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Tuesday, April 30, 2013

Democrats “Nervous,” “Concerned” About “Complex,” Confusing, “Train Wreck” ObamaCare

By Susan Duclos

This Speaker.gov post should be shown everywhere, hammered home and relentlessly expanded on in campaigns against every single Democratic senator that voted for Obamacare and is on the ballot for the 2014 midterms.

All 14 of them.

Jeanne Shaheen (D-NH)
Tom Harkin (D-IA)
Mark Begich (D-AK)
Mark Pryor (D-AR)
Mark Udall (D-CO)
Richard Durbin (D-IL)
Mary Landrieu (D-LA)
Al Franken (D-Minn)
Tom Udall (D-NM)
Kay Hagan (D-NC)
Jeff Merkley (D-OR)
Jack Reed (D-RI)
Tim Johnson (D-SD)
 Mark Warner (D-VA)

Via Speaker.gov: "Welcome to the Club"

The Democrats who stitched together ObamaCare and shoved it into law are starting to admit, one-by-one, the whole thing is a mess – “complex,” “confusing,” and heading for a “huge train wreck”:
  • “NERVOUS”: The New York Times says Democrats are “getting nervous that they could pay a political price if the rollout of the law was messy or if premiums went up significantly.”
  • “CONCERNED”: Rep. Lloyd Doggett (D-TX) admitted in Politico, “I’m concerned — because we did take substantial criticism for putting this plan in place — that it achieve its true purpose.”
  • “COMPLEX”: Sen. Jay Rockefeller (D-WV) – “one of the main architects of Obamacare” – says the law has to be implemented right the first time or “it will just simply get worse,” per National Review. It’s “probably the most complex piece of legislation ever passed,” Rockefeller said.
  • “CONFUSION”: “‘I think there is a lot of confusion,’ Rep. Diana DeGette of Colorado, a chief deputy whip for House Democrats and a vocal supporter of the law,” said to Politico.
  • “TRAIN WRECK”: Sen. Max Baucus (D-MT), a “top Democrat who helped write President Barack Obama’s health care law … fears it is headed for a ‘huge train wreck,’” reported AP.
  • “NO IDEA WHAT TO DO”: “We are hearing from a lot of small businesses in New Hampshire that do not know how to comply with the law,” said Sen. Jeanne Shaheen (D-NH). Sen. Baucus similarly said, “Small businesses have no idea what to do, what to expect,” reported The Hill.
  • “THIRD-WORLD EXPERIENCE”: Forbes quoted Henry Chao from the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services saying, “I’m pretty nervous—I don’t know about you.” The administration official worried aloud about preventing ObamaCare from becoming a “third-world experience.”
Democrats are right to be worried about the law not achieving what they promised. For one, a recent survey of small businesses found “71% say the law makes it harder for them to hire more employees.”

It’s also driving up costs – 77 of small business owners “say the health care law will make coverage for their employees more expensive.” The Energy & Commerce committee found “Americans earning as little as $25,000 will still pay more.” For “young adults, the premium spike will be even more painful.”

Then there are low-income and minority seniors who could see their benefits (or entire plans) stripped away. “Even the people who wrote the law don't believe” that “if you like the insurance you have, you'll be able to keep it,” notes the Wall Street Journal. That’s why, going back to 2009, the “Democrats who passed ObamaCare tried repeatedly to exempt themselves or their key aides.”

And of course, there’s all of the new spending, higher taxes, and additional debt that will be racked up under the health care law.

Yep, sounds like a train wreck, alright … for everybody.

Start hammering folks..... we need to take control of the Senate in 2014 and make Obama a true lame duck.

 

Report: Tsarnaev Family received $100,000 Welfare Benefits

By Susan Duclos

The family of the two men suspected of the Boston Marathon bombings reported has received more than $100,000 in taxpayer-funded welfare benefits, the Boston Herald reports.
The Tsarnaev family, including the suspected terrorists and their parents, benefited from more than $100,000 in taxpayer-funded assistance — a bonanza ranging from cash and food stamps to Section 8 housing from 2002 to 2012, the Herald has learned.

“The breadth of the benefits the family was receiving was stunning,” said a person with knowledge of documents handed over to a legislative committee today.

The state has handed over more than 500 documents to the 11-member House Post Audit and Oversight Committee, which today met for the first time and plans to call in officials from the Department of Transitional Assistance to testify.

“I can assure members of the public that this committee will actively review every single piece of information we can find because clearly the public has a substantial right to know what benefits, if any, this family or individuals accused of some horrific crimes were receiving,” said state Rep. David Linsky (D-Natick), the committee’s chairman.

Linsky’s committee has requested documents from the DTA, the state’s Medicaid director and Health and Human Services Secretary John Polanowicz. But so far the committee has not released the records publicly, citing a privilege the DTA is asserting under state law.
That does not include the cost of Dzhokhar Tsarnaev's public defender which is being provided to him by the state.

The attack on America by blowing people up at the finish line of the Boston Marathon is a hell of a way for them to say "Thank you."




Majority Of Registered Voters Do Not Know Planned Parenthood Performs Abortions

By Susan Duclos

In a poll conducted for National Right to Life Committee by The Polling Company, 88 percent of respondents said they were familiar with Planned Parenthood, yet 55 percent had no idea that PP provides abortion services. Out of the 45 percent that were aware Planned Parenthood performed abortions, just 14 percent (6% of the entire sample) knew that they perform over 300,000 abortions annually.

Planned Parenthood performs just over 27% of all abortions performed in the United States, making them the largest abortion provider in the country, yet 55 percent of voters do not even know the organization performs abortions at all?

“The polling reflects the results of Planned Parenthood’s campaign to publicly minimize and obfuscate its involvement with abortion.” said David N. O’Steen, Ph.D., National Right to Life Executive Director.

O’Steen told LifeNews that his organization’s poll found 88% of respondents said that they were familiar with Planned Parenthood, with 41% saying that they were very familiar and 47% saying that they were somewhat familiar.  Forty percent said they knew someone who had received services at a Planned Parenthood.  Although 63% said that they had a favorable opinion of Planned Parenthood, including 38% of those who identified themselves as pro-life, 55% of those polled did not know that Planned Parenthood performs abortions.

The poll found 50 percent of pro-life respondents did not know that Planned Parenthood performs abortions. Of the 45% who knew that Planned Parenthood performs abortions, the majority greatly underestimated the number of abortions Planned Parenthood performs annually.


“The American people have been duped into thinking that Planned Parenthood is nothing more than a ‘mainstream health care provider,’ when in reality, Planned Parenthood clinics are performing upwards of 27% of all abortions performed in the United States annually,” added Carol Tobias, president of National Right to Life. “Regardless of what they say, for Planned Parenthood, abortion is big business.”

