Saturday, April 14, 2012

Monsters in the Classroom: NYC Teachers Union Reinstates Alleged Molesters


by Education Action Group
4.14.12

NEW YORK – What are parents to do when their child comes home from school with stories about "this creepy guy in my class" – and it turns out to be the teacher?

That’s a very real concern for parents with children in New York City public schools, where 14 teachers of highly dubious character have been reinstated to the classroom – and two others have been given "desk duty" – thanks to appeals by their powerful teachers union, the United Federation of Teachers.

NYDailyNews.com reports that 16 teachers "kept their jobs after being brought up on egregious charges, some sexual, some involving excessive personal familiarity with students."

A few examples:

Gym and health teacher Willie Laraque was charged with bending a male student over a desk, leaning in to him and saying, "I’ll show you what is gay." The Daily News reports Laraque is back in the classroom after paying a $10,000 fine.

Norman Siegel, a high school teacher, was accused of pressing his genitalia against a female student’s leg. Siegel only received a 45-day unpaid suspension, "although the arbitrator found that the girl’s charge was likely true" and that Siegel "was previously accused of a similar offense," the Daily News writes.

There’s also a case involving Edward Cascio, a gym teacher who accepted pornographic pictures from a student – of another student. Cascio was back at work after serving his three-month suspension.

The district tried to fire these individuals, but the UFT appealed the decisions to arbitrators, who gave the teachers their jobs back.

"Why would arbitrators throw kids to the wolves?" asks a Daily News editorial. "Because they make a living deciding such cases – and because they are hired by joint agreement of the Education Department and the UFT. They well know that if they toss teachers out of work, the union will do the same to them."

The paper is calling on Gov. Andrew Cuomo to have teachers accused of bad behavior to stand before the "Office of Administrative Trials and Hearings, where every other civil servant goes for adjudication" and whose "professional administrative judges have no built-in bias against rendering the tough rulings needed to protect kids."

That’s a good start, but education reformers should demand changes to teacher tenure, so district officials don’t have to spend a small fortune in legal fees every time they attempt to remove a perverse educator from the classroom. Given UFT’s influence over New York’s school system, such a bold change might not be possible. But New Yorkers must do everything in their power to protect their students from these teachers – and their union.

HILLARY TO TUNISIAN STUDENTS: OBAMA ADMINSTRATION SUPPORTS THE MUSLIM JIHAD AGAINST ISRAEL

Friday, April 13, 2012

In an Town Hall meeting with Tunisian students - in Tunisia - that is openly posted on the United States State Department website, Hillary Clinton lets the mask slip and admits that the Administration's pro-Israel rhetoric is just campaign talk, and that the Arab students should judge Obama by his actions - which after his re-election (Heaven forbid!) will become even more anti-Israel: CNS News has more here, including a link to the full transcript of this disgusting spectacle.

HERE'S THE ANTI-ZIONIST QUESTION AND CLINTON'S ANTI-ZIONIST ANSWER:


HERE'S THE FULL TOWN HALL MEETING:


Video streaming by Ustream

Posted by Punditarian at 6:23 PM

Lovely: Nation's Second-Largest Teachers' Union Hires... Militant Communist and 9/11 Truther

Friday, April 13, 2012
Lovely: Nation's Second-Largest Teachers' Union Hires... Militant Communist and 9/11 Truther

I would assume that Van Jones wasn't available.

Remind me why we support public education again? ... At least the Totalitarians are out in the open. The Socialists, Communists, Democratic-Socialists (euphemism for Socialists and Communists) are hiding in plain sight and they are in charge of our children.


They are making public education their base of operations for obvious reasons.

One of their new organizer’s jobs is to unionize charter schools which would destroy alternative public education and continue the failed public education monopoly, while relegating poor children to the fate of an inferior and radical education.

One of the reasons public education is failing is the unions. As an educator, I see them as self-serving socialists who care nothing about the children – schools are not for children in their world, schools are for them. This is something I have been told by many a union leader. The breakdown of our social fiber is no small contributing factor either.

The AMERICAN FEDERATION OF TEACHERS (AFT) is a national union headquartered in Washington, D.C., and is affiliated with the Socialist, thuggish American Federation of Labor–Congress of Industrial Organizations (AFL-CIO). The AFT joined with the NEA to form an NEAFT Partnership in 2001. AFL-CIO affiliation is optional for them since that was always a sticking point. The AFT and NEA collaboration was charted to strengthen the organizations’ abilities to buy politicians’ votes and to negotiate favorable contracts in the twenty-first century.

Hiring radicals at the AFT is nothing new. Albert Shanker, the AFT leader who died in 1997, was an avowed Socialist all his life... Now the AFT has hired a Socialist, Shaun Richman, who is also a Truther and Osama bin Laden apologist... Shaun Richman, the new deputy director of organizing for the AFT, gained his experience organizing for the Socialist Party USA. [Little more than two months ago, Richman wrote:]


Quitting the Socialist Party freed me to commit the twin heresies of reading V.I. Lenin and Michael Harrington. My political perspective hasn’t changed very much, but my perspective has become more nuanced. This leaves me very familiar with American social democratic theory and with the twists and turns of the old Socialist Party, as well as its last major off-shoots, and, thanks to Si Gerson’s library, with the external work and internal factionalism of the Communist Party, at least up until 1960...

Bryan D. Palmer’s “James P. Cannon and the American Revolutionary Left” begins to fill in some of that gap. Cannon is best known (to the extent that he’s known at all) as a father of American Trotskyism and founder of the Socialist Workers Party. Palmer’s volume focuses on the period when he was a founder of the Workers (Communist) Party. Along with such odd bedfellows as William Z. Foster and Jay Lovestone, Cannon helped foster a native expression of Marxist-Leninist agitation in America, while navigating intense and ever-changing factional intrigue in the party and the International...

...[Members of] the Socialist Party are Truthers... The Truther argument conveniently works with the Socialist anti-war platform and they get to pick up more members from the vulnerable in the peace movements and Libertarian movements. It’s a political ploy as are most of the Socialist agenda items. They want Totalitarianism at all costs and will say anything to pick up members.

So what does this Totalitarian make as a salary? Comrade Richman makes a capitalistic $212,746 salary because, like all good totalitarians, the rules don’t apply to him. He just wants you to make minimal salaries for your labors.

Just the kind of leadership we want in our schools, no?

I have asked this question over and over again: when did it become acceptable for Communists to infiltrate American institutions and the Democrat Party's leadership?

Communism is mass-murder. It is genocide. It is antithetical to the United States Constitution. And it must be stamped out in this country.

Which is why the Democrat Party must be obliterated at the ballot box in November. O. Blit. Eh. Rated. I will march on broken glass to vote, and I will for vote every non-Democrat I can. Because this party is defective. It's been poisoned. It is anathema to the American family and American values.

We must politically crush this virus. November is coming.


Hat tip: BadBlue.

Your future under Obama: Union thugs pressuring you 24/7

Friday, April 13, 2012
Your future under Obama: Union thugs pressuring you 24/7

That is, if you're lucky enough to have a job.

Unknown figures entering your workplace through the back door without identification. Harassing late night phone calls. Strangers blocking your driveway and studying your exact movements.


These are not just the tactics of common criminals and thugs; they are also the tactics of Service Employees International Union Healthcare Workers West organizers at Chapman Medical Center in Orange County...

"It is just ludicrous," said Marlene Felter of Costa Mesa, a medical coder in Chapman's financial department. "(The company) said the SEIU can come in and organize (without any notice). SEIU organizers were calling people on their jobs and showing up at people's homes at 9 o'clock at night... "They would block people in their homes and driveways. How they got our cellphone numbers I don't know, but we've received numerous calls from different numbers... They wanted to know what my hours were, when I came and left work, and my pay."

You see, SEIU officials and Chapman management entered into a backroom deal known as a "neutrality agreement," designed to grease the skids for workers to be forced into union ranks.

However, the agreement is anything but "neutral:" Company officials granted union operatives access to company facilities to conduct a coercive "card check" organizing campaign in which union organizers pressure workers to fill out cards that count as votes for unionization of the workplace. Meanwhile, Chapman waived the right to have a federally supervised secret-ballot election to determine whether employees really wish to be unionized.

In response to the union's coercive tactics, a majority of hospital workers signed cards, letters, and petitions stating that they do not want the SEIU union bosses' so-called "representation." Instead of respecting the employees' wishes, Chapman officials accepted SEIU officials as the workers' monopoly bargaining agents after a rigged "card count" was held in November 2011.

"The SEIU 'won' by two votes because they kept throwing the votes out," Felter told us. "It was all done behind closed doors."

