans and Canadians.
- Americans have better access to preventing screening and treatment for chronic diseases than Canadians.
- In the United Kingdom and Canada, patients wait far longer than Americans (about twice as long, sometimes even more than a year) to see a specialist, have elective surgery like hip replacements or cataracts, or get radiation treatment for cancer.
- Sixty percent of Western Europeans say their health systems need "urgent" reform.
- Although much maligned by economists and targeted by policymakers, an overwhelming majority of America's leading physicians themselves recently listed the computerized tomography (CT) scan and magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) as the most important medical innovations in improving patient care in the previous decade.
- By any measure, the vast majority of all the innovation in health care in the world comes out of the U.S. health-care system.*
[Like nearly 75% of all new drug development.]
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FISCAL RESPONSIBILITY SUMMIT AND HEALTH CARE
According to the Social Security and Medicare Trustees:
- The unfunded liability in Social Security and Medicare is more than $100 trillion dollars (that's trillion, not billion), or about 6 ½ times the size of the entire U.S. economy.
- That's the size of our commitments over and above expected premiums and dedicated taxes, measured in current dollars.
- Of this amount, Medicare accounts for about $85 trillion; additionally, Medicaid is almost as large as Medicare and two thirds of that is a federal obligation.
If we stay on the current course, these programs will crowd out every other federal program over time...
[And to this Obama wants to add a massive new entitlement.]
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TEACH FOR (SOME OF) AMERICA
Teach for America (TFA) -- the privately funded program that sends college grads into America's poorest school districts for two years -- received 35,000 applications this year, up 42 percent from 2008. More than 11 percent of Ivy League seniors applied, including 35 percent of African-American seniors at Harvard. [bravo]
So poor urban and rural school districts must be rejoicing, right? Hardly: Union and bureaucratic opposition is so strong that TFA is allotted a mere 3,800 teaching slots nationwide, or a little more than one in 10 of this year's applicants. Districts place a cap on the number of TFA teachers they will accept. This is a tragic lost opportunity:
- TFA picks up the $20,000 tab for the recruitment and training of each teacher, which saves public money.
- More important, the program feeds high-energy, high-IQ talent into a teaching profession that desperately needs it.
- Unions claim the recent grads lack the proper experience and commitment [?] to a teaching career; despite two-thirds staying in the field after their two years.
But why have any caps? TFA young people should be able to compete on equal terms with any other new teaching applicant.
The fact that they can't is another example of how unions and the education establishment put tenure and power above student achievement.
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Detroit Free Press: Era of Oppression of Free Speech?
Oh, she isn't saying that Obama himself is trampling on free speech, but she is starting to understand that the left's penchant for political correctness is serving the function as a sort of self-imposed oppression no matter what Obama says. It's getting so bad, according to Brown, that any criticism of Obama is treated as akin to treason... at least it is in the "circles" she runs in, anyway.
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Big Labor's Investment in Obama Pays Off
.''We spent a fortune to elect Barack Obama -- $60.7 million to be exact -- and we're proud of it,''
boasted Andy Stern, president of the Service Employees International Union, to the Las Vegas Sun this week. The behemoth labor organization's leadership is getting its money's worth.
The ubiquitous Stern now enjoys a prominent seat at the table of every major policy discussion at the White House, including economic recovery and health care radicalization...
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McGovern says the secret ballot is 'a matter of principle'
George McGovern’s name has long been synonymous with the kind of principled, doctrinaire and politically suicidal liberalism that Democrats from Bill Clinton to Barack Obama work to avoid.
But McGovern, 87, has reemerged in recent months on the other side of the political spectrum, as a prominent foe of a key piece of the progressive agenda: the labor-backed Employee Free Choice Act - card check...
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Resigned Miss California Director Claims National Organization for Marriage is Hate Group; CBS Doesn’t Bat an Eye
After her resignation from her Miss California position, Moakler went on the show in an exclusive interview to discuss her departure. Donald Trump's announcement in a press conference on May 13 that Carrie Prejean would keep her title as Miss California led to her departure, and Moakler criticized Prejean in the interview.
"I think it's wrong to start screaming that you're being persecuted, then you go and align yourself with organizations like NOM, to me that are particularly, I consider them hate groups," said Moakler.