Other findings:

LifeNews.com cited data from the polling company, inc./WomanTrend on behalf of the National Right to Life Committee showing support for two major policy changes in regards to abortion.  The poll found that 64% supported a ban on abortions after the point at which the unborn child can feel pain (20 weeks).  This included 47% that identified themselves as “pro-choice”.  The poll also found that 85% to 11% believed that sex-selective abortion should be illegal as well.  In a related policy matter, a majority (58%) oppose using taxpayer funds to provide abortion services.

View the full article from LifeNews.com.
 Emphasis mine.

This past year, Planned Parenthood got $542 million from the government (i.e., from you and me), which accounts for almost half (45%) of the abortion chain’s budget. (The DC)

P.S.- Barack Obama- April 27, 2013: Thank you, Planned Parenthood. God bless you. God bless America. Thank you.

Video- Senator Ted Cruz Full Speech: We Are Winning On Gun Control

By Susan Duclos

The video below is of Senator Ted Cruz (R-TX) speaking in front of a crowd at a meeting of the Tea Party group FreedomWorks.



Via the details on the YouTube page:

Speaking before a crowd at a meeting of Tea Party group FreedomWorks this weekend, Senator Ted Cruz (R-TX) laid out exactly how the Senate's gun background checks compromise died. From Cruz's perspective, it was the letter he sent, along with Senators Rand Paul (R-KY) and Mike Lee (R-UT), threatening to filibuster any gun control legislation that ultimately doomed the bill from passing.

Cruz began his speech by telling the FreedomWorks members in attendance that their ideology is "winning" in Congress. As an example, he pointed to the recent debate over gun control, specifically the background checks compromise from Senators Pat Toomey (R-PA) and Joe Manchin (D-WV) that failed to garner enough votes earlier this month.

"A month ago in Washington D.C., guns was a done deal," Cruz said. "The president was out there every day, pounding on it. Taking grieving moms and dads who tragically lost their babies and treating them as political props." He then essentially took credit for stopping the "momentum" on the issue by sending that threatening letter to Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV). Because of that letter, Cruz said, his fellow Republican senators were forced to face their constituents who were asking, "Why aren't you standing up for the Second Amendment? If these guys are fighting, what are you doing?"

Cruz went even further in his speech, belittling his more moderate Republican colleagues who were at least open to having a public debate on the issues. "Here was their argument," Cruz said of his fellow Republicans in the Senate. "They said: 'Listen, before you did this, the politics of it were great. The Democrats were the bad guys. The Republicans were the good guys. Now we all look like a bunch of squishes.' Well, there is an alternative," he said he responded. "You could just not be a bunch of squishes."

While Cruz did cast himself as hero in the fight to "protect the Second Amendment" and block any efforts to expand background checks, he also offered praise to his Tea Party constituents. He called the "involvement" of the American people in pressuring their senators "critical" to the eventual outcome. Thirty years ago, he said the big three networks, ABC, CBS and NBC "determined what was news and what wasn't." But now, he concluded, groups like FreedomWorks are able to "focus the attention of the American people."

Mitch McConnell Web Video- 'The American Ideal' - Conservatives Own These Principles

By Susan Duclos

Senator Mitch McConnell's new web video has racked up over a million hits and highlights the big government mentality of Barack Obama and Democrats, speaks of the "American Ideal" and ends big by asserting "We own these principles, we own them"

[WATCH]



[Update ] McConnell is determined to close the technological gap between Republicans and Democrats and if the speed that the video above has gone viral is anything to go by, perhaps Republicans up for election and reelection in 2014, should be tapping his people for some help.


Benghazi Whistle-Blowers In State Department And CIA Threatened By Obama Administration

By Susan Duclos

[Update added below the post]  Fox News video with more information about the explosive nature of what these threatened whistle-blowers are going to testify to.

Victoria Toensing, a former Justice Department official and Republican counsel to the Senate Intelligence Committee, is representing  a State Department employee and claims her client,  a whistle-blower, was threatened by the Obama Administration for the testimony they are preparing to give to Congress about the Benghazi attacks that killed four Americans, including U.S. Ambassador to Libya Chris Stevens.

“I'm not talking generally, I'm talking specifically about Benghazi – that people have been threatened,” Toensing said in an interview Monday. “And not just the State Department. People have been threatened at the CIA.”

Toensing declined to name her client. She also refused to say whether the individual was on the ground in Benghazi on the night of Sept. 11, 2012, when terrorist attacks on two U.S. installations in the Libyan city killed four Americans, including U.S. Ambassador to Libya Chris Stevens.

However, Toensing disclosed that her client has pertinent information on all three time periods investigators consider relevant to the attacks: the months that led up to the attack, when pleas by the ambassador and his staff for enhanced security in Benghazi were mostly rejected by senior officers at the State Department; the eight-hour time frame in which the attacks unfolded, and the eight-day period that followed the attacks, when Obama administration officials incorrectly described them as the result of a spontaneous protest over a video.

“It's frightening, and they're doing some very despicable threats to people,” she said. “Not ‘we're going to kill you,’ or not ‘we're going to prosecute you tomorrow,’ but they're taking career people and making them well aware that their careers will be over [if they cooperate with congressional investigators].”

Federal law provides explicit protections for federal government employees who are identified as “whistle-blowers.” The laws aim to ensure these individuals will not face repercussions from their superiors, or from other quarters, in retaliation for their provision of information about corruption or other forms of wrongdoing to Congress, or to an agency’s inspector-general.

Are any of these whistle-blowers the Benghazi survivors that Congress has been demanding the Obama administration allow them to interview?

Quite possibly.

Rep. Trey Gowdy, appearing on Fox News on Saturday afternoon, promised that “explosive” congressional hearings over the Sept. 11 attacks on the U.S. Consulate in Benghazi, Libya, are “coming quickly.”

 “There are more Benghazi hearings coming; I think they’re going to be explosive,” Mr. Gowdy, a South Carolina Republican who is a member of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, told Fox’s Uma Pemmaraju.

Mr. Gowdy wasn’t able to give out too many details, but he hinted that the public for the first time might hear from witnesses to the terror attack that left four Americans dead.

“I am bound by certain measures of confidentiality, but I would tell you that you are getting very warm,” Mr. Gowdy said when asked by Ms. Pemmaraju whether witnesses could be coming forward. “[The hearings] are coming sooner rather than later.”

Is anybody else waiting to hear Hillary Clinton use the phrase "vast right-wing conspiracy?

[Update] Fox News video with more information about t what these threatened whistle-blowers are going to testify to.



For the kids of our Fallen: Gate to Gate Run, ODA 7125's run for the SOWF, in Honor of Fallen SF Medic, SGT Timothy Padgett

On this last day of the officially designated Month of the Military Child, a reminder of an important event which supports the kids of our Fallen of the Special Ops:

via War On Terror News:


Gate to Gate Run In Honor of SGT Timothy Padgett, SF Medic

Of all the MOS's (jobs) in the military, the one I hold in greatest respect is probably an 18D, Special Forces Medic.  Those that graduate the SF Medic's course are capable of amazing feats of life saving trauma treatment.  As (more than) one person has described the role of the SF Medic:

"They can kill you and then save your life."

