Colonel Hazard

Back to Tea Party at Perrysburg

2010-02-05T15:52:00.002-05:00

Well, after a long month, the great gods (little g) of Google have decided to release Tea Party at Perrysburg, which was marked as SPAM because of all the attacks on the America Rising video we had posted. Okay, so from now on, we will be posting at Tea Party. (Link here) In the event of another meltdown, we will switch back to Col. Hazard. Blogger is FREE but notoriously unstable when it comes to being marked as SPAM.

The most awesome video in the whole world!!!

2010-02-05T06:06:00.001-05:00

He does it again!!!

2010-02-05T05:40:00.001-05:00

Do you believe it???? He has a PRAYER breakfast where he talks about UNITY and he complains about BUSH and the Republicans as being divisive!!!!

"You can question my policies without questioning my faith. Or, for that matter, my citizenship," Obama said, referring to critics who have questioned whether he was born in the United States.
President Obama also said his Office of Faith-Based and Neighborhood Partnerships had "turned the faith-based initiative around" from its previous incarnation under the Bush administration to "find common ground among people of all beliefs."

New Hampshire says buh bye to The One

2010-02-04T21:25:00.001-05:00

Heh. Laughing my you know what off:

The crucial independent voters of notoriously independent New Hampshire, the ones who were so vital to Barack Obama's 2008 victory there and nationally, are fast falling out of love with the Democrat.
A new WMUR Granite State Poll of 500 voters by the University of New Hampshire Survey Center finds the president's support has slipped below 50% now. In the early 2008 Democratic primary there, voters preferred Hillary Clinton to Obama, 39 to 36. But come November they gave the Illinoisan 54% to John McCain's 45%.

AGW exposed!

2010-02-04T05:58:00.002-05:00

Well, more and more is being revealed about the great global warming scam that almost was. Although, who knows. Maybe they'll still manage to pass something with some of the cheating tactics they've been using. And with Lindsey Graham's cooperation.

I can't recall the wheels coming off the bus of any expert-driven hysteria as fast or as completely as they are now coming off the global-warming scare.
I suppose they must have came off faster from Y2K. At 12:00:01 AM on Jan. 1, 2000, when airliners didn't fall from the sky and power plants didn't shut down spontaneously or computers didn't freeze up all over the world, the air came out of the Y2K scare instantly. Billions had been spent on preventing that disaster-that-never-was up until midnight on the final day of 1999, then almost not a penny afterwards.

Congress strips Inspector from right to investigate Black Panthers

2010-02-04T05:45:00.002-05:00

This case of voter intimidation by the New Black Panther party is absolutely despicable. The charges were brought, the case was won, and DOJ DROPPED it, even as the NBP party didn't even bother to show up in court. So Republicans have been querying the motivation in dropping this case. Here is an update:

In a terse letter to a Republican lawmaker who requested an investigation of the dismissal of complaints against the New Black Panther Party, Justice Department Inspector General Glenn A. Fine said he should be able to do so, but was powerless because Congress had stripped him of that authority.
In a four-page response to Rep. Frank R. Wolf of Virginia, who had requested that the IG's office investigate what he called the complaint's "unfounded dismissal," Mr. Fine said that unlike all other inspectors general who have unlimited jurisdiction to investigate all claims of wrongdoing inside their agencies, his office does not.

Lawyers with mental retardation sought

2010-02-04T05:35:00.002-05:00

No kidding. From the DOJ. Rush mentioned this at the end of his show yesterday.

The Civil Rights Division encourages qualified applicants with disabilities, including individuals with targeted disabilities, to apply. Targeted disabilities are deafness, blindness, missing extremities, partial or complete paralysis, convulsive disorder, mental retardation, mental illness, severe distortion of limbs and/or spine. Applicants who meet the qualification requirements and are able to perform the essential functions of the position with or without reasonable accommodation are encouraged to identify disabilities, including targeted disabilities, in response to the questions in the Avue application system seeking that information.

Brown to be sworn in tomorrow

2010-02-03T16:44:00.001-05:00

But, of course, lots of monkeying going on before, like seating a Labor secretary who wants to get through card check, which would make it difficult for businesses to NOT have unions. So that's secretary is set to be sworn in at 11:00 a.m. while Brown won't be sworn in until 5. Hm. Curious?

ROTFLMAO

2010-02-03T16:33:00.001-05:00

Budget blunders

2010-02-03T05:50:00.001-05:00

Unbelievable news with the new budget.

There is another aspect which makes the raw numbers even more pernicious. Many of the new tax increases are a function of the taxpayer's overall income, such as caps on deductions for mortgage payments, state and local taxes, and charitable deductions, and the new 20-percent capitals gains tax bracket.

Tying these items to overall income creates uncertainty, since the value of the deductions and the cost of the capital gains will not be know until after the fact, when the taxpayer's total annual income is calculated.

Health care bill to be downsized

2010-02-03T05:33:00.001-05:00

So they're still at it, working away at JUNK to take control of our lives. This still isn't reform; it's a takeover:

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., also voiced optimism about the approach in a conference call Tuesday with bloggers, while cautioning that final decisions to move forward remained to be made.
"We will not be deterred from this course of getting something done one way or another, and I'm hoping it will ... be mainly by passing the comprehensive bill. That's our plan," Pelosi said.
Pelosi also said the House plans to vote next week on a small element of the massive health bill it approved in November stripping insurance companies of their decades-old exemption from certain federal antitrust laws. Pelosi's office provided audio of the conference call.

Wine train

2010-02-02T20:37:00.001-05:00

Ugh. This is simply sickening. There is also some suspicion that Pelosi is involved in this, since she owns a vineyard in Napa Valley. Hm.

Because an investigation just published by California Watch and reprinted in the San Francisco Chronicle shows that the Wine Train scam was far worse than you imagined. The $54 million wasn’t just spent on an overpriced not-a-thrill ride for tipsy tourists: it was thrown down the toilet on a no-bid contract handed to a shady Alaskan front corporation which deviously abused race-based “set-aside” laws to land a vastly overpriced deal — which they then proceeded to subcontract at a much lower rate to a different company, while pocketing a cool $20 million for doing no work whatsoever.

Murtha in intensive care

2010-02-02T20:11:00.001-05:00

Another one.

Rep. John Murtha is now in a Virginia hospital's intensive care unit after unexpected complications from gallbladder surgery last week, his spokesman confirmed this morning.
Murtha, 77, had been suffering from gallbladder pain and problems in December and arranged to have the organ removed last week at Bethesda Naval Hospital. A spokesman for the Pennsylvania Democrat declined to discuss the seriousness of the situation that sent Murtha back to another hospital's intensive care unit.

Absolutely stunning

2010-02-02T19:50:00.002-05:00

What have we seen in the last few weeks? Absolutely bizarre behavior by our President. At one event, he dresses down the Republicans contemptuously for not approving of his policies and not being willing to work with the Democrats, even though they never ask for meetings and much of the important legislation has been behind closed doors. Then yesterday he pops out and says we cannot sustain the course we are on, even as aides lug the budget down the hallway on a 100 lb dolly and record deficits are being recorded. In addition, he says we'll cut the budget....next year. That's the way it's done! THIS year we'll have a 6% increase! But we can't spend like it's Monopoly money. Truly this is scary. Is the man undone? Now he's ripping on the very Republicans, who are so pitifully in the minority that they are powerless to do anything, for not working with him and being willing to take risks, as if his budget isn't a risk! What does he need them for anyway? COVER??

President Barack Obama branded Republicans on Tuesday as electoral opportunists more concerned about their own interests than the people's, taking a political risk by escalating criticism of the very lawmakers he's urging to work with him.
The newly combative approach is a double-edged sword for Obama.
Fearful of losses in the November congressional and gubernatorial elections, Democrats have been urging Obama to throw tougher punches at Republicans. Those calls grew louder after the Democrats' stunning loss two weeks ago of a Senate seat in Massachusetts, seen as an indictment of Democratic control over Congress and the White House.

Ringo finds God

2010-02-02T18:54:00.001-05:00

Huh. Who woulda thought it. Hard to believe he's 70.

John Lennon caused a worldwide storm by claiming that the Beatles were more popular than Jesus.
Now, more than four decades on, it seems his former bandmate Ringo Starr has acknowledged a humbler place in the grand scheme of things.
The drummer says he has found God - after taking a long and winding road to enlightenment.

Is Abdulmutallab talking?

