News of the Week for May 4th, 2014
- Election 2014
- Obama Scandals
- Gun Rights
- Hide the Decline
- Obamacare
- War & Terror
- National News
- Economy & Taxes
- International News
- Opinion
Election 2014
Mike Lee’s Shadow Party
The Utah senator pushes his reform agenda for the GOP.
Eat Your Words, Debbie Wasserman Schultz
Obamacare’s backers are choking on their promises and running for the hills.
Straight talk about gay Republican congressional candidate Carl DeMaio
Let’s pretend you’re a screenwriter assigned to develop a character to run for Congress in California in 2014. You need a compelling story, so you make him an orphan at 13 – wait, even better his dad leaves the family two weeks before his mother died – and then social services splits up his brothers and sisters leaving him alone in the world.
Stunner: Illinois Governor Up For Re-Election Facing Criminal Probe
Also what’s know as business as usual in the corrupt state of Illinois. As Iowahawk notes, with two former governors already in prison they’re going for the trifecta.
Wisconsin Dem Gov candidate to hand out KKK hoods as publicity stunt
Dressing up as Confederate Soldier didn’t get State Rep. Brett Hulsey attention, so now he’s gone White Hood
Oh my: GOP challenger leads Dem incumbent Jeff Merkley — in Oregon
A mini-bombshell from the Daily Caller. The only poll of the race taken before this came at the start of April and had Monica Wehby trailing Jeff Merkley by 12 points. A month later, the Caller finds her up 40/39 among “active voters,” i.e. newly registered voters plus longtime registered voters who voted in one of the last two elections. What’s changed? Maybe nothing; with so few polls to go by, it could be that one of these is an outlier. Or, it could be that Wehby’s much-praised “Trust” ad that made the rounds a few weeks ago raised her name recognition enough to make her competitive with a weak incumbent.
Wayne County Clerk: John Conyers not qualified for Aug. 5 ballot
Congressman may have filed insufficient number of valid signatures to qualify for ballot
California’s very weird governor’s race
This year’s election for governor of the Golden State is just plain weird.
So what would the GOP do with the Senate if they got it?
There are precious few sure bets in American politics, but if Nate Silver starts giving you a 60% chance at something you generally pay attention. And that’s the odds Nate is laying out for the GOP to retake the Senate. But for a group of people who seem so entirely hell bent for leather on getting this done, we don’t really know what they plan to do with it if they get it. Over at Outside the Beltway, Doug shares some predictions from Michael Tomasky, who is not particularly optimistic.
Obama Scandals
It’s Come to This: State Department Nitwit Jen Psaki Now Tweeting Think Progress and Daily Kos Links
As it was reported tonight that John Kerry said Israel might become an apartheid state, the State Department is in furious spin mode.
A Doctor’s Declaration of Independence
It’s time to defy health-care mandates issued by bureaucrats not in the healing profession.
Judicial Watch Secures White House Email Stating That Primary Goal of Susan Rice Appearances Were to Establish That Benghazi Attack Was Due to “Internet Video” and Not “Failure of Policy”
Here’s that FOIA’d email. Judicial Watch published a press release noting this and other emails.
Anti-Koch FEC Official to Testify Before Congress
Ann Ravel falsely accused Kochs of campaign finance violations
DOJ’s “Operation Choke Point” Strips Porn Stars of Bank Accounts
Then they came for the Porn Stars
Boehner calls for select committee to investigate Benghazi
Speaker Boehner announced today that he will ask the House to vote to create a new select committee to investigate the September 11, 2012 terrorist attack in Benghazi. Here is Boehner’s announcement
Gun Rights
Orange County, CA residents have been applying for concealed carry permits in droves
The Ninth Circuit has a well-earned reputation as one of the most liberal courts in all the land, but in February, a three-judge panel struck down the part of California’s concealed-carry permitting law that requires applicants to submit a specific reason why they should be allowed to have a firearm upon their person in public. Most counties held back on loosening their permitting procedures while the decision goes through the appeals process, but a couple of counties dove right in with issuing permits to all law-abiding citizens. In Orange County, it took barely a month for more than 500 applications to roll in, and that evidently wasn’t just an initial rush but rather the beginning of a sustained pattern
Georgia Is Not the Jungle
No, E. J. Dionne, Georgia’s new gun laws will not condemn us to a Hobbesian nightmare.