They don't wear the medic red cross, because theirs is a combat mission, with the job of keeping everybody alive and healthy.  On the range, you probably wouldn't know the difference between the 18D and his teammates, and ODA's (Operational Detachment Alpha) are the epitome of a team.  The things they can do aren't a matter of just physical brawn. It's intelligence, common sense, hard work, constant practice, dedication beyond perfection, but above and beyond all is teamwork.


So, it does not surprise me to find that team 7125, formerly known as 725, has adopted SGT Padgett's family as their own, or that they are going the extra 4.4 miles in Honor of him, and in support of the Special Operations Warrior Foundation.

I have rarely mentioned SOWF, but it is one of the most efficient Non-Profits in the Pro-Troop arena.  It specializes in ensuring that the children of fallen Special Operations Troops get a college education.  Funds donated to it make it to that cause at a percentage unprecedented in the Non-Profit world.  In short, they are good stewards of financial donations.

Though the team is currently deployed to Afghanistan, they are training and have a goal of being 1st and raising $10,000, in the 4.4 mile run at Eglin AFB in May.  They're running treadmills at a pace of 5:50 minute miles, which is frankly unreal to me, for an individual, much less a team.  And they plan to cut that time down before the race, and when they aren't in the middle of place where people are shooting at them.


In fact, it wasn't the team itself that contacted me about this, but the brother of a team member, because their duties still come first, defending America, in a far off land that has taken a Brother from them.


If you can find $5 or $500 to donate to a worthy cause, in the Honor of a Fallen Warrior, as supported by some of Our Nation's best, please donate here: http://www.indiegogo.com/projects/in-memory-our-fallen-hero-and-teammate


GO now and watch the video WOTN has up, and please if you can, donate a few dollars.  Check out the FaceBook page, too.

As I always say:  The children ALSO serve, and these kids have sacrificed so much.  Support them, please.

Monday, April 29, 2013

Female DNA Found On Bomb From Boston Marathon Bombing

By Susan Duclos

Breaking news shows that female DNA was found on the bombs used in the Boston Marathon explosions on April 15, 2013.

Wall Street Journal:

Investigators have found female DNA on at least one of the bombs used in the Boston Marathon attacks, though they haven't determined whose DNA it is or whether that means a woman helped the two suspects carry out the attacks, according to U.S. officials briefed on the probe.

The officials familiar with the case cautioned that there could be multiple explanations for why the DNA of someone other than the two bombing suspects—Tamerlan Tsarnaev and his younger brother, Dzhokhar—could have been found on remnants of the exploded devices. The genetic material could have come, for example, from a store clerk who handled materials used in the bombs or a stray hair that ended up in the bomb.

Whether this means a female was involved in the attacks or not is still under investigation.

The question of whether others were involved or not, has been prominent, especially after a top ranking GOP Representative,  chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, Mike Rogers, reportedly said "There are clearly more persons of interest, and they’re not 100 percent sure if there aren’t other explosives."

 More:

Rogers’ comments came ahead of a Wall Street Journal report Friday that the FBI has concluded the bomb makers “likely had additional training or expertise.”

Captured bombing suspect Dzhokhar Tsarnaev reportedly told investigators he and brother Tamerlan made the devices using instructions from the Al-Qaeda magazine “Inspire.” Tamerlan Tsarnaev died last week after a gun battle with police.

Those assertion by Dzhokhar Tsarnaev came into question after it was reported that there may be more accomplices because evidence showed that a line-of-sight detonation was used for the Boston Marathon bombings, which was not part of the Al-Qaeda magazine “Inspire" instructions.




Liberal: Exposing The Murder Of Living Babies After Botched Abortions Is Worse Than Murdering Babies

By Susan Duclos

In the liberal mind of Slate's William Saletan, exposing the horrors of killing living, breathing babies and/or refusing to provide them with medical treatment after surviving a botched abortion, is worse than infanticide.

With the trial of Kermit Gosnell, charged with murdering babies A-G, born alive after a botched late term abortion or partial birth abortion, by "snipping" their necks, severing their spinal cords, as well as a charge of murder on a women that went to him for a  late term abortion, Live Action, has started publishing videos taken undercover at other late term abortion clinics.

Sunday I published a video where an abortion clinic workers told a women if her baby was born alive at home, to "flush it," or "put it in a bag," but not to take it to a hospital because a hospital would attempt to save the child.

Live Action's next video was of Washington D.C. doctor, Cesare Santangelo, stating that if a baby survived the abortion attempt, "we would not help it."

“I mean, technically, you know, legally, we would be obligated to help it, you know, to survive, but . . . it probably wouldn’t,” Santangelo is shown telling the woman, who was 24 weeks pregnant. “It’s all in how vigorously you do things to help a fetus survive at this point.”

Video below: "Inhuman: Undercover in America's Late-Term Abortion Industry - Washington D.C."


It took a concentrated  effort to force the media to actually cover the "House of Horrors", Gosnell trial, with some abortion supporters explaining why they didn't report on it and why they should have.

Example:  Megan McArdle at The Daily Beast:

But I understand why my readers suspect me, and other pro-choice mainstream journalists, of being selective—of not wanting to cover the story because it showcased the ugliest possibilities of abortion rights. The truth is that most of us tend to be less interested in sick-making stories—if the sick-making was done by "our side."  

 Carl M. Cannon attempts to explain the liberal mindset of people like Slate's William Saletan and journalists that completely ignored the Kermit Gosnell trial until they were forced to cover it. Cannon explains that abortion is "Journalism's Most Sacred Cow."

So I went on television and reluctantly criticized my own employer. Looking back, we were not wrong about the need for a newspaper to encourage the free flow of ideas. But on the issue of abortion, we quite wrong about which side really wanted to chill honest and open discussion. That was our real sacred cow.

No one ever put it quite this way, but the traditional media in this country were about to embark on an extraordinary exercise in self-censorship. It is a social experiment that has lasted up until this week, until our industry’s shame over a refusal to cover the Kermit Gosnell murder trial brought this issue to a crucible.
To liberals like William Saletan, the video above, and the one shown on Sunday, the Kermit Gosnell atrocities and murders, are the abortion industry and pro-abortion supporters' dirty little secret and anyone reporting on the exposure of that dirty little secret must be punished for doing so.

This isn't about the "abortion argument" and whether abortion is right or wrong.

This is about late term abortions and/or partial birth abortions that fail, where a breathing, moving, living baby is born and either murdering that child by severing the spinal cord in the case of Gosnell, or by refusing to provide medical attention and allowing that baby to suffer before dying.

