Tuesday, February 2, 2010

Schwarzenegger: Send Calif. Illegal Inmates to Mexico

Subject: txt cali immig mny -
Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger suggested California could ease its crowded prison system by sending thousands of undocumented inmates to specially built jails in Mexico.

"We pay them to build the prison down in Mexico. And then we have those undocumented immigrants down there in prison. It would half the costs to build the prison and run the prison. We could save a billion dollars right there that could go into higher education."

Schwarzenegger's remarks come as California prepares for the latest in a long line of state budget crises.

READ MORE


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What did Hoover, Truman, and Eisenhower have in common?

[HT:GC]




Back during The Great Depression, President Herbert Hoover ordered the
deportation of ALL illegal aliens in order to make jobs available to American
citizens that desperately needed work..

Harry Truman deported over two million Illegal's after WWII to create jobs
for returning veterans..

And then again in 1954, President Dwight Eisenhower deported 13 million
Mexican Nationals! The program was called 'Operation Wetback'. It was
done so WWII and Korean Veterans would have a better chance at jobs.
It took 2 Years, but they deported them.

Now...if they could deport the illegal's back then - they could sure do it today.

lf you have doubts about the veracity of this information, enter Operation
Wetback into your favorite search engine and confirm it for yourself.

Reminder: Don't forget to pay your taxes... 20 million Illegal Aliens are depending on you...
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Black History Month Should Be about Black History

I've often said jokingly that Black History Month should more accurately be called "white people and America suck" month. Rather than focusing on all of black history, every February, the liberal media and most democrats gleefully bring up all of America's past sins.

Fine. I mean, after all, it is a part of history. But what is wrong is that these race exploiters imply that current race relations in America have not come very far from the days of blacks being lynched. Thus, Black History Month in reality is the liberal democrats' annual fundraiser and promo campaign for more entitlement programs.

In fairness, Carver, Washington, and Walker are featured during Black History Month in classrooms and the media. But it is not mentioned that the success of these outstanding Americans is a testimony of the greatness of our country.

American blacks have achieved amazing things under extraordinary circumstances, most of which could not have happened without the assistance of good, decent, God-fearing whites. But we never hear about these whites...



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Fox News Winning in Quantity and Now Quality

A poll conducted last week by Public Policy Polling found that among 1,151 registered voters surveyed, Fox News Channel crushed the other networks in trust, with 49 percent of respondents saying they trusted FNC. That's 10 percentage points more than CNN, and 14 points more than MSNBC, the home of Obama-boosting or leftist personalities such as Keith Olbermann, Rachel Maddow, Chris Matthews and Ed Schultz.


Reacting to the news, Media Research Center President and NewsBusters Publisher Brent Bozell issued the following statement:

The proof is in the pudding. Americans want balanced news, not liberal advocacy. Fox offered them ‘fair and balanced' journalism, and America has embraced them.



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Eyes Wide Shut: How the Elephant In the Room Is Now Anchoring the Evening News


One of two things is happening here; a) The leftist activist old media is on a mission to push their agenda and nothing else matters, or b) they really don’t know what they’re doing and the stories just take on a life of their own and like NASCAR , they just happen to take left turns nearly all the time.



I’ll take the former on this one. I’m not going to bother debating whether the activist old media turns left. It’s all well documented here on Bigjournalism.com and elsewhere. Besides, you know what you know, you see what you see, and you’ve figured this out long ago. I do wonder if the activist old media would rather see their businesses destroyed than to admit they have a bias. Perhaps.

What claim to fair and balanced coverage when you believe your purpose is to save the world from Evil Fat Cat Bankers? Bernie Madoff stealing $50 billion leads the newscasts, but the Obama Administration stealing $1.8 trillion from our grandchildren falls on the cutting room floor... [snip]

The ratings don’t lie. Fox News destroys its “competition.” CNN had a 20-year head start and its numbers don’t come close, MSNBC has the power of NBC news behind them its numbers are in the toilet. Do they think Fox beats both of them combined because they have better graphics?

Evening newscasts are in a ratings freefall. Let’s blame that on George W. Bush just because we’ve gone half way through this column and haven’t blamed him yet.




It’s amazing the efforts media takes to try to figure out why people watch, listen or read what they do. The analysis that takes place, the consultants, the dollars that are spent and the effort that goes into research of whether to use Blue #2 or Blue #3 on the graphics would shock you.

Meantime, if they just provided honest, balanced coverage, eyeballs would return to screens.

This is not a fun thing to watch. After spending 30 years in TV news it’s like watching a close friend do a slow crash and burn. Everybody knows it, can see it, they know what needs to be done -- except for the friend. Eyes wide shut. Yes, it is the elephant in the room that the media will never address, and it is an elephant, not a donkey.

