Shout First, Ask Questions Later

Greed and Virtue

2012-01-31T10:59:00.000-05:00

Hat Tip - Instapundit and Jonah GoldbergI think anything from Mr. Friedman is awesome.

Why I Didn't Bother Watching Obama's SoU

2012-01-25T10:24:00.002-05:00

State of the Union Rerun

Calling For A Group Record Release

2012-01-23T08:35:00.000-05:00

Once again, the republican establishment earns it's title as the stupid party.

Romney to right tax "mistake" after primary loss

First off, it wasn't a mistake. Tax forms aren't released until after April 15th.

Second, all presidential contenders should agree to release all financial, medical, and educational records only once Obama releases his.

We know the individual college grades of every president and presidential nominee from the past 30+ years, but not Obama's? Does that seem fair?

But the press demands the full-monty only from conservatives. Does that seem fair?

This whole tax record issue is a manufactured scarum from the press to distract the presidential contenders from attacking Obama.

And like an idiot, Romney doesn't use it as an opportunity to unmask the press and Obama's hypocrisy but caves.

Stupid, stupid, stupid.

Bye Bye Newt

2012-01-18T20:58:00.000-05:00

Two things. First of all, if ABC news has this interview which could devastate Gingrich's campaign, then why wait. Just talking about it now is impacting the race.And two, if ABC news airs this when will the LA Times release the Obama Tapes?

Sweet Economic Freedom

2012-01-18T16:56:00.003-05:00

Reason Magazine hits it out of the park with this article Does the Constitution Protect the Unenumerated Right to Economic Liberty?

Wonderful Wine.com

2012-01-18T15:57:00.002-05:00

Okay, it is easy to complain so it should be easy to praise as well.I recently won and received a gift certificate for wine.com. Needless to say, it did not stay unspent long (like seconds).There was a slight problem with the order and when I called to inquire, Cathy from wine.com's customer service informed me that one bottle from my order was missing. I could wait until the order was completed and so aside from some chatting 'cause I'm a talker, the call was over.Well, imagine my delight when I open my email and find out that Cathy from wine.com not only removed the missing bottle from the order so it could be shipped to me right away, AND no only did Cathy search the warehouse and find the missing bottle and arrange for that bottle to be shipped to me as well.Cathy from wine.com also waived the shipping fees! (Yippee! Enough for another bottle!)I responded with the following email below:

Dear Cathy,You are wonderful. Thank you so much for your help and over-the-top assistance with my order. Please pass this message on to your supervisor or send me their email and I will tell them directly how thoughtful and kind you have been to me. That you are a credit to the company. And that I am a very loudmouthed broad who is delighted to tell all and sundry what great customer service wine.com has provided me via YOU. I look forward to visiting (and purchasing from) wine.com repeatedly in the future.

Being a gal of my word, I'm posting this consumer-company exchange. I hope wine.com keeps Cathy because she is going to be the reason I purchase wine from them in the future.

My First Hero, M. Thatcher

2012-01-15T18:33:00.001-05:00

And this my friends is why Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher will ALWAYS be a righteous kick-ass babe in my book. ALWAYS.

Abortionists Inc.

2012-01-04T10:53:00.001-05:00

Planned Parenthood’s Annual Report: Got $487.4M in Tax Money, Did 329,445 Abortions

According to its latest annual report, the Planned Parenthood Federation of America (PPFA) received $487.4 million in tax dollars over a twelve-month period and performed 329,455 abortions.Planned Parenthood Federation of America President Cecile Richards and President Barack Obama. (AP Photo) In addition, the number of adoption referrals made by the organization continued to decline.

The State of Rights

2012-01-04T10:35:00.001-05:00

As a Yankee girl, the phrase "states' rights" always had a slavery twinge to it. In some ways, still does. But nowadays, the idiocy of a central, all-powerful government in a country as varied and large as the United States of America makes States' Rights an increasingly urgent issue.This article is yet another example of why the Federal government must be hacked away and brush cleared so that individuals and individual states/localities can decide what best works for them. No one in DC knows better than the postman in Des Moines what Des Moines needs most. Period.Why Medicaid Is No Longer a Voluntary Program. How the Emergency Treatment and Labor Act interferes with state sovereignty

Latest in WSJ

2011-12-29T15:07:00.002-05:00

Britain's Future Lies With America, Not Europe Welcoming Britain back into the North Atlantic economic community would be a win-win for all involved.

TSA Rape Victim Speaks Out

2011-12-21T15:06:00.002-05:00

Read about it here on the Advice Goddess website.

Pipeline Pipe Dreams

2011-12-20T13:47:00.000-05:00

I don't know what Obama is smoking but if he thinks he can convince the American public that the Keystone XL Pipeline shouldn't be built then he'd better quit smoking. 60% Favor Building Keystone XL Pipeline.The administrations position is that

"The White House sent new signals Sunday that President Barack Obama may be forced to kill TransCanada Corp.'s Keystone XL oilsands pipeline if his administration is forced to make a decision on the project within 60 days. Gene Sperling, a senior economic adviser to Obama, told CNN that legislation requiring a final ruling on Keystone XL within two months could doom the pipeline because there's not enough time to complete a new environmental review."
Hat Tip: Small Dead AnimalsThe frantic refusal to even consider the pipeline which could help businesses from all industries and create many jobs is puzzling. One assumes it is because pipelines are so unusual and need special environmental studies since they are so rare. ... Oh Really?
A quick google and you can see that nearly all the inhabited areas of the United States of America are riddled with pipelines. We need this energy. It is from a friendly neighbor and ally rather than a middle eastern dictatorship and as my husband explains in this article - Create wealth, not jobs. Keystone XL pipeline would boost prosperity, not government -
TransCanada's Keystone XL pipeline is a massive job- and wealth-creation project. The pipeline will snake its way 1,700 miles from Alberta to the Gulf coast with stops in Oklahoma and Illinois. Keystone will create $7 billion in investment without any additional congressional spending. It is exactly the sort of massive construction project Mr. Obama demanded from Republicans in September, with one important exception: It’s private.
Read the whole article, it's very good in my completely biased opinion.The long and short of it is, the Keystone Pipeline would be a huge help to the American economy and her people. That Obama wishes to stop it from helping us is unforgivable and hopefully makes him unelectable next year.

An Explanation

2011-12-18T18:41:00.003-05:00

Dear Reader,I owe you an explanation as to why my posting at this blog has dropped off.Chaos.Chaos.And more chaos.In the one year and three months since my father died, I've gone into a tailspin, coped with every older female in my family being in and out and in and in and in hospital for various ailments and surgeries and self-inflicted injuries.We've added new pets (three) to the family, we've traveled to visit family up and down the coast, my husband went awol to promote his book, I've had a personal illness (mild), and the regular stresses of caring for a family which includes a child with both ADHD and SID.Worst of all, I miss my daddy beyond words.There are other shoes which must drop but I promise in the new year to do better. Thank you for your patience and my God bless you this holiday season and bring you joy in the new year.

Layaway Angels

2011-12-16T09:46:00.001-05:00

And this my friends is what I call Christmas. I can not begin to tell you how inspiring I found this story to be, how proud I am of my fellow Americans, and how I think I might go to K-Mart this week and do my part as well. After all, these Christmas layaway angels seem to be mostly from the great American Heartland as a lifelong East Coaster, I have to make sure we keep up.Anonymous donors pay off Kmart layaway accounts. At Kmart stores, Santa gets help: Anonymous donors are paying off strangers' layaway accounts

The young father stood in line at the Kmart layaway counter, wearing dirty clothes and worn-out boots. With him were three small children. He asked to pay something on his bill because he knew he wouldn't be able to afford it all before Christmas. Then a mysterious woman stepped up to the counter. "She told him, 'No, I'm paying for it,'" recalled Edna Deppe, assistant manager at the store in Indianapolis. "He just stood there and looked at her and then looked at me and asked if it was a joke. I told him it wasn't, and that she was going to pay for him. And he just busted out in tears." At Kmart stores across the country, Santa seems to be getting some help: Anonymous donors are paying off strangers' layaway accounts, buying the Christmas gifts other families couldn't afford, especially toys and children's clothes set aside by impoverished parents. Before she left the store Tuesday evening, the Indianapolis woman in her mid-40s had paid the layaway orders for as many as 50 people. On the way out, she handed out $50 bills and paid for two carts of toys for a woman in line at the cash register. "She was doing it in the memory of her husband who had just died, and she said she wasn't going to be able to spend it and wanted to make people happy with it," Deppe said. The woman did not identify herself and only asked people to "remember Ben," an apparent reference to her husband.

Simply wonderful but what got me crying was this.

In Missoula, Mont., a man spent more than $1,200 to pay down the balances of six customers whose layaway orders were about to be returned to a Kmart store's inventory because of late payments. Store employees reached one beneficiary on her cellphone at Seattle Children's Hospital, where her son was being treated for an undisclosed illness. "She was yelling at the nurses, 'We're going to have Christmas after all!'" store manager Josine Murrin said.

Read the whole article, it is filled with Christmas goodness.

Excellent Review of "Stealing You Blind"

2011-12-13T09:46:00.000-05:00

A great review of "Stealing You Blind. How government fat cats are getting rich off of you." from The American Spectator.The Grinches Who Stole Christmas

Murray's book focuses largely on the bureaucracy and why they have become an increasing threat to our freedom and our pocketbooks. Bureaucrats have a huge incentive to increase costs. In government, a bureaucrat's success -- his pay raises and promotions -- is determined not by solving problems but by finding more problems to justify ever larger budgets and staff.Murray, a Brit by birth, saw this first hand when he went to work for the Department of Transport. "In government, performance is judged by increases in funding. The cost-cutting boss is viewed with suspicion, even outright hostility, by his peers, as letting his side down," Murray, who works at the Competitive Enterprise Institute, writes.The success that the political class has had is evidenced by the fact that the wealthiest Congressional District in America is not in Manhattan or Beverly Hills, but in Northern Virginia. It is Virginia's 11th District, a suburb of Washington, D.C. that is home to many top-level federal workers. The district has a median household income of $80,397, nearly double the national average of almost $42,000. Bureaucrats are now paid, on average, more than the private sector, have top-notch health and retirement benefits, and virtually iron-clad job security. The justification for this is that such people are in "public service" and good wages and benefits are needed to attract good people. But it is a myth that so-called public servants are any less self-interested than anyone else. Indeed, they often serve themselves at the expense of the public.Murray provides numerous examples, from the federal down to the local level. One agency that looks like a disaster waiting to happen is the Transportation Safety Administration. "TSA is a reactive security operation, always fighting the last battle. Yet it doesn't even fight those battles particularly well," Murray writes. Post 9/11, TSA failed to detect Richard Reid, the shoe bomber, and Umar Farouk, the underwear bomber, both of whom were fortunately subdued by passengers on their planes. But TSA's failure means more inconvenience for passengers, as we now have to take off our shoes and go through either body-scan machines or pat downs on our private areas. Despite this, testing has found that TSA screeners may miss up to 60%-75% of simulated explosives. Testing at airports that employ private security companies perform much better, with a failure rate of 20 percent. The reason is that screeners from private companies "know they will be picked on with constant covert tests and are therefore 'more suspicious.'"TSA has grown into a 67,000-employee bureaucracy, and in February of this year the Obama administration gave TSA the right to unionize. A unionized TSA could mean even more headaches for travelers as unionized government employees are nearly impossible to fire and union contracts tend to favor pay scales based on seniority rather than performance. Some members of Congress have urged airports to take their "opt-out" option and hire private security firms. But that requires TSA approval, and like any bureaucracy protecting its turf, the agency has declared that "unless a clear and substantial advantage to do so emerges in the future, the requests will be denied." TSA Administrator John Pistole has said that he doesn't think there's any advantage to private security firms.On the local level, there is no better example in Murray's book of the lengths to which a union will go to get its way than the Uniformed Sanitationmen's Association in New York City. A major blizzard hit New York in December 2010. Wanting to send a message to the mayor about staff cutbacks and reduction in the ranks of supervisors, union heads told snow crews go slow in snow cleanup. Several neighborhoods such as Borough Park and Middle Village were targeted for poor snow removal since the residents there are wealthier and have more influence with their politicians. This may have led to the death of one three-year-old boy as the ambulance could not get to him in time. However, priority cleanup was given to the neighborhoods of agency heads and other city bigwigs.