...Felter has filed federal unfair labor-practice charges with the National Labor Relations Board against SEIU and company officials. She seeks an injunction to stop hospital and SEIU officials from illegally negotiating a contract based on the fraudulent "card check" union recognition because the union does not have majority support of the workforce. Because of the gravity of the charges and the overwhelming evidence, the NLRB has authorized investigative subpoenas...

Uhm, hate to be Johnny Buzzkill, Ms. Felter. But I wouldn't get your hopes up with the NLRB. After all, they're not even legitimate appointees.

Card Check - That's a pretty little house ya got there.
It'd be a shame if it got boined up.

Another NYC shooting death that doesn’t fit the MSM Narrative.

By Jeremy Griffith
Apr 13, 2012
CDN:

A 48-year old retired NYC police lieutenant is being heralded as a hero for shooting down a would-be armed robber, but you won’t hear much about this story from the MSM because it doesn’t fit the “Trayvon Martin” narrative.

The New York Post reported Friday that two men attempted to rob a drug store at gun point looking for cash and expensive prescription drugs. What they got was more than they bargained for.

The store was filled with customers and employees, and a baby in a stroller. An alert store employee hit a panic button that warned cops of the robbery. Three cops showed up, two females and one male. The officers coaxed one suspect to exit without incident, and was in custody briefly before escaping. The other man, 23-year old Rudolph Wyatt came out of the store shooting his .32 cal pistol at the cops. He ran across the street to a gas station where he met up with Lt. Thomas Barnes. The retired lieutenant was working on his second career as a driver for a hedge fund manager and was fueling his car when the suspect came at him. Barnes fired three shots and downed the suspect, killing him.

Here’s the problem and the reason why you won’t hear much of this story. Let’s lay aside the fact that the robbers were black and the retired officer is white. In New York City under the leadership of Mayor Bloomberg, carrying a weapon in the city is illegal. Innocent people who legally own guns in other states and have permits to carry them are prosecuted as felons for making the mistake of carrying them into New York. Meanwhile this former police officer shoots down a man in the street and Bloomberg and his gun owner hating cronies say nothing. What’s the problem, a hero helped the cops, defended himself and stopped a horrible criminal. What’s the problem Bloomberg?

Recently the intrepid NY Mayor railed against guns coming into his town illegally from other states after a number of his officer have been shot by criminals. Bad news to be sure, but Bloomberg doesn’t blame the criminals who have no respect for the law. He hates other states and their citizens who have the audacity to exercise their 2nd Amendment rights to keep and bear arms. Now comes this retired hero, who served for years on gang task forces and ends a dangerous situation with well aimed shots, and the Mayor has nothing to say. Isn’t that interesting?

Civil rights leaders like the Rev. Al Sharpton and Jesse Jackson won’t say anything about a black man gunned down in the streets. He wasn’t 17 and cute in photos. Wyatt was a Bloods gang member of the “It’s all about the money” branch. There won’t be any marches through black communities demanding justice for Rudolph, a.k.a Booga.

The race and ethnicity of the players in these stories is immaterial. Martin Luther King Jr. looked forward to the day when we would all be judged by the content of our character and not the color of our skin. The older I get, the farther off that dream appears to be. It doesn’t help when Sharpton and Jackson put gas on the flames.

The Bloombergs of this world don’t really believe that the removal of guns from law abiding citizens will reduce crime. If they do, they are blind to the truth, and here we have another anecdotal story as evidence that one man trained and ready with his gun can stop a horrible crime with three well aimed shots or less.

Power Grab for Natural Gas – New Executive Order

White House: We must interfere and impose federal power and control over the states. We cannot let cheap natural gas interfere with our plan for expensive alternative sources of energy

Dr. Ileana Johnson Paugh
Saturday, April 14, 2012
Canadian Free Press:

It was Friday the 13. If you are superstitious, then the new Executive Order issued yesterday, “Supporting Safe and Responsible Development of Unconventional Domestic Natural Gas Resources” must give you pause.

The order states, “While natural gas production is carried out by private firms, and States are the primary regulators of onshore oil and gas activities, the Federal Government has an important role to play by regulating oil and gas activities on public and Indian trust lands, encouraging greater use of natural gas in transportation, supporting research and development aimed at improving the safety of natural gas development and transportation activities, and setting sensible, cost-effective public health and environmental standards to implement Federal law and augment State safeguards.”

Because natural gas produced 25 percent of our energy in 2011, the federal government must control this source of energy in order to deliver on the promise of making gasoline prices rise to $10 per gallon, bankrupt the coal industry, and cause energy prices to skyrocket.

An interagency working group is tasked to “facilitate coordinated Administration policy efforts to support safe and responsible unconventional domestic natural gas development.” This working group bureaucracy will be chaired by the Director of the Domestic Policy Council and has several curious members that have no direct involvement with natural gas production:
the Department of Defense
the Department of the Interior
the Department of Agriculture
the Department of Commerce
the Department of Health and Human Services
the Department of Transportation
the Department of Energy
the Department of Homeland Security
the Environmental Protection Agency
the Council on Environmental Quality
the Office of Science and Technology Policy
the Office of Management and Budget
the National Economic Council

The Chair may invite other agencies or offices to participate in the working group. The working group will “support [read control] the safe and responsible production of domestic unconventional natural gas by performing the following functions: coordinate agency policy activities, share scientific, environmental, technical and economic information, coordination with federal government in long-term planning, and “consult with other agencies as appropriate.”

The White House Blog explains this new bureaucracy as a step in eliminating “redundancy.” What is there redundant about each state controlling and exploring their natural gas? The federal government is concerned, since natural gas volumetric exploration in 2011 was so large, it eclipsed the all-time high production record of 1973, it must “ensure that we can successfully tap this critical resource for decades to come, we must develop it safely and responsibly.” Translation, we must control it and reduce its production so that our air and water are safe according to the EPA dictates. This is interesting because natural gas is one of the cleanest sources of energy.

The White House Blog continues, “At the same time, as the administration develops a framework for safe and responsible production that builds on steps already taken by states across the country, we must ensure that those efforts continue to happen in a coordinated way.”

There we have it; we cannot let states continue business as usual. We must interfere and impose federal power and control over the states. We cannot let cheap natural gas interfere with our plan for expensive alternative sources of energy. Fossil fuels and fracking are tampering with our power grab plans.

Janet Napolitano Signed 'Stand Your Ground' Law for Arizona in 2006


by AWR Hawkins
4.14.12
Breitbart.Com:

Amid Democrat attempts to use the Trayvon Martin shooting as a means to push for the repeal of Stand Your Ground laws, it’s been interesting to note how many Democrats have a past that includes support for them.

For example, on April 2nd, I had a post on Big Government that highlighted how former Michigan Gov. Jennifer Granholm, a Democrat, used her Current TV show to lambaste Stand Your Ground laws, and to blame Republicans for the existence of such laws in the first place. However, as I showed, the dirty little secret is that Granholm signed Michigan’s Stand Your Ground bill into law in 2006.

Now it’s been discovered that an even more prominent Democrat, Secretary of Homeland Security Janet Napolitano, signed Arizona’s Stand Your Ground bill into law while governor of that state in 2006. And it’s important to note that Napolitano didn’t sign the bill half-halfheartedly, rather, she even countered anti-gunners’ opposition in the signing. According to the Arizona Daily Star:

[Gubernatorial spokeswoman Jeanine L’Ecuyer] said Napolitano, a former state and federal prosecutor, concluded the measure would not cause the harm that foes contend it would. “She believes in the fundamental right of self-defense,” L’Ecuyer said. “And the law still requires the defendant to be in imminent peril of death or serious physical injury.”

The NRA heaped praise upon Napolitano for signing the bill as well. And they issued a special press release to explain that the bill Napolitano had signed was actually a combination of Castle Doctrine and Stand Your Ground legislation (making it especially deplorable to gun grabbers):

[The] bill has two components: One is Castle Doctrine, which presumes you are justified in the use of force if you believe you are in danger of serious bodily harm or death within your home or occupied vehicle. The second and most significant component is the return of the burden of proof in self-defense cases to the state, so law-abiding citizens who are forced to actually use their firearms or other means of protection for self-defense will not be wrongfully imprisoned or financially devastated by costs associated with their legal defense. They will once again be presumed innocent – consistent with the American system of justice.

The bottom line: It would behoove current Democrats to do a quick records search before continuing their denigration of Stand Your Ground laws as a solely Republican initiative. For it is pretty evident that some prominent Democrat governors are among those who’ve recognized the value of honoring Americans’ right to keep and bear arms as well.