Perhaps that’s why it’s so hard for the media to see it.



READ MORE

Monday, February 1, 2010


image toon 1st fnn 2010 = Saints fans don't care about mayors race

China Warns of Sanctions in Fallout Over Taiwan

Subject: txt 1st intl nsec china trade -
China threatened to impose sanctions on American arms contractors and cut cooperation with Washington unless it cancels a $6.4 billion arms sale to Taiwan, in an unprecedented move signaling Beijing’s growing global power. [Or America's perceived weakness.]

China on Saturday bitterly denounced the Obama administration’s announcement a day earlier that it wanted to sell the package of defensive weapons to Taiwan, the self-ruled island that Beijing views as an illegitimate breakaway state.

“The United States will shoulder responsibility for the serious repercussions if it does not immediately reverse the mistaken decision to sell weapons to Taiwan,”

Chinese Vice Foreign Minister He Yafei told the United States ambassador to China Jon Huntsman in comments reported on the Foreign Ministry’s Web site.

“It will be unavoidable that cooperation between China and the United States over important international and regional issues will also be affected,”

the Chinese foreign ministry said, without specifying any of those issues.

The Obama administration told the . Congress on Friday of the proposed sales, which include Black Hawk helicopters, Patriot “Advanced Capability-3” anti-missile missiles and two refurbished Osprey-class mine-hunting ships. [all defensive]

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[RECALL:]

Since 1979, US law regarding Taiwan has been guided by the Taiwan Relations Act (TRA). The TRA was designed to provide protection for Taiwan by: (a) providing a legal framework for US commercial and cultural ties with Taiwan; (b) outlining the terms of Washington's 'unofficial' governmental relations with Taiwan; and (c) including provisions for Taiwan's defence.

Under the TRA, the US is obliged to help Taiwan build up its self-defense capability and, if attacked, defend it...

[TRA excerpt]:



January 1, 1979
TAIWAN RELATIONS ACT
Public Law 96-8 96th Congress

SECTION 1. This Act may be cited as the "Taiwan Relations Act".
FINDINGS AND DECLARATION OF POLICY

  • to make clear that the United States decision to establish diplomatic relations with the People's Republic of China rests upon the expectation that the future of Taiwan will be determined by peaceful means;
  • to consider any effort to determine the future of Taiwan by other than peaceful means, including by boycotts or embargoes, a threat to the peace and security of the Western Pacific area and of grave concern to the United States;
  • to provide Taiwan with arms of a defensive character; and
  • to maintain the capacity of the United States to resist any resort to force or other forms of coercion that would jeopardize the security, or the social or economic system, of the people on Taiwan.

Nothing contained in this Act shall contravene the interest of the United States in human rights, especially with respect to the human rights of all the approximately eighteen million inhabitants of Taiwan. The preservation and enhancement of the human rights of all the people on Taiwan are hereby reaffirmed as objectives of the United States.

Source/TRA text: http://www.ait.org.tw/en/about_Ait/tra/

[Do we still stand for these things? Do we still mean what we say? {Or is this yet more 'discretionary' law} China obviously thinks otherwise. I wonder where they got such a notion.

This nation {its government} is not our friend, and by all objective evidence {their actions} our active enemy. We can hope for the best, but we need plan...]

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The Great Game in the 21st Century

China sends out a trial balloon that it "mulls setting up military bases in Pakistan."

... But the U.S. does have a significant deterrence move, and it is air power. The London Times just reported the first flight of the Russian version of our fifth generation F-22. It is obvious that fifth-generation Air Dominance fighters have great value.

The Russian plan for their fifth-generation fighter is unlike the U.S.'s. They will not limit production, and they will concurrently develop an export version. History tells us that the PLAAF has been a significant beneficiary of Russian aircraft design.

It is time that the administration and Congress immediately rethink both more Raptors for the USAF and also an export version and the immediate deployment of Raptors where they will be a demonstration of American resolve.



Both the Times of India and the London Times had important implied questions: What will America do? Both issues can be addressed concurrently by basing the F-22 Raptor on strip alert in Afghanistan.

The smart geopolitical move in light of a possible PLA base in Pakistan is to deploy the F-22 where it can make a huge statement of U.S. positioning against any PLA/PLAAF maneuvering for basing.

Such a move would signal visionary leadership and action in this most serious and dangerous time.

READ MORE

FLASHBACKs >

Axing the Air Force
Production of the F-22 has been terminated. Production of the C-17 has also been terminated. Production of the Combat Search and Rescue Helicopter has also been terminated. Production of the Multiple Kill Vehicle has also been terminated. F-15s, F-16s, and A-10s will all leave the Force with no replacements...