2010-02-02T18:42:00.002-05:00

Dems are saying today that Detroit bomber Abdulmutallab is talking. Did he receive a plea bargain to do that? What is going on? After a month of no talking (he blabbed like a baby in the first 50 minutes before he was Mirandized...then he clammed up), he's talking again. This person who tried to kill 300 people is getting leniency? WHAT IS GOING ON??? This is a WAR CRIMINAL!

The ridiculous budget

2010-02-02T05:53:00.002-05:00

Well, ok, so you saw him bow to the Tampa mayor and just about every other leader in the world on the wrong side of politics. Then you heard him lecture everyone that we can't go around spending money like it's Monopoly money, even while proposing a bizarrely increased (6%?) budget for the next year that took a flat bed to wheel down the haul. Now here are some of the ramifications:

According to our quick analysis of his budget, the president’s budget also would:
* Permanently expand the federal government by nearly 3 percent of gross domestic product (GDP) over 2007 pre-recession levels;

* Raise taxes on all Americans by more than $2 trillion over the next decade (counting health-care reform and cap-and-trade);

* Raise taxes for 3.2 million small businesses and upper-income taxpayers by an average of $300,000 over the next decade;

* Borrow 42 cents for each dollar spent in 2010;

Global warming scandal

2010-02-02T05:44:00.002-05:00

If you've been following all the latest developments concerning AGW, you know that much of their so-called "evidence" has been revealed as inaccurate, manipulated, or non-existent. The scandal has grown since the Russians (it is believed) broke open the email correspondence between the AGW scientists who receive so much funding from their concern and belief in AGW. Read it here. It's short with a roundup:

You have to assume that America's dying monodailies are now actively auditioning for state ownership. How else to explain the silence of the massed ranks of salaried "environmental correspondents" on the daily revelations emerging from the fast disintegrating "scientific consensus" on "climate change"? You get livelier coveragefrom the Chinese press.
But in competitive newspaper markets they still know a story when they see one. Surely the most worrying sign for the thuggish enforcers of "settled science" is that even the eco-lefties at The Guardian and The Independent, two of the most gung-ho warm-mongers on the planet, are beginning to entertain doubts.

Why did he bow to Tampa mayor?

2010-02-02T05:39:00.002-05:00

Did you know she declared Nov. 15 CAIR day? And, yes, that would be the radical Muslim group that defends even the most abominable acts by Muslims.

Well it didn’t take long to peg this one. In 2008 Mayor Iorio gave CAIR a day named in their honor.
Zimbio reported:
“By virtue of the authority vested in me as mayor of the city of Tampa, I do hereby proclaim November 15, 2008, as ‘Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) Day’ in the city of Tampa, Florida.”
Hat Tip Brian B.
CAIR (Council on American-Islamic Relations) is a civil rights group partially funded by the Saudi Wahhabi establishment and has numerous ties to extremist Islamic organizations.

James O'Keefe update

2010-02-01T20:46:00.001-05:00

Patterico is blogging over at Hot Air. He compares several recent cases and makes a decision about O'Keefe, the conservative journalist who exposed ACORN:

Steward was peddling lies. The Black Panthers were spreading fear. James O’Keefe was searching for the truth.

Only one of these cases is being prosecuted.

Maybe James O’Keefe did enter a federal building under false pretenses. Maybe.

But doesn’t every Congressperson do that every day?

Proof Obama is not interested in intelligence or national security

2010-02-01T20:39:00.001-05:00

This is an article over at The American Thinker. Analysis of the Detroit incident is revealing.

The picture that emerged from the hearing was of a president uninterested in national security, more concerned about health scare and cap-and-tax than in preventing what his Homeland Security chief infamously called "man-caused disasters"; of an administration more busy fighting turf wars than waging the real war against Islamic terrorists -- whom Obama refuses to even call by that name; of a Commander-in-Chief who doesn't take seriously his most essential job of protecting this country's citizens, more focused on extending terrorists these citizens' rights than he is on gathering the intelligence needed to keep Americans safe.

The Obamedia all but ignored the hearing, of course. It was more important for them to protect their anointed One...even if folks' lives are at stake.

Whom are we trying to impress?

2010-02-01T20:30:00.003-05:00

Well, that's easy. Certainly not the tea partiers or the general American population.

So whom are we trying to impress? The answer seems to be left-wing intellectuals, academics, voters -- "the educated class," in David Brooks's term -- who decried George W. Bush's policies as reeking of fascism and dictatorship. We are making policies to please those who hang out in law school faculty lounges.

Their numbers turn out to be less formidable than the amount of coverage they have received in sympathetic media suggests. For that we have evidence from the commonwealth of Massachusetts, where Republican Senate candidate Scott Brown called for handing over KSM and the Christmas bomber to military tribunals. His Democratic opponent disagreed. She carried "the educated class," blacks and Hispanics. Brown carried just about everyone else and, even in Massachusetts, won.

The spell is broken

2010-02-01T06:03:00.001-05:00

Wall Street Journal:

The curtain has come down on what can best be described as a brief un-American moment in our history. That moment began in the fall of 2008, with the great financial panic, and gave rise to the Barack Obama phenomenon.
The nation's faith in institutions and time-honored ways had cracked. In a little-known senator from Illinois millions of Americans came to see a savior who would deliver the nation out of its troubles. Gone was the empiricism in political life that had marked the American temper in politics. A charismatic leader had risen in a manner akin to the way politics plays out in distressed and Third World societies.

The food police are coming

2010-02-01T05:48:00.002-05:00

Step back from politics for a moment and consider the latest attack on parents and choices (not choices to abort a baby, of course, but food choices. In all these things, liberals only want you to have the "choices" they "choose.") The Blog Prof has an interesting perspective:

No freedom or liberty is safe from liberal fascism, right down to to what is on your dinner plate. Soda taxes, taxes on bottled water, fast food, bans on certain types of fats, etc. are in vogue throughout liberal land. Because we - individual people - are too stupid to make our own nutritional choices. John Stossel, a libertarian, talks with Nick Gillespie, a libertarian. In the other corner is Meme Roth, a bona fide food Nazi. You can guess who gets the upper hand in knowledge and reason:

Dems accuse Alito of inappropriate behavior

2010-02-01T05:33:00.002-05:00

Is there no low to which these people will reach? First their president shrieks untruths from his pulpit and then they accuse a Supreme Court justice for reacting to the untruth.

Senate Democrats, taking a cue from President Obama, are ripping into Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito for his understandable (and understated) display of disagreement with the president's misrepresentation of a recent court decision.
During last week's State of the Union Address, recall, Obama launched into an unpresidential attack on the court's upending of the McCain-Feingold campaign-finance act.
Obama incorrectly claimed the ruling -- in which Alito joined the 5-4 majority -- would permit foreign corporate campaign contributions in US elections.

Pelvic exams on unconscious women routine

2010-01-31T21:26:00.001-05:00

Yes, it's true. It's policy in Canada. Coming to a hospital near you.

Medical students routinely practice doing internal pelvic examinations while surgery patients are unconscious, and without getting specific consent, at least in Canada.
Guidelines in the United States and Britain say specific consent is required but, by contrast, Canadian guidelines state that pelvic examination by trainees is “implicit.”
The practice – one of those dirty little secrets of medicine – has been exposed in a thoughtful, professional manner by a young doctor.

Happening all across the USA

2010-01-31T21:16:00.002-05:00

Just like yesterday's tea party at Sandusky, this is happening everywhere. Rest on it.

Now, though, the speech-making over loudspeakers to angry throngs seems to have given way to a much quieter form of protest - one in which Tea Party activists, here and across the country, are trying to either take over or gain a foothold in the political parties from the ground up.
They are doing it here by the hundreds by filing as candidates in the May 4 primary election for the office of precinct executive, the lowest rung of the political party structure.

Openly astro-turfing

2010-01-31T17:27:00.002-05:00

If you've been following the story of Ellie Light, you know that it has been discovered that numerous persons are posting NUMEROUS identities saying positive things around the web and in newspapers. It is thought that this is being encouraged, if not funded, but the DOJ or Axelrod's political machine. This is called astro-turfing, primarily because it is a fraudulent effort to magnify the number of people who actually are affirming Obama, as opposed to the truly grassroots movement of the tea partiers. This is being done openly now. Here is O's website that encourages people to do this, all in the name of Teh One.

Thousands of OFA supporters calling talk radio shows with a pro-health reform message could have a big impact on the debate. But to make it happen, we need active volunteers to help identify which radio shows talk about politics and accept calls.

Can you spare a few minutes to help? We’ll give you all the resources you need – just click “Start This” below.