Embattled Democratic consultant Hilary Rosen has ties to BP

Published: 11:08 PM 04/13/2012
By Alex Pappas
The Daily Caller:

BP, the British oil and gas company, is among the companies with ties to Democratic operative Hilary Rosen, who came under fire this week for comments about Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney’s wife.

As head of the Brunswick Group, Rosen served in 2010 as a crisis management consultant to BP in the aftermath of the Gulf Oil spill.

Rosen caused a firestorm this week after suggesting during a CNN appearance that Ann Romney doesn’t understand the economic struggles of most American women because she has “never actually worked a day in her life.”

After doubling-down on her comments at first, Rosen eventually apologized to Mrs. Romney.

Rosen is now the managing director of the communications firm SKDKnickerbocker, which has close ties to the Obama White House. That firm has recently helped Georgetown Law student and contraception advocate Sandra Fluke and promoted the HBO film “Game Change,” a critical look at former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin.

The Daily Caller reported Friday that Rosen made millions with the Recording Industry Association of America, serving as its president and CEO until 2002.

Revisionist History Education consultants working to whitewash history of Islam in public schools

Under pressure from a well-funded Muslim education group, the nation’s public school textbooks increasingly present a politically correct portrait of Islam, according to a new report.

ACT for American Education, a non-profit organization dedicated to raising awareness of Islamic fundamentalism, said it found examples of historical revisionism in 38 of the most popular history textbooks used in public schools.

ACT traced the new approach to Islam to a non-profit group that employs education consultants with links to political Islam, draws money from controversial donors, and has promoted glaring inaccuracies about the religion’s history.

The Institution on Religion and Civic Values—which recently changed its name from the Council on Islamic Education—is working to conduct a “bloodless” revolution in the school system according to founder Shabbir Mansuri.

One of the IRCV’s former leading scholars has been associated with groups that have raised questions in the past for their ties to radicalism.

Susan Douglass, who served as IRCV’s curriculum specialist for more than 10 years, taught social studies at the Islamic Saudi Academy in Alexandria, Va., a school funded by Saudi Arabia. The class of 1999’s valedictorian was convicted of plotting to assassinate former President George W. Bush in 2005.

At the time, liberal Sen. Chuck Schumer (D., N.Y.) questioned whether the school is “another example of the Saudi government turning a blind eye to terrorism.”

“I hope that the ISA is not another madrassa in the United States,” he said.

Douglass has also worked for an Islamic think tank—the International Institute of Islamic Thought—that was raided by federal officials in 2002. The group was founded with the backing of former Muslim Brotherhood members in the 1980s and had financial ties to anti-Israel terrorist groups in the early 2000s.

Douglass now works as an education consultant at Georgetown University’s Prince Alwaleed Center for Muslim-Christian Understanding, which was renamed in 2005 after Prince Alwaleed Bin Talal donated $20 million to the center.

She did not return calls for comment.

One of the IRCV’s patrons, California defense contractor Rahim Sabadia, has funneled millions to Islamic organizations in the U.S.

Sabadia sent more than $300,000 to IRCV from 2008 to 2010, according to documents obtained by the Washington Free Beacon. He also pumped more than $300,000 to the radical Council on American Islamic Relations during that same time period, and gave a $300,000 check to the left-wing Rockefeller Philanthropy Advisors in 2009.

His wife, Nafees El Batool, contributed nearly $60,000 to the Democratic National Senatorial Committee in the 2006 and 2008 cycles. Sabadia has split his six figure political donations evenly between both parties.

Sabadia lost his security clearance in June, reportedly claiming in an email to a colleague that his charity work was to blame, according to the Orange County Register.

Sabadia did not return calls for comment.

The six figure donations are aimed at pushing an agenda, rather than good scholarship, according to ACT executive director Guy Rodgers. He said textbook companies are eager to turn to groups like the IRCV in order to avoid accusations of racism.

“The IRCV gives a faulty picture, a rosy picture of Islam,” he said. “The textbooks are responding to this politically correct concern that we’re being intolerant to Muslims—they’re rewriting history to suit those concerns.”

IRCV has consulted for dozens of textbooks and instructed thousands of teachers since 2000. Mansuri, who did not return calls for comment, said he founded the group because, “The U.S., like any other nation, is part of the global community. We need to know about each other.”

But the type of information IRCV has provided to textbook companies sheds an overly positive light on Islam, according to ACT.

For example, the group played a major role consulting on Houghton Mifflin Harcourt’s 2003 history book, Across the Centuries.

In the textbook, ancient Islam is depicted in a very progressive manner: as tolerant of non-Muslims, in favor of equal rights for women, and unwilling participants in the fight for Jerusalem and the resulting Crusades.

The textbook featured many of the talking points forwarded by IRCV, including the assertion that “under Islam, Jews and Christians had full religious freedom. They built churches and synagogues, and several were financed by the state.”

The book failed to mention the scholarship of acclaimed Johns Hopkins University professor Majid Khadduri, who founded the school’s Middle East Studies Program. The Iraqi-born Khadduri combatted the revisionism embraced by many Muslim scholars, pointing out that Muslims barred the creation of new churches, taxed non-believers, branded them with yellow badges, and barred them from testifying in court.

Houghton Mifflin Harcourt stands by the book, as well as the publisher’s relationship with Mansuri, according to company spokesman Josef Blumenfeld.

“We have 180 years of trusted content and we vet that content to other organizations because standards change and perceptions change,” he said. “[IRCV] helped, but we reach out to a lot of different interested parties to get their input.”

Guidelines that have since been scrubbed from the IRCV site stated that the group would not work with textbook makers for academic review “unless a substantial and substantive revision is planned by the publisher.” Although the policies prohibit textbook endorsements, the policies also said IRCV would promote textbooks that embraced its message.

“IRCV may on occasion recommend textbooks that contain balanced coverage of Islam and Muslim history,” the policies read.

IRCV’s relationship with HMH ended in 2003. Blumenfeld could not comment on the nature of the split, but dismissed the notion that HMH bowed to any kind of pressure from the Islamic group.

“We’d never give anyone veto power over our work,” he said.

Rodgers pointed to the treatment of the term jihad, often cited by Islamists as the driving force behind the 9/11 attacks and terrorist groups such as al Qaeda. The term is defined simply as a personal spiritual struggle in many leading textbooks.

“The most respected and authoritative collection of hadith contains 199 references to jihad, and every one uses the term to mean warfare against infidels,” according to the ACT report.

Blumenfeld said ACT is wasting its time.

“Anyone who says (textbooks are pro-Islam) is just looking to make a name for themselves and should focus on doing something more productive,” he said.

Rodgers, a former public school teacher, said the revisions “skew” a student’s ability to put the realities of Islamic terrorism in the proper context.

“What teachers do and what textbooks do has a big influence on young people,” he said. “You see kids who grew up in the post-9/11 era who don’t know what jihad is. How can we understand our enemy in the War on Terror if we are fed historical revisionism?”

“That’s not just an educational problem—that’s a national security problem.”

BY: Bill McMorris - Washington Free Beacon - April 11, 2012 5:00 am

Bella Santorum’s fight

Children like Bella are not expected to live past their first birthday. | AP Photo

By JUANA SUMMERS
4/14/12 7:04 AM EDT
Politico:

Rick Santorum may have abandoned his bid for the Republican presidential nomination, but families impacted by the rare genetic disorder that afflicts his 3-year-old daughter say he won’t be easily forgotten.

The former Pennsylvania senator has become the highest-profile advocate for children living with trisomy 18, the rare genetic condition that has low survival odds. Often, he says children like his daughter, Bella, are not expected to live past their first birthday.

“A couple years ago, nobody knew what trisomy 18 was,” Susan Budd, the mother of a 2-year-old who has the chromosomal abnormality, told POLITICO. “Now, when I’m out and about and when somebody will ask me about my daughter, they’ll see trisomy 18 and they’ll say, ‘Oh, isn’t that what Rick Santorum’s daughter has?’ So Bella Santorum has done a lot for trisomy awareness in a very positive way because I think that more and more people are seeing that children are living with it.”

Budd – a mother of five including 2-year old Rebekah, who also has the disorder – said during her pregnancy several years ago, “if you typed trisomy 18 into Google, everything that you’d pick up would be negative,” but that now – partially thanks to the Santorum family – there’s a greater awareness and more resources for families like hers, impacted by the rare condition.

Without resources to turn to, she started a Facebook group that now boasts nearly 1,000 members and also keeps a blog about her daughter’s life.

