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Saturday, May 28, 2011
How to Respond to attacks on Sarah Palin
When the Democratic talking-heads say: "Sarah Palin did not finish out her term as goveror..." Someone needs to remind them that Barack Obama did not finish out 1/10 of his term as U.S. Senator before he began running for President.
Prez dude served what? 6 Months in the Senate before he started running for President while taxpayers paid his salary?
Prez dude served what? 6 Months in the Senate before he started running for President while taxpayers paid his salary?
Superintendent to Governor: 'Make My School a Prison'
Are inmates treated better than students?
A public school superintendent asked Gov. Rick Snyder to “make my school a prison” as he complained about proposed budget cuts in a letter to the editor he recently submitted to local papers.
In the May 11 letter, Ithaca Public Schools Superintendent Nathan Bootz wrote, “Consider the life of a Michigan prisoner. They get three square meals a day. Access to free health care. Internet. Cable television. Access to a library. A weight room. Computer lab. They can earn a degree. A roof over their heads. Clothing. Everything we just listed we DO NOT provide to our school children.”
The district confirmed this week that the two elementary schools and the high school each have their own media center and library. The high school also has a weight room. And in August of 2010, voters approved a $3.4 million bond for roof replacement and for technology equipment.
Bootz didn’t respond to emails seeking comment.
State Rep. Tom McMillin called the letter “inflammatory rhetoric.”
“The guy just can’t be serious,” McMillin said. “It shows they don’t want to live in reality and make a few tough decisions.”
The state of Michigan spends about $2 billion to house about 45,400 prisoners. The state spent about $12 billion to educate about 1.5 million students.
But students are educated 180 days a year for 7.5 hours a day. Prisoners are housed 24/7.
Students cost roughly $6.46 per hour to educate. Prisoners cost $5.92 per hour to house. Michigan schools also receive federal funding that isn’t included in this hourly rate analysis.
“I’m willing to give Mr. Bootz the benefit of the doubt that he doesn’t seriously mean to turn schools into prisons,” said Paul Kersey, the director of labor policy at the Mackinac Center for Public Policy, in an email. “But when he says that ‘Schools are the one place on Earth that people look to to “fix” what is wrong with society,’ he is revealing an incredibly self-centered outlook that permeates the public school system. Important as education might be, public schools are not the only things that matter. We have police and prisons to apprehend and isolate criminals. We have fire and EMS units to respond to emergencies. These are every bit as important as public schools. Mr. Bootz needs to realize that there are people outside of the school system and even outside of government who do valuable work, and who need resources to do their jobs.”
A public school superintendent asked Gov. Rick Snyder to “make my school a prison” as he complained about proposed budget cuts in a letter to the editor he recently submitted to local papers.
In the May 11 letter, Ithaca Public Schools Superintendent Nathan Bootz wrote, “Consider the life of a Michigan prisoner. They get three square meals a day. Access to free health care. Internet. Cable television. Access to a library. A weight room. Computer lab. They can earn a degree. A roof over their heads. Clothing. Everything we just listed we DO NOT provide to our school children.”
The district confirmed this week that the two elementary schools and the high school each have their own media center and library. The high school also has a weight room. And in August of 2010, voters approved a $3.4 million bond for roof replacement and for technology equipment.
Bootz didn’t respond to emails seeking comment.
State Rep. Tom McMillin called the letter “inflammatory rhetoric.”
“The guy just can’t be serious,” McMillin said. “It shows they don’t want to live in reality and make a few tough decisions.”
The state of Michigan spends about $2 billion to house about 45,400 prisoners. The state spent about $12 billion to educate about 1.5 million students.
But students are educated 180 days a year for 7.5 hours a day. Prisoners are housed 24/7.
Students cost roughly $6.46 per hour to educate. Prisoners cost $5.92 per hour to house. Michigan schools also receive federal funding that isn’t included in this hourly rate analysis.
“I’m willing to give Mr. Bootz the benefit of the doubt that he doesn’t seriously mean to turn schools into prisons,” said Paul Kersey, the director of labor policy at the Mackinac Center for Public Policy, in an email. “But when he says that ‘Schools are the one place on Earth that people look to to “fix” what is wrong with society,’ he is revealing an incredibly self-centered outlook that permeates the public school system. Important as education might be, public schools are not the only things that matter. We have police and prisons to apprehend and isolate criminals. We have fire and EMS units to respond to emergencies. These are every bit as important as public schools. Mr. Bootz needs to realize that there are people outside of the school system and even outside of government who do valuable work, and who need resources to do their jobs.”
Europe Staring Into Yawning Financial Abyss
It has come to this. A year after rescuing Greece from default, Europe is staring into the abyss. The bailout has proved insufficient. Greece needs more money, and it can't borrow from private markets where it faces interest rates as high as 25%.
But Europe's governments are reluctant to advance more funds unless other lenders — banks, bondholders — absorb some losses by writing down their debts. This, however, would constitute a default, risking a broader banking crisis that might torpedo Europe's fragile recovery in France, Germany and elsewhere. There is no easy escape.
What's called a "debt crisis" is increasingly a political and social crisis. Looming over the financial complexities is the broader question of the ability — or willingness — of weak debtor nations to endure growing hardship to service their massive government debts.
Already, unemployment is 14.1% in Greece, 14.7% in Ireland, 11.1% in Portugal and 20.7% in Spain. What are the limits of austerity? Steep spending cuts and tax increases do curb budget deficits; but they also create deep recessions, lowering tax revenues and offsetting some of the deficit improvement.
Just how long this grinding process can continue is unclear. In Spain, the incumbent socialist party lost big in recent elections. Popular unrest persists in Greece amid signs, reports the Washington Post, of a "resurgence of an anarchist movement" there and elsewhere.
Some causes of Europe's plight are well-known: the harsh recession following the 2008-2009 financial crisis; aging populations coupled with costly welfare states. But there's also another less-recognized culprit: the euro, the single currency now used by 17 countries.
Launched in 1999, it aimed to foster economic and political unity. Economic growth would improve. Costly currency conversions would cease; money would flow smoothly across borders to the best profit opportunities.
Using euros — and not marks or lira — Germans, Italians and others would increasingly consider themselves "Europeans." For a while, it seemed to succeed. In its first decade, jobs in countries using the common euro increased by 16 million. It was a mirage. The euro helped create the crisis and has made its resolution harder, as an International Monetary Fund report shows.
Loaned Too Much
For starters, the euro fostered a credit bubble that led to booms in housing, borrowing and consumer spending. When each country had its own currency, the country's central bank (its Federal Reserve) regulated local interest rates and credit conditions.
With the euro, the European Central Bank (ECB) assumed that job. But one policy didn't fit all: Interest rates suited to Germany and France were too low for "periphery" countries (Greece, Ireland, Portugal and Spain).
"Financial markets" — private investors — compounded the problem by assuming that the euro's creation reduced risk. Weak countries would be protected by the strong. Money poured into the periphery countries.
There was a huge compression of interest rates. In 1997, 10-year Greek government bonds averaged 9.8% compared to 5.7% for similar German bonds. By 2003, Greek bonds fetched 4.3%, German bonds 4.1%.
"The markets failed. All this would not have occurred if banks in Germany and France had not lent so much," says economist Desmond Lachman of the American Enterprise Institute. "It was like the U.S. housing market." Both U.S. and European banks went overboard in relaxing credit standards.
Now that the credit bubble has burst, the euro impedes recovery. One way countries revive from financial crises is by devaluing their currencies. This makes exports and local tourism cheaper, creating some job gains that cushion the ill effects of austerity elsewhere. But latched to the euro, Greece and other vulnerable debtors forfeit this safety valve.
Greece's debt is approaching an unsustainable 160% of its gross domestic product. If it defaulted, investors might dump bonds of other weak debtors fearing they too would default. That could send interest rates soaring and saddle European banks with huge losses.
At the end of 2010, Europe's banks had about $1.3 trillion of loans and investments, both governmental and private, in Greece, Ireland, Spain and Portugal, says the Institute of International Finance, an industry research group. A banking crisis would imperil recovery.
So Europe is playing for time. It's struggling to delay any Greek default long enough for other vulnerable countries to demonstrate they can handle their debts. The very process makes the euro — contrary to original intent — a source of contention, as nations shift blame and costs to others.
Given Europe's huge debts, even the holding action may fail. It may merely postpone a broader crisis. "They may dodge this bullet," says Lachman, "but not the next."
But Europe's governments are reluctant to advance more funds unless other lenders — banks, bondholders — absorb some losses by writing down their debts. This, however, would constitute a default, risking a broader banking crisis that might torpedo Europe's fragile recovery in France, Germany and elsewhere. There is no easy escape.
What's called a "debt crisis" is increasingly a political and social crisis. Looming over the financial complexities is the broader question of the ability — or willingness — of weak debtor nations to endure growing hardship to service their massive government debts.
Already, unemployment is 14.1% in Greece, 14.7% in Ireland, 11.1% in Portugal and 20.7% in Spain. What are the limits of austerity? Steep spending cuts and tax increases do curb budget deficits; but they also create deep recessions, lowering tax revenues and offsetting some of the deficit improvement.
Just how long this grinding process can continue is unclear. In Spain, the incumbent socialist party lost big in recent elections. Popular unrest persists in Greece amid signs, reports the Washington Post, of a "resurgence of an anarchist movement" there and elsewhere.
Some causes of Europe's plight are well-known: the harsh recession following the 2008-2009 financial crisis; aging populations coupled with costly welfare states. But there's also another less-recognized culprit: the euro, the single currency now used by 17 countries.
Launched in 1999, it aimed to foster economic and political unity. Economic growth would improve. Costly currency conversions would cease; money would flow smoothly across borders to the best profit opportunities.
Using euros — and not marks or lira — Germans, Italians and others would increasingly consider themselves "Europeans." For a while, it seemed to succeed. In its first decade, jobs in countries using the common euro increased by 16 million. It was a mirage. The euro helped create the crisis and has made its resolution harder, as an International Monetary Fund report shows.
Loaned Too Much
For starters, the euro fostered a credit bubble that led to booms in housing, borrowing and consumer spending. When each country had its own currency, the country's central bank (its Federal Reserve) regulated local interest rates and credit conditions.
With the euro, the European Central Bank (ECB) assumed that job. But one policy didn't fit all: Interest rates suited to Germany and France were too low for "periphery" countries (Greece, Ireland, Portugal and Spain).
"Financial markets" — private investors — compounded the problem by assuming that the euro's creation reduced risk. Weak countries would be protected by the strong. Money poured into the periphery countries.
There was a huge compression of interest rates. In 1997, 10-year Greek government bonds averaged 9.8% compared to 5.7% for similar German bonds. By 2003, Greek bonds fetched 4.3%, German bonds 4.1%.
"The markets failed. All this would not have occurred if banks in Germany and France had not lent so much," says economist Desmond Lachman of the American Enterprise Institute. "It was like the U.S. housing market." Both U.S. and European banks went overboard in relaxing credit standards.
Now that the credit bubble has burst, the euro impedes recovery. One way countries revive from financial crises is by devaluing their currencies. This makes exports and local tourism cheaper, creating some job gains that cushion the ill effects of austerity elsewhere. But latched to the euro, Greece and other vulnerable debtors forfeit this safety valve.
Greece's debt is approaching an unsustainable 160% of its gross domestic product. If it defaulted, investors might dump bonds of other weak debtors fearing they too would default. That could send interest rates soaring and saddle European banks with huge losses.
At the end of 2010, Europe's banks had about $1.3 trillion of loans and investments, both governmental and private, in Greece, Ireland, Spain and Portugal, says the Institute of International Finance, an industry research group. A banking crisis would imperil recovery.
So Europe is playing for time. It's struggling to delay any Greek default long enough for other vulnerable countries to demonstrate they can handle their debts. The very process makes the euro — contrary to original intent — a source of contention, as nations shift blame and costs to others.
Given Europe's huge debts, even the holding action may fail. It may merely postpone a broader crisis. "They may dodge this bullet," says Lachman, "but not the next."
Romney the RINO: "I Support the Subsidy of Ethanol"
DES MOINES, Iowa -- On his first trip back to the nation's first voting state as a soon-to-be declared presidential candidate, former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney reaffirmed his support for federal ethanol subsidies -- an always important campaign issue in Iowa that figures to take on an even more central role in the divided GOP field.
"I support the subsidy of ethanol," Romney told a potential voter after an event here was cut short by a fire alarm. "I believe ethanol is an important part of our energy solution in this country."
Support for ethanol subsidies has long been considered a political necessity for candidates who want to succeed in the Iowa caucuses, but former Minnesota Gov. Tim Pawlenty tested that maxim on Monday during his official campaign announcement here.
"The truth about federal energy subsidies, including federal subsidies for ethanol, is that they have to be phased out," Pawlenty said. "We need to do it gradually. We need to do it fairly. But we need to do it."
Pawlenty was widely praised in fiscally conservative circles for taking a stance against the subsidies, which cost taxpayers about $5 billion in 2010, while former House Speaker Newt Gingrich has been singled out for criticism by influential conservative media outlets, including the Wall Street Journal editorial board, for his vocal support of subsidized ethanol.
Romney supported ethanol subsidies during his unsuccessful 2008 presidential run, in which he largely banked on winning the Iowa caucuses but finished a disappointing second to former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee.
In the first two of his three scheduled Iowa appearances on Friday, Romney was peppered with questions about his commitment to the 2012 caucuses and was asked more than once why he's chosen New Hampshire, rather than the Hawkeye State, as the venue where he will officially announce his candidacy on Thursday.
Romney noted that New Hampshire was "next door" to his campaign headquarters in Boston.
"I'm fully committed to Iowa and the process," Romney told reporters, adding that he and his political team had not yet settled on a strategy as to how he will spend his time and resources and whether he would participate in the August straw poll in Ames.
Still, it was clear that Romney intended to downplay the social issues that were a major staple of his Iowa campaign throughout 2007, instead speaking almost exclusively about jobs and the economy and his decades of experience in the private sector.
Dressed in a Brooks Brothers button-down shirt and blue jeans (he later changed into khakis), Romney had a little more gray sprinkled into his famously well-coifed hair than he did the last time he campaigned here, but he appeared just as energized and eager to engage with both voters and the media as he did the last time around.
However, his campaign entourage was noticeably smaller than the one he typically travelled with in the last cycle. "These are lean times," Romney said. "We've got a lean campaign."
Romney will spend Friday night in Cedar Rapids after attending a local GOP picnic in the eastern Iowa city.
"I support the subsidy of ethanol," Romney told a potential voter after an event here was cut short by a fire alarm. "I believe ethanol is an important part of our energy solution in this country."
Support for ethanol subsidies has long been considered a political necessity for candidates who want to succeed in the Iowa caucuses, but former Minnesota Gov. Tim Pawlenty tested that maxim on Monday during his official campaign announcement here.
"The truth about federal energy subsidies, including federal subsidies for ethanol, is that they have to be phased out," Pawlenty said. "We need to do it gradually. We need to do it fairly. But we need to do it."
Pawlenty was widely praised in fiscally conservative circles for taking a stance against the subsidies, which cost taxpayers about $5 billion in 2010, while former House Speaker Newt Gingrich has been singled out for criticism by influential conservative media outlets, including the Wall Street Journal editorial board, for his vocal support of subsidized ethanol.
Romney supported ethanol subsidies during his unsuccessful 2008 presidential run, in which he largely banked on winning the Iowa caucuses but finished a disappointing second to former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee.
In the first two of his three scheduled Iowa appearances on Friday, Romney was peppered with questions about his commitment to the 2012 caucuses and was asked more than once why he's chosen New Hampshire, rather than the Hawkeye State, as the venue where he will officially announce his candidacy on Thursday.
Romney noted that New Hampshire was "next door" to his campaign headquarters in Boston.
"I'm fully committed to Iowa and the process," Romney told reporters, adding that he and his political team had not yet settled on a strategy as to how he will spend his time and resources and whether he would participate in the August straw poll in Ames.
Still, it was clear that Romney intended to downplay the social issues that were a major staple of his Iowa campaign throughout 2007, instead speaking almost exclusively about jobs and the economy and his decades of experience in the private sector.
Dressed in a Brooks Brothers button-down shirt and blue jeans (he later changed into khakis), Romney had a little more gray sprinkled into his famously well-coifed hair than he did the last time he campaigned here, but he appeared just as energized and eager to engage with both voters and the media as he did the last time around.
However, his campaign entourage was noticeably smaller than the one he typically travelled with in the last cycle. "These are lean times," Romney said. "We've got a lean campaign."
Romney will spend Friday night in Cedar Rapids after attending a local GOP picnic in the eastern Iowa city.
US offers $14.5 million for Somalia food aid
Nurture thy enemies!
"The United States has approved a $14.5 million contribution to the World Food Programme to benefit Somalis in need of food assistance," Mark Toner, a State Department spokesman, told reporters.
"The United States is also staging approximately 19,000 metric tons of food aid and it's prepositioning sites worldwide in order to be prepared for additional emergency food assistance in the weeks and the months to come," he added.
He said the United States has already provided around $15 million in food assistance, $23 million in non-food humanitarian aid, and $27 million in development assistance since 2010.
"The United States has been the largest overall donor of humanitarian and food aid to Somalia. Since 1991 the US has provided more than $1 billion in humanitarian assistance to Somalia," he said.
In February, UN official Valerie Amos said drought in Somalia is threatening two million people, the vast majority living in zones controlled by radical Islamist insurgents where it is impossible to send aid.
"The United States has approved a $14.5 million contribution to the World Food Programme to benefit Somalis in need of food assistance," Mark Toner, a State Department spokesman, told reporters.
"The United States is also staging approximately 19,000 metric tons of food aid and it's prepositioning sites worldwide in order to be prepared for additional emergency food assistance in the weeks and the months to come," he added.
He said the United States has already provided around $15 million in food assistance, $23 million in non-food humanitarian aid, and $27 million in development assistance since 2010.
"The United States has been the largest overall donor of humanitarian and food aid to Somalia. Since 1991 the US has provided more than $1 billion in humanitarian assistance to Somalia," he said.
In February, UN official Valerie Amos said drought in Somalia is threatening two million people, the vast majority living in zones controlled by radical Islamist insurgents where it is impossible to send aid.
G8 leaders praise Arab Spring activists
Leaders at the Group of Eight summit in France expressed their support for democracy activists in the Middle East and North Africa on Friday but stopped short of pledging money to support them.
The G8 leaders raised the possibility that multilateral development banks could provide more than $20 billion to support reforms in Egypt and Tunisia, where popular uprisings dislodged authoritarian rulers.
French President Nicolas Sarkozy said the amount of aid could reach $40 billion. In addition to the possible $20 billion, he cites about $10 billion in bilateral commitments not mentioned in the G8 summit's communique and $10 billion in contributions from Gulf Arab states such as Saudi Arabia, Qatar and Kuwait.