After briefly clarifying what "NOM" refers to (Moakler said, "The National Organization for Marriage."), Chen immediately moved on to a completely different question about Trump's response to her resignation.
[Hmmm. Wonder what that would make of the majority of Californians who voted for prop. 8?]
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Axelrod Joke: Obamas Considered Naming Dog Miss California
Given what White House senior advisor David Axelrod said in jest about the Obamas considering naming their new dog "Miss California," and
Appearing on NPR's "Wait, Wait...Don't Tell Me," Axelrod was asked about Bo by host Peter Sagal.
Axelrod's response, and the audience laughter, is rather telling (YouTube audio embedded below the fold with partial transcript):
[Classy. From the White House yet.]
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Friday, May 15, 2009
Omission Watch: ABC, CBS and NBC Ignore Pelosi’s Torture Hypocrisy
ABC, CBS and NBC have said nothing about the Speaker’s shifting stories, or the potential hypocrisy of her once supporting (or at least not objecting to) policies that she would later condemn as illegal “torture.”
“Members of Congress were briefed at the time and reportedly didn’t dissent, including intelligence committee leaders Nancy Pelosi, Porter Goss, Bob Graham and Richard Shelby.”
ABC and CBS said nothing about Pelosi that night.
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Still the Biggest Missing Story in Politics
.
In August of last year I wrote an article, "The Biggest Missing Story in Politics," which reviewed the single most important datum in the last thirteen Battleground Polls over a period stretching from early 2002 to late 2008. The critical fact, completely ignored by almost everyone, was that in answering Question D3, which asked the respondent what he considered his ideology to be, sixty percent of the American people described themselves as "conservative" or "very conservative."
In every single Battleground Poll, conservatives vastly outnumbered not only liberals, but moderates and undecided respondents combined. The Battleground Poll itself is a bipartisan poll, combining the resources of the Tarrance Group and Lake Research Partners. Unlike many polls driven by newspapers, networks, or other agenda driven organizations, this poll is one of the few which has no ideological agenda or partisan bias.
The last Battleground Poll, which came out after my article, no longer revealed the answer to Question D3. Did that mean that America, suddenly, stopped being an overwhelmingly conservative nation and had been seduced by Obama into being moderate or Leftist? No. The Tarrance Group did reveal the ideological breakdown of Americans, although in a different way than in the thirteen prior Battleground Polls.
Those earlier polls had asked people to describe themselves as "very conservative," "somewhat conservative," "moderate," "don't know," "somewhat liberal," or "very liberal." Those who chose "very conservative" or "somewhat conservative" were as low in some of the thirteen polls as 58% of the nation and as high in other polls as 63% of the nation, and the average of the polls was a rock solid 60%, year in and year out.
The Tarrance Group chose to look at ideology differently in its post-election poll. Respondents were asked to refine their definition of "conservative." So instead of being asked about the intensity of their ideology (i.e. "very conservative" versus "somewhat conservative"), the Battleground Poll changed the question.
Two questions replace the old Question D3. Now Americans were asked on social issues if they were "very conservative," "somewhat conservative," "moderate," "somewhat liberal" or "very liberal" as well as on fiscal issues if they were "very conservative," "somewhat conservative," "moderate," "somewhat liberal," or "very liberal." The Tarrance Group also provided data on the answers to this question within political parties.
The responses illuminated some aspects of the prior polls, but the over all result was the same: Americans, overwhelmingly, are conservative. There were some differences between social conservatives and fiscal conservatives. Twenty-six percent of Americans call themselves "very conservative" on fiscal issues and forty-three percent consider themselves "somewhat conservative" on fiscal issues. One percent of America is moderate on fiscal issues -- that vital "center" of American politics! -- and three percent "don't know." Twenty-two percent of Americans are "somewhat liberal" on fiscal issues, and a piddling five percent of Americans are "very liberal" on fiscal issues. When the mushy "moderate" and "don't know" respondents are excluded, fiscal conservatives outnumber fiscal liberals by seventy-four percent to twenty-six percent.