Full Disclosure - This is actually another shameless attempt on my part to promote my husband's book (which makes an EXCELLENT Christmas present by the way) in order to boost sales so I can finally replace my 25-year-old stove and carpeting.

Hollywood's Child Rapists Run Rampant

2011-12-12T17:58:00.001-05:00

NYT silent on shocking Hollywood pedophilia charges

Corey Feldman [made] eye-opening remarks in August to ABC’s “Primetime Nightline” that “the No. 1 problem in Hollywood was and is and always will be pedophilia. That’s the biggest problem for children in this industry … It’s the big secret.” Alison Arngrim, the veteran Hollywood actress best known for her role decades ago as Nellie on “Little House on the Prairie,” has said, “This (the abuse of children) has been going on for a very long time. “If a child actor is being sexually abused by someone on the show, is the family, agents or managers – the people who are getting money out of this – going to say, ‘OK, let’s press charges’? No, because it’s going to bring the whole show to a grinding halt, and stop all the checks,” says Arngrim. “So, the pressure is there not to say anything.”

Read the whole thing but make sure it is on an empty stomach.I guess Hollywood's love of pedophilia explains that bastard Polanski: Nobody is applauding as Hollywood premieres Polanski defense

This Year's Christmas Card

2011-12-09T18:36:00.000-05:00

Merry Christmas

Dick Durban Aiding Murder of Egyptian Copts

2011-12-07T12:10:00.001-05:00

For the sake of an earmark, Dick is preventing Egyptian Copts from getting the help and protection they desperately need. What a murderous douche-bag. The End of Religious Freedom In an age when the persecution of Egypt's Coptic Christians is more bloody than ever the bill to continue funding the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom was held up by just one man, Senator Dick Durbin (D-Ill).Read the whole thing and be nauseated.

Finally: What does Dick Durbin have to do with the death of the USCRIF? Perhaps there are simpler reasons involved in the death of USCRIF. The bill to continue funding it was held up by just one man, Senator Dick Durbin (D-Ill). Durbin may not necessarily oppose aiding religious minorities as much as he is in favor of delivering pork barrel to his constituents. Thus, unbelievably, only until or unless the Thomson Correctional Center in northwest Illinois is funded and/or funded for the purpose of holding Guantanamo Bay detainees, there can be no funding for religious freedom anywhere else on earth. Politics is a decidedly unfunny business. I usually tell people that a politician is, by definition, a thief and a liar, but that he or she is also a balancer, a compromiser, someone who is always in a position to sell one cause for the sake of another, to help one person and not another, to borrow from Peter in order to pay Paul. This is both how democracy works and how things get done in non-democratic countries as well. Cronyism, greed, arrogance, intolerance, injustice, occasional mercy, occasional do-goodism characterize how humanity in the aggregate behaves. We know that most Muslims are not friendly toward any infidel religion, including Christians, Hindus, Jews, Buddhists, etc. Christians have been — and still are — savagely persecuted in Muslim lands. I and many others have often written about this. Author and apostate Nonie Darwish and ex-Muslim secularist Ibn Warraq have both spoken out about this burning issue. Christians are being savagely persecuted in Egypt and all across the Middle East and Islamic world. In Pakistan, Christians have literally been crucified, teenaged Christian girls have been kidnapped, raped, and then forced to marry their rapists and convert to Islam. In 2010, a Muslim mob attacked a Christian man and slaughtered him with pick-axes for refusing to convert to Islam. Saudi Arabia, Iran, and Afghanistan do not allow Christians, Jews, or other “infidels” to pray openly or to build any new houses of worship. The Arab Muslim Middle East is almost completely “Judenrein” (free of Jews) since more than 800,000 Arab Jews were exiled or forced to flee their countries between 1948-1968. Mina Nevisa is an Iranian Muslim convert to Christianity who wrote a book about her experiences. Both she and her female cousin were attending an underground Christian church in Teheran which put them in danger. Nevis fled Iran together with her husband. Her cousin was not so lucky:
She was arrested on charges of apostasy and taken to Evin prison, where she was raped, tortured, and then killed by a firing squad. Their pastor was also killed.
Muslim apostates in Europe also face perilous challenges. Egyptian-Italian Magdi Cristiano Allam, who was converted to Catholicism by the pope, lives with six round-the-clock bodyguards. Ayaan Hirsi Ali, the Somali-Dutch-American apostate-secularist, also requires a full-time security detail. People who do not have public profiles, who are not academics, intellectuals, politicians, or public speakers, also face similar danger. Tomorrow, the Tom Lantos Human Rights Commission hosts a hearing on the “Worsening Plight of Egypt’s Christian Copts.” Nina Shea, the head commissioner of USCRIF, is a keynote speaker. Clearly, USCIRF provides invaluable information concerning the injustices levied against religious minorities in the Middle East and in the Islamic world. Congress must reinstate the US Commission for International Religious Freedom — to do otherwise would be immoral, dangerous, un-American, and unacceptable.

Happy Thanksgiving

2011-11-24T18:15:00.001-05:00

I hope everyone's turkey day was filled with family, love, grace and creamed onions (it's my favorite!).

"It's Like A Snowman Puked All Over The Livingroom"

2011-11-22T08:56:00.001-05:00

I know two kids who are definately on Santa's Naughty List.Watch this video to the end to hear their distraught mother speak the words of the title of this post. I was almost in tears for the poor woman.To her credit, she was about a thousand times calmer than I would ever have been.

Occupier Video from S. Crowder

2011-11-19T19:05:00.001-05:00

Not For TEA Partiers

2011-11-19T19:04:00.001-05:00

Seriously funny!Questions You Don’t Have to Ask Tea Partiers

Help Support This Program

2011-11-16T08:41:00.001-05:00

This project is being developed by a personal friend and they need help. It's an excellent program and will provide seeds for schools to start their own gardens. An especially good project for urban schools.

Please help by visiting - FreeSeedsForSchools.com game

Parady Obama Song

2011-11-14T11:37:00.001-05:00

Political Humor: Obama Releases Theme Song for 2012 CampaignFrom my facebook page, hat tip Daniel J. Mitchell

Worst. Logo. EVER

2011-11-11T09:45:00.001-05:00

I spend years working as a copywriter in advertising before becoming a stay-at-home mom. I even won a couple of (minor) awards. I worked with some amazingly talented people, including many top-notch art directors. So believe me when I tell you that this is the crappiest logo I have ever seen. It sucks. This logo leads the Suckfest Parade on It Sucks Day in Sucksville USA.

It's from this article titled, Marketing America: The ‘United States of Awesome Possibilities’. Visit for the comments which point out all the details of this logo's suck-tasticness with observations such as there is no red in this logo, only white, blue and purple (as in red states don't count) and that it looks less like "diversity" and more like the USA is falling apart.The article itself is very short as if the author was too embarrassed by his obligation to say nice things about this sucky logo so he larded this brief press-release-masquerading-as-news with extensive and offensive quotes from the geniuses behind this logo such as:

The campaign also features a website that gives foreign travellers some useful tips about American life and culture.For instance, it warns: "Health care is superior in the US but it can be very expensive because there is no universal health care."The site also cautions that "some banking networks charge fees of $1-2 per transaction," for ATM withdrawals. (In fact, some charge $3.)And: "Be aware that Americans are fanatics about showering and hygiene."

The whole ghastly idea came from

"The campaign, set to launch next year, is the brainchild of the Corporation for Travel Promotion (CTP), a private-public partnership formed to encourage tourism, with a marketing budget of $200 million. The corporation calls the push "the first-ever coordinated global marketing effort dedicated to welcoming international travelers to the United States."

I think the key phrase is "private-public partnership" which to me translates into government-run advertising pretending to be a private company sort of the same good tax dollar investment as Fannie Mae.If this suckfest of a logo is any indication of the craptacularness of the ad campaign then we will not have to worry about being overrun by smelly international tourists.

Cain's Accuser Doesn't Make Sense

2011-11-07T17:14:00.002-05:00

I'll be upfront, I hope the allegations are untrue about Herman Cain.However, I am open-minded enough to wait until I hear both sides of the story. That said, this fourth accuser has not helped her case with me by hiring Gloria Allred as her lawyer. This "lawyer" has a sad history of backing anyone sensational enough to get her publicity. But my serious concern is why did Sharon Bialek stay in the car? In all candor, I have been in similar situations where unwanted and aggressive advances were made upon me. My reaction, get the hell out of dodge. Ms. Bialek says Cain and she were in the car when he grabbed her. When she made it clear that no means no, he backed off and drove her back to the hotel.Let me get this straight. Ms. Bialek went up to DC to get help from Mr. Cain in her job search. She goes out to dinner with him and afterwards while sitting in his car near the National Restaurant Association building, Cain moves on her. Ms. Bialek says no, Cain stops, and she allows him to drive her back to the hotel.Now the NRA building is near the corner of M Street and 17th, this is a VERY active place for cabs. But Ms. Bialek doesn't get out of the car and take a cab back to the hotel, she allows Cain to drive her to the hotel? I have a problem with that. She was "embarrassed" and did not file charges because she did not work for the NRA? I have a problem with that too. Ms. Bialek's behavior does not impress me. Not with the company she keeps (Allred) nor with the details of her story. If someone tried to push my head into their crotch, I would not have remained another second in their car - especially in the center of DC where other means of getting back to the hotel are readily available.The jury is still out and if the other women wish to give details, I'm willing to hear them but Ms. Bialek does not seem entirely credible to me.Fourth accuser urges Herman Cain to ‘come clean’ about harassment Cain Accuser Speaks (Update: Cain Campaign Responds) Update: Video Added (Update: Previous Accuser Corroborates?)Why We Should Be Unfair to Herman Cain

Who Said This?

2011-11-07T12:08:00.000-05:00

This quote is from a speech recently given by a top politician. If find it interesting because it could have come from any number of sources. Can you guess who said these words?