Hide the Decline
Environment &
“Green Energy”
Obama administration finally allowing for a little exploratory fracking on public lands in Nevada
The Obama administration is quite partial to taking credit for the widespread economic benefits of the shale boom — brought on by the freshly deployed technology of hydraulic fracturing and horizontal drilling — despite the fact that the lion’s share of the production increase has happened on state and private lands while the federal government has deliberately slow-walked new drilling leases on the third of the surface area of the United States it controls (and let’s not even get started on the offshore drilling opportunities it has actively thwarted).
What Are Public Schools Teaching YOUR Kids About Fracking?
Propaganda. That’s what.
EPA Delayed Climate Change Regulation Until After Midterms
Inhofe: ‘Possibility of electioneering is deeply troubling’
Obamacare
Government in Healthcare
Another Obamacare problem: Not all the people in the operating room are going to be covered by your policy
The Marin Independent Journal is something of a joke as an investigative paper. People in Marin read it, not to get high-end analyses about news and policy, but, as is true for all small community newspapers, to find out what’s going on in their neighborhood. Sometimes, though, what’s going on in the neighborhood is a sufficiently important issue that it deserves to be broadcast widely.
Brother of CBS News President at Center of Latest Benghazi Bombshell
Missing from much of the coverage of yesterday’s revelations that Senior White House adviser Ben Rhodes coordinated an effort to obfuscate the truth behind the Sept 11 2012 terror attacks in Benghazi was a key detail about the insidious relationship between politics and media in Washington.
Obamacare’s doom
If the president wants to witness a refutation of his assertion that the survival of the Affordable Care Act is assured, come Thursday he should stroll the 13 blocks from his office to the nation’s second-most important court, the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals. There he can hear an argument involving yet another constitutional provision that evidently has escaped his notice. It is the origination clause, which says: “All bills for raising reveornue shall originate in the House of Representatives; but the Senate may propose or concur with amendments as on other bills.”
War & Terror
Sinn Fein leader Gerry Adams arrested over 1972 death of Belfast widow
Jean McConville was executed by Irish Republican Army for being a suspected spy
The Chinese Military Is a Paper Dragon
Corruption, bad neighbors, inflation and a demographic time bomb—these are just a few of Beijing’s woes
“People’s Republic Of Donetsk” Unveils Independence Referendum Set For May 11th
As we showed in the map earlier, the spread of pro-Russian-held cities is rapid across eastern Ukraine and it seems things are reaching a very dangerous head very quickly. As RIA reports, the Central Election Commission of the “Donetsk People’s Republic” has agreed to hold a referendum (covering 55 territorial election commissions, more than two thousand polling stations, and more than two million ballots) on May 11th. Citizens will answer one simple question, “Do you support the act of the proclamation of independence of the Donetsk State People’s Republic?” As RIA adds, leadership have stated that region of Donetsk will not vote in the May 25 presidential election in Ukraine if the majority of residents support independence.
How Ukraine and Russia are moving toward war
With Ukrainian troops launching a major assault on a rebel stronghold Friday, just a day after Russian President Vladimir Putin warned Kiev to withdraw its troops from the east and south of the country, it looks like the Ukraine crisis is entering a new stage.
National
Lawsuit! Another Student Ordered to Stop Handing Out Constitutions on Campus Files Suit in Hawaii
A student ordered by administrators to stop handing out copies of the U.S. Constitution at the University of Hawaii at Hilo has filed a lawsuit today in federal court. Merritt Burch is suing the University of Hawaii System for violating her First Amendment rights. She is joined as a plaintiff by fellow student Anthony Vizzone.
Missouri legislature will begin impeachment proceedings against governor
A Missouri state House committee will hold hearings Wednesday into three proposed articles of impeachment against Gov. Jay Nixon (D), whom some Republicans say has committed offenses worthy of being removed from office.
Dartmouth Greeks cancel fundraiser for cardiac care over concerns its fiesta theme was racist
Alpha Phi sorority and Phi Delta Alpha fraternity were to put on a “Phiesta” to fundraise for cardiac care.
