Obama, fascist

Like an iceberg beginning to surface, the lawless activities of the IRS-OFA are becoming more and more obvious every day. Conservatives, Jews, Hispanics, Catholics, and Pro-Life groups in general appear to have been harassed, intimidated and humiliated.

As a reward for this criminal behavior, former head of the IRS' tax-exempt division now leads the agency's ObamaCare enforcement arm.

MSNBC, of all places, revealed this morning that the IRS covered up its unlawful activities prior to the election:


The IRS commissioner "has known for at least a year that this was going on," said Myers, "and that this had happened. And did he share any of that information with the White House? But even more importantly, Congress is going to ask him, why did you mislead us for an entire year? Members of Congress were saying conservatives are being targeted. What's going on here? The IRS denied it. Then when -- after these officials are briefed by the IG that this is going on, they don't disclose it. In fact, the commissioner sent a letter to Congress in September on this subject and did not reveal this. Imagine if we -- if you can -- what would have happened if this fact came out in September 2012, in the middle of a presidential election? The terrain would have looked very different."

And contrary to the president's standard assertion ("I only found out about this yesterday on the news"), Obama's Chief of Staff was aware of the IRS investigation last year:

Treasury Secretary Jack Lew said today that he was aware in the fall of 2012 of the Treasury inspector general probe of the IRS targeting of conservative groups, but he claims he did not know the details of the investigation... Even if ... he was not aware of details, It’s not clear why Lew, as White House chief of staff, did not seek more information about such a potentially explosive matter as the IRS singling out the president’s opponents for special scrutiny.

Additional reports say that the IRS asked Tea Party groups for access to their websites:

The Obama IRS demanded that several Tea Party groups provide back-end access to their websites... And, from reliable sources: This happened to several Tea Party groups! The source has this in writing. It states they wanted access to everything the members had access to, which would be chats, email, contact information, etc...

There would be only one reason to request back-end access to a Tea Party group's website: to intimidate it from expressing it First Amendment rights to free speech.

And it gets better: the IRS is said to have asked pro-life group about "the content of their prayers":

During a House Ways and Means Committee hearing today, Rep. Aaron Schock, R-Ill., grilled outgoing IRS commissioner Steven Miller about the IRS targeting a pro-life group in Iowa.

"Their question, specifically asked from the IRS to the Coalition for Life of Iowa: ‘Please detail the content of the members of your organization’s prayers,’" Schock declared.

This is fascism, flat out. I am not exaggerating. This is fascism.


Source

Speech codes

The Justice Department put its contempt for the First Amendment on full display with its snooping on journalists at The Associated Press. It's a display of contempt for freedom of the press equaled only by the administration's disdain for freedom of speech, another of the essential First Amendment protections. The military has lately demonstrated a similar contempt for freedom of religious expression.

The Justice Department is making common cause with the Department of Education to renew the push for "speech codes" on campus. The sordid scheme was revealed in a letter of May 9 to President Royce Engstrom at the University of Montana, where the federal government proposes to limit free expression as a "blueprint for colleges and universities throughout the country."

Colleges were once the place where young men and women could explore new ideas and learn a thing or two that might be useful. No longer. When the fad for political correctness came down on us in the 1980s and '90s, administrators quickly surrendered to bullies, and stringent speech codes were adopted to "protect" students from words deemed to be insensitive, discriminatory or hateful. Some of these codes have been struck down as unconstitutional, but many remain.

Columbia University prohibits "belittling remarks" about "gender," and no "inappropriate sexual innuendoes or humor." The New Jersey Institute of Technology requires student groups to "have the content of their advertisements approved" before a simple flier or poster can be put up in the campus center. More advanced houses of learning have since realized that freedom of thought and expression takes precedence over whining and have eliminated these unconstitutional blights.

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Arizona's immigration law

The immigration debate in Arizona reached a boiling point in 2007 when the state passed a groundbreaking law targeting those often blamed with fueling the nation's border woes: Employers who hire immigrants living in the U.S. illegally.

The law marked a bold step by a state into an area that had long been the domain of the federal government, and it paved the way for Arizona's landmark 2010 immigration law. It also represented a key moment in the immigration battles that continue today as Congress mulls a proposed overhaul of the immigration system.

But an examination of the law by The Associated Press found that it has done little to crack down on problematic employers. Only three of the state's 147,000 employers have been brought to civil court on illegal hiring allegations, while several hundred employees who are living in the U.S. illegally have been arrested under a section of the law that made it a felony to use fake or stolen IDs to get jobs.