We sent a new class of leaders to D.C., but immediately the permanent political class tried to co-opt them – because the reality is we are governed by a permanent political class, until we change that. They talk endlessly about cutting government spending, and yet they keep spending more. They talk about massive unsustainable debt, and yet they keep incurring more. They spend, they print, they borrow, they spend more, and then they stick us with the bill. Then they pat their own backs, and they claim that they faced and “solved” the debt crisis that they got us in, but when we were humiliated in front of the world with our country’s first credit downgrade, they promptly went on vacation. No, they don’t feel the same urgency that we do. But why should they? For them business is good; business is very good. Seven of the ten wealthiest counties are suburbs of Washington, D.C. Polls there actually – and usually I say polls, eh, they’re for strippers and cross country skiers – but polls in those parts show that some people there believe that the economy has actually improved. See, there may not be a recession in Georgetown, but there is in the rest of America. Yeah, the permanent political class – they’re doing just fine. Ever notice how so many of them arrive in Washington, D.C. of modest means and then miraculously throughout the years they end up becoming very, very wealthy? Well, it’s because they derive power and their wealth from their access to our money – to taxpayer dollars. They use it to bail out their friends on Wall Street and their corporate cronies, and to reward campaign contributors, and to buy votes via earmarks. There is so much waste. And there is a name for this: It’s called corporate crony capitalism. This is not the capitalism of free men and free markets, of innovation and hard work and ethics, of sacrifice and of risk. No, this is the capitalism of connections and government bailouts and handouts, of waste and influence peddling and corporate welfare. This is the crony capitalism that destroyed Europe’s economies. It’s the collusion of big government and big business and big finance to the detriment of all the rest – to the little guys. It’s a slap in the face to our small business owners – the true entrepreneurs, the job creators accounting for 70% of the jobs in America, it’s you who own these small businesses, you’re the economic engine, but you don’t grease the wheels of government power. So, do you want to know why the permanent political class doesn’t really want to cut any spending? Do you want to know why nothing ever really gets done? It’s because there’s nothing in it for them. They’ve got a lot of mouths to feed – a lot of corporate lobbyists and a lot of special interests that are counting on them to keep the good times and the money rolling along.

Follow the link Psst! Just Asking! to see who said what. (Hat tip: Instapundit)

Our Economic Crisis Explained

2011-11-07T11:55:00.000-05:00

With booze, because that's the best way. Indeed the only quibble I have with this explanation is that it omits the part about how Clinton Did It with his insistance that the banks give loans to bad credit risks.From my email box and a UK relative:Helga is the proprietor of a bar.She realizes that virtually all her customers are unemployed alcoholics and, as such, can no longer afford to patronize her bar.To solve this problem, she comes up with a new marketing plan that allows her customers to drink now, but pay later.Helga keeps track of the drinks consumed on a ledger (thereby granting the customers loans).Word gets around about Helga's "drink now, pay later" marketing strategy and, as a result, increasing numbers of customers flood into Helga's bar.Soon she has the largest sales volume for any bar in town .By providing her customers freedom from immediate payment demands, Helga gets no resistance when, at regular intervals, she substantially increases her prices for wine and beer, the most consumed beverages.Consequently, Helga's gross sales volume increases massively.A young and dynamic vice-president at the local bank recognizes that these customer debts constitute valuable future assets and increases Helga's borrowing limit.He sees no reason for any undue concern, since he has the debts of the unemployed alcoholics as collateral!!!At the bank's corporate headquarters, expert traders figure a way to make huge commissions, and transform these customer loans into DRINKBONDS.These "securities" then are bundled and traded on international securities markets.Naive investors don't really understand that the securities being sold to them as "AA" "Secured Bonds" really are debts of unemployed alcoholics.Nevertheless, the bond prices continuously climb!!!, and the securities soon become the hottest-selling items for some of the nation's leading brokerage houses.One day, even though the bond prices still are climbing, a risk manager at the original local bank decides that the time has come to demand payment on the debts incurred by the drinkers at Helga's bar. He so informs Helga.Helga then demands payment from her alcoholic patrons, but being unemployed alcoholics they cannot pay back their drinking debts.Since Helga cannot fulfil her loan obligations she is forced into bankruptcy. The bar closes and Helga's 11 employees lose their jobs.Overnight, DRINKBOND prices drop by 90%. The collapsed bond asset value destroys the bank's liquidity and prevents it from issuing new loans, thus freezing credit and economic activity in the community.The suppliers of Helga's bar had granted her generous payment extensions and had invested their firms' pension funds in the BOND securities. They find they are now faced with having to write off her bad debt and with losing over 90% of the presumed value of the bonds.Her wine supplier also claims bankruptcy, closing the doors on a family business that had endured for three generations, her beer supplier is taken over by a competitor, who immediately closes the local plant and lays off 150 workers. Fortunately though, the bank, the brokerage houses and their respective executives are saved and bailed out by a multibillion dollar no-strings attached cash infusion from the government.The funds required for this bailout are obtained by new taxes levied on employed, middle-class, non-drinkers who have never been in Helga's bar.Now do you understand?

Taking Credit & Taking Lives

2011-11-07T09:09:00.002-05:00

This account of the SEAL raid on Bin Ladin's compound is fascinating on its own but the author's belief, quoted below, that Obama's rush to take credit destroyed any hope of using the intelligence gathered is crushingly dismal.Correcting the ‘fairy tale’: A SEAL’s account of how Osama bin Laden really died

President Obama stepped up to a podium in the East Room of the White House that night to announce bin Laden’s death. That rapid announcement, explained Pfarrer, posed a major threat to U.S. national security. “There was a choice that night,” Pfarrer told TheDC. “There was a choice to keep the mission secret.” America, Pfarrer explained, could have left things alone for “weeks or months … even though there was evidence left on the ground there … and use the intelligence and finish off al-Qaida.” But Obama’s announcement, he said, “rendered moot all of the intelligence that was gathered from the nexus of al-Qaida. The computer drives, the hard drives, the videocasettes, the CDs, the thumb drives, everything. Before that could even be looked through, the political decision was made to take credit for the operation.”

Damn, Dirty Hippy Round-Up (OWS) 11-06

2011-11-06T16:47:00.001-05:00

Interestingly this critical look at the OWS movement and what they do is written by a fervant supporter of the movement who appears genuinely aghast at the direction OWS is taking both financially and organizationally. A Chill Descends On Occupy Wall Street; "The Leaders of the allegedly Leaderless Movement"Oustanding Round-Up #OccupyDC ‘What Democracy Looks Like’ I have no words for the first new listed at this site from Allahpundit that the OWS NYC site now needs a rape shelter.Thank You OccupyDC - Rampaging Occupiers Attack 78-Year-Old Woman Near the end of this video is a scene of a woman screaming at the protesters not to touch her children. She's dragged off by her husband who is carrying a child. The woman's venom is startling but understandable. Any of these thugs come near my children and it will take more than my husband to pull me off of them.

Obama's Always Been A Leftie

2011-11-06T15:12:00.000-05:00

If this 2004 "Meet Barack Obama" video produced by the Obama Team as part of his campaign for the US Senate had been run by Hilary or McCain in 2008, Obama would not have been elected. I've blamed the media for the Obama presidency in 08 and I blame them now. Bastards. Thank goodness for the Daily Caller. At least we're seeing this now. Rediscovered 2004 Senate ad shows Obama pitching similar rhetorical themes

A rediscovered video from Barack Obama’s 2004 Senate race shows him road-testing his current rhetorical techniques, pitching far-left policies, and depicting business and the marketplace as negative forces. ...... [snip].....The 2004 video also showcases several recurring features of Obama’s speeches — his use of the passive tense to glide past controversial issues, his passive-aggressive portrayal of himself as the reasonable moderate among extremists, and his promises of benefits without costs. The video features several segments of Obama pitching himself in an African-American church, complete with a minister’s Sunday cadence. “I believe we can provide homes to the homeless, food to hungry, clothes to the naked,” he preaches while an organist backs him up. He cites his work as a “political organizer” working with several churches to ameliorate the impact of steel-industry shutdowns. But doesn’t offer any examples where his work, or entrepreneurs’ work, helped attract or create new jobs. However, he does say that his organizing work registered more people to vote for the Democratic Party.

Homes of the GOP Candidates

2011-11-06T09:32:00.001-05:00

On one hand, I don't know if this matters very much. On the other hand, I do not remember EVER seeing an article about Democrate Presidential candidate homes. I found this article from 2008 but it only shows Hilary Clinton's house and was just a light skim. in comparison to the article below.So while this article - Homes of the GOP Candidates - may simple be a human-interest piece, it also smacks of a lame attempt at classwarfare. Lame because at least two of the homes are fairly modest and most of the homes have lost value since 2008. In the interest of balance, here are some pictures of Obama's bigass house.

ACORN Caught Again

2011-11-04T18:05:00.000-04:00

ACORN Officials Scramble, Firing Workers and Shredding Documents, After Exposed as Players Behind Occupy Wall Street ProtestsTruth will out.

Occupy Crime Map - Interactive!

2011-11-04T17:59:00.000-04:00

(Hat Tip - Instapundit)Over at Daily Caller and from the great Jim Treacher's blog comes the following headline: I don’t want to say things are getting grim in Zuccotti Park, but Bloomberg might send in Snake Plissken Scroll down to the bottom and you'll find this awesome interactive crime map.
View Mapping the #Occupy Hate and Violence in a larger map

Pelosi Gets It

2011-11-04T17:46:00.002-04:00

From Sixty Minutes of all places.

Another Clinton Did It. Obama is doing it.

2011-11-03T14:58:00.000-04:00

First The Housing Crisis, now Income Inequlity Income Inequality Rose Most Under President Clinton

But it turns out that the rich actually got poorer under President Bush, and the income gap has been climbing under Obama. What's more, the biggest increase in income inequality over the past three decades took place when Democrat Bill Clinton was in the White House. The wealthiest 5% of U.S. households saw incomes fall 7% after inflation in Bush's eight years in office, according to an IBD analysis of Census Bureau data. A widely used household income inequality measure, the Gini index, was essentially flat over that span. Another inequality gauge, the Theil index, showed a decline. In contrast, the Gini index rose — slightly — in Obama's first two years. Another Census measure of inequality shows it's climbed 5.7% since he took office. Meanwhile, during Clinton's eight years, the wealthiest 5% of American households saw their incomes jump 45% vs. 26% under Reagan. The Gini index shot up 6.7% under Clinton, more than any other president since 1980.

Why I Love South Park

2011-11-03T14:49:00.001-04:00

South Park takes on the whole 99%/OWS movement and they are glorious. Full episode here.Ann Althouse has her take here and the short clip below.

1%
Get More: SOUTH
PARK Eric Cartman,Wendy Testaburger,more...

Thank you Glen Reynolds (aka Instapundit)

Keep off Our Bodies!