Social conservatives are the clear majority of America too, although the numbers are not quite as overwhelming. Thirty-four percent of America, more than one person in three, is "very conservative" on social issues and nineteen percent are "somewhat conservative" on social issues. One percent is moderate on social issues - again, that vital "center" of American politics! - and seven percent "don't know." Twenty percent are "somewhat liberal" on social issues and nineteen percent are "very liberal" on social issues. When the mushy "don't know" and moderates are taken out, social conservatives outnumber social liberals fifty-nine percent to forty-one percent.
Tarrance also helps explain what Sarah Palin and Rush Limbaugh are so popular with Republicans. Seventy-four percent of Republicans are both social and fiscal conservatives. Ninety-one percent of Republicans are fiscal conservative. And seventy-seven percent of Republicans are social conservatives.
Any effort to change the Republican brand ought to begin with that dramatic fact.
What about Obama's own political party, the Democrats? Only forty-two percent of Democrats are both social liberals and fiscal liberals. Perhaps more amazing, twenty-three percent of Democrats, almost one in four, describe themselves as both social conservative and fiscal conservative. Forty-seven percent of Democrats describe themselves as fiscal conservatives, and thirty-four percent of Democrats describe themselves as social conservatives. Fifty-eight percent of Democrats consider themselves either a fiscal conservative or a social conservative or both.
These results, more detailed and more informative than past responses to Question D3 in previous Battleground Polls, do not alter the profoundly conservative character of the American electorate at all.
A social conservative, who was perceived as a social conservative running against a social liberal, would win an easy majority of the American people in any election. A fiscal conservative, who was perceived as a fiscal conservative running against a fiscal liberal, would win a landslide greater than any in the history of these two political parties. A candidate perceive as both a social conservative and a fiscal conservative would win one quarter of the Democrat Party vote, if the Democrat was perceived as a liberal, and sweep the nation easily.
In fact, if a Democrat ran for his party's nomination as a conservative - and if the other candidates for the nomination were perceived as liberals - he ought to be able to compete for the fifty-eight percent of Democrats who were social conservatives, fiscal conservatives, or both. The biggest story in American politics has been answered again, with the data even more detailed and refined.
The answer is the same - just the same - America is still, in every way and from every vantage, a conservative nation.
[So how in the world do liberals compete ideologically?
A: Because so many Americans get their news from TV, where all things are contorted.
This is also why the MSM is working overtime portraying conservatism as the Republican party's 'problem', and ceaselessly attacking folks like Sarah Palin: because if the party can nurture another Reagan, they know what will happen...]
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'Many Republicans Wince' at Cheney -- And They're All Anonymous?
On the occasion of President Obama reversing course on plans to release photographs "depicting the abuse of detainees," a decision wildly unpopular on the hard left, The Washington Post's lead story Thursday was "As Cheney Seizes Spotlight, Many Republicans Wince." There's only one obvious problem with Dan Balz's front-pager. Those "many Republicans" are too timid to attach their names to all the wincing.
[It's all horse pucky: the left fears the true conservative {reference Palin} because they know we're essentially a center-right country by a near 2:1 ratio - hence plan B: depict the Republican party as needing to move left to be re-elected - you know, just as it worked out with McCain...]
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APs Cheney Analysis: We Read His Mind And Decided What He Really Means
Did you know that former vice president Dick Cheney is speaking out only because he is trying to protect his legacy? Well just in case you wondered about it Steven Hurst for the Associated Press wants to assure that he has read Cheney's mind and it's all settled. This is what passes for "analysis" at the AP.
The AP has also decided that Cheney speaking out causes "chagrin" in a GOP trying to "rebuild the tattered party." Additionally, he AP throws out that much bandied liberal canard that Cheney is dishonoring "protocol" by speaking out because, you see, former chief executives always remain silent about presidents that follow them. Right Jimmy Carter, Bill Clinton, and Al Gore? Riiiight?
Oh, and one more thing: did you know that Cheney was "unpopular"? Well, just in case you forgot, the AP kindly reminds you. After reading this anti-Cheney attack piece, one wonders if the AP is now just letting White House flacks write its copy for it. It probably saves the AP some time, anyway.
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Psychologists Told CIA Waterboarding Was Safe
There is new scrutiny into the role of two psychologists who oversaw and and advised the CIA's interrogation of captured terrorists.