While the law has been upheld by the U.S. Supreme Court and hailed as a tool for states to confront illegal immigration, it has faced several problems:

— Hundreds of immigrant workers arrested under the law have spent months in jail on ID theft charges, while only two businesses — a sandwich shop and now-defunct amusement park — had their business licenses suspended for several days. The case against the third business, a custom furniture maker, is still pending.

— A high legal standard for proving violations by businesses and a lack of subpoena power in getting employment records are almost insurmountable barriers to making cases against employers.

— Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio's office is the only police agency in the state that has raided businesses in enforcement of the employment law. It has arrested hundreds of workers in 72 business raids since 2008. The office has since been accused by the U.S. Justice Department of discriminating against Latino workers, allegations the sheriff denies.

— Despite the small number of cases against employers, the county prosecutor's office in metropolitan Phoenix has spent $4.5 million since 2008 investigating businesses suspected of hiring workers who aren't in the country legally and to pursue criminal ID theft cases against employees. Nearly a third of the money — $1.4 million — was given by the prosecutor's office to Arpaio's agency to investigate such cases.

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Same to you, fella

Rig count

In case you were wondering whether there was really an oil Renaissance happening in Texas, the state has 838 drilling rigs – about 47 percent of all U.S. rigs and 26 percent of drilling rigs worldwide.

The Texas rigs are mostly operating in five fields across the state, according to the latest Baker Hughes Rig Count.

The Permian Basin in West Texas has 397 rigs, the Eagle Ford in South Texas has 234, the Granite Wash in the Panhandle has 44, the Barnett Shale in North Texas has 31 and the Haynesville Shale in East Texas has 19.

Eagle Ford: Chesapeake thinks it has 342 million barrels.

Our neighbors continue to see an enormous amount of oil and gas activity as well. Oklahoma has 190 drilling rigs, Louisiana has 106, New Mexico has 77 and Arkansas has 15 rigs, according to Baker Hughes.

Source

A nation of laws?

U.S. Senators John McCain (R-Ariz.) and Carl Levin (D-Mich.), Ranking Member and Chairman of the U.S. Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations, today released the following new information about the February 2013 release of ICE detainees with criminal records:

In February 2013, in a misguided effort to comply with anticipated budget cuts due in part to sequestration, without explanation or warning, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officials released from custody 2,226 detainees into communities across the country. In response to requests for information by the Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations (PSI), the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), after a three month delay and under threat of a possible subpoena, finally disclosed details about those releases. DHS disclosed that, as part of the larger release, it freed 622 detainees with criminal records, including 32 with multiple felony convictions.

Among the 32 detainees, for example, ICE’s Phoenix District Office released a detainee who had a felony second degree robbery prior conviction and countless convictions for prostitution and solicitation for lewd conduct. The Phoenix office releases also included an individual who had been convicted of an extreme case of driving under the influence (DUI) and harassment, as well as having caused criminal damage to property, as well as a detainee who had prior convictions for carrying a loaded firearm, DUI with a controlled substance, felony possession of drugs, second degree burglary, vandalism, and trespassing. The San Francisco Field Office released someone with a prior felony conviction to manufacture fake identifications as well as a man with two DUIs and two stalking convictions, the last one as recent as 2012. The Houston office deemed a person convicted of felony possession of marijuana of up to 2,000 pounds acceptable for release.

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Utopian Universalism

The family of the accused Boston Bombers entered the U.S. claiming "asylum." Like so many other "refugees," the Tsarnaevs immediately went on welfare, and then flew back and forth to Russia for visits. How could they be escaping a life-and-death situation if they were returning to their home country for extended stays?

This is one small incident in a giant scam called Refugee Resettlement which is run by the State Department and originated in the Refugee Resettlement Act of 1980. The federal program has settled tens of thousands of Somalis, Nigerians, and Muslims in small towns in Minnesota, Vermont, Tennessee and elsewhere, which of course destroys those communities forever. After decades many of these refugees remain on welfare, suspicious and resentful and dedicated to building in America the same failed culture they supposedly left behind. In this assault on our civilization, the U.S. taxpayer has had no vote, but he must, of course, pay the costs in terms of welfare, terrorism, endless expanded security.

One group that is making out nicely are the federal contractors aligned with the Catholic Church, Lutherans, and Hebrew Immigrant Services who all make big money at this scam. This has nothing to do with real religion and everything to do with their demonic new faux religion, Utopian Universalism.