2011-11-02T20:01:00.003-04:00

Ever since I lived in the UK, I have been passionately AGAINST government-run healthcare. For that reason, I will not vote for Romney in the primaries. When I was younger, the battle cry (for women) was keep the government off my body. Well if that was the battle cry to protect your womb from the government, why isn't it still the battle cry for the rest of our bodies (both men and women)?Mitt Romney's Health Care Defenses Still Don't Cut It

OWS Bastards

2011-11-02T14:34:00.001-04:00

From Another “Occupier” Raped, In Baltimore [With Update: Occupier Assaults 14-Year-Old Girl in Dallas]

Naming OWS Supporters

2011-11-01T15:07:00.001-04:00

Over at the Zombie website (hat tip - instapundit), they are naming names. In an excellent example of research, Zombie has an evolving list of the Occupy Wall Street supporters that is truly terrifying. The 99%: Official list of Occupy Wall Street’s supporters, sponsors and sympathizers I've copied and pasted the names of these supporters below but go to the above link in order to access the research they give to back up the list.Be very wary of these Occupiers, they have some very ugly "friends".The 99%: Official list of Occupy Wall Street’s supporters, sponsors and sympathizersCommunist Party USA, Sources: Communist Party USA, OWS speech, The Daily CallerAmerican Nazi Party, Sources: Media Matters, American Nazi Party, White Honor, Sunshine State NewsAyatollah Khamenei, Supreme Leader of Iran, Sources: The Guardian, Tehran Times, CBS NewsBarack Obama, Sources: ABC News, CBS News, ForexTV, NBC New YorkThe government of North Korea, Sources: Korean Central News Agency (North Korean state-controlled news outlet), The Marxist-Leninist, Wall Street Journal, Times of IndiaLouis Farrakhan, Nation of Islam, Sources: video statement (starting at 8:28), Black in America, Weasel Zippers, Philadelphia WeeklyRevolutionary Communist Party, Sources: Revolutionary Communist Party, Revolution newspaper, in-person appearance David Duke, Sources: Talking Points Memo, video statement, davidduke.com Joe Biden, Sources: Talking Points Memo, video statement, Mother Jones Hugo Chavez Sources: Mother Jones, Reuters, Examiner.com Revolutionary Guards of Iran, Sources: Associated Press, FARS News Agency, UPI Black Panthers (original), Sources: in-person appearance, Occupy Oakland, Oakland Tribune Socialist Party USA, Sources: Socialist Party USA, IndyMedia, The Daily Caller US Border Guard, Sources: White Reference, www.usborderguard.com, Gateway Pundit, Just Another Day blog Industrial Workers of the World, Sources: IWW web site, iww.org, in-person appearances CAIR, Sources: in-person appearance, Washington Post, CAIR, CAIR New York Nancy Pelosi, Sources: Talking Points Memo, video statement, ABC News, The Weekly Standard Communist Party of China, Sources: People’s Daily (Communist Party organ), Reuters, chinataiwan.org, The Telegraph Hezbollah, Sources: almoqawama.org, almoqawama.org (2), almoqawama.org (3), wikipedia 9/11Truth.org, Sources: 911truth.org (1), 911truth.org (2), 911truth.org (3) International Bolshevik Tendency, Sources: bolshevik.org, Wire Magazine Anonymous, Sources: Adbusters, The Guardian, video statement White Revolution, Source: whiterevolution.comInternational Socialist Organization, Sources: Socialist Worker, socialistworker.org, in-person appearance PressTV (Iranian government outlet), Sources: PressTV, wikipedia Marxist Student Union, Sources: Marxist Student Union, Big Government, marxiststudentunion.blogspot.com Freedom Road Socialist Organization, Sources: FightBack News, fightbacknews.org ANSWER, Sources: ANSWER press release, ANSWER web site, Xinhua Party for Socialism and Liberation, Sources: Liberation News (1), pslweb.org, The Daily Free Press, Liberation News (2)

Clinton Did It

2011-11-01T14:55:00.000-04:00

Smoking-Gun Document Ties Policy To Housing Crisis

The fair-lending task force's original policy paper undercuts the notion the financial crisis was all about banker "greed," though it certainly played a role after the fact. Rather, it offers compelling evidence that the crisis evolved chiefly from government mandates and threats to increase lending to applicants who could not afford them.

Strangely enough, I remember reading about the study mentioned above way back when. It's nice to have someone other than President Bush to blame. Now, how do we dismantle this group?

2 Sets of Questions About Occupy Wall Street

2011-10-28T15:24:00.000-04:00

First and foremost, where is the demand for the collective justice? Shouldn't the first step of the OWS movement be the demand that all those "Wall Street Fat Cats and Bankers" be thrown in jail for the illegal act of putting a gun to those innocent students' collective heads and forcing them to sign up for student loans? Or is that their parents/respective universities' faults?Second, can I get a refund/rebate for the student loan my father took out for me so I could study abroad my junior year at Oxford, UK? Even though, I personally paid off the student loan completely myself by the mid-90s? I'd really like to see some of that money back if the government is handing freebies out to the loafers in Zuccotti Park?

Exposing OWS-ers and Their Very, Very Bad Behavior

2011-10-28T13:16:00.000-04:00

Over at Powerline is this post - Occupy Wall Street Exposed - about a new website - Occupy Wall Street Exposed.Powerline writes...

I wrote yesterday that the occupiers aren’t a political movement, they are a crime wave. Until now, however, it has been hard to keep up with all of the occupiers’ misdeeds, most of which are reported, if at all, in local press outlets. Now there is a single web site, OWS Exposed, devoted exclusively to revealing the truth about the disreputable, crime-ridden, far left Occupy Wall Street movement. Check it out, for the news reporting that our major news outlets generally prefer not to do.Also, you can go here to sign a petition asking President Obama to stop fomenting class warfare.OWS Exposed is a brand new site, but it looks like the Occupy movement will be around for a while longer, so watch for content to be added daily.UPDATE: As always, the Left doesn’t like to be exposed. The people who run OWS Exposed spent much of the day yesterday dealing with denial of service attacks by enraged liberals. The site is working again today.FURTHER UPDATE: OWSExposed.com is down again this morning, due to more denial of service attacks by liberals. I find it somewhat ironic that the occupiers, who purport to be defending rights of free speech, try to shut down the web sites of those who comment on their activities.

Support the good guys and visit Occupy Wall Street Exposed Today! Oh, and Powerline!

Why Econ Modelers Are Always Wrong

2011-10-28T13:06:00.001-04:00

Via the great Instapundit, this Scientific American Article (see link):

UNEXPECTEDLY! Why Economic Models Are Always Wrong.“If you had to readjust the constant in Newton’s law of gravity every time you got out of bed in the morning in order for it to agree with your scale, it wouldn’t be much of a law. But in finance they just keep on recalibrating and pretending that the models work.” Of course, if the models are always wrong, that’s a good argument for leaving things to markets, instead of having regulators — whose models are always wrong, remember — trying to run things.

Ayers Teaching Occupyers - UGH

2011-10-27T12:34:00.003-04:00

Looks like Villaraigosa will be the next Democratic mayor to send cops after occupiers

A Human Observation

2011-10-27T09:24:00.001-04:00

Why is it that we are so happy for complete strangers when we see a successful marriage proposal but we laugh at compete strangers pain when they get hit with a football in the groin a la America's Funniest Home Videos, yet reach out and help complete strangers with real suffering? I may not like my fellow drivers on the road but I think we love our fellow travelers in this world.

Greenpeace Terror

2011-10-26T17:37:00.003-04:00

From BigGovernment.com

Good line

2011-10-23T11:19:00.002-04:00

Via Instapundit from Ace of Spades

SEEN ON FACEBOOK: “The social contract exists so that everyone doesn’t have to squat in the dust holding a spear to protect his woman and his meat all day every day. It does not exist so that the government can take your spear, your meat, and your woman because it knows better what to do with them.”

Why no jobs?

2011-10-23T11:08:00.000-04:00

A question from a friend's facebook page in response to the above image;

There is a difference to being entitled and wanting people to pay their fair share. Why should people who earn more money pay less of a percentage of tax on that money? If they are "job creators" where are the jobs? They haven't been taxed yet, they have been living under this Bush tax cut for years, so again- where are the jobs???

My Answer:

Think of it this way, if you owned a flower shop and suddenly you had to spend hours filling out EPA forms and business registration forms and at the same time, your customer base was halved, would you hire an additional florist? If the government has created through burdensome over-regulation a business climate of uncertainty and expense, then businesses do not hire. If demand for goods and services is down, then businesses do not hire. If the tax rates could change at any moment, businesses do not hire. It started with the housing collapse but has continued with bad government policies frightening the horses. Finally, you are right. There is a difference between demanding an entitlement and contributing your fair share. In the 1980s only 19% of Americans did NOT pay taxes, today it is 47% of Americans who do NOT pay taxes. The top 1% of tax-payers pay 40% of taxes, the top 5% pay 60%, the remaining 40% is paid by the remaining 48% of taxpayers. So who exactly isn't paying their fair share?

Opaque Obama

2011-10-19T16:32:00.002-04:00

So much for "the most transparent administration ever" - Obama's administration held secret meetings on government transparency. Oh good grief.

Obama Has No Words

2011-10-19T15:18:00.001-04:00

via InstapunditConan O'Brien observes that without his teleprompter, Obama has no words....

Calling All Browncoats, Join The Fight For Free Speech.

2011-10-18T08:20:00.000-04:00

What's that famous quote about evil succeeds when good men fail to stand against it? It's a good one but personally, I prefer this line "I aim to misbehave.") Either way, this chick feels like joining the fight against evil and lies.Zilla of the Resistance has called my attention to the plight of Donald Douglas (a personal friend of hers) who is being viciously attacked by the left for his blog American Power.As Zilla points out in her post, standing together against lies and destructive personal attacks is the only way to show folks, what's right and what's wrong because clearly people who would attack someone for there personal views are people without a moral compass.My own husband and his co-workers have been on the receiving end of everything from idiotic lies to actual death threats. Some joker even called us at home after one of his radio interviews. Unacceptable.Anyways, I urge everyone to turn Browncoat and stand up for what's right and support Prof. Douglas's right to free speech.

Party Vs. Occupy

2011-10-14T08:18:00.001-04:00

Reading this story, NYC official: Protest cleanup is being postponed, made me think of three things: One, when did NYC become so spineless (oh wait, Bloomberg. Gulianni wouldn't have tolerated this crap), Two, winter isn't going to be kind to these jokers (bwahahaha). And three, did they realling think "Occupy" was an appealing name? The last is the most telling. "Occupy (insert place name here) is so much more negative than "Party". Tea Party protests didn't occupy someplace, they came, they expressed themselves, they went back to their jobs. These Occupy (insert place name here) protests go on and on, are filthy, and incoherent. If you think this is a "movement" you can support, read the quote below and decide if all this occupying is even remotely part of the American ethos as partying is.

The protest has led sympathetic groups in other cities to stage their own local rallies and demonstrations: Occupy Boston, Occupy Cincinnati, Occupy Houston, Occupy Los Angeles, Occupy Philadelphia, Occupy Providence, Occupy Salt Lake and Occupy Seattle, among them.

Emailing The Pope

2011-10-06T17:20:00.001-04:00

I really dislike the changes the Pope is making to the Catholic Mass. In fact, I feel increasingly alienated from the Church because of them. So I just emailed the Pope and told him so. If you feel the same way, you can too. Pope's Official Email benedictxvi@vatican.va

George Soros Jeopordy

2011-10-06T08:03:00.000-04:00

Given his history working for the Nazis, would this new development Hundreds of Nazi probes reopened, put George Soros in jeopordy as a former nazi helper. After all as the article states:

Special Nazi war-crimes investigators reopened the files after the conviction of former U.S. autoworker John Demjanjuk, whose case set a new legal precedent in Germany. It was the first time prosecutors had been able to convict someone in a Nazi-era case without direct evidence that the suspect participated in a specific killing.Now authorities are weighing whether the same approach could be used to pursue others, said Kurt Schrimm, the prosecutor who heads the investigation unit.

And yes, Soros is an admitted Nazi collaborator.