Daniela Hernandez, a self-described “Mexican-born, United-States-raised” student, complained.
The event has now been canceled.
Media Matters For America, Champion Of Unions And Worker’s Rights Actively Opposing Its Workers Attempt To Unionize
There’s very little enjoyable in politics these days so there’s not telling how long this tasty morsel of schadenfreude will have to last. Enjoy it while you can.
Latino assemblyman: Asians not ‘people of color’
The increasing rift between Latino and Asian Democrats over Latinos’ newly revived interest in gutting Proposition 209 took a funny twist in the Sacramento Bee. So much for the Rainbow Coalition — it turns out that one lawmaker thinks Asian-Americans are no longer “of color
Former Congressman Bonior, longtime liberal on Capitol Hill, discovers the profit motive
David Bonior is a hungry entrepreneur bent on making money. David Bonior ? The former Michigan Democratic congressman, liberal pit bull, academic, antiwar firebrand and labor-union BFF has undergone an epiphany, making him simpatico with businesses and the profit motive.
ATTENTION VOTER ID OPPONENTS: 44,000 Additional Bogus Voters Discovered in Virginia
A crosscheck of voter rolls in Virginia and Maryland turned up 44,000 people registered in both states, a vote-integrity group reported Wednesday.
DOJ’s ‘Operation Choke Point’ May Be Root of Porn Star Bank Account Closings
Despite being in good financial standing, adult film performers and others in the porn industry have had bank accounts abruptly terminated—and the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) may have had something to do with it.
Consumer Finance Protection Bureau: Hotbed of Discrimination?
The Consumer Finance Protection Bureau (CFPB) is the newest agency in D.C. and it’s extremely powerful. In concert with the Department of Justice, it pursues financial institutions using the disparate-impact theory of discrimination. The great benefit of disparate-impact theory, at least to the regulators, is that no disparate treatment need be shown. If a company has a facially neutral policy or criteria that nonetheless has a disparate impact on minorities, the government claims that the company is discriminating on the basis of race.
Senate Dems plan vote amending the First Amendment to curtail criticism
Think of the big issues facing the American public. We now routinely borrow about 40 cents on the dollar for our federal budget, our entitlement programs are heading for a fiscal collapse in the hundreds of trillions of dollars, and our economy has stagnated through nearly five years of Democratic-run economic policy in the “recovery.” What do Senate Democrats plan to do about this? Make it harder for us to complain about it
Taxpayer-Supported Latino Caucus Closes Door on Latino, Because He’s a Republican
California’s Latino Legislative Caucus is operated with state government funding, and has an official website that is paid for by California taxpayers. The Caucus does not identify itself as a partisan organization beholden to either Democrats or Republicans. Its legislative activities are also managed by legislature employees. So it’s far more than a club. Taxpayers pay for it.
When Men Are Raped
A new study reveals that men are often the victims of sexual assault, and women are often the perpetrators.
NJ Democrat Caught on Tape, Fears Her Town May Become a “F—ing N—–town”
Clearly all of America must condemn yet another racist Democrat. What is wrong with these people?
John Kerry, under fire
Name one high-profile issue that’s going well right now for Secretary of State John Kerry.
HS Students Say Pledge In Arabic: ‘One Nation Under Allah’
The principal at Rocky Mountain High School in Fort Collins, Colorado, is facing a hailstorm of criticism from some very angry parents and residents. The school recites the Pledge of Allegiance weekly, on Mondays. Last Monday, a member of their “Cultural Arms Club” led the student body in an Arabic version of the pledge, replacing the words “under God” with “under Allah.”
SEIU membership, revenues plummet after state ends ‘underhanded scheme’
A Michigan branch of the powerful Service Employees International Union saw its membership and revenues plummet after the reversal of a measure that forced caregivers tending to friends or relatives to be members with their dues paid by those they cared for.
Circuit Court Overturns Immunity For Law Enforcement Officials Who Sent An Innocent Man To Prison For 22 Years
An innocent man, who had 22 years of his life taken away by deceitful police officers and prosecutors, has just received a gift from the Third Circuit Court of Appeals, which has stripped the defendants of their immunity. Everything about the case is appalling — from the murders themselves to the behavior of law enforcement.