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Because they could

The most striking characteristic emerging from accounts of the IRS audits of the administration’s political enemies is the sheer, unbridled malevolence of them. It was, like a friend told me over dinner, as if we had suddenly awoken "in the middle of the third Obama term" to find everything that could never happen, all that was said to be impossible — indeed unthinkable — suddenly upon us. I ate another mouthful of pizza before realizing that, in fact, the events now being decried had happened in his first term.

The IRS inquisitors even demanded printouts of Facebook pages, the minutes of meeting back to whenever, a detailed description of every statement, political or otherwise, under penalty of perjury.
Some of the letters asked for copies of the groups’ Web pages, blog posts and social media postings — making some tea party members worry they’d be punished for their tweets or Facebook comments by their followers…. And each letter had a stern warning about "penalties of perjury" — which became intimidating for groups that were being asked about future activities, like future donations or endorsements.
Moreover, there was a kind of capriciousness about the pattern of inquisition that defied rational explanation. One Catholic professor — an eminent but hardly a household name — was audited in 2010 by the IRS, which demanded to know what her politics were.

Someone at the IRS was even passing the content of conservative application forms to liberal NGOs.

It sounded like people were running wild, doing what they wanted because they could.

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Democrats should be ashamed, but aren't

In May 2011, Drew Ryun, a conservative activist and former Republican National Committee staffer, began filling out the Internal Revenue Service application to achieve nonprofit status for a new conservative watchdog group.

He submitted the paperwork to the IRS in July 2011 for a research site called Media Trackers, which calls itself a "non-partisan investigative watchdog dedicated to promoting accountability in the media and government." Although the site has investigated Republicans like Ohio Gov. John Kasich and Florida Gov. Rick Scott, the site's organizers are unapologetically conservative.

"One thing we don't hide is: 'Yeah, we're conservative—free-market, free-enterprise, full-spectrum conservative,'" Ryun told Mother Jones magazine last year.

Eight months passed without word from the agency about the group's application, Ryun said. In February 2012, Ryun's attorney contacted the IRS to ask if it needed more information to secure its nonprofit status as a 501(c)3 organization. According to Ryun, the IRS told him that the application was being processed by the agency's office in Cincinnati, Ohio—the same one currently facing scrutiny for targeting conservative groups—and to check back in two months.

As directed, Ryun followed up with the IRS in April 2012, and was told that Media Trackers' application was still under review.

When September 2012 arrived with still no word from the IRS, Ryun determined that Media Trackers would likely never obtain standalone nonprofit status, and he tried a new approach: He applied for permanent nonprofit status for a separate group called Greenhouse Solutions, a pre-existing organization that was reaching the end of its determination period.

The IRS approved Greenhouse Solutions' request for permanent nonprofit status in three weeks.

Source

Cristero War

The Cristero War (1926–29) also known as La Cristiada, was a mass popular uprising and attempted counter-revolution against the anti-Catholicism of the ruling Mexican government. Based in western Mexico, the rebellion was set off by the enforcement of the Mexican Constitution of 1917 by former Mexican President and atheist Plutarco Elias Calles, in order to persecute the Roman Catholic Church and its sub-organizations.

The Mexican Revolution was the largest rebellion in Mexican history. It was based on the peasants' overwhelming demand for land and for social justice. The Catholic Church was cautious to not support the revolution, which at times threatened the property rights of many Mexicans. However, the Calles' administration felt its revolutionary reforms, such as those against private property and Catholic schools, were threatened by the Church. As a solution to the Church's influence over the Mexican populace, the anti-clerical statutes of the Constitution were instituted, and beginning a 10-year persecution of Catholics, resulting in the death of thousands.

After a period of peaceful resistance by Mexican citizens, a number of skirmishes took place in 1926; violent rebellions began in 1927. The rebels called themselves Cristeros, invoking the name of Jesus Christ under the title of "Cristo Rey" or Christ the King. The rebellion is known for the women who assisted the rebels in smuggling guns and ammunition and for certain priests who were tortured and murdered in public and later canonized by Pope Paul II. The rebellion eventually ended by diplomatic means brokered by the United States Ambassador to Mexico, Dwight Whitney Morrow, with the financial relief and assistance by the Knights of Columbus.

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Jon Stewart is pissed

Jon Stewart hasn’t had much good to say about Ted Cruz since the conservative Texan joined the Senate in January.