Both men, doctors Jim Mitchell and Bruce Jessen, assured the CIA that their methods could 'break' a terrorist and would be safe, according to two former high-ranking CIA officials and a collection of recently declassified Bush administration memos.
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Nobody Wants a Terrorist For a Neighbor
President Barack Obama made a serious mistake when he decided to close the U.S. prison facility at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, without first figuring out where to put the 240 detainees held there.
Most of these people are hard-core jihadists whose main goal in life is to kill Americans. Obama can call it an “overseas contingency operation,” but for the Gitmo detainees it is a declared war against us and terrorism is their weapon of choice...
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Foreign 'Torture' Probe's Threat to US
PRESIDENT Obama's passivity before the threatened foreign prosecution of Bush administration officials achieves by inaction what he fears doing directly. This may be smart politics in the Democratic Party, but it risks grave long-term damage to America...
[Party before country.]
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Obama: Islam Has Shaped the U.S.A.
Undeniably the Islamic faith has done a great deal to shape the world – a statement that makes no value judgment about exactly how it has shaped the world. It has formed the dominant culture in what is known as the Islamic world for centuries. But what on earth could Obama mean when he says that Islam has also “done so much” to shape his own country?
Surveying the whole tapestry of American history, one would be hard-pressed to find any significant way in which the Islamic faith has shaped the United States in terms of its governing principles and the nature of American society. Meanwhile, there are numerous ways in which, if there had been a significant Muslim presence in the country at the time, some of the most cherished and important principles of American society and law may have met fierce resistance, and may never have seen the light of day.
So in what way has the Islamic faith shaped Obama’s country? The most significant event connected to the Islamic faith that has shaped the character of the United States was the attack on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon on September 11, 2001.
The Islamic faith has shaped the U.S. since 9/11 in leading to the spending of billions on anti-terror measures, and to the ventures in Iraq and Afghanistan, and to Guantanamo, and to so many features of the modern political and social landscape that they cannot be enumerated within the space of a single article...
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'Angels & Demons' Film Adaptation Scratches Muslim Villain
In the forthcoming release of "Angels & Demons", there's a politically correct element to the movie adaptation of the Dan Brown novel that's worth noting: Hollywood's aversion to portraying radical Muslims as the bad guys.
From Christian film critic Dr. Ted Baehr's May 14 review (h/t Townhall's Greg Hengler; emphasis mine):
... Also unlike the book, the assassin henchman of the mad clergyman in the movie is not a rabid Muslim as he is in the novel, but a very lapsed Catholic.
This is nothing new, of course.
Take, for example, 2002's "Sum of All Fears," an adaptation of the Tom Clancy novel by the same name, where the novel's chief villains were changed from Palestinians bent on subverting American support for Israel to neo-Nazis hoping to trigger a nuclear war that would destroy the U.S. and Russia out of a desire to avenge the demise of Hitler's Third Reich.
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Poll: Pick Supreme Court Justice Based On Experience
Americans think judicial experience should be the most important factor in selecting the next Supreme Court justice, far outdistancing other qualities such as the nominee's race, gender, sexual preference, and issue positions.
60 percent to 26 percent Americans think the Supreme Court should interpret the U.S. Constitution based on what the Framers meant when they wrote it rather than on what feels appropriate in today's world.
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AP Blows The Deficit Reporting, Part II: The Invisible April Receipts Dive
Even though this "accounting change," which does not report TARP disbursements as outlays because they are considered "investments," violates fundamental cash-flow reporting principles, Crutsinger gave the change an unskeptical treatment. He also failed to tell readers whether the administration used the old or new method in calculating its latest full-year deficit projection of $1.84 trillion.
If Team Obama used the new method to determine it, the deficit under the old and more correct method will more than likely be over $2 trillion.
Crutsinger also failed to report the steep dive in federal receipts that took place in April, which is the government's highest month for collections, compared to last year's all-time record April haul, which I referred to as the "Supply-Side Stunner," and which Crutsinger and others also failed to report when it occurred last year.
Here is how April 2009 collections compared to April of 2008...
[Anyone who thinks Obama's tax and spend policies are working isn't looking past them to businesses' interpretation of his plans: they're bailing.]