How Cosmos Does Religious History Badly
Advance publicity for the FOX and National Geographic series Cosmos ran so hot that the ratings were bound to disappoint. After all, this is a science documentary stuck in the same time slot as Masterpiece Classic, The Good Wife, Duck Dynasty and River Monsters.
Pennsylvania Supreme Court: Cops no longer need a warrant to search citizens’ vehicles
Pennsylvania police officers no longer need a warrant to search a citizen’s vehicle, according to a recent state Supreme Court opinion.
Young Catholics Not Welcome at the University of Notre Dame
Young volunteers with Tradition Family Property Student Action were ordered to “cease and desist” promoting traditional marriage at the University of Notre Dame on Friday, April 25.
Video Game Company Fires Worker for Tweet Defending Privacy, Free Speech in Sterling Case
Turtle Rock Studios, a California video game company that has produced such titles as Evolve and Left 4 Dead, has fired one of its employees for tweeting that Los Angeles Clippers owner Donald Sterling possesses privacy and free speech rights.
The NBA’s Slippery Sterling Slope: Haters Target Christian Owner
Loquacious Dallas Mavericks owner Mark Cuban, perhaps having visions of Robespierre on the guillotine, started the week warning of a “very slippery slope” should the NBA take Donald Sterling’s Los Angeles Clippers away from him.
Security Tight at Secretive Democracy Alliance Meeting
Billionaires and millionaires rub elbows behind closed doors with Democratic pols and progressive foundations
Spy Plane Fries Air Traffic Control Computers, Shuts Down LAX
A relic from the Cold War appears to have triggered a software glitch at a major air traffic control center in California Wednesday that led to delays and cancellations of hundreds of flights across the country, sources familiar with the incident told NBC News.
“College campuses essentially operate on mob rule at this point”
Condoleeza Rice withdraws as Commencement speaker at Rutgers after protests (Update — Does this mean Hillary should be banned too?)
California Aims to Ditch ‘Man and Woman’ Language in Family Code
SB 1306, a bill that would remove language from the state Family Code defining marriage as between “man and woman” and replace it with gender-neutral language, cleared the state Senate on Thursday.
Economy & Taxes
Senate blocks federal minimum wage bill
A bill to increase the federal minimum wage stalled Wednesday in the Senate, in the latest setback for Democrats pushing a set of election-year economic bills.
The heavy hand of the IRS seizes innocent Americans’ assets
The civil forfeiture law — if something so devoid of due process can be dignified as law — is an incentive for perverse behavior: Predatory government agencies get to pocket the proceeds from property they seize from Americans without even charging them with, let alone convicting them of, crimes. Criminals are treated better than this because they lose the fruits of their criminality only after being convicted.
International
UK Cops Arrest Man for Quoting Winston Churchill
The leader of an anti-immigration pressure group has been arrested for quoting Winston Churchill. Paul Weston, chairman of LibertyGB, was taken into custody in Winchester, southern England, after delivering a speech in which he quoted an excerpt from the wartime Prime Minister’s book The River War.
Kerry Warns Israel Could Become ‘An Apartheid State’
The secretary of state said that if Israel doesn’t make peace soon, it could become ‘an apartheid state,’ like the old South Africa. Jewish leaders are fuming over the comparison.
The UK in the Balance
The colorful Nigel Farage and his UKIP are getting most of the attention as the insurgent party of the populist right in the UK these days, but another fringe party, Liberty GB, is making some headlines. Apparently party leader Paul Weston was arrested recently for reading in public Winston Churchill’s infamous description of Islam from the unabridged edition of The River War.
Subway removes ham and bacon from nearly 200 stores and offers halal meat only after ‘strong demand’ from Muslims
Almost 200 branches of Subway have cut ham and bacon from their menus, serving halal meat in response to calls from their Muslim customers.
Criminalizing Speech in the UK?