“This budget guarantees that the oldest Air Force in the history of our nation will get even older" ... “B-52s, built in the 1950s, will have to be kept on duty for a minimum of another 15-20 years.”

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New U.S. air strategy in Afghanistan: First, do no harm

Subject: txt gwot -



Along the main road to the base just outside Jalalabad, the unit was flagged down by a man who said that a policeman had found a roadside bomb up ahead in a busy area of shops, where it should have been difficult to hide an explosive without others knowing.

As Lt. Col. Simmons interviewed the local police chief about how a bomb could have been buried just outside his station, Brooks determined that an F-15 was flying 15 miles to the north. He jumped out of the truck and began trying to find a target.

As he listened to the police chief's answers, which were growing increasingly evasive, Brooks became antsy. Taliban fighters might be nearby, and the unit was now stopped. He asked the F-15 to drop flares. Ten minutes later it did, sending the villagers running out of fear they were about to be struck.

That was a success, Brooks said. The troops were safer. Still, he sighed.

Under the new tactical directive, Brooks would have to explain why he used flares...

"All I can think about is the paperwork," he said. "It will take hours for 15 minutes of air power."

[War? Try suicide - murder when you consider it's not ourselves but our brave young folks in uniform who pay for this insanity.

Unbelievable but reality > you need know > ]


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Collins: 'This administration cannot see a foreign terrorist right in front of them'

[HT:DG]Subject: txt gwot -
Maine Sen. Susan Collins (R) on Saturday hammered the Justice Department for treating Flight 253 terror suspect Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab as a "common criminal" -- a move she described in her party's weekly address as a "failure" of the entire justice system. The decision to read Miranda rights to Abdulmutallab -- better known as the Christmas Day bomber -- is symptomatic of the White House's general "blindness" in its approach to the ongoing war with terror...

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image toon gwot nsec = Barak Nukakis = only need 30K troops

Christian in Egypt: ‘They Try to Kill Us’

Subject: txt islm -
Egyptian Maher El-Gowhary and his 15 year old daughter Dina never pray twice at the same church, never stay longer than a month in any one apartment. They are constantly under threat, always on the run because they converted to Christianity in a largely Muslim country. Maher and Dina nervously agreed to meet us at a Church in Cairo.(Snip) Born Muslims they chose to convert to the Christian Church...

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Cardinal: EU faces Islamisation

Subject: txt islm intl -
The European Union has diverted from the Christian foundations on which it was being built and it has got secularised, by which it has opened space to Islamisation, Czech Cardinal Miloslav Vlk says in an interview released on his web page yesterday.

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Rape victim receives 101 lashes for becoming pregnant

Subject: txt islm -
A 16-year-old girl who was raped in Bangladesh has been given 101 lashes for conceiving during the assault. The girl's father was also fined and warned the family would be branded outcasts from their village if he did not pay. According to human rights activists, the girl, who was quickly married after the attack, was divorced weeks later after medical tests revealed she was pregnant.

Her rapist was pardoned by the elders...

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United in Hate: The Left’s Romance with Tyranny and Terror -

Subject: txt islm gwot nsec edu -
With the decline of communism, the Left began to support Islamism. Whereas journalists, novelists and activists led the charge in the first wave, Glazov explains in the second half of the book, the most vociferous defenders of Islamism now come from the Ivory Tower...

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SOBERING...

[HT:MH]

Here is a blunt and chilling answer to a serious question put to Newt Gingrich on CNN. It is a clearly worded warning not heard from any other public figure concerning the state of world affairs. This is one the most powerful and articulate summaries of the dangers of our current situation ever heard, and a mystery why it is not painfully obvious to every American and a subject of constant discussion. It not only demonstrates the dangers we face, but clearly shows what an experienced and knowledgeable leader can convey in five minutes without the use of a Tele-Prompter and a speech writer.

[five minutes - Recommended > ]

Link

YOUTUBE

Football, hot dogs, applie pie...and federal intervention

It just wouldn't be liberal America unless Obama's Justice Department could find a way to regulate the BCS Championship game

Apparently, there is no way that you and I can enjoy our college football diversions without Washington's intervention. What's more, the nation's economy depends on it! Thankfully, the Pronoun-in-Chief's Justice Department plans to save us from our heretofore pleasant madness:

The Obama administration is considering several steps that would review the legality of the controversial Bowl Championship Series, the Justice Department said in a letter Friday to a senator who had asked for an antitrust review.

In the letter to Sen. Orrin Hatch, obtained by The Associated Press, Assistant Attorney General Ronald Weich wrote that the Justice Department is reviewing Hatch's request and other materials to determine whether to open an investigation into whether the BCS violates antitrust laws.

Importantly, and in addition, the administration also is exploring other options that might be available to address concerns with the college football postseason," Weich wrote, including asking the Federal Trade Commission to review the legality of the BCS under consumer protection laws.