"The changes under way in the Middle East and North Africa are historic and have the potential to open the door to the kind of transformation that occurred in Central and Eastern Europe after the fall of the Berlin Wall," the G8 leaders said in a statement.
Time.com: Never meet again | GPS: Relevance proven
"The aspiration of people for freedom, human rights, democracy, job opportunities, empowerment and dignity, has led them to take control of their own destinies in a growing number of countries in the region."
The G8 is made up of the United States, France, the United Kingdom, Germany, Japan, Italy, Canada, and Russia. They meet regularly to coordinate actions on a range of issues. The United States will host the annual G8 meeting next year.
RELATED TOPICS
Group of Eight
France
In a statement, the G8 unveiled an initiative called the Deauville Partnership -- named for the city in France where the leaders met. It seeks to address the Arab Spring, the wave of anti-government demonstrations that started in Tunisia and have since roiled several countries in the Middle East and North Africa, including Egypt, Syria, Yemen and Bahrain.
The partnership focuses on political reform and economic growth.
"We met with the prime ministers of Egypt and Tunisia, and decided to launch an enduring partnership with those countries engaging in a transition to democracy and tolerant societies," the G8 leaders said. "Our common goal is to develop the rule of law and citizen engagement as well as foster economic and social reforms to meet the aspirations of the people."
Obama ends trip in Poland
The partnership hopes to generate economic transition and integration into the regional and global economy. The G8 leaders asked senior foreign and finance ministries to meet in coming months to forge a framework for the effort.
"While Egypt and Tunisia registered economic growth over the past decade, these gains were not widely disbursed. Over the medium and long term, the United States and other members of the G8 commit to support partnership countries in addressing underlying economic challenges in order to broaden economic opportunity," the G8 said.
The group also intends to help Egypt and Tunisia recover stolen assets, and it praised the work of both countries to present their economic plans of actions to international donors.
The group also focused on creating "the political space for democracy" and promoting freedom of expression. It is also committed to tackling illiteracy and unemployment .
The G8 leaders raised the possibility that multilateral development banks could provide more than $20 billion to support reforms in Egypt and Tunisia, where popular uprisings dislodged authoritarian rulers.
French President Nicolas Sarkozy said the amount of aid could reach $40 billion. In addition to the possible $20 billion, he cites about $10 billion in bilateral commitments not mentioned in the G8 summit's communique and $10 billion in contributions from Gulf Arab states such as Saudi Arabia, Qatar and Kuwait.
"The changes under way in the Middle East and North Africa are historic and have the potential to open the door to the kind of transformation that occurred in Central and Eastern Europe after the fall of the Berlin Wall," the G8 leaders said in a statement.
Time.com: Never meet again | GPS: Relevance proven
"The aspiration of people for freedom, human rights, democracy, job opportunities, empowerment and dignity, has led them to take control of their own destinies in a growing number of countries in the region."
The G8 is made up of the United States, France, the United Kingdom, Germany, Japan, Italy, Canada, and Russia. They meet regularly to coordinate actions on a range of issues. The United States will host the annual G8 meeting next year.
RELATED TOPICS
Group of Eight
France
In a statement, the G8 unveiled an initiative called the Deauville Partnership -- named for the city in France where the leaders met. It seeks to address the Arab Spring, the wave of anti-government demonstrations that started in Tunisia and have since roiled several countries in the Middle East and North Africa, including Egypt, Syria, Yemen and Bahrain.
The partnership focuses on political reform and economic growth.
"We met with the prime ministers of Egypt and Tunisia, and decided to launch an enduring partnership with those countries engaging in a transition to democracy and tolerant societies," the G8 leaders said. "Our common goal is to develop the rule of law and citizen engagement as well as foster economic and social reforms to meet the aspirations of the people."
Obama ends trip in Poland
The partnership hopes to generate economic transition and integration into the regional and global economy. The G8 leaders asked senior foreign and finance ministries to meet in coming months to forge a framework for the effort.
"While Egypt and Tunisia registered economic growth over the past decade, these gains were not widely disbursed. Over the medium and long term, the United States and other members of the G8 commit to support partnership countries in addressing underlying economic challenges in order to broaden economic opportunity," the G8 said.
The group also intends to help Egypt and Tunisia recover stolen assets, and it praised the work of both countries to present their economic plans of actions to international donors.
The group also focused on creating "the political space for democracy" and promoting freedom of expression. It is also committed to tackling illiteracy and unemployment .
Obama's Regulatory Cuts Come Up Way Short
Regulation: Nobody should be fooled by President Obama's latest effort to appear business-friendly by trimming a few old federal regulations. This is still the most pro-regulation, anti-business administration in decades.
Back in January, just after Republicans took control of the House of Representatives, Obama issued an executive order calling on agencies to sweep out their regulatory closets and toss any unneeded rules and regulations.
Last week, dozens of agencies delivered their lists, offering up hundreds of outdated, redundant or just plain crazy regulations that could be scrapped.
The Occupational Safety and Health Administration, for example, found $40 million worth of redundant workplace reporting rules. The EPA discovered it was treating spilled milk at dairy farms like the Exxon Valdez, at a cost to the dairy industry of $146 million a year.
Cass Sunstein, head of the White House Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs, claimed that "the reforms have the potential to save billions of dollars."
If the agencies actually cut all this useless red tape — a process that in most cases still requires lengthy review and could easily be jettisoned — that's good news.
But in the end it's meaningless, since Obama is at the same time eagerly imposing a vast array of rules and regulations on every nook and cranny of the economy, the costs of which will overwhelm whatever minor savings his regulatory review achieves. Consider:
• The number of pages in the Federal Register — the government's central repository of new regulations — leapt 18% from 2009 to 2010.
• In just his first 18 months in office, Obama imposed 43 major regulations that will cost businesses more than $26 billion. As the Heritage Foundation noted in a report out last fall, that's "far more than any other year for which records are available."
• As ObamaCare kicks in, it will saddle the health care industry with a mind-boggling amount of new rules. Just six pages of text in the law already resulted in 429 pages of regulations.
• The Dodd-Frank financial overhaul will require 243 rule makings by 11 federal agencies, the Heritage report notes. That doesn't include whatever mischief the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau dreams up.
• The paperwork burden for the FCC's net neutrality rule — which supposedly would keep Internet service providers from restricting consumers' online access — is reportedly so extensive and time consuming that, five months after announcing it, the agency still hasn't been able to issue the rule.
• As IBD reported last week, the Education Department is getting ready to impose a new rule on for-profit colleges that, according to Democrats and Republicans alike, will hamstring this once thriving industry with costly new regulatory burdens.
On and on it goes. Obama wants credit for recognizing that federal regulations hamper economic growth, often without providing any real benefits in return.
He doesn't deserve that credit. Not as long as he continues to wage regulatory war on every front of the private economy.
Back in January, just after Republicans took control of the House of Representatives, Obama issued an executive order calling on agencies to sweep out their regulatory closets and toss any unneeded rules and regulations.
Last week, dozens of agencies delivered their lists, offering up hundreds of outdated, redundant or just plain crazy regulations that could be scrapped.
The Occupational Safety and Health Administration, for example, found $40 million worth of redundant workplace reporting rules. The EPA discovered it was treating spilled milk at dairy farms like the Exxon Valdez, at a cost to the dairy industry of $146 million a year.
Cass Sunstein, head of the White House Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs, claimed that "the reforms have the potential to save billions of dollars."
If the agencies actually cut all this useless red tape — a process that in most cases still requires lengthy review and could easily be jettisoned — that's good news.
But in the end it's meaningless, since Obama is at the same time eagerly imposing a vast array of rules and regulations on every nook and cranny of the economy, the costs of which will overwhelm whatever minor savings his regulatory review achieves. Consider:
• The number of pages in the Federal Register — the government's central repository of new regulations — leapt 18% from 2009 to 2010.
• In just his first 18 months in office, Obama imposed 43 major regulations that will cost businesses more than $26 billion. As the Heritage Foundation noted in a report out last fall, that's "far more than any other year for which records are available."
• As ObamaCare kicks in, it will saddle the health care industry with a mind-boggling amount of new rules. Just six pages of text in the law already resulted in 429 pages of regulations.
• The Dodd-Frank financial overhaul will require 243 rule makings by 11 federal agencies, the Heritage report notes. That doesn't include whatever mischief the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau dreams up.
• The paperwork burden for the FCC's net neutrality rule — which supposedly would keep Internet service providers from restricting consumers' online access — is reportedly so extensive and time consuming that, five months after announcing it, the agency still hasn't been able to issue the rule.
• As IBD reported last week, the Education Department is getting ready to impose a new rule on for-profit colleges that, according to Democrats and Republicans alike, will hamstring this once thriving industry with costly new regulatory burdens.
On and on it goes. Obama wants credit for recognizing that federal regulations hamper economic growth, often without providing any real benefits in return.
He doesn't deserve that credit. Not as long as he continues to wage regulatory war on every front of the private economy.
Sarah Palin could take the Presidency from Obama in 2012
Among the many speculators who love to offer their opinions regarding who will be the next United States President, the voice of Rush Limbaugh is a familiar, if not rather annoying one. He seems to think that if Republican Sarah Palin runs it will give the message that he is “beatable” and no first term president wants to hear he may not be capable of earning enough votes for that second term. That means he has not been in especially high favor those first four years, and perhaps he has not earned the respect and the votes he captured that first time around and those who did vote for him have since developed “buyer’s remorse”.
It is considered that Sarah Palin will announce her candidacy in an upcoming bus trip she has planned and that makes many Republicans worry. Because she actually has a chance this time… a chance of winning it all. And she learned she loves the attention even if some of it is negative. Palin has suffered from media attacks and came to realize it just goes with the territory when it comes to high public offices. As others have said Palin has gotten her feet wet during the first go around and now will be in a far better position to counter-act or simply ignore the negative remarks that every candidate must face. Like a gauntlet or trial under fire, it takes thick skin and a single mindedness to get past the trials and that makes a candidate all the tougher.
Democrats always seem to spend too much time attacking those they fear most, especially when they are going to be fighting such an uphill battle as the 2012 election will most likely be. Watch and see just how hard they try to discredit Sarah Palin as well as Mitt Romney, Herman Cain, Newt Gingrich, Gary Johnson and the rest of the pack in the coming months.
It is considered that Sarah Palin will announce her candidacy in an upcoming bus trip she has planned and that makes many Republicans worry. Because she actually has a chance this time… a chance of winning it all. And she learned she loves the attention even if some of it is negative. Palin has suffered from media attacks and came to realize it just goes with the territory when it comes to high public offices. As others have said Palin has gotten her feet wet during the first go around and now will be in a far better position to counter-act or simply ignore the negative remarks that every candidate must face. Like a gauntlet or trial under fire, it takes thick skin and a single mindedness to get past the trials and that makes a candidate all the tougher.
Democrats always seem to spend too much time attacking those they fear most, especially when they are going to be fighting such an uphill battle as the 2012 election will most likely be. Watch and see just how hard they try to discredit Sarah Palin as well as Mitt Romney, Herman Cain, Newt Gingrich, Gary Johnson and the rest of the pack in the coming months.
Harper's role in Middle East peace efforts causes stir at G8
Hey Canada let's swap!
DEAUVILLE, France — Prime Minister Stephen Harper praised a G8 resolution on the Middle East peace process Friday that, according to a media report, was watered down at his request to avoid a reference that has infuriated Israel.
The stir at the summit over Harper's role arose as the G8 leaders emerged with a $40-billion U.S. plan to help Egypt and Tunisia transform from dictatorships to democracies.
French President Nicolas Sarkozy said $20 billion would come from multilateral institutions, such as the African Development Bank, $10 billion from Saudi Arabia, Qatar and Kuwait, and $10 billion in direct bilateral aid from G8 countries — including $1 billion from France.
But Canada refused to commit to any country-to-country aid, saying it has given sufficient funding since 2009 to multilateral institutions tasked to help the region.
Reuters cited diplomatic sources saying that Harper insisted there be no reference to Israel's borders before 1967, when it seized the West Bank and Gaza from Jordan and Egypt, respectively, during the Six Day War.
U.S. President Barack Obama's recent call for negotiations with the Palestinians to be based on those prewar lines has infuriated Israel, even though the U.S. position is that negotiations will then include "land swaps."
"The Canadians were really very adamant, even though Obama expressly referred to 1967 borders in his speech last week," a European diplomat told the news agency.
Harper — seen internationally as one of Israel's most fervent supporters — neither confirmed nor denied the report when asked twice about it by Canadian reporters.
"We are pleased that the statement that came out of the G8 was a balanced statement," Harper said.
According to the Jerusalem Post, Israeli Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman called his Canadian counterpart John Baird Friday and thanked him and Harper for their pro-Israel stance at the G8 summit. Lieberman said during the conversation that "Canada is a true friend of Israel."
The resolution expressed "strong support" for Obama's vision set out in the speech, and called for a new round of negotiations.
"We are convinced that the historic changes throughout the region make the solution of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict through negotiations more important, not less," the G8 said.
Harper said he has no problem with Obama's speech, saying it had to be considered in its "entirety." He noted that Obama supported the creation of a demilitarized Palestinian state and a Jewish state, the latter of which would rule out the longstanding Palestinian demand that refugees and their families living outside Israel have the right to return.
Sarkozy, meanwhile, told reporters he strongly supported Obama's "courageous" focus on the 1967 borders.
The Middle East peace issue was part of a larger effort by the G8 countries — Canada, the U.S., Russia, Japan, Britain, France, Germany and Italy — to deal with the fallout from the Arab Spring.
Tunisian Finance Minister Jalloul Ayed said Friday he wasn't surprised Canada didn't put any new money on the table, blaming the problem on the lack of a historic bilateral relationship.
"Since it is not a historical partner, we did not really expect much in terms of contributions at this stage from Canada, but it is something we have to work on," Ayed said.
Critics didn't pull their punches.
Canadian foreign policy analysts were less forgiving of Harper's position.
"While there are certainly many demands on Canada's modest aid budget, it is important to recognize that the 'Arab Spring' is of momentous importance for the future economic, political, and strategic evolution of the Middle East," McGill University political scientist Rex Brynen told Postmedia News in an email.
"Given that, one would have thought that Canada might have joined its G8 partners in finding additional resources to support transitions to democracy."
Fen Hampson, director of Carleton University's Norman Paterson School of International Affairs, said Canada needs to "step up to the plate" with a significant bilateral aid package.
"We are among the strongest economies in the G8 and we should open our wallets," Hampson said.
The G8 communique called on Libyan dictator Moammar Gadhafi to abandon power, and Harper said the NATO-led campaign against his forces — which includes Canadian warplanes — is making progress.
He said he wants to extend Canada's mission there past June and will consult Parliament about that plan.
"The rebels have sustained their gains in the east of the country and I think there continues to be evidence that the power of the Gadhafi regime continues to be degraded."
Harper pointed out that the G8 reaffirmed its commitment to the Muskoka Initiative for Maternal, Newborn and Child Health launched at the 2010 summit in Canada.
His officials also noted that there were two references to the importance of minority religious rights in the Middle East and North Africa.
Harper, who announced during the election campaign the planned creation of an office at Foreign Affairs devoted to that issue, has regularly raised concerns about treatment of Egypt's Coptic Christian community.
Following his trip to France, Harper is travelling to Greece for two days to meet with Greek Prime Minister George Papandreou and visit the site of a Second World War Nazi atrocity.
DEAUVILLE, France — Prime Minister Stephen Harper praised a G8 resolution on the Middle East peace process Friday that, according to a media report, was watered down at his request to avoid a reference that has infuriated Israel.
The stir at the summit over Harper's role arose as the G8 leaders emerged with a $40-billion U.S. plan to help Egypt and Tunisia transform from dictatorships to democracies.
French President Nicolas Sarkozy said $20 billion would come from multilateral institutions, such as the African Development Bank, $10 billion from Saudi Arabia, Qatar and Kuwait, and $10 billion in direct bilateral aid from G8 countries — including $1 billion from France.
But Canada refused to commit to any country-to-country aid, saying it has given sufficient funding since 2009 to multilateral institutions tasked to help the region.
Reuters cited diplomatic sources saying that Harper insisted there be no reference to Israel's borders before 1967, when it seized the West Bank and Gaza from Jordan and Egypt, respectively, during the Six Day War.
U.S. President Barack Obama's recent call for negotiations with the Palestinians to be based on those prewar lines has infuriated Israel, even though the U.S. position is that negotiations will then include "land swaps."
"The Canadians were really very adamant, even though Obama expressly referred to 1967 borders in his speech last week," a European diplomat told the news agency.
Harper — seen internationally as one of Israel's most fervent supporters — neither confirmed nor denied the report when asked twice about it by Canadian reporters.
"We are pleased that the statement that came out of the G8 was a balanced statement," Harper said.
According to the Jerusalem Post, Israeli Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman called his Canadian counterpart John Baird Friday and thanked him and Harper for their pro-Israel stance at the G8 summit. Lieberman said during the conversation that "Canada is a true friend of Israel."
The resolution expressed "strong support" for Obama's vision set out in the speech, and called for a new round of negotiations.
"We are convinced that the historic changes throughout the region make the solution of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict through negotiations more important, not less," the G8 said.
Harper said he has no problem with Obama's speech, saying it had to be considered in its "entirety." He noted that Obama supported the creation of a demilitarized Palestinian state and a Jewish state, the latter of which would rule out the longstanding Palestinian demand that refugees and their families living outside Israel have the right to return.
Sarkozy, meanwhile, told reporters he strongly supported Obama's "courageous" focus on the 1967 borders.
The Middle East peace issue was part of a larger effort by the G8 countries — Canada, the U.S., Russia, Japan, Britain, France, Germany and Italy — to deal with the fallout from the Arab Spring.
Tunisian Finance Minister Jalloul Ayed said Friday he wasn't surprised Canada didn't put any new money on the table, blaming the problem on the lack of a historic bilateral relationship.
"Since it is not a historical partner, we did not really expect much in terms of contributions at this stage from Canada, but it is something we have to work on," Ayed said.
Critics didn't pull their punches.
Canadian foreign policy analysts were less forgiving of Harper's position.
"While there are certainly many demands on Canada's modest aid budget, it is important to recognize that the 'Arab Spring' is of momentous importance for the future economic, political, and strategic evolution of the Middle East," McGill University political scientist Rex Brynen told Postmedia News in an email.
"Given that, one would have thought that Canada might have joined its G8 partners in finding additional resources to support transitions to democracy."
Fen Hampson, director of Carleton University's Norman Paterson School of International Affairs, said Canada needs to "step up to the plate" with a significant bilateral aid package.
"We are among the strongest economies in the G8 and we should open our wallets," Hampson said.
The G8 communique called on Libyan dictator Moammar Gadhafi to abandon power, and Harper said the NATO-led campaign against his forces — which includes Canadian warplanes — is making progress.
He said he wants to extend Canada's mission there past June and will consult Parliament about that plan.
"The rebels have sustained their gains in the east of the country and I think there continues to be evidence that the power of the Gadhafi regime continues to be degraded."