The Comedy Central "Daily Show" host often ridicules Cruz as a far-right wind bag, sometimes with bleeps hiding his unexpurgated disdain.

But television’s most popular liberal and the Senate’s most outspoken conservative share a common cause when it comes to one thing: unrelenting criticism of the Internal Revenue Service for targeting conservative and Tea Party groups for heightened scrutiny. (Should we say "enhanced interrogation"?)

"So unlike much of the Benghazi inquiry, this seems like a genuine scandal," Stewart said on his Monday show.

In a five-minute riff on the IRS scandal, Stewart even played a tape of Cruz warning of government overreach if gun background checks were expanded.

But instead of ridiculing Cruz — as he is wont to do — Stewart noted that the IRS scandal now gives Cruz and his conservative allies the political high ground against the federal government.

The IRS political retaliation, Stewart said, badly damages President Obama because it "removed the last arrow in your pro-governance quiver: skepticism about your opponents."

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IRS getting more powerful

The Internal Revenue Service scandal would be bad enough if the IRS just handled issues like collecting income taxes and granting nonprofit status. But the immensely powerful federal agency is about to become even more powerful with the arrival of national health care, and that makes the still-unfolding scandal even more troubling.

"When I hold town meetings, a great deal of distrust comes through about the size and increasing power of government," says Republican Sen. Charles Grassley of Iowa. "The IRS targeting crystallizes that distrust in a very big way because of the IRS' reach into taxpayer information. What's happened heightens fears about how the IRS will handle taxpayer information and wield its power when it enforces Obamacare starting next year."

The IRS is critical to Obamacare. The structure created by the Affordable Care Act requires the government to know about both the health care coverage (or lack of it) and the financial resources of every American. The IRS, which already knows the latter, was the only agency with the reach to do the job.

A look at the text of the health care law reveals that much of it consists of amending the Internal Revenue Code to give the IRS more power. When Obamacare goes fully into effect in January, every American will have to prove to the IRS that he or she has "qualifying" health coverage, meaning coverage with a list of features approved by Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius. That will be done by submitting a document to the IRS, something like a W-2, to confirm coverage.

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Eating insects

Eating more insects could help fight world hunger, according to a new UN report.

The report by the UN Food and Agriculture Organization says that eating insects could help boost nutrition and reduce pollution.

It notes than over 2 billion people worldwide already supplement their diet with insects.

However it admits that "consumer disgust" remains a large barrier in many Western countries.

Wasps, beetles and other insects are currently "underutilised" as food for people and livestock, the report says. Insect farming is "one of the many ways to address food and feed security".

"Insects are everywhere and they reproduce quickly, and they have high growth and feed conversion rates and a low environmental footprint," according to the report.

Nutritional value

The authors point out that insects are nutritious, with high protein, fat and mineral content.

They are "particularly important as a food supplement for undernourished children".

Insects are also "extremely efficient" in converting feed into edible meat. Crickets, for example, need 12 times less feed than cattle to produce the same amount of protein, according to the report.

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How to be Invisible

Book Review...

This a book about how to hide from people who want to find you, such as ex’s, disgruntled associates, opportunistic lawyers, private investigators, stalkers, the press, etc. Hiding means obscuring your identity. It is not about hiding from governments, because as Luna observes, "privacy" is a matter of economics; anyone can be found using enough money, which is what governments have. Luna classifies the 4 levels of obscurity one can achieve by assigning them 4 levels of money paid to find you. Level 1 is hundreds of dollars, Level 2 thousands, and Level 3 tens to hundreds of thousands. Level 4 is the government. The more it costs to find you, the harder you have to work to remain hidden.

This book reveals the many tricks one can do to hide your location, your assets, your identity, while still paying your taxes. Most of these tricks are legal, or at least in the gray zone of "not outright illegal." (For instance, by supplying true but irrelevant facts, rather than stating something false.) There are many legitimate reasons for not wanting to be found by someone (spousal abuse, escaping revenge, identity theft, etc.) but I think the overriding one that motivates this book is the fear of having assets seized in a frivolous "deep pocket" law suit.

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Street violence

Some of reactions to the FBI’s announcement that the New Orleans Mother's Day shooting was "a flare-up of street violence" as seen on Twitter are quite interesting.
Is this so they don’t have to say ‘gun violence?'

Wish the FBI wouldn’t use "street violence" as a synonym for "it’s just black people"

It’s terrorism when white folks are shot in mass and "street violence" when it’s mostly black folks.

