Southern California View From The Right

The Truth About Occupy Wall Street: It’s Much Smaller Than It Seems | The New Republic

2011-10-15T05:30:00.000-07:00

The Truth About Occupy Wall Street: It’s Much Smaller Than It Seems | The New Republic

Concerns About Solyndra Loan Program Were Raised Directly to Obama

2011-09-27T08:33:00.000-07:00

Report: Concerns About Solyndra Loan Program Were Raised Directly to Obama8:38 AM, SEP 27, 2011 • BY MARK HEMINGWAY Despite the repeated attempts to wish away the Solyndra scandal, it appears to be getting bigger. Today, the Los Angeles Times informs us key White House personnel raised concerns the Department of Energy loan program that gave Solyndra $535 million was poorly conceived and managed long before the solar panel manufacturer's bankruptcy:At a White House meeting in late October, Lawrence H. Summers, then director of the National Economic Council, and Timothy F. Geithner, the Treasury secretary, expressed concerns that the selection process for federal loan guarantees wasn't rigorous enough and raised the risk that funds could be going to the wrong companies, including ones that didn't need the help.

Obama Twilight Zone

2011-09-12T21:13:00.000-07:00

I'd Rather Be A Son of A Bitch, than A Greedy Union Thug Leader

2011-09-05T15:44:00.000-07:00

Hoffa Threatens GOP At Obama Event: "Take These Son Of Bitches Out"

Say What????

2011-08-16T21:16:00.000-07:00

Obama Ag Secretary Vilsack: Food Stamps Are A "Stimulus"

Obama's Secretary of Agriculture Tom Vilsack: "Well, obviously, it's putting people to work. Which is why we're going to have some interesting things in the course of the forum this morning. Later this morning, we're going have a press conference with Secretary Mavis and Secretary Chu to announce something that's never happened in this country -- something that we think is exciting in terms of job growth. I should point out, when you talk about the SNAP program or the foot stamp program, you have to recognize that it's also an economic stimulus. Every dollar of SNAP benefits generates $1.84 in the economy in terms of economic activity. If people are able to buy a little more in the grocery store, someone has to stock it, package it, shelve it, process it, ship it. All of those are jobs. It's the most direct stimulus you can get in the economy during these tough times."

Body Blow To Healthcare Mandate, Still Not Far Enough

2011-08-12T12:38:00.000-07:00

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - President Barack Obama's healthcare law suffered a setback Friday when a U.S. appeals court ruled that it was unconstitutional to require all Americans to buy insurance or face a penalty.
The Appeals Court for the 11th Circuit, based in Atlanta, found that Congress exceeded its authority by requiring Americans to buy coverage, but also reversed a lower court decision that threw out the entire healthcare law.

If Robert Gibbs is a Moron Jay Carney is a Retard

2011-08-11T10:44:00.001-07:00

Carney: Unemployment Benefits Could Create Up To 1 Million Jobs

Doorbell

2011-08-10T18:06:00.001-07:00

Senator Kerry, Remind me again Which Party has Spent us into Oblivion the past three Years?

2011-08-07T20:11:00.000-07:00

Blame Game Vitriol Demonstrates S&P Disgust

Published August 07, 2011

Standard & Poor's faulted political entrenchment in Washington for this weekend's U.S. credit rating downgrade, but it was lawmakers on Sunday bickering over S&P's move that provided insight into how such a decision could be reached.

"I believe this is without question the Tea Party downgrade," said Sen. John Kerry, D-Mass. "This is the Tea Party downgrade because a minority of people in the House of Representatives countered even the will of many Republicans in the United States Senate who were prepared to do a bigger deal."

Your Tax Bailout $$$ hard at Work

2011-08-03T08:36:00.000-07:00

Chevy Volt: Still Not Selling
8:08 AM, AUG 3, 2011 • BY JONATHAN V. LAST

The July sales numbers are out and the Chevy Volt continues to electrify (get it?) the country. GM sold … 125 Volts last month!

I Like this Plan

2011-07-30T10:03:00.000-07:00

Support for the Mack Penny Plan Grows in the Senate
PR Newswire

Fiscal Hawk Senator Rand Paul (R-KY) Signs Onto Mack Plan

WASHINGTON, July 13, 2011 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- Congressman Mack today welcomed the support of Tea Party Senator Rand Paul (R-KY) as he signed on to the "One Percent Spending Reduction Act," legislation – also known as the "Penny Plan" – that was introduced by Senator Mike Enzi (R-WY) last week, and authored by Congressman Connie Mack (R-FL) last spring in the U.S. House of Representatives.

Seriously, What Did the Dems do Last October When they were in Charge?

2011-07-30T08:22:00.005-07:00

Obama: House Republicans wasted 'precious days' with Boehner plan

By Gautham Nagesh - 07/30/11 06:00 AM ET

President Obama used his his weekly address to call out House Republicans for holding up the process of getting "our fiscal house in order."

"Republicans in the House of Representatives just spent precious days trying to pass a plan that a majority of Republicans and Democrats in the Senate had already said they wouldn’t vote for," Obama said in the Saturday morning message.

Not Very Surprising Here

2011-06-25T14:15:00.000-07:00

Michelle Obama: "Fortunately, We Have Help From The Media"

Preach It Congresswoman Bachmann!!

2011-06-20T14:25:00.000-07:00

Bachmann: Obama ‘Has Failed the African American Community’ and Hispanic Community

Monday, June 20, 2011
By Terence P. Jeffrey

Rep. Michele Bachmann addresses the Republican Leadership Conference in New Orleans on June 17, 2011. (AP photo/Patrick Semansky)

(CNSNews.com) - Pointing to double-digit unemployment rates among African Americans and Hispanics, Rep. Michele Bachmann (R.-Minn.) said on Friday that President Barack Obama “has failed” both these communities.

“This president has failed the Hispanic community. He has failed the African-American community,” said Bachmann. “He has failed us all when it comes to jobs.”

So Begins the Summer of Recovery Part Deaux :(

2011-06-17T15:33:00.000-07:00

How Miserable? Index Says the Worst in 28 Years

When it comes to measuring the combination of unemployment and inflation, it doesn’t get much more miserable than this.

In fa

Getty Images

ct, misery, as measured in the unofficial Misery Index that simply totals the unemployment and inflation rates, is at a 28-year high, reflective of how weak the economic recovery has been and how far there is to go.

The index, first compiled during the soaring inflation days of the 1970s by economist Arthur Okun, is registering a nausea-inducing 12.7—9.1 percent for unemployment and 3.6 percent for annualized inflation—a number not seen since 1983. The index has been above 10 since November 2009 and had been under double-digits from June 1993 through May 2008.

The good news, of course, is that the Fed-led Paul Volcker embarked on a highly successful inflation-slaying campaign that brought the level of misery down sharply through the rest of the ’80s recovery decade.

Really Mr. President, ATM's are the reason the recovery is WEAK?????

2011-06-17T07:14:00.000-07:00

Revenge of the Machines? Obama Mocked for Blaming Slow Recovery on ATMs

Earlier in the week, at a jobs council meeting, the president was called out for saying that "shovel-ready projects' weren't quite as shovel-ready as he thought. Then later, in an interview with NBC News, Obama suggested that innovation and technology -- like job-stealing ATMs -- were reasons why the employment rate was not rebounding as quickly as he had hoped.

WINNING! NOT!!!!!!

2011-06-15T19:13:00.000-07:00

Debbie Wasserman Schultz: ‘We own the economy’

Democrats are ready to take responsibility for the state of the economy and they deserve credit for putting it on the right track, the party’s chairwoman, Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz, said on Wednesday.

“We own the economy. We own the beginning of the turnaround and we want to make sure that we continue that pace of recovery, not go back to the policies of the past under the Bush administration that put us in the ditch in the first place,” Wasserman Schultz told Mike Allen at POLITICO’s ‘Playbook Breakfast.’

Really? Our Allies in the Fight Against Terrorism??

2011-06-14T20:38:00.001-07:00

WORLD
Pakistan Arrests C.I.A. Informants in Bin Laden Raid
By ERIC SCHMITT and MARK MAZZETTI
Published: June 14, 2011
Pakistan’s detention of five C.I.A. informants, including a Pakistani Army major, is the latest evidence of the fractured relationship between the United States and Pakistan.

Michele Bachmann enters presidential race

2011-06-13T21:02:00.000-07:00

ST. PAUL, Minn. — Minnesota Rep. Michele Bachmann, an outspoken Republican with close ties to the tea party, announced Monday that she is running for president, a candidacy that could further shake up a volatile fight for the GOP nomination.
The first female contender to enter the 2012 race, Bachmann announced her bid during a Republican presidential debate in New Hampshire. The third-term Minnesota congresswoman has been leaning heavily toward a run over the past few months, visiting early primary states, raising money and railing against President Barack Obama.

"We cannot risk giving President Obama four more years to dismantle our nation. We must act now," Bachmann said in a fundraising letter sent within an hour of her entrance. "That's why I've made the decision to get in this race."

CAN ANYONE REALLY BE THIS OBTUSE?

2007-12-13T06:22:00.001-08:00

OK ... I used "obtuse" instead of stupid because I'm in a warm and loving mood today. The object of my warm and fuzzy feelings right now would be Mika Emilie Leonia Brzezinski. Yes, she's the 40-year-old daughter of Ziggy. She's the co-host and news reader on MSNBC's "Morning Joe" program. Yesterday she was delivering the news about that shooting at the Colorado over the weekend --- you know, the one where Jeanne Assam stopped a killer with a rifle using only a handgun. After she delivers the news story her co-host Joe Scarborough says that this story shows that one person with a gun can make a difference. Mika, who is staunchly anti-gun, responds with "no, no, no, no, no – no no no no no no" and then follows with "You know, that is the most inane statement I have ever heard. You can watch the video right here.

Try to understand this, my friends, though in the end it is going to be impossible. Here is your friendly left-wing news reader delivering a story about one civilian with a gun saving multiple lives .. and then saying that it is "inane" to suggest that one person with a gun can make a difference. ONLY in the mind of a liberal could you find this thought process.

GLOBAL WARMING AND HURRICANES

2007-12-12T06:28:00.000-08:00

Democrats are trying the blame the Bush administration for pressuring experts to downplay the connection between hurricanes and global warming. A report released by Democrats on Monday called the "Political Interference With Climate Change Science Under the Bush Administration" marks the end of a 16-month investigation into the conspiracy theories of Democrats. The report says that "the Bush Administration has engaged in a systematic effort to manipulate climate change science and mislead policymakers and the public about the dangers of global warming."

Now former director of the National Hurricane Center, Max Mayfield has stepped forward to contradict the Democrats' findings: political pressure did not cause him to change his congressional testimony which downplayed the link between global warming and hurricanes.

The controversy started when a staff member of Senator Ted Stevens of Alaska sent an email to the NOAA asking Mayfield to say that global warming was not making hurricanes stronger. Bottom line for Democrats ... Bush was behind the whole thing. I wonder how many Democrat staffers have pressured government scientists to participate in the global warming alarmism?

By the way, part of Mayfield's original testimony following hurricane Katrina states, "the increased activity since 1995 is due to natural fluctuations/cycles of hurricane activity driven by the Atlantic Ocean itself along with the atmosphere above it and not enhanced substantially by global warming."

Why are Democrats upset? They see global warming as the key to more income redistribution. They don't want to loose this argument.

GREEN U-TURN

2007-12-07T05:52:00.001-08:00

Australia's new green Prime Minister Kevin Rudd has suddenly done an about-face on cutting green house gas emissions. I love to see a leader with convictions. Just days after Rudd said Australia would back a 25-40% cut on 1990 emission levels by 2020, he has suddenly decided that it is unrealistic.

The electricity industry stepped up and warned that it wouldn't be able to meet growing consumer demand and comply with the target, causing huge rises in electricity prices. The Energy Supply Association of Australia found that cutting carbon emissions by 30% of 2000 levels by 2030 would push power costs up by 30%.

Perhaps Australia's new "green" top guy has figured out that this whole global warming thing is really a badly disguised attack by tired or communists and leftists castoffs against the industrialized world and the evil specter of capitalism.

IRAN

2007-12-06T05:12:00.001-08:00

In light of the report on Iran’s nuclear activity, an Iranian government spokesman said that “Americans should pay the price” for turning international public opinion against Iran.

I don’t think it takes the United States to turn international opinion against Iran … I think its leader Mahmoud Ahmadinejad does it for them. His latest idea is to create an international Islamic court to try war criminals and other human rights violators.

He claims that bodies like the UN are being “manipulated by the West.

Remember … when it comes to Iran and whether they do or don’t have nukes, which would be the biggest error:

(a) Believing that Iran does have a nuclear weapons program and taking action to stop it; or,
(b) Believing that Iran does not have a nuclear weapons program, when in fact they do, and failing to stop it.

I apologize for the fact that this may be too tough a problem for a government educated liberal to solve.

HILLARY TRAILS

2007-11-27T06:13:00.000-08:00

Polls are now showing that Hillary Clinton trails five Republican presidential contenders in general election match-ups. The top five were Rudy Giuliani, Mitt Romney, Fred Thompson, John McCain and Mike Huckabee. (Huckabee, by the way, was not considered a top five candidate in the first round of polling during the summer.) But against Barack Obama or John Edwards, Republicans were down in the hypothetical head-to-head match-ups.

Our best hope at this point is for the MoveOn Democrats to go ahead and nominate Hillary ... they we can watch with glee as she self-destructs and takes the Democrats with her.

WHITE FLAG DEMS PASS IRAQ WITHDRAWAL BILL

2007-11-15T06:34:00.000-08:00

By Michelle Malkin

Time to bring it out again…

Just about an hour ago, the Dems passed their Iraq withdrawal bill, tying $50 billion in war funding to a demand that President Bush start bringing troops home in coming weeks (never mind that it’s already starting) with a mandated timetable of ending combat by December 2008:

House Democrats pushed through a $50 billion bill for the Iraq war Wednesday night that would require President Bush to start bringing troops home in coming weeks with a goal of ending combat by December 2008.

The legislation, passed 218-203, was largely a symbolic jab at Bush, who already has begun reducing force levels but opposes a congressionally mandated timetable on the war. And while the measure was unlikely to pass in the Senate — let alone overcome a presidential veto — Democrats said they wanted voters to know they weren’t giving up.

“The fact is, we can no longer sustain the military deployment in Iraq,” said House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif. “Staying there in the manner that we are there is no longer an option.”

Translation of Pelosi’s remarks: “Stop pestering me, Code Pink! I beg you to stop!”

The White House says it will veto the bill; the GOP reportedly will back the president. Nancy was sweating it for a bit this evening:

The bill represents about a quarter of the $196 billion Bush requested for combat operations in the 2008 budget year, which began Oct 1.

It would compel an unspecified number of troops to leave Iraq within 30 days, a requirement Bush is already on track to meet as he begins in coming weeks to reverse the 30,000 troop buildup he ordered earlier this year. It also sets a goal of ending combat by Dec. 15, 2008, and states that money included in the bill should be used to redeploy troops and “not to extend or prolong the war.”

The measure also would set government-wide standards on interrogation, effectively barring the CIA from using such harsh techniques as waterboarding, which simulates drowning.

The bill was on shaky ground this week, after some liberal Democrats said they were concerned it was too soft and would not force Bush to end the war. Conservative Democrats said they thought it went too far and would tie the hands of military commanders.

The bill’s prospects brightened somewhat after three leading anti-war Democrats announced they would support it. California Reps. Lynn Woolsey, Barbara Lee and Maxine Waters said they had agreed to swing behind it because the bill explicitly states the money should be used to bring troops home.

But still uncertain the bill would pass, Pelosi on Wednesday delayed a vote by several hours while she met with supporters and asked them to help her round up votes.

Fifteen Democrats broke ranks and joined 188 Republicans in opposing the measure. Four Republicans joined 214 Democrats in supporting it.

Roll call vote coming up…

Here it is.

The 15 Dems who opposed the withdrawal bill:

Allen
Baird
Barrow
Boren
Cooper
Kucinich (because he didn’t think it went far enough)
Lampson
Marshall
Matheson
McNulty
Michaud
Snyder
Stark (because he didn’t think it went far enough)
Tanner
Taylor

The 4 Republicans who supported the withdrawal bill:

English (PA)
Jones (NC)
Shays
Walsh (NY)

One voted “present:”

Lewis (GA)

And 11 didn’t vote:

Bono
Carson
Cubin
Doyle
Hastert
Jindal
Mack
Oberstar
Pearce
Sessions
Weller

***

John Boehner’s office e-mailed the following statement following the vote:

“By Christmas, some 3,000 American troops will return home from Iraq after achieving remarkable success in our fight against al Qaeda. And how is Congress welcoming them back? By passing yet another politically-motivated measure that cuts off funding for those continuing to serve our nation in Iraq and hamstrings the commanders who are leading them to victory. This measure will never be signed into law, and it represents yet another failure for Democratic leaders intent on putting politics before accomplishment.

“Congress would be better served by sending the President the long-overdue veterans and troops funding bill, which enjoys broad, bipartisan support in both the House and Senate. But the Majority leadership has played politics with this critical legislation, stalling its completion to take up today’s cynical proposal to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory in Iraq. Consequently, returning troops and their families will face more hurdles and take more time to get the housing and health care benefits they deserve – all thanks to Congress.

“Under General Petraeus’ strategy, our troops are routing al Qaeda in Iraq, improving security for the Iraqi people, and laying the foundation for critical political reconciliation in that country. Congress should not undermine this success and risk having al Qaeda stand back up. Instead, Members of both parties should recognize that the Petraeus plan is working, continue to solidify our troops’ gains, and work to bring them home after victory, not defeat.”

Meanwhile, over in Iraq…

More from the front on the Dawn Patrol at Mudville Gazette. And Herschel Smith at Captain’s Journal.

***

The NYT covers tonight’s “rancorous debate” on the House floor:

In two hours of rancorous debate on the House floor, Republicans stressed the recent progress in Iraq while Democrats said that the political situation remained bleak and that it was time to pull out American troops.

“The sacrifice of our troops was simply not met by the actions of the Iraqi government,” said Speaker Nancy Pelosi, Democrat of California. “This legislation today offers something fundamentally different than what President Bush is proposing, a 10-year war, a war without end costing trillions of dollars. It provides the tools to our troops so they can get the job done. It also presents a strategy that will bring them home, responsibly, honorably, safely and soon.”

…For Republicans, the debate provided another chance to accuse the Democrats of wasting time. “Today, if my calculations are right, we will have our 58th vote on trying to restrain the commanders in the field in Iraq,” said Representative Roy Blunt of Missouri, the Republican whip. “The Democrats appear to never get tired of foregone conclusions, to never get tired of doing the same thing over and over again with the same result — the ultimate Groundhog Day of legislation that doesn’t get us anywhere.”

The White House also hammered the Democrats in Congress. Dana Perino, the White House press secretary, promised a veto and accused the Democrats of ignoring gains in Iraq.

You’ll love this bit of editorializing in the last paragraph of the NYT piece:

The debate over war financing also provided a forum for Republicans to praise recent developments in Iraq, including what they called a decline in violence.

“…what they called a decline in violence.”

“They” are not the only ones calling it that.

Related: A Pat Dollard reader has an interesting exchange with a WaPo reporter about the MSM coverage of Iraq. Read it.

EDWARDS' FAMILY LEAVE

2007-11-14T06:06:00.000-08:00

Now the great John "poverty tour" Edwards has released his plan for the Family Leave Act. Edwards proposes spending $2 billion a year (that we don't have) to help states create family leave programs – that's twice as much as Hillary Clinton's suggestion. But Edwards wants at least eight weeks of paid time off every year for so-called family leave .. and he wants it by 2014

Edwards also wants to expand the federal Family and Medical Leave Act to include 13 million workers who are eligible for unpaid leave. But wait! There's more! He also wants to require all businesses to offer workers a minimum of seven paid sick days a year.

Add it up. Edwards wants to use the police power of government to force employers to pay employees for a minimum of 47 days a year ... for not working. This is in addition to vacation days!