Query: Will we have to pay a tax for cheering for our home team?
This is America, where, once upon a time, kids used to win and lose without any government assistance. Back then, Washington didn't own Chevrolet. Looks like they'll soon own football. Can we hold on to hot dogs and apple pie?

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A few reminders for the constitutionally challenged

Subject: txt msm bias sclm bbro legal lbrty -

"The right of freely examining public characters and measures, and of free communication among the people thereon ... has ever been justly deemed the only effectual guardian of every other right."
-- James Madison

The Bill of Rights does not grant rights. Those 10 amendments limit the power of government to encroach on the rights presumed to belong to all of us.

The Founders were students of the proponents of natural law, especially John Locke and his treatises on government. For the Declaration of Independence, Thomas Jefferson drew from Locke's argument that government must protect the people's life, liberty and property or it may be legitimately overthrown.

James Madison embraced Locke's concepts of checks and balances in the Constitution. Madison even thought the Bill of Rights unnecessary because such rights are presumed.

Rights come from nature, not government.

Look at how the Bill of Rights is phrased. None says the state hereby grants these rights to its citizens. It should more properly have been called the Bill of Prohibitions.


"Congress shall make no law ... abridging the freedom of speech ..."
The freedom is presumed and Congress shall not interfere.

"... the right of the people to keep and bear arms, shall not be infringed ..."
The right exists. Don't infringe.

"The right of the people to be secure in their persons ..." "... the right of trial by jury shall be preserved ..."
Preserved, not granted.

"The enumeration in the Constitution, of certain rights, shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people."
They are enumerated, not granted. And those not enumerated are retained by the people.

Don't imagine what you want the Constitution to say or pretend it says something it does not.

If you, like the president, don't like what the Constitution says, amend it.

An amendment banning corporate free speech probably would pass, because most people think the rest of us are too gullible to resist a message backed by money.

If that's the case, this experiment in democracy is over.

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Watchdog: Bailouts Created More Risk in System

Subject: txt mny msm -
The government's response to the financial meltdown has made it more likely the United States will face a deeper crisis in the future, an independent watchdog at the Treasury Department warned.

The problems that led to the last crisis have not yet been addressed, and in some cases have grown worse, says Neil Barofsky, the special inspector general for the trouble asset relief program, or TARP. The quarterly report to Congress was released Sunday.

"Even if TARP saved our financial system from driving off a cliff back in 2008, absent meaningful reform, we are still driving on the same winding mountain road, but this time in a faster car,"
...

Since Congress passed $700 billion financial bailout, the remaining institutions considered "too big to fail" have grown larger, Barofsky wrote.

He said the banks still have an incentive to take on high-risk investments because they know if they fail the government will save them... [As known would be the case when such bailout were being 'debated'.]

He said the key to preventing future crises is to reform Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac and re-implement rules that separated lending banks from speculating investment firms...

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Reality Check re: " America needs an alternative."

Subject: txt mny --

"Our nation is barrelling down a path of uncontrolled Federal Government spending, unsustainable entitlement growth, and crushing levels of taxes and debt. If we resign ourselves to this, our health and retirement security programs will grow themselves into extinction... America needs an alternative.

For that reason, I am re-introducing ‘A Roadmap for America's Future' - updated to reflect the dramatic decline in our economic and fiscal condition since its introduction in 2008..."

US Federal Debt, With and Without Republican Plan




Source: Congressional Budget Office.

Federal spending (excluding interest) and deficit projections under the CBO's "alternate scenario" in 2020, 2040, 2060 and 2080, as percentage of GDP.

Spending: 22.1%, 27.3%, 30.4%, 34.4%.

Deficits: 7.4%, 17.2%, 28.0%, 42.8%.

Same projections under the Republican plan.

Spending: 19.0%, 19.3%, 16.1%, 13.8%..

Deficits: 3.7%, 4.5%, 0.5%, surplus of 5%.

Source: Congressional Budget Office.
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Obama Says Deficit Could Jeopardize Recovery

Subject: txt mny -
[But he'll ignore the above Republican plan and, with the help of the MSM, portray them as 'do nothings'...]

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image toon 1st fnn hcare = Capt Oby hcar titanic = full speed ahead

Democrats quietly working to resuscitate healthcare overhaul

Subject: txt hcare -

President Obama's campaign to overhaul the nation's healthcare system is officially on the back burner as Democrats turn to the task of stimulating job growth, but behind the scenes party leaders have nearly settled on a strategy to salvage the massive legislation...

[Eternal vigilance.]