Soros was thirteen years old in March 1944 when Nazi Germany occupied Hungary.[20] Soros took a job with the Jewish Council,[11] which had been established during the Nazi occupation of Hungary to carry out Nazi and Hungarian government anti-Jewish measures.[21][22] Soros later described this time to writer Michael Lewis:
The Jewish Council asked the little kids to hand out the deportation notices. I was told to go to the Jewish Council. And there I was given these small slips of paper...It said report to the rabbi seminary at 9 am...And I was given this list of names. I took this piece of paper to my father. He instantly recognized it. This was a list of Hungarian Jewish lawyers. He said, "You deliver the slips of paper and tell the people that if they report they will be deported."[23]
Later that year, at age 14, Soros lived with and posed as the godson of an employee of the Hungarian Ministry of Agriculture. On one occasion, the official was ordered to inventory the remaining contents of the estate of a wealthy Jewish family that had fled the country.[24] Rather than leave the young Soros alone in the city, the official brought him along.

Source: Soros, Early Life, Wikipedia, referencing Soros biography.

Black Panther President?

2011-10-04T14:12:00.000-04:00

Presumably this is why the DoJ dropped the Black Panther Voter Intimidation case.Shock Photos: Candidate Obama Appeared And Marched With New Black Panther Party in 2007

Getting Robbed In America

2011-10-04T14:09:00.002-04:00

I have no idea why my husband's book - Stealing You Blind: How Government Fat Cats Are Getting Rich Off of You - isn't on the Amazon Best Sellers In Politics (here) when so many of today's scandals involve the very behavior he exposes! Check it out!Many government retirees also get public paychecks. Thousands of government retirees across country return to work to collect public paychecks Revolving Door Thank Wal-Mart for your new bank card fee Top Democrat wants to gut Government Watchdog that has uncovered vast waste of taxpayer dollars OBAMA'S ILLEGAL SUPPORT GROUP MOBILIZING FOR 2012 ELECTIONS Activists Protest ‘Cozy’ Relationship Between Lobbyist, Obama Admin in Pipeline Emails Texas whistle-blowers allege corruption Candidate-Specific Super PACs Offer End Run For Maxed-Out Donors Also buried 7 paragraphs down is this: "The analysis also found that nine individuals donated to President Obama's reelection campaign as well as to Priorities USA Action, the super PAC founded by former Obama staffers, in that same time period."Cronyism, Corruption, and the “War on Terror”Fincher one of 14 'most corrupt' in Congress Solar Energy School Propaganda 101 Bank of America, CARD Act, Dodd-Frank, and soaking the poor.Governor's Town Hall Meeting Focuses on Corruption In New Jersey Judicial Watch Releases Special Report: "The Rebranding of ACORN"Corruption Squared Former Prince George’s Co. Councilwoman Leslie Johnson seeks delay of sentencingAnd while you are at it, check out his first book too. The Really Inconvenient Truths: Seven Environmental Catastrophes Liberals Don't Want You to Know About--Because They Helped Cause Them

Robo-Signing & Corruption Since 2003

2011-10-04T13:44:00.001-04:00

Gov't report: Fannie knew of 'robo-signing' in '03. Investigator says Fannie knew of alleged improper foreclosure practices in '03 but didn't actLet's just remember a couple of things about Fannie Mae...Timeline shows Bush, McCain warning Dems of financial and housing crisis; meltdown Bush Proposed Fannie Mae / Freddie Mac Supervision In 2003AND who not only blocked the attempts at reforming Fannie Mae but also encouraged even more dubious lending - that scandal-cloaked douche-bag, Barney Frank.Barney Frank Caught Lying About Fannie Mae In fact, Barney Frank and his co-horts have made Judicial Watch's Top Ten Most Corrupt Politicians Annual List for YEARS now, most recently, here.

Department of In-Justice - Fast & Furious

2011-10-04T13:35:00.001-04:00

As you scan through these headlines of this round-up below, ask yourself how many Mexicans and Americans were murdered for this program? One? Ten? Nope. So far the known body count is a couple of American ATF agents and hundreds of Mexicans. When do you think the liberals will care?ATF Death Watch 93: Holder Lied, People Died AND Purjury Charges Coming for Eric Holder?Gunrunner Impact Team Chart - horrifying!Furiously unraveling. Gun scandal still growingATF Fast and Furious: New documents show Attorney General Eric Holder was briefed in July 2010 Gunwalker: Holder Appears To Be Fast, Furious, and Finished. News documents indicate that U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder more than likely perjured himself in congressional testimony about Operation Fast and Furious earlier this year. Testimony on Assault Weapons Guts Obama’s 90 Percent Lie. Only eight percent of guns recovered from cartels in Mexico originated from legal gun dealers in the U.S.: not 90 percent as Obama has claimed.DOJ Protecting Political Appointees New Fast and Furious docs released by White House Gunwalker: Under White House Control? New documents reveal extensive White House communication with the ATF head behind the scandal.Secret recordings raise new questions in ATF 'Gunwalker' operation The Ultimate Goal of Gunwalker? It's hard to think of a more logical reason for Gunwalker to exist.Fast and Furious: Using Humans as Collateral Damage ATF Fast and Furious: New documents show Attorney General Eric Holder was briefed in July 2010 DOJ Considering Elimination of ATF Gunwalker Explodes into the Heartland It's time for the administration to come clean, under oath, and face the consequences for its actions.Blood On Their Hands: Giving Guns to Criminals Was the Plan All Along ATF Fast and Furious secret audio recordings US Government Accused of Seeking to Conceal Deal Cut With Sinaloa “Cartel”Unbelievable: Operation Fast and Furious Agents...Promoted

Round-Up of the Green Cronyism Scandal

2011-10-04T13:05:00.002-04:00

Solyndra and the Scandal of Tomorrowland Solyndra Expands into Energygate Car of Your Dreams!Solyndra Scandal: E-mails Show White House Questioned Solyndra's Viability Early On E-Mails Reveal Early White House Worries Over Solyndra Tipping Point Is Not a City in China Obama on Solyndra: Meh, Hindsight is 20/20 E-Mails Show Obama Was Warned; Bitter OMB, DOE Divide Over Solyndra EPA's Mission Leap Solyndra and the Dubious Benefits of Loan Guarantees

Solyndra and a Billionaire's Guilt Trip Was this solar energy company absolution for George Kaiser's oil money?Additional Documents Relating to the Solyndra Loan Guarantee Clean-energy credits tarnished Carbon credits tarnished by human rights 'disgrace'

Faster and Furiouser

2011-09-26T14:59:00.001-04:00

U.S. Government Used Taxpayer Funds to Buy, Sell Weapons During 'Fast and Furious,' Documents Show

Not only did U.S. officials approve, allow and assist in the sale of more than 2,000 guns to the Sinaloa cartel -- the federal government used taxpayer money to buy semi-automatic weapons, sold them to criminals and then watched as the guns disappeared.

Read the whole article and when your done reading and weeping, call your Congressional representatives! Also, these guys the Sipsey Street Irregulars are doing hero's work covering the Fast & Furious scandal as well as the many others of the Obama administration!

Ignoring Obama's Gaffes

2011-09-26T14:44:00.001-04:00

The LA Times (!) askes "How many Obama gaffes can the media ignore?" and then bless their hearts writes about them.Obama confuses Jews with janitors (this one has video!).Oops, Obama touts his jobs plan today at an Ohio bridge that won't qualify Obama's urgent jobs plan: Right now, 'right now' means sometime next month maybe Obama hails America's historic building of 'the Intercontinental Railroad'

Justice Disgraced

2011-09-26T13:07:00.001-04:00

I know this is a long article but it is well-sourced, extensively linked and the latest in a long series of worthy exposes of the deep, wide and vast corruption in the US Department of Justice. Eric Holder and his cohorts ought to be ashamed. And jailed.‘Every Single One’ Fallout: Justice Dept. in Turmoil From PJMedia Series. What’s happened up until now, and what internal leaks say about what’s coming. Hint: jobs may now be at stake. (This is the twelfth of a series of articles about the Justice Department's hiring practices since President Obama took office. Read parts one, two, three, four, five, http://pajamasmedia.com/blog/every-single-one-the-politicized-hiring-of-eric-holder%E2%80%99s-employment-section/, seven, eight, nine, ten, and http://pajamasmedia.com/blog/every-single-one-the-politicized-hiring-of-eric-holders-appellate-section/.)Each article covers a different section of Eric Holder's Department of Justice. See for yourselves.All sixteen new hires to the Voting Section have far-left resumes — which were only released following a PJM lawsuit. (This is the first in a series of articles about the Civil Rights Division’s hiring practices since President Obama took office.)America should be appalled at the overwhelmingly politicized backgrounds of Eric Holder's hires in the Department of Justice Voting Section. All five new hires to the Justice Department's immigration office have far-left resumes All 23 new hires to the Justice Department's Special Litigation office have far-left resumes All 11 new hires to the Justice Department's Education Section have far-left resumes All 15 new hires to the Justice Department's Education Section have far-left resumes All 5 new hires to the Justice Department's Coordination and Compliance Section have far-left resumes All 11 new hires to the Justice Department's Housing Section have far-left resumes All nine new hires to the Justice Department's Disability Rights Section have far-left resumes All ten new hires to the Justice Department's Criminal Section have far-left resumes All seven new hires to the Justice Department's Appellate Section have far-left resumesAll of which were "only released following a PJMedia lawsuit" which the first article makes clear was a year-long fight culminating in a lawsuit whereas liberal establishments got the same information in days. Pathetic.Why should Americans care about the DoJ's hiring practices? The opening paragraphs to this remarkable series are worthy enough to quote at length as an answer (although that doesn't excuse you from your civic duty to read the whole thing. Afterall, in front of every informed voter is a frightened politician).

The Justice Department is forbidden by federal law from hiring employees based on political affiliation. Yet the resumes revealed the following ideological breakdown among the new hires: Leftist lawyers: 113 Moderate, non-ideological, or conservative lawyers: 0. That represents the basest headline for the series, the matter-of-fact evidence that should lead any reasonable observer to believe the DOJ has employed an illegal political litmus test during the interview process. But the “Every Single One” series has provided additional benefits: the results present the inherent flaw in leftism’s perversion of the term “civil rights,” while providing a real world example of the flawed belief actualized. Additionally, the “Every Single One” series presents ramifications that reach far beyond the individuals most directly affected by DOJ activity. We hope not to understate it: this perversion of “civil rights“ is the beating heart of leftism itself. Only one definition of “civil rights” could ever logically exist: that of equal protection under the law, the law defined as the codified protection of an individual’s life, liberty, and property. Yet Eric Holder, Loretta King, Thomas Perez, the 113 hires — they claim that civil rights, and the Division established to enforce them, reside in racial, gender, disability, and even sexuality preferences presiding above the law, in the hands of an elite few trusted by an elite public class to establish some breed of “fair lawlessness.” The flaw is obvious: when the law is not equally applied, a citizen’s actions are no longer their own. Their fates are no longer tied to their personal adherence to life, liberty, and property, but to an unelected bureaucrat’s whim, an individual who believes both that he is qualified to make such judgments of other men and that our country’s laws allow him to do so. They claim that civil rights are not the individual’s, but somehow theirs, a definition incompatible with itself! This is, as we know, the post-Marxist brand of tyranny — a “well-meaning” lawlessness. But prior to this series, we did not know that since 2008 the Civil Rights Division has been populated entirely according to this ideology, behavior which represents the perfect antithesis of civil rights.