Harper pointed out that the G8 reaffirmed its commitment to the Muskoka Initiative for Maternal, Newborn and Child Health launched at the 2010 summit in Canada.
His officials also noted that there were two references to the importance of minority religious rights in the Middle East and North Africa.
Harper, who announced during the election campaign the planned creation of an office at Foreign Affairs devoted to that issue, has regularly raised concerns about treatment of Egypt's Coptic Christian community.
Following his trip to France, Harper is travelling to Greece for two days to meet with Greek Prime Minister George Papandreou and visit the site of a Second World War Nazi atrocity.
Be Confident: We're the Majority
BEGIN TRANSCRIPT
RUSH: I want to start out here today with a little bit of a lesson. This is a story in the Daily Caller.com, Chatsworth Osborne Jr.'s website, and this story I dare say will never see the light of day in the Drive-By Media. But here we go: "According to a recent Sachs/Mason Dixon poll --" and Mason-Dixon's a credible bunch "-- obtained exclusively by The Daily Caller, a large majority of the public backs an amendment to the Constitution requiring a balanced budget, a reform some lawmakers say is on the table in the debt ceiling debate."
Does that surprise you? Does me. We're talking the US Constitution. Sixty-five percent of the public supports a balanced budget amendment to the US Constitution, 65%. Only 27% oppose; 8% are undecided. Eighty-one percent of Republicans support the idea. Sixty eight percent of independents support the idea. "Even a plurality of Democrats, the party that typically resists spending cuts, back the amendment by a 45 percent to 44 percent margin. 'Americans are concerned about our nation’s deepening deficit and as a result, an overwhelming number support a balanced budget amendment,' said Alia Faraj-Johnson, Partner and Executive Vice President of Ron Sachs Communications, the organization that commissioned the poll. A large plurality -- 46 percent to 21 percent -- also say they would be 'more likely' to vote for a presidential candidate who backs the amendment."
Okay. Now, what is the lesson here, ladies and gentlemen? 'Cause I'll bet that beyond the Internet and this program, maybe some other talk shows, this story will never see the light of day on any mainstream news outlet. Instead they're out there hammering Medicare reform, continuing to distort and lie about that. I'm not stressing the fact that it won't be heard or seen in the mainstream media 'cause they're liberal. The point here is and the little lesson here is that people ought not get down in the dumps about our agenda. Our agenda is a majority agenda.
Folks, I know it is a tough thing to resist the media onslaught every day. It's tough. Even I, El Rushbo, have to consciously figuratively slap myself in the face sometimes to avoid getting caught up in the everyday media narrative. The everyday media narrative is that Obama's overwhelmingly popular; the vast majority of the American people want a socialist welfare state; the vast majority of the American people are unconcerned and uninformed about budgets, spending, and debt. The overall media narrative each and every day is that liberalism is preferred and actively supported by a large margin. That's the everyday mantra and narrative. And of course accompanying that is the notion that all of us are a small minority, really disconnected from the mainstream of our country, that we're just oddballs and our concerns are so old-fashioned and irrelevant and in fact even sometimes embarrassing.
That's the attempt every day, I don't care what the story is. I don't care whether it's foreign policy news, domestic news, cultural news, whatever it is, the overriding narrative and template that I just cited is what guides the media every day. A great illustration of it was that paragraph excerpt from that hapless Rolling Stone piece on Roger Ailes and Fox yesterday, which said that 31% of Fox viewers actually believe scientists who say that there's a debate about global warming. I mean that's one of the greatest illustrations yet. Those realities, these liberal lies, the whole leftist agenda, lie after lie after lie, is so etched as unalterable truth, that anybody who opposes it is an oddball, kook, very weird, small in number. It's just the opposite.
We need to be positive about our agenda. We need to be enthusiastic about it. We need to be unapologetic. The public supports our agenda, 65% balanced budget amendment to the Constitution of the US, and there are other items, other policies that poll similar to this in terms of support. The public supports conservatism. The public lives their lives, a majority of them, as conservatives. It's also true that conservatism scares the left and liberalism more than any other force on the planet. And conservatism is a force. It is a powerful force and it frightens the left more than anything else, more than any other enemy.
The public, the voting public, the people who make this country work support cutting spending in big numbers. They support reforming entitlements in big majorities. They support limiting government in big majorities. The Republican leadership needs to learn this. The Republican leadership needs to accept this, happily so, and then run on these issues. They need to have press events every day. We hear next to nothing from the Senate leadership and the entire leadership is mostly reacting to liberal attacks or liberal policy premises rather than going on offense, as of course I frequently mention here. It's an oft repeated refrain on this program, always on defense, reacting to their premise rather than going on offense and establishing our own.
One of the areas, for example, that I think could qualify as a subject for everyday press conferences, the concept that lowering taxes increases revenue. Now, you and I know this, we believe it, we've lived it, we know it's the truth. We also know that there's an entire political party and ideological apparatus devoted to convincing people it's not true. Democrat Party, liberalism, high taxes, they also have people believing that they're concerned about raising revenue. They're not. If you really want to raise revenue to the Treasury, you lower taxes on all activity that generates revenue: corporate capital gains, personal income. You lower the rates and get out of the way. It works every time it's tried. There's a point, by the way, where you can't lower rates and raise revenue, but we're not at that point yet. That's what the Laffer Curve is. It shows you where you reach that point. Art Laffer. But we're not there yet.
We got plenty of room to lower rates, still create that's worth shouting every day, particularly in this climate. It's worth getting behind every day. It would establish and serve to educate and inform while making the policy point at the same time. Now, the Washington Post, of all places, has published a poll just a few days ago which showed the American people are far more worried about borrowing more money, raising the debt ceiling, than they are about defaulting on the debt. We reported that, we shared it with you from the Washington Post. So the public is with us. The public is us. We are the public. We are and represent a majority of the thinking in the country.
So again, we need to not get depressed or get down about our agenda because the public supports it. It's waiting to be tapped by a clever, engaged candidate.
BREAK TRANSCRIPT
RUSH: So during the break, the usual complaints: "Okay, so you say 65% of the American people support a balanced budget amendment, and that you conservatives have 60% support and all these other issues? What are these other issues? I noticed you didn't mention any." All right, you want me to mention 'em? Abortion. Gallup poll yesterday: 61% the American people are opposed to abortion. Immigration issues, closing the border. That's easy. Well over 60% of the American people oppose amnesty. Well over 60% of the American people oppose the Obama-Democrat Party solution for our immigration problem. They oppose it, clearly.
Obamacare, that number is close to 70% now of the American people who oppose Obamacare. Cutting government spending. Well, we just had the balanced budget amendment: 65%. Lowering taxes? Does somebody want to show me the poll that shows 55 or 60% of the American people favor raising taxes? You can't. That poll doesn't exist. Repealing regulations? Speaking of which, there's a great piece today. I'm gonna get to this in the first hour of the program today. It's actually a column by a Yale professor who ended up on a train or an airplane with a small business owner, and the Yale professor said, "You know, this is really worth my while. We professors deal in the abstract. We don't deal with human dynamism."
One of the most-often leveled observations and complaints by me on this program: Faceless people, statistics, plug them into policies and watch them behave according to the way a computer or a statistical mathematical formula would say they would behave, but you put a real person into it or a real business owner and start tacking on taxes and regulations. I really gotta praise the Yale prof for being honest about what he learned from a small business owner about why the small business owner will not hire. Now, the Yale prof also, in a continuation of yesterday, thinks the economy's growing when it's not -- and, by the way, there's another 60%. I'll guarantee you, 65% of the American people do not think that we're in recovery yet. The Democrats are in a minority on issue after issue after issue, and it's time for us to understand it and act like it.
BREAK TRANSCRIPT
RUSH: Appleton City, Missouri. This is Dexter. Welcome to the EIB Network, sir. Great to have you here.
CALLER: Well, thank you. Glad to be here. You were talking about getting the amendment to the Constitution for balanced budget, and I don't believe there is any agenda that has anything to do with that. I believe that the Americans are tired of having to pay their own bills and keep going the way they're supposed to and get the government doesn't have -- the government isn't held to -- the same high standard that the American people are.
RUSH: Oh, amen to that.
CALLER: And so I don't think there's an agenda. I don't think it's a Democrat thing; I don't think it's a conservative thing. I think it's an American thing. We're just tired of the government spending, spending, spending and --
RUSH: Yeah, but I wasn't trying to say there's an agenda. What I was trying to say is here's a poll out of the blue that shows that 65% of the American people support a balanced budget amendment. Now, to me, whether there's an actual movement to do that, not my point. My point on this is that the media, liberal, which we know, is that it's just another example, 65% of the American people support a balanced budget. That means support reducing spending. It means support not raising the debt limit. It means supporting all kinds of fiscal sanity, 65%. My point is that the public supports all of these things. The public supports exactly what you're talking about, cutting spending, reforming entitlements, limiting government. Of course we're held to standards the government doesn't hold to itself. But my point is the Republican leadership needs to run on these issues, and they need to have press events every day touting these issues. They don't need to be ashamed of what they believe. It's time to stop thinking they're in the minority. It's time to stop acting defensive about what they believe, because these issues are majority issues in terms of public opinion in the country.
END TRANSCRIPT
RUSH: I want to start out here today with a little bit of a lesson. This is a story in the Daily Caller.com, Chatsworth Osborne Jr.'s website, and this story I dare say will never see the light of day in the Drive-By Media. But here we go: "According to a recent Sachs/Mason Dixon poll --" and Mason-Dixon's a credible bunch "-- obtained exclusively by The Daily Caller, a large majority of the public backs an amendment to the Constitution requiring a balanced budget, a reform some lawmakers say is on the table in the debt ceiling debate."
Does that surprise you? Does me. We're talking the US Constitution. Sixty-five percent of the public supports a balanced budget amendment to the US Constitution, 65%. Only 27% oppose; 8% are undecided. Eighty-one percent of Republicans support the idea. Sixty eight percent of independents support the idea. "Even a plurality of Democrats, the party that typically resists spending cuts, back the amendment by a 45 percent to 44 percent margin. 'Americans are concerned about our nation’s deepening deficit and as a result, an overwhelming number support a balanced budget amendment,' said Alia Faraj-Johnson, Partner and Executive Vice President of Ron Sachs Communications, the organization that commissioned the poll. A large plurality -- 46 percent to 21 percent -- also say they would be 'more likely' to vote for a presidential candidate who backs the amendment."
Okay. Now, what is the lesson here, ladies and gentlemen? 'Cause I'll bet that beyond the Internet and this program, maybe some other talk shows, this story will never see the light of day on any mainstream news outlet. Instead they're out there hammering Medicare reform, continuing to distort and lie about that. I'm not stressing the fact that it won't be heard or seen in the mainstream media 'cause they're liberal. The point here is and the little lesson here is that people ought not get down in the dumps about our agenda. Our agenda is a majority agenda.
Folks, I know it is a tough thing to resist the media onslaught every day. It's tough. Even I, El Rushbo, have to consciously figuratively slap myself in the face sometimes to avoid getting caught up in the everyday media narrative. The everyday media narrative is that Obama's overwhelmingly popular; the vast majority of the American people want a socialist welfare state; the vast majority of the American people are unconcerned and uninformed about budgets, spending, and debt. The overall media narrative each and every day is that liberalism is preferred and actively supported by a large margin. That's the everyday mantra and narrative. And of course accompanying that is the notion that all of us are a small minority, really disconnected from the mainstream of our country, that we're just oddballs and our concerns are so old-fashioned and irrelevant and in fact even sometimes embarrassing.
That's the attempt every day, I don't care what the story is. I don't care whether it's foreign policy news, domestic news, cultural news, whatever it is, the overriding narrative and template that I just cited is what guides the media every day. A great illustration of it was that paragraph excerpt from that hapless Rolling Stone piece on Roger Ailes and Fox yesterday, which said that 31% of Fox viewers actually believe scientists who say that there's a debate about global warming. I mean that's one of the greatest illustrations yet. Those realities, these liberal lies, the whole leftist agenda, lie after lie after lie, is so etched as unalterable truth, that anybody who opposes it is an oddball, kook, very weird, small in number. It's just the opposite.
We need to be positive about our agenda. We need to be enthusiastic about it. We need to be unapologetic. The public supports our agenda, 65% balanced budget amendment to the Constitution of the US, and there are other items, other policies that poll similar to this in terms of support. The public supports conservatism. The public lives their lives, a majority of them, as conservatives. It's also true that conservatism scares the left and liberalism more than any other force on the planet. And conservatism is a force. It is a powerful force and it frightens the left more than anything else, more than any other enemy.
The public, the voting public, the people who make this country work support cutting spending in big numbers. They support reforming entitlements in big majorities. They support limiting government in big majorities. The Republican leadership needs to learn this. The Republican leadership needs to accept this, happily so, and then run on these issues. They need to have press events every day. We hear next to nothing from the Senate leadership and the entire leadership is mostly reacting to liberal attacks or liberal policy premises rather than going on offense, as of course I frequently mention here. It's an oft repeated refrain on this program, always on defense, reacting to their premise rather than going on offense and establishing our own.
One of the areas, for example, that I think could qualify as a subject for everyday press conferences, the concept that lowering taxes increases revenue. Now, you and I know this, we believe it, we've lived it, we know it's the truth. We also know that there's an entire political party and ideological apparatus devoted to convincing people it's not true. Democrat Party, liberalism, high taxes, they also have people believing that they're concerned about raising revenue. They're not. If you really want to raise revenue to the Treasury, you lower taxes on all activity that generates revenue: corporate capital gains, personal income. You lower the rates and get out of the way. It works every time it's tried. There's a point, by the way, where you can't lower rates and raise revenue, but we're not at that point yet. That's what the Laffer Curve is. It shows you where you reach that point. Art Laffer. But we're not there yet.
We got plenty of room to lower rates, still create that's worth shouting every day, particularly in this climate. It's worth getting behind every day. It would establish and serve to educate and inform while making the policy point at the same time. Now, the Washington Post, of all places, has published a poll just a few days ago which showed the American people are far more worried about borrowing more money, raising the debt ceiling, than they are about defaulting on the debt. We reported that, we shared it with you from the Washington Post. So the public is with us. The public is us. We are the public. We are and represent a majority of the thinking in the country.
So again, we need to not get depressed or get down about our agenda because the public supports it. It's waiting to be tapped by a clever, engaged candidate.
BREAK TRANSCRIPT
RUSH: So during the break, the usual complaints: "Okay, so you say 65% of the American people support a balanced budget amendment, and that you conservatives have 60% support and all these other issues? What are these other issues? I noticed you didn't mention any." All right, you want me to mention 'em? Abortion. Gallup poll yesterday: 61% the American people are opposed to abortion. Immigration issues, closing the border. That's easy. Well over 60% of the American people oppose amnesty. Well over 60% of the American people oppose the Obama-Democrat Party solution for our immigration problem. They oppose it, clearly.
Obamacare, that number is close to 70% now of the American people who oppose Obamacare. Cutting government spending. Well, we just had the balanced budget amendment: 65%. Lowering taxes? Does somebody want to show me the poll that shows 55 or 60% of the American people favor raising taxes? You can't. That poll doesn't exist. Repealing regulations? Speaking of which, there's a great piece today. I'm gonna get to this in the first hour of the program today. It's actually a column by a Yale professor who ended up on a train or an airplane with a small business owner, and the Yale professor said, "You know, this is really worth my while. We professors deal in the abstract. We don't deal with human dynamism."
One of the most-often leveled observations and complaints by me on this program: Faceless people, statistics, plug them into policies and watch them behave according to the way a computer or a statistical mathematical formula would say they would behave, but you put a real person into it or a real business owner and start tacking on taxes and regulations. I really gotta praise the Yale prof for being honest about what he learned from a small business owner about why the small business owner will not hire. Now, the Yale prof also, in a continuation of yesterday, thinks the economy's growing when it's not -- and, by the way, there's another 60%. I'll guarantee you, 65% of the American people do not think that we're in recovery yet. The Democrats are in a minority on issue after issue after issue, and it's time for us to understand it and act like it.
BREAK TRANSCRIPT
RUSH: Appleton City, Missouri. This is Dexter. Welcome to the EIB Network, sir. Great to have you here.
CALLER: Well, thank you. Glad to be here. You were talking about getting the amendment to the Constitution for balanced budget, and I don't believe there is any agenda that has anything to do with that. I believe that the Americans are tired of having to pay their own bills and keep going the way they're supposed to and get the government doesn't have -- the government isn't held to -- the same high standard that the American people are.
RUSH: Oh, amen to that.
CALLER: And so I don't think there's an agenda. I don't think it's a Democrat thing; I don't think it's a conservative thing. I think it's an American thing. We're just tired of the government spending, spending, spending and --
RUSH: Yeah, but I wasn't trying to say there's an agenda. What I was trying to say is here's a poll out of the blue that shows that 65% of the American people support a balanced budget amendment. Now, to me, whether there's an actual movement to do that, not my point. My point on this is that the media, liberal, which we know, is that it's just another example, 65% of the American people support a balanced budget. That means support reducing spending. It means support not raising the debt limit. It means supporting all kinds of fiscal sanity, 65%. My point is that the public supports all of these things. The public supports exactly what you're talking about, cutting spending, reforming entitlements, limiting government. Of course we're held to standards the government doesn't hold to itself. But my point is the Republican leadership needs to run on these issues, and they need to have press events every day touting these issues. They don't need to be ashamed of what they believe. It's time to stop thinking they're in the minority. It's time to stop acting defensive about what they believe, because these issues are majority issues in terms of public opinion in the country.
END TRANSCRIPT
This Is Your War on Drugs! (Video HERE)
We have another video of a raid by the Columbia Police Department. The action starts at 5:30. There’s more violence. More perfunctory dog killing. (I didn’t hear a single menacing growl, and the dogs were shot while retreating.) There’s more careless tossing of flash grenades. (They threw five, then, bizarrely, two more “to prove that the previous 5 grenades had done no damage.”) This raid, once again, was for marijuana.
I’ve become somewhat inoculated to the outrage in many these stories. I think you probably need to in order to write about this stuff every day. But I was shaking while watching this one. Then I let out a string of profanities. Then I gave my dog a hug.
All of which is why you need to watch it. And help distribute it as far and wide as the Columbia raid video from last year. This isn’t like watching video of a car accident or a natural disaster. This doesn’t have to happen. You’re watching something your government does to your fellow citizens about 150 times per day in this country. If this very literal “drug war” insanity is going to continue to be waged in our name, we ought to make goddamned sure everyone knows exactly what it entails. And this is what it entails. Cops dressed like soldiers breaking into private homes, tossing concussion grenades, training their guns on nonviolent citizens, and slaughtering dogs as a matter of procedure.
More details from the good people at Keep Columbia Free.
I’ve become somewhat inoculated to the outrage in many these stories. I think you probably need to in order to write about this stuff every day. But I was shaking while watching this one. Then I let out a string of profanities. Then I gave my dog a hug.