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Global warming science implodes overseas: American media silent

The great unraveling not being covered here

The revelations have been nothing short of jaw dropping. Dozens - yes dozens - of claims made in the IPCC 2007 report on climate change that was supposed to represent the "consensus" of 2500 of the world's climate scientists have been shown to be bogus, or faulty, or not properly vetted, or simply pulled out of thin air.

We know this because newspapers in Great Britain are doing their job; vetting the 2007 report item by item, coming up with shocking news about global warming claims that formed the basis of argument by climate change advocates who were pressuring the US and western industrialized democracies to transfer trillions of dollars in wealth to the third world and cede sovereignty to the UN... [snip]

A Canadian analyst has identified more than 20 passages in the IPCC's report which cite similarly non-peer-reviewed WWF or Greenpeace reports as their authority, and other researchers have been uncovering a host of similarly dubious claims and attributions all through the report...

This is a great story. It has everything a media outlet could desire; scandal, conflict of interest (IPCC head Pauchuri runs companies that benefited from climate scare stories), government cover ups - why then, has this unraveling of the basis of climate science that posited catastrophic man made warming not been making any news at all in the United States?

It's past time to ask why this story being revealed overseas with new revelations almost daily in Europe while being completely ignored here. We hear crickets chirping when it comes to stories from major newspapers and - outside of Fox News - the cable nets.

As global warming the political movement is losing its scientific justification, the American people - who will be asked to foot the bill to the tune of trillions of dollars if Obama goes ahead with his "green" plans - are grossly uninformed about the state of the debate. Until the media starts to give this story the coverage it deserves, that state of affairs will not change...

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image toon - grn owg - Alarmists dwindling due to too much sun shine-transparentcy

HOW REGRESSIVE IS A PRICE ON CARBON?

Subject: txt grn engry -
Under either a cap-and-trade program that limits carbon emissions or a carbon tax that imposes an outright tax on these emissions, the poor may be among the hardest hit.

Because they spend a greater share of their income on energy than higher-income families, households in the lowest fifth of the income distribution could shoulder a relative burden up to 4 times higher than that of households in the top fifth of the income distribution, according to a study by Corbett Grainger and Charles Kolstad, conducted for the National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER).

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Today's Insult...

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Obama: Health Debate 'Actually Was on C-SPAN’

Freshman Rep. Jason Chaffetz, R-Utah, told the president that he and many Americans were disappointed that


“when you stood up before the American people multiple times and said you would broadcast the healthcare debates on C-SPAN, you didn’t.”

Obama answered Chaffetz by saying,

“Look, the truth of the matter is that if you look at the healthcare process, just over the course of the year, overwhelmingly the majority of it actually was on C-SPAN, because it was taking place in congressional hearings in which you guys were participating...”

The president seemed to be saying that when he promised during the presidential campaign that health reform “negotiations” would be televised on C-SPAN, what he really meant was “congressional hearings.”

The trouble with that claim is that congressional hearings have been televised by C-SPAN for many years. What force does a campaign promise have if the promise is for something that’s already there?

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Bill Gates promises $10 billion for vaccines

Subject: txt gdd lbrty othr intl owg -
DAVOS, Switzerland (Reuters) - Bill and Melinda Gates said on Friday they would spend $10 billion over the next decade to develop and deliver vaccines, an increased commitment that reflects progress in the pipeline of products for immunizing children ...

[American philanthropy; second to none. Well done Bill.]

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Paranoid Much? Robert Reich Imagines that Fox News Was Around in 1994

Subject: txt msm bias libs fnn =
In a Monday column at Salon.com ("Is the President Panicking?"), Reich excoriated President Obama's proposed discretionary spending "freeze" -- a "freeze" that NewsBuster Julia Seymour noted fails to offset the spending proposals Obama brought up in his State of the Union speech -- for

"invok(ing) memories of (Bill) Clinton's shift to the right in 1994," [oh horror]

But in the process of recounting his fevered view of 1990s history, Bill Clinton's former Secretary of Labor revealed that paranoia really does strike deep:

In December 1994, Bill Clinton proposed a so-called middle-class bill of rights including more tax credits for families with children, expanded retirement accounts, and tax-deductible college tuition. [but] Right-wing populists were the ascendancy, with Newt Gingrich and Fox News leading the charge..."

There's one "little" problem:

Fox News Channel's first day on the air was October 7, 1996.

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Thursday, January 28, 2010

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[Apologies for yesterday's very late post; had an SMTP-relay snafu]


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xt image toon - 1st fnn reps libs 2010 = Why re-elect mediocre Oby

The Lesson of an Affirmative Action President

Subject: txt bdd vals othr libs 1st -



The vote in 2008 was even crazier than picking your brain surgeon by the color of his skin. If the knife slips in the surgeon's hand, you might die, but the nation as a whole doesn't. But if the president has a nervous breakdown in the Oval Office, the whole world is at risk. It's a mad, mad, mad idea to elect people on the basis of race or gender.