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Trash the environment or give up on green
As the idea of "renewable" energy gets its first serious vetting, many are pointing out that there are environmental tradeoffs in going green just as there are in drilling or transporting oil:
Renewable-energy development, which the Obama administration has made a priority, is posing conflicts between economic interests and environmental concerns, not entirely unlike the way offshore oil and gas development pits economics against environment. But because of 'concerns about climate', many environmentalists and government agencies could find themselves straddling both sides, especially in Western states where the federal government is a major landowner.
This is a dirty little secret that outfits like NRDC has known for years but somehow never managed to mention it when trashing oil and gas development. The cost to the environment is relative when you begin to calculate the enormous size that these more inefficient methods of producing energy are used.
And what about the manufacture of solar cells? The process uses extremely hazardous chemicals and as we know, accidents happen in both the manufacturing and storage process.
It's why liberals never debated this subject honestly.
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Obama energy options may be long wait
President Obama's plan to move quickly to replace fossil fuels with renewable energy sources relies on technology that analysts agree is neither affordable nor available on a commercial scale and won't be for many years to come.
Expensive, small-scale pilot projects are under way that convert vegetation into fuel for cars (snip)have not been proved at levels that would make even a dent in the U.S. appetite for fossil fuels...
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Let's get real about alternative energy
(CNN) -- We need to introduce simple arithmetic into our discussions of energy. Our failure to talk straight about the numbers is allowing people to persist in wishful thinking, inspired by inane sayings such as "every little bit helps." [snip]
In total, the European lifestyle uses 125 kWh per day per person for transport, heating, manufacturing, and electricity. That's equivalent to every person having 125 light bulbs switched on all the time. The average American uses 250 kWh per day: 250 light bulbs.
And most of this energy today comes from fossil fuels. What are our post-fossil-fuel options? [snip]
- To supply 42 kWh per day per person from solar power requires roughly 80 square meters per person of solar panels.
- To deliver 42 kWh per day per person from wind for everyone in the United States would require wind farms with a total area roughly equal to the area of California, a 200-fold increase in United States wind power.
- To get 42 kWh per day per person from nuclear power would require 525 one-gigawatt nuclear power stations, a roughly five-fold increase over today's levels.
I hope these numbers convey the scale of action required to put in place a sustainable energy solution. The sober message about wind and solar applies to all renewables: All renewables, much as I love them, deliver only a small power per unit area, so if we want renewable facilities to supply power on a scale at all comparable to our consumption, those facilities must be vast.
The public discussion of energy options tends to be emotional, polarized, mistrustful and destructive. I hope that focusing attention on the numbers may make it possible to develop honest and constructive conversations about energy.
David MacKay is a professor of physics at the University of Cambridge. His book, "Sustainable Energy - Without the Hot Air," is published by UIT Cambridge and is also available in electronic form for free from http://www.withouthotair.com/.
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When Doctors Opt Out
We already know what government-run health care looks like.
Here's something that has gotten lost in the drive to institute universal health insurance: Health insurance doesn't automatically lead to health care. And with more and more doctors dropping out of one insurance plan or another, especially government plans, there is no guarantee that you will be able to see a physician no matter what coverage you have.
Consider that the Medicare Payment Advisory Commission reported in 2008 that 28% of Medicare beneficiaries looking for a primary care physician had trouble finding one, up from 24% the year before. The reasons are clear: A 2008 survey by the Texas Medical Association, for example, found that only 38% of primary-care doctors in Texas took new Medicare patients. The statistics are similar in New York state, where I practice medicine.
More and more of my fellow doctors are turning away Medicare patients because of the diminished reimbursements and the growing delay in payments. The problem is even worse with Medicaid. A 2005 Community Tracking Physician survey showed that only 50% of physicians accept this insurance. I am now one of the ones who doesn't take it. I realized a few years ago that it wasn't worth the money to file the paperwork for the $25 or less that I received for an office visit. [snip]
Bottom line: None of the current plans, government or private, provide my patients with the care they need. And the care that is provided is increasingly expensive and requires a big battle for approvals.
Of course, we're promised by the Obama administration that universal health insurance will avoid all these problems. But how is that possible when you consider that the medical turnstiles will be the same as they are now, only they will be clogged with more and more patients?
The doctors that remain in this expanded system will be even more overwhelmed than we are now. I wouldn't want to be a patient when that happens.