Just remember, to Democrats like John Edwards, government is the solution to everything. Edwards says, "It works in combination with universal health care, universal preschool, and a whole series of things that are essentially aimed at making sure we strengthen and grow the middle class in this country, and provide some level of financial security that does not exist today." Universal ... universal ... that's just another way of saying "funded by your tax dollars."

There is not one single penny earned by one individual in this country that people like Edwards don't covet. They're smart, though. They'll be sure to take the money from people who's votes they don't need .. and then spend it on those more likely to vote for them.

If Edwards and the MoveOn Democrats were to get their way on programs like these, all future election campaigns would be peppered with warnings that "If you vote for my opponent he will take away your paid family leave! If you'll vote for me, I'll give you a few days more!"

Nowhere in our Constitution can I find any article or section that gives Washington the power to force employers to pay people for not working. Once you've accepted the premise that Washington does have this power ... what's the limit?

THE "BOYS" ARE TOUGH ON HIS WIFE?

2007-11-13T06:36:00.000-08:00

Would someone please give us a big-time break here?

Bill Clinton had a few things to say yesterday in Charleston, S.C., about the treatment his "wife" has been getting from the other MoveOn Democrat candidates. He said "those boys have been getting tough on her lately."

Surely he can't be serious. He's actually complaining because these "boys," as he calls them, have been tough on Hillary? If I may be so intemperate as to ask a simple question, do you think that these "boys" have been tougher on Hillary than you have been?

You want to talk about being "rough" on your wife? Let's do a short review:

We'll start with a few names: Gennifer Flowers, Dolly Kyle Browning, Then there's Monica Lewinsky, Juanita Broaddrick, Kathleen Willey and Paula Jones --- plus goodness knows how many more. These are just the names of some of the women Bill Clinton either assaulted or has had affairs with during his so-called "marriage" to Hillary.

So Bill calls it "getting rough" when Hillary's campaign opponents question her flip-flopping on the issue of driver's licenses for illegals, or make statements about Hillary's planted questions (see next item) during campaign stops. That is "getting rough" on the lady ... while having multiple affairs and being a serial sexual harasser – including at least one rape – is not? If putting your "wife" in charge of cleaning up after multiple affairs and assaults isn't "being rough on her," then what, pray tell, is?

The fact is that Hillary Clinton has been engaged in a fraud marriage for decades ... a marriage born out of a desire for political power rather than an endearing love and dedication. The problem here isn't that the "boys" are being rough on Hillary, or that Hillary and Bill are playing the gender card in this primary ... the problem is that we have a woman who has conspired with her husband to disgrace the institution of marriage trying to pass herself off as a loyal wife and dedicated mother in order to appeal to women to whom the institution of marriage actually means something.

The real question here is why various pundits and columnists don't step up and call the Clinton marriage what they and everybody else knows full well it is ... a fraud and a sham. When I give speeches I love to tell people that one of the greatest status symbols one can acquire in this country is a long-term marriage. You can't buy one, and you can't inherit one. You have to work for it ... day after day. There are times you'll want to quit; times you think things are looking grim. Stick to it, recommit yourself, and you'll get there. When I say this to an older group they invariably applaud. When I say it to a younger group (those students at the University of Georgia a week ago, for instance) they just sit there. That's fine. They'll learn.

It disgusts me that these two people continue to engage in this phony marriage of theirs while the media just plays along. The institution of marriage in this country is to be valued and defended, not made a mockery by two people engaged in a political alliance with a dedication to one, and only one thing ... power.

OBAMA AND THE 'FORTUNATE'

2007-11-12T05:34:00.000-08:00

Barack Obama is also singing the tunes of many of his fellow MoveOn Democrats. It seems that to be a presidential candidate for 2008, you must support increased social security cap so that the evil rich pay their "fair share."

Obama says, "I think the best way to approach this is to adjust the cap on the payroll tax so that people like myself are paying a little bit more and people who are in need are protected." It's just a little bit more! And look at all the people we need to protect!

But it gets better. In reference to his buddy, Warren "tax me more" Buffet, Obama says, "I think a lot of us who have been fortunate are willing to pay a little bit more to make sure that a senior citizen who is struggling to deal with rising property taxes or rising heating bills, that they've got the coverage that they need."

Those of you who have listened to me for any time at all will know that Obama just yanked one of my chains. Here he is promoting the leftist idea that anyone who succeeds in this country did so not because of hard work, but because they were "fortunate." They were lucky. It's not about sacrifice. It's not about work ethic. It's not about dedication. It's not about making smart choices. It's all about being lucky.

There's a reason for this language. If Democrats can convince you that the high achievers in our economy were merely "lucky," then it is so much easier to argue the cause of income redistribution. After all, they're just evening out the odds.

A TALE OF TWO COUPS

2007-11-11T06:19:00.000-08:00

by Oliver North

It’s been a tough week for democracy and American diplomacy. In Pakistan, President Pervez Musharraf pulled a coup against himself and U.S. diplomats were apparently stunned. In Venezuela, President Hugo Chavez pulled a coup against his countrymen and U.S. diplomats were once again, well…stunned. The difference in political attention and media coverage accorded these two affairs has been -- for lack of a better word -- stunning.

Print and broadcast coverage of events nearly half the world away in Pakistan have been ubiquitous since Mr. Musharraf declared a “State of Emergency” and fired his self-appointed Supreme Court last Saturday. Photos and footage of protesting, out of work, Pakistani lawyers being dragged away in handcuffs by police in Islamabad have produced breathless coverage from correspondents who also freely reported that there is now no freedom of the press in Pakistan.

These images were apparently enough to give liberals in the U.S. Congress post traumatic stress disorder, causing a number of members to muse about cutting off economic, military and intelligence assistance -- and of course, blame George W. Bush. On Wednesday, while President Bush was giving French President Sarkozy a guided tour of Mount Vernon, Under Secretary of State John Negroponte was on Capitol Hill begging the solons not to pull the plug on Pakistan and abandon “an indispensable ally in the war on terror.”

Meanwhile, the potentates of the press and the powerful on the Potomac have all but ignored the coup in Caracas, just 1,400 miles south of Miami. Last week Venezuela’s rubber-stamp legislature approved 69 constitutional changes drafted by their party boss, Hugo Chavez. If affirmed by referendum on 2 December, the amendments would dramatically expand the powers of Venezuela’s chief executive, permit the government to seize private property without court approval, virtually eliminate civil liberties, and allow Mr. Chavez to serve -- like Kim Jung Il in North Korea -- as president for life. To make this “deal” attractive to the people, the Venezuelan work-day would be officially shortened to six hours.

On Wednesday this week, while Presidents Bush and Sarkozy toured George Washington’s gardens and Congress mulled the means of tightening the screws on Pakistan, more than 80,000 people took to the streets of Caracas to protest the Chavez coup. When students gathered on the campus of Central University and refused to disperse as ordered by police, the cops and National Guard troops pulled back allowing goons from Mr. Chavez’ United Socialist Party, many wearing ski masks, to open fire on the student gathering.

Despite numerous accounts of the Caracas clashes in the Latin American and European press -- even the BBC -- there has been scant coverage in the U.S. media -- and almost no mention of Chavez’ machinations by our diplomats. The protests in Pakistan -- including pitiful pictures of jailed lawyers -- have gotten almost as much ink and airtime in the U.S. as the Hollywood writer’s strike. President Bush even called Mr. Musharraf to tell him to “take off his uniform” and hold elections as promised. Yet, official Washington has been practically mute in criticizing Mr. Chavez. Why the difference?

Part of the answer is, of course, that Pakistan has nuclear weapons and Venezuela doesn’t -- yet. Interestingly, in his prepared remarks before the House Foreign Affairs Committee, Mr. Negroponte made only one elliptical mention of Islamabad’s nukes -- and focused instead on the need to keep Pakistan with us in the fight against radical Islamic terrorism. Notably, while everyone was busy bashing Mr. Musharraf, he was quietly moving a full division of Pakistan’s army from the border with India to the Federally Administered Tribal Areas along the Pakistan-Afghan frontier – long a Taliban-Al Qaeda stronghold.

For skeptics -- and I confess to being one when it comes to the press and politicians -- there may be other explanations for the disparity in how the two coups have been covered and commented upon.

First, Mr. Musharraf has been an ally of the United States in our war against radical Islam since 1981. America’s allies are second only to the U.S. military as whipping boys for the American media. Conversely, Mr. Chavez has proclaimed himself to be America’s enemy since he came to power in 1998. His promise of spreading a “21st Century Socialist Revolution” resonates favorably with the U.S. left. Last May, when Mr. Chavez seized control of Venezuela’s most popular radio and TV stations, it created barely a blip in the U.S. press.

Second, Venezuela is the fourth-leading supplier of crude oil and petroleum products to the United States. With oil soon to be at $125 per barrel -- or higher -- is it too cynical to ask if the Chavez coup has been buried by our political and media elites because they are worried about finding fuel for their limos?

HILLARY SLIPPING

2007-11-08T06:18:00.000-08:00

Hillary Clinton admitted that she flopped in last week's debate on MSNBC. She told "The Situation Room's" Candy Crowley, "I wasn't at my best the other night."

Now the latest Rasmussen polls show that Hillary's lead over Obama has slipped to its lowest level. Clinton now leads with 34%, that's only 10 points above Obama at 24%.

Meanwhile, Obama took a shot at the Clinton campaign saying that "they've been fighting some of the same fights since the '60's and it makes it very difficult for them to bring the country together to get things done."

The recent publicity for Hillary's "hippie museum" in New York probably doesn't help either. Although the earmark for the museum has been removed ... is there still a way that Hillary could get her Woodstock museum? Oh hell yes, she will ... and she'll do it without ever having to take the responsibility.

So .. now that Hillary is screwing up ... watch it become even more difficult to get a straight answer out of her on anything!

HILLARY'S GENDER CARD

2007-11-06T06:09:00.000-08:00

Hillary is really trying to boost her feminine side. That, my friends, is a challenge. In a speech in Iowa she went on and on and on about how she is going to have to clean up the White House ... oh, you mean she meant politically? Wouldn't you think all the residue is gone after eight years? But as she was telling this story about cleaning the White House, she remembered a heckler from a previous speech shouting out "that's what women are good at ... cleaning up the mess." Probably a Ron Paulista.

You know things are getting bad when the feminists start calling you out. Kate Michelman is the former president of NARAL Pro-Choice America. She says that Hillary is "disingenuously playing the victim card," and she is infusing her campaign with messages about gender. Ooooh. Now mind you, Kate Michelman isn't just saying this for the baby's health, she has allied herself with the Edwards campaign.

But it gets even worse. Even Nancy Pelosi is calling Hillary out for playing the women card. Nancy Pelosi ... the first woman Speaker ... a Democrat herself. But Nancy says that Hillary's campaign appears to have been trying to exploit the perception that she is being treated differently because she is a woman.

Is anyone out there starting to feel sorry for Ms. Rodham?

PELOSI DISAPPROVES

2007-11-02T05:49:00.000-07:00

Nancy Pelosi is unhappy. She says that if a pollster asked her what she thought of Congress, she would be one of those people who said Congress is doing a lousy job. She’s upset because Congress hasn’t done anything … but what she really means is that she hasn’t ended the war in Iraq.

Of course, in typical Democrat fashion, she blames Congress’ lousy job on President Bush and the Republicans. While Pelosi’s Congress hasn’t done anything, she says that “there is no question that the war in Iraq has eclipsed much of what we have done." Got it? War in Iraq … President Bush … Republicans. Not one ounce of responsibility actually falls on her or her party. That’s government for you.

By the way … that “much of what we have done” line. Can she fill us in there?

It’s not only the public that is dissatisfied. President Bush also chastised Congress for its failure to do anything. He says that Democratic leaders are stalling important aspects of his fight against Islamic extremism … dragging out Mike Mukasey’s confirmation is the obvious. Congress has also failed to act on a bill on eavesdropping on terrorist suspects, and it has been slow to approve spending for the war against Islamic extremism, the Pentagon, and veterans programs.

Oh .. almost forgot. This congress has set an all-time record in failing to send even one budget bill to the president’s desk. Durned Republicans.

Bush says that the current debate over Iraq is similar to when Lenin first talked of launching a communist revolution, when Hitler began to establish an “Aryan superstate,” and when people wanted to appease the Soviet Union rather than compete with it during the Cold War. Appeasers in those days denied that we were at war also. We see how that worked out.

ENDLESS INSULTS IN WASHINGTON

2007-10-31T08:18:00.000-07:00

Yesterday President Bush slammed Congress for not getting its work done. He says that Congress is too busy focusing on investigating his administration and trying to pull the troops out of Iraq.

Nancy Pelosi was not too pleased with this. She says, "Instead of criticizing Congress, the president's time would be better spent working in a bipartisan way to end this disastrous war in Iraq, keep our promises to our veterans by providing the largest veterans' healthcare investment in history, and providing healthcare for 10 million children."

OK .. first of all, Nancy Pelosi's MoveOn Democrat party controls both the House and the Senate. They can end the war in Iraq any time they want to. Right now it's the Democrat's fault the war hasn't been called off, not the president's. Just shut up, Nancy, and get it done. Secondly ... no child in America goes without health care if the caretaker of that child cares enough to seek it. You're going to get your precious nationalized health care in the U.S. You're going to get what Democrats have dreamed of for decades ... control over the health care of every single American. You're going to get your wish because Americans largely believe that they are not responsible for their own health care. So just shut up about it for now, and try to get some budget bills passed.

Back to Bush ... the president also pointed out that democrats have passed an "endless series of tax increases" and that they can't seem to solve anything without it involving a tax hike. He points to S-CHIP, the farm bill, the energy bill and a small business bill as prime examples. And while Bush is no frugal president, he points out that the Democrats seek to spend more than $205 billion over the next five years.

Is there something about this that surprises Bush?

Meanwhile, Dennis Kucinich has found the time to question the president's mental health, in light of Bush's comments about a nuclear Iran could mean WWIII. Kucinich says, "I seriously believe we have to start asking questions about his mental health ... There's something wrong. He does not seem to understand his words have real impact." Then, after telling the world that he thinks Bush has a mental health problem, Kucinich proceeded to talk about the time he saw a UFO.

No wonder our government can't get anything done. We have resorted to publicly question the mental state of our own president. Kucinich, by the way, is certifiable.

EDWARDS NEW DEAL

2007-10-29T13:37:00.000-07:00

John Edwards wants to institute New Deal-like programs to fight poverty and stem growing wealth prosperity ... if he is elected President. The "if he's elected president" part means that we don't have to worry about Edwards right now .. but his ideas are typical big-government Democrat. Edward's poverty fighting program will require him to ask Americans to make sacrifices like paying higher taxes. Rich Americans, that is.

Edwards says the federal government should provide universal pre-kindergarten, create matching savings accounts for "low-income" people, mandate a minimum wage of $9.50 and provide a million new Section 8 housing vouchers for the poor. He also wants to start a government-funded educated program called "College for Everyone."

To pay for it ... increasing the capital gains taxes because "taxes on 'wealth income' should be in line with those on work income." And to top things off, Edwards says that it is important to "share in prosperity, and that "people who have done well in this country, including me, have more of a responsibility to give back."

Where do I start? Let's just attack this with some quick bullet points.

Raising capital gains taxes to the extent Edwards wants would chase billions, perhaps trillions of dollars of capital out of this country. Already we have $13 trillion dollars of American wealth working overseas to escape our tax system and politicians like Edwards.
Universal pre-kindergarten? This is just the government getting its hands on your children at an earlier age .. before you can instill values like freedom and individuality in their fresh little minds.
Raising the minimum wage? A perfect ploy for Democrats. "Vote for us and we'll make your employer pay you more money ... whether you're worth it or not."
More Section 8 welfare housing? Same stuff. "Vote for us and we'll take money from those evil rich people to buy you a place to live." Nothing ruins a neighborhood quicker than Section 8 housing. Edwards obviously believes that it is the government's role to provide people with a place to live. I would rather live next door to a hooker than to someone using Section 8.
"College for everyone"? Not everyone is capable of college level work. Who the hell does Edwards think is going to cook the French fries?

DEMS PLAN TO CUT FUNDING

2007-10-26T07:00:00.000-07:00

Combover Carl

... for the war against Islamic extremism.

Senator Carl Levin (a democrat) is the Chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee. He is working with Senator Jack Reed (also a democrat) on a strategy that would basically cut the White House's war funding request in half. He hopes this will put enough pressure on President Bush to change course in Iraq.

Senator Reed says that Democrats want to include language in the supplemental that would target a complete withdrawal from Iraq in nine months. In the House, Democrats want to withhold the supplemental until President Bush commits himself to changing course in Iraq ... this would force war funding to go through the regular budget process.

The White House points to the fact that Congress can't even pass its annual appropriations bills. So sending something like this through the "regular budget process" would put our troop in harm's way ... because Congress would never get to it in time. I suppose that is the Democrat's version of supporting our troops.

Interesting, isn't it, that when most analysts would agree that progress is being made ... the MoveOn Democrats want to "change the course." The course the Democrats want is a course to defeat ... for it is defeat that gives them their reward and their victory. Bush is right ... the Democrats can't pass their appropriations bills .. they're certainly not as important as insuring our defeat overseas. Weakening a Republican president is job number one.

QUOTE OF THE DAY .. MAYBE OF THE YEAR

"Hillary tried to get a million dollars for the Woodstock museum. I understand it was a major cultural and pharmaceutical event. I couldn't attend. I was tied up at the time." - John McCain

DREAM ACT IS A FAILURE

2007-10-25T06:08:00.000-07:00

Yesterday the DREAM Act failed to gain cloture in the Senate. It failed 52-44, eight votes short of the 60 votes required which would have ended debate and started the voting process. Still, Democrats, like Dick Durbin, feel that it is morally imperative that this bill, or some form of it, be passed.

While some Republicans, like Senator James Inhofe, were staunchly against the bill, other Republicans objected to its timing. Many complained that the Senate should be focusing on spending bills at this time, instead of debating controversial immigration reforms. Minority Leader Mitch McConnell says that the Senate has yet to see an appropriations bill. I guess this is why Nancy Pelosi gets her thong in a wad, saying that the Senate moves too slowly. (Don't worry ... I'm sure they'll find another Muslim holiday to commemorate soon.)

The Internet tax moratorium expires in one week, and Congress has yet to address the alternate minimum tax. These are issues that affect legal, taxpaying Americans – rather than wasting time Hispandering.

CALIFORNIA FIRES......BUSH'S FAULT. OF COURSE!

2007-10-24T06:57:00.000-07:00

Well, you knew this just had to happen. Fires are devastating California from North of Los Angeles down to San Diego. Hundreds of thousands of people have had to flee their homes. Disaster is an understatement. So along comes MoveOn Moonbat Senator Barbara Boxer to announce who is to blame. And who would that be? Why none other than George Bush. It would seem that President Bush has taken the time off from killing children and becoming amused as our servicemen are killed in Iraq to plot these fire strategies for California. And just how is this all Bush's fault? Why, he sent all of those California National Guardsmen to Iraq .... For his amusement, of course.

It must be really strange to have such a bizarre woman representing you in the U.S. Senate.

This will just be the beginning. Look for more and more Democrats to lay the blame for the California fires .. and the failure to contain them .. on Bush. Hey .. it's what Democrats do.

But the Harry Reid isn't much better. You knew that this had to happen sooner or later also. Reid is blaming the fires on global warming. There is, of course, no scientific proof whatsoever of this ... nor is there any evidence ... but as long as you have a natural disaster on your hands, you might as well find a way to use it to push your agenda. So ... global warming it is!

The truth is that these fires .. well, not the fires themselves, but the severity of the fires .. can be blamed on whacko environmentalists. Every time someone in California suggests thinning out the brush that fuels these fires you have some environmentalist screaming about kangaroo rats or field mice or some such nonsense. I can remember many years ago there was a community outside of Los Angeles that wanted to clear the brush that abutted their homes. The environmental moonbats said no .. they went to court and managed to prevent the creation of a fire break. One homeowner told the eco-radicals to take a hike, and created his firebreak anyway. While the tree huggers were fuming, along came the fire. Can you guess which was the only home in the neighborhood that didn't burn down?