All of which is why you need to watch it. And help distribute it as far and wide as the Columbia raid video from last year. This isn’t like watching video of a car accident or a natural disaster. This doesn’t have to happen. You’re watching something your government does to your fellow citizens about 150 times per day in this country. If this very literal “drug war” insanity is going to continue to be waged in our name, we ought to make goddamned sure everyone knows exactly what it entails. And this is what it entails. Cops dressed like soldiers breaking into private homes, tossing concussion grenades, training their guns on nonviolent citizens, and slaughtering dogs as a matter of procedure.
More details from the good people at Keep Columbia Free.
Terrorist 'pre-crime' detector field tested in United States
Screening system aims to pinpoint passengers with malicious intentions.
Planning a sojourn in the northeastern United States? You could soon be taking part in a novel security programme that can supposedly 'sense' whether you are planning to commit a crime.
Future Attribute Screening Technology (FAST), a US Department of Homeland Security (DHS) programme designed to spot people who are intending to commit a terrorist act, has in the past few months completed its first round of field tests at an undisclosed location in the northeast, Nature has learned.
Like a lie detector, FAST measures a variety of physiological indicators, ranging from heart rate to the steadiness of a person's gaze, to judge a subject's state of mind. But there are major differences from the polygraph. FAST relies on non-contact sensors, so it can measure indicators as someone walks through a corridor at an airport, and it does not depend on active questioning of the subject.
The tactic has drawn comparisons with the science-fiction concept of 'pre-crime', popularized by the film Minority Report, in which security services can detect someone's intention to commit a crime. Unlike the system in the film, FAST does not rely on a trio of human mutants who can see the future. But the programme has attracted copious criticism from researchers who question the science behind it (see Airport security: Intent to deceive?).
From fiction to fact
So far, FAST has only been tested in the lab, so successful field tests could lend some much-needed data to support the technology. "It is encouraging to see an effort to develop a real empirical base for new technologies before any policy commitments are made," says Tom Ormerod, a psychologist in the Investigative Expertise Unit at Lancaster University, UK. Such testing, he adds, could lay the groundwork for a more rigorous randomized, controlled, double-blind study.
According to a privacy-impact statement previously released by the DHS, tests of FAST involve instructing some people passing through the system to carry out a "disruptive act". Ormerod questions whether such role-playing is representative of real terrorists, and also worries that both passengers and screeners will react differently when they know they're being tested. "Fill the place with machines that go ping, and both screeners and passengers start doing things differently."
In lab tests, the DHS has claimed accuracy rates of around 70%, but it remains unclear whether the system will perform better or worse in field trials. "The results are still being analysed, so we cannot yet comment on performance," says John Verrico, a spokesman for the DHS. "Since this is an ongoing scientific study, tests will continue throughout coming months."
Some scientists question whether there really are unique signatures for 'malintent' — the agency's term for the intention to cause harm — that can be differentiated from the normal anxieties of travel. "Even having an iris scan or fingerprint read at immigration is enough to raise the heart rate of most legitimate travellers," says Ormerod.
Steven Aftergood, a senior research analyst at the Federation of American Scientists, a think-tank based in Washington DC that promotes the use of science in policy-making, is pessimistic about the FAST tests. He thinks that they will produce a large proportion of false positives, frequently tagging innocent people as potential terrorists and making the system unworkable in a busy airport. "I believe that the premise of this approach — that there is an identifiable physiological signature uniquely associated with malicious intent — is mistaken. To my knowledge, it has not been demonstrated," he says. "Without it, the whole thing seems like a charade."
As for where precisely FAST is being tested, that for now remains a closely guarded secret. The DHS says that although the first round was completed at the end of March, more testing is in the works, and the agency is concerned that letting people know where the tests are taking place could affect the outcome. "I can tell you that it is not an airport, but it is a large venue that is a suitable substitute for an operational setting," says Verrico.
Planning a sojourn in the northeastern United States? You could soon be taking part in a novel security programme that can supposedly 'sense' whether you are planning to commit a crime.
Future Attribute Screening Technology (FAST), a US Department of Homeland Security (DHS) programme designed to spot people who are intending to commit a terrorist act, has in the past few months completed its first round of field tests at an undisclosed location in the northeast, Nature has learned.
Like a lie detector, FAST measures a variety of physiological indicators, ranging from heart rate to the steadiness of a person's gaze, to judge a subject's state of mind. But there are major differences from the polygraph. FAST relies on non-contact sensors, so it can measure indicators as someone walks through a corridor at an airport, and it does not depend on active questioning of the subject.
The tactic has drawn comparisons with the science-fiction concept of 'pre-crime', popularized by the film Minority Report, in which security services can detect someone's intention to commit a crime. Unlike the system in the film, FAST does not rely on a trio of human mutants who can see the future. But the programme has attracted copious criticism from researchers who question the science behind it (see Airport security: Intent to deceive?).
From fiction to fact
So far, FAST has only been tested in the lab, so successful field tests could lend some much-needed data to support the technology. "It is encouraging to see an effort to develop a real empirical base for new technologies before any policy commitments are made," says Tom Ormerod, a psychologist in the Investigative Expertise Unit at Lancaster University, UK. Such testing, he adds, could lay the groundwork for a more rigorous randomized, controlled, double-blind study.
According to a privacy-impact statement previously released by the DHS, tests of FAST involve instructing some people passing through the system to carry out a "disruptive act". Ormerod questions whether such role-playing is representative of real terrorists, and also worries that both passengers and screeners will react differently when they know they're being tested. "Fill the place with machines that go ping, and both screeners and passengers start doing things differently."
In lab tests, the DHS has claimed accuracy rates of around 70%, but it remains unclear whether the system will perform better or worse in field trials. "The results are still being analysed, so we cannot yet comment on performance," says John Verrico, a spokesman for the DHS. "Since this is an ongoing scientific study, tests will continue throughout coming months."
Some scientists question whether there really are unique signatures for 'malintent' — the agency's term for the intention to cause harm — that can be differentiated from the normal anxieties of travel. "Even having an iris scan or fingerprint read at immigration is enough to raise the heart rate of most legitimate travellers," says Ormerod.
Steven Aftergood, a senior research analyst at the Federation of American Scientists, a think-tank based in Washington DC that promotes the use of science in policy-making, is pessimistic about the FAST tests. He thinks that they will produce a large proportion of false positives, frequently tagging innocent people as potential terrorists and making the system unworkable in a busy airport. "I believe that the premise of this approach — that there is an identifiable physiological signature uniquely associated with malicious intent — is mistaken. To my knowledge, it has not been demonstrated," he says. "Without it, the whole thing seems like a charade."
As for where precisely FAST is being tested, that for now remains a closely guarded secret. The DHS says that although the first round was completed at the end of March, more testing is in the works, and the agency is concerned that letting people know where the tests are taking place could affect the outcome. "I can tell you that it is not an airport, but it is a large venue that is a suitable substitute for an operational setting," says Verrico.
Mandela aide: Lavish handouts are making Africa the 'spoilt child of the planet'
Lavish aid to Africa is turning the continent into a ‘spoilt child’, according to the head of a charity backed by Nelson Mandela.
Mike Kendrick, founder of the respected Mineseeker Foundation, warned that aid often increased the hardship faced by the world’s poorest people.
In a devastating verdict, he told the Daily Mail last night: ‘I sometimes use the analogy of a spoilt child. We have all seen rich parents give their child everything they need, without earning it.
‘Africa is a spoilt child of the planet. It is not their fault. It is ours.
‘It is completely pointless and totally detrimental to spend endless billions on projects that are well intentioned but badly thought out and poorly implemented.
‘The current government is apparently determined to repeat the mistakes of the former one.’
Mr Kendrick decided to speak out as David Cameron defended of his controversial pledge to increase spending on international aid by 34 per cent while cutting budgets at home.
He is now seeking a meeting with the Prime Minister to discuss his experiences of the impact of aid on developing countries.
The Mineseeker Foundation was established ten years ago with the backing of Sir Richard Branson to help the victims of landmines in former conflict zones, including many parts of Africa.
Mr Kendrick said he had witnessed the failure of international aid at first hand and his views were ‘shared’ by Mr Mandela.
He said that as well as making people dependent on handouts, aid money often undercut local businesses and initiatives.
‘International financial aid, unless specifically targeted toward practical and ongoing projects, is of little use and should be stopped immediately to prevent yet more suffering,’ he added.
‘We need to change lives permanently, not just whilst funds last, and develop sustainable sturdy economies that will transform lives on a long-term basis.
‘The problem is that aid, when badly directed, actually kills people and this is a matter of fact – not opinion. In the past few decades the West has provided several trillion dollars in aid, yet the average African is now twice as poor as he was before all that started.’
Mr Kendrick said that even well-meaning initiatives, such as Gordon Brown’s project to supply £100million of mosquito nets to Africa, could have damaging unintended consequences.
‘I doubt he realised that in doing so he was committing many hundreds of people into a poverty trap that would possibly reduce them to starvation.
‘Making and repairing mosquito nets is one of the few remaining cottage industries in Africa and by dumping millions of dollars worth of nets in various areas it simply shut all of those local businesses down.’
Mr Kendrick is pioneering a series of ‘aid-free zones’ in Mozambique to attract investors to directly support local businesses. The first project, to create a major coconut plantation, could eventually sustain 50,000 people and is being set up without a penny of aid.
Mr Kendrick said similar projects could transform Africa in the long term, while aid would never be more than a quick fix.
Mike Kendrick, founder of the respected Mineseeker Foundation, warned that aid often increased the hardship faced by the world’s poorest people.
In a devastating verdict, he told the Daily Mail last night: ‘I sometimes use the analogy of a spoilt child. We have all seen rich parents give their child everything they need, without earning it.
‘Africa is a spoilt child of the planet. It is not their fault. It is ours.
‘It is completely pointless and totally detrimental to spend endless billions on projects that are well intentioned but badly thought out and poorly implemented.
‘The current government is apparently determined to repeat the mistakes of the former one.’
Mr Kendrick decided to speak out as David Cameron defended of his controversial pledge to increase spending on international aid by 34 per cent while cutting budgets at home.
He is now seeking a meeting with the Prime Minister to discuss his experiences of the impact of aid on developing countries.
The Mineseeker Foundation was established ten years ago with the backing of Sir Richard Branson to help the victims of landmines in former conflict zones, including many parts of Africa.
Mr Kendrick said he had witnessed the failure of international aid at first hand and his views were ‘shared’ by Mr Mandela.
He said that as well as making people dependent on handouts, aid money often undercut local businesses and initiatives.
‘International financial aid, unless specifically targeted toward practical and ongoing projects, is of little use and should be stopped immediately to prevent yet more suffering,’ he added.
‘We need to change lives permanently, not just whilst funds last, and develop sustainable sturdy economies that will transform lives on a long-term basis.
‘The problem is that aid, when badly directed, actually kills people and this is a matter of fact – not opinion. In the past few decades the West has provided several trillion dollars in aid, yet the average African is now twice as poor as he was before all that started.’
Mr Kendrick said that even well-meaning initiatives, such as Gordon Brown’s project to supply £100million of mosquito nets to Africa, could have damaging unintended consequences.
‘I doubt he realised that in doing so he was committing many hundreds of people into a poverty trap that would possibly reduce them to starvation.
‘Making and repairing mosquito nets is one of the few remaining cottage industries in Africa and by dumping millions of dollars worth of nets in various areas it simply shut all of those local businesses down.’
Mr Kendrick is pioneering a series of ‘aid-free zones’ in Mozambique to attract investors to directly support local businesses. The first project, to create a major coconut plantation, could eventually sustain 50,000 people and is being set up without a penny of aid.
Mr Kendrick said similar projects could transform Africa in the long term, while aid would never be more than a quick fix.
Fear of the killer cucumbers
Germany is living in "fear of killer germs," declares Bild, which gives its front page over to a “health warning on tomatoes, cucumbers and lettuce.” Five people in northern Germany have died of suspected contamination of cucumbers from Spain by E. coli, which causes severe digestive problems. “Lettuce was supposed to be healthy, rich in vitamins and good for the figure. And so Germany is tossing salad leaves like never before,” writes the popular daily in distress. “All fear biting down on the horror germ EHEC! Plates are being swept clear of fresh vegetables!” Bild is also concerned about the fallout for German farmers, forced to dump tons of lettuce and tomatoes even though it is not yet known for sure whether the vegetables were contaminated in Spain or during transport to Germany.
The Unseen
The Unseen
Each day in America, millions of unseen hands commit to tasks so varied it would take most of a lifetime just to find and catalog them all…and then once done, would be already fully out of date, as what we do as people changes, not just by the decade, but by the hour. Those changes are ones driven technology, social matters, even cultural norms or habits, and the changes in what we do are a dynamic response to this ever-constant change.
In my lifetime, I have observed the rise of TV, the rise of the Information Age, the rise of the Internet, and the rise of technological social structures. I look back at my lifetime and I am dumbfounded at the change. Had you told me at 12 years old what would exist in in a few decades, I would laughed. Same with most of us.
In “The Way Out” I described how there has been a concerted, organized, funded, and deliberate effort to change our culture. This is still ongoing, every day, every school, every tv show, every university, every news broadcast, every poster, every PSA, every movie, and the list goes on, with very few exceptions. This effort to fundamentally alter our basis of thinking and evaluating self governance has integrated itself into every facet of life.
And so, here’s another change that must happen. It’s time to learn what it is, what it looks like, so people know how to spot it. Then, it needs to be countered. Or replaced. And so, another change to “normal life” is being put upon us, and unless we’re willing to cede the United States to the dustbin of history and allow it to simply pass on into failure and irrelevance to the world, yet another change needs to occur.
We are not collectivists at heart. At least not normal Americans. The activists are, but we aren’t. We do not normally think in terms of coordinated, group centered action. And perhaps that’s a key component that will aid us in our efforts. Autonomous diligence to achieve goals by large groups could be described as “inevitable”. It can only be countered by the same, but larger, effort. And collectivists will not ever form such a thing, it is an anethema to them. Then again, neither will we, unless we are convinced en masse, and become motivated to act.
So, how do you start a widespread, autonomous cultural restoration? It will, of course, require leadership. This nation did not form without leadership. And that leadership left its stamp on history by forming the Constitution – which created a form of government designed to be forever immune to the machinations of a few, hoping to use the resources of the many, to change the nature of said created society. Without violation of the Constitution, the very tools the collectivists are using, which is vast amount of tax money, legislation, rules, stifling of debate and media, and more, this could never have occurred.
This use of force, taxation, and ultimately, bribery, to change the nature of a culture en masse, could not have been done without the power of government employed to make it happen. And, our federal government, at least, was specifically deprived of all the powers that have been used to accomplish the deed. It would be, and is in my mind, a coup over the founding fathers, to so pervert our society without a lot of violence and fear. Yet, they have made huge inroads.
Imagine with me, if you will, beginning in a year or two, that non-collectivists – somewhat poorly described as American conservatives – begin to do something they have never done before. They leave their positions in their conventional lives of productive and important things and begin moving into becoming teachers, media moguls, moviemakers, actors, musicians, newscasters. We as conservatives, instead investing our money purely by the numbers, set aside part of our investments to form some new movie studios, and we invest in startups for conservative television channels, and cable tv startups and we fund new private enterprise schools, which compete with public education and yet, teach the fundamentals that public schools are not, and true history and NOT the liberal brainwashing going on.
Do you see that happening? It’s ok to say yes or no, here, the point is to ask the question.. If not, why not? If so, how so? It not, however, in my opinion, acceptable to say “it cannot be done”. If Washington and his men could beat back the British and their Hessian mercenaries, it seems like the challenge to beat back some liberals who are so obsessed with immaterial and irrational things would be merely mundane.
We must fight the political fight… gather our votes and back men of principle to do the right things in office… but unless we win the war of changing our culture back, eventually, the voters will simply overwhelm both the Constitution (more than they have) and every good and decent thing and will continue down the road to absolute destruction – with our children’s futures fully entwined.
We must start with the political process now, but we must make an overwhelming commitment to get ourselves on the boards of public schools, to become overwhelmingly the majority of teachers, professors, and researchers. We must take the offices of government used to promotee this perversion of our nation and use them properly, instead improperly.
We must take jobs as social workers and teachers and aids and pundits and news anchors. And reporters and commentators and all the rest, so the truth is told, not the activist dogma now being spread.
Again I ask. How do you start a widespread, autonomous cultural restoration?
I call it “Crucial Debates” for a reason.
Each day in America, millions of unseen hands commit to tasks so varied it would take most of a lifetime just to find and catalog them all…and then once done, would be already fully out of date, as what we do as people changes, not just by the decade, but by the hour. Those changes are ones driven technology, social matters, even cultural norms or habits, and the changes in what we do are a dynamic response to this ever-constant change.
In my lifetime, I have observed the rise of TV, the rise of the Information Age, the rise of the Internet, and the rise of technological social structures. I look back at my lifetime and I am dumbfounded at the change. Had you told me at 12 years old what would exist in in a few decades, I would laughed. Same with most of us.
In “The Way Out” I described how there has been a concerted, organized, funded, and deliberate effort to change our culture. This is still ongoing, every day, every school, every tv show, every university, every news broadcast, every poster, every PSA, every movie, and the list goes on, with very few exceptions. This effort to fundamentally alter our basis of thinking and evaluating self governance has integrated itself into every facet of life.
And so, here’s another change that must happen. It’s time to learn what it is, what it looks like, so people know how to spot it. Then, it needs to be countered. Or replaced. And so, another change to “normal life” is being put upon us, and unless we’re willing to cede the United States to the dustbin of history and allow it to simply pass on into failure and irrelevance to the world, yet another change needs to occur.
We are not collectivists at heart. At least not normal Americans. The activists are, but we aren’t. We do not normally think in terms of coordinated, group centered action. And perhaps that’s a key component that will aid us in our efforts. Autonomous diligence to achieve goals by large groups could be described as “inevitable”. It can only be countered by the same, but larger, effort. And collectivists will not ever form such a thing, it is an anethema to them. Then again, neither will we, unless we are convinced en masse, and become motivated to act.
So, how do you start a widespread, autonomous cultural restoration? It will, of course, require leadership. This nation did not form without leadership. And that leadership left its stamp on history by forming the Constitution – which created a form of government designed to be forever immune to the machinations of a few, hoping to use the resources of the many, to change the nature of said created society. Without violation of the Constitution, the very tools the collectivists are using, which is vast amount of tax money, legislation, rules, stifling of debate and media, and more, this could never have occurred.
This use of force, taxation, and ultimately, bribery, to change the nature of a culture en masse, could not have been done without the power of government employed to make it happen. And, our federal government, at least, was specifically deprived of all the powers that have been used to accomplish the deed. It would be, and is in my mind, a coup over the founding fathers, to so pervert our society without a lot of violence and fear. Yet, they have made huge inroads.