Gosnell and the Live Action videos from multiple abortion clinics across the country, are not isolated cases as evidenced by a video explaining  the position of the largest abortion providers in the nation, Planned Parenthood, by Alisa Laport Snow, the lobbyist representing the Florida Alliance of Planned Parenthood Affiliate, of what should happen to babies born alive after a botched abortion:


So, um, it is just really hard for me to even ask you this question because I’m almost in disbelief," said Rep. Jim Boyd. "If a baby is born on a table as a result of a botched abortion, what would Planned Parenthood want to have happen to that child that is struggling for life?”

"We believe that any decision that's made should be left up to the woman, her family, and the physician," said Planned Parenthood lobbyist Snow.
(Video of the quoted segment of her testimony, found here)

Clinic Workers Describe Babies Born Alive

We had one saline [type of abortion] born alive. I raced to the nursery with it and put it in an incubator. I called the pediatrician to come right down, and he refused. He said, “That’s not a baby. That’s an abortion. (1)
[...]

One case where a baby was born in an abortion clinic and then killed by direct action of the abortionist came to light when clinic workers revealed what happened. According to Lime 5, a book by pro-life author Mark Crutcher:
According to five abortion clinic employees, Texas abortionist John Roe 109 [pseudonym] was performing an abortion when a 1 foot long infant girl with light brown hair was born. They testified that the baby curled up in Roe’s hand and attempted to breathe as Roe held the placenta over her face. He then dropped her into a bucket of water, and several employees testified that bubbles rose to the surface. They went on to say that Roe then “dropped the fetus into a plastic bag….The bag was tied and placed at the end of the operating room… [The] sides of the bag pulsated as though someone were breathing into it. Then the bag stopped moving.” One witness said he was holding the bag in which Roe placed the infant, and later put the bag in the freezer where aborted fetuses were stored. (3)


What Live Action is doing, is showing that Kermit Gosnell was not the exception, and that is the dirtiest little secret of all.


Related:

Abortionist Kermit Gosnell Murder Trial: Judge Reinstates Murder Charge For "Baby C" Saying He Erred

Kermit Gosnell Murder Trial: Baby B,” “Baby C,” and “Baby G Will Get No Justice

Remember Kermit Gosnell And Women's Medical Society's Victims, Babies A-G
 
Video- Anderson Cooper's Kermit Gosnell Report: 'Doctor's "House of Horrors"'

Must See Horrific Documentary On Truth Behind PA Abortion Clinic And Kermit Gosnell

Embedded- Grand Jury Report Kermit Gosnell & Women's Medical Society - #Gosnell

Kermit Gosnell Trial & Media Silence On Babies Born Alive After Botched Abortions, Then Murdered

CNN's Wolf Blitzer and Congressman Mike Rogers, SWAT-ted

By Susan Duclos

The Swat-ting continues, this time CNN's Wolf Blitzer and Congressman Mike Rogers were the victims of the SWAT-timg.

SWAT-ting is when police are called with a fake report, usually telling the police there has been a shooting in the household, using technology to make the authorities believe the call has come from the residence being SWAT-ted.

Montgomery County police received an urgent message at about 6:25 p.m. Saturday saying someone had been shot at Wolf Blitzer’s home in Bethesda. Officers streamed toward the CNN host’s residence near Congressional Country Club. They set up a perimeter.

H/T Twitchy we see that on Sunday, SWAT-ting came to Congress. Via Wood TV:
The heavy police presence seen outside of Congressman Mike Rogers’ Howell home on Saturday night was called there because of an “unfortunate prank,” the congressman said in a statement.
The Livingston County Sheriff’s Department told Lansing affiliate WILX that it was “a high-priority situation.” Police cleared the scene by 10:45 p.m. Saturday.

Washington Post reports: Earlier this month, the place was Beverly Hills and the target was “American Idol” host Ryan Seacrest. The caller told police armed men were trying to break into Seacrest’s place; officers arrived to find nothing amiss. In March, it was Brian Krebs, an Internet security writer and former Washington Post reporter. The caller said Russians had broken in and killed Krebs’s wife. Fairfax County police, weapons drawn, handcuffed Krebs before they learned the report was a sham.

Twitchy reminds readers of other previous SWAT-ting incidents:

 Other conservatives who have been SWAT-ted:  Erik RushAaron Walker, and Erick Erickson.

The problem, including the wasted resources which could be spent on investigating and responding to real crimes, has gotten to the point that over 80 members of the United States House of Representatives sent a letter to Attorney General Holder asking for an investigation, back in June of 2012.

Police and emergency communications specialists said the costs of such hoaxes can be tremendous. Scrambling teams of officers can waste tens of thousands of dollars worth of police time, and there are dangers inherent in speeding toward a would-be crime scene or confronting an unsuspecting, albeit innocent, suspect.

“If somebody’s shot, we believe they’re dead or could be dead, we have to get there fast,”  Montgomery Police Capt. Paul Starks said. “People are responding with lights and sirens, so there’s the potential for danger there.”

Moreover, he said, “you’re diverting resources that might otherwise . . . go elsewhere to respond and resolve an actual emergency.”

 No word on whether Holder has actually taken action on the investigation members of Congress requested.


Calling All Patriots!

 By Findalis

My dear friend Patriot USA is in dire need of both funds and prayers.  As many know, Patriot USA had major spinal surgery this last month.  He is unable to work, unsure that he will have a job to return to, and the bills are piling up.  Recently he had to spend big bucks on the repairs to his car.  (OK his wife's car.)  Thus depleting his savings.  His wife is out of work and has one child in college and a child in High School.  Things are getting so bad that even AJ, his dog is feeling the pinch.

I know times are tight.  Heck I am short too, but Patriot's need is greater.  A few bucks his way will do wonders for his recovery and health.

Either click here and hit the side link to donate or you can donate directly by clicking here.  And remember Patriot in your prayers.

Thank you;

Findalis



Video- Pat Condell- The Difference Between Progressives And Liberals- 'Progressives Give Me The Creeps'

By Susan Duclos

The video is titled "The truth is incorrect" and under details it says "Progressive" doesn't mean what you think it means." The video below is 6:49 minutes long and well worth the time it takes to listen to it.



Patrick "Pat" Condell is an English writer, political commentator, comedian and atheist internet personality.

Yuo can follow Pat Condell at Twitter here.

Sunday, April 28, 2013

American Official: The biggest source of corruption in Afghanistan was the United States

By Susan Duclos

Bags of cash personally delivered from the CIA to the offices of Afghanistan’s president, ghost money they call it. The United States, according to a NYT article, isn't the only one that drops of bags of money there either. Iran reportedly used to as well

All told, tens of millions of dollars have flowed from the C.I.A. to the office of President Hamid Karzai, according to current and former advisers to the Afghan leader. 
“We called it ‘ghost money,’ ” said Khalil Roman, who served as Mr. Karzai’s chief of staff from 2002 until 2005. “It came in secret, and it left in secret.” 

The C.I.A., which declined to comment for this article, has long been known to support some relatives and close aides of Mr. Karzai. But the new accounts of off-the-books cash delivered directly to his office show payments on a vaster scale, and with a far greater impact on everyday governing.