“During the pregnancy and early on, my local contacts and my online community - that got me through things,” Budd said. “Now, I’m at the point where Rebekah is fairly healthy and stable, and so I spend a lot of time helping other families that are just beginning this journey, or who have never known that there is a big community to help them.”

Budd’s problem is less common now, after Santorum’s decision to step off the campaign trail – twice – to be with his ailing daughter made national headlines.

Trisomy 18 is a genetic anomaly occurring when a child has three chromosomes, rather than two, in the 23 pairs of human chromosomes. Most children with trisomy 18 die soon after birth. Only 5 percent to 10 percent survive as long as one year.

Santorum often cited Bella and her illness as one of his reasons for entering the presidential race. And even though Bella didn’t take to the campaign trail with Santorum, who was frequently joined by at least one of his seven children, she became a crowd favorite. And Santorum wasn’t shy to talk about her.

“There’s a lot of pressure on moms and dads because of the burden of a disabled child. Look, it is a hardship. A lot of these children require a tremendous amount of care and I can understand the pain and hardship,” Santorum said Tuesday in Lancaster, Pa., hours after ending his presidential campaign. “Now, I can tell you as someone who has gone through it, Bella is a great – we have seven children and they are all a tremendous great gift. But Bella is, all of the kids would tell you, is a special one.”

“She talks in her own way. She doesn’t talk in a way that you would understand but she talks in a way that we understand. She’s a happy, healthy girl,” he said. “Like everybody else, like every other kid, she gets sick. The problem is when she gets sick it’s life threatening.”

Bella’s fight for life, seen recently when she was hospitalized for the second time this year, was one of the factors that weighed on Santorum as he decided the fate of his race.

He told reporters Tuesday in Gettysburg that the Easter weekend, when Bella was hospitalized, was a “little bit of a passion play for us.”

Pneumonia can be life-threatening for children with trisomy 18, and Santorum said Bella’s bout with the illness caused him and his wife Karen to “think about the role we have as parents in her life.”

Parenting a child with trisomy 18 can involve extensive care. Budd, who lives with her family outside of Greenville, S.C., is a stay-at-home mom, but employs a full-time nurse for her daughter. She says her house is set up like “a little hospital, we have a lot of equipment at home.”

But there’s not one-size fits all care for such children. Victoria Miller, the executive director of the Dale City, Va., based Trisomy 18 Foundation, said.

“These children do require round-the-clock support and have a large number of special health-care needs that require really good access to health care and really good insurance coverage. And sadly, depending on where a family lives in the country and their employment, they may not have that.”

“There isn’t a treatment for trisomy 18 as a genetic condition, because once a child is born with an extra chromosome you can’t go in and pull that back out,” she continued. “However, there are many established treatments for certain associated symptoms.”

But now, Miller said, there’s been an overwhelming surge in inquiries about the condition.

“We have definitely seen a major spike in website traffic,” Miller said. “This has now happened twice, the first time being in late January when Bella was first hospitalized. That was the first time the national press came calling, saying what is trisomy 18? That’s certainly a priceless moment for awareness purposes.”

She said trisomy18.org has seen a “10-fold increase in website traffic,” and that their email subscriber lists are growing steadily.

For Mary Kellett, who founded the Minnesota-based group Prenatal Partners for Life, Santorum’s impact came in a more concrete form: fundraising.

Foster Friess, who spent nearly $1.7 million boosting Santorum’s presidential bid, also donated toward the non-profit’s coffers, Kellett said, a fraction of the $7.7 million the retired investor and his wife, Lynn, gave away to charities supported by their friends to honor their 70th birthdays.

“We were very blessed to be one of them,” said Kellett, who lives with her family in Maple Grove, Minn. “I got a chance to meet Foster in person and to give him a big hug and to tell him, you know, that we were so grateful for his donation because we really are a small little group.”

Prenatal Partners for Life focuses on connecting families and children with trisomy 18 with resources, Kellett said. She estimates the group has provided assistance to children in all 50 states and 27 countries.

“One mom, we just sent her a bunch of gas cards to help her pay for gas. She lived in a small town and had to travel to a major metropolitan area, and it was just really expensive,” Kellett explained. “Another one was on bed rest, and we bought her a cleaning certificate because she wasn’t able to keep her house clean. Just stuff like that; whatever a family needs.”

Kellett, the parent of a child with trisomy 18 who died earlier, said Santorum’s presence in the race was good for families like hers and the ones she advocates for. She’s met the Santorum family more than once, and said she connects them with families she works with.

“The Santorums should be congratulated for the sacrifice they made,” Kellett said. “I know it wasn’t easy having their daughter and all the demands of running a presidential campaign. They, I think, should just be commended for that. Boy, in my eyes, they really are American heroes.”

Andrew Klavan’s Talking Crap 3: ABSOLUTE CRAP!!!

Hat Tip: Trevor @ TrevorLoudon.Com

Fate of health law's Medicaid expansion hinges on how much doctors get paid

By Julian Pecquet
04/14/12 06:20 AM ET
The Hill:

The success of the healthcare reform law's massive Medicaid expansion could hinge on new regulations that are expected as early as next week.

While the 20 million people who will gain subsidized coverage on the new insurance exchanges have gotten most of the attention, President Obama's health law also expands Medicaid and the Children's Health Insurance Program to 17 million low-income families starting in 2014. Medicaid, however, is already straining to care for the more than 58 million already in the program because it doesn't pay doctors enough to participate.

The law's expansion “could generate unsustainable pressure on Medicaid's already taxed network of primary care providers,” the nonprofit Center for Health Care Strategies warned in a report last year.


To alleviate some of the pressure ahead of the law's expansion, House Democrats included in their version of the bill a provision requiring states to pay primary care physicians no less than 100 percent of Medicare payment rates in 2013 and 2014 for primary care services. The temporary increase would be fully funded by the federal government.

Republicans say the temporary expansion is a “bait and switch” that either hides the true cost of the Medicaid expansion if Congress ends up extending the rate bump indefinitely or promises millions of people coverage that will turn out to be worthless if patients can't find a doctor.

“There will be calls to extend this after 2014,” a House Republican staffer told The Hill. “And if we extend it, shouldn't that have been calculated into the overall cost of the bill, or is that just another budget gimmick? And if we don't extend it, who's going to take care of the 20 million new Medicaid beneficiaries?”

Even a two-year provision, the Center for Health Care Strategies report concluded, could be beneficial.

“The increased reimbursement,” the report said, “could be a powerful tool for bolstering the delivery system, enhancing access, and improving the quality of primary care for current and new beneficiaries.”

The nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office has estimated that the two-year provision would cost the federal government $8.3 billion. Average Medicaid rates for primary care services were only 66 percent of Medicare rates in 2008, according to the Kaiser Family Foundation, with wide variations among states (New York and Rhode Island Medicaid rates were only 36 percent of Medicare, while Alaska paid rates that were 40 percent higher than Medicare).

The provision could end up costing more than that if the upcoming federal regulation broadens the definition of primary care, however. While congressional intent clearly focused on internists and general practitioners, said a health policy analyst who is tracking the issue, other doctors are lobbying the Department of Health and Human Services to also be covered by the regulation.

“The big fight is over who counts for primary care,” the analyst said. “And what's happening is you have ... all of these specialties saying hey, I'm primary care too, because they want the rate bump too.”

Expanding the primary care definition would cost the federal government more money, the source said, but on the flip side Obama administration regulations so far have largely kept the healthcare industries who supported the law happy.

In any case, it's not clear regulators have much leeway.

A spokeswoman for the American Congress of Obstetricians and Gynecologists told The Hill the group hasn't written to the Department of Health and Human Services because “it's pretty clear who qualifies for the bonus, but we want Congress to amend the statute to get us included.”

Commie Fund Raiser To Be Held In St. Louis Union Hall; Awardees Include Local AFL-CIO Prez & Former Dem Organizer

Posted by Gateway Guest Blogger
Saturday, April 14, 2012, 6:00 AM
GatewayPundit.Com:

Posted By The P/Oed Patriot


Is This Tomorrow? was published in 1947 and told the story of how Communists infiltrated every aspect of American society and eventually even took over the White House thereby overthrowing the nation from the inside. At the time it was considered a fanciful piece of propaganda.

But today, that booklet could almost be considered more prophetic than Nostradomus because it seems everywhere you look there are signs of Communist influence. While one can see this influence in places like public schools and the main stream media, the signs are most obvious in several of the major Unions and even the Democratic Party.

For example, according to the Communist Party USA News (CPUSA) People’s World, on May 5th the CPUSA is holding their annual fund raiser, the Hershel Walker Peace and Justice Awards, at the Local 6300 CWA Union Hall in St. Louis.