FBI: New Orleans shooting street violence = Obama Voters Shooting it out over Drugs they SELL to other Obama Voters!

So the shootings in New Orleans are classed as "street violence" and not terrorism. The suspects aren’t Muslim…go figure.
So take your pick. How is this going to be framed? Partisan politics, gun control, racism, anti-Islamic bigotry, pro-Islamic bigotry, class warfare, the Zombie Apocalypse? Take your pick because nobody just dies any more. Every death, each effusion of blood on the sidewalk lately has been a narrative waiting to happen. And if we don’t know which narrative it is that is because it is still being worked out.

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Benghazi, and other tall tales

The hearing on Benghazi has made one thing abundantly clear. The Democratic Party will do whatever it takes to bury the Benghazi consulate attack issue. The chief defense against the accusations raised is that there’s nothing to see in that ‘long ago’ event which is not simply partisan and political in nature. Everything from filibusters, administrative delays, backhanded intimidation — the works — has been thrown into the defense. And defenders of the administration will point out that these are merely the same tactics Republicans have used in the budget and gun regulation debates and are simply being paid back in their own coin. Story

John Locke wrote in his 2nd Treatise on Government...."Whenever the legislators endeavor to take away and destroy the property of the people, or to reduce them to slavery under arbitrary power, they put themselves into a state of war with the people, who are thereupon absolved from any further obedience and are left to the common refuge, which God hath provided for all men, against force and violence."

Most confusing headline of the year....Pope to nuns, don't be old maids.

Mother Forced To Pay Spousal Support To Man Who Raped Daughter. Story

A black Columbia University football player has been charged with a hate crime against an Asian student.

Funny and timely cartoon here.

The Internal Revenue Service apologized Friday to conservative political groups for giving their tax documents extra scrutiny — validating the worst fears of Republican activists who have long accused the Obama administration of politicizing the process. Roughly 75 groups were singled out using words like "tea party" or "patriot" in tax documents, Lois Lerner, who is responsible for overseeing tax-exempt groups, said on a hastily arranged conference call Friday afternoon. Story 

Two of the Via Rail terror suspects allegedly contemplated poisoning the air or water before settling on the plot to target a passenger train, according to newly released U.S. court documents. The fresh details came to light Thursday as American authorities revealed an FBI sting operation scooped up a third man in connection to the foiled plot to derail a train between Toronto and New York. Story

According to voter registration records, Ariel Castro, the Cleveland kidnapper, is a registered Democrat. He was also the alleged leader among the three Castro brothers, who were arrested this week, and the owner of the house at 2207 Seymour Ave., where the three abducted local women had been kept in captivity for over a decade. Why is this important? Whenever a crime or a scandal captures national attention, the pattern in the mainstream media is to either identify the culprit as a Republican or hold silence -- in which case we can rest assured that the culprit is a Democrat. Source

Between 1993 and 2007, the number of full-time administrators per 100 students at America’s leading universities grew by 39 percent, while the number of employees engaged in teaching, research or service only grew by 18 percent. Inflation-adjusted spending on administration per student increased by 61 percent during the same period, while instructional spending per student rose 39 percent. Arizona State University, for example, increased the number of administrators per 100 students by 94 percent during this period while actually reducing the number of employees engaged in instruction, research and service by 2 percent. Nearly half of all full-time employees at Arizona State University are administrators. Story

"IRS admits it targeted conservatives." The director of the IRS should resign immediately. But I'll bet nothing will come of it.

Northwestern University continued to stumble over diversity issues this week as Mexican students voiced disagreement with a campuswide letter that advised students not to celebrate Cinco de Mayo by engaging in racially-offensive activities, such as eating tacos and drinking tequila. Story

Days after Hitler’s suicide a group of American soldiers, French prisoners, and, yes, German soldiers defended an Austrian castle against an SS division—the only time Germans and Allies fought together in World War II. Andrew Roberts on a story so wild that it has to be made into a movie. Story

The U.S. Department of Education recently announced that it will no longer use the terms "mother" and "father" when collecting information about a student's legal parents when those parents apply for federal student aid. Instead of using the words "mother" and "father," the new Free Application for Federal Student Aid form (FAFSA) will use "Parent 1" and "Parent 2." Story

A key Benghazi whistle-blower who has allegedly been punished for speaking out against the administration is a registered Democrat who voted for both Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama. Story