Moreover, there is little evidence that the payments bought the influence the C.I.A. sought. Instead, some American officials said, the cash has fueled corruption and empowered warlords, undermining Washington’s exit strategy from Afghanistan. 

“The biggest source of corruption in Afghanistan,” one American official said, “was the United States.”
The United States was not alone in delivering cash to the president. Mr. Karzai acknowledged a few years ago that Iran regularly gave bags of cash to one of his top aides.

At the time, in 2010, American officials jumped on the payments as evidence of an aggressive Iranian campaign to buy influence and poison Afghanistan’s relations with the United States. What they did not say was that the C.I.A. was also plying the presidential palace with cash — and unlike the Iranians, it still is.

More:

When word of the Iranian cash leaked out in October 2010, Mr. Karzai told reporters that he was grateful for it. He then added: “The United States is doing the same thing. They are providing cash to some of our offices.” 

At the time, Mr. Karzai’s aides said he was referring to the billions in formal aid the United States gives. But the former adviser said in a recent interview that the president was in fact referring to the C.I.A.’s bags of cash. 

No one mentions the agency’s money at cabinet meetings. It is handled by a small clique at the National Security Council, including its administrative chief, Mohammed Zia Salehi, Afghan officials said. 

Mr. Salehi, though, is better known for being arrested in 2010 in connection with a sprawling, American-led investigation that tied together Afghan cash smuggling, Taliban finances and the opium trade. Mr. Karzai had him released within hours, and the C.I.A. then helped persuade the Obama administration to back off its anticorruption push, American officials said. 

So, not only does the U.S. give "billions in formal aid," but also tens of millions in secret money?

American taxpayer money.

Yet Washington politicians are blathering about the reductions to the automatic increases in spending that went into effect due to the sequester? Closing down the White House tours, making a huge deal out of FAA funding cuts, flight delays, etc.....?

Seriously?

I wonder how many years of White House tours could be funded with those tens of millions?




Updated- Multiple People Stabbed At Albuquerque Church

By Susan Duclos

Eyewitness News4 reports:

Multiple people were stabbed at a church in northwest Albuquerque on Sunday.

Albuquerque police spokesperson Tasia Martinez said officers are investigating the stabbing at St. Jude Thaddeus Parish, 5712 Paradise Blvd NW.
KRQE reports four to five people were stabbed and two are in critical condition.

No word yet if the perpetrator has been caught or not....[Update below- In custody]

[Update] Twitter user @theladderman56 provided eyewitness accounts before the media did.

Story is still developing, will update when more is known.

[Update] More details from LA Times:

Two parishioners told the Los Angeles Times that after communion at the St. Jude Thaddeus Catholic Church on Sunday morning, a man in his teens or early 20s leaped from the pews and stabbed the choir's lead singer while the choir was singing.

"While that was going on, people were just panicking. It was scary, you wouldn’t think something like that would happen in church," Reyes Stinson, 18, told The Times.

Another parishioner, Vanessa Lucero, 14, told The Times she was sitting right behind the man, who "was kind of twitchy, sketchy looking. He had a tattoo of an upside-down star on his wrist."

Lucero said the man climbed over the pews, punched and then repeatedly stabbed the choir's lead singer.

"He said, like, 'False preacher!' " Lucero said. "I don’t know why.”

The congregation subdued the attacker, at which point more parishioners could have been stabbed, Stinson said.

After the suspect was in handcuffs, Lucero said, "Old ladies were telling him, 'God bless you, forgive yourself,' and he was saying, 'You don’t know about the Masons.' "

Neither witness had seen the man before. After the attack, Stinson said that the choir's lead singer had stab wounds on his left arm and that his jacket was "torn to pieces."

“At this point, we’re just trying to deal with it," Father John C. Daniel said in a brief phone interview with The Times. "It sounds like everybody is going to be OK.”

In a statement, Albuquerque police confirmed that the suspect was in custody but did not release his identity.

"It has been determined that he is not a parishioner," police said. "As to the motive regarding the multiple stabbing, this has not yet been determined."

[Update] Is this "The Masons" he was talking about?

[Update] Identity of suspect released:

Albuquerque police have identified the 24-year-old man who is accused of stabbing four people at a Catholic church as a Sunday service was nearing its end.

Police spokesman Robert Gibbs says Lawrence Capener is now being interviewed by police and is expected to face felony charges.

It's not yet known whether Capener has an attorney.

Police say Capener jumped over several pews at St. Jude Thaddeus Catholic Church around noon Sunday and walked up to the choir area where he began his attack.

The injuries to the four church-goers weren't life-threatening.

All four were being treated at hospitals.

An off-duty police officer and others at the church subdued Capener and held him down until police arrived.

[Update] NY Daily News is reporting also.


Video- Late Term Abortion Clinic Worker: If Baby Comes Out Alive At Home, Flush It! Put It In A Bag!

By Susan Duclos

H/T to Hot Air, who gives a very succinct description of the eight-minute video seen below:

What happens, the young woman asks, if the baby is moving and breathing when it comes out?  No worries, says the abortion-clinic saleswoman — the toxic solution will make it “automatically stop.”  If the baby spontaneously delivers, she advises the mother to “Flush it!” Or, failing that, stick the baby in a plastic bag and bring him or her to the clinic for the toxic solution.  Don’t go to the hospital, she warns, because the hospital might actually try to save the baby.

Inhuman: Undercover in America's Late-Term Abortion Industry

[WATCH]



[Update] NY Post- The truth about late-term abortion- Must read.

Sarah Palin Still Has It: 'Assclowns' Tweet Sends Liberals Over The Edge: Lib Message- Raising Children Isn't 'Work'

By Susan Duclos

Conservatives may be divided over whether Sarah Palin should run for any type of office or not. She has fans, she has those that prefer she play the role of highlighting conservative candidates, support them and help get them elected and she has people that simply don't care for her.

Conservatives are not divided however on enjoying the hell out of watching Sarah turn liberals into mindlessly rabid attack dogs and freaking out publicly over every word she says, tweets and writes.

The latest example was a Tweet she sent out on Saturday regarding the White House Correspondents’ Dinner:


Twichy has two full pages of reactions from liberals to that tweet as well as some tweets supportive of Palin, and  the full tweet via her Facebook page:
Yuk it up media and pols. While America is buried in taxes and a fight for our rights, the permanent political class in DC dresses up and has a prom to make fun of themselves. No need for that, we get the real joke.

Page one here and page two here.

Other than the sheer amusement over Palin's innate ability to completely send liberals into a frenzy, their knee jerk reactions to anything Sarah Palin related also shows the sheer disdain they have for the "work" required to raise children, especially when one of those children has Down Syndrome.

A few examples:







It wasn't only Twitter liberals that showed such disdain for the work it takes to raise children, according to one commenter at Democratic Underground, motherhood isn't a "real job".