The keynote speaker for the event is to be Clarence Lang, a University Professor from Champaign/Urbana Illinois and a visiting Professor at the University of Kansas.

While the list of those who will receive a Communist award is a venerable who’s who of the Missouri Progressive movement; there are two that stand out from the rest, Bradley Harmon and Vanessa Crawford.

Bradley Harmon CWA (AFL-CIO) President of the Missouri State Workers Union is an avid supporter of President Obama and even told a CPUSA reporter last month that he wants the “Tea Party Republicans to think this (election) is Total War.” Mr. Harmon has even been involved with the Communist affiliated Jobs with Justice (JWJ) .

Vanessa Crawford currently holds the title of Executive Director at Missouri Immigrant and Refugee Advocates. But according to Vanessa’s Likedin page she has held positions in several ‘Green’ organizations, worked on the staff of two Democratic politicans and was even a Field Organizer for the Democratic Party.

Coincidentally, the St. Louis CWA isn’t new to holiding Commie events. Last year the CPUSA Fund Raiser was held at the same CWA Local 6300 Union Hall where a Missouri Democrat Representative gave the invocation and a booklet handed out at the event provided proof that the AFL-CIO, SEIU and a Democratic Super Pac gave money to the CPUSA.

So if we take all of this information and add the facts that Democratic Congressman Charlie Rangel recently praised a CPUSA Leader in a letter sent to a Commie event and Democratic Congressman Danny Davis actually accepted a Communist Award one might reasonably conclude that the Communists are using Is This Tomorrow? as a blueprint for the internal takeover and the subsequent destruction of the United States.

But on the other hand, if your a Progressive (aka Communist) you might think this article is just a fanciful piece of propaganda.

New Crossroads GPS radio ad attacks White House war on coal, jobs

Friday, April 13, 2012
New Crossroads GPS radio ad attacks White House war on coal, jobs

Earlier this month I covered the following comments made by Cecil Roberts, the president of the United Mine Workers union, but now you can hear them for yourself in a new Crossroads GPS radio ad running in West Virginia, Ohio, and Pennsylvania.

"The Navy SEALs shot Osama Bin Laden in Pakistan,' the union leader said, "and [EPA administrator] Lisa Jackson shot us in Washington." Roberts is referring to new regulations that will make coal-fired power plants much more expensive to operate.



"Look--this is a job killer for us," he adds.

President Obama did promise to "bankrupt" the coal industry.

Related post: War on coal update: Terror edition

Eliana Benador: Impeachment-Ready Obama Surrenders American Military to U.N.

Friday, April 13, 2012

Gates of Vienna is pleased to welcome Eliana Benador as a new contributor. Ms. Benador has previously published articles at Right Side News, among other places.

Her first contribution here concerns the various actions by President Obama that have promoted Islam and abetted the spread of shariah all over the world, but especially in the United States.



Impeachment-Ready Obama Surrenders American Military to U.N.

by Eliana Benador

“You can always count on Americans to do the right thing — after they’ve tried everything else.” — Sir Winston Churchill

It all started with an unhappy America. And, Americans were right. But, the solution has proven worse than the problem.

Muslim Terrorist Major Nidal Malik Hasan

The case of Major Nidal Malik Hasan has revealed a flagrant abuse of power by the Obama administration and its Department of Defense. The American-born Palestinian Hasan joined the Army and seems to have continued his college studies in the Army until he became a psychiatrist at Fort Hood, Texas. Hasan admired the terrorist leader Anwar al-Awlaki, with whom he had emailed in a quest for advice about violence — and al-Awlaki “blessed the Fort Hood massacre because it was against a military target.” Hasan was also praised by Al-Qaeda’s spokesman who considered him a “Mujahid brother,” a “pioneer, a trailblazer and a role-model.”

In the attack, Hasan killed 13 military personnel and wounded 32. A Senate report considered it “the worst terrorist attack on U.S. soil since September 11, 2001.”

General Jack Keane testified with utmost clarity before a Senate committee “… just how unacceptable the military’s failure to deal properly with Major Hasan’s radicalization to violent Islamist extremism was.” And that “…the report’s conclusion that Hasan’s open displays of violent Islamist extremism was a violation of military rules calling for good order and discipline.” General Keane also mentioned what he believed to be “…some of the obvious signs [for which] Hasan should have been discharged…”

However, despite General Keane’s efforts, the FBI and the U.S. Army inexplicably determined that Hasan acted alone. Purposefully closing their eyes to conspicuous evidence to the contrary, they pretend they have not found any evidence of links to terrorist groups. When Hasan’s communications with Awlaki, targeted in 2010 as a dangerous Al Qaeda leader, were evaluated, against all signs to the contrary they concluded that they posed no threat at the time.

And, to crown the whole maneuver, Attorney General Eric Holder made a controversial decision: not to charge Hasan with terrorism. The nation wondered why Hasan should not be called a “terrorist”. Thus Hasan has so far been charged with 13 counts of premeditated murder and 32 counts of attempted murder.

In time, Obama called this massacre “work place violence,” which meant that the victims or their survivors were not to be awarded the Military Order of the Purple Heart — because in order to receive it, members of the armed forces of the United States, must be wounded by an instrument of war in the hands of the enemy… Which was the case. But this determination was nullified by Obama’s declaring it “Workplace Violence.”

Hasan was arraigned on July 20, 2011 and his trial was scheduled for March 2012. However, on February 2, 2012, a military judge ruled that Hasan will stand trial only on June 12, 2012.

Obama Asked NASA Director to Reach Out to Muslim World

When, in 2010, NASA Administrator Charles Bolden told that Obama’s first priority for him, was to reach out to the Muslim world “to make them feel good about themselves,” according to a former head of NASA who was not happy at all with the situation.

After all, what ignoramus could come up with such an idea, to give outreach to Muslim countries as a priority to the head of the leading space exploration agency in the world!?

Time has passed, and Obama’s agenda has only strengthened. Until Obama arrived with his “Muslim Priority,” NASA had been one of the very best outfits in America. Certainly, as such an entity, NASA has to collaborate with other countries. But what is there in the Muslim world that could possibly be useful to NASA? As former NASA director Michael Griffin said: “There is no technology they have that we need.” That says it all.

The next item in Obama’s agenda was fulfilled when in 2010, when he cancelled the Constellation Moon Program, which was supposed to take humans back to the moon.

Unpatriotic Obama Unveils Navy Seal Team Six Secrecy

The cruel attitude of the current president of the United States against our military men is now more comprehensible. At the time when the Navy Seals captured Osama Bin Laden in May 2011, it was with dismay that we saw how casually a president unveiled the existence of Team Six, one of the most highly trained elite counter-terrorist teams in America. In hindsight, though, it now seems it could have been part of a plan to jeopardize the existence of what was until then the highly sophisticated, completely unknown Navy Seals Team Six. Only an anti-patriotic man could have done something like that.

22 Navy Seal Team Six shot in Afghanistan

After that presidential betrayal, a Taliban attack in Afghanistan shot down a helicopter transporting 30 people. And with it 22 elite counter-terrorist soldiers from the Navy Seal Team Six died.

Most certainly, not a coincidence.

Contrast between Muslim terrorist Hasan and Sergeant Robert Bales

Naturally, it is wrong to kill people. But it is also wrong to push our wounded warriors in active service beyond what they possibly can handle. After two deployments to Iraq and being seriously wounded, Sergeant Bales should not have been sent to Afghanistan. Period.

They did not wait long — a week after the tragedy — to officially charge him with 17 counts of murder, among other charges.

NATO Soldiers who burned Korans face trial

In yet another unprecedented move, recent news have announced that NATO has agreed to Afghanistan’s demands to have the soldiers who burned the Korans face trial. This suggests that members of the American military could be handed over to an Afghan system that imposes Shariah-related penalties, which include beheading, stoning, mutilation, and much more of the same kind of punishments.

Meanwhile, in a PBS interview, a representative from the Islamic Center of Southern California, said if the Koran was in a state of “disrepair”, then it was acceptable to burn it. And, they do that out of respect, as said the representative.

Obama Placed America under United Nations Orders

American Defense Secretary Leon Panetta told Congress a month ago that he and President Obama would seek “international permission” before engaging in war in Syria or elsewhere. He specifically said that once they have obtained international permission, they would inform Congress.

As such, they would forgo the constitutionally-required declaration of war.

On March 7, 2012, Panetta, together with the Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman General Martin Dempsey, answered questions from Senator Jeff Sessions at a Senate Armed Services Committee Hearing.