The Party of KNOW

2010-01-31T14:07:00.000-05:00

Propaganda passed out in Massilon High School

2010-01-31T14:02:00.004-05:00

Apparently students are being encouraged to serve internships in Teh One's political organization...to preserve the change we fought so hard for in 2008....Undoubtedly this internship will be apolitical, n'est ce pas? Nothing political, no. Go HERE to read:

Children must be advised to expose this ugly propaganda. Children must tell their parents how they are being used and manipulated. Parents, warn your kids. Better yet, home school.
Check out the recommended reading list page 4:
Rules for Radicals, Saul Alinsky
The New Organizers, Zack Exley
Stir It Up: Lessons from Community Organizing and Advocacy, Rinku Sen
Obama Field Organizers Plot a Miracle, Zack Exley, Huffington Post
Dreams of My Father Chicago Chapters, Barack Hussein Obama

Wonder what Obama does with his time?

2010-01-31T08:32:00.003-05:00

Well, The One was just on the news complaining about the fact that he doesn't have time to watch an entire basketball game (too busy attending the nation's business!) but once the Final Four rolls around, he will be watching all the games. He said this as he cockily half grinned to the obsequious CBS sports commentators who eagerly interviewed him about his personal interests. After all, it IS all about him. He DOES so enjoy talking about himself.

So if you're sorry for The One because he has so little time to watch basketball because he's the most important person in the world (important enough to take time out to scold the Republicans about their lack of support for his policies), don't be.

Remember this? After Obama Tells America “Everyone Must Sacrifice” the White House Throws 1 Party Every 3 Days in First Year

And this? In his first year:

On only 21 days was he out of the public eye, presumably working.

He attended 28 fundraisers.

He gave 411 speeches.

He gave 158 interviews.

Indeed, when does the man have time to...work?

Queen Pelosi snatches your dollars for her grandkids

2010-01-31T08:09:00.002-05:00

Well, by now you've all read the stories about Queen Nancy's abuse of taxpayer dollars by spending $100,000 on alcohol in her trips around the world on "her" jet that seats 200 people. Oh, and the $2 million for travel. Oh, and the $1+ million cost for the week at Copenhagen. Follow the links in this report to read how Pelosi uses OUR MILITARY to BABYSIT her grandkids. Lots of links in the post below at The Blog Prof to verify this abusive behavior:

Looks like my Pelosi post from yesterday has an epilogue, and it's a doozy. In my prior post (You're drink's on us! Taxpayers pay $101,000 for Pelosi's in-flight 'food, booze'), I pointed out Pelosi's obscene price tag - all at taxpayer expense - for lavish food and booze: more than $100,000 worth. Last week, information surfaced on these Congress-critters bilking us out of more than $1.1 million for a junket to Copenhagen (The tab for Congress' Junket to Copenhagen? $1.1+ million). It turns out Queen Pelosi's corrupt ways go even further than that. Not only has she used the air force as her personal taxi service, she's been doing so for her family as well, all on our dime. From Doug Ross viamemeorandum: Un-frickin-believable: U.S. Military Serving as Chauffeurs, Babysitters for the Pelosi Kids: Receipts That Will Blow Your Mind

Seat Scott Brown NOW!!!

2010-01-30T09:53:00.005-05:00

Go here to sign the petition!

2010-01-30T09:53:00.001-05:00

Tea party meeting today in Sandusky!

2010-01-30T09:48:00.001-05:00

*************************************

CITIZENS' TOWN HALL MEETING

*******************************************

Purpose: to mobilize voters for the 2010 elections in local, state and national races

Saturday January 30, 2010

2:00 PM

Lyman Harbor Waterfront Banquet Hall/Restaurant

1615 First Street

Sandusky, OH 44870

(www.lymanharbor.com)

SPONSORS:

Perrysburg Patriots

We-by-For

The Children of Liberty

Back to Basics

Tea Partiers Move Forward!

2010-01-30T08:21:00.002-05:00

This is a very long but GREAT article about the current Tea Party movement. For once, we are pictured as grass roots activists...people who hold jobs and work for a living but are alarmed at the direction this country is taking. Most MSM outlets simply do not get it. They think we are organized by some rich politicians because they cannot understand thousands, MILLIONS of us being motivated to take to the streets with signs, particularly since so many of us are not that type...we are quiet conservative people. Go here to read at...The New Yorker, no less....are they starting to get it? And do we LIKE that?

The Tea Party movement, identified by some commentators as the first right-wing street-protest movement of our time, may be a reflection of how far populist sentiment has drifted away from the political left in the decades since the New Deal. “The original Populists were the ones who came up with the income tax,” Charles Postel, the author of “The Populist Vision,” said recently. “They were for the nationalization of everything. Their idea of a model institution was the Post Office.” Bryan believed that the “right to coin money and issue money is a function of the government,” and railed, most memorably, against the “cross of gold.” Yet few ideas stir the Tea Party faithful more than a fear of creeping nationalization and the dangers—both moral and practical—associated with printing money to suit momentary needs. The sponsors of Glenn Beck’s nightly history lessons on the depredations of American progressivism frequently include purveyors of gold.

Michael Moore takes advantage of little guy

2010-01-30T07:30:00.002-05:00

If you've read anything about Michael Moore, you know he doesn't practice what he preaches. He takes things out of context and chronology to make false points, he owned Halliburton stock while bashing the company, criticizes others for not hiring minorities when he does not do so himself, stays at the Ritz while taking interviews at a cheap hotel to make himself look like an average guy. (Go here for info on some of these details.)

And now he's taken HUGE tax breaks and reimbursements from the absolutely BROKE state of Michigan for his ridiculous film "Capitalism: A Love Story." Not everyone thinks this is okay. Read here:

Moore's acceptance of the Michigan film incentive subsidy is troubling because he has grown wealthy railing against corporations and capitalist institutions — such as Wall Street — for enriching themselves at the expense of the little guy and taxpayers.
In the trailer for "Capitalism: A Love Story," Moore shows up on Wall Street and says, "...we're here to get the money back for the American people..." This is in reference to the high-profile bailout of big banks (and other institutions) by the federal government. By accepting a state subsidy, Moore, who shows disdain for private, for-profit businesses raiding the pocketbooks of Americans, engages in this very practice himself.

Why are the Republicans not protesting?

2010-01-30T07:01:00.002-05:00

What the heck is going on here? Where are the Republicans demanding that Scott Brown be seated? Are the liberals going to get their horrendous health care bill through sleight of hand by not seating Brown immediately? This is abhorrent.

Massachusetts’ top election official says it could take weeks to certify the results of the upcoming U.S. Senate special election. That delay could let President Barack Obama preserve a key 60th vote for his health care overhaul even if the Republican who has vowed to kill it wins Democrat Edward M. Kennedy’s former seat.
Secretary of State William F. Galvin, citing state law, says city and town clerks must wait at least 10 days for absentee ballots to arrive before they certify the results of the Jan. 19 election. They then have five more days to file the returns with his office.

Funny haha

2010-01-30T06:44:00.001-05:00

From a blog article entitled: Talking down to the public will surely work....Wow...very insightful.

Whole issue make brain hurt. Good thing man with nice voice in charge. Him have right ideas. Just need to try new angle, that all. Talk slower. Talk louder. Use small words. Treat American people like kid who got held back in elementary school. That bound to work eventually.

Sacrifice

2010-01-30T06:18:00.002-05:00

Jim Hoft posted this and I couldn't get it out of my mind. I hate to be too petty about people's personal habits, particularly with regard to clothes and girly stuff, but this is really excessive. To be fair, I don't remember the press going crazy over Laura Bush's clothes, although there was quite a brouhaha about Nancy Reagan's wardrobe. But this is really remarkable, if you consider how MUCH money we are talking about with regard to clothing. For people who claim to be sacrificial public servants and who discourage private enterprise in favor of "service" to the public, this is pretty incredible:

Michelle Obama didn’t want to come off too glitzy at her hubby’s SOTU Address on Wednesday so she settled on an $1850 frock by Isaac Mizrahi.
Kristann reported:
First Lady Michelle Obama evinces no concern for the tens of millions of Americans suffering the consequences of her husband’s failing economic policies as she is once again seen flaunting her Imelda Marcos taste in ridiculously expensive designer clothers.
Women’s Wear Daily reported today that Michelle Obama wore a dress that retails for $1850 to the State of the Union address given by her husband, Barack Obama, on Wednesday night.