The federal government spent more than $2 billion to provide food stamps to Puerto Rico in 2012, up to 25 percent of which is untraceable because it is distributed in cash and there is "no way to verify that funds are spent on food," according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA). Story

You knew the mainstream media was biased, but this is incredible. It was revealed today that CBS News President David Rhodes' brother is Obama Deputy National Security Advisor Ben Rhodes, who was instrumental in rewriting the Benghazi talking points. But it gets worse. It is now learned that ABC President Ben Sherwood's sister, Dr. Elizabeth Sherwood-Randall, is a Special Assistant to Barack Obama on national security affairs. But even this isn't it! CNN's deputy bureau chief, Virginia Moseley, is the wife of Tom Nides, who until February was Hillary Clinton's deputy. Story

Seen in the Los Angeles Times....Article 2 of the impeachment bill against Richard Nixon included the following, which PASSED the House Judiciary Committee (before he resigned): "He has, acting personally and through his subordinates and agents, endeavoured to obtain from the Internal Revenue Service, in violation of the constitutional rights of citizens, confidential information contained in income tax returns for purposes not authorized by law, and to cause, in violation of the constitutional rights of citizens, income tax audits or other income tax investigations to be intitiated or conducted in a discriminatory manner."

Once upon a time, police were there to protect people like parents, children, the elderly, and pregnant ladies. But the lines are being drawn and great effort is being undertaken to create a new breed of villains for the "authorities" to fight – and those villains are us. Story

The government decides to try to increase the middle class by subsidizing things that middle class people have: If middle-class people go to college and own homes, then surely if more people go to college and own homes, we’ll have more middle-class people. But homeownership and college aren’t causes of middle-class status, they’re markers for possessing the kinds of traits — self-discipline, the ability to defer gratification, etc. — that let you enter, and stay, in the middle class. Subsidizing the markers doesn’t produce the traits; if anything, it undermines them. Source

Senator Chris Murphy (D-CT) is exposing his ignorance of American history for all to see. On MSNBC, he recently called laws passed in Alabama and Kansas that sought to prevent enforcement of any new federal gun control laws "laughable." (Other states are preparing to pass similar laws.) While there are certainly legitimate questions as to how far states may go in this area, there is nothing laughable about the concept of state nullification: it is a fundamental part of U.S. history and constitutional law. Story

Rush Limbaugh says it's time to rename our president Barack Milhous Obama.

A man from Saudi Arabia was arrested after arriving at the Detroit airport with a pressure cooker in his baggage. Jeez.

For the naysayers who maintained that Tesla Motors wasn’t going to make it, with the Model S too expensive to be successful, here is a fact worth reflecting on: in the first quarter, Tesla outsold comparable cars from BMW, Mercedes-Benz, and Audi. Story

False complaints of sexual abuse in the military are rising at a faster rate than overall reports of sexual assault, a trend that could harm combat readiness, analysts say. Story

Things Conservatives Have Been Proven Right About Lately: ☑ Benghazi; ☑ Pigford;☑ Obamacare; ☑ IRS. Next up: The immigration reform scam. Source  (and I would add Fast & Furious too)

No answers forthcoming

Family members of the fallen SEAL Team Six members shot down in Afghanistan in 2011 said members of Congress and top military brass have ignored their concerns about the circumstances surrounding their sons’ deaths at a press conference at the National Press Club on Thursday.

The families of Aaron Vaughn, Michael Strange, and Patrick Hamburger claim they were misled during the investigation and believe that flawed U.S. military "rules of engagement" policy contributed to the downing of a Chinook helicopter by the Taliban in Wardak province. All 38 people on board the Chinook, which included 15 SEAL Team Six members and seven Afghan National Army commandos, were killed.

The families also alleged the U.S. military allowed an imam to pray their sons’ "souls into eternal fire" at a ceremony at Bagram Air Base.

Billy Vaughn, father of Aaron Vaughn, said he contacted numerous members of Congress to ask for help with his inquiries about the attack. He said he received no response from House Speaker John Boehner (R., Ohio) or Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D., Nev.).

"Sen. Carl Levin (D., Mich.), chairman of the [Armed Services Committee] in the Senate, I called him. I called him numerous times. Told him who I was, who my son was, what had happened. They told me to ‘stop harassing the senator,’" said Vaughn. "Thank you, Sen. Levin."

Levin’s office did not respond to requests for comment.