Imagine with me, if you will, beginning in a year or two, that non-collectivists – somewhat poorly described as American conservatives – begin to do something they have never done before. They leave their positions in their conventional lives of productive and important things and begin moving into becoming teachers, media moguls, moviemakers, actors, musicians, newscasters. We as conservatives, instead investing our money purely by the numbers, set aside part of our investments to form some new movie studios, and we invest in startups for conservative television channels, and cable tv startups and we fund new private enterprise schools, which compete with public education and yet, teach the fundamentals that public schools are not, and true history and NOT the liberal brainwashing going on.
Do you see that happening? It’s ok to say yes or no, here, the point is to ask the question.. If not, why not? If so, how so? It not, however, in my opinion, acceptable to say “it cannot be done”. If Washington and his men could beat back the British and their Hessian mercenaries, it seems like the challenge to beat back some liberals who are so obsessed with immaterial and irrational things would be merely mundane.
We must fight the political fight… gather our votes and back men of principle to do the right things in office… but unless we win the war of changing our culture back, eventually, the voters will simply overwhelm both the Constitution (more than they have) and every good and decent thing and will continue down the road to absolute destruction – with our children’s futures fully entwined.
We must start with the political process now, but we must make an overwhelming commitment to get ourselves on the boards of public schools, to become overwhelmingly the majority of teachers, professors, and researchers. We must take the offices of government used to promotee this perversion of our nation and use them properly, instead improperly.
We must take jobs as social workers and teachers and aids and pundits and news anchors. And reporters and commentators and all the rest, so the truth is told, not the activist dogma now being spread.
Again I ask. How do you start a widespread, autonomous cultural restoration?
I call it “Crucial Debates” for a reason.
SWAT attorney: 71 shots in 7 seconds 'standard operation'
A defense attorney for the Pima County Sheriff's SWAT team defended the actions of the officers, saying it was a "standard operation."
"When you take into account five shooters, it doesn't seem excessive," says Mike Storie.
The five officers fired 71 shots into a small hallway in seven seconds, killing former Marine Jose Guerena.
Officers were trying to serve a search warrant, and say the 26-year-old pointed a gun at them.
"This is a standard operation," says Storie. "The only thing unusual about this operation is unseen."
Unseen, because while a one-minute videotape released by the sheriff's department shows the actions of the officers, what is not seen is what is going on inside the house when the shooting happened.
"Put yourself in their shoes as they breech the door, fully marked as police," he says. "They faced an AR-15. What would you do?"
There's no way to confirm what the officers saw. Although the officers were separated and gave statements after the shooting. They told essentially the same story, Storie said.
What's evident on the tape, is that the officers fired very quickly. Guerena has 20 wounds on his body, most from bullets, but others could have been fragments of wood or other flying debris, officials said.
Storie says the officers were trying to protect one of their own.
The officer in the video who is carrying the shield - the first one into the house once the door was breeched - tripped and fell. The other officers then used what's known as "suppressive" firing.
They were, as seen on the video, trying to drag the officer away from the front door.
"Officers are taught to keep firing until the threat is resolved," Storie says.
When asked, Storie says the officer carrying the shield "didn't panic, he simply lost his balance."
The shield weighs about 30 pounds and the officer was holding it in one hand while firing a handgun with the other.
The shield would not have been able to protect the officer from a bullet from an AR-15.
A lawyer for Guerena's family would only say they are "conducting their own investigation and would not comment further."
A call to Pima County Sheriff Clarence Dupnik went unanswered.
Storie says some officers did "not empty their clips," at least three of them still had rounds in their weapons after the shooting. Although, in documents released on Thursday, one officer said he kept shooting "until his weapon ran dry."
"When you take into account five shooters, it doesn't seem excessive," says Mike Storie.
The five officers fired 71 shots into a small hallway in seven seconds, killing former Marine Jose Guerena.
Officers were trying to serve a search warrant, and say the 26-year-old pointed a gun at them.
"This is a standard operation," says Storie. "The only thing unusual about this operation is unseen."
Unseen, because while a one-minute videotape released by the sheriff's department shows the actions of the officers, what is not seen is what is going on inside the house when the shooting happened.
"Put yourself in their shoes as they breech the door, fully marked as police," he says. "They faced an AR-15. What would you do?"
There's no way to confirm what the officers saw. Although the officers were separated and gave statements after the shooting. They told essentially the same story, Storie said.
What's evident on the tape, is that the officers fired very quickly. Guerena has 20 wounds on his body, most from bullets, but others could have been fragments of wood or other flying debris, officials said.
Storie says the officers were trying to protect one of their own.
The officer in the video who is carrying the shield - the first one into the house once the door was breeched - tripped and fell. The other officers then used what's known as "suppressive" firing.
They were, as seen on the video, trying to drag the officer away from the front door.
"Officers are taught to keep firing until the threat is resolved," Storie says.
When asked, Storie says the officer carrying the shield "didn't panic, he simply lost his balance."
The shield weighs about 30 pounds and the officer was holding it in one hand while firing a handgun with the other.
The shield would not have been able to protect the officer from a bullet from an AR-15.
A lawyer for Guerena's family would only say they are "conducting their own investigation and would not comment further."
A call to Pima County Sheriff Clarence Dupnik went unanswered.
Storie says some officers did "not empty their clips," at least three of them still had rounds in their weapons after the shooting. Although, in documents released on Thursday, one officer said he kept shooting "until his weapon ran dry."
Limbaugh: Palin Scares 'Establishment' GOP and Democrats, Obama 'Easily Beatable'
The Truth at last!
GRETA VAN SUSTEREN, FOX NEWS HOST: Are Democrats and Republicans afraid of Governor Sarah Palin? Radio talk show host Rush Limbaugh tells us that might be the case.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
VAN SUSTEREN: Rush, thank you for joining us. And today, in your third hour on your radio show, you talked about the news of Governor Palin on a bus tour. Do you think this is the beginning of a campaign for the White House?
RUSH LIMBAUGH, RADIO TALK SHOW HOST (Via Telephone): Before I answer the question, Greta, can I address something here? I'm almost or mostly appearing on your program on the phone.
I told some people I was going to be on the phone. They said, why don't you -- why you're never on camera? Why don't they want you on camera?
I said, it's not them, it's me. I'm looking so good these days that people would not hear what I say and they'd be so blinded by my appearance. So, I choose to be on the phone to actually be heard.
Yes. I think this bus trip is certainly designed to get people speculating that's she in. And it's clear, Greta, the thing about Sarah Palin to me is that she has now learned to relish and to profit from all of the attention, be it negative or positive. And she certainly knows negative attention. She has suffered slings and arrows. She's got the media anal exam unlike any other Republican candidate.
And I've never met her. I don't know it appears to me her skin is very thick. I think she now has come to grips with the fact that's part and parcel of the process. But I think what -- one of the things that she enjoys is just rubbing it right back in their face. She knows that they are trying to intimidate her into silence, not running perhaps, being quiet or shutting up.
Here comes the bus tour. I think she's mastering the things that she's going to have to master if she indeed decides at some point to run.
VAN SUSTEREN: You had the Gallup poll. You talked about that today. It says she is two points behind Governor Romney. She hasn't even indicated she jump going in the race.
Does that show a particular strength? How is the Republican Party going to embrace her?
LIMBAUGH: Well, it's interesting. That poll, that result shocked me. The way the Gallup people wrote it up, they say since Governor Daniels out, since Trump is out, he was never in, and since Huckabee is not running. This has opened it up to launch her to number two. Only two points behind Romney, I think that was -- that was startling.
But, Greta, you've asked the question of the day. You've asked the question of the campaign. The Republican Party is really royal right now inside the Beltway intelligentsia power base is not oriented toward conservatism. Conservative Republicans make them nervous.
The inside the Beltway ruling class the elites more oriented toward candidates they can attach the word serious to, which is another way of saying somebody that's boring, somebody that doesn't ruffle feathers, somebody that exudes an air of formal education and sophistication. She doesn't exude that. And I think she'll shake a lot of people up.
You know her as well as I do. You've followed her. You've traveled around the country in various states with her. You know the effect that she has on establishment Republicans. They are just as frightened in their own way as the Democrats are of Palin.
And I -- one thing I think that is inescapable, particularly with when looking at the Democrats. The Democrats will always -- and the media -- will always tell us who they are afraid of by virtue of who they spend time trying to destroy. By the same token, when Mitch Daniels was flirting with possibly getting in, "Washington Post," "New York Times", all quoting Democrats and Republicans, yes, this is who Obama really fears. The White House really, really fears Mitch Daniels.
Really? Would they tell us that if they thought that? Is that who they're really afraid of? They are trying to goad into the race?
Ruth Marcus, I think, of "The Washington Post" please Mitch run so we have a serious campaign that makes Obama better. They're really convoluted thinking, weird thinking.
Bottom line is she scares them. She also scares the Republican establishment. So do some other potential candidates.
VAN SUSTEREN: Like who else scares them? How about Santorum or Bachmann, or Gingrich?
LIMBAUGH: Well, Santorum and Bachmann are great examples. Bachmann especially, is somebody that would -- anybody who is Tea Party-oriented is going to send some chills down the spines of both the Republican and Democrat establishment.
There's something about the Tea Party that frightens them. I think there's a direct connection with the American people that the Tea Party represents. And you go back even Reagan, Greta, was not that embraced by the Republican establishment, particularly during the campaigns of '76 and '80. After he was elected, they kind of had no choice.
But it's always a battle for conservatives to overcome.
VAN SUSTEREN: To what extent do you think the political journalists and the political pundits are so far removed from the Tea Party that they don't understand them and don't realize their impact?
LIMBAUGH: I think they do understand. I think they are far removed by choice. I think they don't want to be in touch with middle class, hardworking people who make -- the kind of people who make the country work. We really are class division politics in this country. And there are people who are elites and who aren't.
The elites are always going to be afraid of people who aren't because there are far fewer elites than non-elites. The non-elites happen to relate to each other -- and so, it is just -- it is a rip more than anything else.
I think it's -- you have a Tea Party candidate who is victorious, running for the presidency. You have a possibility here of upsetting the entire D.C. power and social structure that exists. They are outsiders. They are considered outsiders. They are not considered genuine political professionals.
By definition, Tea Party people aren't. They are people in many cases that have never been involved in politics. They started going to town hall meetings a couple of summers ago and have simply come to life because they don't like the direction the country is going and they don't see their attitude, their views, their wishes and their desires passionately defended or represented in Washington. So, they are taking matters in their own hands, coming up with their own candidates. And that's what propelled the Republican Party to victory in November 2010.
The Republicans have got to realize they did nothing to win that election except not be Democrats.
VAN SUSTEREN: Well, today, you talked about the GOP having a message problem. Does that play into this?
LIMBAUGH: Well, yes, but that was a conversation about Ryan and health care, Medicare reform, and this kind of thing. I think the overall Republican message problem is simply a fear they have.
I think that the liberal aspects of the Democrat Party, the social political structures run Washington. I think people never get out of high school. You all always want to be in the big clique. You always want to be approved. You have to be approved by the people who run the big clique if you want to get in the big clique.
And I think Republicans brought into the notion over the years that moderates are the key to victory, the 20 percent who are undecided. Let's get those people. We know 40 percent going to go Democrat, 40 percent going to go Republican, that 20 percent -- the great, great moderate, the open-minded people supposedly non-ideological. Everybody who is a professional political consultant targets those people.
And one of the rules that's been established without getting moderate is that you cannot be argumentative and you can't appear partisan, and you can't appear extreme. You can't appear mean-spirited. You have to be reasonable, calm and you can be critical of your opponent and so forth.
And I think Republicans have bought this. I think they bought -- all it is, is a very clever trick by the left to get Republicans to shut up and not be passionate about themselves, defending what they believe in advancing their causes. It keeps them always on defense.
The message problem stems from Republicans more often than not, allowing the premise of any issue to be set by the Democrats and reacting to it, always on defense. That's what that discussion was about.
And I think that is always going to be a problem for the Republicans, until there is a nominee who is conservative, who is proud conservative, who is passionate conservative, who believes it, who doesn't need a note card and doesn't need a prompter. And can't wait to talk to people about it, can't wait to try to persuade, can't wait to get people to follow him or her in whatever quest they have.
That -- you see that in Netanyahu. Netanyahu -- Benjamin Netanyahu is one of the greatest lessons the Republican Party has. Benjamin Netanyahu is lighting the way, showing the Republican Party the way back in terms of national presidential politics.
Donald Trump -- I said from the get-go that the real value of Trump and the reason why there was much interest and excitement about Trump is because he was taking it to the opposition. He was taking it to Obama. Not just on the birth certificate. He was taking it to him on the future of the country.
He was taking -- Mr. President, you are destroying job creation. You are destroying the opportunities that our kids and grandkids should have for prosperity in the future. You have to throw all of this moderate, "don't offend anybody" kind of speech out the window.
These are desperate times. If you really believe these are desperate times and if you believe the future of the country is founded, hangs in the balance, and a lot of people do and a lot of voters do, you're not going to reach them by being milquetoast.
VAN SUSTEREN: Isn't that -- I mean, didn't President Obama, though -- didn't he reach out to those moderates? And he was sort of the calm, the professorial type. Isn't that how he got that 20 percent?
LIMBAUGH: Well -- but, yes -- but that's 2008. This is a different time now. He's got a record to defend, which he can't. He's got a totally indefensible record.
I think Obama is easily beatable.
Now, what the Democrats and the media are trying to establish is that he's unbeatable. That he's so powerful. That he's so authentic. He's got such a wonderful way of communicating, that this is not the time to try to beat him.
And the Democrats are going to say, look, this was much worse than we thought. This economy -- much, much worse. When we got here, we had our policies put in place. Normally, they would have worked well by now.
Yes, they are just starting to have an affect, three years, 2 1/2 years. This is going to be a much longer process than even we thought, and it's going to be a big mistake to change horses in middle of the stream.
That's their campaign. The policies, the fixes are just now really taking hold, it would be a total mistake to turn this country over to the Republicans who want to go back to the failed policies so you can hear the same old cliches. That's what -- that's what the campaign is going to be.
The truth of the matter is, the Democrats have an indefensible record. Their record is so defensible, they would not even propose and defend a budget that outlines what their ideals and their opinions and views are for the future.
There has never been a greater time -- greater time than now for the Republican Party to genuinely contrast itself against the Democrat Party and the American left and show the American people a genuinely different direction for this country that takes us in a direction and genuine real, prosperity on the part of people who work and make this country work.
It's such a golden opportunity. There's no reason to be frightened of Obama. There's no reason to be afraid of the Democrats. There's no reason to allow them to make us timid and to shut up, and only try for 20 percent of the electorate, which is a bogus premise any way.
I think if it's Palin, for example, or if it's Santorum, Herman Cain, if it's Rick Perry, you watch how these people -- these genuine conservatives are going to campaign for every vote. They are not going to try to get the Hispanic with this message. They're not going to try to get women with this message. And they're not going to try to subdivide the American electorate into a bunch of different groups, some victimized and some not. They're not just going to go for America.
Here's our message: We're Americans. We love America. We love the country.
Here's how we make it better. Here's how we save the country from current policies. It doesn't matter what kind of an American you are. If you are with us and you want a better country, and you want a place in it, we are the way to go. That's the message.
VAN SUSTEREN: If you were President Obama, who would be the Republican you would not run against -- not want to run against, and why?
LIMBAUGH: If I were Obama, I would not want to run against Palin. Contrary to what everybody says -- I don't want her to run. You know, when they tell us that's what they hope for, it's opposite. I wouldn't want to run Chris Christie if I were them. I wouldn't want to run against Santorum. I wouldn't want to run against Rick Perry.
I think, the truth of the matter is, in the White House, the truth of the matter is, if you could get hold of their internal reelect polls, I will bet you that they are bad. And I think what they believe is, they've got to do everything they can to make sure that whoever the Republican nominee is not a conservative.
They think they can beat a moderate Republican. They know they can beat a liberal Republican. They know they can beat a Republican who is afraid to be a Republican.
But they are mostly afraid of a genuine, full-throated, passionate, articulate conservative.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
VAN SUSTEREN: We have much more of our interview with Rush Limbaugh coming. And straight ahead: Rush is talking about President Obama. What he says the president is doing now that is working against him.
And remember the back-and-forth between Rush and Speaker Gingrich? You'll hear from Rush about that. That's next.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
VAN SUSTEREN: Here's more of our interview with Rush Limbaugh.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
VAN SUSTEREN: The president is overseas. I think in the past -- and correct me if I'm wrong -- but that you thought his going overseas has been a bit of an apologist. How is he doing overseas in your opinion now?
LIMBAUGH (Via Telephone): Well, you know, I -- this is a tough questions for me, because I don't like saying, and I don't like thinking what I think. I just, Greta ... I didn't know what year it is when he signs the guest book -- wandering aimlessly answers in joint press conferences.
He's got a problem because everything Cameron is doing in the U.K. is working. So, Obama can't in any way shape, manner or form agree with him. He's got a problem right there. He has to wander and meander and not give credit to Cameron, whose policies are starting to have -- Europe is doing a 180 going in the exact opposite direction that Obama is trying to take America.
They've had their experience with well-intentioned, big hearted socialism, it doesn't work. You always run out of somebody else's money. It just isn't possible. Obama hasn't learned it yet.
So, I think the more he goes overseas and speaks, the more obvious it is that he's -- he doesn't have all these great (INAUDIBLE) -- he doesn't have all that much experience. And his life skills are not enough to compensate for it. I think -- I think it's obvious, here's a guy that spent 153 days in the U.S. Senate. Prior to that, a lot of time in Chicago organizing the community, rabblerousing and so forth, a few years in the Illinois state house and it shows.
VAN SUSTEREN: And in terms of -- do you give him credit for doing anything in terms of his administration. Is there anything that you think that he's done particularly well?
LIMBAUGH: Well, I always get this question. "Can't you say one nice thing?"
I think we are really serious time. I think the country faces a serious crossroads.
And I always tell you -- Greta, you are talking earlier about messaging the Republican Party. Let me tell you, there are many in the Republican Party establishment who do not see it at all the way I've described it. They don't think the country is in trouble. They don't think all this spending and this indebtedness portend dire consequences.
There's that division in the Republican Party in and of itself. So, a lot of people would not agree with me how dire the consequences are. I don't think the country has founded and would stand four more years of this with no waivers from Obamacare. Four years of this stuff being implemented, it could be really, really difficult to get the country back if there's four more years of Obama-ism inculcated throughout society.
So, yes, I -- look, I'm sure there are some positive things. I wouldn't change my mind about supporting him or his policy.
VAN SUSTEREN: Has Speaker Gingrich recovered from making that statement about the right wing social engineering?
LIMBAUGH: Oh, yes. I don't know if he's recovered yet, but anybody can.
Look at -- look at this IMF guy. One day, he is the fait accompli, next president of France. Five minutes later, he's in the same situation as Eliot Spitzer, client number nine. That's how fast things can change in politics.