First whack the opposition, then ask why we all can't just get along

2010-01-30T06:15:00.001-05:00

Villainous Company has some interesting insight into The One's political tactics:

Listening to the Prez the other night, I couldn't help noticing that Obama always follows the same M.O.: begin by whacking away at the opposition and then plaintively ask why both sides can't bury the hatchet?
It occurred to me then that getting along with the opposing party isn't all that much different than getting along with the opposite sex. In both cases you're dealing with two parties who don't think alike, don't have the same priorities, needs or goals, and frequently misunderstand each other. The idea that comity between the sexes or between the parties is going to magically occur without a concerted effort is pretty laughable.

Collapse of Democratic party?

2010-01-30T05:29:00.002-05:00

Michael Barone, an astute political watcher, sees the collapse of the Democratic party. Of course, that doesn't mean the Republicans have their focus or determination either:

But more than health care legislation is in trouble. I have not seen a party's fortunes collapse so suddenly since Richard Nixon got caught up in the Watergate scandal and a president who carried 49 states was threatened with impeachment and removal from office.

Me, Me, MEEEEEE!!!!!!!

2010-01-29T06:05:00.001-05:00

Heh. As usual, Jonah Goldberg has it goin' on:

The White House insists that the new wave of populism created by Democratic governance is, in fact, the same populist wave that carried Obama to victory in 2008. In other words, Obama was elected president by the backlash against his own presidency.
This novel theory allows Obama to stick to his view that there's nothing wrong with his health-care plan, and anyone who feels differently hasn't heard or understood the president's explanations.
So, he not only implored Democrats not to "run for the hills" on the health-reform bill, but insisted that as "temperatures cool," hot-tempered opponents will, of course, realize they were wrong about the bill.

Laugh at him

2010-01-29T05:57:00.001-05:00

An interesting point from a reader over at NRO:

Obama hates being ridiculed.

At 48:45 on the cspan feed, Republicans laugh when he says the freeze will start next year. Obama pauses, clinches his jaw, and adds the off-script line "that's how budgeting works." Then Democrats laugh back at the Republicans and applaud.

If you saw the fox feed, it was on the tight shot when he said it. I remember being struck at how angry his face looked, much like it did after Joe Wilson's comment last year.

That's his greatest weakness. Republicans should just start laughing at him and making jokes.

Link around

2010-01-29T05:53:00.002-05:00

Lots of good stuff over at the Blog Prof, including the remarkable video of David Shuster screaming at Andrew Breitbart. What a jerk.

Not much interesting in the news today

2010-01-29T05:50:00.001-05:00

Except for more lies. Yeah, that's it. More lies. In the SOTU speech. Which some are calling the STFU speech. Just reporting the news.

Only ten? Maybe the Associated Press got as tired as everyone else listening to Barack Obama’s lengthy State of the Union speech last night and stopped paying attention after an hour. AP’s headline focuses on the “toothless commission” that Obama demanded, but the other nine fails on their fact-check test are just as interesting and revealing (via Geoff A):
President Barack Obama told Americans the bipartisan deficit commission he will appoint won’t just be “one of those Washington gimmicks.” Left unspoken in that assurance was the fact that the commission won’t have any teeth. …

Blue steel or Magnum?

2010-01-28T21:35:00.001-05:00

Obama approved ALL of 2009 spending

2010-01-28T21:28:00.003-05:00

Each time Obama complains that "he" was dealt such a difficult budget when he came into office, please remember that HE voted for it...all of it:

[O]n March 14, 2008, then Sen. Obama voted in favor of the 2009 budget which authorized $3.1 trillion in federal outlays along with a projected $400 billion deficit. The 51-44 vote that morning was strongly along party lines with only two Republicans saying "Yes."
When the final conference report was presented to the House on June 5, not one Republican voted for it.
This means the 2009 budget was almost exclusively approved by Democrats, with "Yeas" coming from current President then Sen. Obama, his current Vice President then Sen. Joe Biden, his current Chief of Staff then Rep. Rahm Emanuel, and his current Secretary of State then Sen. Hillary Clinton.

Obama's donors

2010-01-28T20:54:00.003-05:00

Along with The One's rank hypocrisy of his criticism last night of the Supreme Court decision while his campaign collected foreign cash, there is this new information that stimulus cash has gone to Obama donors. Why are we surprised? Go to Gateway Pundit:

Crony Capitalism: Donate to Democratic Candidate- Win $100 Million in Stimulus Cash & Box Seats at SOTU
Thursday, January 28, 2010, 5:27 PM
Jim Hoft
It’s Called Crony Capitalism.
Obama mentioned a company last night that actually had created jobs thanks to the (failed) democratic Stimulus bill.
“The plan that has made all of this possible, from the tax cuts to the jobs, is the Recovery Act. That’s right – the Recovery Act, also known as the stimulus bill. Economists on the left and the right say that this bill has helped save jobs and avert disaster. But you don’t have to take their word for it. Talk to the small business in Phoenix that will triple its work force because of the Recovery Act.”
Of course, like the bogus insurance fraud examples he shared at his last health care speech to Congress, there is more to this story, too.
The democrats gave $100 million to a company owned by prominent democratic donors who have created only 15 jobs so far with the stimulus money. And the company’s owner got to sit with Michelle Obama at the SOTU last night

WE can pay for KSM to be tried in NYC

2010-01-28T20:08:00.002-05:00

But we can't pay the health care, HEALTH CARE bills of the 9/11 responders. How just is that? Does that make sense?

The Obama administration stunned New York's delegation Thursday, dropping the bombshell news that it does not support funding the 9/11 health bill.
The state's two senators and 14 House members met withHealth and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebeliusjust hours before President Obama implored in his speech to the nation for Congress to come together and deliver a government that delivers on its promises to the American people.

Alito was not rude enough!

2010-01-28T17:18:00.002-05:00

What really bugs me about the incident with the Supreme Court insult that The One hurled is that he, HE, of all people, dares to criticize that decision when HIS OWN CAMPAIGN suspended verification of credit cards to his campaign so that people all over THE WORLD could donate to his winning the presidency...even Arab countries who could see him as an advantage to their cause. These aren't just lies...they are evil. Read over at Legal Insurrection:

Alito Was Not "Rude" Enough To His Arrogancy
The stupid meme of the day is that Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito was "rude" to Obama during the State of the Union address because Alito grimaced and mouthed the words "not true" when Obama stoked the crowd with a lie about a recent Supreme Court decision:
The AP headlines its article Alito disparages Obama's Supreme Court criticism, which is as clear a case of getting something ass backwards as there ever were.
Glenn Greenwald, the self-appointed guardian of free speech (with which he agrees), proclaims that Alito's conduct "was a serious and substantive breach of protocol that reflects very poorly on Alito and only further undermines the credibility of the Court."
Professor Adam Winkler of UCLA Law writes at HuffPo that Alito was Rude (but Right).

Another opinion on O'Keefe

2010-01-28T06:00:00.001-05:00

From Patterico:

Me, I don’t buy the Government theory. I think Good Lt. has a much better theory. Playing off of my posts’ focus on the allegedly jammed phone lines, Good Lt. spun out atheory that I think makes more sense than anything I have seen:
I am postulating that the group was trying to document (with video camera) that Landrieu’s office had either disconnected or re-routed the phones to deflect incoming calls – hence, why they couldn’t get through. There have been anecdotal reports that Landrieu’s office has received complaints that it has been inaccessible by phone, particularly around the time when she was bought off by the Democrats for the now-infamous Louisiana Purchase.
I have a related theory that strikes me as even more likely: they came in to “fix” the “jammed” phone lines — expecting to be received by countless staffers saying: “What problem? We haven’t had any jammed phone lines. What are you talking about?”

Is he for real?

2010-01-28T05:53:00.001-05:00

Have you seen this "eerie unchanging smile"?
Barack Obama's amazingly consistent smile from Eric Spiegelman on Vimeo.

Is Barack headed for a meltdown?

2010-01-28T05:50:00.002-05:00

The Anchoress has a roundup of links and commentary.

Barack Obama headed for some sort of meltdown? Is he clinging to his podium and teleprompters because he has lost his protective shields and does not trust himself without them? The starry-eyed adulation of the press has simmered down to a mere gaze of hopefulness and longing, accompanied by the barest of criticisms, and Obama translates that as the press being “against” him.