Now ... I know I'm not the first person to have thought of this. Do you remember about four years ago ... there was a report that some Al Qaeda detainees had said something about starting fires in a Western state? Here's the story from USA Today, dated July 11, 2003. Well ... doesn't it seam just the least bit curious that all of these fires from north of Los Angeles to San Diego erupted at pretty much the same time? No, I'm not saying they were started by terrorists. I am saying that if terrorists had decided to set the fires it would have been a pretty easy task ... and there is some history here.

SHAMNESTY ALERT!!!!!!

2007-10-23T21:13:00.000-07:00

Shamnesty alert: Dems prepare to ram DREAM Act through with cloture vote; Update: Where do your Senators stand?

By Michelle Malkin • October 23, 2007

Update 7:30pm Eastern. I’m bumping this post to the Lead Story slot and will keep it here through tomorrow’s cloture vote. Where do your Senators stand? Let me know what responses you get. If Republicans had brains, they would put attrition through enforcement first and Just Say No to any new illegal alien magnets.

Noam Askew has a list of possible fence-sitters. You’ll notice a lot of open-borders Republicans on that list.

Sen. Cornyn (R-Texas) sent his statement this evening. Kind of wishy-washy, but at least he comes down on the right side:

U.S. Sen. John Cornyn, a member of the Senate Judiciary Committee, made the following statement this evening regarding his intention to vote tomorrow against the motion to proceed to the DREAM Act (S. 2205), which was introduced by U.S. Sen. Dick Durbin, D-Ill.

“As I have long said, I have a great deal of sympathy for the plight of children who have no moral culpability for being in this country illegally. Congress should continue seeking reasonable and responsible ways they can complete their education and achieve opportunity.

“Unfortunately, the Durbin bill contains a number of gaping loopholes, while failing to address the much larger need for comprehensive immigration reform and the immediate crisis at our borders. For example, it contains no firm requirement for the illegal immigrant to graduate with a degree from an accredited U.S. institution of Higher Education (either a two or four-year institution), it grants them broad access to federal student loans at a time when we are struggling to meet loan needs for our own citizens, and it extends the benefits to adults, rather than focusing on children. Moreover, from a law enforcement perspective, his bill does nothing to prevent fraud, allows certain criminal aliens to qualify for legal status, and ties the hands of law enforcement by severely limiting their access to application information.

“If my colleagues who support this measure are committed to solving America’s immigration crisis and the plight of illegal immigrants, then the focus of this Congress should be on passing a comprehensive reform bill that addresses all of our pressing immigration matters, including securing our broken borders and the needs of American businesses for more workers.”

Here are the others targeted by the DREAM-pushers:

Hutchison, Kay Bailey- (R - TX) (202) 224-5922
Thad Cochran (202) 224- 5054
Norm Coleman(202) 224-5641
John Sununu (202) 224-2841
Olympia Snowe (202) 224-5344
Jon Tester (202) 224-2644
Richard Burr (202) 224-3154
John Warner (202) 224-2023
Lindsey Graham (202) 224-5972
Judd Gregg (202) 224-3324
Chuck Grassley (202) 224-3744
Tim Johnson (202) 224-5842
Robert Byrd (202) 224-3954
Byron Dorgan (202) 224-2551
Pete Domenici (202) 224-6621
Max Baucus (202) 224-2651
Larry Craig (202) 224-2752
Ted Stevens (202) 224-3004
George Voinovich (202) 224-3353
Lisa Murkowski (202) 224-6665
Claire McCaskill (202) 224-6154
Benjamin Nelson (202) 224-6551
John Barrasso (202) - 224-6441
Susan Collins (202) 224-2523
Crapo (202) 224-6142
Bennet (202) 224-5444
Martinez (202) 224-3041
Sen Brownback, Sam [KS] - (202) 224-6521
Sen Landrieu, Mary L. [LA] - (202) 224-5824
Sen Ensign (202) 224-6244

***

I’ve been keeping you up to date with the latest on the Dems’ attempt (with help from open borders Republicans) to ram the DREAM Act through the Senate. It now looks like a cloture vote is set for tomorrow. Numbers USA reports: “Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) filed to invoke cloture on S. 2205, Assistant Majority Leader Dick Durbin’s (D-Ill.) new stand-alone DREAM Act amnesty bill. The cloture vote, for which 60 YES votes are necessary to prevent a filibuster on the measure, is set for Wednesday, October 24. Reid is attempting to bring this nightmarish amnesty bill to the floor under Senate Rule XIV without it ever having been debated in committee.”

This morning, I received the following e-mail circulated today by Sen. Durbin’s Judiciary staff:

From: Dodin, Reema (Judiciary-Dem)
Sent: Tuesday, October 23, 2007 9:36 AM
To: All Judiciary Users
Subject: Briefing on the DREAM Act: TODAY at 3pm in SC-6

Durbin-Hagel-Lugar DREAM Act Briefing: Tuesday, October 23rd at 3PM in SC-6

Senators Durbin, Hagel and Lugar invite you to a staff briefing on S. 2205, the DREAM Act. A cloture vote on the motion to proceed to the DREAM Act will take place this Wednesday morning (tomorrow). The briefing is scheduled for Tuesday, October 23, in SC-6 of the U.S. Capitol.

The DREAM Act would make it possible for certain long-term undocumented immigrant children to go to college or join the military if they meet stringent requirements. It does not address the status of their parents, but simply allows children-who had no choice in the decision to come here-the opportunity to continue their education and give back to the country that they call home.

This bipartisan legislation has passed the Senate Judiciary Committee three times in various forms, and was approved by the Senate last year as part of the comprehensive immigration bill, S. 2611.

The briefing will feature presentations by:

Several students who would benefit from the DREAM Act; Angela Kelley, Director, Immigration Policy Center; Melissa Lazarin, Director of Education Policy, First Focus; Alfred Campos, Federal Lobbyist, National Education Association; Stephanie Grosser, Outreach & Program Coordinator, Hebrew Immigrant Aid Society; and Kevin Appleby, U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops.

This event is for Congressional staff only (no press). For more information, please contact Reema in Sen. Durbin’s office at 4-1158.

For more on the DREAM Act, please see the new report from the Immigration Policy Center.

Hope to see you there!

They’ve moved from health care kiddie human shields to illegal alien youth human shields.

The Democrat Party: It’s the Party That Won’t Grow Up.

Won't You Take Me to Chinatown?

2007-10-19T08:02:00.000-07:00

By Michelle Malkin

The Los Angeles Times digs into Hillary’s finances and uncovers more mysterious Chinatown donors with dilapidated addresses in NYC and jobs unlikely to put them in the position of maxing out campaign contributions. They include dishwashers, waiters, contributors who deny making contributions, and another who “admitted to lacking the legal-resident status required for giving campaign money.” And more:

Dishwashers, waiters and others whose jobs and dilapidated home addresses seem to make them unpromising targets for political fundraisers are pouring $1,000 and $2,000 contributions into Clinton’s campaign treasury. In April, a single fundraiser in an area long known for its gritty urban poverty yielded a whopping $380,000. When Sen. John F. Kerry (D-Mass.) ran for president in 2004, he received $24,000 from Chinatown…

…Of 74 residents of New York’s Chinatown, Flushing, the Bronx or Brooklyn that The Times called or visited, only 24 could be reached for comment.

Will Hillary accuse the Times reporters of “stalking” now?

I like the use of the adjective “ephemeral:”

Like many who traveled this path, most of the Chinese reported as contributing to Clinton’s campaign have never voted. Many speak little or no English. Some seem to lead such ephemeral lives that neighbors say they’ve never heard of them.

Predictions: Hillary will come out swinging at the Times, her Asian-American acolytes will accuse the paper of racism and ethnic bigotry, and those “ephemeral” donors will never be found.

***

Hey, I just remembered something. Remember the story I blogged this summer about Chinese-language ballots in Boston? One Chinese translation of Hillary Clinton’s name:

“Upset Stomach.”

Most fitting today, I imagine.

***

Allah dubs it “Hsu II.”

And once again, the question looms:

Where is the money coming from?

***

Flip Pidot takes note of the rise of the bundler and takes a close look at Hill’s 3Q refunds. Methinks more of those will be on the way.

FORTNEY STARK.....CLEARLY A MADMAN

2007-10-19T07:57:00.000-07:00

Did you hear what this august member of the MoveOn Democrat Party had to say on the floor of the House of Representatives yesterday? His name is Fortney "Pete" Stark, and he's the congressman representing (this time) California's 13th district.

First ... maybe a little review. Pete Stark seems to have a history of saying outrageous things about other public figures.

He called Health and Human Services Secretary Louis Sullivan a "disgrace to his race."
He called a fellow congressman a "little wimp" and a "fruitcake."
He once made a reference to Congressman J.C. Watts as being "born out of wedlock."
He called former Congresswoman Nancy Johnson, a Republican, a "whore for the insurance industry," saying that here knowledge of health care came from "pillow talk."
Called the director of the California state welfare program a "baby killer."

According to Wikipedia (link above) The San Francisco Chronicle once editorialized: "Only a politician who assumes he has a job for life could behave so badly on a semi-regular basis by spewing personalized invective that might get him punched in certain East Bay taverns ... Surely there must be someone along the shoreline between Alameda and Fremont who could represent the good citizens of the district with class and dignity. It's not the case now."

So .. now that you have a little background, here's what Stark had to say about George Bush yesterday. The comment was made in reference to Bush's veto of the MoveOn Democrat's attempt to vastly expand the S-CHIP program for children's health care:

"Republicans sure don't care about finding $200 billion to fight the illegal war in Iraq. Where are you going to get that money? Are you going to tell us lies like you're telling us today? Is that how you're going to fund the war? You don't have money to fund the war on children. But you're going to spend it to blow up innocent people if he can get enough kids to grow old enough for you to send to Iraq to get their heads blown off for the President's amusement."

Click here to catch Stark's little tantrum. Republicans are spinning around on their eyebrows demanding an apology from Stark. They should save their breath. Wrong tactic. Enough of this apology nonsense. Just let Stark's statement stand on its own ... and use it to show the deep, seething hatred that so many Democrats have toward George Bush ... a hatred so intense that they're willing to sabotage the efforts or our men and women fighting the Islamic radical menace.

FIGHTING GLOBAL WARMING....AND POVERTY

2007-10-15T08:58:00.000-07:00

The new secretary general of the United Nations Ban Ki-moon told 80 heads of state that global warming threatens our goals of eliminating widespread global poverty.

Global warming is going to add stress to the poorest regions of the world and will make it difficult for these societies to pursue sustainable livelihoods, according to Ban Ki-moon. The agricultural production in places like Africa is going to be severely compromised.

But of course, the rich nations of the US should provide "humanitarian assistance across the globe." He says that "increased resources" will be necessary to adapt the world for climate change ... basically, he wants more money. Rather than providing emergency assistance when catastrophes occur, we should be providing solutions (and money) now, in order to save poor nations from the perils of climate change!

The cost is "very modest" according to the climate change panel. If we do not implement these measures, then – brace yourself – "the income and wealth disparities between nations will increase." And the existence of poverty, which should be "ethically unacceptable," could pose a threat to global security.

Horse squeeze.

First of all .. any measurable warming of the earth stopped about ten years ago. And even then we're only talking about one degree over the last century. OwlGore has his Peace Prize ... so enough already. It's time to get off this phony global warming crap and put some real science into the picture. I'm so sick and tired of hearing these cultists yammer about "2600 scientists" who have bought into this fad, then to realize that a good portion of these scientists are podiatrists, electrical engineers and experts on macro economics.

Can anyone out there tell me what the ideal temperature for the earth would be? Come on! I'm waiting.

Consider this scenario: The earth heats up. As the earth heats up more water evaporates from the surfaces of the earth's lakes and oceans. The atmosphere thus becomes even more saturated with water and rainfall increases. As rainfall increases the arid portions of the earth that were not suitable for farming suddenly become rich with crops. Not only that, but areas that were once frozen throughout the summer can now be planted in crops for a short growing season. Result? More food. OK, now tell me why this wouldn't be the real scenario ... if, that is, we actually experienced this global warming.

Bottom line .. global warming is being touted as an excuse by Bang My Gong, or whatever his name is, for a program of worldwide wealth redistribution. I'm not really in love with the idea.

STILL MORE FROM THE LEFT COAST

2007-10-11T07:34:00.000-07:00

Another story from San Francisco. A federal judge has given in to labor and civil liberties organizations. The judge is temporarily blocking the U.S. government from cracking down on businesses employing illegal immigrants.

The Social Security Administration and the Department of Homeland Security had a plan to send joint letter to businesses that have workers with Social Security numbers that don't match their names. The businesses would face penalties if it was shown that they were hiring illegal aliens.

These "No Match" letters were supposed to be sent starting in September until labor groups and immigrant activists filed a lawsuit. They claim that this policy puts a burden on employers and may cause "authorized immigrants" and U.S. citizens to lose their jobs over simple mistakes on their paper work. Activists say that this would be a violation of their rights!

I'm sorry but that is BS. That is NOT why these people are opposing this plan. "The legal citizens may lose their jobs if they incorrectly filled out their paperwork." If they made a mistake ... if they transposed a digit in their Social Security number ... they get every opportunity to correct it. . But these activists are hiding behind this pitiful argument in order to ensure that their fellow illegals don't lose their jobs. Or in this case, aren't even questioned. As for the unions ... you can figure that one out for yourself. They're looking for new members. Especially since more and more American workers are figuring out that unions do more harm than good.

LAMESTREAM COVERAGE OF HILLARY

2007-10-09T06:27:00.000-07:00

Yesterday we broke the news to you that Hillary had placed a nifty new advisor on her campaign staffer. None other than Sandy Berger. Berger was Hillary's "husband's" National Security Advisor. Before the 9-11 Commission started conducting hearings Berger marched his loyal self over to the National Archives and proceeded to steal classified documents relating to Clinton's treatment of Osama bin Laden and Islamic terrorism during his eight years in the White House. To this day nobody really knows the totality of what Berger stole. We can only assume that the material was damaging to Clinton.

There's another element here I haven't yet explored .. and that is the WHY? Was Berger acting to protect himself, or someone else. Did someone ask, beg or instruct him to retrieve those documents? If so, whom? Someone with an eye to future power? Someone with a promise of a future position of power?

Well, as of late yesterday afternoon – that's more 12 hours after the news broke – where was the mainstream media coverage of Sandy Berger advising Hillary Clinton? New York Times. Nothing. Washington Times. Nothing. CNN. Nothing. LATimes. Nothing. Ditto for the Washington Post. Now, to be fair, I haven't had the time to go through all of these newspaper websites ... but durned if I don't think this is actual news!

FOXNews covered the story. But the only paper to actually run a story was USAToday, after an interview with Hillary. Of course, now she is claiming that Sandy Berger "is an unofficial adviser."

And while we are the subject of Hillary, let's talk about another story that the MSM won't cover either ... Hillary's pork-barrel spending. She, by the way, is one of the only candidates who refuses to identify her earmarks ... or "congressionally allocated funds."

Well let's take a look at why.

Between 2002 and 2006, Hillary earmarked more than $2.2 billion in spending bills.

In the 2008 defense spending bill, Hillary managed to attach 26 earmarks worth more than $148 million. This was more than any other Senator except her Democratic compadre Carl Levin ... who is the chairman of the Armed Services Committee.

How about a few local projects including $250,000 to the Seneca Knitting Mill, and $200,000 to the Buffalo Urban Arts Center. And I'm sure that is just the beginning.

IS THERE A TRIAL LAWYER IN THE HOUSE?

2007-10-08T22:19:00.000-07:00

Ann Coulter

The only "crisis" in health care in this country is that doctors are paid too little. (Also, they've come up with nothing to help that poor Dennis Kucinich.)

But the Democratic Party treats doctors like they're Klan members. They wail about how much doctors are paid and celebrate the trial lawyers who do absolutely nothing to make society better, but swoop in and steal from the most valuable members of society.

Maybe doctors could get the Democrats to like them if they started suing their patients.

It's only a matter of time before the best and brightest students forget about medical school and go to law school instead. How long can a society based on suing the productive last?

You can make 30 times as much money as doctors by becoming a trial lawyer suing doctors. You need no skills, no superior board scores, no decade of training and no sleepless residency. But you must have the morals of a drug dealer. (And the bank wire transfer number to the Democratic National Committee.)

The editors of The New York Times have been engaging in a spirited debate with their readers over whether doctors are wildly overpaid or just hugely overpaid. The results of this debate are available on TimeSelect, for just $49.95.

"Many health care economists," the Times editorialized, say the partisan wrangling over health care masks a bigger problem: "the relatively high salaries paid to American doctors."

Citing the Rand Corp., the Times noted that doctors in the U.S. "earn two to three times as much as they do in other industrialized countries." American doctors earn about $200,000 to $300,000 a year, while European doctors make $60,000 to $120,000. Why, that's barely enough for Muslim doctors in Britain to buy plastic explosives to blow up airplanes!

How much does Pinch Sulzberger make for driving The New York Times stock to an all-time low? Probably a lot more than your podiatrist.

In college, my roommate was in the chemistry lab Friday and Saturday nights while I was dancing on tables at the Chapter House. A few years later, she was working 20-hour days as a resident at Mount Sinai doing liver transplants while I was frequenting popular Upper East Side drinking establishments. She was going to Johns Hopkins for yet more medical training while I was skiing and following the Grateful Dead. Now she vacations in places like Rwanda and Darfur with Doctors Without Borders while I'm going to Paris.

Has anyone else noticed the nonexistence of a charitable organization known as "Lawyers Without Borders"?

She makes $380 for an emergency appendectomy, or one-ten-thousandth of what John Edwards made suing doctors like her, and one-fourth of what John Edwards' hairdresser makes for a single shag cut.

Edwards made $30 million bringing nonsense lawsuits based on junk science against doctors. To defend themselves from parasites like Edwards, doctors now pay hundreds of thousands of dollars in medical malpractice insurance every year.

But as the Times would note, doctors in Burkina Faso only get $25 and one goat per year.

As long as we're studying the health care systems of various socialist countries, are we allowed to notice that doctors in these other countries aren't constantly being sued by bottom-feeding trial lawyers stealing one-third of the income of people performing useful work like saving lives?

But the Democrats (and Fred Thompson) refuse to enact tort reform legislation to rein in these charlatans. After teachers and welfare recipients, the Democrats' most prized constituency is trial lawyers. The ultimate Democrat constituent would be a public schoolteacher on welfare who needed an abortion and was suing her doctor.

Doctors graduate at the top of their classes at college and then spend nearly a decade in grueling work at medical schools. Most doctors don't make a dime until they're in their early 30s, just in time to start paying off their six-figure student loans by saving people's lives. They have 10 times the IQ of trial lawyers and 1,000 times the character.

Yeah, let's go after those guys. On to nuns next!

But Times' readers responded to the editorial about doctors being overpaid with a slew of indignant letters -- not at the Times for making such an idiotic argument, but at doctors who earn an average of $200,000 per year. Letter writers praised the free medical care in places like Spain. ("Nightmare" in the Ann Coulter dictionary is defined as "having a medical emergency in Spain.")

One letter-writer proposed helping doctors by having the government take over another aspect of the economy -- the cost of medical education:

"If we are to restructure the system by which we pay doctors to match Europe, which seems prudent as well as inevitable, we must also finance education as Europeans do, by using state dollars to finance the full or majority cost of higher education, including professional school."

And then to reduce the cost of medical school, the government could finance "the full or majority cost" of construction costs of medical schools, and "the full or majority cost" of the trucks that bring the cement to the construction site and the "the full or majority cost" of coffee that the truck drivers drink while hauling the cement and ... it makes my head hurt.

I may have to see a doctor about this. I should probably get on the waiting list now in case Hillary gets elected.

That's how liberals think: To fix an industry bedeviled by government controls, we'll spread the coercion to yet more industries! (TDC; The Liberal Democrat way of dealing with failed policy is to do the same thing over again and hope for a different result! They raised income taxes and revenues went down so they want to cancel out Bush’s tax cuts which raised revenues hugely and raise taxes again. Get it?)