Any poll right now really is worthless. The election is not for 18 or 19 months, whatever it is. Polls are -- in terms of who would win the nomination of the presidency right now, don't mean anything. There's way too much that can happen, particularly things that are unpredictable.
So, yes. It would be silly to say that Newt can't recover from that. Time will tell.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
GRETA VAN SUSTEREN, FOX NEWS HOST: Are Democrats and Republicans afraid of Governor Sarah Palin? Radio talk show host Rush Limbaugh tells us that might be the case.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
VAN SUSTEREN: Rush, thank you for joining us. And today, in your third hour on your radio show, you talked about the news of Governor Palin on a bus tour. Do you think this is the beginning of a campaign for the White House?
RUSH LIMBAUGH, RADIO TALK SHOW HOST (Via Telephone): Before I answer the question, Greta, can I address something here? I'm almost or mostly appearing on your program on the phone.
I told some people I was going to be on the phone. They said, why don't you -- why you're never on camera? Why don't they want you on camera?
I said, it's not them, it's me. I'm looking so good these days that people would not hear what I say and they'd be so blinded by my appearance. So, I choose to be on the phone to actually be heard.
Yes. I think this bus trip is certainly designed to get people speculating that's she in. And it's clear, Greta, the thing about Sarah Palin to me is that she has now learned to relish and to profit from all of the attention, be it negative or positive. And she certainly knows negative attention. She has suffered slings and arrows. She's got the media anal exam unlike any other Republican candidate.
And I've never met her. I don't know it appears to me her skin is very thick. I think she now has come to grips with the fact that's part and parcel of the process. But I think what -- one of the things that she enjoys is just rubbing it right back in their face. She knows that they are trying to intimidate her into silence, not running perhaps, being quiet or shutting up.
Here comes the bus tour. I think she's mastering the things that she's going to have to master if she indeed decides at some point to run.
VAN SUSTEREN: You had the Gallup poll. You talked about that today. It says she is two points behind Governor Romney. She hasn't even indicated she jump going in the race.
Does that show a particular strength? How is the Republican Party going to embrace her?
LIMBAUGH: Well, it's interesting. That poll, that result shocked me. The way the Gallup people wrote it up, they say since Governor Daniels out, since Trump is out, he was never in, and since Huckabee is not running. This has opened it up to launch her to number two. Only two points behind Romney, I think that was -- that was startling.
But, Greta, you've asked the question of the day. You've asked the question of the campaign. The Republican Party is really royal right now inside the Beltway intelligentsia power base is not oriented toward conservatism. Conservative Republicans make them nervous.
The inside the Beltway ruling class the elites more oriented toward candidates they can attach the word serious to, which is another way of saying somebody that's boring, somebody that doesn't ruffle feathers, somebody that exudes an air of formal education and sophistication. She doesn't exude that. And I think she'll shake a lot of people up.
You know her as well as I do. You've followed her. You've traveled around the country in various states with her. You know the effect that she has on establishment Republicans. They are just as frightened in their own way as the Democrats are of Palin.
And I -- one thing I think that is inescapable, particularly with when looking at the Democrats. The Democrats will always -- and the media -- will always tell us who they are afraid of by virtue of who they spend time trying to destroy. By the same token, when Mitch Daniels was flirting with possibly getting in, "Washington Post," "New York Times", all quoting Democrats and Republicans, yes, this is who Obama really fears. The White House really, really fears Mitch Daniels.
Really? Would they tell us that if they thought that? Is that who they're really afraid of? They are trying to goad into the race?
Ruth Marcus, I think, of "The Washington Post" please Mitch run so we have a serious campaign that makes Obama better. They're really convoluted thinking, weird thinking.
Bottom line is she scares them. She also scares the Republican establishment. So do some other potential candidates.
VAN SUSTEREN: Like who else scares them? How about Santorum or Bachmann, or Gingrich?
LIMBAUGH: Well, Santorum and Bachmann are great examples. Bachmann especially, is somebody that would -- anybody who is Tea Party-oriented is going to send some chills down the spines of both the Republican and Democrat establishment.
There's something about the Tea Party that frightens them. I think there's a direct connection with the American people that the Tea Party represents. And you go back even Reagan, Greta, was not that embraced by the Republican establishment, particularly during the campaigns of '76 and '80. After he was elected, they kind of had no choice.
But it's always a battle for conservatives to overcome.
VAN SUSTEREN: To what extent do you think the political journalists and the political pundits are so far removed from the Tea Party that they don't understand them and don't realize their impact?
LIMBAUGH: I think they do understand. I think they are far removed by choice. I think they don't want to be in touch with middle class, hardworking people who make -- the kind of people who make the country work. We really are class division politics in this country. And there are people who are elites and who aren't.
The elites are always going to be afraid of people who aren't because there are far fewer elites than non-elites. The non-elites happen to relate to each other -- and so, it is just -- it is a rip more than anything else.
I think it's -- you have a Tea Party candidate who is victorious, running for the presidency. You have a possibility here of upsetting the entire D.C. power and social structure that exists. They are outsiders. They are considered outsiders. They are not considered genuine political professionals.
By definition, Tea Party people aren't. They are people in many cases that have never been involved in politics. They started going to town hall meetings a couple of summers ago and have simply come to life because they don't like the direction the country is going and they don't see their attitude, their views, their wishes and their desires passionately defended or represented in Washington. So, they are taking matters in their own hands, coming up with their own candidates. And that's what propelled the Republican Party to victory in November 2010.
The Republicans have got to realize they did nothing to win that election except not be Democrats.
VAN SUSTEREN: Well, today, you talked about the GOP having a message problem. Does that play into this?
LIMBAUGH: Well, yes, but that was a conversation about Ryan and health care, Medicare reform, and this kind of thing. I think the overall Republican message problem is simply a fear they have.
I think that the liberal aspects of the Democrat Party, the social political structures run Washington. I think people never get out of high school. You all always want to be in the big clique. You always want to be approved. You have to be approved by the people who run the big clique if you want to get in the big clique.
And I think Republicans brought into the notion over the years that moderates are the key to victory, the 20 percent who are undecided. Let's get those people. We know 40 percent going to go Democrat, 40 percent going to go Republican, that 20 percent -- the great, great moderate, the open-minded people supposedly non-ideological. Everybody who is a professional political consultant targets those people.
And one of the rules that's been established without getting moderate is that you cannot be argumentative and you can't appear partisan, and you can't appear extreme. You can't appear mean-spirited. You have to be reasonable, calm and you can be critical of your opponent and so forth.
And I think Republicans have bought this. I think they bought -- all it is, is a very clever trick by the left to get Republicans to shut up and not be passionate about themselves, defending what they believe in advancing their causes. It keeps them always on defense.
The message problem stems from Republicans more often than not, allowing the premise of any issue to be set by the Democrats and reacting to it, always on defense. That's what that discussion was about.
And I think that is always going to be a problem for the Republicans, until there is a nominee who is conservative, who is proud conservative, who is passionate conservative, who believes it, who doesn't need a note card and doesn't need a prompter. And can't wait to talk to people about it, can't wait to try to persuade, can't wait to get people to follow him or her in whatever quest they have.
That -- you see that in Netanyahu. Netanyahu -- Benjamin Netanyahu is one of the greatest lessons the Republican Party has. Benjamin Netanyahu is lighting the way, showing the Republican Party the way back in terms of national presidential politics.
Donald Trump -- I said from the get-go that the real value of Trump and the reason why there was much interest and excitement about Trump is because he was taking it to the opposition. He was taking it to Obama. Not just on the birth certificate. He was taking it to him on the future of the country.
He was taking -- Mr. President, you are destroying job creation. You are destroying the opportunities that our kids and grandkids should have for prosperity in the future. You have to throw all of this moderate, "don't offend anybody" kind of speech out the window.
These are desperate times. If you really believe these are desperate times and if you believe the future of the country is founded, hangs in the balance, and a lot of people do and a lot of voters do, you're not going to reach them by being milquetoast.
VAN SUSTEREN: Isn't that -- I mean, didn't President Obama, though -- didn't he reach out to those moderates? And he was sort of the calm, the professorial type. Isn't that how he got that 20 percent?
LIMBAUGH: Well -- but, yes -- but that's 2008. This is a different time now. He's got a record to defend, which he can't. He's got a totally indefensible record.
I think Obama is easily beatable.
Now, what the Democrats and the media are trying to establish is that he's unbeatable. That he's so powerful. That he's so authentic. He's got such a wonderful way of communicating, that this is not the time to try to beat him.
And the Democrats are going to say, look, this was much worse than we thought. This economy -- much, much worse. When we got here, we had our policies put in place. Normally, they would have worked well by now.
Yes, they are just starting to have an affect, three years, 2 1/2 years. This is going to be a much longer process than even we thought, and it's going to be a big mistake to change horses in middle of the stream.
That's their campaign. The policies, the fixes are just now really taking hold, it would be a total mistake to turn this country over to the Republicans who want to go back to the failed policies so you can hear the same old cliches. That's what -- that's what the campaign is going to be.
The truth of the matter is, the Democrats have an indefensible record. Their record is so defensible, they would not even propose and defend a budget that outlines what their ideals and their opinions and views are for the future.
There has never been a greater time -- greater time than now for the Republican Party to genuinely contrast itself against the Democrat Party and the American left and show the American people a genuinely different direction for this country that takes us in a direction and genuine real, prosperity on the part of people who work and make this country work.
It's such a golden opportunity. There's no reason to be frightened of Obama. There's no reason to be afraid of the Democrats. There's no reason to allow them to make us timid and to shut up, and only try for 20 percent of the electorate, which is a bogus premise any way.
I think if it's Palin, for example, or if it's Santorum, Herman Cain, if it's Rick Perry, you watch how these people -- these genuine conservatives are going to campaign for every vote. They are not going to try to get the Hispanic with this message. They're not going to try to get women with this message. And they're not going to try to subdivide the American electorate into a bunch of different groups, some victimized and some not. They're not just going to go for America.
Here's our message: We're Americans. We love America. We love the country.
Here's how we make it better. Here's how we save the country from current policies. It doesn't matter what kind of an American you are. If you are with us and you want a better country, and you want a place in it, we are the way to go. That's the message.
VAN SUSTEREN: If you were President Obama, who would be the Republican you would not run against -- not want to run against, and why?
LIMBAUGH: If I were Obama, I would not want to run against Palin. Contrary to what everybody says -- I don't want her to run. You know, when they tell us that's what they hope for, it's opposite. I wouldn't want to run Chris Christie if I were them. I wouldn't want to run against Santorum. I wouldn't want to run against Rick Perry.
I think, the truth of the matter is, in the White House, the truth of the matter is, if you could get hold of their internal reelect polls, I will bet you that they are bad. And I think what they believe is, they've got to do everything they can to make sure that whoever the Republican nominee is not a conservative.
They think they can beat a moderate Republican. They know they can beat a liberal Republican. They know they can beat a Republican who is afraid to be a Republican.
But they are mostly afraid of a genuine, full-throated, passionate, articulate conservative.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
VAN SUSTEREN: We have much more of our interview with Rush Limbaugh coming. And straight ahead: Rush is talking about President Obama. What he says the president is doing now that is working against him.
And remember the back-and-forth between Rush and Speaker Gingrich? You'll hear from Rush about that. That's next.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
VAN SUSTEREN: Here's more of our interview with Rush Limbaugh.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
VAN SUSTEREN: The president is overseas. I think in the past -- and correct me if I'm wrong -- but that you thought his going overseas has been a bit of an apologist. How is he doing overseas in your opinion now?
LIMBAUGH (Via Telephone): Well, you know, I -- this is a tough questions for me, because I don't like saying, and I don't like thinking what I think. I just, Greta ... I didn't know what year it is when he signs the guest book -- wandering aimlessly answers in joint press conferences.
He's got a problem because everything Cameron is doing in the U.K. is working. So, Obama can't in any way shape, manner or form agree with him. He's got a problem right there. He has to wander and meander and not give credit to Cameron, whose policies are starting to have -- Europe is doing a 180 going in the exact opposite direction that Obama is trying to take America.
They've had their experience with well-intentioned, big hearted socialism, it doesn't work. You always run out of somebody else's money. It just isn't possible. Obama hasn't learned it yet.
So, I think the more he goes overseas and speaks, the more obvious it is that he's -- he doesn't have all these great (INAUDIBLE) -- he doesn't have all that much experience. And his life skills are not enough to compensate for it. I think -- I think it's obvious, here's a guy that spent 153 days in the U.S. Senate. Prior to that, a lot of time in Chicago organizing the community, rabblerousing and so forth, a few years in the Illinois state house and it shows.
VAN SUSTEREN: And in terms of -- do you give him credit for doing anything in terms of his administration. Is there anything that you think that he's done particularly well?
LIMBAUGH: Well, I always get this question. "Can't you say one nice thing?"
I think we are really serious time. I think the country faces a serious crossroads.
And I always tell you -- Greta, you are talking earlier about messaging the Republican Party. Let me tell you, there are many in the Republican Party establishment who do not see it at all the way I've described it. They don't think the country is in trouble. They don't think all this spending and this indebtedness portend dire consequences.
There's that division in the Republican Party in and of itself. So, a lot of people would not agree with me how dire the consequences are. I don't think the country has founded and would stand four more years of this with no waivers from Obamacare. Four years of this stuff being implemented, it could be really, really difficult to get the country back if there's four more years of Obama-ism inculcated throughout society.
So, yes, I -- look, I'm sure there are some positive things. I wouldn't change my mind about supporting him or his policy.
VAN SUSTEREN: Has Speaker Gingrich recovered from making that statement about the right wing social engineering?
LIMBAUGH: Oh, yes. I don't know if he's recovered yet, but anybody can.
Look at -- look at this IMF guy. One day, he is the fait accompli, next president of France. Five minutes later, he's in the same situation as Eliot Spitzer, client number nine. That's how fast things can change in politics.
Any poll right now really is worthless. The election is not for 18 or 19 months, whatever it is. Polls are -- in terms of who would win the nomination of the presidency right now, don't mean anything. There's way too much that can happen, particularly things that are unpredictable.
So, yes. It would be silly to say that Newt can't recover from that. Time will tell.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
FAT KIDS
Remember the fat kid at school? The one everyone made fun of at lunchtime, the one who got pushed down during P.E., the one who had to have his parents pick him up at the school gate so he wouldn’t be tarred and feathered by the rest of the student body? Well here it is 2011 and guess what EVERY KID IS NOW THE FAT KID. Man boobs (or Moobs) on 8 year olds, back fat on 12 year olds at the pool, Jesus it’s sickening. Where are the parents? Probably chowing down themselves. This is an injustice, this is an insult, this is an epidemic—and it’s hard to look at.
From my window I watched a family unloading groceries from their car and trudge back to their apartment. First Father, then Mother, both looked normal—then came THE KIDS. I took the first kid to be a girl at first from his overly feminine features and a set of boobs like a Victoria Secret model but no, it’s a boy, not a man but a girlish pre-teen, creepy and soft as a marshmallow. Then came the other kid, the REALLY FAT ONE, this kid looked like a Hasidic version of Augustus Gloop, almost skipping as he carried his box of pudding cups back to his secret underground lair. With a pair of boobs that would rival my ex-wife’s, bouncing up and down in a loose shirt like some Playboy soft-core porn, giggling and farting away—and I say again…where are the parents? Do they think this is normal, having a he-she and Chaz Bono as their children? Where’s the fucking discipline?
People might not think I’m qualified to comment on parenting since I am not a parent. I only watch the TV and Internet from On High, uninvolved in the day to day nightmare of dealing with spoiled brat kids. Kids that cannot do math, that talk like they text, that think Wii is exercise. Kids that are shattered if their parents can’t provide them with an Ipad 2 to replace their Ipad 1 they got only 6 months ago. Most of you are from my generation, most of us grew up middle-class or lower. Most of us can remember when going out to dinner was a big deal, when getting a bicycle for Christmas was like winning the lottery, when all you needed to be cool at school was a $15 pair of Levi’s. I wax nostalgic…
I see Dr. Drew consoling the parents of a kid getting bullied on Facebook, well here’s a small bit of advice parents, TAKE YOUR KID OFF FACEBOOK. Wow, no more bullying! Didn’t think of that, didja? But how can a kid be socially acceptable these days if he or she doesn’t have hundreds of imaginary ‘friends’ to talk to about absolutely jack shit? How will they grow if they can’t discuss Dancing with the Stars or the newest fart noise App? Who will show them the newest YouTube teen beating or the meaning of Miley Cyrus’s vagina?
When I see a fat kid I wanna slap the parent but I guess I’m not aware of the pressures put on parents. People losing their jobs, food prices sky-rocketing, gas prices, insurance going up and all the while fat Junior is bitching that his Iphone needs an upgrade. Let’s not cook tonight, let’s go to McDonalds, the Xanadu of fatties everywhere. 67 tablespoons of sugar per serving in that Jumbo soft drink, here ya go Jumbo drink it down. And don’t forget your Insulin. Double Quarter pounder, no make that a triple—and a large side of fries. And don’t forget that McSlurry for dessert, 16 ounces of gelatinous syrupy goo sitting on top of that meat and cheese you just chewed into cud, fermenting like a vat of Samuel Addams in that chamber of Horrors you call a stomach. Then its home again to endless video games, hand grenades and hookers, de-sensitized and numb, thumbs blazing as fart after fart slides out of your butt cheeks like an old bent kazoo.
Back fat and beer guts don’t belong on children, they belong on old guys like us, we’ve earned them from years of pushing that stone up the hill. Boys shouldn’t have boobs, girls should have boobs and young boys should squeeze them, often a little too hard. Children are growing up thinking that success is just a reality show away. And, unfortunately, maybe it is.
Jizzy Pearl
From my window I watched a family unloading groceries from their car and trudge back to their apartment. First Father, then Mother, both looked normal—then came THE KIDS. I took the first kid to be a girl at first from his overly feminine features and a set of boobs like a Victoria Secret model but no, it’s a boy, not a man but a girlish pre-teen, creepy and soft as a marshmallow. Then came the other kid, the REALLY FAT ONE, this kid looked like a Hasidic version of Augustus Gloop, almost skipping as he carried his box of pudding cups back to his secret underground lair. With a pair of boobs that would rival my ex-wife’s, bouncing up and down in a loose shirt like some Playboy soft-core porn, giggling and farting away—and I say again…where are the parents? Do they think this is normal, having a he-she and Chaz Bono as their children? Where’s the fucking discipline?