This from someone who hasn't had a real job since 2009

Another comment at DU asks:

65. ...and what HARD WORKING job do you have, missy?.....

 Side Note- Tom Brokaw had some serious criticism about the White House Correspondents’ Dinner as well, but he doesn't have the talent Palin has in driving liberals completely batcrap crazy.

Thank you Sarah for my Sunday morning entertainment.




HuffPost-YouGov Poll Finds Fox News Most Believable Of News Networks On Boston Bombing Coverage

By Susan Duclos

A Huffington Post-YouGov poll conducted April19-20,2013, finds Fox News was the most believable in their coverage of the Boston Marathon bombing,, CNN ranked as the least believable.

Furthermore,  more people said they do not watch CNN, MSNBC, CBS News, ABC News, and NBC News, than those that say they don't watch Fox News.

Fox News was the only media outlet that reached the 50 percent mark in being very or somewhat believable.

Poll embedded below:



Saturday, April 27, 2013

Corruption: Biggest Smuggling Scheme in Baltimore City History, Run From Baltimore City Detention Center

By Susan Duclos

25 people behind bars, 13 of them female correctional officers, with charges of racketeering, money laundering and possession of drugs with the intent to distribute, all of which was run by the prisoners in the Baltimore City Detention Center in Maryland.

Via CBS Baltimore:

Federal agents say Tavon White is the mastermind behind one of the most elaborate schemes at the Baltimore City jail, involving drugs, money and sex. White, a four-year inmate, has been charged with attempted murder and is a member of the notorious gang, the Black Guerilla Family.

Twenty-five people, 13 of those female correctional officers, are now behind bars facing federal charges of racketeering, money laundering and possession of drugs with the intent to distribute. Investigators say the women helped White and other gang members smuggle cell phones, marijuana, prescription pills and cigarettes into the Baltimore City Detention Center.

“It’s pretty much its own city. The guards aren’t running the jail; prisoners really run the jail,” said one former inmate.

The CBS piece goes on to detail how the prisoners ran the biggest smuggling scheme in Baltimore City history:

Here’s how the operation worked according to FBI investigators: acquaintances of the inmates and officers would give the contraband to the guards, who would smuggle the items into the jail by hiding them in their shoes. The contraband would then be delivered to members of the gang, who would then sell it to other inmates.

A percentage of the money the gang made would be paid to the officers and the suppliers on the street for their services.

There were no cash transactions in this operation. The inmates paid for the drugs and cell phones using pre-paid debit cards that were also smuggled into the jail.

Mayor Stephanie Rawlings-Blake calls the reports unsettling.

“It’s certainly dangerous when we think we are putting criminals behind bars to serve time, yet they’re still in business,” she said.

 Former inmates claim this has been going on since at least 2006.

Here is a good question and the run around the questioner received shows there are no good answers... read "Who was in charge at the city detention center?"

Too Little, Too Late: Indiana Officials Found Guilty in Obama, Clinton Ballot Petition Fraud

By Susan Duclos

Too little and over four years too late, the courts have found two Democratic political operatives guilty Thursday night, in a scheme that put Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton on the presidential primary ballot in Indiana in the 2008 election, fraudulently. It only took three hours of deliberations to find the defendants guilty on all counts.

Former longtime St. Joseph County Democratic party Chairman Butch Morgan Jr.  was found guilty of felony conspiracy counts to commit petition fraud and forgery, and former county Board of Elections worker Dustin Blythe was found guilty of felony forgery counts and falsely making a petition, after being accused of faking petitions that enabled Obama, then an Illinois Senator, to get on the presidential primary ballot for his first run for the White House.

Morgan was accused of being the mastermind behind the plot.

According to testimony from two former Board of Election officials who pled guilty, Morgan ordered Democratic officials and workers to fake the names and signatures that Obama and Clinton needed to qualify for the presidential race. Blythe, then a Board of Elections employee and Democratic Party volunteer, was accused of forging multiple pages of the Obama petitions.

The forged signatures for Hillary Clinton were not enough to have bounced her off the ballot, but the forged signatures for Obama, was enough to have kept his name off the ballot.

Prosecutors say that in President Obama's case, nine of the petition pages were apparently forged. Each petition contains up to 10 names, making a possible total of 90 names, which, if faked, could have brought the Obama total below the legal limit required to qualify. Prosecutors say 13 Clinton petitions were apparently forged, meaning up to 130 possibly fake signatures.  Even if 130 signatures had been challenged, it would have still left Mrs. Clinton with enough signatures to meet the 500 person threshold.

How did they get away with it?

Nees previously told Fox News that the fraud was clearly evident, "because page after page of signatures are all in the same handwriting," and that nobody raised any red flags "because election workers in charge of verifying their validity were the same people faking the signatures."

Hillary Clinton beat Barack Obama in the 2008 Democratic Indiana presidential primaries but Barack Obama did receive 34 of the 72 delegates for the state of Indiana.

Indiana was not the only state where the voter fraud alarm sounded about the 2008 elections with accusations of 1) Irregularities: Prematurely Taking Precinct Convention Packets by Obama Campaign, 2) Voter Intimidation: Lock-out of Clinton caucus goers by Obama Campaign and 3) There are numerous instances of Obama supporters filing out precinct convention sign-in sheets during the day and submitting them as completed vote totals at caucus. This is expressly against the rules. The sign-in sheets were copied by the Obama campaign from the Texas Democratic Party website and taken by supporters to various polling places to sign-up caucus goers prior to the start of the caucuses.

Hillary Clinton took the popular vote in Indiana, with 48 percent to Barack Obama's 47 percent.

According to Real Clear Politics, out of 4257 Democratic delegates awarded nationwide to Clinton and Obama, there was  a 333 delegate count difference in favor of Obama.

Without further convictions for voter fraud, no one can claim with any degree of certainty that Hillary Clinton would have won the Democratic primaries....... but using the examples above, the 72 delegates in Indiana which would have gone to Clinton if Obama's name was not on the ballot  the Texas where Clinton took the popular vote by 3 percent, over 100,000 votes, carried a total of 227 delegates, means there is a possibility that Hillary Clinton would have won the Democratic primary election and should have been the Democratic presidential candidate in 2008.

Other states in 2008 decrying voter fraud include Iowa, Hawaii and Nevada.

Iowa carried 57 delegates,  Nevada 34 delegates, and Hawaii 29 delegates (Note- despite fraud allegations in Hawaii, Obama carried enough of a lead that Clinton could not have won the state)

As much as it pains me to say this, Clinton supporters who claimed and still claim that Barack Obama, the DNC and Obama supporters stole the primary by illegal means........ may be right.




Sacbee's Texas Goes Boom Cartoon: Tasteless, Sick And Disrespectful To Victims And Families

By Susan Duclos

Editorial cartoonist Jack Ohman published a cartoon in the Sacbee showing Texas Governor Rick Perry saying Business is BOOMING in Texas," on one side then a huge explosion with the word "BOOM!," on the other side.