Controversy erupts over The One's disrespect of the Court

2010-01-28T05:45:00.000-05:00

Meeting SATURDAY

2010-01-28T05:18:00.001-05:00

Hear Marcy's competition:

CITIZENS' TOWN HALL MEETING
*******************************************
Purpose: to mobilize voters for the 2010 elections in local, state and national races

Saturday January 30, 2010

2:00 PM

Lyman Harbor Waterfront Banquet Hall/Restaurant
1615 First Street
Sandusky, OH 44870
(www.lymanharbor.com)

SPONSORS:
Perrysburg Patriots
We-by-For
The Children of Liberty
Back to Basics

SPEAKERS SCHEDULED FOR JANUARY 30 SANDUSKY TOWN HALL

1. Kurt Liston, listomansion@gmail.com, candidate for State Rep. Akron area.
2. Ken Matesz, scott.mcclure@lpo.org, and smcclure@midohio.twcbc.com, Libertarian Party candidate for governor.
3. Eric Deaton, info@deatonforsenate.com, Independent candidate for U.S. Senate.
4. Tom Ganley, ryan.mdickson@gmail.com, Republican candidate for U.S. Senate.
5. Jack Smith, jsmith831@sbcglobal.net, Republican candidate for U.S. House, 9^th District.
6. RichIott, rbiacs@aol.com, Independent candidate for U.S. House, 9^th District.
7. Dave Yost, yost4ohio@gmail.com, candidate for Ohio Attorney General.
8. Jeremy Swartz, Jeremy@swartzforsenate.com, Independent candidate for U.S. Senate.
9. Joseph M. Jaffee, josephmjaffe@yahoo.com, Libertarian candidate for U.S. House, 9^th District.

Conservative filmmaker update

2010-01-27T18:20:00.001-05:00

By now you've heard about the young conservative filmmaker who exposed ACORN and his encounter down in Landrieu's office. Well, apparently it's not quite as cut and dried as the reporters made it sound. Take a look at what Patterico is postulating:

When I first read a news story about this yesterday, it sounded to me like O’Keefe and company were being accused of an attempt to wiretap or bug Landrieu’s phones. Indeed, that’s the way I characterized the Government’s claim in my post based on a news story. But now I have had a chance to review the affidavit. And it doesn’t say that.
The link to the affidavit is here. I challenge you to find me the language that accuses O’Keefe et al. of a “plot to bug” Landrieu’s office, or an “alleged wiretap scheme.”
It isn’t there.
What you will see is an allegation that three of the four men entered the office pretending to be telephone company employees. O’Keefe was allegedly holding his cell phone as if to record the other two on video. You know, the kind of undercover recording thing that he does.
One witness allegedly saw one of the other two men “take the handset of the phone and manipulate it.” This is the main phone at the reception desk, presumably in full view of everyone. What does “manipulate” mean? I don’t know. Does it mean he simply picked the phone up? That would technically comport with one dictionary definition of “manipulate” — to “operate with . . . the hands.”

Stimulus 2 on its way?

2010-01-27T05:54:00.001-05:00

The One speaks

2010-01-27T05:47:00.001-05:00

And when he speaks, about anything--the economy, the war, taxes--his primary reference is to himself, as evidenced by this video, in which he mentions himself 132 times and taxpayers....twice. Here it is, if you can stand to watch the whole thing.

More teleprompters in small rooms...

2010-01-26T21:15:00.001-05:00

Cheer up

2010-01-26T21:12:00.000-05:00

We scored one for Brown. Next we'll beat health care.

Even Jon Stewart gets a dig in

2010-01-26T21:04:00.001-05:00

You HAVE to say the picture of Obama with the teleprompters and White House podium in the 6th grade classroom was a hilarious photo op...imagine if Bush did this. No, actually I can't.

Strickland on education in Ohio

2010-01-26T18:58:00.002-05:00

Well, today was the State of the State speech. The governor wants to emphasize that he LOVES Ohio. He also wants to claim that we are properly funding education in Ohio, even in towns like Perrysburg. Huh. He didn't address the $3 million cuts Perrysburg Schools face next year. He didn't address all the teachers who will lose their jobs next year, or the unfunded mandates that will require schools like Perrysburg to make drastic changes that will cost more dollars. Hm. Didn't do that, did he?

Next door in Indiana they are in the process of slashing 300 million dollars in state funds from their primary and secondary schools. In Georgia, school funding was cut by 440 million dollars. And at least twenty other states are inflicting serious cuts on their school systems.
But in Ohio, in Ohio, we are not going backward on our schools. Using a combination of state and federal resources, we increased school funding by 5.5 percent in the last budget.
I believe in Ohio because we recognize that a superior education starting from the earliest age is the only path to sustained prosperity.

Who is Ellie Light?

2010-01-26T18:55:00.001-05:00

More on the mystery...is it a she or a he? Cleveland Plain Dealer has been doing some investigating.

The Plain Dealer and others sought to find out real story. That led to a series of e-mail exchanges between The Plain Dealer and "Ellie Light," followed by phone calls Monday night and today to a number provided in the e-mails. She talked with a husky voice. And she eventually appeared to confess, reluctantly, that her real name is Barbara Brooks. She said she is a nurse who travels to hospitals across the country.

Edwards could have been president

2010-01-26T06:01:00.002-05:00

Even Richard Cohen is admitting the thought is horrifying. By now, you've all heard the absolutely horrendous stories about John Edwards, his behavior, his character, his utter faithlessness to both principles and his family. What is most shocking is that the press KNEW all this...and covered for him! Do you think they would have covered for a REPUBLICAN? Of course not. It makes one question what ELSE they know that they don't tell, simply out of partisanship and lack of love for the country. Spare us the handwringing, Mr. Cohen.

We have substituted the camera - fame, celebrity - for both achievement and the studied judgment of colleagues. The political machine, the organization, even the parties themselves are gone, severely atrophied or discredited as (ugh) mainstream. They once served as filters, admission committees, but they have been replaced by a sham familiarity - fame at its most beguiling and dangerous. This was John Edwards. He's not a scandal. He's a lesson.

A liberal says The One is dishonest??

2010-01-26T05:56:00.001-05:00

Wow. The world is falling apart. EVAN THOMAS, oh, he of the "Obama is God" remark:

The chance Obama missed, he really had a chance, a lot of people saying, ‘OK, you’re gonna change government.’ He was not fundamentally honest. What caught him up, I think, was his dishonesty. He didn’t level with the American people, ‘This is what government can do about jobs, here are the limits of what we can do, here’s what we can and what we can’t do, here’s what health care really is, here’s how Afghanistan really is.’ In none of those cases did he level with the American people about the true options and Americans, even those who are not politically engaged, smelled dishonesty and a rat and their reaction to it is to go to tea parties and, you know, vote for Brown and you know, just revolt.”

You're too dumb

2010-01-26T05:43:00.003-05:00

To know that the stimulus dollars were helpful to YOU, according to Time's Joe Klein. Never mind the millions of dollars spent on converting from analog to digital in Sylvania, the $30,000 spent on 25 laptops, the million dollars on Head Start in Toledo, thousands of dollars spent at MCO and UT on various projects of dubious value (go to stimuluswatch.org to view)...it was all for YOU, even though the government had to print the dollars to "spend" them because we are flat busted BROKE. Yeah, Joe Klein says you're a dumb you know what if you doubt any of this. This is because he is one of the anointed, the educated class, one to whom we should give deference.

Too Dumb to Thrive
Posted by JOE KLEIN Monday, January 25, 2010 at 11:30 am
179 Comments • Trackback (31)
Absolutely amazing poll results from CNN today about the $787 stimulus package: nearly three out of four Americans think the money has been wasted. On second thought, they may be right: it's been wasted on them. Indeed, the largest single item in the package--$288 billion--is tax relief for 95% of the American public. This money is that magical $60 to $80 per month you've been finding in your paycheck since last spring. Not a life changing amount, but helpful in paying the bills.CX1

More maneuvering

2010-01-25T21:25:00.001-05:00

They just can't let it go.

The new strategy is as politically risky as it is bold. There is widespread support for Obama's goals of expanding coverage to nearly all Americans while trying to slow costs. But polls show the public is deeply skeptical of the Democratic bills, and Republicans would certainly accuse Democrats of ignoring voters' wishes.
Obama initially voiced doubts last week that a comprehensive bill was still viable, but he now seems to be pushing for it. Asked Monday if the president was backing away from his pursuit of major changes, White House spokesman Robert Gibbs responded: "No."