We have been so PC-whipped as a nation that Obama's election as a black man -- not as a competent black man, not as an experienced and well-qualified black man -- was celebrated by liberals and Leftists around the world. It is the victory of brain-dead ideology over common sense. The guy in the White House today is potentially the most dangerous, mentally fixated, and irresponsible demagogue we have ever known. Those wacky ideas are once again on the rise, not just in the schools and colleges, but even at the very centers of power. The election of Obama was by far the screwiest thing American voters have ever done. It throws doubt on the whole American experiment, because we have inflicted this disaster on ourselves.

The lesson of the Obama presidency is exactly the opposite of what our stuck-on-stupid media are telling us. It is that we must never, ever hire, promote, or elect somebody to a position of power and responsibility merely because of his race. Abraham Lincoln would not have been surprised. Neither would Martin Luther King, Jr. Even the editors of the New York Times choose schools for their kids not by race, but by educational competence.

Somehow the American people have forgotten their common sense while Obama was rifling their wallets...

[Recommended > ]

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Gitmo? Mideast? Not in Obama Speech

Subject: txt gwot nsec -
Don't look for any mention of Pakistan's struggle with al-Qaida in President Barack Obama's State of the Union address.

Or the ongoing conflict between the Israelis and the Palestinians. Or the detention facility at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.

Obama was notably silent on those elements of American foreign policy during his speech Wednesday night to Congress. All are top challenges facing his administration, but they didn't make the cut for his first State of the Union address.

[Guess we're no longer in two shooting wars. Won't our young people in uniform be relieved.]

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Obama ‘Engagement’ Policy Has Led to ‘Unprecedented’ International Consensus on Iran

Subject: txt nsec intl iran - National Security Adviser Says
Washington – Gen. Jim Jones, President Obama’s national security adviser, claimed Monday that the administration had seen “unprecedented” success in rallying the world against Iran through its strategy of engagement.

“Engagement, our strategy in Iran, has resulted and is resulting in an unprecedented level of international consensus and unity on Iran,”

Jones told reporters Monday. The four-star general made the comments at a liberal think-tank, the Center for American Progress (CAP),

But while the other Security Council nations were reportedly considering circumventing the U.N., James Phillips of The Heritage Foundation, said that option has also recently imploded as well.

“I don’t know what consensus that he’s referring to that we should be encouraged by. I don’t see any progress being made,”

Phillips, who is Heritage’s senior fellow for Middle Eastern affairs, told CNSNews.com.

“Just today, the foreign ministers of the EU (European Union) backed away from imposing sanctions and said that they should be imposed only by the Security Council or that it’s necessary for the Security Council to take the lead.”

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[?]

Russia: Iran nuclear plant to start up this year

Der Spiegel: Iran able to produce nuclear bomb this year

'Iran to unveil new missiles in Feb.'

Iran’s Private Army Digs in for a Wider Lebanon War

EU wary on new Iran sanctions, waits for UN discussions

Iranian official uses 'N' word to describe Obama

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A vanishing

Subject: txt intl china lbrty sclm bbro -
Readers may remember Gao Zhisheng, the incredibly brave and valuable Chinese human-rights lawyer who was snatched last February — snatched by the state and then made to disappear. I wrote about him last April, in this column.

Interestingly enough, the Chinese Foreign Ministry was asked about Gao last week. And an official replied that Gao “is where he should be.”

Of course. And where might that be? Nowhere good, you can be assured.

[Never forget what we're attempting to 'deal' with in China: An undemocratic communist tyranny aggressively working for regional and global dominance.]

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DON'T LOOK TO EUROPE, THE UNITED STATES NEEDS REHAB CAPITALISM

Subject: txt mny intl sclm -
It makes no sense to regard the crisis of the American economic system as reason to glorify Europe's social welfare system, with its ghastly faults, or to see the latter system as a way out of decline, says Edmund S. Phelps, director of the Center on Capitalism and Society at Columbia University and the winner of the 2006 Nobel Prize in Economics.

Europe has been a distant second to the United States in dreaming up, developing, marketing and embracing new commercial products. The reason is not bad luck. Europe is lacking in economic dynamism -- in systematically cultivating and facilitating innovation. This is evident by any measure:

  • Venture capital investment in Europe is less than half the U.S. level.
  • There are few start-ups in Europe -- no Microsoft, Netscape or Google.
  • In European countries the same old companies remain in the top 20 from decade to decade.

Some economic indicators convey the costs of this deficiency:

  • Young people still leave Europe in droves to make their careers.
  • Reported job satisfaction and employee engagement are far lower in France and Italy than in Canada and the United States.