At that point, General Dempsey indicated that “international permission “rather than Congressional approval” provided a ‘legal basis’ for military action by the United States.”

Is that also why Obama did not wait to have Congress approval to take us to war in Libya?

American Soldiers now United Nations Soldiers…?

By subordinating America to the rule of the United Nations and NATO, American troops have become almost nationless. Whenever there is an attack and there are casualties, we are told that “NATO” soldiers have been killed. As such, whoever is part of the NATO coalition is unable to think offhand who could actually have been killed.

In essence, American families have been removed from the fates of their men and women — who they are willing to sacrifice to protect “our country” when the reality is that — unless Obama is urgently impeached and removed even before elections — American soldiers are serving the “global” entity. And they will be dying not for the country and people they love, but for a treacherous enemy that is infiltrating their country during their absence.

United Nations and Islam

The United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights adopted the resolution “Combating Defamation of Religions,” on March 30, 2007. Which was among the first veiled signs of what was later going to be known as Defamation of Religion Resolution, which has been an issue repeatedly addressed by some member states, mostly Muslim countries, of the United Nations (UN) since 1999.

While various non-binding UN resolutions have condemned the “defamation of religion,” it was mostly the motions sponsored on behalf of the Organization of the Islamic Conference (now the Organization of Islamic Cooperation), the group of sharia-abiding Muslim countries, which have aimed to prohibit expression that would “fuel discrimination, extremism and misperception leading to polarization and fragmentation with dangerous unintended and unforeseen consequences.” Naturally, Islam was mostly what they had in mind.

Islamic countries were concerned that “Islam is sometimes associated with terrorism and human rights violations”, though unsurprisingly, especially after the multiple-massacres perpetrated by 19 Muslim terrorists screaming “Allahu Aqbar” against the Twin Towers in New York City, the Pentagon in Washington, D.C. and in Pennsylvania. The purpose of the resolutions was to fight Islamophobia.

“Islamophobia” is a neologism which emerged primarily as a creation of a Muslim Brotherhood front outfit, the International Institute for Islamic Thought (IIIT). Abdur-Rahman Muhammad writes in the New York Daily News: “This loathsome term is nothing more than a thought-terminating cliché conceived in the bowels of Muslim think-tanks for the purpose of beating down critics.” And, he writes further: “Muslims are everywhere in this country, doing practically everything. There are Muslims doctors, lawyers and businessmen… There are Muslim soldiers and CIA agents…. “ Indeed.

The author is right. Muslims in this country have been able to establish themselves and blossom in true communities, where even Muslim royals come to attend weddings in lost forlorn little towns that have all but been taken over by… Muslims.

Conclusion: This explains that…

Americans may remember that under Obama’s orders the FBI recently removed every mention of Muslim terrorism from its training materials. This is all part of the plan of submission to the greater power of the United Nations with the support of Muslims worldwide.

And Americans would do well to finally open their eyes to a reality that will not change unless they decide to defend their country and their defenseless men in the military, at the mercy of the wrong leadership whose now obvious allegiance is not to watch over American interests.

So far, every measure taken by Obama and his entire administration has been nefarious for our country.

Our most highly trained and most patriotic men have been massacred as a result of Obama’s purposeful, indirect, silent, but persevering attack against America’s well-being.

Obama’s interests are communism and world domination by Islam.

America’s interests are not Obama’s interests.

SOURCE: Gates of Vienna

Why is this baby crying?

by Cardigan - April 13, 2012 - 21:00


SOURCE: iOtW

Obama appoints Soros-linked immigration advisor to lead natural gas council

Ceclia Munoz, Center for Community Change, Open Society Institute

Institute for Energy Research
Friday, April 13, 2012

WASHINGTON D.C. — President Obama released today an executive order claiming to support safe and responsible development of unconventional domestic natural gas resource. The order creates an interagency working group led by the chairman of the White House Domestic Policy Council, Ceclia Munoz, who formerly led the Center for Community Change and the Open Society Institute — two organizations with close ties to billionaire George Soros, ACORN, MoveOn, and other radical groups with a record of opposing the development of America’s organic fossil fuels.

IER Senior Vice President for Policy, Daniel Kish, issued the following statement in response to the executive order:

“If the president is serious about robust development of our vast natural gas resources, it is bemusing to learn that he has appointed an immigration advisor and community organizer with deep ties to George Soros to lead the effort. Natural gas production on federal lands is dropping under this administration, a fact that the non-partisan Energy Information Administration attributes in part to the regulatory difficulties faced by industry when seeking to access these resources.

“The natural gas production boom that is happening in the United States has occurred in spite of the president’s policies. Private and state lands are experiencing record production, along with the job creation and low prices that are associated with our growing supply. Once again, the president is playing charades with the American public, pretending to support production he cannot stop and for which he cannot honestly take credit. Meanwhile, he’s creating more labyrinthine regulatory hurdles and pointless councils led by someone whose only qualification is apparently her ties to George Soros.

“Again, the president’s failed solution to everything is more government. America does not need another White House council, but less intervention in the private sector, the states and the lives of hardworking men and women who have created this energy miracle.”

Why Not Put the "Buffett Rule" to a vote in the House?

John Marzan
4.13.12
Ricochet.com:

Let's see how many of House Democrats will vote to pass the rule? Come on Speaker Boehner, you can make this happen. After this, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell can ask Harry Reid to vote on this thing too.

The Democrats in the House and Senate running for re-election in 2012 are not being asked to put their necks on the line to support this silly OWS class warfare gimmick.

Obama Lawyer Admits Obama’s Birth Certificate Is a Forgery

Obama Lawyer Admits Forgery But Disregards “image” As Indication Of Obama’s Ineligibility

DAMAGE CONTROL: A recent ballot challenge hearing in New Jersey exposes a desperate strategy by Obama to distance himself from his forged certificate and induce the contrived value of his transient political popularity as the only “legitimate qualification” needed to hold the office of the presidency.

By Dan Crosby
THE DAILY PEN
Thursday, April 12, 2012 2:33

NEW YORK, NY – After a Maricopa County law enforcement agency conducted a six-month forensic examination which determined that the image of Obama’s alleged 1961 Certificate of Live Birth posted to a government website in April, 2011 is a digital fabrication and that it did not originate from a genuine paper document, arguments from an Obama eligibility lawyer during a recent New Jersey ballot challenge hearing reveals the image was not only a fabrication, but that it was likely part of a contrived plot by counterfeiters to endow Obama with mere political support while simultaneously making the image intentionally appear absurd as evidence toward proving Obama’s constitutional eligibility in court.

Taking an audacious and shocking angle against the constitutional eligibility mandate, Obama’s lawyer, Alexandra Hill, admitted that the image of Obama’s birth certificate was a forgery and made the absurd claim that, therefore, it cannot be used as evidence to confirm his lack of natural born citizenship status. Therefore, she argued, it is “irrelevant to his placement on the ballot”.

Hill went on to contort reasoning by implying that Obama needs only invoke his political popularity, not legal qualifications, in order to be a candidate.

At the hearing, attorney for the plaintiffs, Mario Apuzzo, correctly argued that Obama, under the Constitution, has to be a “natural born Citizen” and that he has not met his burden of showing that he is eligible to be on the New Jersey primary ballot by showing that he is indeed a “natural born Citizen.” He argued that Obama has shown no authenticate evidence to the New Jersey Secretary of State demonstrating who he is and that he was born in the United States. Apuzzo also argued that as a matter of law, Obama is not a “natural born Citizen” because he was born to a father who was not a U.S. citizen.

As Obama’s legal argument becomes more contorted, he is being forced to avoid an ever shrinking legal space, and an increasing weight, of his failure to meet constitutional eligibility requirements.[...]

READ FULL STORY AT EXPOSE OBAMA

The Obama Legacy: Tax Refunds Being Used to Pay for Bankruptcy Filings

by Tammy Bruce
April 13, 2012


Horrible. Barack Obama is destroying this country and people’s lives. There is no second chance–either we get it right on November 6th, or it’s all over. From CNBC, HT to HotAirPundit.

Some Americans spend their tax refunds on high-tech gadgets and long-awaited vacations. Others use the cash to file for bankruptcy protection.

More than 200,000 money-strapped households will use their tax refunds this year to pay for bankruptcy filing and legal fees, says a new study by the National Bureau of Economic Research.

The NBER research confirms what bankruptcy lawyers have long known: At the first part of the year, when Americans receive their tax refunds, there almost always is a spike in personal bankruptcy filings.