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Senate eyes tax change to pay for health insurance
WASHINGTON - Experts urged Congress on Tuesday to cut tax breaks for employer-sponsored health insurance as a way to help pay to cover people without benefits.
The Senate Finance Committee, which is taking a lead in writing legislation to overhaul the $2.5 trillion U.S. healthcare system, is weighing spending cuts and tax increases to help cover the cost of expanding coverage to uninsured people...
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Smokers, drinkers to carry tax burden?
If you make big bucks — or enjoy alcohol, cigarettes and Coke — the government might hit you up to pay for fixing the nation’s health care system.
On Tuesday, the Senate Finance Committee peeked into vending machines and liquor stores, company payrolls and health savings accounts, looking for a mix of tax increases to pay for a health overhaul — which could cost more than $1.5 trillion over 10 years.
Experts thought the big debate might be public plan vs. no public plan. But that may well pale in comparison to the difficulty of settling on a way to finance health care reform.“I wish there were a number of painless options,”
Robert Greenstein, executive director of the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, wrote in his prepared testimony.
“There aren’t.”
[We're going to ruin the worlds best health care system for the overwhelming majority of us and give our government unimagined power over our lives in the process. We really shouldn't let them do it.]
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[Then ACT >
"Oppose government run healthcare"
Obama transition http://www.change.gov/page/s/contact
Your Congressman https://forms.house.gov/wyr/welcome.shtml
Your Senator http://www.senate.gov/general/contact_information/senators_cfm.cfm
.
White House Czar Calls for End to 'War on Drugs'
The Obama administration's new drug czar says he wants to banish the idea that the U.S. is fighting "a war on drugs," a move that would underscore a shift favoring treatment over incarceration in trying to reduce illicit drug use. (Snip) Gil Kerlikowske said Wednesday the bellicose analogy was a barrier to dealing with the nation's drug issues.
[Another war magically ended - if only we'd known it was that easy.]
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Left can't stand right-thinking beauty
SHE was not stripped of her crown. But Miss California Carrie Prejean -- the beauty queen who had the gall to speak out against gay marriage -- was stripped of her innocence.
There is no free speech in politically correct America.
[Untrue: there is for some...]
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Couple's 'buy black' experiment becomes a movement
ATLANTA (AP) - It's been two months since 2-year-old Cori pulled the gold stud from her left earlobe, and the piercing is threatening to close as her mother, Maggie Anderson, hunts for a replacement. It's not that the earring was all that rare—but finding the right store has become a quest of Quixotic proportions. (snip)would try to patronize only black-owned businesses.
[And if a white couple did likewise?]
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A slogan for our times
Was walking up Broadway and saw a sign touting a group called Earth Justice. Their slogan: “Because the earth needs a good lawyer.” I thought that this combined two important elements of modern life nicely, and chillingly: environmentalism, probably of an extreme variety; and litigation. Could there be anything more American, in 2009? Environmental litigation?
By the way, people — real live people — need good lawyers, too. For example, to protect them from environmentalist takings. Will those lawyers be supplied?
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Cheney Advises GOP Against Moderation
“I think it would be a mistake for us to moderate. This is about fundamental beliefs and values and ideas … what the role of government should be in our society, and our commitment to the Constitution and constitutional principles.
You know, when you add all those things up, the idea that we ought to moderate basically means we ought to fundamentally change our philosophy. I for one am not prepared to do that, and I think most of us aren’t.
Most Republicans have a pretty good idea of values, and aren’t eager to have someone come along and say, 'Well, the only way you can win is if you start to act more like a Democrat.'"
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Liberal Taliban Issues Fatwa Against Miss California
Not even Dick Cheney can incite the blood-curdling rage of liberals at the sight of a sexy Evangelical Christian. Paula Jones, Katherine Harris, Michele Bachmann, Sarah Palin and, most recently, Miss California, Carrie Prejean, have all come under a frenzy of attacks from liberals.
Christians are supposed to be fat, balding sweaty little men with bad complexions. It's liberals who are supposed to be the sexy ones...
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[The less humorous aspect to the above point is that all the 'testicular fortitude' in the Republican party seems to be in the sole possession of the fairer sex - it's in serious need of Wilsonizing.
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