The corporatist strategy of inserting the state in place of private initiative and creativity has never worked -- we need return to high dynamism by bringing back old-fashioned banks that lend to business and old-fashioned companies that are forward-looking and courageous.

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'UN Wrongly Linked Global Warming To Natural Disasters'

Subject: txt owg grn - Breaking:
Just days after the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change admitted it used junk science to predict Himalayan glaciers would vanish by 2035, its claim that global warming is linked to increased natural disasters has also been found to be wrongly concluded.





The British Times Online reported moments ago:

THE United Nations climate science panel faces new controversy for wrongly linking global warming to an increase in the number and severity of natural disasters such as hurricanes and floods.

It based the claims on an unpublished report that had not been subjected to routine scientific scrutiny — and ignored warnings from scientific advisers that the evidence supporting the link too weak.

The report's own authors later withdrew the claim because they felt the evidence was not strong enough.

The article continued:

When the paper was eventually published, in 2008, it had a new caveat. It said: "We find insufficient evidence to claim a statistical relationship between global temperature increase and catastrophe losses."

Despite this change the IPCC did not issue a clarification ahead of the Copenhagen climate summit last month.

It has also emerged that at least two scientific reviewers who checked drafts of the IPCC report urged greater caution in proposing a link between climate change and disaster impacts — but were ignored.

The credibility of the organization at the very heart of global warming hysteria is increasingly brought into further question -- but will American media report this new revelation?

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U.N. Offiicial Won't Quit for Climate Report Error

Subject: txt owg grn -
The head of a panel of United Nations climate scientists said Saturday he would not resign despite a recent admission that a panel report warning Himalayan glaciers could be gone by 2035 was hundreds of years off.

But Rajendra Pachauri, who heads the panel, said no action would be taken against the authors of the report and he would not resign...

[Of course - that would be too close to accountability. Mistakes happen. The more indicative actions are those in response to their discovery...

And the Obama administration is supporting this outfit's ability to tax us directly for its operating revenue...]


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What Bias? Re: MSM Newsers Ignore UN Apology for Himalayan Glacier Error

Subject: txt owg grn msm bias -



Last Sunday [two weeks ago], it was reported that the United Nations was to retract a claim its Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change made back in 2007 concerning Himalayan glaciers being completely gone by 2035 as a result of global warming.

Last [week's] Wednesday, the IPCC issued a statement doing just that.

But despite the seriousness of this apology and its implications for the veracity of the entire manmade global warming myth, the announcement was completely ignored by America's major television news outlets except Fox News (partial transcript of January 20's "Special Report" below the fold):

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IT'S TIME TO FREEZE GOVERNMENT WAGES

Subject: txt mny bbro sclm -
In a recession when wages are stagnating, you would expect governments to capitalize on the loose labor market by holding the line on employee compensation. But public sector compensation (as measured by the Department of Labor) rose 42 percent faster than private sector compensation over the last three years:

  • Since the end of 2006, hourly total compensation (wages plus benefits) has risen 6.5 percent for private sector workers, essentially keeping pace with inflation; but state and local government workers saw their hourly compensation rise 9.2 percent.
  • Federal civilian workers (about 10 percent of the public sector civilian workforce) are excluded from the above measure, but they did even better, receiving Congressionally-approved wage rises totaling 9.9 percent over the same period.

Why have public sector wages grown so fast?

  • In some cases, it's because employees are receiving scheduled raises under contracts 'negotiated' [extorted] by public employee labor unions.
  • But in other cases, governments have agreed to pay increases during the recession, or been forced into them by arbitrators.
  • Transit agencies in New York and Washington, D.C., have seen their budget crises exacerbated by arbitrator-mandated pay increases, leading to service cuts.
  • And Congress just approved another 2 percent pay increase for federal workers, effective this month.
If states and localities had kept pace with private sector wage growth over the last three years, state budget gaps would be approximately $36 billion less than they are today.

Or, put differently, the last three years' excess growth in public sector compensation necessitates an

extra $36 BILLION

in annual tax collections or program cuts,...


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Reality Check...

Subject: txt sclm bbro libs mny msm lbrty =

"When I made the decision to leave my job to found Public Allies Chicago [in 1993], an AmeriCorps program that prepares youth for public service, I realized right away that I had made the right decision. There are few things more rewarding than watching young people recognize that they have the power to enrich not only their lives, but the lives of others as well. But careers in public service are not always encouraged. We push our young people to strive for things, an advanced degree, a job title, a big salary... But, at a time when our nation is facing unprecedented challenges, encouraging careers in public service and social innovation is more important than ever."

Remarks of First Lady Michelle Obama at TIME 100 Most Influential People Awards




Source: Bureau of Economic Analysis data, tables 6.2D and 6.5D.