In my post over the weekend about the arrest of Paul Weston over in the UK for reading Churchill’s infamous passage about Islam from The River War, I wondered whether Weston might have been arrested for violating some kind of hateful “hate speech” law or perhaps on the narrower charge of violating the UK equivalent of a “time, place, and manner” restriction. It ominously appears it was the former
Masked gunmen tighten grip on eastern Ukraine
Masked gunmen in military fatigues took control of a government building in another Ukrainian town on Wednesday, as pro-Russian separatists tightened their grip on a swathe of the country’s industrial east largely unopposed by police.
Woman marries DOG in ‘romantic’ wedding ceremony – after marriage to man didn’t work out
British divorcee Amanda Rodgers wed her dog Sheba after falling in love with the pooch and reckons – if you like it then you better put a lead on it
Deadly car bomb rocks Nigerian capital
The Nigerian capital of Abuja was rocked by what appeared to be a car bomb on Thursday, killing at least 12 people and injuring dozens as it detonated near the same site of last month’s explosion which left over 70 dead.
Brand New Smallpox-Related Virus Emerges In Country Of Georgia
Scientists have identified new cases of a never-before-seen smallpox-related virus in the country of Georgia, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention researchers reported this week.
Nigerian militants Boko Haram holding more than 200 kidnapped school girls
Nigerian police say Boko Haram militants are holding 223 girls of the 276 seized from their school in the country’s north east, revising upwards the number of youngsters abducted.
Spooning for success: Over 95% of straight male college athletes admit to cuddling their teammates in bed
Researchers found that 97.5% of heterosexual, male British college athletes have shared a bed with another
Small study interviewed 40 male athletes on their sleeping arrangements
Opinion
Joining the New Elite: A How-to Guide (Part 2)
In Part 1 of this series, we addressed the topic of where the aspiring member of the New Elite should go to college. College is only eight or nine years of a Humanities major’s life, though, and after graduation he or she must consider where to move in order to join this new caste. Clearly a minor in Global Peace Studies will be completely wasted back in Peoria, so Blackmailers Don’t Shoot is here with a guide on where the New Elite live.
Rights vs. Principles
Those who live the politicized life want us to treat freedom of speech as something to be tolerated legally and worked around socially rather than a fundamental belief. This isn’t to say every fringe belief should be indulged—9/11 was not an inside job; blacks were not better off as chattel—but on issues where there is legitimate debate and a sizable portion of the populace on either side of the argument? Maybe you should think twice before you try to destroy someone’s livelihood. As a society we’re better off not waging perpetual war against everyone with whom we disagree.
How to overthrow the (union) government
Last week, a group of teacher union members seized control of the Wicomico County Education Association (WCEA) in Maryland without a vote or any authority except the signatures on a petition they created. It was a bizarre event, unique in the annals of National Education Association history, as far as I know. There are many instances of national or state unions establishing trusteeships over rogue locals, and employing tactics similar to those used in Wicomico to gain control. But in those cases, the parent unions had the cloak of union by-laws and affiliate agreements to justify their actions. In Wicomico, the actions of the “interim managers” are entirely extra-constitutional.
Herbert Marcuse’s Revenge
Herbert Marcuse, a man who managed somehow to reconcile revolutionary romanticism and opposition to all that exists with the cushy lifestyle of the high-profile academic, once enthused the spoiled brats of the whole Western world with his turgid prose, Teutonic pedantry, vacuous utopian abstractions, and destructive paradoxes. All that endures of his work, I suspect, is a familiar two-word phrase: repressive tolerance.
‘Microclimates of Totalitarianism’
Politics don’t belong in science fiction: Column
A writer shouldn’t be punished for his political beliefs.
Janet Napolitano Accidentally Admits Universities Don’t Need Affirmative Action
Janet Napolitano, now head of the University of California system, is not happy with the constraints — set out by the voters of California and recently upheld by the Supreme Court — she must face in discriminating among student applicants on the basis of their skin color and what country their ancestors came from. Her Washington Post op-ed over the weekend is illogical and dishonest in predictable ways – mischaracterizing the state’s ban on racial preferences; ignoring the costs of such discrimination and overstating the benefits; etc. — but she grudgingly admits that the “educational benefits” of “diversity” can be achieved without racial discrimination.