More love for The One

2010-01-25T21:19:00.001-05:00

From VD Hansen over at NRO. Heh:

Since Obama is both inexperienced and apparently a stubborn ideologue, I think all we will be left with when the novelty wears off is rhetoric and euphemism. Obama will grow the deficit even larger and call it fiscal sobriety; he will push for higher taxes and suggest the entrepreneurial class is the same as the super-rich who "made out like bandits under Bush"; he will declare that his outreach to Chávez, Assad, Putin, and Ahmadinejad has been successful, even as those leaders incrementally and insidiously readjust their respective regional maps; he will borrow far more money than Bush did and copy his homeland-security protocols, while continuing to blame Bush for America's problems — hoping that $2 trillion of annual borrowing, along with a recovering world economy and the resilience of U.S. business, will bring a half-hearted recovery by November 2010.

Health care bill still not dead

2010-01-25T05:53:00.001-05:00

It doesn't matter to these people what we think, as voters and taxpayers. All yesterday they were spinning on the Sunday shows about how Massachusetts was really a MANDATE to pass health care. Don't believe it? Just watch some of the videos all over the web of Gibbs and Axelrod, et al. Then there's this:

Democratic staffers are telling Newsweek that though Pelosi is still “way short” of the 218 votes it would take to pass the Senate bill—with issues such as the Cadillac Tax and Cornhusker Kickback serving as sticking points—that equation could soon change. Democrats are “working the phones furiously to talk up the idea of the Senate promising to retroactively unravel several distasteful components.”

Astroturfing summarized by Patterico

2010-01-25T05:50:00.001-05:00

Here it is. Now we go to work, watching and recording.

Over the weekend, we discovered two types of Astroturfing:
Donald Trump Astroturfing: A letter published in multiple places from one person claiming to live in multiple cities
Ellie Light was the quintessential Donald Trump Astroturfer. In fact, her real estate holdings would put Trump to shame. She published the very same pro-Obama letter in 65 publications — including 31 states, and the District of Columbia. It also appeared in 3 national publications and a Yahoo link — and in 2 foreign publications, including a publication in Bangkok, Thailand.
And she claimed to live in almost all of these locations. Because that claim enhanced her ability to place her letters. So she claimed to live in Philadelphia, PA; and Daly City, California; and Mansfield, Ohio; and Waynesboro, Virginia; and Algoma, Wisconsin; and Bangor, Maine — and dozens of other places.

Remember!

2010-01-25T05:46:00.003-05:00

We have the power to change. Nebraskans are NOT forgetting how to influence the direction of this country. The elected plan on all of us "forgetting" by the time elections roll around. Not so anymore.

They call themselves the “Nebraskans Advisory Group” — a small band of citizens angry (yes, ANGRY!) about Nebraska Sen. Ben Nelson’s ridiculous Demcare cop-out/sell-out/attempted shameless do-over. Group founder Susan Smith e-mails that a dozen members stood out in the snow for their first “Rat Rally” last weekend.

Health care--it's not over yet

2010-01-24T21:17:00.001-05:00

Dick Morris has a flash:

Dick Morris: Pelosi and Reid Plot Secret Plan for Obamacare
Sunday, 24 Jan 2010 05:54 PMBy: Dick Morris and Eileen McGann
Highly informed sources on Capitol Hill have revealed to me details of the Democratic plan to sneak through Congress Obamacare, despite collapsing public approval for healthcare "reform" and disintegrating Congressional support in the wake of Republican Scott Brown's victory in Massachusetts.

President Obama, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, Senate leader Harry Reid have all agreed to the basic framework of the plan.

Ho ho ho! They're coming out of the woodwork!

2010-01-24T19:56:00.002-05:00

Well, it's a Sunday afternoon and maybe some of us didn't have much to do, but this is a HUGE story that is developing in the blogosphere. Scroll down to catch up, if you haven't been following. What it boils down to is that it has been discovered that numerous DOJ sock puppets have been posting positive, sometimes vicious letters to the editors of newspapers around the U.S. and this weekend, bloggers discovered one, then two, then three, then five....some of these letters are posted separately and some of them are posted TOGETHER in the same paper...REPEATEDLY around the country! These are taxpayer dollars funding attorneys at DOJ to do this! Go here to see:

Still More Astroturfing: Gloria Elle and Jan Chen Write the Same Anti-Republican, Pro-Obama Letter; UPDATED: Two More Pairings Found; UPDATED AGAIN: Four Pairings Total, and One Is a Triplet!
Filed under: General — Patterico @ 1:06 pm
Now that people are paying attention, the Astroturfers are coming out of the woodwork:
Jan Chen of Seattle writes to the Northwest Asian Weekly (a small Asian paper serving the Seattle area):
As one listens to the Republican anger over health care reform, one can imagine an anti-government protester cheerfully paying premiums on insurance policies that drop you after you make a claim, or happily sauntering out of an emergency room that denied them treatment because of a coverage problem. One can imagine a town hall sign-waver enthusiastically forking over most of their pay to bill collectors after suffering a catastrophic injury, thinking, “Wow, the free market system is great.”
Meanwhile, Gloria Elle writes to the Baltimore Chronicle — on the same page as Mark Spivey and Ellie Light:
As one listens to the Republican anger over health care reform, one can imagine an anti-government protester cheerfully paying premiums on insurance policies that cancel you for making a claim, or happily sauntering out of an emergency room that denied them treatment because of a coverage problem. One can imagine a town-hall sign-waver enthusiastically forking over most of their pay to bill collectors after suffering a catastrophic injury, thinking, “Wow, the free market system is great.”
Jan Chen and Gloria Elle certainly have a similar writing style, don’t they?

Mystery deepens

2010-01-24T19:07:00.005-05:00

In addition to Ellie Light, we now have Mark Spivey, who has written repeated letters on behalf of The One, in addition to living in numerous places around the country. In addition, suspicion has arisen as to the identity of Ellie Light:

Who is Mark Spivey? I know only this: that he is the author of this pro-Obama letter that has appeared in numerous publications:
A recent Associated Press article stated that President Barack Obama’s hesitancy on the Afghan war buildup implies weakness.
I wish world leaders had more of that kind of weakness. Clearly, Obama does not want to send soldiers into harm’s way without a clear goal, a solid plan and an exit strategy, three aspects sorely missing from former President George W. Bush’s military ventures.
I know that we Americans are used to presidents who play cowboy, who say things like “bring ’em on” and “mission accomplished” without a second thought; presidents who send Americans into battle on falsified weapons reports.

No rules!

2010-01-24T16:48:00.001-05:00

This editorial says it all

2010-01-24T14:37:00.002-05:00

Read over at the NY Post:

At the center is a young and talented celebrity whose worldview, we now know, is an incoherent jumble of poses and big-government instincts. His self-aggrandizing ambition exceeds his ability by so much that he is making a mess of everything he touches.
He never advances a practical idea. Every proposal overreaches and comes wrapped in ideology and a claim of moral superiority. He doesn't listen to anybody who doesn't agree with him.
After his first year on the job, America is sliding backwards, into grave danger at home and around the world. So much so that I now believe either of his rivals, Hillary Clinton or John McCain, would have made a better, more reliable and more trustworthy president.
They warned us he wasn't ready.

Story of the week or year?

2010-01-24T13:01:00.002-05:00

As previously noted, Ellie Light, which appears to be a pseudonym for numerous editorial comments around the nation, is being tracked by a number of eager bloggers around the country, at this moment. (Ain't the blogosphere wonderful?) Over at American Thinker, Clarice Feldman suggests some links between the DOJ and the president's initiative to establish some propaganda groups within DOJ (paid by your tax dollars) to plant letters around the country and suggest that The One's opposition is wrong, etc. Isn't this illegal? Isn't this wrong for attorneys to be paid by tax dollars to do this? Feldman links back to NRO in October:

Those of you wondering how DOJ uses your tax dollars to enforce our nation's laws might be interested to learn that Eric Holder has apparently hired former Democratic campaign bloggers to work at the department in what appears to be a secret propaganda unit. According to a story at The Muffled Oar website, the bloggers are housed in the Office of Public Affairs (the press office). Their job is to place "anonymous comments, or comments under pseudonyms, at newspaper websites with stories critical of the Department of Justice, Holder and President Obama." One of the bloggers is former DNC and John Edwards staffer Tracy Russo, whose name was featured prominently on the department's introduction of its new website on October 1.
At the same time that DOJ was refusing to answer questions about its outrageous dismissal of the voter-intimidation case against the New Black Panther Party and apparently paying government employees to post anonymous or pseudonymous comments or comments under false names attacking critics of the administration, the department declared that it was launching its new website "to increase openness and transparency in government." In fact, Russo claims it is "just the first step towards creating the most open, accessible, and transparent Justice Department possible." If that is true, how can DOJ justify these anonymous/pseudonymous postings? The misrepresentation is clearly material or DOJ wouldn't go to such lengths to engage in it.