More here

Targeting the Tea Party

On Monday morning, ABC News reported that "The targeting of conservatives by the IRS started earlier and was more extensive than the IRS acknowledged last week. …" Accompanying its story, ABC has posted a draft IRS inspector general report. Below, I’ve collected a list of the factors in applications for tax-exempt status that the IRS determined were red flags that warranted closer scrutiny between 2010 and 2012:
» "Tea Party"

» "Patriots"

» "9/12″

» "We the People"

» "Take Back the Country"

» "Political action type organizations involved in limiting/expanding government, educating on the constitution and bill of rights, social economic reform/movement"

» "Issues include Government spending, Government debt, or taxes"

» Education via advocacy/lobbying to "make America a better place to live."

» "Criticiz(ing) how the country is being run."
Source

From Russia with love and welfare

In Massachusetts, where last year the Governor vetoed efforts to prohibit food stamps being used for pornography, piercings, tattoos, guns, manicures, etc, they’re now trying to discover whether the Tsarnaev brothers used them to pay for the Boston Marathon bombing:
A mountain of new welfare records shows numerous EBT card cash withdrawals made by the Tsarnaev family, but so far there is no information about how terrorist Tamerlan Tsarnaev and others may have spent the money.

The EBT receipts were handed over by the state to the House Post Audit and Oversight Committee as part of its probe into the Russian family’s $100,000-plus taxpayer-financed life in the Bay State. The committee met yesterday behind closed doors to review Medicaid and welfare awards…

The purchases show specific stores, but not the items bought. But further details could be available to investigators.
I began my book America Alone with an Arnold Toynbee quote: "Civilizations die from suicide, not murder." Paying Islamic terrorists to blow you up is more like assisted suicide. Cheaper than going to a Swiss clinic, although somewhat bloodier.

Source

Lawyers in love

One lawyer billed his client for the time they spent having sex. Another harbored a fugitive and lied to law enforcement, while a third raided a family trust she was paid to administer.

Twenty Minnesota attorneys have been disbarred, suspended, publicly reprimanded or placed on probation so far this year. So many lawyers have been disciplined by the Minnesota Supreme Court that the total for 2013 is likely to surpass last year’s 38 actions and could overtake the record of 55 lawyers sanctioned in 1990.

Last week, Minneapolis attorney Peter Nickitas was handed a 30-day suspension for a conflict of interest and intimidating an opposing lawyer, saying he hoped she’d "sleep with the fishes," according to the state’s petition for discipline. Last month, Bemidji attorney Amber Ahola received a public reprimand and two years’ probation for briefly housing a client who absconded from a treatment program, then lying to the deputy who came looking for him.

In March, William J. Morris Jr. of Minneapolis was disbarred following his conviction for 12 felony counts for an online education scam that netted $3.5 million. Two months before that, attorney Thomas P. Lowe of Eagan was suspended for a minimum of 15 months for having a sexual relationship with a client he was representing in a divorce case, and including the time spent during their trysts in his billable hours.

The numbers are not likely to indicate a sustained rise in bad behavior among Minnesota’s 28,000 lawyers — about 25,000 of whom are actively licensed, said Martin Cole, director of the state’s Office of Lawyers Professional Responsibility. The board investigates complaints against lawyers and, if warranted, files petitions and recommendations for disciplinary action.

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War on men

There is no War on Women, there is a war on men that began back in the 70's and stories like the following are very common nowadays....

Talk show TV makes millions off the catch phrase, you are not the Daddy!

However, the reality in Memphis is just because you’re not the father, doesnt mean you won’t have to pay.

Edward Bowdery told us, "I was down there in handcuffs and chains."

Over the years Bowdery had his drivers license stripped and once even found himself in handcuffs over child support payments for a child that’s not his, "I would hate to see somebody else go through the same thing. I’ve been going through this, headaches."

A mound of paperwork shows a juvenile court judge ordered him to pay child support even before the birth.

"I didn’t do a voluntary acknowledgement. I didn’t sign the birth certificate. All I know is we legitimated the child in your name," said Bowdery.

Bowdery asked several judges during several hearings for a DNA test, but no judge ordered one.

"I said how did I ever get put on child support and I never said this was my child and again this is not what we’re here for," said Bowdery.

In 2009 he took the child himself to get a DNA test and found the son he supported for years was not biologically his.

He took the documentation to court.

The judge wouldn’t accept it, but ordered a DNA test done that showed the same results.

The probability of paternity was zero percent.