What I've Been Up To Lately

2011-09-25T10:32:00.001-04:00

Obama's Scandal Sheet 09/23/11

2011-09-23T12:05:00.000-04:00

Yes, I can lay these at Obama's feet because he's supposed to be the leader. Even if he was completely unaware of these activities and never sanctioned them, once exposed it is his duty and obligation to denounce them and punish those who committed the acts. His abject failure to do this ultimately lays them and their results at his feet.Holder’s hell week. More Fast & Furious fallout Issa is doing hero's work here. US Justice Department obstructing 'Fast and Furious' gun probe, ATF director says Dead federal retirees are paid $120 million annually, report says Study: Obamacare will jack premiums up 55%-85%Judge questions honesty of Interior Department scientists Obama’s NASA: Leading From Behind In Rush to Assist a Solar Company, U.S. Missed Signs The AFL-CIO Defends Union Violence As A ‘Legitimate’ Union Activity…No Political Opportunity Left BehindWho flashes that kind of bling when their husband is responsible for putting so many Americans out of work. Michelle does. Michelle Obama dazzles New York in $42,150 diamond bracelets (and puts young jeweller on the map)

Another Obama Gaffe

2011-09-23T11:31:00.003-04:00

New gaffe: Obama hails America's historic building of 'the Intercontinental Railroad'

“A railroad between continents? A railroad from, say, New York City all the way across the Atlantic to France? Now, THAT would be a bridge! It’s yet another humorous gaffe by the Harvard graduate, overlooked by most media for whatever reason. Like Obama saying Abraham-Come-Lately Lincoln was the founder of the Republican Party. Or Navy corpseman. Or the Austrian language. Fifty-seven states. The president of Canada. Etc.”

Mr. Reynolds (aka Instapundit (hat-tip)) - "WHOEVER’S PROGRAMMING HIS TELEPROMPTER MUST BE A GOP MOLE"I think Glenn Reynolds' caption of this headline pretty much sums up the proper reaction to this latest gaffe. That is if you are willing to put aside the complete MSM ignoring of this and all his other gaffes - which is insulting, alarming, and irresponsible on the MSM's part.And speaking of the MSM (because I love beating dead horses), this little tidbit has come out of Gallup. Majority in U.S. Continues to Distrust the Media, Perceive Bias. More perceive liberal bias than conservative bias

Updates on Obama's Latest Scandals (Besides DoJ)

2011-09-22T14:08:00.001-04:00

Solyndra employees speak out about mismanagement and sloppy spending Solyndra’s ‘Green Jobs’ Included Employment for D.C. Lobbyists — Including Former Democrat Aides. If you want to read more about this kind of revolving door croynism buy this book - "Stealing You Blind. How Government Fat Cats Are Getting Rich Off Of You."And of course it gets worse when this old bastard gets involved. Soros turns up in Obama's LightSquared imbroglioAnd the Obama administration and most of Justice should fall for this epic fail - New Fast & Furious audio: Border Patrol agent killed by F&F weapons was “collateral damage” More on other aspects of this Fast & Furious hell - hereOn a lighter note, fining companies for hiring people - CEO Tells Congress He Was Fined For Hiring Too Many People Of course, this happened in 2008 but the regulations that resulted in the fine are still on the books and probably still actively enforced.

Take Your $16 Muffin And....

2011-09-22T11:44:00.000-04:00

Why the $16 muffin is no joke

Managers whose budgets do not depend on customer satisfaction and who do not face competitive pressure in the marketplace, will not, on balance, spend their money wisely. Vendors selling to those managers know that price matters much less than it does to, say, Wal-Mart. And anywhere there is political urgency and official involvement high up the command chain, conditions will begin resembling a gold rush.

As major Solyndra investor and Barack Obama donor George Kaiser told a crowd of his fellow Oklahomans not long after Obama's stimulus was announced in 2009, "There's never been more money shoved out of the government's door in world history and probably never will be again than in the last few months and the next 18 months. And our selfish, parochial goal is to get as much of it for Tulsa and Oklahoma as we possibly can."

There is no such thing as war without the brutal, violent death of innocents, including children. Similarly, there is no such thing as government spending without gobs of disgusting waste, graft and corruption. It's all cooked right into the system.

The article is worth a full reading.And the hits keep coming. This nugget is from the big book of Duh - Americans Say Federal Gov't Wastes Over Half of Every Dollar. I'd say it wastes 75% of every dollar.

Obama's Scandal Sheet

2011-09-20T14:06:00.000-04:00

The Obama Administration’s Pre-Solyndra Scandals List

Lots of links and other goodies. Nice job!

The Gore Carbon Cult Exposed

2011-09-20T13:48:00.002-04:00

Just stumbled on another great article in the American Spectator. It is a spectacular fisking of a recent Thomas Friedman article. Welcome to the Carbon Cult Hot-headed they may be, but the Thomas Friedmans of our world aren't exactly "on fire." It's a brilliant piece and you should read all of it but I really liked this portion. Liked it enough to quote it because when you really understand the numbers these "scientists" are talking about, then you understand why so many right-thinking people have realized what a hoax the climate-change lefties are trying to put over on us.

Friedman asks if we should "pay a little more per gallon of gas and make the country stronger, safer and healthier." To put this call for human sacrifice in context, allow me to pose a multiple choice question.

Roughly what percentage of the earth's atmosphere is composed of carbon dioxide?

A) 52%
B) 31%
C) 17%
D) 9%
E) 4%

If you answered D, 9%, you're…wrong. In fact if you answered any of the above, you're not just wrong, but wrong by two or three orders of magnitude. The answer is that the earth's atmosphere is less than 390 parts per million, or less than 0.04%, CO2. Yes, this is up from about 320 parts per million, or .032% CO2 fifty years ago, but it is an astonishingly low number to most whose only contact with "climate science" is through what they read in the papers.

Have you ever heard that fact discussed in the "mainstream" media, or even on the nominally conservative Fox News? You hear that the atmospheric concentration of carbon dioxide has increased, but you never hear that it's gone from a minuscule number to a very slightly larger minuscule number.

In fact, our atmosphere is approximately 78% nitrogen and 21% oxygen. For those of you keeping score at home, that's 99% of the atmosphere. Of the 1% that remains, more than 90% is Argon. Less than 4% of that 1% is carbon dioxide. (Those measures are of the "dry atmosphere," excluding water vapor, because the water vapor percentage is highly variable. At the surface, water vapor is usually somewhere between 1% and 4% of the atmosphere, reducing the other numbers proportionately.)

If this doesn't already have you asking, "What's all the carbon dioxide fuss about?" here's a little more:

• The "greenhouse effect" of increasing carbon dioxide is logarithmic, meaning that each additional increase has less impact on temperatures than the prior (same sized) increase.

• It is estimated (such as here and here) that 96%-97% of carbon dioxide comes from natural sources, such as animals, plant decay, and volcanoes. Climate alarmists claim that the single-digit percentage human contribution to atmospheric CO2, a small percentage of a tiny percentage, is nevertheless destroying the world.

• Although estimates vary widely, water vapor, which is essentially 100% naturally occurring, is responsible for the majority, somewhere between 50% and 90%, of the "greenhouse effect." So, man-made carbon dioxide is responsible for a small percentage of a tiny percentage of less than half of the greenhouse effect… but is destroying the world.

The point of this is not to offer you a science lesson, but to put in context the fear mongering as anti-capitalists posing as environmentalists become ever more desperate. As Solyndra pounds one of the last nails into the "green jobs" and solar-as-savior coffin, alarmists are making one last stand urging you to reduce your standard of living on the altar of the cult of man-made global warming. It is an altar bloodied with human sacrifice, made to a false god.

The US's Greek Tragedy

2011-09-20T13:27:00.004-04:00

Below is an article from The American Spectator online authored by my husband. It is awesome, if I do say so myself. So terrific I am reproducing it in full below:

Obama the Greek. His jobs plan is the Greek option -- and there's no Germany to bail us out.

Greece is in economic meltdown. Its economy has become so biased towards the public sector that it is now literally unsustainable. It cannot afford to pay its bills and will surely default soon, unless Germany can be persuaded to bail it out. Unfortunately for America, the principles that got Greece into this mess are the same ones that President Obama wants to use to supposedly get America back to work. If he has his way, we'll head down the Greek road, with the added problem that there is no Germany waiting to bail us out.

Let's see where Greece is today. It has a GDP of $310 billion, enough to place among the world's top 25 economies. That's where the good news ends. Greece has public debt of $470 billion, and spends about 50 percent of GDP on government, while raising only 39 percent in revenues. Over the past year, it lost 7 percent of GDP as a result.

The International Monetary Fund has told Greece it needs to significantly reduce its bloated public spending, but that it should not try to make up the gap with new taxes. Yet that's exactly what the Greek government is trying to do. Rather than close or privatize loss-making public enterprises like the nationalized railroads, it has attempted to raise money by selling gaming licenses and increasing property taxes -- measures the newspaper Ekathimerini described as "appalling."

As the government attempts to shore up its collapsing public sector, the private sector has been paying the price. Every day in August, 1,000 Greeks lost private sector jobs. Meanwhile, the government has hired between 15,000 and 20,000 new public employees since 2010. Attempts to raise income taxes resulted in massive tax evasion, so the government has decided to levy a property tax paid via electricity bills. The electricity employees union has already said it won't help collect this.

This is a Greek tragedy, but in a comic move worthy of Aristophanes, President Obama is following this particular Greek play. His American Jobs Act aims to shore up the public sector, paying for it by tax rises.

The President wants to keep public employees in jobs, particularly teachers, whose generous pay and benefits are causing problems for states and localities across the nation. He also wants to expand the number of public works projects via a national infrastructure bank, bringing the failed financial principles behind Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac to spending on high speed rail and green energy investments. Solyndra is just the beginning.

Obama says he wants to increase taxes on unpopular targets, like "millionaires and billionaires" and oil companies. If you don't believe these people won't employ enough accountants to find new loopholes, I'd like to sell you the Corinth Canal. As for electricity bills, the President has already said that he wants electricity bills to skyrocket, in order to close down coal-fired power plants.

None of this worked in Greece, and it won't work here.

The right solution for America is the same as for Greece -- end public sector obesity by putting the state on a revenue-controlled diet. In addition, reduce the burden of bureaucracy, ending uncertainty, and empowering the private sector to make the investment it needs to get the economy working again.

Greece's prime asset is its history, which could be the basis of a thriving tourism industry. Instead, Greece invested in an unsustainable public sector and became famously rude to visitors. There's a lesson for America in that.

Our prime asset is our innovative genius. Yet we have also invested in an unsustainable public sector and made the country less nurturing to innovative industry. We need to turn back before we go as far down as Greece already has.

As Virgil put it, beware of Greeks bearing gifts. He might have added, especially when the gift is an economic plan.

Jobocalypse Now?

2011-09-17T09:38:00.002-04:00

Hey loser, get a job or else. If Obamacare prevails, then what’s to prevent Obamajobs?

Freedom is man’s power to exercise his own faculties as he chooses as long as he prohibits no other man from doing the same. Law exists to ensure that no man takes another man’s life - other than in self-defense - or deprives him of his liberty or property. If it is wrong for one man to plunder, then surely it is equally wrong for a group of 20 men to plunder. And if it’s wrong for 20 men to plunder, then it’s equally wrong for 100 million men to plunder - even if they have codified it into law.