Zuckerman strikes again

2010-01-24T12:43:00.002-05:00

This is hard to believe, but Mort Zuckerman billionaire left wing activist and publisher of the NY Daily News, has struck again. It's hard to tell what is an attempt to salvage the Obama presidency and what is sincere about being concerned about the US in general (I believe it's the latter). Here is the second article:

More worrying for the administration is that while Obama gets the approval of 76 percent of non-whites, his approval among whites is down to 41 percent, according to Gallup. This is a huge change that literally puts the Democratic control of Congress at risk. The Republicans have hardly been stellar either, but there is now a renewed openness in the country to hear what they have to say. Obama's political realignment of America is over. We no longer believe that he will "change the world" and "transform the country."

This brings to mind why an adviser to President Roosevelt in the 1930s, Bernard Baruch, told electors to vote for the person who promised them less. In this way, he said, "you would be less disappointed." There is still time for Obama to change and turn things around. But the first year is the critical year, one in which the public defines the president, and it has to be said that broad swaths of the country are deeply disappointed.

Obama's shocking speech on Friday in Ohio

2010-01-24T12:13:00.002-05:00

The speech by Obama on Friday was truly disgusting, self-pitying and narcissistic. In more ways than one, this speech was also consequential. Flopping Aces:

It’s shocking to see the President deliver what is essentially a partisan political address paid for entirely with taxpayer dollars. The old rules that Republican Administrations scrupulously followed (monitored by teams of lawyers) to avoid using such language outside of political campaigns where the speech was paid for by the party or candidate seem to have been tossed aside.
But does Obama really think the voters of Ohio, or the nation, will be so easily fooled by his rhetoric? This “buzz saw” wasn’t an army of lobbyists but an army of citizens who refused to swallow the snake oil Obama was selling. This “ugly process” was the result of Democrats trying to force this thing through with secret backroom deals. And Obama has the nerve to talk about upholding accountability?

More transparency (not!) coming from DOJ

2010-01-24T08:41:00.003-05:00

Remember the case of the New Black Panthers patrolling a voting place with a weapon, threatening voters? Even some early civil rights crusaders were shocked at this blatant attempt to discourage voting for an "opposition" candidate, protesting the behavior as unconstitutional and unAmerican. Oddly, you will recall that the DOJ dismissed the charges against the offenders after the offenders were found guilty and didn't even bother to show up to defend themselves. Now the DOJ is refusing to show their work in how they "resolved" these issues. More to come.

The complaint was dropped against the New Black Panther Party and two of its members, while the department sought a separate restraining order against the one party member who wielded a nightstick at the Philadelphia polling place in the November 2008 incident.
Questions about the dismissal have since spread to Congress with 14 Republicans on the House Judiciary Committee asking last week that Attorney General Eric. H. Holder Jr. be called to explain it. Their request was defeated in a party-line 15-14 vote

Wow...Mort Z goes ballistic on The One

2010-01-24T08:36:00.001-05:00

The emergence of open hate speech on the left

2010-01-24T07:55:00.004-05:00

Not just hate speech..lately left wing commentators and some so-called right wingers (No, we do not include Charles Johnson of LGF as a right winger) like David Brooks have felt free to step away from the smelly masses of tea partiers, using appalling language to describe patriots who are fighting for the future of their country AND the way our money is spent. The following is excellent commentary on this issue:

Naturally, it's tempting for politicians to fight dirty when they're not getting their way. The classic method is to depict one's opponents as fools or knaves.
We are used to such tactics in the halls of Congress, where officeholders of both parties deliberately and loudly misunderstand one another, and cast one another's views and votes in the worst possible light.

But we are not used to politicians pouring their bilious invective on ordinary citizens. And we do not like it. Since Joe the Plumber had the temerity to question then-candidate Obama, we have seen the reasonable objections of regular people turned into a kind of rhetorical weapon against them.

Health care to go to reconciliation

2010-01-24T07:11:00.002-05:00

According to Fox News this morning, health care is being worked on (just as we reported) this weekend to move on through reconciliation, which would require only 51 votes. There are many barriers to this, but when you are willing to override the will of the people and cheat to get what you want (permanent power is at the root of this), I guess anything's possible. More later. Are these people are enemies?

Letter writer/s post same letter around U.S.

2010-01-23T21:42:00.002-05:00

And guess what? That letter is about poor Barry, who can't quite control anything under his purview. So the person/s wrote and wrote and wrote...to 42 newspapers that have been tracked down. The same letter.

Ellie Light: Obama Astroturfer? Or Very, Very, Very Energetic But Independent Letter Writer? With Houses All Over the Nation?
Filed under: General — Patterico @ 1:52 am
A woman has written the same letter defending Obama to dozens of publications across the country, getting them published in at least 42 newspapers in 18 states, as well as Politico.com, the Washington Times, and USA Today. And the woman, Ellie Light, has claimed residence in many of these states.
Think there might be some phony Astroturfing there?
At the Cleveland Plain Dealer, Sabrina Eaton makes a nice catch:

Incompetence

2010-01-23T08:51:00.002-05:00

Some of us have been wondering about Barack Obama. Surely he has the gift of oratory; how hollow that rings now depends on how you perceive him; surely yesterday's pettiness in Elyria elucidated the problem. But, behind it all, we've always HOPED there was a certain degree of measurable COMPETENCE which would extend into his time in the presidency (reminder, BO-You're living in the White House...it's not your HOME). Some serious questions have arisen, indeed burst forth dramatically and explosively this week with the shift in Massachusetts from red to blue.

No one is audibly lamenting the retirement of George W. or throwing shoes at his successor's head because he speaks in sentences, but this president is bestriding the world as a flake, cow-towing to the Mikado, apologizing for President Truman's use of the atomic bomb, criticizing Roosevelt and Churchill's uninclusive approach to winning World War II, and Churchill and Eisenhower for disposing of the pajama-clad hysteric Mohammed Mossadegh as head of Iran.

The One's shameful Ohio performance

2010-01-23T08:29:00.003-05:00

Ugh. Who can stand to listen to what The One had to say yesterday in Ohio. Self-pitying, "wounded," it's not my fault rhetoric about how he will bravely put his face to the sun and fight, FIGHT, I SAY, for the little people. He's losin' it.

President Obama is on the campaign trail again in Ohio for yet another bottomless-spending “jobs bill.” He recycled his “I will fight for you” lines circa 2008, bashed the insurance companies (that have been meeting with his pal Tom Daschle and visiting the White House over the past year negotiating the best Demcare deals they can), and channeled Scott Brown-style populism — droppin’ his g’s as he talked ’bout the hard-workin’ people who drive the same kind of trucks he bashed Brown for driving last week.

Anniversary, II

2010-01-22T18:58:00.000-05:00

This handful of stories is representative of many more. In fact, with the exception of communism, we can think of few other movements from which so many activists have defected to the opposition. Nonetheless, the vast majority of clinic workers remain committed to the pro-choice cause. Perhaps some of those who stay behind are haunted by their work. Most, however, find a way to cope with the dissonance.

Venom from the left wing

2010-01-22T18:42:00.003-05:00

While it is true that right wingers can be abusive (watch a column at Free Republic through a few hundred posts and you'll see it happen), the MOST intolerant of people are those who brag of their TOLERANCE more than others. Witness the dying of Dennis Hopper:

The venomous personal attacks on Dennis Hopper that erupted on The Huffington Post after the cancer-stricken star filed for divorce from Victoria Duffy are said to be motivated by politics. "Arianna Huffington has indoctrinated Duffy, a naive former restaurant hostess, in her ultraliberal ideology," a family confidant tells Page Six. Huffington's site reported Hopper was mentally incompetent from cancer drugs and trying to impoverish his wife. A turning point in the marriage came when Hopper refused to join Duffy in hosting a fund-raiser for presidential candidate John Edwards. Hopper's first wife, Brooke Hayward, daughter of Hollywood's Leland Hayward and Margaret Sullavan, says, "The sinister, baseless and malicious allegations" about Hopper "are coming from the direction of rabid, left-wing would-be pundits who seem dismayed that his politics have become more conservative over the years."