The only sane letter on the matter, I'm happy to report, came from the charming town of New Canaan, Conn., which means that I am not the only normal person who still reads the Times. Ray Groves wrote:

"Last week, I had the annual checkup for my 2000 Taurus. I paid $95 per hour for much needed body work. Next month, when I have my own annual physical, I expect and hope to pay a much higher rate to my primary care internist, who has spent a significant portion of his life training to achieve his position of responsibility."

There is nothing more to say.

GOP SENATORS SHOULD DEFEND RUSH LIMBAUGH

2007-10-08T08:01:00.000-07:00

By Doug Patton
October 8, 2007

---

Recently, radio talk show host Rush Limbaugh was attacked by Democrats on the floor of the United States Senate. Why? Their claim was that Limbaugh had referred to military personnel who disagree with our country's policies in Iraq as "phony soldiers." The statement, put forth by Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nevada, and Sen. Tom Harkin, D-Iowa, is a lie designed to lay the groundwork for reinstatement of the so-called "Fairness Doctrine."

Limbaugh was referring to soldiers who have been lionized by the Left as heroes for claiming to have witnessed atrocities in Iraq, only to later be discredited as liars. One individual, who claimed to have been an Army Ranger in Iraq, was exposed as a washout after 44 days in boot camp. ABC news had done a story on this man and others like him just days before Limbaugh made his statements on the radio.

But it really doesn't matter, because liberals will commit whatever perfidy necessary to reinstate the Fairness Doctrine.

Repealed in the 1980s, the Fairness Doctrine was a federal communications law on the books for the better part of forty years. In essence, it forced radio stations to "balance" their programming in such a way as to present opposing political points of view. It is debatable whether it was ever necessary, even in the 1940s. In the diverse 21st Century communications marketplace, it is as redundant as the phrase "liberal Democrats." Yet there are those in Congress who want to bring it back.

When anyone expresses a point of view contrary to theirs, liberals want to silence that person. In this case, it is Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity, Laura Ingraham, Michael Savage, Glenn Beck, Michael Reagan, Neal Boortz, Michael Medved, Dennis Prager, Mike Gallager and a host of lesser known radio talk show hosts who have flourished in the marketplace of ideas over the last twenty years since the Fairness Doctrine was repealed.

Democrats have ABC, NBC, CBS, CNN, The New York Times, The Washington Post, The Boston Globe, The Los Angeles Times, The San Francisco Chronicle (and most other big-city newspapers), the faculties of most universities and the left-wing blogosphere.

Balancing all this, Republicans have Rush Limbaugh and those who have followed in his footsteps down the trail he has blazed on AM radio over the last twenty years. It can also be argued that without Limbaugh, conservative Internet bloggers and the balanced format of Fox News might never have come to prominence.

Today's Dems cannot abide the popularity of conservative talk radio. They are reminiscent of similar authoritarians who have gone before them. Those who fight their tactics and express opposing points of view must be silenced.

But where are the Republicans of the United States Senate? As Harry Reid and Tom Harkin were spewing erroneous talking points fed to them by left-wing web sites, I heard nothing from the GOP side of the aisle. Meanwhile, Rush Limbaugh was left to deal with Reid's and Harkin's prevarications on his daily radio show for two solid weeks. Others on radio and on cable television came to his defense, but did anyone hear a peep out of the Senate Republicans?

Rush Limbaugh has been one of America's staunchest defenders of our military for twenty years or more. He has also been the best friend Republicans in Congress have ever had. Where were the Senate Republicans when their friend was being viciously attacked? Where were they when Rush Limbaugh and others were pointing out the hypocrisy of Democrats who demean our troops and their mission?

Democrats believe so fervently that they have next year's presidential and congressional elections wrapped up that they are pushing an agenda of censorship against their opponents in the only media not doing their bidding - talk radio. And why wouldn't they believe that? Their genteel "colleagues" on the right side of the aisle are so concerned about being liked by the mainstream media they have forgotten who their real friends are.

-------

Doug Patton is a freelance columnist who has served as a political speechwriter and public policy advisor. His weekly columns are published in newspapers across the country and on selected Internet web sites, including Human Events Online, TheConservativeVoice.com and GOPUSA.com, where he is a senior writer and state editor. Readers may e-mail him at dougpatton@cox.net.

AL QAEDA'S SUGAR DADDY

2007-10-05T19:55:00.001-07:00

The US military says that American and Iraqi troops have arrested a financer for al Qaeda. The financer had received over $100 million from donors in order to fund insurgent operations in Iraq.

For a while the military has been saying that al Qaeda's expansion was due to its access to external financing. It is hard to tell the exact scale of the financing operation that they are facing.

The man in question distributed $50,000 a month to al Qaeda and employed up to 50 terrorists to plant roadside bombs ... and paid them $3,000 for each operation.

In 2006 there was an attack on the Golden Shrine in Samarra, which is a holy Shia site. This man's money was linked to purchase of explosives used in that attack, which severely escalated violence in the region.

Details of the man's nationality have yet to be released, but apparently he used a leather merchant business as a front, which allowed him to smuggle weapons and explosives. He had shops in Iraq's Falluja and in Syria and Jordan.

The sad part of this story was that he was arrested rather than just killed. But maybe we can get some information out of him that would lead us to some of the people funding Islamic radicalism. Torture him? To tell you the truth .. wouldn't upset me all that much.

THE NERVE OF GERALDO RIVERA

2007-10-04T06:18:00.001-07:00

By Michelle Malkin •

This man has some nerve. Here he is, the insane man who threatened to, you know, spit on me, last night, complaining that the “extremes” on both sides of the political debate are guilty of “coarsening the debate.” Thanks to Allahpundit for clipping the unstomach-able clip:

“Coarsening the debate.”

Un. Freaking. Believable.

Geraldo Rivera: The Rosie O’Donnell of Fox News.

FAIRNESS DOCTRINE WATCH

2007-10-02T23:33:00.001-07:00

The Crush Rush Democrats’ agenda; Wesley Clark crusades to kick Rush off of Armed Forces Radio; Update: Daily Kos wants in on the action!

By Michelle Malkin

Update Midnight: Poor Daily Kos is feeling left out of the Rush-bashing action. Kos promotes VoteVets.org diatribe to the front page.

Lonewacko has advice on how to fight back.

Another target.

Update 8:35pm Eastern. Backdoor restoration of the Fairness Doctrine, take two: Wesley Clark ramps up the nutroots’ campaign to kick Rush Limbaugh off of Armed Forces Radio:

It’s time to put real pressure on Rush Limbaugh. His show is broadcast on Armed Forces Radio, and this time we are going to go straight to the lifeblood of Rush’s show — Congress. Congress has the power to remove Rush Limbaugh from Armed Forces Radio, and it won’t be as easy for elected officials to ignore our call.

Clark’s PAC is leading the organizing campaign:

Today, I am asking you to join 13,793 other Americans and email Congress urging them to take Rush Limbaugh off Armed Forces Radio.

Last week, Rush Limbaugh labeled American servicemembers who support an end to the war in Iraq “phony soldiers.”

We’re going directly to Congress to take him off the Armed Forces Radio airwaves. Elected officials in Congress have the power to prevent Limbaugh from using taxpayers’ money to disrespect and censure the voices of our soldiers.

Join us and hold Rush Limbaugh accountable for his offensive and outrageous comments — tell your member of Congress to Dump Rush From Armed Forces Radio today!

These people are fighting dirty. They are focused. They are unhinged.

Watch from the sidelines or get your head in the game.

***

Backdoor restoration of the Fairness Doctrine. That’s what I said the anti-Rush campaign is really about. The Hill underscores the point in a piece filed tonight:

House Republicans are threatening to launch a discharge petition on legislation that would ensure the future prosperity of conservative radio talk-show hosts but is expected to face opposition from Democratic leaders. On Monday evening, Republicans filed a rule with the House Rules Committee laying the groundwork for a petition that would force action on protecting radio from government regulation later this fall.

The move comes at a time when Democrats have launched a coordinated attack on conservative radio host Rush Limbaugh, accusing him of disparaging American troops critical of the Iraq war as “phony soldiers.”

Senate Majority Whip Dick Durbin (D-Ill.) has said broadcasters should be required to give listeners both sides of political issues so voters can make informed decisions.

Conservatives fear that forcing stations to make equal time for liberal talk radio would cut into profits so severely that radio executives would choose to scale back on conservative programming to avoid rising costs and interference from the government.

Republicans’ concern has grown as Democrats have waged a battle against Limbaugh in recent days. On Tuesday, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) sent a letter to the chief executive of Clear Channel Communications, Mark Mays, calling on him to denounce Limbaugh’s remarks.

The Baltimore Sun’s Swamp blog has the list of the 41 Crush Rush Democrats (also posted over at Dingy Harry’s website):

Senator Harry Reid, Majority Leader
Senator Richard Durbin, Assistant Majority Leader
Senator Charles Schumer, Vice Chairman, Democratic Conference
Senator Patty Murray, Secretary, Democratic Conference
Senator Daniel Akaka
Senator Max Baucus
Senator Joseph Biden
Senator Barbara Boxer
Senator Sherrod Brown
Senator Robert Byrd
Senator Benjamin Cardin
Senator Tom Carper
Senator Bob Casey
Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton
Senator Kent Conrad
Senator Christopher Dodd
Senator Byron Dorgan
Senator Dianne Feinstein
Senator Tom Harkin
Senator Daniel Inouye
Senator Edward M. Kennedy
Senator John Kerry
Senator Amy Klobuchar
Senator Mary Landrieu
Senator Frank Lautenberg
Senator Patrick Leahy
Senator Carl Levin
Senator Blanche Lincoln
Senator Bob Menendez
Senator Barbara Mikulski
Senator Bill Nelson
Senator Barack Obama
Senator Jack Reed
Senator Jay Rockefeller
Senator Ken Salazar
Senator Bernie Sanders
Senator Debbie Stabenow
Senator Jon Tester
Senator Jim Webb
Senator Sheldon Whitehouse
Senator Ron Wyden

Allahpundit salutes the 10 Dems who refused to put their names on the letter.

The Swamp also has a copy of Clear Channel’s reply. A snippet:

I’ll believe Harry Reid cares about the First Amendment when he condemns MoveOn.org for stomping on the free speech rights of the CafePress shop owners who stood up for Gen. Petraeus and satirized the MoveOn goons.

Waiting…

***

If you’d like to write to Clear Channel to share your fair and balanced view of Limbaugh, here’s the address:

Mr. Mark P. Mays
CEO, Clear Channel Communications Inc.
200 East Basse Road
San Antonio, TX 78209

***

Next on the counter-offensive to-do list:

“If anyone ever doubted that there is enmity between Democrats and American talk radio, they need look no further than the personal attacks leveled on Rush Limbaugh on the floor of the Senate,” said Rep. Mike Pence (R-Ind.), the sponsor of legislation shielding broadcasters from government interference. “I thought it astonishing that members of the U.S. Senate would engage in repeated and distorted personal attacks on a private citizen. It gives evidence of a level of frustration with conservative talk radio that is very troubling to anyone who cherishes the medium.”

Pence, a former professional talk radio host, and Rep. Greg Walden (R-Ore.), a radio station owner, on Monday sent letters to House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.), Majority Leader Steny Hoyer (D-Md.) and Energy and Commerce Committee Chairman John Dingell (D-Mich.) demanding a vote on the Broadcaster Freedom Act.

***
Dan Riehl dares Harry Reid to ask the troops who they’d rather listen to:

Let them vote - a show by you, or Limbaugh’s program. It won’t be the first time you were humiliated when people had a say in the matter.

COST OF ILLEGAL IMMIGRANTS

2007-10-02T06:17:00.001-07:00

LA County has released figures which outline the actual cost of illegal immigrants. Remember that these figures are just for Los Angeles County and they are just for one month.

In the month of July, illegal immigrants and their families collected over $35 million in welfare and food stamps. $20 million in welfare and $15 million in food stamps.

The estimated annual cost of illegal immigrants in LA County -- $440 million.

But wait, that doesn't include the additional $220 million for public safety and $400 million for healthcare. Where are we at now? The taxpayers of LA County are paying more than $1 billion per year because of illegal aliens.

One more thing ... that figure does not include the soaring cost of government education.

Then again .. remember that Mexican Magazine which ran a story with the headline "Los Angeles is Ours!" Fine ... let Mexico pay the bills.

..... and the invasion rolls on.

MEDIA MATTERS ON THE ATTACK AGAINST LIMBAUGH

2007-10-02T06:13:00.000-07:00

If you need any proof that the Democrats are going to try to rip the guts out of talk radio when they gain control of the White House, you need look no further than the current storm surrounding Rush Limbaugh.

OK .. so Limbaugh is a competitor (though I'm sure he doesn't see me as any competition for him whatsoever). That's fine. Competing for stations and ratings is one thing, but when a fellow talk show host is attacked by mindless myrmidons like Media Matters it's another. I'll step forward and defend any host who is being wrongly attacked, just as I did with O'Reilly. The difference is, Limbaugh won't attack me later for it.

The instigator here is Media Myrmidons. They like to call themselves "Media Matters" but myrmidons fits so much better. Media Myrmidons is an ultra left-wing machine created by Hillary Clinton and her supporters and backers to carry forth the attack on conservative talk radio. Every once in a while they do me the favor of featuring me in one of their attacks, thus increasing my name recognition across the country. It is no real surprise that ever since Media Myrmidons started their attacks on me my syndication has begun to grow ... adding over five stations just this week.

Back to Limbaugh.

Media Myrmidons started this attack on Limbaugh by writing that Rush called "service members who advocate U.S. withdrawal from Iraq 'phony soldiers.'" Media Myrdions is lying .. and they know they're lying. They also know that they can depend on the mainstream media in this country to not only ignore their distortion, but to actually work to support and spread it.

This whole mess starts with a clown by the name of Jesse Macbeth. Macbeth became very popular with the media earlier this year when he started telling stories about all of the hideous crimes he saw our soldiers commit while he was serving in Afghanistan and Iraq as an Army ranger. Oh, how the leftist media sopped it up. The only problem was, Macbeth was lying.

Rather than take my word for it, here's an excerpt from a release from the U.S. Attorney's Office for the Western District of Washington:

U.S. Attorney Jeffrey C. Sullivan today announced some of the results of "Operation Stolen Valor," a year long effort to investigate and prosecute those who lie about their military service for financial gain or other reasons.

Here's Sullivan's description of Jesse Macbeth:

*Jesse Macbeth, 23, Tacoma, Washington, sentenced today in connection with his fraudulent claims of military service. Macbeth sought medical benefits claiming to suffer from PTSD related to service in Iraq and Afghanistan, in fact, Macbeth was discharged from the Army about a month after he joined. Macbeth never traveled outside the U.S. with the Army. Macbeth duped reporters, claiming to be a decorated Army Ranger who had witnessed war crimes.

I've read the transcripts; the complete transcripts, and it is crystal clear that when Limbaugh made his "phony soldiers" reference it was directed at Jesse Macbeth and his ilk, people who falsely claimed to serve in the Middle East and lied about the actions of our troops there. It's an apt description, I would say, since U.S. Attorney Jeffrey Sullivan himself referred to Macbeth and the other's who joined him in his efforts as "phony war heroes."

We know exactly what's going on here. It's no mystery. Rush Limbaugh is perhaps the biggest single obstacle in the way of Hillary Clinton or some other member of the MoveOn Democrat Party becoming our next president. Media Matters is a creation of Hillary Clinton and her cabal. There's no denying this, Hillary has openly admitted her role in creating this organization. As the election season continues you can expect Media Myrmidons to increase their attacks, and as they do so their attacks on Conservative talk radio will sound more and more desperate. And while Media Myrmidons keeps up the attack, Hillary's dog washers – Harry Reid, for example – will keep barking from the sidelines.

THE ANT AND THE GRASSHOPPER

2007-10-01T15:23:00.000-07:00

Two Different Versions! Two Different Morals!

OLD VERSION:

The ant works hard in the withering heat all summer long, building
his house and laying up supplies for the winter
The grasshopper thinks the ant is a fool and laughs and dances and
plays the summer away.

Come winter, the ant is warm and well fed.
The grasshopper has no food or shelter, so he dies out in the
cold.

MORAL OF THE STORY: Be responsible for yourself!

MODERN VERSION:

The ant works hard in the withering heat all summer long,
building his house and laying up supplies for the winter.

The grasshopper thinks the ant is a fool and laughs and dances
and plays the summer away.

Come winter, the shivering grasshopper calls a press conference
and demands to know why the ant should be allowed to be warm and well
fed while others are cold and starving.

CBS, NBC, PBS, CNN, and ABC show up to provide pictures of the
shivering grasshopper next to a video of the ant in his comfortable
home with a table filled with food. America is stunned by the sharp
contrast.

How can this be, that in a country of such wealth, this poor
grasshopper is allowed to suffer so?

Kermit the Frog appears on Oprah with the grasshopper, and
everybody cries when they sing, "It's Not Easy Being Green."

Jesse Jackson stages a demonstration in front of the ant's house
where the news stations film the group singing, "We shall overcome."
Jesse then has the group kneel down to pray to God for the
grasshopper's sake.

Nancy Pelosi & John Kerry exclaim in an interview with Larry King
that the ant has gotten rich off the back of the grasshopper, and both
call for an immediate tax hike on the ant to make him pay his fair share.

Finally, the EEOC drafts the Economic Equity & Anti-Grasshopper
Act retroactive to the beginning of the summer.

The ant is fined for failing to hire a proportionate number of
green bugs and, having nothing left to pay his retroactive taxes, his
home is confiscated by the government.

Hillary gets her old law firm to represent the grasshopper in a
defamation suit against the ant, and the case is tried before a panel
of federal judges that Bill Clinton appointed from a list of
single-parent welfare recipients.

The ant loses the case.

The story ends as we see the grasshopper finishing up the last
bits of the ant's food while the government house he is in, which just
happens to be the ant's old house, crumbles around him because he
doesn't maintain it.

The ant has disappeared in the snow.

The grasshopper is found dead in a drug related incident and the
house, now abandoned, is taken over by a gang of spiders who terrorize
the once peaceful neighborhood.

MORAL OF THE STORY: Be careful how you vote.

NEWT NO MORE: WHAT McCAIN FEINGLOD DID TO A GINGRICH BID

2007-10-01T07:55:00.000-07:00

by Martha Zoller

"I had to make a choice. American Solutions is in the early stages of being a genuine citizens movement. To walk out on it just as it was getting launched was irresponsible. It's far more important than exploring prospects for the presidency." Newt Gingrich, September 29, 2007

What a difference 48 hours makes in politics. On Thursday, at 10:15 am, while appearing on my program on WDUN AM 550 in Gainesville, Georgia, Newt Gingrich gave the answer to the “presidential question” he would give for the rest of that day and Friday and had been giving through out this year. As soon as his world wide event, American Solutions, was over on September 29th he would have Randy Evans, on his behalf, see if there were $30 million dollars in pledges for a presidential campaign. He said that on October 21 he would give a final answer. As late as Thursday evening on The Sean Hannity Show and later on Hannity and Colmes on Fox News Channel, he said that there was a 20% chance he would run.

When I talked to him on my program and later at the conference, he repeated many of the same things. He was looking for “Red, White and Blue” solutions, he was a “middle-class” guy who couldn’t write a $100 million dollar personal check like Gov. Mitt Romney, and that the way to beat Sen. Hillary Clinton was to have ideas not attacks. He sounded like a man who was running and he looked like a man on top of his game.

The ink was hardly dry on the press release to announce his exploratory committee on a run for president, Gingrich had suspended his contract with Fox News Channel earlier in the week and had fielded and answered a number of questions regarding living in Virginia while basing a campaign out of Atlanta. He looked like a candidate. In fact, a number of news organizations ran commentary with titles like, “Newt will Run.” What a difference a few hours make. Gingrich pulled the plug on his own presidential aspirations.

It appears that Newt Gingrich is the first casualty of McCain/Feingold and the squashing of free speech through campaign finance reform. Gingrich said, "McCain-Feingold has legal penalties. It penalizes being a citizen. We thoroughly understood the legalities of running for president. We didn't realize the implications for American Solutions. We just said this is important. We can't have all these workshops and kill it Monday morning."