Sick and tasteless are just a couple of the words being used to describe the cartoon above, considering the  little town of West, Texas, with a population of approximately 28,000, is suffering after a fertilizer plant explosion which killed 14, injured others, took out a four-block radius and left a massive crater in it's place.

Disrespectful is another word being used for Mr. Ohman's cartoon. Disrespectful to a town that suffered a devastating tragedy. Disrespectful to the families of those that lost their lives, some first responders, fireman and cops. Disrespectful to the men, women and children left homeless after the explosion destroyed their homes. Disrespectful to those left jobless after the businesses they worked at were leveled.

After receiving numerous complaints about his cartoon, Mr. Ohman then took to the pages of Sacbee to defend his cartoon by saying he was trying to make a "point" about Texas regulations.

The Texas chemical plant had not been inspected by the state of Texas since 2006. That's seven years ago. You may have read in the news that Gov. Perry, during his business recruiting trips to California and Illinois, generally described his state as free from high taxes and burdensome regulation. One of the burdensome regulations he neglected to mention was the fact that his state hadn't really gotten around to checking out that fertilizer plant. Many Texas cities have little or no zoning, resulting in homes being permitted next to sparely inspected businesses that store explosive chemicals.

So when the plant exploded and killed 14 people, people started asking the inevitable questions about whether this tragedy could have been prevented.

Question that have no answers yet, as Mr. Ohman clearly admits in his next sentence:

Well, we're not going to know that now, exactly, but I doubt that more inspections and better zoning would have hurt.
So Mr. Ohman admits there are no official investigation findings yet about the explosion, no facts to back up his political point, yet still thinks it is somehow defensible to use the devastation, loss and deaths, in a cartoon that has offended not just those affected by the tragedy, but many more throughout the country.

Texas Governor Rick Perry responds to the cartoon:

Re "Business is booming in Texas" (Editorial cartoon, April 25): It was with extreme disgust and disappointment I viewed your recent cartoon. While I will always welcome healthy policy debate, I won't stand for someone mocking the tragic deaths of my fellow Texans and our fellow Americans.

Additionally, publishing this on the very day our state and nation paused to honor and mourn those who died only compounds the pain and suffering of the many Texans who lost family and friends in this disaster. The Bee owes the community of West, Texas an immediate apology for your detestable attempt at satire.

-- Gov. Rick Perry, Austin, Tex.

Mr. Ohman and the Sacbee editorial page director, Stuart Leavenworth, that attempted to defend the cartoon, should both be ashamed of themselves.

H/T Twitchy


Friday, April 26, 2013

Video- 'Line-of-Sight' Detonation Leaves Investigators Wondering Was There A Third Boston Bomber?'


By Susan Duclos

From the day of the Boston Marathon bombings, every time new details emerge they leave those keeping up with the news with more questions.... today's question is "was there a third Boston bomber involved with the Marathon bombings?"

H/T Twitchy with description of information in the video.

Fox News’ Catherine Herridge is reporting today that the FBI has not ruled out the possibility of a third party involved in the Boston Marathon terrorist bombing. Evidence that the two bombs were detonated not by a cell phone but by parts ripped from a toy car remote control suggest that whoever triggered the explosions had to have been in the line of sight of the bombs.

Further, the instructions the Tsarnaev brothers were believed to have followed to construct the pressure cooker bombs didn’t mention the remote control method of detonation, though a search of their computers might turn up a source for that information.

[WATCH] Fox News report below:




[Update] In other related news today, investigators are searching a landfill for bombing clues:

Information from Dzhokhar Tsarnaev himself, plus other leads, spurred authorities to look through the New Bedford, Massachusetts, landfill, the official told CNN's Susan Candiotti. The 19-year-old went to school -- at the University of Massachusetts-Dartmouth -- in an adjacent town, and he was spotted in his dorm room there in the days after the April 15 twin blasts that left three dead.

What exactly are investgators hoping to find?

Boston bombing suspects' mother was also on a terror watch list as was her older son, Tamerlan Tsarnaeva, who was one two U.S. watchlists:

 Russian officials warned authorities in the United States about the mother of the bombing suspects in 2011, and she was also added to a terror watch list, according to CNN.
JWF points to a Boston Herald column asking a very interesting question:

Meanwhile, Howie Carr asks a very interesting question nobody else has wondered about.
If the Tsarnaevs were so persecuted in Kleptostan that they needed “asylum,” how come all of them fly back and forth to that Third World hellhole like they’re jumping on the Red Line to Park Street?

Like I said, the more details that emerge, the more questions the leave.

[Update #2] Boston Herald:

A top-ranking Republican congressman said yesterday he expects the feds to make more arrests in their ever-widening probe of the deadly Boston Marathon bombings, which took a new frightening turn yesterday when officials revealed the accused terrorist brothers made “spontaneous” plans to launch an attack on Times Square.

“I hear a lot of definitive statements out there that it was just these two men and it’s over, but I will tell you I hear these briefings every day, and I don’t think this is over,” said U.S. Rep. Mike Rogers, a Michigan Republican who chairs the House Committee on Intelligence. “There are clearly more persons of interest, and they’re not 100 percent sure if there aren’t other explosives.”


Liberals Upset With Democrats For Voting To Mitigate Sequester Pain

By Susan Duclos

Chart via Phil Kerpen
Not even attempting to be subtle anymore, progressive liberals are expressing their disappointment and anger at Democrats in Congress for voting to with Republicans to mitigate the pain for the Federal Aviation Administration.

In the minds of progressive liberals, the pain of necessary cuts should be felt, should be allowed to harm the public, just to make a political point. The public be damned, the GOP must suffer for forcing Obama and Democrats to reduce, by very little percentage wise, the automatic increases in  spending, is the mindset.

Notice the chart to the left, even after the sequester cuts, the FAA's budget was still more than was requested for them by Obama for 2013.

Example:Noam Scheiber at New Republic: "Senate Democrats' Shameful Cave on Flight Delays"

The problem with the deal to end the airport delays—as with so many of the other ways the sequester has been eased—is that it does away impact of the dreaded FAA cut without an alternative that would be roughly as painful for the affluent. It treats the delays as a kind of gratuitous sideshow to the sequester fight when in fact they’re really the whole point. "The public's going to be furious when they find out that this could have been prevented," Republican Senator Dan Coats complained to the Journal. Exactly. And it was only then that they would have had the moral standing to judge the rest of the sequester.

Yes, you see,  to Scheiber, it is a moral thing after all to spend money the country does not have because we are already $16 trillion in debt, and borrow the money to keep spending money we do not have. Those shameful Democrats joined Republicans to prevent suffering delays at the airport.

How dare them!!!