Anniversary

2010-01-22T18:24:00.001-05:00

Social media revolution

2010-01-22T16:49:00.002-05:00

Though Buckeye Express was down for FOUR hours during the MOST important election in 50 years, there was a bright moment....and that moment was watching my iPhone as a Tweeter followed the election of Scott Brown with minute to minute updates on the % Brown needed to win each town the % he had achieved as each vote was recorded. This was remarkable. Indeed, it was apparent that Brown had won through this method about 2 hours before Fox News was willing to make a commitment in declaring the winner. In addition, during the second Bush election, Jay Cost (now posting at Real Clear Politics) had a system set up in which each county in particular states reported the returns, which were immediately tabulated by Cost on a national level. Thus, we knew that Bush had won some 24 hours before it came apparent to the rest of the population. Indeed, this method was more scientific and accurate than anything (exit polls?) the networks had previously used. What is a shame is that the mainstream media (MSM) no longer does real research or actually participates in the activity of following news. Instead, they go to various sources, often tainted, to get their news. Read here:

Social media has been important before, particularly in Obama's campaign, but the role of Twitter in this election was unique.

While Facebook and blogs were important to fundraising and messaging, Twitter is what allowed pro-Brown activists to stay in contact with each other, to feed each other news links, and generally to keep up each other's spirits at a time when the radar was showing that Brown had no chance.

I don't think it is an exaggeration to say that this was the first American Twitter revolution.

What a great week!

2010-01-22T05:48:00.001-05:00

Wow. We have some real candidates to run against Marcy, we won the seat in Mass., Air America goes under, health care is likely to remain between doctor and patient (at least until the next fight) and NOW THIS!!!!!! Can it get any better?

The nonbinding Copenhagen Accord was hastily cobbled together at President Barack Obama's insistence as the United Nations' Copenhagen climate change conference whimpered to its end in December. Under the Accord, countries are supposed to make their commitments to cut greenhouse gases official by January 31. It now appears that most countries will miss that deadline. As the New York Times reports:

Pants on the ground

2010-01-22T05:28:00.001-05:00

Here is a bit of interesting background on the General, who has taken America by storm:

"General" Larry Platt, whose original ditty "Pants on the Ground" cracked up everyone on "American Idol" Wednesday night, is not your standard "Idol" outtake (and not only because he's well over the cut-off age of 28).
Beaten by law officers during the 1965 "Bloody Sunday" march in Alabama, Mr. Platt was nicknamed "General" by Atlanta civil rights icon Hosea Williams for his heroic role in the civil rights era. (See a picture here. Platt is the young man on the left looking at the camera.) These days, Platt is going at it alone, protesting that too-stubborn urban fashion statement: pants worn low, crotch almost at the knees – a sign, to many, of disrespect and a thumb in the eye to many civil rights activists like Platt who fought to raise the profile of black Americans in US society.

THE END OF HOPE!!!!!!E@E@!@!@

2010-01-21T20:42:00.000-05:00

AHAHAHAHA!

US President Barack Obama suffered a painful defeat in Massachusetts on Tuesday. With mid-term elections looming, it means that Obama will have to fundamentally re-think his political course. German commentators say it is the end of hope.

Zuckerman horrified by The One's administration

2010-01-21T19:55:00.002-05:00

You HAVE to read this to believe it. They're falling apart:

Obama’s ability to connect with voters is what launched him. But what has surprised me is how he has failed to connect with the voters since he’s been in office. He’s had so much overexposure. You have to be selective. He was doing five Sunday shows. How many press conferences? And now people stop listening to him. The fact is he had 49.5 million listeners to first speech on the economy. On Medicare, he had 24 million. He’s lost his audience. He has not rallied public opinion. He has plunged in the polls more than any other political figure since we’ve been using polls. He’s done everything wrong. Well, not everything, but the major things.
I don’t consider it a triumph. I consider it a disaster.

Don't breathe easy on Obamacare yet

2010-01-21T19:04:00.003-05:00

There's a report that the sneaky you know what's are still scheming on Obamacare with the reconciliation process, which isn't appropriate or legal for the purpose they are planning. Read it here, just posted late tonight:

Rep. Paul Ryan (R., Wis.), the ranking member of the House Budget Committee, tellsNational Review Online that House Democrats are planning to use the budget-reconciliation process in order to pass Obamacare. “They’re meeting with each other this weekend to pursue it,” says Ryan. “I’ve spoken with many Democrats and the message is this: They’re not ready to give up. They’ve waited their entire adult lives for this moment and they aren’t ready to let 100,000 pesky votes in Massachusetts get in the way of fulfilling their destiny. They’ll look at every option and spend the next four or five days figuring it out.”

Man survives earthquake using iPhone

2010-01-21T18:27:00.001-05:00

I love my iPhone, but this is ridiculous!

The app even warned Woolley not to fall asleep if he felt he was going into shock, so he set his cellphone’s alarm clock to go off every 20 minutes. Sixty-five hours later, a French rescue team saved him.
“I just saw the walls rippling and just explosive sounds all around me,” said Woolley, recounting the earthquake to MSNBC. “It all happened incredibly fast. David yelled out, ‘It’s an earthquake,’ and we both lunged and everything turned dark.”

Air America dies

2010-01-21T17:35:00.002-05:00

Heh. Rush Limbaugh remade talk radio. He won't go on satellite radio in loyalty to his am affiliates (We'll see what the fairness doctrine does). NOBODY listened to talk radio before Rush, which makes him a target. Anybody who drives a lot is available to be persuaded by the likes of Rush and Hannity and WJR's deejays. That is why the administration would like to apply the so-called FAIRNESS DOCTRINE to impose local restrictions on who you can hear. Enter Air America, who thought they could compete with Rush, et al. Nuh uh. Air America, who could only be heard in certain places (limited run), was basically depressing and mean radio. Al Franken? Ugh. Mean guy. Stephanie what's her name? Ugh. Not only mean, but very, um, unintelligent. Today we get the news that Air America is dead. Sigh. So sad.

It is with the greatest regret, on behalf of our Board, that we must announce that Air America Media is ceasing its live programming operations as of this afternoon, and that the Company will file soon under Chapter 7 of the Bankruptcy Code to carry out an orderly winding-down of the business.
The very difficult economic environment has had a significant impact on Air America's business. This past year has seen a "perfect storm" in the media industry generally. National and local advertising revenues have fallen drastically, causing many media companies nationwide to fold or seek bankruptcy protection. From large to small, recent bankruptcies like Citadel Broadcasting and closures like that of the industry's long-time trade publication Radio and Records have signaled that these are very difficult and rapidly changing times.

Bias revealed

2010-01-21T16:12:00.002-05:00

Isn't it amazing how the biases of the press emerge when political situations turn desperate, such as the Brown election? The Blog Prof has the statistics on who actually covered WHAT and the election night speeches. You might have heard the nightmare that is Keith Olbermann, who broke into Brown's speech with ridicule:

From Johnny Dollar's Place via Instapundit: CNN, MSNBC Cut Republican Candidate's Mic!

During Tuesday night's coverage of the Massachusetts special election, CNN and MSNBC aired only a fraction of the Republican candidate's speech. Fox News Channel aired both candidates' speeches in their entirety.

Who's fair and balanced indeed!

When Martha Coakley (D) took the podium to concede the election, all three channels aired most or all of the eight-minute speech. However, Republican Scott Brown's address was cut short on CNN after just seven minutes. On MSNBC Keith Olbermann cut Brown's mic and instead attacked the Republican candidate, talked about "teabaggers", and ran commercials. CNN only ran 26% of Brown's speech, while MSNBC aired 37%. Fox News Channel carried 100% of both speeches:

MSNBC revealed

2010-01-21T15:52:00.002-05:00

This is a surprisingly even-handed look at the way Fox, CNN and MSNBC covered the Brown win on election night. This writer actually sees MSNBC for the pathetic vicious left wing shill that it has become. As much as people criticize Fox, and I can't say that I always appreciate Beck and Hannity (eg. Beck's ridicule of Brown's teasing his daughters on election night), Fox at least has a stable of both rabid and reasonable left wing commentators. Favorites (because they tend more toward the classic Democrat philosophy rather than vicious partisanship) include Kirsten Powers, Juan Williams, Alan Colmes and even Bob Beckel. Read the article here:

And on MSNBC, you got practically every conceivable expression of venom against Brown and anybody who voted him. From Maddow's dark suspicions that the election was rigged -- she cited complaints about a grand total of six ballots out of about 2.25 million cast -- to Olbermann's suggestion in the video up above that the same Massachusets voters who went for Barack Obama by a 62-28 percent margin had suddenly realized they helped elect a black guy and went Republican in repentance, the network's coverage was idiotic, one-sided and downright ugly.