Rick Tyler, Gingrich’s spokes person said in an email, “The risk during the exploratory phase would have been being accused of using American Solutions resources to travel, speak, communicate, etc. During this phase, American Solutions would have been open to the factual allegation that while Newt was actually speaking for Solutions, he was instead attempting to drum up support [or pledges]." McCain/Feingold would have made it impossible for Gingrich to continue raising money for American Solutions and explore a run for the Presidency and for a guy who has always had been many things at once, it wasn’t plausible that he could add a presidential run into the mix.

But Gingrich may fight another day. He has ruled out a vice-presidential bid, but hasn’t ruled out a run for president in 2012. I have a moment in time theory about all this. There is a reason that we haven’t had a President Howard Baker or President Sam Nunn -- it’s not because they weren’t talked about or considered or qualified, it’s because they missed their moment in time. While there is some speculation about a Nunn independent run for 2008, it won’t be at the top of the ticket. Is this Gingrich’s moment in time or has it passed? That question can only be answered with time.

His commitment to American Solutions is steadfast and suits him. If he stays with American Solutions and works within the two party system to facilitate change and connections between parties, he may do what presidents and speakers can’t do—bring people together through education. Rush Limbaugh said that the greatest mistake of the Republican Revolution of 1994 is that we thought we had convinced people on conservatism. The current Democrat controlled congress is doing the same thing. They think their win of the House and Senate in 2006 was a vote for them, when actually it was a vote against Republicans who weren’t doing their jobs and were corrupt. Maybe American Solutions is the vehicle for Newt, the teacher, to finally convince the American people about conservatism. It is a way to take the Contract with America of 1994 to a new generation with new ways to spread the message.

Newt Gingrich is a survivor and he is a guy that can get more people together of differing political persuasions than anyone I have every met. He’ll be there for the pendulum to swing back to the right and he will have a say so in where it lands. The sad thing is beginning the weekend with the possibility of a run for president and ending it with the jolt of a definitive, “I am not running,” takes away from what he wanted to accomplish from the weekend. The news became about him and not about the message. However, there will be many more American Solutions weekends and America will be watching.

HILLARY'S INCOME TRANSFER SCHEME

2007-10-01T07:53:00.000-07:00

You've heard the latest, haven't you? This one came out last Friday afternoon. Hillary (please sit down) wants for the federal government to "give" every baby born in America a $5,000 account that can start growing and earning interest so that by the time this kid turns 18 they'll have money to go to college.

No .. I'm not kidding. She actually came out with this idea at a speech before a Congressional Black Caucus forum. It's a brand new entitlement program, courtesy of Hillary Clinton.

Just think about it! Download a baby, and presto!, the taxpayers owe your new child a cool five thousand!

This is pure Hillary Clinton. This is a woman who believes that America is government. If government decides that every new baby gets five grand, then that's all there is to it. Every new baby gets five grand.

Where does it come from? Oh, come on now. Ask Hillary and she'll just tell you it comes from the government. If you ask her where the government is going to get the money, she'll prattle on about repealing the Bush tax cuts or some such nonsense. Bottom line? A new entitlement program. Here's your birth certificate, here's $5,000, and welcome to America!

Let me tell you how Hillary's idiotic little income redistribution idea is going to work out in real life --- after, that is, the young single women of this country make her our next president.

First we'll have to figure out whether or not the five grand baby bonus will be paid to a baby born in this country of illegal aliens. Well of course it would! After all, the baby's a citizen, isn't he? We certainly don't want to discriminate. So .. here's a scenario that will become all-too common. Consuelo lives in Tijuana. Consuelo is pregnant .. bulging, wide-eyed pregnant. Sus roturas del agua. Consuelo heads for the border ... eager to get to the emergency room of a U.S. hospital. And why would that be? Why, so her baby can get it's $5,000, that's why? You couldn't figure that out on your own? Must be government educated. Pity.

Another question. Just how will the parents be able to invest the baby's money?

You can be sure there will be restrictions. Maybe this would be a good time to resurrect the Democrat's idea of "economically targeted investments." Maybe the law would say that you could only invest the money in stocks of a company that is deemed to be "union friendly!" Or maybe it could only be invested in savings institutions that show the politically correct inclination to make loans to minorities with bad credit and job histories!

How would the baby bonus play out around election time? Well, that's a simple enough question to answer. The Democrats would have two stock campaign tactics ready for each election: (1) Vote for me and I'll raise the baby bonus to $6000! A sure winner with every pregnant or hoping-to-be pregnant voter out there. (2) Vote for a Republican and they're going to take your baby bonus away!

What happens when spending gets a little tight? This one's simple also. Democrats will suggest that the baby bonus get phased out for people in upper income brackets. In other words, stiff the high achievers. In order to increase the baby bonus for lower and middle income parents, the Democrats will phase it out for the minority who earn the higher incomes. The math is so simple you should be able to figure it out even if you went to a government school. There are more households who make under $200,000 a year in this country than there are those who make more. Cut off the baby bonus for the evil rich, increase it for the poor and middle income types --- and the votes come rolling in.

Remember Hillary shrieking "I want to take those profits" after Exxon Mobile posted a rather hefty profit figure? Sure she wants to take those profits. She already thinks they belong to her anyway! This is a woman who harbors a gut belief that every penny you earn belongs to the federal government. You are to be allowed to keep just enough of what you earn to keep you fat and reasonably complacent. Beyond that, it's hers, and she will throw it around the way she pleases.

Hold tight, my friends. There's sure to be more Hillary absurdities on the way.

RUSH LIMBAUGH, PHONY SOLDIERS, AND THE LEFT'S DESPERATE NEED FOR ITS OWN "BETRAY US" MOMENT

2007-09-30T20:44:00.000-07:00

By Michelle Malkin

So, word is that the Democrats will introduce a House resolution Monday condemning Rush Limbaugh for his remarks about phony soldiers. Brian Maloney points out that ABC News aired a report on phony soldiers and Operation Stolen Valor two days before Rush made his remarks. Asks Maloney: “Given the overwhelming evidence to support Limbaugh’s contention that he really was talking about phony soldiers who have faked their service, how does the left justify continuing this fabrication?”

Here is what this phony fiasco is really all about: It’s about the MoveOn.org Democrats trying to save face in the aftermath of the disastrous “General Betray Us” smear. They want their own moment of righteous (or rather, lefteous) indignation, their own empty proof that they really, really, really do support the troops. They want to shift attention away from MoveOn.org, its bully tactics, and its thug brethren at Media Matters. They are making a pathetic attempt to equate the “Betray Us” attack–which was deliberately timed for publication and maximum p.r. damage to our military command when the world was watching our top general in Iraq testifying in Congress–with a radio talk show host’s ruminations about anti-war soldiers who have faked their military records/history.

Bottom-of-the-barrel desperation.

I have written and reported extensively on the Winter Soldier Syndrome phenomenon. It goes far beyond Jesse MacBeth, the faker busted by the blogosphere. As I wrote in August in my column on the Scott Thomas Beauchamp fiasco:

Ever since John Kerry sat in front of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee and accused American soldiers of wantonly razing villages “in fashion reminiscent of Genghis Khan,” the Left has embraced a small cadre of self-loathing soldiers and soldier wannabes willing to sell their deadened souls for the anti-war cause.

Think Jimmy Massey, the unhinged Marine who falsely accused his unit of engaging in mass genocide against Iraqis.

Think Jesse MacBeth and Micah Wright, anti-war Army Rangers who weren’t Army Rangers.

Think Josh Lansdale, the anti-war Army medic who attacked former GOP Sen. Jim Talent by spinning a bogus health care tale swallowed whole by Dem Sen. Claire McCaskill, Gen. Wesley Clark and the far Left VoteVets.org crew.

Think Amorita Randall, the NYTimes-championed former naval construction worker who told the Times magazine that she served in Iraq, was in a Humvee that blew up, and was raped twice while serving in the Navy–but, in fact, had never served in Iraq.

Winter Soldier Syndrome will only be cured when the costs of slandering the troops outweigh the benefits. Exposing Scott Thomas Beauchamp and his brethren matters because the truth matters. The honor of the military matters. The credibility of the media matters.

Think it doesn’t make a difference? Imagine where Sen. John Kerry would be now if the Internet had been around in 1971.

Instead of confronting the problem, MoveOn.org/MediaMatters Democrats are preparing to shoot the messenger.

The reported sponsor of the resolution is Democrat Rep. Mark Udall. He’s running for Senate in Colorado. Yes, he’s trying to win a Senate seat by running against Rush Limbaugh. The Colorado Index has the text of his proposed resolution:

110TH CONGRESS
1ST SESSION H. CON. RES.
Honoring all Americans serving in the Armed Forces of the United States and condemning the attack by broadcaster Rush Limbaugh on the integrity and professionalism of some of those Americans.

IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

Mr. UDALL of Colorado submitted the following concurrent resolution; which was referred to the Committee on

CONCURRENT RESOLUTION

Honoring all Americans serving in the Armed Forces of the United States and condemning the attack by broadcaster Rush Limbaugh on the integrity and professionalism of some of those Americans.

Whereas on September 26, 2007, the broadcaster Rush Limbaugh told a nationwide radio audience that members of the Armed Forces who have expressed disagreement with current policies of the United States regarding military activities in Iraq are ”phony soldiers”; and

Whereas such a description constitutes an unwarranted slur on the integrity and professionalism of members of the Armed Forces who exercise their constitutional right to express their opinions regarding public policy in a manner consistent with good order and
discipline: Now, therefore, be it

Resolved by the House of Representatives (the Senate concurring),

SECTION 1. Congress makes the following findings:

(1) Americans serving in the United States Armed Forces have volunteered for such service and have not been drafted for that purpose.

(2) Those who serve in the Armed Forces deserve the respect of all Americans for their willingness to undertake that service.

(3) Those who serve in the Armed Forces do not relinquish their constitutional right to express their opinions regarding public policy in a manner consistent with good order and discipline.

(4) The dedication and honor of Americans serving in the Armed Forces should not be impugned because of their exercise of such right.

SEC. 2. Congress –

(1) recognizes the service of all members of the Armed Forces serving in good standing and with honor to defend the United States, and the personal sacrifices made by them and their families;

(2) commits to judge the merits of the opinions of members of the Armed Forces regarding the policies of the United States, including those related to military actions in Iraq, without prejudice or personal bias, including refraining from unwarranted personal attacks;

(3) condemns in the strongest possible terms the personal attacks made by the broadcaster Rush Limbaugh impugning the integrity and professionalism of Americans serving in the Armed Forces who have expressed opinions regarding military actions in Iraq;

(4) honors all members of the Armed Forces and civilian personnel serving in harm’s way, as well as their families; and

(5) pledges to debate any supplemental funding request or any policy decisions regarding the war in Iraq with the solemn respect and the commitment to integrity that the sacrifices of these members of the Armed Forces and civilian personnel deserve

Like the “Betray Us” ad, this, too, will ultimately backfire.

As my post yesterday about MoveOn.org’s attempt to squelch criticism by t-shirt and bumper sticker sellers at Cafe Press underscored, the unhinged Left is beginning to alienate its own base with its any-means-necessary tactics.

You can only shoot yourself in the foot so many times…

***

Glenn Reynolds spells it out: “…the intent is to limit the ability of people like Limbaugh or O’Reilly to drive stories in the mainstream news as we get closer to the election. Expect more of this, with more targets.”

Yes. In other words: A backdoor restoration of the Fairness Doctrine.

***

You asked for it: Rep. Mark Udall’s contact info…

Rep. Mark Udall
100 Cannon House
Office Building
Washington, D.C. 20515
Phone: (202) 225-2161
Fax: (202) 226-7840

HILLIARYCARE REVEALED

2007-09-18T05:33:00.000-07:00

Hillary Rodham, almost certain to be the nominee of the Democrat MoveOn Party, finally unveiled her government-run healthcare planyesterday. For comic relief Ms. Rodham told the assembled crowd that this health care plan would not be "government run." It's pretty much what everyone anticipated.

In essence ... everyone will be required to purchase a health insurance policy, either on their own or through their employer. And just who is going to require the purchase of these policies? Your local sheriff? Well, not exactly. The Imperial Federal Government will do the requiring here, and, one must assume, the enforcing.

Now here's a question that you won't probably hear many people asking, and that's sad. Just where in our Constitution does the federal government acquire the right – the power – to force free citizens to purchase anything, let alone a health insurance policy.

The Constitution is clear on this point, the federal government can only take actions that are specifically authorized by the Constitution. All other powers are reserved for the states or the people. Nowhere in that document do you see anything that can in be interpreted to allow the feds to tell you what you must purchase.

In her little talk yesterday Hillary drew a comparison to auto insurance. She said that states require people to purchase auto insurance before they can drive. This should come as no surprise, but she's wrong. The only time you can be required to purchase automobile insurance by a state government is IF you wish to drive an automobile on a state or government owned highway. You can own a car and drive it around your private property to your heart's content without buying insurance, or without wearing a seatbelt of having operating headlights, for that matter. Hillary's comparison is absurd, but I suppose it's the best she can do.

How will Hillary's government enforce this requirement? Is everyone required to file a report with the government detailing their health insurance company and policy number? Just how high will the costs of compliance here be? And what happens if you fail to buy a policy. Are you jailed? Does the government withhold your tax refund to purchase a policy for you? What if you don't have a tax refund coming? If you just absolutely refuse to buy a health insurance policy, will the government get some sort of a judgment against you and seize enough of your property to pay for the policy?

More questions: What will the policies entail? If you're not a drug addict are you still going to have to pay for drug rehab coverage? What if you have no plans to get pregnant? Are you still going to have to pay for maternity benefits? Let me tell you how this is going to work. Once the government mandates that every person must, under penalty of God knows what, buy a health insurance policy, you're going to have every medical special interest group out there demanding that the government require that those policies provide payments for their pet medical procedures. Ophthalmologists will demand coverage for eye correction surgery. Psychiatrists will demand coverage for psychological issues. Oncologists will demand coverage for experimental cancer procedures that have not as yet been proven effective. These people will be lining up .. and they'll be throwing the campaign donations around like confetti ... and the politicians will give them exactly what they want.

Oh .. and the MoveOn Democrats just love to yammer endlessly about the uninsured. The truth about the uninsured? Most are only uninsured for a period of less than a year. Many simply have made a choice not to buy health insurance. Some have so much wealth that they essentially self-insure. The truth is far from the scenario they paint.

Oh .. and wouldn't you know it? Hillary's plan includes increasing taxes. She doesn't call it a tax increase .. .she used the MoveOn approved code phrase of "repealing the Bush tax cuts."

Remember. This is not about making you more healthy. This is not about improving the delivery of health care services in this country. This is ONLY about increasing the power of government and politicians.

ILLEGAL ALIENS AREN'T CRIMINALS?

2007-09-05T04:33:00.000-07:00

Criminal: adj. One that has committed or been legally convicted of a crime. American Heritage Dictionary.

OK ... do you now have the definition of a criminal in mind? If you've committed a crime, you are a criminal. If you've been convicted of a crime, you are a criminal. I realize that this is a tough concept for some liberals to grasp ... but even with my government school education, I think I get it.

Now, may I draw your attention to this editorial that appeared on July 24th in the Indianapolis Star? The title of the editorial is "Illegal doesn't make them criminals." Well now! If ever there was a headline or a title to a column or editorial that better exemplifies the mindset of the leftist media in this country, this would be it.

This editorial is full of so much unadulterated bullcrap, I hardly know where to start.

First, of course, the editors of the Indianapolis Star just can't bring themselves to say the words "illegal aliens," even though that is the official government label applied to people who enter this country illegally. For the most part the Star just refers to them as "immigrants". Instead of attaching the "illegal" word to these criminals, the Star editors refer to them as "young male immigrants ... who arrived in this country without proper documentation."

Gawd .. this political correctness is just infuriating!

These are not "young male immigrants who arrived in this country without proper documentation," they are criminals who crossed our borders illegally, who obtained jobs here illegally (often with forged documents), and who remain here illegally. The Star editors try to portray them as poor, hapless, unfortunate Mexicans who crossed the border into this country in the dark of night and then were m to suddenly discover that, ay caramba, they didn't have the proper documentacion!

In one part of this editorial the reader is told that there is no reason to believe that these "young male immigrants" are any more likely than anyone else to commit a crime. Then, a few paragraphs later, we're told that the crime rate in Indianapolis has risen as the immigrant population has grown. OK guys .. which is it?

The paper then goes on to blame the problem of illegal immigration not on those who actually commit the crimes, but instead on our own government? And just why would that be? Why, because we're not letting them in legally! That means they just have to break the law to get here!

Oh .. now I understand.

THE TRUTH ABOUT HILLARY

2007-08-31T08:51:00.000-07:00

DICK MORRIS' '08 PLAY-BY-PLAY ANALYSIS

BILL CLINTON LEAVES TRUTH OUT OF HILLARY'S BIOGRAPHY

Go to www.hillaryclinton.com and check out Bill Clinton's syrupy, five- minute ad for Hillary. He introduces the
commercial by saying that he wants to share some things we may not know
about Hillary's background. His version of her biography is about as
reliable as if it appeared in Pravda!

So, I wanted to make a few corrections;

Bill says: Hillary never wanted to run for public office, but she did want
to work at public service.

The facts are: When Clinton was considering not running for another term as
Governor of Arkansas in 1990, Hillary said she would run if he didn't. She
and Bill even had me take two surveys to assess her chances of winning.
The conclusion was that she couldn't win because people would just see her
as a seat warmer for when Bill came back, licking his wounds after losing
for president. So she didn't run. Bill did and won. But there is no
question, she had her eye on public office, as opposed to service, long ago.

Bill says: In law school Hillary worked on legal services for the poor.

The facts are: Hillary's main extra-curricular activity in law school was
helping the Black Panthers, on trial in Connecticut for torturing and
killing a federal agent. She went to court every day as part of a law
student monitoring committee trying to spot civil rights violations and
develop grounds for appeal.

Bill says: Hillary spent a year after graduation working on a children's
rights project for poor kids.

The facts are: Hillary interned with Bob Truehaft, the head of the
California Communist Party. She met Bob when he represented the Panthers,
and traveled all the way to San Francisco to take an internship with him.

Bill says: Hillary could have written her own job ticket, but she turned
down all the lucrative job offers.

The facts are: She flunked the D.C. bar exam and only passed the Arkansas
bar. She had no job offers in Arkansas, and only got hired by the
University of Arkansas Law School at Fayetteville because Bill was already
teaching there. She only joined the prestigious Rose Law Firm after Bill
became Attorney General, and made partner only after he was elected
governor.

Bill says: President Carter appointed Hillary to the Legal Services Board
of Directors, and she became its chairman.

The facts are: The appointment was in exchange for Bill's support for
Carter in his 1980 primary against Ted Kennedy. Hillary became chairman in
a coup in which she won a majority away from Carter's choice to be chairman.

Bill says: She served on the board of the Arkansas Children's Hospital.

The facts are: Yes she did. But her main board activity, not mentioned by
Bill, was to sit on the Walmart board of directors, for a substantial fee.
She was silent about their labor and health care practices.

Bill says: Hillary didn't succeed at getting health care for all Americans
in 1994, but she kept working at it, and helped to create the Children's
Health Insurance Program (CHIP), that provides five million children with
health insurance.

The facts are: Hillary had nothing to do with creating CHIP. It was
included in the budget deal between Clinton and Republican Majority Leader
Senator Trent Lott. I helped to negotiate the deal. The money came half
from the budget deal and half from the Attorney Generals' tobacco
settlement. Hillary had nothing to do with either source of funds.

Bill says: Hillary was the face of America all over the world

The facts are: Her visits were part of a program to get her out of town so
that Bill would not appear weak by feeding stories that Hillary was running
the White House. Her visits abroad were entirely touristic and symbolic,
and there was no substantive diplomacy on any of them

Bill says: Hillary was an excellent Senator, who kept fighting for
children's and women's issues.