On surviving a witchhunt
I was asked to have a look at this question on Roosh’s forum, as it is something that more and more people are likely to face in the near future
Voters Affirmed
The people, not the courts, have the final say on race-based admissions programs at public universities.
The Donald Sterling Precedent
I hope you will read this op-ed by Kareem Abdul-Jabbar. He’s absolutely right. Donald Sterling is a terrible person. But we have known that for a long time.
Donald Sterling Is a Vile Racist
But even a horrible human being doesn’t deserve to have his property stripped away.
8 Things That Won’t Get You Banned by the NBA
With the lifetime ban by the NBA of despicably racist Los Angeles Clippers owner Donald Sterling, the door is wide open to further sports bans on people who say offensive things in private.
The Left-Liberal Narrative
Liberals see most of our ills resulting from our straying from the righteous path set forth for us by leaders like FDR and LBJ. Their impassioned narrative has deep roots in American society.
Carelessness or Candor?
The “apartheid” slur has a long history.
Demonizing the Helpers
Charter schools provoke the ire of those who have failed students up to now.
Brutally Honest Things I (and other men) Truly Think About “Feminism.”
The following is the God’s-honest truth from the perspective of an imperfect man who was taught chivalry, respect, and love for women. Opinions are solely his and the hundreds of other imperfect men he’s spoken to about this subject in one way or another.
Dark Money Dilemma
Liberals decry ‘dark money’ in politics despite left’s reliance on the same
The End of Affirmative Action
A problematic concept in an age of intermarriage, assimilation, and immigration
The Shrinking Private Sphere
Condemn Donald Sterling, but don’t applaud the means of his exposure.
Joining the New Elite: A How-to Guide (Part 3)
So you’ve graduated from college and hopefully moved to Manhattan. That’s all well and good, but you can’t be a member of the New Elite while working at Starbucks (it’s far too useful,) and sharing that 200 square foot luxury studio apartment with two roommates is becoming kind of a drag.
The economics of political correctness
Over the past few years, spiked online magazine has consistently and robustly defended the principle of free speech against the censorship demands of the politically correct, whatever quarter they may come from. It is great, of course, that there is at least one magazine in which the phrase ‘I believe in free speech’ is unlikely to be followed by a ‘but…’, and more likely to be followed by an ‘even for…’. But while I fully support the spiked line, I also think the spiked authors sometimes misinterpret the intentions of the ‘PC brigade’, and would like to offer an alternative interpretation rooted in boring, old-fashioned textbook economics.
Why Liberals Don’t Care About Consequences
No amount of evidence will convince liberals that they were wrong. Evidence abounds, to be sure: Appeasement invites aggression. Handouts increase dependency. Coddling terror-states like Iran elicits megalomania. Big government stifles the economy. They don’t care. Really.=
The Right Wrestles with the Inequality Debate
The bitter rivalry between “establishment” and “Tea Party” Republicans in many southern states today reflects the bitter divisions within the white South that date back to the political battles between the low country plantation owners and the poor white farmers of old Dixie.
Why Liberals Think Conservatives Are Racist
The sighs of relief from the left are almost audible. Racism lives! The hate is out there!
Bad Donald Sterling facts make it bad for privacy
If thought police is what we need, why should we have to rely on the whims of disgruntled mistresses to protect society?
Same-sex marriage: coercion dolled up as civil rights
Stop treating Brendan Eich as a one-off – gay marriage is inherently illiberal.
Student Groups at Duke Appoint Themselves Word Police
Aren’t the students of Duke University lucky to have a small group of colleagues who have decided which words you can and can’t say on campus?
Inequality isn’t a problem: it’s a driver of progress
Is there a genuine “issue of inequality”? I say no. There are (or at least may be) genuine issues of poverty, market and regulatory failure in the financial sector, or how best to raise taxes to fund public services. Very often discussions of “inequality” are either disguised discussions of one of these things or else inequality is seen a symptom of problems elsewhere (e.g. bonuses in the banking sector seen as a symptom of poor regulatory risk management oversight).
Terry McAuliffe, would-be dictator of Virginia.
Having discovered that it’s much harder to convince somebody of something when you can’t buy them off, Terry McAuliffe is now thinking of ignoring this pesky ‘democracy’ thing entirely