Consider, then, the Obamacare individual mandate. It is perhaps the most egregious use of government force in our lifetime, if not our nation’s history. It makes a mockery of American freedom. You cannot be trusted to determine your own health insurance needs, your governing betters declare, so they will take that liberty from you, as well as a good measure of your property. As government-run health care continues its inexorable decay, many of you will ultimately pay with your lives.

The above is an excellent quote from an excellent article. Read the whole thing.

Jobocalypse Now?

2011-09-17T09:38:00.000-04:00

Hey loser, get a job or else. If Obamacare prevails, then what’s to prevent Obamajobs?

Freedom is man’s power to exercise his own faculties as he chooses as long as he prohibits no other man from doing the same. Law exists to ensure that no man takes another man’s life - other than in self-defense - or deprives him of his liberty or property. If it is wrong for one man to plunder, then surely it is equally wrong for a group of 20 men to plunder. And if it’s wrong for 20 men to plunder, then it’s equally wrong for 100 million men to plunder - even if they have codified it into law.

Consider, then, the Obamacare individual mandate. It is perhaps the most egregious use of government force in our lifetime, if not our nation’s history. It makes a mockery of American freedom. You cannot be trusted to determine your own health insurance needs, your governing betters declare, so they will take that liberty from you, as well as a good measure of your property. As government-run health care continues its inexorable decay, many of you will ultimately pay with your lives.

The above is an excellent quote from an excellent article. Read the whole thing.

New Obama Scandal Breaking

2011-09-16T15:11:00.001-04:00

LightSquared: Another Solyndra? A pattern of providing White House support to favored companies — at taxpayer risk — is emerging.

In this case, the company owner happens to be a big Democratic Party donor. And in the pursuit of giving preference to a specific company, the White House undercut a legendary four-star general and potentially undermined U.S. national security. Adding fuel to the explosive story: at one time President Obama was a personal investor, with $50,000 of his own money.

The company? It’s called LightSquared. And you’re likely to hear more about it in the future. The scandal involves the White House overruling the Pentagon, endangering the American GPS commercial marketplace, and playing favorites to a single company — all to please a well-positioned Democratic donor and advance an Obama pet project.

A disturbing report yesterday by Eli Lake at the Daily Beast charges that the White House pressured U.S. Air Force General William Shelton, commander of the U.S. Space Command, to change his testimony about his opposition to a $14 billion LightSquared wireless internet project. The Space Command and Gen. Shelton warned that LightSquared could cripple the Pentagon’s Global Positioning System (GPS). Lake writes that the White House took sides in favor of LightSquared and against the Pentagon:

Shelton’s prepared testimony was leaked in advance to the company. And the White House asked the general to alter the testimony.

Other commercial industry figures agreed that the new wireless system could interfere with aviation safety, disrupt military and rescue operations, and interfere with high-tech farming equipment and consumer navigation devices.

The fact that Obama has invested his own money into this company makes the scandal all the more revolting. This man has absolutely ZERO respect for the office of the Presidency. Zero, Zip, Nada.

I'd Like To See This "Jobs" Bill Passed!

2011-09-16T09:18:00.002-04:00

Call your Congressional Representatives (Contact here and here) and demand they pass THIS American Jobs Act today!

Tea party congressman beats Obama to ‘American Jobs Act of 2011′; bill would eliminate corporate taxes

Louie Gohmert, a Republican representative from Texas, sat in the House chamber last Thursday night and listened while President Obama told members of Congress to pass his plan for job creation, which he called "The American Jobs Act." The weekend went by, but House Democrats didn't submit an official piece of legislation with Obama's proposals.

Nearly a full week passed. Still no bill.

So Gohmert took matters into his own hands. He submitted his own bill and titled it, "The American Jobs Act of 2011."

Below is the shortened version of the bill from the above article. Go here for the full text.
SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE.
This Act may be cited as the ''American Jobs Act of 2011''.

SEC. 2. REPEAL OF CORPORATE INCOME TAX.
(a) IN GENERAL.—Subsection (b) of section 11 of the Internal Revenue Code of 1986 is amended to read as follows:
(b) "AMOUNT OF TAX.—The amount of the tax imposed by subsection (a) shall be zero percent of taxable income.''.
(b) REPEAL OF ALTERNATIVE MINIMUM TAX FOR CORPORATIONS.—Subparagraph (B) of section 55(b)(1) of such Code is amended to read as follows:
(B) CORPORATIONS.—In the case of a corporation, the tentative minimum tax for the taxable year is zero.''.
(c) CONFORMING AMENDMENTS.— (1) Paragraphs (1) and (2) of section 1445(e)
of such Code are each amended by striking ''35 percent'' and inserting ''0 percent''.
(2) Subparagraph (A) of section 7518(g)(6) of such Code is amended by striking ''34 percent'' and inserting ''0 percent''.
(3) Paragraph (2) of section 53511(f) of title 46, United States Code, is mended by striking ''34 percent'' and inserting ''0 percent''.
(d) EFFECTIVE DATE.—The amendments made by section shall apply to taxable years beginning after this December 31, 2011, except that the amendments made by subsection (c) shall take effect on such date.

Unions By The Numbers

2011-09-15T11:48:00.002-04:00

This post by the great Jonah Goldberg from National Review Online's The Corner was so compelling, that I am posting it in full below (YIKES):

Unions By The Numbers By Jonah Goldberg
Via Labor Union Report:

Financial Information
Annual Dues Paid to Unions: $8,217,838,676
Total Union Assets: $8,804,794,935

Total Spending
Representational Activities: $4,081,097,858
Political Activities: $579,624,489
External Contributions: $321,121,214
Overhead: $3,905,927,269
Unions that fail to pass Department of Labor audits: 92%

Union Officials
Total union officers and staff members: 173,503 people
Total compensation paid to union officials and officers: $1,141,540,980
Total compensation paid to union employees: $2,562,757,481

Diversity
Major Unions with White Presidents: 94%
Major Unions with Male Presidents: 89%

Labor Law Violations
Unfair Labor Practices filed against unions in the last 10 years: 65,529
Duty of Fair Representation 32,235
Hiring Halls 2,236
Actions of Picketers 1,742
Union Security Related (including Beck) 1,636
Coercive Statements 1,376

Now Times That By 50

2011-09-15T11:41:00.003-04:00

New Study: Romneycare Cost Massachusetts 18,000 Jobs Okay so if RomneyCare cost the Bay State 18,000 jobs, do we simply multiply that by 50 to figure out what ObamaCare will cost the nation (900,000)? Or do we figure the percentage of RomneyCare unemployed relative the population of Mass (6,547,629) and then apply that percentage to the whole nation (311,800,000) which would equal 857,165 unemployed people nationwide.

Now, I know this is so absurdly simply an extrapolation to be utterly useless but then again ask yourself can the country afford to lose any more jobs due to an unnecessary and asinine law?

Oh and if you want any more reasons to want Obamacare repealed check out this hell here: CLASS-less Behavior as it is yet another emerging scandal for Obama along with the Fast & Furious cover-up and the Solydra fiasco.

The Unanswerable Question

2011-09-15T10:57:00.003-04:00

Well, the question is unanswerable for liberals of all stripes. That is, "How much of the money I earn should I be allowed to keep?"

To answer it honestly as Jan Schakowsky did in this transcript of an interview over at PowerLine (The Question Liberals Will Never Answer) is both dangerous and revealing.

Host: So Jan Schakowsky, out of every dollar that I earn, how much do you think I deserve to keep?

Schakowsky: What is really your question here? Do you think you should not contribute to firefighters?

Host: No, no, it’s a very simple question. Out of every dollar I earn, how much do you, Jan Schakowsky, think I deserve to keep?

Schakowsky: No, it’s not a simple question. No, it is not a simple question. I’ll put it this way. You don’t deserve to keep all of it.

Host: Why?

Schakowsky: It’s not a question of deserving. What government is, is those things we decide to do together.”

“I think you need to pay your fair share for things we’ve decided are our national priorities,” Schakowsky added.

To paraphrase: Government and taxes are the price one pays for civilization (aka rule of law, property rights, etc.).

That said and I think we can all agree on it, where Schakowsky fails is when she adds "What government is, is those things we decide to do together.” Which begs the question who is the "we" that "decides" what "we" are doing "together". Sorry for the scare quotes but from someone with Schakowsky's track record (and her husband's fraud), there is no "we" just her and the liberal agenda. Those who don't like it, as far as she is concerned, do not matter.

And it is this idea that makes the question "How much of our money do we get to keep?" so necessary to ask. It reminds both the questioner and the questioned that taxes do not magically appear in government coffers. Taxes are (in)voluntarily taken from one's paycheck or bank accounts and given to the government to protect our interests.

But as my husband's book "Stealing You Blind: How Government Fat Cats Are Getting Rich Off of You", our government representatives are now only representing themselves. This must stop.

"Slow News Day"

2011-09-14T13:17:00.001-04:00

I'm too tired. Kid's sick and I've been busy with her rather than anything else. That and I still have 300 pictures to process.

It is good news about Nev. and NY special elections though. Isn't it?

Fast And Furious At Eric Holder

2011-09-13T11:25:00.003-04:00

I want Issa to hit the DoJ and Eric Holder for the Gunwalker scandal fast and furiously and repeatedly. Holder is either stupid, a liar or both.

Issa: ‘Only way’ Eric Holder ‘didn’t know’ about Fast and Furious is if ‘he made sure he didn’t want to know’

“We have a paper trail of so many people knowing that the only way the attorney general didn’t know is he made sure he didn’t want to know,” Issa said. “But if you don’t want to know something of this sort then you shouldn’t have the job he has. And ultimately one of the questions is, if he didn’t know, is he that inept that he is dangerous to have as the attorney general, and that is for the president to decide.”

Operation Fast and Furious was a botched gun walking operation where Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives agents facilitated the sale of weapons to Mexican drug cartels via straw purchasers. Straw purchasers are people who could buy guns in the United States legally, but did so with the intention of turning around and selling them to drug cartels.

“This thing was dumber than Iran-Contra, and as a Republican I hate to say that, but this was so dumb that there was no chance of it ever yielding the kind of solutions that they claimed it would,” Issa said on Ingraham’s show.

Holder Defends Himself Against Gun Walker Investigation

Issa must be doing something right... Rep. Issa hit with ethics allegations

An Issa spokesman on Monday said the allegations have absolutely no merit and are part of a smear campaign spearheaded by the White House.

AND Predictable: Liberal 'Advocacy Group' Hits Issa With Ethics Complaint

Nexus of Corruption

2011-09-13T11:15:00.003-04:00

Revolving door of employment between Congress, lobbying firms, study shows

“For every person the American people have elected to sponsor legislation of public benefit, special interests have more than one former legislative advocate now working on the inside in Congress,” said Jock Friedly, founder of LegiStorm. “That represents a large network of people to influence decisions and to provide valuable intelligence.”

Actually the article above is very much like my husband's most recent book, "Stealing You Blind". You should buy it!

We Got Your "Shovel-Ready Jobs" Right Here!

2011-09-11T11:29:00.001-04:00

The Obama energy crisis as you've never before seen it

But other than pointing to staggering unemployment figures and gas prices that remain nearly double what they were when the president took office in 2009, it's difficult to convey the magnitude of the Obama energy crisis in the Gulf of Mexico. The consequences of this crisis far exceed in terms of human and economic losses those occasioned by the Deepwater Horizon disaster that was used to justify the Permatorium in the first place.