But that has been especially true since the cost of bankruptcy soared after U.S. bankruptcy laws changed in 2005. And many more families have been forced to delay filing until they can afford to pay the fees, the NBER study says.


While Americans are filing their taxes and going bankrupt, what has the Obama Regime been spending your tax dollars on?

Breitbart: Obama Sends $147 Million to Hamas-Run Gaza

Canada Free Press: Muslim Brotherhood’s $1.5 billion Holy Week Windfall

‘Brother Ain’t Shooting No Blanks’: Farrakhan Tells Blacks — Breeding With Whites Is the ‘End of Your Race’

Posted on April 13, 2012 at 5:50pm
by Billy Hallowell - The Blaze:

Louis Farrakhan, The Nation of Islam’s infamous leader, is known for issuing some bizarre commentary on a variety of social and political issues. Earlier this week, while speaking at Alabama A&M University, Farrakhan made the curious claim that Jesus was a black Muslim. On Thursday night, while giving an address at Jefferson Street Missionary Baptist church in Nashville, Tennessee, his questionable ideals continued to flow.


The faith leader, who is known for his fiery sermons, doesn’t need to look far to find a catalyst for his seemingly never-ending personal angst. Even the event’s location was a point of contention for the minister. After his plans to speak at Tennessee State University (TSU) fell through, Farrakhan accused the higher education facility of purposefully keeping him off of the campus.

(Related: ‘My God Will Wipe This Country From the Face of the Earth’: The Real Louis Farrakhan in His Own Words on GBTV)

“What was wrong with me coming up on the campus?,” he asked the audience. “Well, I want you to go back after this lecture and tell them Farrakhan wants to come and we‘ve invited him again and I’m coming back — no lies! No excuse!”

In a phone interview with The Blaze, TSU spokesperson Rick Delahaya denied Farrakhan’s claims about the location of the event.

“It never was supposed to be held out here. There was a big conflict with campus facilities,” Delahaya explained. “We were trying to work with them…the facilities that they were requesting — they just weren’t available.”

According to the spokesperson, it was Farrakhan’s camp who had approached TSU about renting space at the university — a request that school officials said didn’t fit with what was currently available.

“We don’t block anybody from coming based on their political views or beliefs,” Delahaya continued. “We just didn’t have the facilities available at the time they needed them.”

But Farrakhan had bigger targets to point at during his lecture.

To begin, he took on the regularly-waged accusation that he’s anti-Semitic. His comments on the matter, as controversial as they always are, poked at white Americans.

“I don’t know what anti-Semitism is from your perspective, because we’ve never stopped a Jewish person from going to the school of his or her choice. We’ve never stopped a Jewish person from owning property or setting up businesses. We’ve never done that,” he said. “We’ve never made laws to exclude Jewish persons. But we know somebody did that to us. So could it be that those who call me anti-Semitic are anti-black?”

Then, the minister seemed to continue from where he left off during his previous speech at Alabama A&M, as he, once again, made the claim that Jesus Christ was black.

"Jesus, whether you want to believe it or not, was a man of color. How many of you are ready to accept Jesus as one of you?,” the minister rhetorically asked. “Jesus — his mother Mary was an Egyptian. Egypt is Northeast Africa.”

Farrakhan continued, explaining Jesus’ background and lineage. In doing so, he referenced Revelation 22:16, which reads, in part, “I am the Root and the Offspring of David, and the bright Morning Star.”

“Jesus said in Revelations ‘I am the seed of David. The root of Jesse. The bright and the morning star.’ Well Jesse was the father of David,” he explained. “David was the father of Solomon and Solomon said ‘I am black but come ye all you daughters of Jerusalem!” So if Solomon was black, David couldn’t have been white.”

Farrakhan then attempted to bring his rationale all together, saying “White folks don’t produce black children — except [if] it‘s a white woman with a black man or a black man with a white woman and that’s the end of your race. So you’re dying a natural death these days. And without an AK47 ’cause the brother ain’t shooting no blanks.”


After delving into his perceived analysis of Jesus’ ethnic background, the faith leader then tackled what he believes to be an intentional portrayal of Jesus Christ as a white man.

“So if Jesus was a black man and you’re looking for him to return, why did they give us the image of themselves when the Pope knows that Jesus was black?,” he pondered. “Even Billy Graham said it years ago and the Pope has a black Madonna — so why did you make him white when you know he was black?”

What Billy Graham actually said, as per quotations captured during the civil rights movement, was that, “Jesus was not a white man; He was not a black man. He came from that part of the world that touches Africa and Asia and Europe.”

Then, Farrakhan took aim at a popular gospel song and tied it to racial commentary.

“See, you’ve got a song you sing in the church — ‘Ride on Kind Jesus’ — ‘Ride on King White Folk.‘ That’s what you’re saying,” he continued. “You may not think you’re saying that but your actions prove that you worship white people and hate yourself at the same time.”

Farrakhan’s “us versus them” mentality and preaching style, as noted, was as divisive on Thursday evening as it’s ever been.

“Some of you wouldn‘t want a black person on New Year’s Day to be the first one to enter your house,” he proclaimed. “I’m talking about a real black person. So the darker we were, the more we suffered from the blackness of our skin.”

The controversial minister also told his audience that “they have made us worshippers of themselves.” But he wasn’t done there.

“You are at the mercy now of the former slave masters and their children, because we ran away from the land…because the sharecropping…did you know that when slavery ended, white folk did not know how to use a hammer and a saw?,” he asked, skimming from one topic to the next. “It was a literal thing where you see a white man with a hammer — he draw a crowd.”

As for Republicans, Farrakhan had a solid — and offensive message.

“Now you conservative Republicans, you know you tired of black people. I understand because the scriptures say I’m going to vex you with the foolish people and you about vexed now,” he said. “But let me tell you something about these Republicans. They‘ve given you enough they feel and they don’t want to give you no more.”


He went on to claim that conservative Republicans are tired of being taken to the Supreme Court by African Americans and that, although the high court voted in blacks’ favor, the states are still out to discriminate.

“The states are saying, ‘The Hell with the Supreme Court. We gonna do with these negros what we want to do,’” Farrakhan continued. “So they keep you running back and forth like a dog between his tail.”

He told the audience members that their children, unlike them, don’t see “white folk as giants.“ Farrakhan said that the black kids of today ”see them (whites) as they are.” While this was left somewhat vague, judging from the rest of the content, it certainly wasn’t a favorable mention.

Farrakhan spent another portion of his speech deriding “white Christians” for not, in his view, helping African Americans who were suffering in America. He used Jesus’ Parable of the Good Samaritan (Luke 10) in the Bible to illustrate his point.

“You saw us suffering. You knew we were wounded but you didn’t have the good oil or even the will to make a better people,” he said. “But you saw us in our destroyed state and you used us to your advantage without ever healing us.”
He also brought up old historical wounds and reminded the audience that it was African Americans “who built the mansions in Tennessee that white folk lived in.”

“So before you can really reach your full potential, you’ve got to know what that potential is,” he proclaimed. “Who built the mansions in Georgia, Alabama, Mississippi, LA, North and South Carolina? Your fathers did that. In fact, we were on loan from the plantation to go to Washington to build the Capitol and the White House.”

Watch these comments, among many others, below:

Nazis Get Their Own Lobbyist

April 13, 2012
Robert Schlesinger
U.S. News and World Report

So Rep. Allen West thinks the Democratic Party is full of communists? Wait until he gets a load of the new Nazi lobbyist. No, seriously.

On Tuesday, the same day that West was fantasizing about 80 members of Congress being card-carrying members of the Communist Party, the actual American Nazi Party was making its move onto the Hill. One John Bowles registered with the Clerk of the House that day as a lobbyist for for the white supremacist group (hat tip LegiStorm). Bowles was the National Socialist Movement's presidential nominee in 2008.

What could the Nazis want to lobby the Congress about? "Political Rights and ballot access laws," according to the registration form, which also lists lists accounting, agriculture, clean air and water, civil rights, health issues, the Constitution, immigration, manufacturing, and retirement as "general lobbying issue areas." Who knew the Nazis had strong views on agriculture?

Bowles seemed genuinely puzzled when I asked him whether he really thinks that any members of Congress or Hill staffers would take a meeting with a Nazi lobbyist. "I don't see why not," he says, adding that he knows lobbyists rely on their credibility. "Of course I won't approach anybody in Congress unless it's a very interesting issue or law," he promises. "I'm going to be very careful about the issues I choose for this."

He might also be careful about the members he approaches. For example I'd avoid Debbie Wasserman Schultz, Joe Lieberman, and Chuck Schumer. Oh yeah, and Allen West too.