The facts are: Other than totally meaningless legislation, like changing
the names on courthouses and post offices, she has passed only four
substantive pieces of legislation: One set up a national park in Puerto
Rico. A second provided respite care for family members helping their
relatives through Alzheimer's or other conditions. And two were routine
bills to aid 9-11 victims and responders, which were sponsored by the entire
NY delegation.

Here is what bothers me more than anything else about Hillary Clinton: She
has done everything possible to weaken the President and our country when it
comes to the war on terror.

1. She wants to close GITMO & move the combatants to the U. S. A., where
they would have access to our legal system.

2. She wants to eliminate the monitoring of suspected Al Qeada phone calls
to/from the U. S. A..

3. She wants to grant constitutional rights to enemy combatants captured on
the battlefield.

4. She wants to eliminate the monitoring of money transfers between
suspected Al Qeada cells & supporters In the U. S. A..

5. She wants to eliminate the type of interrogation tactics used by the
military & CIA where coercion might be used when questioning known
terrorists, even though such tactics might save American lives.

I can't think of a single bill Hillary has introduced or a single comment
she has made that would tend to strengthen our country in the War on Terror.
But I can think of a lot of comments she has made that weakens our country &
makes it a more dangerous situation for all of us. She goes hand-in-hand
with the ACLU on far too many issues where common sense is abandoned.

She is a disaster for all Americans.

ILLEGAL 'UNLICENSED' DRIVERS

2007-08-30T05:55:00.000-07:00

The Los Angeles Police Department decided that it is going to stop impounding cars ... of "unlicensed drivers." They say the practice may be unconstitutional because "many unlicensed drivers who have their cars towed are illegal immigrants who cannot get driver's licenses."

Just an FYI ... I did a little research. There are over 2 million illegal immigrants in California alone. At least one million of them drive without a license.

The department decided to change its rules after civil rights aaaactivists and LA politicians read a court ruling in Oregon. The case involved a man named Jorge Miranda. Good ole Jorge (pronounced whore-hey) was teaching his wife, an unlicensed driver, to drive his car. She was pulled over by a cop. He impounded the vehicle for thirty days because it was being driven by an unlicensed driver. The ruling said this is a no-no.

Now let's see here. If you drive a car and you don't have a license, somewhat of an indication you don't know how to drive, they can't take the car. But if they find a little Mary Jane stuffed between the cushions of the back seat, they can.

LAPD will no longer impound vehicles solely because the driver is driving without a license. Now how is this for government brilliance ... the driver will be cited for driving without a license but the car will only be impounded if it cannot be driven away by a licensed driver or parked legally and secured.

In other words, if none of your amigos actually have a legal driver's license and cannot come and pick up the car, you are still SOL.

But don't worry. Senator Gil Cedillo of Los Angeles has information on his website as to how unlicensed drivers can fight impounds. Now there's man of the people.

CHILLARY

2007-08-27T06:22:00.000-07:00

Chillary

by Susan Easton

“Hillary is the first choice of Martian visitors,” or so said Gerard Baker in his August 17 Op Ed piece in The Times of London. Baker, who is the U.S. Editor of the Times, reports that wherever he went across Europe this summer everyone asked him the same question: “who’s going to win the election?” Baker attributes this to a unique confluence of interest between Europe and the States. ”However briefly,” he writes, “the rest of the world is thinking the same way as America.”

Baker admits that this is not a question he would normally feel comfortable answering, especially since the election is fully 15 months away. Who among us enduring this era of the eternal campaign cannot empathize? But what do Martians have to do with anything?

The humorous galactic gambit is Baker’s way of stating the bloody obvious. If a Martian were to come down and follow the Democrat Party’s US Presidential candidates for a few days, he would wonder why there was any question at all why Mrs. Clinton should not be the anointed. “It is evident that she is the most knowledgeable, experienced and disciplined. Most of the time, like a Queen Elizabeth I or a Margaret Thatcher, she easily dominates the inferior men shuffling around her,” states Baker. He then hastens to add that she is not his favorite person. “I continue to find the ease with which she has sacrificed her principles on everything of importance, the makeover from radical feminist to soft-focused mother and devoted wife, from V-sign-waving peacenik to hawkish warmonger, all a little chilling even for my slightly cynical tastes.” Baker laments the credulity of American voters who are likely to overlook Hillary’s faults.

“To be fair for a moment,” Baker concludes, “even I would have to acknowledge that Bill Clinton’s First Lady (though, assuredly not his last), on the evidence of the campaign so far at least, deserves her lead.”

He sees the lesser Democrat candidates as merely hanging around in a tedious collective audition for spots in Mrs. Clinton’s Administration.

Baker is dismissive of Barack Obama. “To be frank,” he says, “that same Martian would have to wonder what exactly all the fuss was about with the Illinois Senator.” He rejects the endless comparisons between Obama and JFK adding: “Mr. Obama remains an oddly unconvincing world saviour.” Nor does Baker spare candidate John Edwards. He characterizes the Edwards campaign as “larded with a hypocrisy and opportunism that make Mrs. Clinton look like St. Thomas More.”

In June, another London Times reporter, Sarah Baxter, penned a book review of political consultant, Bob Schrum’s, mid life memoir: "No Excuses: Confessions of a Serial Campaigner." With the eye catching headline: “Clinton’s zipper problem returns to haunt Hillary,” Baxter chose to indicate the gossipy nature of Schrum’s tome by recounting the late Pamela Harriman’s fury at Bill Clinton. The story goes that he once brought a woman back to Harriman’s home to spend the night with him. Harriman, then the US Ambassador to France, had quite a reputation as what is called a “courtesan” in polite company, but even she was repulsed by Bill Clinton’s recklessness. Baxter’s slant on Hillary’s candidacy is that it will put the spotlight back on the Clinton’s clearly rocky marital history, something rhetorically echoed in the words of Michele Obama last weekend: “If you can't run your own house, you can't run the White House."

In his August 19 commentary on Hillary, The Independent’s Foreign Editor, Leonard Doyle, asks: “Why Is She Hated By Progressives and Right Wingers Alike?” His subtitle gives the answer straightaway. “They say she is a scheming control-freak who will stop at nothing in her bid to become the first Mrs. President.” For the record, The Independent is the youngest (founded 1986) of the UK’s daily papers. It was begun by former Telegraph journalists as an alternative venue for those who did not subscribe to the worldview of the Murdoch publishing cartel. It is positioned to attract readers who are politically center left, which suggests it should be aligned with Mrs. Clinton. But Doyle chose to pack his Hillary piece with rather unflattering snippets. Not least of these is his focus on how Hillary has riled America’s left wing feminists. Doyle cites best selling author and filmmaker Nora Ephron as an exemplar of this crowd. Once a supporter who said someone would have to burn down the White House to get her to say anything against the former First Lady, now Ephron is an avowed Hillary resister. Why? Because, she says, (in so many words) you can’t trust Hillary as far as you can spit. This turn hinges almost entirely on the New York Senator’s position on the war in Iraq, frequently cited as the probable source of her downfall, should it come. And here’s a slam which Doyle saw fit to print, although it is unlikely to appear in the New York Times. He quotes Jane Fonda’s description of Hillary as “a ventriloquist for the patriarchy with a skirt and a vagina.” One could argue with the skirt comment as Hillary is always seen wearing pantsuits.

The Guardian newspaper, demographically positioned for center to left wing readers, warned its audience that whoever was elected President in 08, one regrettable fact would not change. A June 7 article remorsefully noted that, even when the evangelical Bush left office, there would be no escape from Christianity. That piece (with an embedded sigh) was entitled: “There’s one thing the US presidential contenders all have in common: God.” Two weeks later, a Guardian correspondent posted in Washington held out hope for British lefties by reporting: “Poll of Democrats reveals Gore could still steal the show.” This political resurrection, should it happen, was put down to “the greatest brand makeover in history.”

For pure comic relief, the Times ran a contribution from the witty Hugo Rifkind, who specializes in writing humorous send-ups of celebrities. In this instance, Rifkind conjured up an uncomplimentary image of Hillary (and Bill) by creating a week’s worth of imaginary entries from her personal diary.

Here are two excerpts from Monday -- with the really juicy bits edited out.

“I am dressing. My husband, Bill, is still in bed, watching a women’s beach volleyball match on TV.”

“I am not one of those apple-pie women who frets over her white slacks and gingham shirt each day. Hell no. I despise those women. Although I also respect them, as Americans. Today, though, I’m not sure. Should I be Soft Hillary, in pink and beige, with a glimpse of flesh? Or should I be Hard Hillary?”

It is this impression of Mrs. Clinton which led a Telegraph writer to nickname her “the power behind the drone.”

But for all the insults and parodies being aimed at Hillary and Obama et. al, the respected European journal, The Economist, reports that 40% of GOP supporters believe the Democrats will win the White House in 2008. That is no laughing matter.

THE BW WIRETAP LAW

2007-08-07T05:07:00.000-07:00

The president signed a new electronic surveillance bill into law yesterday. This morning the New York Times carried the story, and I think that it is safe to say that the Times treatment of this story will become the standard.

First ... why was the law needed? Let's say you have an Islamic terrorist suspect in London, perhaps a doctor, making a phone call to a like-minded Muslim inside the United States. I think that most people would agree that our intelligence agencies might have a passing interest in what is being said during that conversation. The best way to intercept and monitor that conversation would be through the communications switching facilities in the United States. But there's a small problem there. The FISA intelligence court ruled earlier this year that the government needed to seek court-approved warrants to monitor those international calls coming through American switching centers. So, the Bush Administration asked for a new surveillance law permitting just that type of monitoring, and the Democrat congress gave him just such a bill to sign.

There's a few interesting facets to the Times reporting of this story. First ... not once in the entire article do you find the words "Muslin", "Islamic", or "terrorist." Islamic terrorism is the reason this eavesdropping is needed. There are estimates of thousands of Al Qaeda and Islamic terrorist sympathizers already in this country. For some odd reason our intelligence people think that it might be a good idea if we could monitor their communications with their buddies overseas. You would think that somewhere in the Times story they might make some sort of a mention as to why this new law is so essential to the safety of the American people. But noooooo.

Secondly, maybe it's just me, but if I were writing the story I would have found a way to make it clear that the people inside the United States who would end up being monitored are not just Americans – not just citizens. I would suspect that most of the people in this country who end up on the U.S. side of a monitored conversation would not be "Americans." They would be foreign nationals living in this country.

At any rate, the left will have to shut up for a few days about the evils of "warrentless wiretapping." This has been such a big deal for the Bush-haters, now he has signed a bill presented to him by a Democrat congress! We'll just have to sit back and wait for a bit to see how long it takes for the left to forget their all-important role in this new law.

NO TO AMNESTY. DO THEY FINALLY GET IT?

2007-08-01T04:53:00.001-07:00

State Republican honchos from around the nation are going to meet this Thursday. There are 168 members of the Republican National Committee. Thus far 47 of them have signed a petition saying that they will oppose any immigration reform policy that will grant legal residency to illegal aliens.

Fine, as far as it goes. Will the petition also state support for spending as much money as is needed to close – tight – the porous border between the U.S. and Mexico? Will the petition support the denial of all federal crime-fighting grants to cities who adopt "sanctuary city" policies with respect with the illegals sucking off their taxpayers?

I'm not through yet. Here's some more ideas for the petition:

A change in the law to deny legal residency and citizenship to babies born to mothers who are in this country illegally.
Stricter penalties, widely enforced, against companies that hire illegal aliens.
Only emergency medical care at taxpayer's expense for illegal aliens.
No access to government schools for the children of illegal aliens.

But .. what the heck. I guess the denial of amnesty to illegal aliens is a start. Maybe they're getting the message.

PROTECTING OUR BORDERS

2007-07-28T05:33:00.000-07:00

That's going to be pretty tough. Especially if our government insists on punishing any one that uses a gun to do so. And not just any one ... our own border patrol agents! They are given weapons for a reason. But when they use them against Mexican drug smugglers, this calls for time in jail. Here's the story.

Ignacio Ramos and Jose Compean were border patrol agents. They are now serving 11- and 12-year sentences respectively. Why? For shooting and wounding a Mexican trying to escape after failing to smuggle 743 pounds of marijuana across the border.

They are now sitting in jail. Their longest sentence is for "discharge of a firearm in relation to a crime of violence," a violation of section 924(c)(1)(a) of the U.S. Code. The minimum is a ten year prison sentence. The "crime of violence," by the way, is drug smuggling.

But there's a catch. Simply discharging a firearm near a violent crime is not illegal. It is merely a factor used in sentencing. There is a lot of legal jargon involved. But basically these guys couldn't use their guns if the Mexican was only committing a drug crime because they are Border Agents and can only use their weapons to prevent border crossing.

Does that make any sense? Well, what the hell. We are talking about government here, aren't we?

SHEEHAN VS PELOSI

2007-07-09T07:15:00.000-07:00

Just when we thought she was out of the public spotlight forever – yeah, that lasted long – Cindy Sheehan rears her somewhat-empty, anti-American head again. She's still on Bush's case, but she wants to reach him via good 'ole Nancy Pelosi.

Cindy says that if Nancy does not move to impeach Bush, she herself is going to run for her seat in Congress. Wouldn't you just love to see that add campaign? Endorsements from Hugo Chavez ... Jane Fonda ... and fellow travelers from around the world. If Nancy does what she is told, then Cindy said she will shut up and go overseas to do humanitarian work ... where I assume she will be joining Jimmy Carter in his ongoing effort to make statements which undermine America while in foreign countries.

The fact that this woman has any control over politicians or politics is just astounding. Hopefully the aging hollow-eyed hippie from Haight-Ashbury is laughing in her Cheerios.

TELL ME IF YOU'VE HEARD THIS BEFORE

2007-07-08T19:55:00.000-07:00

This time it happened in Columbia, Tennessee. Juan Villa has been in the Maury County jail 11 times. Charges? Let’s see ….. assault, public intoxication, driving without a license, contempt of court .. .the usual stuff. Eleven times since 2001.

Juan’s last visit to the local hoosegow ended last Friday at about 9:45 p.m. Less than three hours later, just after midnight, Juan celebrated his freedom (a friend bailed him out) by raping a 15-year-old girl.

You know where this is going, don’t you? Yup … you got it. Juan is most likely an illegal alien. Yeah .. the county authorities had notified the feds, but the feds were just too busy to do anything right away. They said they would deal with Juan later. Trouble is, Juan dealt with the 15-year-old before the feds could deal with him.

Well see how long Juan stays in jail this time. In the meantime, local illegal immigration advocates are voicing their concern. No .. not about Juan raping this girl, but about the fact that the Maury County Sheriff’s Department has detained about 80 illegal aliens since May. They’re yelling racial profiling.

And so it goes. The endless story.

NEW STUDY IS BAD NEWS FOR ROSIE AND OTHER MOONBATS

2007-06-27T07:10:00.000-07:00

Posted by Bobby Eberle

A new study from Purdue University must have Rosie O’Donnell and other conspiracy theorists shaking their heads. “Oh no! The government has gotten to Purdue too!,” they must be saying. For Rosie and the moonbats who believe the government somehow engineered the collapse of the World Trade Center towers on September 11, 2001, the Purdue research is not welcome news. For the rest of us, it’s a great piece of research into what a jet airplane being used as a missile can do to a skyscraper.

As noted in the story Simulation Finds 9/11 Fireproofing Key, the Purdue research “supports a federal agency’s findings that the initial impact from the hijacked airplanes stripped away crucial fireproofing material and that the weakened towers collapsed under their own weight.”

See the clip below from youtube.com:

“One thing it does point out… is the absolute essential nature of fireproofing steel structures,” Hoffmann told The Associated Press. “This is something that wasn’t done originally in the World Trade Center when it was built. It wasn’t code at that time.”

Mete Sozen, a professor of structural engineering and a lead investigator on the simulation, said Purdue researchers hope their work leads to better structural design and building codes to prevent similar collapses.

Some conspiracy theorists believe that the collapse of the towers was the result of a government-led controlled demolition. The Purdue report, however, “concludes that the weight of the aircraft’s fuel, when ignited, produced ‘a flash flood of flaming liquid’ that knocked out a number of structural columns within the building and removed the fireproofing insulation from other support structures.”

Ayhan Irfanoglu, a Purdue professor of civil engineering, said half of the building’s weight-bearing columns were concentrated at the cores of the towers.

“When that part is wiped out, the structure comes down,” Irfanoglu said. “We design structures with some extra capacity to cover some uncertainties, but we never anticipate such heavy demand coming from an aircraft impact. If the columns were distributed, maybe, the fire could not take them out so easily.”

Even though the tin-foil crowd will likely disregard this academic study, as they have with other findings in the past, it would be much better to move on and focus on the real enemy: al Qaeda. This organization of radical Islamists is bent on the destruction of the United States, plain and simple. They are the ones who brought down the Twin Towers, and they can strike again. We need to do everything we can to wipe them out. This is, indeed, a war, and we are fighting for the ultimate stakes… our survival.

BORDER AGENTS SMUGGLING MEXICANS

2007-06-14T02:29:00.000-07:00

Three National Guardsmen were arrested this week for arranging the smuggling of Mexicans across the border. They pocketed big bucks, at the expense of American security. They found 24 Mexicans in the van when one of the Guardsmen was arrested. Is this where circuses get those clowns they stuff into small cars?

Let's take a look at the names of the Guardsmen: Rodrigo Torres, Julio Cesar Pacheco and Clarence Hodge Jr. Well, two out of three ain't bad. It's safe to assume that the first two are Hispanic – most likely Mexican. Let's see ... if we do, in fact, have an invasion going on here, just what would call a federal officer who aids the invasion force?

This case just goes to show that borer security should be the number one issue. Forget amnesty, guest-worker programs, Z-visas, blah blah blah ... we can't even control our current border situation. Close the borders. And make sure that you do it properly by employing U.S. citizens. If those citizens are sympathetic to the Mexicans' cause? Fine. But in the end, you have a job to do. And if you don't do it properly then you should be fired.

As for these men ... send them to jail. Make them sit there and realize that U.S. border security is not to be compromised. They have made our agents who do believe in the rule of law, look like fools. Instead of getting free time in jail, they should have to go to the border and pick up the millions of pounds of trash their Mexican compadres leave behind as they head to Houston, Atlanta .. wherever..

While I can't be too optimistic, maybe this will be another wakeup call for the American people. Don't let Bush get away with this amnesty bill. We clearly need to focus on border security.

KEEP THE IMMIGRATION PROTEST GOING

2007-06-10T06:39:00.000-07:00

by Jay D. Homnick

Okay, class, settle down. Today’s subject is immigration. Oy vey, yelp my non-Jewish readers (who are comfortable using Yiddish colloquialisms.) Goodness gracious, groan my Jewish readers (too self-conscious to employ Yiddish expressions.) Not that again?! Haven’t we discovered and covered that enough? Must we recover this subject? Can’t we recover from this?

The answer is yes we must, no we can’t. We don’t need to beat a dead horse but in politics it never hurts to keep beating a horse that looks moribund -- until the coroner declares it officially deceased. To make our point, let us begin with our favorite immigrants as children, the friendly Italian shoemakers who were posted in storefronts at two-block intervals all around the Brooklyn of our youth.

The old joke went that a man pulled his wedding tux from the closet after 30 years, pleased to find it would still fit him perfectly for his daughter’s upcoming nuptials. He sticks his hand into the pocket and pulls out a colorful piece of stiff cardboard. It is his tag from the shoe store. He had snagged the heel of his wedding shoes dancing and brought them to the shoe repair guy that same day. They had lain there forgotten for three decades. He drives back to the old neighborhood and sure enough, the guy is still there, wizened and stooped. He takes the tag, goes into the back, then returns empty-handed with a terse message.

“They’ll be ready tomorrow.”

Politicians practice a variation on this theme. When something they propose draws constituent ire, they stall it or withdraw it until such time as the clamor dissipates. Once people have spent their passion, the pols can jump in and spend their money. This happens with regularity at the school board and town council level. In Cincinnati, for example, a levy to raise two hundred million dollars to build a new jail was defeated last year. This year the initiative is back, now puffed up to seven hundred million.