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Obama in Texas

President Barack Obama came to Texas on Thursday to tout the economic recovery and pressure Congress, saying, "Terrific things are going on in communities all across America," but you wouldn’t know it from Washington obstruction.

Traveling to the heart of a state that bounced back quicker than many after the deep recession, Obama said the government has a role in fostering policies to encourage innovation, improve education and help assure middle-class jobs and opportunity.

But, he said, "if you listen to all the doom and gloom in Washington, the politics, watching cable TV, you think nothing’s going right. But the truth is there are a lot of reasons to be optimistic about where we’re heading as a country after the tough times we’ve been through after the last several years."

Obama was greeted by a half-page ad in the Austin newspaper from Gov. Rick Perry that tweaked the president, saying the lesson he should take from Texas is that economic success is the product of low taxes, light regulation and protecting businesses from lawsuits.

By coming to Texas, Obama sought to highlight that the economy is improving under his tenure. He also depicted his Republican critics, including Ted Cruz, the state’s junior senator, as the face of the Washington opposition, amid signs that his legislative agenda may be stalling early in his second term.

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Influence peddling

Obama influence peddlers are evidently at it again. This time, a very curious and potentially threatening decision to approve a deal that puts China in control of drilling interests in the Gulf of Mexico and puts cash in the pockets of Obama campaign donors and bundlers.

On February 14, 2013, Judicial Watch filed a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) lawsuit against the U.S. Department of the Treasury to obtain records relating to the Obama administration’s approval of the acquisition of the Canadian energy company Nexen Inc. by the Chinese government-owned Chinese National Offshore Oil Corporation (CNOOC).

This acquisition will allow CNOOC access to drilling in northern Canada and the Gulf of Mexico, but that is not all. The deal will also provide a windfall of financial returns to major Obama campaign contributors.

On November 13, 2012, Judicial Watch sent the FOIA request to the Obama Treasury Department. By a letter dated November 16, 2012, Treasury acknowledged receipt of the Judicial Watch FOIA. Though required by law to respond within 20 days, to date, Treasury has not done so and we are now in court to compel a response. The Judicial Watch FOIA lawsuit was filed in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia on February 14, 2013.

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Benghazi

At least five major bombshell revelations emerged yesterday during the House Oversight Committee’s hearing on the September 11, 2012 terrorist attack in Benghazi, Libya:

1. According to the deputy chief of mission in Libya, a four-man commando team in Tripoli was denied permission to go to Benghazi and help those under siege. The administration’s response that there wasn’t enough time is ludicrous given no one knew how long the attacks would last.

2. Mark Thompson testified that the FEST anti-terrorist team wasn’t sent in because conditions on the ground were too dangerous. Yet this is exactly what FEST is designed for, and the FEST team wanted to go in.

3. It is now established beyond any doubt that instantly the State Department knew this was a terrorist attack. Why did the administration lie, calling this a video issue, and who gave that order?

4. Gregory Hicks, the number two diplomat in Libya, says he was demoted after complaining about the false story being put out by Washington. This is denied by the State Department, which says no one was punished.

5. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton stated months ago that she was taking full responsibility. She announced an Accountability Review Board (ARB) to investigate this. We now know she was never interviewed. Why?

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Malcolm X grandson killed in Mexico

Malcolm Shabazz, grandson of political activist Malcolm X, died in Mexico City after a violent dispute in a bar, Mexican authorities said Friday. He was 28.

City prosecutors are investigating the attack that sent Shabazz to a nearby hospital where he died Thursday of blunt-force trauma injuries. United States officials confirmed that Shabazz was killed in Mexico City.

Much like his grandfather, Shabazz spent his youth in and out of trouble. At 12, he set a fire in his grandmother's apartment, a blaze that resulted in the death of Malcolm X's widow. After four years in juvenile detention, Shabazz was later sent back to prison on attempted robbery and assault charges.

In recent years, the first male heir of Malcolm X seemed to seek redemption, saying he was writing a memoir and traveling around the world speaking out against youth violence. Before his trip to Mexico, he reached out to a group of Mexican construction workers in the U.S. and then visited in Mexico with a leader who had been deported.

Malcolm X, who inspired books and the 1992 Hollywood movie named after him, was shot to death as he delivered a speech in a Harlem ballroom in 1965. Shabazz's mother was only 4 at the time.

The Shabazz family said in a statement they were saddened to hear of the death of Malcolm X's grandson.

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