Read the whole thing but more importantly watch the video below. Basically, if Obama wants "shovel-ready jobs" the fastest and best more would be to simply lift the asinine moratorium on drilling in the Gulf of Mexico and off our coasts.

More Scandal, More Media Blackout

2011-09-11T11:19:00.000-04:00

Gunwalker Explodes: FBI Hid Weapon, Tax Dollars Subsidized Murder
The depth of the scandal dramatically widened yesterday.

Every American, regardless of political ideology, should be livid that the FBI gave at least $70,000 of “seed money” to murderous felons so that they could buy firearms. The FBI knew these weapons were destined for narco-terrorists, and that they would be used to target not just other murderous cartels but to terrorize innocents.

Shut Up He Explained

2011-09-11T11:17:00.003-04:00

Roger Kimball over at Roger's Rules begs Obama to stop talking since everytime the man opens his mouth the market tanks.

Plus he posted this sad, sad chart.

Obama Demeans The Office Further

2011-09-09T12:51:00.001-04:00

The Gladney-ization of America: Trumka sits with First Lady After AFL-CIO Took Hostages

Earlier this morning 500 or so members of the AFL-CIO stormed a port in Washington, vandalized the facility, reportedly cut the brake lines of train cars, and held six guards hostage. Shockingly, no one was arrested. Earlier that week a judge issued a restraining order against this same group after they clashed with police while brandishing bats and issuing death threats. Nineteen people were arrested for misdemeanors.

While all of this was going on, the group’s head, Richard Trumka, was invited as a guest of the President to tonight’s jobs address.

I have no words except to encourage you to read this post in its entirety because this union's behavior is unacceptable. Period.

Investor's Business Daily Pulls Out The Big Guns

2011-09-09T12:48:00.001-04:00

More coverage of the continuously unfolding Gunrunner scandal with these words from IBD A White House 'Gunrunner'?

If Restrepo wasn't the author of Gunwalker he'd know who is and should be called to tell Congress. Either he's kept Obama in the dark about Gunwalker, or Obama should be impeached.

Read the whole thing.

Fast Food Food Stamps?

2011-09-09T12:25:00.003-04:00

This article, Shame on Pizza Hut, KFC, and Taco Bell for Trying to Mooch off the Food Stamp Program, is pretty much the topic of my husband's book - Stealing You Blind - and relevant to the Palin post below.

Indeed, this is downright reprehensible, perhaps even worse than the story about college students mooching off the program. Shame on Yum! Brands. This is another distasteful example of how big business is willing to rape taxpayers and/or consumers by using he coercive power of government.

In short, this behavior is a very good example of crony capitalism and big government working hand-in-glove.

West Coast Reaction to Obama's Job Speech?

2011-09-09T12:20:00.001-04:00

Below, please enjoy the LA Times scathing spanking of Obama's jobs speech. Wow.
961 days in, Obama becomes sick and tired of someone dawdling about jobs

But here's the catch that Obama and his Windy City wizards missed: Most Americans are not politically obedient machine Chicagoans. Like a linebacker reading the quarterback's eyes, they've already figured out this South Sider's game.

This week's ABC News/Washington Post Poll found that, based on their 961 days' experience with the current White House crowd, 47% say Obama's new economic program will have zero effect on the economy.

Worse politically, twice as many -- 34% vs 17% -- say Obama's plan will actually make matters worse, instead of better.

An NBC News/Wall Street Journal Poll the other day found 73% of Americans believe the nation is on the wrong track. That's 23 points more than felt that way at the beginning of summer.

Funny coincidence. The last time the revealing wrong track number was this high (78%) was in the autumn of 2008, just two weeks before Americans bought Obama's "Change to Believe In" line.

And they have the pink slips to prove it.

As always, read the whole thing.

Cain Shoots From The Lips and Scores

2011-09-09T12:19:00.000-04:00

Herman Cain’s Brilliant Response to Obama’s Speech

Team Cain has sent out the candidate’s response to President Obama’s speech. Here it is, in its entirety:

We waited 30 months for this?

Honestly, what more needs to be said?

Wow! NYT Takes Palin Seriously.

2011-09-09T12:17:00.000-04:00

Some of Sarah Palin's Ideas Cross the Political Divide
A surprisingly balanced article compared to the outright lies and hyperventilating from the NYT (and others) about Palin in the past. She is a very smart and independent woman who has some really good ideas and it was refreshing to see the New York Times take off its blinkers and take a serious look at her.

DoJ is still Dept. of Injustice.

2011-09-08T12:15:00.001-04:00

Under Investigation by DOJ for Using Banned Wood, Gibson Guitar CEO Will Attend Obama's Job Speech

Gibson chief Henry Juszkiewicz denies the charges and is attending as the guest of Rep. Marsha Blackburn (R-Tenn.). The company was raided on similar grounds back in 2009 (that case is still pending). One of the major twists in the story? Juskiewicz is on the record as saying the DOJ told him that if they outsourced labor, there wouldn't be any issue

Details at the link below. This is, truly, outrageous.

DoJ is still Dept. of Injustice.

2011-09-08T12:15:00.000-04:00

Under Investigation by DOJ for Using Banned Wood, Gibson Guitar CEO Will Attend Obama's Job Speech

Gibson chief Henry Juszkiewicz denies the charges and is attending as the guest of Rep. Marsha Blackburn (R-Tenn.). The company was raided on similar grounds back in 2009 (that case is still pending). One of the major twists in the story? Juskiewicz is on the record as saying the DOJ told him that if they outsourced labor, there wouldn't be any issue

Details at the link below. This is, truly, outrageous.

No Interest In Any More Speeches

2011-09-08T12:12:00.003-04:00

I do not want to hear another speech from Obama. I just don't. I was completely unswayed by his rhetoric in 2008 and I still don't like it now.

This is nothing less than abuse of the Office of the Presidency by using it for campaigning for re-election. Nothing in this speech will be worth hearing because it will be nothing but a thinly disguised campaign speech.

Ugh!

Fast & Furious Investigations Continued

2011-09-07T11:05:00.001-04:00

ATF Death Watch 73: Phoenix U.S. Attorney’s Office Implodes Over Gunwalker Why this hasn't been extensive covered by the media nor deeply investigated is a mystery. Oh, wait. Obama.

Fast & Furious Investigations Continued

2011-09-07T11:05:00.000-04:00

ATF Death Watch 73: Phoenix U.S. Attorney’s Office Implodes Over Gunwalker Why this hasn't been extensive covered by the media nor deeply investigated is a mystery. Oh, wait. Obama.

Straight Shooting From Palin To Unions

2011-09-07T11:03:00.001-04:00

Again, without mincing words or being derogatory, former Govenor Palin has written an excellent message to Union Members on her facebook page. Read it for yourself ...

Welcome, Union Brothers and Sisters

What I say now, I say as a proud former union member and the wife, daughter, and sister of union members. So, as a former card-carrying IBEW sister married to a proud former Laborers, IBEW, and later USW member, please hear me out. What I have to say is for the hard working, patriotic, selfless union brothers and sisters in Michigan and throughout our country: Please don’t be taken in by union bosses’ thuggery like Jim Hoffa represented yesterday. Union bosses like this do not have your best interests at heart. What they care about is their own power and re-electing their friend Barack Obama so he will take care of them to the detriment of everyone else.

Obamacare Raises Costs (aka Dog Bites Man)

2011-09-07T10:45:00.002-04:00

Despite my snarky title for this post, this article from Reason below is well worth reading as it explores a recent report "ordered and authored by true-blue ObamaCare backers" which explains precisely how Obamacare is going to make a significant percentage of Americans' lives more expensive.

Whoops! ObamaCare Backers in Wisconsin Produce Report Showing That the Health Care Overhaul Will Make Health Insurance More Expensive

Eugenics Raises It's Ugly Head

2011-09-06T11:57:00.001-04:00

Targeting Down Syndrome by Regulation

Perhaps the HHS is not purposefully trying to sneak in a modern-day eugenics program to eliminate Down syndrome by regulation. It is likely that the IOM report relied on professional guidelines that recommend the offering of prenatal testing for Down syndrome. Actual experience, however, has shown that such tests do not “improve wellbeing”—certainly not for the aborted child, but also not for the expecting parents.

Read the whole thing.

California Blues

2011-09-06T11:31:00.002-04:00

The Golden State Is Crumbling
This article orginially appeared in The Daily Beast so it's critic of liberal California is all the more telling. With 12% unemployment and the idiocy of the man-made Central Valley drought along with needless and harmful over-regulation, California is imploding. Sad really, that such a once-powerful state now ranks 50th in new job creation. All of which is a terrible example of the wrongness of Liberal economic policies.

California's pain is not restricted to farming towns. The state's regulatory vigilantes have erected a labyrinth of rules that increasingly makes doing almost anything that might contribute to increased carbon emissions—manufacturing, conventional energy, home construction—extraordinarily onerous. Not surprisingly, the state has not gained middle-skilled jobs (those requiring two years of college or more) for a decade, while the nation boosted them by 5 percent and archrival Texas by a stunning 16 percent over the same time period.

There is little chance that the jobs lost in these fields will ever be recovered under the current regime. As decent blue-collar and midlevel jobs disappear, California has gone from a rate of inequality about the national average in 1970, to among the most unequal in terms of income. The supposed solution to this—Gov. Jerry Brown's promise of 500,000 "green jobs"—is being shown for what it really is, the kind of fantasy you tell young children so they will go to sleep.

Many Californians who aren't slumbering are moving out of the state—and not only the pathetic remains of the old Reaganite majority. According to the most recent census, those leaving the state include old boomers, middle-aged families, and increasingly, many Latinos as well. Outmigration rates from places like Los Angeles and the Bay Area now rival those of such cities as Detroit. In the last decade, California’s population grew only 10 percent, about the national average, largely due to immigrants and their offspring. Population increases in the Bay Area were less than half that rate, while the City of Los Angeles gained fewer new residents—less than 100,000—than in any decade since the turn of the last century!

Increasingly, California no longer beckons ambitious newcomers, except for a handful of the most affluent, best educated, and well connected. Through the 1980s and even through the late '90s, the aspirational classes came to California. Now they head to other, more opportunity-friendly places like Austin, Houston, Dallas, Raleigh-Durham, even former “dust bowl” burghs like Des Moines, Omaha, and Oklahoma City. Meanwhile, Golden California, particularly its expensive, ultragreen coast, gets older and older. Marin County, the onetime home of the Grateful Dead and countless former hippies, is now one of the grayest urban counties in the country, with a median age of 44.

Read the whole thing.

US Debt Up 59% Thanks to Hope & Change

2011-09-05T17:47:00.002-04:00

U.S. Debt Held by Public Tops $10T for 1st Time—Up 59 Percent Under Obama According to the US Treasury.

During Obama's presidency, debt held by the public has now increased by $3.71694 trillion--or almost 59 percent from the $6.3073 trillion in debt held by the public that the government owed to its creditors on Jan. 20, 2009, when Obama was inaugurated.

Read the whole thing and weep.

Also I should point out that Corruption Queen Maxine Waters wants to "tax banks out of business." That's a nice bit of hope and change that wouldn't destroy America. WTF! Maxine Waters Threatens to 'Tax Banks Out of Business'