People might not think I’m qualified to comment on parenting since I am not a parent. I only watch the TV and Internet from On High, uninvolved in the day to day nightmare of dealing with spoiled brat kids. Kids that cannot do math, that talk like they text, that think Wii is exercise. Kids that are shattered if their parents can’t provide them with an Ipad 2 to replace their Ipad 1 they got only 6 months ago. Most of you are from my generation, most of us grew up middle-class or lower. Most of us can remember when going out to dinner was a big deal, when getting a bicycle for Christmas was like winning the lottery, when all you needed to be cool at school was a $15 pair of Levi’s. I wax nostalgic…
I see Dr. Drew consoling the parents of a kid getting bullied on Facebook, well here’s a small bit of advice parents, TAKE YOUR KID OFF FACEBOOK. Wow, no more bullying! Didn’t think of that, didja? But how can a kid be socially acceptable these days if he or she doesn’t have hundreds of imaginary ‘friends’ to talk to about absolutely jack shit? How will they grow if they can’t discuss Dancing with the Stars or the newest fart noise App? Who will show them the newest YouTube teen beating or the meaning of Miley Cyrus’s vagina?
When I see a fat kid I wanna slap the parent but I guess I’m not aware of the pressures put on parents. People losing their jobs, food prices sky-rocketing, gas prices, insurance going up and all the while fat Junior is bitching that his Iphone needs an upgrade. Let’s not cook tonight, let’s go to McDonalds, the Xanadu of fatties everywhere. 67 tablespoons of sugar per serving in that Jumbo soft drink, here ya go Jumbo drink it down. And don’t forget your Insulin. Double Quarter pounder, no make that a triple—and a large side of fries. And don’t forget that McSlurry for dessert, 16 ounces of gelatinous syrupy goo sitting on top of that meat and cheese you just chewed into cud, fermenting like a vat of Samuel Addams in that chamber of Horrors you call a stomach. Then its home again to endless video games, hand grenades and hookers, de-sensitized and numb, thumbs blazing as fart after fart slides out of your butt cheeks like an old bent kazoo.
Back fat and beer guts don’t belong on children, they belong on old guys like us, we’ve earned them from years of pushing that stone up the hill. Boys shouldn’t have boobs, girls should have boobs and young boys should squeeze them, often a little too hard. Children are growing up thinking that success is just a reality show away. And, unfortunately, maybe it is.
Jizzy Pearl
Brazilian president cancels homosexual indoctrination program in nation’s schools
Pedos everywhere are shedding tears!
Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff has agreed to eliminate a very explicit United Nations approved program designed to convince children and adolescents to accept homosexual behavior and transsexualism, following threats from Protestant and Catholic legislators to block new legislation in protest.
The program, which was sponsored by by the Brazilian Ministry of Education and referred to as “Schools without Homophobia,” included an “anti-homophobia kit,” with videos showing a cartoon of a child masturbating while fantasizing about sex with a man, adolescents who enter into homosexual relationships, and a “transsexual” student who calls himself “Bianca.”
In the original video, the “Bianca” character reportedly becomes sexually aroused at the sight of another male student urinating in the bathroom, although this scene was apparently removed later, along with an another image showing two girls kissing on the lips. The program also supplied students with games, toys, and musical lyrics, all designed to normalize homosexuality and other sexual deviations. Despite the minor modifications made to the materials, they have continued to spark outrage from parents and pro-family activists.
Under massive pressure from a high-profile Internet campaign and from legislators, Rousseff capitulated, and one congressional ally reported that she regarded the program as “horrific” and “the end of the world.”
“I’m not in agreement with the kit, because I don’t think that it defends non-homophobic practices,” Rousseff said publicly. “I didn’t watch the videos, but I saw part of one of them on television and I don’t agree with it.”
“We cannot interfere with the private lives of people,” Rousseff continued. “There will not be authorization for this type of policy of defending A, B, C, or D. However, the government can teach that it is necessary to respect differences and that you can’t use violence against those who are different from you.”
Before retracting the materials, the government had boasted of the approval it had received for the program from the United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization (UNESCO), which had judged the videos “suitable” for the target audience, which is reported to reach children as young as 11 years of age.
“The material of the Schools without Homophobia project is suitable for the age groups and the affective-cognitive development for which it is targeted,” UNESCO wrote, according to a Brazilian government website.
The cancellation of the program, which has caused controversy in Brazil for over half a year, has made headlines across the country. Revelations that the government has spent over a million of dollars of public money on the program have also added fuel to the fire.
The defeat of “Schools without Homophobia” represents another major blow against the socialist government’s long-standing anti-life and anti-family policies.
The Brazilian Labor Party, led by the popular presidents Luiz Lula da Silva and Dilma Rousseff, his handpicked successor, have consistently advocated the decriminalization of abortion and policies that would punish those who speak out against homosexuality. However, Rousseff found her presidential aspirations threatened last year when pro-family forces emphasized her party’s record on human life and family issues, forcing her to sign an agreement not to promote her party’s agenda.
Public opinion polls, as well as polls of congressional representatives, have also indicated a strengthening of the pro-life and pro-family positions in the Brazilian electorate.
Although Roussef has been careful to indicate her rejection of the program, her Women’s Policies minister has taken a more defiant tone.
“The program for confronting homophobia is a definitive program. It will not suffer setbacks. The government of President Dilma [Rouseff] is committed to the issue of rights. The president has demonstrated that in all of her acts,” said chief minister Iriny Lopes.
Rousseff’s education minister Fernando Haddad promised to return to the schools with new materials in a matter of months, after a further consultation with “specialists.” The program reportedly will be reformulated by the same homosexualist non-governmental organizations that created the current program.
Julio Severo, one of Brazil’s most influential pro-family activists, is warning that the administration will continue to push the homosexual agenda, and urges Catholics and Evangelical Protestants to continue fighting.
“Whether or not Dilma has retreated, the Catholic and Evangelical leadership should not retreat,” writes Severo, adding that “above all, it is necessary to unmask and combat the campaign that, in the name of fighting against ‘homophobia’ is combating the Christian majority of Brazil and the mothers and father who want to protect their children form every type of immoral assault.”
Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff has agreed to eliminate a very explicit United Nations approved program designed to convince children and adolescents to accept homosexual behavior and transsexualism, following threats from Protestant and Catholic legislators to block new legislation in protest.
The program, which was sponsored by by the Brazilian Ministry of Education and referred to as “Schools without Homophobia,” included an “anti-homophobia kit,” with videos showing a cartoon of a child masturbating while fantasizing about sex with a man, adolescents who enter into homosexual relationships, and a “transsexual” student who calls himself “Bianca.”
In the original video, the “Bianca” character reportedly becomes sexually aroused at the sight of another male student urinating in the bathroom, although this scene was apparently removed later, along with an another image showing two girls kissing on the lips. The program also supplied students with games, toys, and musical lyrics, all designed to normalize homosexuality and other sexual deviations. Despite the minor modifications made to the materials, they have continued to spark outrage from parents and pro-family activists.
Under massive pressure from a high-profile Internet campaign and from legislators, Rousseff capitulated, and one congressional ally reported that she regarded the program as “horrific” and “the end of the world.”
“I’m not in agreement with the kit, because I don’t think that it defends non-homophobic practices,” Rousseff said publicly. “I didn’t watch the videos, but I saw part of one of them on television and I don’t agree with it.”
“We cannot interfere with the private lives of people,” Rousseff continued. “There will not be authorization for this type of policy of defending A, B, C, or D. However, the government can teach that it is necessary to respect differences and that you can’t use violence against those who are different from you.”
Before retracting the materials, the government had boasted of the approval it had received for the program from the United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization (UNESCO), which had judged the videos “suitable” for the target audience, which is reported to reach children as young as 11 years of age.
“The material of the Schools without Homophobia project is suitable for the age groups and the affective-cognitive development for which it is targeted,” UNESCO wrote, according to a Brazilian government website.
The cancellation of the program, which has caused controversy in Brazil for over half a year, has made headlines across the country. Revelations that the government has spent over a million of dollars of public money on the program have also added fuel to the fire.
The defeat of “Schools without Homophobia” represents another major blow against the socialist government’s long-standing anti-life and anti-family policies.
The Brazilian Labor Party, led by the popular presidents Luiz Lula da Silva and Dilma Rousseff, his handpicked successor, have consistently advocated the decriminalization of abortion and policies that would punish those who speak out against homosexuality. However, Rousseff found her presidential aspirations threatened last year when pro-family forces emphasized her party’s record on human life and family issues, forcing her to sign an agreement not to promote her party’s agenda.
Public opinion polls, as well as polls of congressional representatives, have also indicated a strengthening of the pro-life and pro-family positions in the Brazilian electorate.
Although Roussef has been careful to indicate her rejection of the program, her Women’s Policies minister has taken a more defiant tone.
“The program for confronting homophobia is a definitive program. It will not suffer setbacks. The government of President Dilma [Rouseff] is committed to the issue of rights. The president has demonstrated that in all of her acts,” said chief minister Iriny Lopes.
Rousseff’s education minister Fernando Haddad promised to return to the schools with new materials in a matter of months, after a further consultation with “specialists.” The program reportedly will be reformulated by the same homosexualist non-governmental organizations that created the current program.
Julio Severo, one of Brazil’s most influential pro-family activists, is warning that the administration will continue to push the homosexual agenda, and urges Catholics and Evangelical Protestants to continue fighting.
“Whether or not Dilma has retreated, the Catholic and Evangelical leadership should not retreat,” writes Severo, adding that “above all, it is necessary to unmask and combat the campaign that, in the name of fighting against ‘homophobia’ is combating the Christian majority of Brazil and the mothers and father who want to protect their children form every type of immoral assault.”
Will gun owner apathy enable ATF’s ‘emergency’ long gun registration scheme?
“Comments for multiple rifle sales reporting re-opened,” Chris Knox of The Firearms Coalition reported yesterday.
The comment period for the ATF’s proposed “temporary,” emergency regulation requiring firearms dealers to file reports every time someone purchases more than one semi-auto long gun was reopened, but that comment period closes this Tuesday, May 31.
They share some disturbing, inexcusable news:
During the last comment period on this gun owners were outnumbered by the prohibitionists. That should NEVER happen! We outnumber them 10 to one and our response to outrageous proposals like this should reflect that numbers advantage.
“Profiles in apathy.” You know, inaction by gun owners that enables “gun control," derails valiant efforts and disheartens those who continually find themselves carrying an inordinate share of the burden?
Those who’ve done nothing to date: What excuse do you have?
Particularly in light of this reminder:
The ATF claims the reporting is necessary to combat the flow of firearms across the border into Mexico, but in light of the “Gunwalker” scandal currently being investigated in Congress and by the Justice Department Inspector General’s office, it looks like ATF is the problem, not the solution.
Read the rest of Knox’s analysis, but don’t stop there. Use his sample comment or create one of your own, and send it in. Now. And copy your senators and representatives. Now.
Here:
oira_submission@omb.eop.gov
Here:
http://www.senate.gov/
Here:
http://www.house.gov/
Could it possibly be made any easier?
And then tell every one of your gun-owning friends. And bug the hell out of them to follow suit.
Or do nothing, and embolden and enable the opposition. It’s up to you.
UPDATE: I am advised the antis got that superior ratio by using an automated form emailer. Activists on our side are fighting fire with fire and could not have made things any easier for us.
UPDATE 2: Kurt Hofmann is in no damn mood for excuses.
Also see:
ATF ‘emergency’ long gun reporting an agenda-driven power grab
‘Project Gunwalker’ protest can help kill ATF’s long gun reporting proposal
A journalist’s guide to ‘Project Gunwalker' Part One, Part Two and Part Three for a complete list with links of independent investigative reporting and commentary done to date by Sipsey Street Irregulars and Gun Rights Examiner.
Note to newcomers to this story: “Project Gunrunner” is the name ATF assigned to its Southwest Border Initiative to interdict gun smuggling to Mexico. “Project Gunwalker” is the name I assigned to the scandal after allegations by agents that monitored guns were allowed to fall into criminal hands on both sides of the border through a surveillance process termed “walking” surfaced.
------------
Help wanted--inquire within
Regular readers: If you agree that mainstream press coverage of the gun rights issue demands a counter-balance, please help me spread the word by sharing Gun Rights Examiner links with your friends via emails, and in online discussion boards, blogs, etc. (Also note “Share” options, below.) Then get more commentary at The War on Guns: Notes from the Resistance.
The comment period for the ATF’s proposed “temporary,” emergency regulation requiring firearms dealers to file reports every time someone purchases more than one semi-auto long gun was reopened, but that comment period closes this Tuesday, May 31.
They share some disturbing, inexcusable news:
During the last comment period on this gun owners were outnumbered by the prohibitionists. That should NEVER happen! We outnumber them 10 to one and our response to outrageous proposals like this should reflect that numbers advantage.
“Profiles in apathy.” You know, inaction by gun owners that enables “gun control," derails valiant efforts and disheartens those who continually find themselves carrying an inordinate share of the burden?
Those who’ve done nothing to date: What excuse do you have?
Particularly in light of this reminder:
The ATF claims the reporting is necessary to combat the flow of firearms across the border into Mexico, but in light of the “Gunwalker” scandal currently being investigated in Congress and by the Justice Department Inspector General’s office, it looks like ATF is the problem, not the solution.
Read the rest of Knox’s analysis, but don’t stop there. Use his sample comment or create one of your own, and send it in. Now. And copy your senators and representatives. Now.
Here:
oira_submission@omb.eop.gov
Here:
http://www.senate.gov/
Here:
http://www.house.gov/
Could it possibly be made any easier?
And then tell every one of your gun-owning friends. And bug the hell out of them to follow suit.
Or do nothing, and embolden and enable the opposition. It’s up to you.
UPDATE: I am advised the antis got that superior ratio by using an automated form emailer. Activists on our side are fighting fire with fire and could not have made things any easier for us.
UPDATE 2: Kurt Hofmann is in no damn mood for excuses.
Also see:
ATF ‘emergency’ long gun reporting an agenda-driven power grab
‘Project Gunwalker’ protest can help kill ATF’s long gun reporting proposal
A journalist’s guide to ‘Project Gunwalker' Part One, Part Two and Part Three for a complete list with links of independent investigative reporting and commentary done to date by Sipsey Street Irregulars and Gun Rights Examiner.
Note to newcomers to this story: “Project Gunrunner” is the name ATF assigned to its Southwest Border Initiative to interdict gun smuggling to Mexico. “Project Gunwalker” is the name I assigned to the scandal after allegations by agents that monitored guns were allowed to fall into criminal hands on both sides of the border through a surveillance process termed “walking” surfaced.
------------
Help wanted--inquire within
Regular readers: If you agree that mainstream press coverage of the gun rights issue demands a counter-balance, please help me spread the word by sharing Gun Rights Examiner links with your friends via emails, and in online discussion boards, blogs, etc. (Also note “Share” options, below.) Then get more commentary at The War on Guns: Notes from the Resistance.
Iran Sending Forces To Assist In Syria Crackdowns
Iran sending members of elite Quds force as well as weapons, riot gear, sophisticated surveillance equipment to use against Syria government opposition.
U.S. officials said that Iran is assisting Syrian President Bashar Assad's violent crackdown on protesters, sending trainers and advisers to suppress opposition, according to a Washington Post report.
Iran has sent members of its elite Quds force, whom the United States has recently sanctioned in response to the 10 weeks of brutal Syrian government quashing of protests, to help the Syrian government, Iran's most important ally in the region.
Manpower is only one of the forms of assistance Iran has sent to Syria, the report said, with the Islamist government sending weapons, riot gear and sophisticated surveillance equipment that allows Syrian authorities to trace and find opposition members through Facebook and Twitter accounts.
The surveillance system has reportedly prompted the arrest of hundreds of Syrians in recent weeks, two U.S. officials and a diplomat from an allied nation told the Washington Post, all speaking on condition of anonymity due to the sensitivity of the information.
The diplomat said that Iranian military trainers have been brought to Syria's capital Damascus to teach security forces techniques that were used against the "Green Movement" in 2009. Protests to the allegedly corrupt election of current President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad were met with brutal violence from Iranian security forces.
The elite Iranian Quds force has reportedly played an influential role in crackdowns since at least mid-April, the sources told the Washington Post, prompting Obama to sign an executive order sanctioning the group last month.
The Quds Force is a branch of the Iranian government's principal security agency which operates outside Iran and has in the past been accused by U.S. officials of interfering extensively in political and insurgent activities in Iraq.
The elite force has also helped train members of Hamas and Hezbollah.
Although the number of Iranian advisers in Syria remains unknown, it has reportedly been increasing, according to the U.S. and allied officials.
The Obama administration mentioned the Quds force in a second set of sanctions last week, which targeted Assad and six other top officials including Mohsen Chizari, and Iranian military officer who is the Quds Force's third in command responsible for training.
In March Turkey informed a UN Security Council panel that it seized a cache of weapons Iran was attempting to export to Syria in breach of a UN arms embargo.
The report to the council's Iran sanctions committee, which oversees compliance with the four rounds of punitive steps the 15-nation body has imposed on Iran over its nuclear program, said a March 21 inspection turned up the weapons, which were listed as "auto spare parts" on the plane's documents.
The plane was bound for Aleppo, Syria, and was given permission to pass through Turkish airspace provided it made a "technical stop" at Diyarbakir airport, the report said.
U.S. officials said that Iran is assisting Syrian President Bashar Assad's violent crackdown on protesters, sending trainers and advisers to suppress opposition, according to a Washington Post report.
Iran has sent members of its elite Quds force, whom the United States has recently sanctioned in response to the 10 weeks of brutal Syrian government quashing of protests, to help the Syrian government, Iran's most important ally in the region.
Manpower is only one of the forms of assistance Iran has sent to Syria, the report said, with the Islamist government sending weapons, riot gear and sophisticated surveillance equipment that allows Syrian authorities to trace and find opposition members through Facebook and Twitter accounts.
The surveillance system has reportedly prompted the arrest of hundreds of Syrians in recent weeks, two U.S. officials and a diplomat from an allied nation told the Washington Post, all speaking on condition of anonymity due to the sensitivity of the information.
The diplomat said that Iranian military trainers have been brought to Syria's capital Damascus to teach security forces techniques that were used against the "Green Movement" in 2009. Protests to the allegedly corrupt election of current President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad were met with brutal violence from Iranian security forces.
The elite Iranian Quds force has reportedly played an influential role in crackdowns since at least mid-April, the sources told the Washington Post, prompting Obama to sign an executive order sanctioning the group last month.
The Quds Force is a branch of the Iranian government's principal security agency which operates outside Iran and has in the past been accused by U.S. officials of interfering extensively in political and insurgent activities in Iraq.
The elite force has also helped train members of Hamas and Hezbollah.
Although the number of Iranian advisers in Syria remains unknown, it has reportedly been increasing, according to the U.S. and allied officials.
The Obama administration mentioned the Quds force in a second set of sanctions last week, which targeted Assad and six other top officials including Mohsen Chizari, and Iranian military officer who is the Quds Force's third in command responsible for training.
In March Turkey informed a UN Security Council panel that it seized a cache of weapons Iran was attempting to export to Syria in breach of a UN arms embargo.
The report to the council's Iran sanctions committee, which oversees compliance with the four rounds of punitive steps the 15-nation body has imposed on Iran over its nuclear program, said a March 21 inspection turned up the weapons, which were listed as "auto spare parts" on the plane's documents.