But even in a fishbowl like Washington, with all its relentless media scrutiny, this is often accomplished successfully. As the old saw goes: “If you don’t let them through the front door, they will come sneaking in the back door.” One day when the country has its attention focused elsewhere, dealing with a hurricane or something, the bill may waft its way over the transom.

While it is true the initial outraged response to this immigration bill (in its second coming, don’t forget, it first visited in mid-2006) has representatives reeling, any letup in the indignation will provide an opening. Remember, if it gets to the President’s desk, he will sign it proudly. The only winnable front, the last line of defense, is in the Congress. Making noise only gives a bill a headache; it takes an incessant cacophony, a farrago of flak, a fanfaronade of feedback, to make it explode irreparably.

Even while the bill is tabled, or off the table, the scurrilous attacks against its detractors will continue apace. We will hear all day everyday that only people of utter ill will could conceivably oppose this panacea. Anti-amnesty types are people with no forgiveness in their hearts, with no compassion for the stricken and the battered. Like the other classic joke about the Jewish immigrant with the heavy accent who complains he is being rebuffed in efforts to be hired as a radio announcer. To what does he attribute his failure? “It’s those anti-Semites!”

That charge won’t stick against my position. I have been campaigning in at least four years of articles for the policy toward Haitian immigrants to be changed; they should be treated like Cubans and given preferential treatment. Citizens of a neighboring country with a broken system of government (no, Mexico is not in that category) should get better treatment from the United States. Legal immigration should be more efficient and our populace must always remain open-hearted in helping new arrivals to learn the language and acclimate.

That being said, common sense must govern in setting rules and quotas for entry but beyond that the rule of law must be next-to-sacrosanct. With rare exceptions for obvious anomalies and unintended injustices, the system should be run well and honestly. It is that law which provides the shield those immigrants seek from the harshly avenging and scavenging forces loose in the Third World. Making that law into a mockery threatens us with the anarchic fate they are so bent on escaping. This is why the class reviewed this subject today. Now let’s do our homework.

AMNESTY BILL--------DEAD????

2007-06-09T03:51:00.000-07:00

They had a little test vote in the Senate late yesterday ... to see of they could get the votes necessary for cloture and bring the amnesty bill to the floor for a vote. Not enough votes .... so the amnesty bill was withdrawn. Withdrawn for now.

The Democrats immediately went into defense mode. The media has been reporting for weeks that this bill was belonged to Ted Kennedy and John McCain. McCain was distancing himself from the bill earlier this week ... so that pretty much left Kennedy hanging out there alone. So here comes Democrat Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid to tell all the world that this bill actually belonged to George Bush.

What an amazing tactic! When the bill is born you brag about the bipartisan nature of the bill and showcase your icon, Ted Kennedy, as a major mover and shaker behind this wonderful effort, and then the bill falls on its face. Suddenly it belongs to George Bush. The problem is that the government educated myrmidons of this country will buy Reid's story. He knows it.

This whole affair is particularly distressing to Democrats and the left because it presented them with clear evidence that the right is not dead. Perhaps they thought they dealt a death crushing to conservatives with last year's elections. Maybe they thought the death blow could be delivered with the election of President Rodham next year. Now we have conservative America standing up to this transparent Hispandering bill -- this amnesty bill -- and the support started to erode.

Do you know that they couldn't even manage to pass an amendment that would have eliminated illegal aliens with criminal records from the amnesty provisions?

Speaking of criminal aliens. I suppose it didn't help things this week when some illegal Mexican .. a Mexican who had twice before been deported .. got drunk, stole a car and killed a man in a grinding collision. How many people are killed by illegal alien drunk drivers every day? Some studies put the number at around 12 or so. Nice going.

Politicians who see these illegal aliens as a great source of future political support aren't going to give up. Don't go to sleep on this one. This bill is coming back.

SHAMNESTY ON THE SENATE FLOOR, DAY 2

2007-06-07T03:52:00.000-07:00

Menendez amendment fails, Kyl amendment passes
Hillary and Obama make appearances
Lindsay Graham has a hissy fit; Inhofe's English declaration passes
Clinton, Obama fail; Dorgan sunset passes

By Michelle Malkin

Update: 12:40am Senate adjourned until 10am...Reid has called for a vote later today on a motion to limit debate to 30 additional hours...It's the "moment of truth" now...Sen. Jeff Sessions, who has been an eloquent and stalwart amnesty opponent, says tonight: "I think enthusiasm is waning for the legislation..."

Chicago Tribune says Dorgan amendment "may have critically jeopardized the measure as it enters final days of consideration." More from Sen. Sessions:

Supporters of the bill claimed victory not only over the temporary worker program, but over the bill's entire process.
"No one has the right to meet in secret with special-interest groups and write a bill and ram it down the throats of the United States Senate," said Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-Ala.), a critic of the bill who voted to kill the guest worker program. "I hope today people begin to see that a small group of senators … don't have the power to say we can't have an amendment and we can't change it."

Update: 12:20am 6/7...Scroll for amendment updates...not on the Senate page yet, but hearing that the Dorgan amendment to sunset the Y visa program after 5 years, SA 1316 passed 49-48...confirmed...here's the roll...

The Dorgan amendment had failed by one vote two weeks ago. Six senators changed their votes and one senator who hadn't voted sided with the yeas. Here are the vote-switchers:

Switched from nay to yea:

R - Bunning, DeMint, Dole, Enzi
D - Menendez

Switched from yea to nay:
R - Grassley

Switched from no vote to yea:
Dodd

AP reports on the vote as a potential deal-breaker:

Shortly after midnight, the Senate voted 49-48 to end a new temporary worker program after five years. The vote reversed the one-vote outcome on the same amendment — offered both times by Sen. Byron Dorgan, D-N.D. — two weeks ago. Six senators switched their votes, reflecting the issue's political volatility.
The temporary worker program is crucial to many business groups, and the bill's backers vowed to try on Thursday to undo the damage. Sen. Arlen Specter, R-Pa., said he or his allies would slightly reword Dorgan's amendment and hope for a change of heart by one or more senators who "don't want to kill the bill."

Dorgan, who contends that immigrants take many jobs Americans could fill, said no one in the debate "is talking about the impact on American workers."

"There are a lot of people here who want jobs and can't find jobs, and find downward pressure on their incomes," Dorgan said.

Allah mulls it over: Is this the killer amendment?

Update: Here's more on Lindsay Graham's embarrassing hissy fit against Barack Obama and on behalf of John McCain, which continued off the Senate floor...

Update: The White House thinks we are all idiots. Message to White House: Look in the mirror. Conservatives not amused.

Update: Latest AP coverage--"Immigration deal survives Senate threat...A proposed immigration overhaul narrowly survived strong Senate challenges Wednesday, boosting its backers' hopes that the fiercely debated legislation might soon win passage and advance to the House..."

Picking up from my liveblogging earlier today, debate on S.1348, the shamnesty bill, resumed tonight on the Senate floor at 6:45pm. Numbers USA previewed tonight's action:

* The main thrust of Sen. John Cornyn's (R-Texas) SA 1250 is that information provided illegal alien applicants for amnesty, as provided for by the compromise proposal, could be shared with intelligence and law enforcement officials at all levels, thus encouraging real enforcement of our immigration laws.
* Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) is offering SA 1331, which would prohibit any provision of this bill from impacting the Internal Revenue Code's treatment of illegal aliens' eligibility for the Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC).

* On the flip side, Sen. Jeff Sessions' (R-Ala.) SA 1234 would prohibit guestworkers imported pursuant to this bill and illegal aliens granted amnesty under this measure from claiming the Earned Income Tax Credit unless their status is adjusted to lawful permanent resident.

* A proposal considered a "deal breaker" by some of the bill's Republican proponents – notably, Sen. Jon Kyl (R-Ariz.), the lead Republican in the "compromise" negotiations (see below) – SA 1194, sponsored by Sen. Robert Menendez (D-N.J.), would add 110,000 green cards a year for adult children and sibling backlog reduction and revise the cut-off date for reducing the “backlog” of family-sponsored immigration applicants from May 1, 2005, to January 1, 2007 (i.e., the same date by which illegal aliens must have been unlawfully present in the United States in order to receive amnesty under this bill). Sen. Kyl is offering a counterproposal to the Menendez amendment, SA 1460, but text of that amendment is not yet available for review.

* Finally, Sen. Joe Lieberman (I-Conn.) is proposing SA 1191, which would make it more attractive to aliens seeking to game our already broken immigration apparatus by encouraging refugee and asylum fraud.

The Menendez amendment, 1194, failed, 53-44. It would have changed the cut-off date for reducing the “backlog” of family-sponsored immigration applicants from May 1, 2005, to January 1, 2007, the same date by which illegal aliens must have been unlawfully present in the United States in order to receive amnesty under this bill. Would have added 110,000 green cards a year for adult children and sibling backlog reduction.

Cornyn's SA 1250 passes, 57-39. It bars illegal aliens seeking amnesty under S1348 from submitting “sworn affidavits from nonrelatives” as proof of unlawful work or unlawful presence in the United States. Eliminates provisions protecting the confidentiality of the information contained in amnesty applications and, instead, requires the sharing of application-related information upon the request of a law enforcement agency, intelligence, or national security agency, or DHS component when requested in connection with a duly-authorized investigation of a civil violation.

Sessions SA 1234 passed 56-41: Prohibits foreign workers imported through this bill’s new Y “guestworker” program and illegal aliens granted “probationary status” (i.e., amnesty) from claiming the Earned Income Tax Credit unless their status is adjusted to lawful permanent resident.

Reid SA 1331 passed 57-40: Prohibits any provision of this bill from having an impact on the Internal Revenue Code's treatment of illegal aliens' eligibility for the Earned Income Tax Credit.

Bingaman SA 1267 (for himself and Sen. Obama) failed 41-57. Would have removed the requirement that Y "temporary" nonimmigrant workers (as provided for in the underlying legislation) leave the United States before they renew their visas – not by modifying the length of their authorized stay (i.e., up to six years), but by mandating that they be given visas that expire after two years and that are renewable twice.

8:24pm Eastern. At this moment, the Senate is voting an amendment by Kyl. There's no text available, but it is SA 1460--a "side-by-side" amendment with SA 1194 (Menendez) that addresses concerns related to the family-sponsored immigration backlog.

The vote: Kyl amendment is approved.

Yea - 51
Nay - 45

Next up: SA 1182, the Thomas amendment. Supports the Shadow Wolves program for border tracking and apprehension. Passes without debate.

Now: SA 1272, Schumer amendment. Passes without debate. No text available.

8:32pm Eastern. SA 1183. Hillary Clinton on the floor. Her amendment would reclassify the spouses and minor children of lawful permanent residents as immediate relatives. "It is our view that we must make reuniting families a priority of our immigration system...reform immigration to bring families together...This amendment is not considered a bill-killer...I hope this chamber would endorse this act of compassion and common-sense..."

Specter: Effect of the Clinton amendment would be for current green-cardholders to bring in a potential of 800,000 spouses and minor children. In addition, after 8 years of backlog-clearing under the current proposal, the 12 million illegal aliens on a path to citizenship would then be able to bring in all their minor children and spouses.

Kyl notes that Clinton amendment would obliterate the right between a citizen and LPR to bring over spouses and minor children.

Time up for Hillary. Discussion of Inhofe and Salazar amendments on English language, Vitter on exit tracking.

9:25pm Eastern. Obama takes his turn to attack the merit-based point system. Proposes SA 1202 to sunset the point system after 5 years instead of 14 years as written in S1348. "We're not proposing to strike the system from the bill...but should be reexamined..."

9:34pm Eastern. Ugh. Lindsay "You are all bigots" Graham is on the floor. He is all worked up about Obama's amendment. The camera can't keep up with his gesticulating. "Bipartisanship is music to the American people's ears...some of us have been beat up...thank you to my friend, Sen. McCain...what a sweet idea it is to give people a second chance in life...when they say why can't you work together, this is it!!!"

What the hell?

Obama assails Graham's histrionics. I have to agree. NumbersUSA points out: "The timeline for granting permanent resident status to illegal aliens granted amnesty – be it in five years or in 13 years – is of little consequence considering they have already been given what they came here to obtain: jobs and legal status."

9:40pm Eastern. Sen. Hutchinson squeezes in a few last words about her amendment 1415. Sen. Inhofe pitches his English language amendment 1151.

9:47pm Eastern. Kennedy opposes amendments by Ensign and Vitter.

12:20am updates...

Obama amendment 1202 to sunset point-system rejected.

Vitter amendment 1339 to require exit system in place before guest worker programs triggered rejected.

Inhofe amendment to require English as official language passes. Salazar amendment 1384 on English also passes.

Ensign amendment 1374 to improve point-system rejected.

Clinton amendment rejected.

***
Previous:

June 6- Who voted against the Cornyn amendment? Which Repubs voted for the Kennedy amendment?
June 6- Shamnesty on the Senate floor, Day 2; Sen. Sessions knocks sense into the Dems; Specter sides with Kennedy; 12:25pm Kennedy amendment passes; 12:37pm Cornyn amendment fails
June 5 - Shamnesty on the Senate floor; Allard amendment rejected; Durbin amendment passes; Reid, McConnell spar on amendment limits; Reid--"We're going to file cloture on this bill today"; Hutchison, Cornyn call out Dems stalling

AMNESTY BILL UPDATE

2007-06-06T09:29:00.001-07:00

Senate action on the amnesty bill. Here's what they accomplished yesterday:

Members today voted down (31-62) an amendment sponsored by Sen. Wayne Allard (R-Colo.) that would have ensured that green card applicants who entered the country illegally were not given preference under a merit-based processing system over those who have waited outside the country for their immigration status to be approved. So ... we forgive the law breakers at the expense of the law-abiders. Sound like amnesty to you?

The Senate adopted an amendment (71-22) sponsored by Assistant Majority Leader Dick Durbin (D-Ill.) that would eliminate provisions authorizing the Department of Labor to waive requirements that employers in "labor shortage areas" offer jobs to U.S. workers before seeking to import foreign workers. Well now ... there's something positive to celebrate.

Notice, please, the absence of amendments give priority to securing our borders. Politicians are more concerned about getting the Hispanic vote than securing America for its legal citizens.

In the meantime, Alabama Republican Senator Jeff Sessions released an excellent report of 20 different loopholes he found in the bill.

-Loophole 1 – Legal Status Before Enforcement
-Loophole 2 – U.S. VISIT Exit Not In Trigger
-Loophole 3 – Trigger Requires No More Agents, Beds, or Fencing Than Current Law
-Loophole 4 -- Three Additional Years Worth of Illegal Aliens Granted Status, Treated Preferentially To Legal Filers
-Loophole 5 – Completion of Background Checks Not Required For Probationary Legal Status
-Loophole 6 – Some Child Molesters Are Still Eligible
-Loophole 7 – Terrorism Connections Allowed, Good Moral Character Not Required
-Loophole 8 – Gang Members Are Eligible
-Loophole 9 – Absconders Are Eligible
-Loophole 10 – Learning English Not Required For A Decade
-Loophole 11 – Earned Income Tax Credit Will Cost Taxpayers Billions In Just 10 Years
-Loophole 12 – Affidavits From Friends Accepted As Evidence
-Loophole 13 – Taxpayer Funded Legal Counsel and Arbitration
-Loophole 14 – In-State Tuition and Student Loans
-Loophole 15 – Inadequacy of the Merit System
-Loophole 16 – Visas For Individuals That Plan To Overstay
-Loophole 17 – Chain Migration Tippled Before Being Eliminated
-Loophole 18 – Back Taxes Not Required
-Loophole 19 – Social Security Credits Allowed For Some Illegal Work Histories
-Loophole 20 – Criminal Fines Not Proportional To Conduct

Are those not enough reasons for you? Can Bush still claim that criticism is nothing more than empty political rhetoric? No. The loopholes point to the fact that there is no middle-ground way to tackle immigration reform. There are too many holes in the bill that will only drag down the immigration process for those who come legally. And for those who are illegal ... they will only continue to benefit from the lack of enforcement and new reforms.

Oh ... and by the way ... as we discussed yesterday, the Congressional Budget Office has come out with its own study [pdf] which shows that if the current amnesty bill is made law it will only stem illegal immigration by about 25 percent. Now that's something to brag about, isn't it?

FOX NEWS ISN'T REAL NEWS?

2007-06-06T09:27:00.000-07:00

Anyone who thinks that any news source out there is unbiased is fooling themselves. You have been brainwashed by liberal media outlets to believe that their news is the "right" news ... that it is balanced and lacking expression of political beliefs or opinions.

Sorry .. but that is flat out wrong. It is impossible to rid the media of political bias. Media is not just about how you say something but what you choose to talk about. The New York Times putting the Muslim JFK plot on the 37th page—liberal media bias. Not acknowledging the fact that the conspirators were Muslim in their on-line digest, liberal media bias.

I say every day on this radio show that if you believe everything that I say and don't check it out for yourself, then you are making a big mistake. You are relying on one, clearly opinionated, source for your news and that does not make someone educated. You might be interested ... heck, you might even find it entertaining! But to assume that any media news source is the be-all-end-all of the "truth" is just just not all that bright.

That brings us to Bernard Shaw, one of CNN's most well-known retired anchors, Shaw says that Fox News isn't really news. He says it's "commentary and personal analysis." Sorry .. but I think Shaw has it wrong. There have been non-partisan studies of the major news sources on television, and these studies have pretty much shown that most, if not all, of the major broadcast news organizations are very much liberal in their viewpoint, their choice of news stories and their presentation. I said most. There is an exception. These studies have shown that Fox News can't be defined as liberal. Nor can it be defined as conservative. That would be Fox News. Fox presents its news in what these studies have described as a centrist manner. The commentary? Well, that would be something else. Perhaps the problem here is that our government educated people can't really differentiate between commentary and news.

Shaw says, "Unfortunately, Fox News is the ratings leader . . . on the cable side of the business, and what Fox puts on the air is not news." I think what we're dealing with here is a bit of sour grapes. How dare Fox bring higher ratings than CNN! Who do they think they are?

Well there you have it. Anchors at CNN deliver the "right" news, while Fox News is simply discredited. This is a typical liberal tactic. Rather than refute arguments or ideas presented on Fox, liberals just slap a conservative label on it and call it a day. There is no point in arguing. Liberals know best, and nothing else it worth addressing.

MURTHA: IRAQ IS TO BLAME FOR JFK PLOT

2007-06-05T04:16:00.001-07:00

How long was it going to take before a Defeatocrat came up with this one? John Murtha—our favorite moonbat from Pennsylvania—says that the terrorists arrested in the JFK plot were a product of the war in Iraq. Basically, if we had not gone into Iraq, this terrorist plot would never have come about. He is the boat with 9/11 conspiracy theorists and all those who sympathize with "freedom fighters" and the "peaceful" religion of Islam.

What has this man been smoking? If this was the excuse for the JFK plot, than who does he blame the 9/11 attacks on? He does not understand that the fundamental hatred of terrorists is not based on our presence in Iraq. Rather, this hatred is based on a general hatred for our culture. It almost seems as if moonbats like Murtha want nothing more than to see America defeated by Islam. Why? It can't be that they don't recognize the threat! Is there anger over losing power in Washington in 1994, and the election to Bush in 2000 so intense that they would actually endanger their country to exact revenge?

The intelligence gathering of this plot should be commended, as our understanding of what it takes to fight radical jihadists grows under this administration. Rather than bow to the wishes of such extremism, we will face it. Yes, mistakes were made it Iraq but that has nothing to do with the long-standing hatred of radicals, like the terrorists arrested in the JFK plot. John Murtha is full of horse-squeeze. It is comments like this that make me wonder about the people that continue to elect this man into office.

THE TOP TEN REASONS WHY ANOTHER AMNESTY IS SWELL FOR AMERICA

2007-06-02T07:21:00.000-07:00

By Don Feder

Some of you out there think amnesty is a four-letter word. Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich spoke for you when he warned, "The announcement... that the White House and a group of senators have reached an agreement on 'comprehensive immigration reform' should have the same effect that the word 'iceberg' had on the passengers and crew of the Titanic."