  • Michelle Obama's compensation in 2005 as vice president of community affairs at the University of Chicago Hospitals: $316,962. (Source: Chicago Tribune.)
  • Percentage of all households, among those headed by non-Hispanic white males, with more than $250,000 income in 2006: 1.3%. (Source: US Statistical Abstract, Table 683.)
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THE GOLDEN QUARTER

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In the nine quarter-century periods since the American republic was founded in 1789, the one with highest economic growth and job creation was the period from 1983 through 2007. Particularly remarkable -- there were just four quarters (out of 100) of negative economic growth in that entire interval:

  • That period of time was characterized by a reduction in government spending from 23.5 percent of gross domestic product (GDP) to 20 percent (the low point was 18.4 percent in 2000), and a reduction in marginal tax rates.
  • Despite the reduction in tax rates, tax revenues both in absolute terms and as a percentage of GDP grew in the 1983-2007 period because of the improved work and investment incentives.
  • As a result, the deficit fell from 6 percent of GDP in 1983 to just 1.2 percent in 2007.

Most people understand that if the government is growing faster than the economy (as it has been for the past two years) disaster ultimately will occur, but if the economy and the private sector grow faster than the government, as they did from 1983-2007, the country prospers...


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POLL: 59% Say Cut Taxes to Create Jobs, 14% Expect Congress to Listen

Subject: txt mny
Only 15% of voters hold the opposite view and believe that increasing government spending is the better approach.

However, while voters overwhelmingly think cutting taxes is the better approach, they also overwhelmingly expect Congress and President Obama to take the opposite approach.

Seventy-two percent (72%) say the nation’s elected politicians are more likely to increase government spending than cut taxes. Only 14% think they’ll cut taxes instead.

Republicans and unaffiliated voters strongly believe that tax cuts are the best tool for job creation. Democrats are evenly divided. Among those in the president’s party, 33% say tax cuts are best, 30% say increased spending...

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image toon - 1st mny = Oby's spending freeze = cubes

What Bias? Re: Networks Ignore Contradiction Between Obama's Middle Class Giveaways, Spending 'Freeze'

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In an attempt to boost flagging approval ratings, President Barack Obama announced a series of initiatives aimed at 'helping out the middle class' on Jan. 25, two days ahead of his State of the Union address.

"Good evening, everyone. He got the message: it's the economy middle-class voters are most worried about. And with critical congressional elections coming up this year, President Obama today rolled out a series of proposals designed to show he's on the case,"


Couric said as she teased White House correspondent Chip Reid's story.

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image toon = mny = Oby's middle class relief = tiny basket

To re-empower our states

Subject: txt lbrty cali - bbro sclm -
As I was preparing to write a column on the ludi -crous maligning of the Tea Party movement by liberals, Democrats and the mainstream media (which I hope to write next week instead) I started thinking about one of the key objectives of the Tea Party people - the strict enforcement of the 10th Amendment ("The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.").



As an early-1960s-vintage member of the then-new conservative movement, I remember us focusing on the 10th Amendment during the 1964 Goldwater campaign. It has been a staple of conservative thought, and the continued dormancy of 10th Amendment enforcement has been one of the failures of our now half-century-old movement.

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Dem plan: Split GOP, tea party

Democrats are looking for someone to blame for their electoral woes — and Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee Chairman Robert Menendez is working hard to make sure it’s not him. Showing that they’ve learned the lesson of Massachusetts, Menendez and his staff will distribute a memo Tuesday advising Democratic campaign managers to frame their opponents early — and to drive a wedge between moderate voters and tea-party-

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Newsmax-Zogby Poll: Palin Tops GOP Field for 2012

Sarah Palin's recent book success and her new high-profile role on Fox News are having a stunning impact on her political standing with a Newsmax-Zogby poll showing the former Alaska governor now leading the GOP field as the party's preferred candidate for president.

The exclusive Newsmax Media-Zogby poll released Thursday asked likely GOP voters:

"If the Republican primary for president of the United States were held today... for whom would you vote?"

The poll gave voters a selection of top tier potential candidates as well as some dark horses, the list included Scott Brown, Jeb Bush, Newt Gingrich, Mike Huckabee, Sarah Palin, David Petraeus, Tim Pawlenty, and Mitt Romney.

Despite the size and diversity of the field, Palin grabbed a solid 22.2 percent to take the lead with former Massachusetts Gov. Romney close behind with 19.4 percent.



Also making a strong showing was former Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich with 12 percent, followed by former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee at 11 percent.

The Newsmax-Zogby poll suggests the rumble for top dog among GOP candidates is anything but static.


The latest data is clearly good news for Palin.



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image toon - gdd palin = Rogue dems thinking of Sarah