The plane was bound for Aleppo, Syria, and was given permission to pass through Turkish airspace provided it made a "technical stop" at Diyarbakir airport, the report said.
Eugenic abortion of disabled babies increasing in UK
The most recent available statistics from England and Wales show that eugenic abortions have risen by ten percent in the past year.
The 2010 statistics, published by the Department of Health this week, also found that unmarried girls are overwhelmingly more likely to abort their children than married women, with 81 percent of abortions carried out on single women. For every two abortions carried out on married women, 11 children of unmarried women were killed by abortion.
Paul Tully, general secretary of the Society for the Protection of Unborn Children (SPUC), commented: “The annual abortion statistics tell a tragic story of avoidable death – driven by commercial interests and sexual exploitation of women.
“The abortion industry and the Department of Health abet the anti-life culture by promoting the idea that sex – and abortion - must be available to everyone on demand.”
Despite the slight drop from 2009, the abortion rate in England and Wales has climbed steadily overall since the practice was legalized in 1967.
The report notes that 2,290 abortions, about 1 percent, were carried out under “Ground E,” or in cases where the child was suspected of having a handicap, in 2010, a rise of around 10 percent over 2009, when 2,085 disabled babies were aborted; the average for Ground E over the last 5 years has been under 2000.
There were also 85 abortions that involved “selective terminations,” that is, the killing of one or more children in the womb while leaving a twin alive. The practice, also commonly called “selective reduction,” was done in 51 cases. Seventy-eight percent of these were committed under ground E.
Attempts in Parliament in 1990 to lower the gestational age limit for abortion backfired when the change was allowed but only at the expense of disabled children. The age limit was lowered marginally from 28 to 24 weeks, but all restriction on eugenic abortion was lifted; now children suspected of suffering even mild disabilities can be killed legally up to the point of full gestation.
The total number of abortions for England and Wales was 189,574 in 2010, a 0.3 percent increase over 2009 and an 8 percent increase since 2000. The overall rate of abortion for women resident in England and Wales aged 15-44 was 17.5 per 1,000, which the report notes is more than double the 1970 rate of 8.0 per 1000.
Young women are especially at risk of abortion, with 33 abortions per 1,000 for women between 19 and 20. There has been a slight drop in the number of abortions conducted on teenaged girls, with 3.9 per 1000 for under-16s and 16.5 per 1000 for under-18s. This is compared with 2009 rates of 4.0 per 1000 and 17.6 per 1000 respectively.
Ninety-six percent of abortions were funded by the NHS, with 59 percent being contracted out to private abortionist organizations like Marie Stopes and the British Pregnancy Advisory Service.
The number of so-called “medical” abortions, those carried out by the use of the drug RU-486, is also growing, constituting 43 percent of abortions, up from 12 percent in 2000.
The 2010 statistics, published by the Department of Health this week, also found that unmarried girls are overwhelmingly more likely to abort their children than married women, with 81 percent of abortions carried out on single women. For every two abortions carried out on married women, 11 children of unmarried women were killed by abortion.
Paul Tully, general secretary of the Society for the Protection of Unborn Children (SPUC), commented: “The annual abortion statistics tell a tragic story of avoidable death – driven by commercial interests and sexual exploitation of women.
“The abortion industry and the Department of Health abet the anti-life culture by promoting the idea that sex – and abortion - must be available to everyone on demand.”
Despite the slight drop from 2009, the abortion rate in England and Wales has climbed steadily overall since the practice was legalized in 1967.
The report notes that 2,290 abortions, about 1 percent, were carried out under “Ground E,” or in cases where the child was suspected of having a handicap, in 2010, a rise of around 10 percent over 2009, when 2,085 disabled babies were aborted; the average for Ground E over the last 5 years has been under 2000.
There were also 85 abortions that involved “selective terminations,” that is, the killing of one or more children in the womb while leaving a twin alive. The practice, also commonly called “selective reduction,” was done in 51 cases. Seventy-eight percent of these were committed under ground E.
Attempts in Parliament in 1990 to lower the gestational age limit for abortion backfired when the change was allowed but only at the expense of disabled children. The age limit was lowered marginally from 28 to 24 weeks, but all restriction on eugenic abortion was lifted; now children suspected of suffering even mild disabilities can be killed legally up to the point of full gestation.
The total number of abortions for England and Wales was 189,574 in 2010, a 0.3 percent increase over 2009 and an 8 percent increase since 2000. The overall rate of abortion for women resident in England and Wales aged 15-44 was 17.5 per 1,000, which the report notes is more than double the 1970 rate of 8.0 per 1000.
Young women are especially at risk of abortion, with 33 abortions per 1,000 for women between 19 and 20. There has been a slight drop in the number of abortions conducted on teenaged girls, with 3.9 per 1000 for under-16s and 16.5 per 1000 for under-18s. This is compared with 2009 rates of 4.0 per 1000 and 17.6 per 1000 respectively.
Ninety-six percent of abortions were funded by the NHS, with 59 percent being contracted out to private abortionist organizations like Marie Stopes and the British Pregnancy Advisory Service.
The number of so-called “medical” abortions, those carried out by the use of the drug RU-486, is also growing, constituting 43 percent of abortions, up from 12 percent in 2000.
President Obama and Numbergate
Jack Cashill recently detailed what Susan Daniels, a private investigator, has learned about Mr. Obama's Social Security Number. In a nutshell, the president's SSN was issued in 1977 with a Connecticut Area Number (first 3 digits).
Here's what the SS official web site says, in relevant part:
The Area Number [first 3 digits] is assigned by the geographical region. Prior to 1972, cards were issued in local Social Security offices around the country and the Area Number represented the State in which the card was issued. This did not necessarily have to be the State where the applicant lived, since a person could apply for their card in any Social Security office. Since 1972, when SSA began assigning SSNs and issuing cards centrally from Baltimore, the area number assigned has been based on the ZIP code in the mailing address provided on the application for the original Social Security card. The applicant's mailing address does not have to be the same as their place of residence. Thus, the Area Number does not necessarily represent the State of residence of the applicant, either prior to 1972 or since.
One must wonder if the above was written or revised in the last three years in the wake of inquiries about Mr. Obama's SSN to draw a red herring across the trail.
But what if the Obamaites are setting us up for another sucker punch? Their handling of the birth certificate was masterful: the PDF posted mollified all the MSM pundits, who immediately pronounced the matter put to rest, while the artifacts in the PDF allow the matter to stay open, with attendant finger-pointing and laughter from the brilliant Obamaites at the uncouth, unreasonable, unstoppable birthers, who will accept no proof.
So let's take a quick look at what has the left said about the SSN. I donned my bunny suit for entry into a toxic waste site, Huffington Post, and searched on "obama social security number," which led to a blog by one Jason Linkins, who thought all the refutation needed was provided by "the good folks at The Week," who in turn thought the last word on the subject came from one Carole Bengle Gilbert at Associated Content:
What about Obama's father, also named Barack Hussain Obama [sic], who lived in Connecticut after divorcing Obama's mother? That doesn't count as a family connection? ... Even assuming that Obama's father left Connecticut before the Social Security number issued, his residency there establishes the connection Daniels said didn't exist. And it's not too hard to imagine a young Barack Obama checking out the place his dad once lived or connecting with people still there who knew his dad. In fact Barack Obama's dad attended college in Connecticut and in 1977, Obama was college aged; is it beyond reason to consider that he might have checked out his father's alma mater?
Where to start with this farrago of nonsense? We know that by 1977 BHO Sr. had been back in Kenya for 12 years, where he was pursuing an early grave through alcohol and drunk driving accidents. And we learn from the astute Ms. Gilbert that BHO Sr., after abandoning the future president's mother, apparently enrolled at that other Harvard University in Connecticut, not the better-known one in Massachusetts. Then BHO Jr., as a sophomore or junior in high school, went on a fact finding trip to "the place his dad once lived," met up "with people still there who knew his dad" (no small task, akin to verifying the voter rolls in Chicago), and asked one of them if, oh by the way, he might use their address to apply for a Social Security number.
Apparently the Connecticut Harvard made a poor impression on him, because 11 years later he chose the one in Massachusetts for law school. Eventful trip for a high school kid whose chief interests heretofore had been hanging out and getting high. Ties up all the loose ends for me.
But wait, there's another explanation. The Wikipedia article on Social Security numbers, under the section "Identity Theft," offers information that the Obamaites may wish to work into their story:
Identity confusion has also occurred due to the use of local Social Security Numbers by the Federated States of Micronesia, the Republic of the Marshall Islands and the Republic of Palau, whose numbers overlap with those of residents of New Hampshire and Maine.[20]
So when Numbergate heats up, Jay Carney, White House press secretary, can say that Palau is close to Hawaii (both islands, both in the Pacific) and that New Hampshire and Maine and Connecticut are all in New England, so maybe the whole matter is just a bureaucratic snafu. This delivered with Mr. Carney's signature deadpan and received by the press corps (pronounced "corpse") with appreciative laughter.
Here's what the SS official web site says, in relevant part:
The Area Number [first 3 digits] is assigned by the geographical region. Prior to 1972, cards were issued in local Social Security offices around the country and the Area Number represented the State in which the card was issued. This did not necessarily have to be the State where the applicant lived, since a person could apply for their card in any Social Security office. Since 1972, when SSA began assigning SSNs and issuing cards centrally from Baltimore, the area number assigned has been based on the ZIP code in the mailing address provided on the application for the original Social Security card. The applicant's mailing address does not have to be the same as their place of residence. Thus, the Area Number does not necessarily represent the State of residence of the applicant, either prior to 1972 or since.
One must wonder if the above was written or revised in the last three years in the wake of inquiries about Mr. Obama's SSN to draw a red herring across the trail.
But what if the Obamaites are setting us up for another sucker punch? Their handling of the birth certificate was masterful: the PDF posted mollified all the MSM pundits, who immediately pronounced the matter put to rest, while the artifacts in the PDF allow the matter to stay open, with attendant finger-pointing and laughter from the brilliant Obamaites at the uncouth, unreasonable, unstoppable birthers, who will accept no proof.
So let's take a quick look at what has the left said about the SSN. I donned my bunny suit for entry into a toxic waste site, Huffington Post, and searched on "obama social security number," which led to a blog by one Jason Linkins, who thought all the refutation needed was provided by "the good folks at The Week," who in turn thought the last word on the subject came from one Carole Bengle Gilbert at Associated Content:
What about Obama's father, also named Barack Hussain Obama [sic], who lived in Connecticut after divorcing Obama's mother? That doesn't count as a family connection? ... Even assuming that Obama's father left Connecticut before the Social Security number issued, his residency there establishes the connection Daniels said didn't exist. And it's not too hard to imagine a young Barack Obama checking out the place his dad once lived or connecting with people still there who knew his dad. In fact Barack Obama's dad attended college in Connecticut and in 1977, Obama was college aged; is it beyond reason to consider that he might have checked out his father's alma mater?
Where to start with this farrago of nonsense? We know that by 1977 BHO Sr. had been back in Kenya for 12 years, where he was pursuing an early grave through alcohol and drunk driving accidents. And we learn from the astute Ms. Gilbert that BHO Sr., after abandoning the future president's mother, apparently enrolled at that other Harvard University in Connecticut, not the better-known one in Massachusetts. Then BHO Jr., as a sophomore or junior in high school, went on a fact finding trip to "the place his dad once lived," met up "with people still there who knew his dad" (no small task, akin to verifying the voter rolls in Chicago), and asked one of them if, oh by the way, he might use their address to apply for a Social Security number.
Apparently the Connecticut Harvard made a poor impression on him, because 11 years later he chose the one in Massachusetts for law school. Eventful trip for a high school kid whose chief interests heretofore had been hanging out and getting high. Ties up all the loose ends for me.
But wait, there's another explanation. The Wikipedia article on Social Security numbers, under the section "Identity Theft," offers information that the Obamaites may wish to work into their story:
Identity confusion has also occurred due to the use of local Social Security Numbers by the Federated States of Micronesia, the Republic of the Marshall Islands and the Republic of Palau, whose numbers overlap with those of residents of New Hampshire and Maine.[20]
So when Numbergate heats up, Jay Carney, White House press secretary, can say that Palau is close to Hawaii (both islands, both in the Pacific) and that New Hampshire and Maine and Connecticut are all in New England, so maybe the whole matter is just a bureaucratic snafu. This delivered with Mr. Carney's signature deadpan and received by the press corps (pronounced "corpse") with appreciative laughter.
Stimulated scammers
When President Obama signed the trillion-dollar stimulus law in 2009, he said he was "keeping the American dream alive in our time." He failed to mention that billions would go to keeping tax scammers afloat on our dime.
According to a General Accounting Office audit conducted over the last year, nearly 4,000 stimulus recipients received $24 billion in Recovery Act funds -- while owing more than $750 million in unpaid corporate, payroll and other taxes. Among them:
* Two social-services groups with nearly $3 million in unpaid taxes each received more than $1 million in stimulus awards.
* One nonprofit owed more than $2 million from years of unpaid payroll taxes, even as its CEO made numerous trips to a casino. The group won more than $1 million in stimulus funds.
* One engineering-services firm had a $6 million delinquent tax debt and was called by the IRS an "extreme case of noncompliance," yet won a contract worth more than $100,000.
* A health-care company that owes more than $1 million in back taxes and has had federal IRS liens filed against it since the late 1990s received $100,000 in stimulus funds.
* One security firm owed $9 million and was repeatedly cited not only for being uncooperative with the IRS, but also for frequent labor violations. It also received a stimulus contract worth more than $100,000.
This is just the tip of the iceberg. The GAO noted that "the estimated amount of known unpaid federal taxes we identified is likely understated" because of rampant underreporting of income and because the analysis did "not include Recovery Act contract and grant recipients who are noncompliant with or not subject to Recovery Act reporting requirements."
The official response of the Obama administration's stimulus-oversight board? The Recovery Accountability and Transparency Board patted itself on the back for its transparency. Then it dodged responsibility by pointing out that "federal law does not prohibit tax delinquents from getting government contracts or grants." As if it couldn't have exercised its common sense to stop such plundering?
And you can't count on the IRS to perform due diligence on behalf of the taxpayer, either. Last week, the Treasury Department inspector general found that the tax police have failed to prevent fraud in the stimulus law's energy-tax-credit program.
Some $6 billion in energy credits for homeowners have been claimed -- but the IG's audit found that 30 percent of credit-claimers had no record of home ownership. "I am troubled by the IRS's continued failure to develop appropriate verification methods for distributing Recovery Act credits," the Treasury watchdog said.
When the IRS wasn't falling down on its job policing outside fraud, its own workers were committing their own stimulus fraud -- by cheating the system and claiming a first-time homebuyer tax credit included in the 2008 and 2009 stimulus packages. At least 128 IRS employees claimed the credit, according to a recent Treasury audit, yet weren't first-time buyers or violated other basic eligibility criteria.
Sen. Tom Coburn (R-Okla.), who has doggedly tracked stimulus waste, said, "That such a huge amount of the stimulus money went to known tax cheats should be a wake-up call for Congress."
It should be about the 20th wake-up call. Obama's slush fund has redistributed wealth to prison inmates, flaky researchers, social-justice boondoggles, infrastructure to nowhere, foreign companies, dead people and ghost congressional districts -- not to mention $20 million to pay for campaign-style stimulus-hyping road signs emblazoned with the shovel-ready logo.
For what?
Unemployment remains near double-digits. Highway jobs have not materialized. Investor's Business Daily notes that a study by economists Timothy Conley and Bill Dupor "found that despite the influx of all that federal money, highway-construction jobs actually plunged by nearly 70,000 between 2008 and 2010."
The researchers found that the stimulus "destroyed or forestalled" a million private-sector jobs by crowding them out with make-work public jobs and programs.
Recovery.gov? More like Wreckovery.gov.
According to a General Accounting Office audit conducted over the last year, nearly 4,000 stimulus recipients received $24 billion in Recovery Act funds -- while owing more than $750 million in unpaid corporate, payroll and other taxes. Among them:
* Two social-services groups with nearly $3 million in unpaid taxes each received more than $1 million in stimulus awards.
* One nonprofit owed more than $2 million from years of unpaid payroll taxes, even as its CEO made numerous trips to a casino. The group won more than $1 million in stimulus funds.
* One engineering-services firm had a $6 million delinquent tax debt and was called by the IRS an "extreme case of noncompliance," yet won a contract worth more than $100,000.
* A health-care company that owes more than $1 million in back taxes and has had federal IRS liens filed against it since the late 1990s received $100,000 in stimulus funds.
* One security firm owed $9 million and was repeatedly cited not only for being uncooperative with the IRS, but also for frequent labor violations. It also received a stimulus contract worth more than $100,000.
This is just the tip of the iceberg. The GAO noted that "the estimated amount of known unpaid federal taxes we identified is likely understated" because of rampant underreporting of income and because the analysis did "not include Recovery Act contract and grant recipients who are noncompliant with or not subject to Recovery Act reporting requirements."
The official response of the Obama administration's stimulus-oversight board? The Recovery Accountability and Transparency Board patted itself on the back for its transparency. Then it dodged responsibility by pointing out that "federal law does not prohibit tax delinquents from getting government contracts or grants." As if it couldn't have exercised its common sense to stop such plundering?
And you can't count on the IRS to perform due diligence on behalf of the taxpayer, either. Last week, the Treasury Department inspector general found that the tax police have failed to prevent fraud in the stimulus law's energy-tax-credit program.
Some $6 billion in energy credits for homeowners have been claimed -- but the IG's audit found that 30 percent of credit-claimers had no record of home ownership. "I am troubled by the IRS's continued failure to develop appropriate verification methods for distributing Recovery Act credits," the Treasury watchdog said.
When the IRS wasn't falling down on its job policing outside fraud, its own workers were committing their own stimulus fraud -- by cheating the system and claiming a first-time homebuyer tax credit included in the 2008 and 2009 stimulus packages. At least 128 IRS employees claimed the credit, according to a recent Treasury audit, yet weren't first-time buyers or violated other basic eligibility criteria.
Sen. Tom Coburn (R-Okla.), who has doggedly tracked stimulus waste, said, "That such a huge amount of the stimulus money went to known tax cheats should be a wake-up call for Congress."
It should be about the 20th wake-up call. Obama's slush fund has redistributed wealth to prison inmates, flaky researchers, social-justice boondoggles, infrastructure to nowhere, foreign companies, dead people and ghost congressional districts -- not to mention $20 million to pay for campaign-style stimulus-hyping road signs emblazoned with the shovel-ready logo.
For what?
Unemployment remains near double-digits. Highway jobs have not materialized. Investor's Business Daily notes that a study by economists Timothy Conley and Bill Dupor "found that despite the influx of all that federal money, highway-construction jobs actually plunged by nearly 70,000 between 2008 and 2010."
The researchers found that the stimulus "destroyed or forestalled" a million private-sector jobs by crowding them out with make-work public jobs and programs.
Recovery.gov? More like Wreckovery.gov.