Erroneous! Another amnesty for an estimated 12 million to 20 million illegal aliens is just what the doctor ordered -- if Jack Kevorkian is the attending physician.

Here are the top ten reasons why another amnesty will be the best thing to happen to America since the influenza epidemic of 1918 and the Wall Street Crash of '29.

1. We can't send them all back -- The argument conjures up images of swarms of heavily armed agents in jackboots, all dead ringers for Major Strasser in "Casablanca," kicking down doors and dragging away terrified occupants. That only happens if the feds are coming for 6-year-old Cubans fleeing Castro's gulag, and Janet Reno is Attorney General.

` Posing an impossibility (deporting every illegal in the land) as the only alternative to an absurdity (amnesty) makes the latter look realistic.

We can't catch every murderer, rapist, child pornographer or drug dealer either. So -- what the heck -- let's stop enforcing those laws too.

I know. I know. We really don't have to catch them all -- just dry up their sources of employment and most will leave voluntarily. But, keep it to yourself.

2. They're taking jobs Americans don't want -- This is another way of saying that corporations, contractors, restaurants, landscapers, etc. want cheap, docile labor (and are delighted to have you, the taxpayer, make up the difference in increased social service/law enforcement costs). In reality, almost anyone will take any job at the right wage. Corporate America wants low, subsidized wages.

Thomas Sowell points out that even in the agricultural sector (generally thought of as the province of border-jumpers), only 24% of all workers are illegal. Where did farmers find the Americans to handle the other 76% of their labor?

On the other end of the spectrum, many of those employed in rebuilding areas devastated by Katrina were illegal. Bet you didn't know that carpentry and welding were jobs Americans don't want.

3. An amnesty will help control our borders -- If we no longer have borders, controlling them will be a breeze. Last year, Congress authorized a fence along 700 miles of our 2,000 mile-long border with Mexico. Guess how many miles have been built to date? Two. But as every savvy proponent of comprehensive immigration reform knows, the way to control our borders is with magnets, not barriers. Build it and they won't come?

Just imagine, if this amnesty goes through, anyone who can procure two documents (a utility bill, a rent receipt) purporting to show that they've been here since January 1, 2007 can apply for a "Z" visa. Rest assured, this will not set off a mad dash for the border, as millions more from Mexico seek economic asylum -- any more than this amnesty will lure future illegals here in hopes of yet another.

4. Diversity is our greatest strength -- Bringing in hordes of people who want to live in America, but not to be Americans, will make us stronger. Admitting those who are contemptuous of our history and heritage will make us stronger. Legalizing aliens who question our right to exist as a nation will make us stronger. National suicide will make us stronger, as a nation.

This year's pro-amnesty demonstrations featured arrogant mendicants marching with signs that read "We are indigenous! The ONLY owners of this continent." What a great way to start their journey toward citizenship and assimilation.

If the presence of millions upon millions of Mexicans who think we stole their country will make us more vibrant, just imagine what a growing population of those who call us infidels for not embracing their religion will do for our national unity. A recent Pew Research poll of American Muslims showed only 26% believe the war on terror is a sincere effort to reduce terrorism, 40% think Arabs did not carry out the 9/11 attacks, and a hefty 26% of religion-of-peace-niks under 30 believe suicide bombings are justified. Can't get more diverse than that.

5. English is sooo boring! -- In 1980, 11% of adult Americans spoke a language other than English at home. By 1990, that figure rose to 14%. In 2000, it was 18%. Do you discern a trend here?

Isn't it fun to get an automated answering machine that instructs you to press "1" if you want to continue in English? (Wait until we're given the option of pressing "8" to continue in Swahili and "9" to continue in Arabic.) Don't you enjoy going to a shopping mall and hearing the new Americans jabber in their native tongues? Bilingualism has proved such a blessing for Canada. Wait till we have multilingualism here.

Besides, under Executive Order 13166, the federal government now requires grant recipients (including hospitals) to provide interpreters for everyone who can't communicate in the language they're supposed to speak when they come here. And think of all the trees we can sacrifice for government forms printed in Spanish, Portuguese, Russian, Arabic, Urdu and Tagalog.

6. It's a great way to grow the welfare state -- Amnestied illegals are immediately eligible for Medicaid and nearly 60 other welfare programs.

The undocs (undocumented workers) made kosher will eventually bring in a score of family members, through aptly termed chain migration. Among other benefits, children of the newly legalized will get public school educations worth $9,600 a piece, on average.

The Heritage Foundation's Robert Rector estimates that, in government benefits alone, this amnesty will cost us approximately $2 trillion. More government spending means more government workers and more power in the hands of politicians. This is just one frequently overlooked blessing of amnesties.

7. It's compassionate -- Especially for the working class and urban minorities -- who are on the receiving end of this particular brand of compassion.

In testimony before Congress, T. Willard Fair (president of the Urban League of Greater Miami) recalled that back in 1965, Ted Kennedy, architect of that year's comprehensive immigration reform, assured us: "The bill will not flood our cities with immigrants. It will not cause American workers to lose their jobs." (And we were dumb enough to believe him!)

Harvard scholar George Borjas found that immigration (legal and illegal) has cut the wages of American men without a high school diploma by roughly $1,800 a year. Fair says that since 1965, one-third of the drop in black male employment can be attributed to immigration.

There aren't a lot of surgeons, lawyers, newspaper editors and foundation presidents wading across the Rio Grande. It's those on the lower rungs of the economic ladder who get knocked off by illegal aliens. How can we deny Ted Kennedy another opportunity to feel compassionate on the backs of the native-born poor and working class?

8. Cops don't have enough to do -- 29% of all federal inmates are criminal aliens. In the last 5 years, 72,000 aliens have been arrested on drug charges alone.

More than 30,000 illegal-alien gang members operate in 33 states (including the notorious Salvadoran Mara Salvatrucha 13), dealing in drugs, arms and prostitution. All a gang member has to do to be amnestied is to sign "a renunciation of gang affiliation" form. (How about notes from their mothers saying they promise to behave?)

In Indianapolis, 27-year-old Jonathan Castillo is under arrest for raping a 7-year-old girl. According to the local news, Castillo is an undocumented rapist. Clearly, we don't have enough indigenous perverts, drug-dealers and gang members, and so needs must import them.

9. Terrorists Deserve a Fighting Chance -- Under the Comprehensive Immigration Deform act now before the Senate, the government has 24 hours to do background checks on amnesty applicants. If nothing turns up, Abu Illegal gets a provisional amnesty that he can use to run around the country legally.

But there's no unified database. Information about those with terrorist ties is buried in the archives of dozens of foreign governments, and can take months to dig out.

Of the 6 terrorists recently arrested for plotting an attack on Fort Dix, three were in the country illegally for at least 20 years. The standard argument for our Iraq intervention is that if we don't fight them (Al Qaeda, et al) there, we'll have to fight them here. Whatever happens in Iraq, thanks to Comprehensive Immigration Reform, we'll have plenty of chances to fight them here too.

10. It's good politics -- Pro-amnesty politicians operate on the premise that, while Middle Americans (normally comatose) won't retaliate, amnestied illegals on their way to citizenship and their supporters will show their gratitude at the ballot box. It's a classic case of sacrificing the national interest to scrounge a few votes. Think of it as a going-out-of-business sale -- for America.

If the Comprehensive Immigration Reform bomb is detonated, you can begin your journey to bilingualism by practicing the following phrase -- "Hasta la vista, America!"

THINKING ABOUT THE TB GUY

2007-06-01T16:10:00.001-07:00

Now ... let's address all of this hysteria over the TB Guy. It turns out that he's an attorney. A personal injury attorney, no less. His name is Andrew Speaker.

Everyone seems to be in a lather over the idea that he endangered an entire plane load of people by coming back to the United States on a Czech airliner.

Methinks we're approaching the point of hysteria here.

According to Speaker, all the time he has been diagnosed with TB he has been interacting with his family, his daughter and his finance, now wife. He had been told repeatedly that he did not present a threat to others. Did they tell him not to travel to Europe? Yes, they did. But Speaker has a tape of these people telling him not to travel to Europe not because he was a threat to others, but because they felt they had to warn him not to travel to cover their own rear ends.

I believe that the bottom line here is that this man felt that his best chance of recovery was to get to that TB hospital in Denver. He also believed that he did not present a contagious threat to others. Doctors had repeatedly told him that he was not contagious and not a treat. Then they tell him that he can't come back home.

Put me in his place... same circumstances ... same promises that he wasn't a threat .. and I'm going to do everything I can to get around the government bureaucracy and get to Denver. The American government would just not be worthy of my trust in this situation. The CDC says now that they were working hard to get him home. Somehow I'm having a hard time believing that.

We need to stop hammering this guy and try to figure out why our great Homeland Security system couldn't keep him out of this country. He was on a no-fly list. His name was on a computer at every border crossing. Yet he got through. Let's study that situation, and leave this guy alone to try to recover from his disease.

Oh ... and before we move on, we need to say this. Andy Speaker is a personal injury lawyer. Turn the situation around just a bit. Let someone who was on that airplane contact him for representation. How long before we would see the lawsuits fly!

Bottom line. The guy has a life-threatening disease. He wanted to get home. He was told that he wasn't a threat to other people. He saw the impossible American government bureaucracy getting in his way. He did what he had to do to protect himself. You would do the same.

AL GORE AND THE FAIRNESS DOCTRINE

2007-05-31T04:55:00.000-07:00

It looks like I agreed with OwlGore for about minute this week when he criticized Americans' obsession with celebrity gossip. Well he is back to his liberal bit-government self again. This time he is joining the ranks of Fairness Doctrine supporters.

On CBS' "Early Show" with Harry Smith, Al Gore said, "the first concerns among defenders of democracy arose with radio. And that's why the equal time provision and the fairness doctrine and the public interest standard were put in place here. Those protections were almost completely removed during President Reagan's term."

There you have it. OwlGore feels that the government should set the "public interest standards" for radio shows like this one. Well, maybe I am a low man on the totem poll, but liberals loathe the conservative influence in talk radio. They just can't stand the fact that people like Hannity, Limbaugh, Ingraham, and even little old me can get up here and yap for hours and hours and they can't do a darned thing to limit what I talk about.

What is so different about what Hugo Chavez in doing in Venezuela? Weren't those pretty much the same words that Hugo used when he seized the nation's most popular television station, a station critical of his rule? Chavez said he was "democratizing" the public's airwaves? Gore excuses his desire to shut down talk radio by referring "defenders of democracy."

Al is losing his political touch here. Sure, there was no real secret that he, along with the rest of the left, wants to shut down talk radio. After all, every attempt at bringing a successful left-wing talk show to the airwaves has met with failure. So, the rule in government is if you can't beat 'em, shut 'em down. But just how stupid do you have to be to voice your threat to shut down talk radio just days after your leftist fellow traveler Hugh Chavez shut down an opposition television station in Venezuela? And then you use virtually the same language that Chavez used to justify your plans?

Poor Al Gore. Perhaps he was listening yesterday when I covered the news story about global warming on Neptune.

THE DANGERS OF DOING 'NOTHING' ABOUT ILLEGAL IMMIGRATION

2007-05-30T07:09:00.000-07:00

Posted by Bobby Eberle

In a recent statement to the media, the #2 Republican in the Senate, Trent Lott of Mississippi, said in reference to the immigration deal brokered by the White House and a select group of senators, that the “only thing that’s unacceptable is to do nothing.”

So… it’s unacceptable, even dangerous to do “nothing,” about illegal immigration? Let’s take a look at what doing “nothing” actually does for us.

Last year, the Congress passed a bill which the president signed creating close to 800 miles of security fencing along America’s southern border. The “grand bargain,” as it’s being called in the Senate, calls for hundreds fewer miles of border fencing. Hmmm… let’s see… this means by doing “nothing” and not passing this terrible immigration bill, we actually get MORE border fence. That doesn’t sound unacceptable or dangerous to me.

Next, let’s look at employer enforcement. There are numerous laws on the books right now to crack down on the hiring of illegal aliens. What’s lacking, of course, is the political will to enforce those laws. For some reason, the White House and some members of the Senate want America to believe that with the new bill will come a new courage to enforce those laws? Show of hands… how many believe that??? So, by doing “nothing,” we still have laws against hiring illegal aliens and still have an administration with no spine for enforcement. I guess it’s not really dangerous or unacceptable to not pass the bill in this case either… let’s just enforce the laws we have.

How about economics? The White House says there are jobs Americans simply won’t do… that we NEED cheap labor and this Senate bill is the way to go. First of all, this is ridiculous. Pay a real wage for the hard work, and Americans would do it. Oh… prices would rise, you say? How much are we paying now in taxes for health care, social services, education, and more for illegal aliens? Imagine not having to pay all those extras taxes… I’d pay a little bit more for my oranges if that were the case.

In addition, the “temporary” worker plan does more than provide for cheap labor to come into America. According to the bill, each “temporary” worker is allowed to bring his spouse and children with him. Thus, the temporary worker has now become a permanent family in America which will likely draw more social services. The bill has yet to address the problem of “anchor babies,” so if these temporary workers have children in America, those children are now U.S. citizens. That doesn’t sound very temporary to me.

Then, there is the concept of deporting those who continue to break the law. As I noted in a previous posting, Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff said that “illegal immigrants living in the United States who don’t try to gain legal worker status will be forced to leave.”

“The people who don’t apply and don’t get the Z visa are going to be hunted down and they’re going to get deported,” Chertoff told FOX News. “So there’s a very clear choice: You can either bring yourself into the system and find, you know, safety, pay your fine, and work within the law, or you can stay outside the law and we’re going to focus our attention on those people and deport them.”

Now, one has to ask… How many of the 12-20 million illegal aliens will decide it’s better to keep the status quo than go through the hassles of a Z Visa? It will likely be millions. What the administration and Senate “leaders” are saying is that with the passage of this bill, America will deport the law breakers. Wait a second… Didn’t they say it was impractical to consider mass deportation? Isn’t that what they are saying they will do if the new bill is passed? Ok, then let’s go after law breakers now and deport them! We don’t need a new bill to do that, do we?

We have the laws in place, both old and recent, to increase the level of Border Patrol Agents, to construct hundreds of miles of security fencing, and to punish employers for illegal hiring practices. We can deport law-breakers now, and we have a system that allows for legal immigration. Add a strong dose of political cajones, and not passing this bill doesn’t seem so “dangerous” or “unacceptable” to me.

PRESIDENT BUSH AND "EMPTY RHETORIC"

2007-05-30T04:24:00.000-07:00

By Michelle Malkin

The Founding Fathers: They meant what they wrote

President Bush attacked immigration enforcement proponents for engaging in "empty political rhetoric"--and the NYTimes was all too happy to report on it:

President Bush today accused opponents of his proposed immigration measure of fear-mongering to defeat it in Congress, and took on his own conservative political base as he did so.
“If you want to scare the American people, what you say is the bill’s an amnesty bill,” Mr. Bush said this afternoon at a training center for border enforcement agents located in this town in Georgia’s southeastern corner. “That’s empty political rhetoric, trying to frighten our citizens.”

President Bush, meet the Preamble to the U.S. Constitution:

We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America.

President Bush, meet Article IV, Section IV of the U.S. Constitution:

The United States shall guarantee to every State in this Union a Republican Form of Government, and shall protect each of them against Invasion; and on Application of the Legislature, or of the Executive (when the Legislature cannot be convened) against domestic Violence.

President Bush, meet your oath of office in accordance with Article II, Section I of the U.S. Constitution:

"I do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will faithfully execute the office of President of the United States, and will to the best of my ability, preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States."

Talk about "empty rhetoric," President Bush.

HUGO CHAVEZ AND THE FAIRNESS DOCTRINE

2007-05-29T18:19:00.000-07:00

Jealousy is an ugly thing. And jealousy is especially ugly when you have freely elected leaders from a country that prides itself on a dedication to freedom and individual liberty being openly jealous of a dictator.

Such is the case with Venezuela's Hugo Chavez.

Hugo the Horrible has now accomplished in Venezuela what Democrats only wish they could accomplish here at home. He has silenced a broadcast outlet that was critical of his regime. Sunday night Venezuela's most popular television station went off the air. Why? Because Chavez decided that their broadcast license would not be renewed. Radio Caracas Television was the only TV station in Venezuela that was broadcast nationwide ... and Radio Caracas Television was critical of Hugo Chavez.

Are you starting to get the picture here?

Chavez says he is "democratizing" the public's airways. He also said that this TV station was a threat to his country. Wow! Now doesn't that sound very much like the things that the left is saying about talk radio in the U.S.?

What Chavez accomplished by edict the left in this country hopes to accomplish through legislation and regulation.

Just be patient, my friends on the left. Your time is coming. The impotent Republicans pose no threat to you in 2008. In the meantime, just sit back and admire your friend Hugo.

We should note that Venezuelans are protesting Chavez' actions. He'll tolerate some protests --- but let's hope these people know just how far they can push it. My wife and I were being shown around Caracas many years ago when we noticed some demonstrators. It was quite a spectacle to watch ... until the gunfire started. Our guide rushed us into a building to keep us safe.

How soon before Chavez answers these protestors with gunfire?

Hold on another second here. We can't let this segment go without mentioning that Hugo Chavez is the hero of such great Americans as Cindy Sheehan (see below), Danny Glover, Harry Belafonte and others. Great Americans all. Coming soon, don't miss Michael Moore's exciting documentary on the evils of Radio Caracas Television!

CINDY SHEEHAN TURNS IN HER CARD

2007-05-29T03:45:00.000-07:00

By Michelle Malkin

Cindy Sheehan bids adieu on The Daily Kos:

I was the darling of the so-called left as long as I limited my protests to George Bush and the Republican Party. Of course, I was slandered and libeled by the right as a “tool” of the Democratic Party. This label was to marginalize me and my message. How could a woman have an original thought, or be working outside of our “two-party” system?
However, when I started to hold the Democratic Party to the same standards that I held the Republican Party, support for my cause started to erode and the “left” started labeling me with the same slurs that the right used…

The most devastating conclusion that I reached this morning, however, was that Casey did indeed die for nothing…

I am going to take whatever I have left and go home.

And "home" would be...Caracas?

I hear Cindy's squeeze Hugo has just acquired a few TV stations in need of far Left propagandist news directors...

***
More on the turmoil in Venezuela from Fox News producer and eyewitness Nora Zimmett. FNC's Adam Housley blogged the protests.

***

Matt at Blackfive remembers Casey Sheehan the right way.

FIREARMS REFRESHER COURSE

2007-05-27T10:24:00.001-07:00

"Those who hammer their guns into plows will plow for those who do not."
- Thomas Jefferson

FIREARMS REFRESHER COURSE

1. An armed man is a citizen. An unarmed man is a subject.
2. A gun in the hand is better than a cop on the phone.
3. Colt: The original point and click interface.
4. Gun control is not about guns; it's about control.
5. If guns are outlawed, can we use swords?
6. If guns cause crime, then pencils cause misspelled words.
7. "Free" men do not ask permission to bear arms.
8. If you don't know your rights you don't have any.
9. Those who trade liberty for security have neither.
10. The United States Constitution (c) 1791. All Rights reserved.
11. What part of "shall not be infringed" do you not understand?
12. The Second Amendment is in place in case the politicians ignore the others.
13. 64,999,987 firearms owners killed no one yesterday.
14. Guns only have two enemies; rust and politicians.
15. Know guns, know peace, know safety. No guns, no peace, no safety.
16. You don't shoot to kill; you shoot to stay alive.
17. 911 - government sponsored Dial-a-Prayer.
18. Assault is a behavior, not a device.
19. Criminals love gun control -- it makes their jobs safer.
20. If guns cause crime, then matches cause arson.
21. Only a government that is afraid of its citizens tries to control them.
22. You only have the rights you are willing to fight for.
23. Enforce the "gun control laws" we ALREADY have, don't make more.
24. When you remove the people's right to bear arms, you create slaves.
25. The American Revolution would never have happened with gun control.
26. "A government of the people, by the people, for the people..."

PLEASE PASS THIS 'REFRESHER' ON TO FREE CITIZENS