DOL forcing media to use government computers

April 13, 2012 4:39pm
by Mark Tapscott - Executive Editor
Washington Examiner

Unrest is simmering in some quarters of the Washington news universe regarding changes in the way the Department of Labor (DOL) manages its pre-release media “lockups” on sensitive data like weekly jobless benefits and unemployment.

For years, journalists participating in the lockups have shown up at DOL at the appointed time, then entered a limited-access area to receive the new data and prepare news stories for release as soon as official embargoes end.

The system insures that major news organizations get the data as soon as possible and allows journalists covering the release get a jump on providing analyses and opinion about the data.

But Carl Fillichio, Labor Secretary Hilda Solis’ top communications advisor, circulated a memo earlier this week to interested media informing them that everybody is being required to re-submit their credentials requests.

Fillichio reminded participants that there are only 20-30 seats available for the lockups and that priority will be given by DOL in selecting participants to those that “are primarily journalistic enterprises.”

He also offered a one-sentence assurance that “the department will not consider editorial or political viewpoints in making credentialing decisions.”

Whatever grumbling might be occasioned by being forced to go through the credentialing process again, the element of the Fillichio memo that has journalists worried is this paragraph:

“Second, as a measure toward enhancing security in its main lockup facility (the DOL news room), the department will supply and maintain standardized equipment with a standard configuration for all participants. This change means that privately owned computer and telephone equipment, including hardware, software, cabling, wiring and Internet and telephone lines will be replaced with equipment owned by the department.”

In other words, journalists will no longer be allowed to bring their laptops or other equipment to the lockups, they will have to use government-supplied equipment, described by Fillichio as including “a virtualized desktop running a Windows operation system, a web browser, word-processing software, an Adobe Reader application and secure file transfer capability. Equipment provided will not have wireless networking capability. Provisions will be in place for news organizations to transmit their stories over the Internet.”

The changes evidently are in response at least in part to worries that some of the non-traditional news organizations allowed in recent years to participate in the lockups may not be using their access simply for journalistic purposes.

Since the stock market can rise or fall by hundreds of points as a result of such a data release, making sure nobody gets an advance peek at the data is critical to insuring the integrity of the process.

But some news organizations worry about having to use government equipment that could compromise their editors and reporters in preparing publishable charts, consulting previous stories and charts for comparison purposes, and reviewing prior stories for context and analyses.

They are also concerned that the whole process will slow down delivery of the news at a time when unemployment is high, the economy is in the doldrums and public concerns about future job prospects are unusually high.

Delays will make it more difficult for independent analysts to understand the new data and could give White House and DOL political appointees more time to blunt the impact of the negative news resulting from the data.

In addition, Fillichio’s promise not to consider editorial or political viewpoints is somewhat less than reassuring in view of his boss’s recent appearance in a poster distributed throughout DOL show Solis arm-in-arm with Rev. Al Sharpton, solidarity-style.

There are also rumblings about transferring control of the whole process from political appointees in DOL to career employees within the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS).

The BLS has a spotless record of maintaining data integrity and insulation from political pressures to manipulate data content or release timing. Solis and Fillichio are said to be quietly resisting efforts in Congress to shift control of the lockups to BLS.

Fillichio has scheduled a conference call for Monday with interested media to discuss the memo and implementation of the new system.

BIDENS DONATE LESS THAN 1.5% OF INCOME TO CHARITY IN 2011

Obamas give 22 percent.
10:46 AM, Apr 13, 2012 • By DANIEL HALPER
WeeklyStandard.Com

President Obama and Vice President Biden released their tax returns today, ahead of Tax Day, which is on April 17 this year (since April 15 falls on a Sunday and Monday is a Washington, D.C. holiday).

According to the White House, "Together, [the Bidens] reported adjusted gross income of $379,035. The Bidens paid $87,900 in total federal tax for 2011. They paid $13,843 in Delaware income tax and $3,614 in Virginia income tax. The Bidens contributed $5,540 to charity in 2011."

In other words, the Bidens donated less than 1.5 percent of their adjusted gross income to charity.

The president and his family were more charitable, giving nearly 22 percent of their adjusted gross income in 2011 to charitable causes.

According to the White House, "[Obama] and the First Lady filed their income tax returns jointly and reported adjusted gross income of $789,674. ... The President and First Lady also reported donating $172,130 – or about 22% of their adjusted gross income – to 39 different charities."

Obama Family Tax Shelter

First family transfers wealth, avoids taxes



BY: Washington Free Beacon Staff - April 13, 2012 2:11 pm

President Obama and his wife, Michele, gave a total of $48,000 in tax-free gifts to their daughters, according to tax records made public on Friday.

The president and his wife separately gave each daughter a $12,000 gift under a section of the federal tax code that exempts such donations from federal taxes.

There is nothing illegal about the president’s taking advantage of this tax shelter, but it does raise eyebrows given that he has lamented the myriad tax exemptions used by the wealthy—“millionaires and billionaires” like himself—to pay less in taxes. He has yet to propose a comprehensive plan to reform the byzantine tax code.

The Obama’s tax return indicates that the gifts, likely for their daughter’s college educations, began in 2007, when the maximum exemptible amount was $24,000 per couple. The maximum exemption has since increased to $26,000 per couple.

The Obamas paid a total federal tax rate of 20.5 percent on a gross adjusted income $789,674, which would typically fall within the top federal rate of 35 percent. According to an analysis of the president’s tax return, he may have paid a lower rate than his secretary despite making more than eight times as much money as she did.

His most recent tax proposal—the so-called Buffett Rule—would increase taxes on about 4,000 millionaires and raise about $4.7 billion in new revenue per year, enough to cover about 0.4 percent of the projected budget deficit in 2012. Though the rule would apparently not hit the president himself.

Supporters of the rule have acknowledged that the projected revenue from the “Buffett Rule,” which the Democratic-led Senate is expected to vote down, is not even a meaningful small amount.”

The Obama’s untaxed gift to their daughters will leave American taxpayers to subsidize the college education of the children of the multi-millionaire Obamas.

EEOC to ban checks on employees criminal and credit backgrounds!

MILLER: Beware lame-duck Obama

GOP launches pre-emptive strike against potential midnight regulations

By Emily Miller
The Washington Times
Thursday, April 12, 2012

Congressional Republican leaders are starting to plan for the end of what they hope is President Obama’s only term in office. House Speaker John A. Boehner and Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell anticipate the administration will hand down a rash of liberal regulations in its final months.

Mr. Boehner and Mr. McConnell sent a letter to the president on Wednesday asking him to uphold his transparency pledge by not issuing “midnight regulations” after the fiscal year ends on Sept. 30. This phrase refers to rules and guidance made during the last months of a presidency.

The GOP leaders are most worried about “economically significant” rules, which affect the economy by at least $100 million, and the Obama White House record of using the regulatory process to implement controversial policies contrary to the will of Congress and the people. “We are deeply concerned about the effect these regulations are having on economic growth and job creation in the country,” they wrote. “Small businesses in particular are suffering because of these rules.”

White House Press Secretary Jay Carney defended the president’s record, claiming, “The net benefits of regulations issued through the third fiscal year of the Obama administration have exceeded $91 billion … which is over 25 times the net benefits through the third fiscal year of the previous administration.” This spin comes by leaving out independent agency regulations, Dodd-Frank implementation and National Labor Relations Board rules.

The Obama administration has acted on 774 economically significant rules in its first three years, compared to 470 in the Bush administration. According to research from the American Action Forum, the Obama administration has imposed more than $236 billion in regulatory costs in just the last two years.

In the next couple weeks, the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) is expected to pass guidance that will prevent employers from conducting criminal background and credit checks on employees. The U.S. Chamber of Commerce sent a letter to the Office of Management and Budget last week blasting the way this decision was being made behind closed doors, before anyone has seen the actual text of the proposal. An EEOC spokesman responded that the agency has held public meetings and solicited input from stakeholders.

The Chamber also protested the economic consequences of EEOC action. “Employers are concerned that the anticipated guidance will remove or significantly limit the use of two important tools that employers use in hiring and related decisions,” the letter said. “The impact could be significant both in terms of costs but also in terms of increased exposure and risk to coworkers, customers and clients, and the public.”

This change would claim authority under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, as if it’s discrimination not to want a deadbeat on the payroll or a serial killer at the water cooler.

Republicans are right to be on their guard against sneaky last-minute rulings that could mean considerable hardship for a struggling economy. The administration ought to respect the process and not try to sneak in controversial policies should voters decide on change in November.

Emily Miller is a senior editor for the Opinion pages at The Washington Times.