Another example- TPM: "How To Lose The Sequestration Fight"

The point of sequestration is supposedly to create just enough chaos that regular people — people with political clout, such as, say, business travelers — demand that Congress fix it. Or as the Democrats conceived it, to create the public pressure they need to knock Republicans off their absolutist position on taxes. 
Well, they got their outcry…and then promptly folded. They allowed Republicans to inaccurately characterize the FAA furloughs as a political stunt. Then without any organized effort to cast the flight delays as part of the same problem that’s also keeping poor people homeless they assented to providing special treatment to the traveling class.

Couple points here. First, sequestration is about spending cuts. Democrats incorrectly assumed that Republicans truly wouldn't want spending cuts, they were just talking about it and fold on raising taxes yet again... but Republicans said, yes, we do want them and we have them, as law, with sequestration.

Next lie from TPM, Republicans didn't inaccurately portray the spending cuts as a political stunt, they were a political stunt that could have been avoided and just have been by offering some flexibility in how the reductions to the increased spending were implemented.

Guy Benson does an awesome job describing the "political stunt" Democrats attempted and felt backfire in their faces:

The point is that Democrats are desperate to extricate themselves from this mess, which they orchestrated in a bone-headed attempt to rile public anger against any spending cuts.  Good luck with this, guys. Instead of hurting Republicans -- which was the entire point -- this entirely manufactured crisis has infuriated travelers, who inconveniently (a) seem to recall that the sequester was proposed and signed by Obama, and (b) aren't buying the idea that a tiny reduction in the rate of spending increase is enough to justify disruptive furloughs.  They're right on both counts, and even some mainstream media outlets have taken the administration to the woodshed.

Benson also points to a number of  mainstream media outlets calling Democrats and Obama out on their "political stunt."

Chicago Tribune "Hostages on the tarmac!"

You're ignoring the sequester. The president isn't happy. 

Washington Post:

Actually, if the air-traffic furloughs pose both a big inconvenience and a short-term danger to the U.S. economy — and they do — it would be irresponsible to let them go on until an unlikely grand bargain is struck, or even to use them as political leverage to achieve one. Mr. Reid is not a powerless bystander; he should work with the White House and Republicans to help the FAA offset the furloughs, which account for $160 million of the $637 million FAA sequester. That’s not small change, but surely it could be scrounged out of the Transportation Department’s $70 billion budget, given appropriate legislation.

Meanwhile, the airline industry is challenging the Obama administration’s implementation of the furloughs. In a lawsuit filed at the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit, the airlines argue, plausibly, that the FAA could have carried out the furloughs with far less impact on air travelers, even if the sequestration law gave it no choice whether to impose them.

Specifically, the lawsuit notes that the FAA opted to cut hours 10 percent for all controllers, at all facilities — whether Los Angeles International or Teterboro, N.J. The airlines insist that there would be fewer delays if the FAA furloughed more controllers where there’s less traffic and vice versa. The FAA’s approach “exacerbates sequester-related disruption rather than minimizing it,” their lawsuit says.

 Wall Street Journal:

The FAA furloughs traffic controllers rather than cut other spending.




Back to the TPM quote for a second- What the hell is a "traveling class?" Anyone who flies, for any reason was affected by the delays, so attempting to use class warfare rhetoric that liberals love so much, is intellectually dishonest.

Okay, moving along.....

Then we have Ezra Klein at Wonkblog: "The Democrats have lost on sequestration"

Recall the Democrats’ original theory of the case: Sequestration was supposed to be so threatening that Republicans would agree to a budget deal that included tax increases rather than permit it to happen. That theory was wrong. The follow-up theory was that the actual pain caused by sequestration would be so great that it would, in a matter of months, push the two sides to agree to a deal. Democrats just proved that theory wrong, too.

Notice he doesn't even remind his readers that just a couple months ago, Republicans did allow tax rates to rise on upper income Americans and liberals and Obama also got bonus tax revenue from 77 percent of American workers with the expiration of the payroll tax holiday.

In effect, what Democrats said Friday was that in any case where the political pain caused by sequestration becomes unbearable, they will agree to cancel that particular piece of the bill while leaving the rest of the law untouched. The result is that sequestration is no longer particularly politically threatening, but it’s even more unbalanced: Cuts to programs used by the politically powerful will be addressed, but cuts to programs that affects the politically powerless will persist. It’s worth saying this clearly: The pain of sequestration will be concentrated on those who lack political power.
Democrats had other choices, of course. As Politico’s Glenn Thrush pointed out on MSNBC Friday, President Obama could’ve vetoed the FAA bill while standing at a Head Start that’s about to throw needy children out of the program. He could’ve vetoed it from the home of an jobless worker who just saw her benefits cut. Democrats could simply have insisted that the powerful can’t get out of sequestration unless the powerless can, too. But they didn’t — and they show no signs that they’ll start.

Get that... if Democrats address unbearable pain for Americans, they have lost because they couldn't score political points off Republicans... because making Republicans look bad, means so much more than helping Americans, in the mind of a liberal.

Notice he too, seems to treat anyone that travels is some a member of the "powerful" elite, and the fact that they were saved the pain is someone in a whole different class as those effected by other reductions in automatic increased spending.

This bill ended FAA furloughs, saved jobs, saved time for ordinary travelers at airports and liberals are having an absolute cow at Democrats in Congress for doing it, for no other reason than because they couldn't hurt Republicans.



Peggy Noonan: Obama fatigue has opened the way to Bush affection

By Susan Duclos

Just a quick pointer to Peggy Noonan's latest piece, where she calls Obama "creepy," in comparison to the Bush family, the Carters and Clintons, s and points out the timing of the unveiling of George Bush's presidential library and polls showing that Bush's approval rating being much higher now that Obama has been in office for four years.

Here is a teaser of Noonan's WSJ piece:

This week something changed. George W. Bush is back, for the unveiling of his presidential library. His numbers are dramatically up. You know why? Because he's the farthest thing from Barack Obama.

Obama fatigue has opened the way to Bush affection.

***

In all his recent interviews Mr. Bush has been modest, humorous, proud but unassuming, and essentially philosophical: History will decide. No finger-pointing or scoring points. If he feels rancor or resentment he didn't show it. He didn't attempt to manipulate. His sheer normality seemed like a relief, an echo of an older age.

And all this felt like an antidote to Obama—to the imperious I, to the inability to execute, to the endless interviews and the imperturbable drone, to the sense that he is trying to teach us, like an Ivy League instructor taken aback by the backwardness of his students. And there's the unconscious superiority. One thing Mr. Bush didn't think he was was superior. He thought he was luckily born, quick but not deep, and he famously trusted his gut but also his heart. He always seemed moved and grateful to be in the White House. Someone who met with Mr. Obama during his first year in office, an old hand who'd worked with many presidents, came away worried and confounded. Mr. Obama, he said, was the only one who didn't seem awed by his surroundings, or by the presidency itself.

Mr. Bush could be prickly and irritable and near the end showed arrogance, but he wasn't vain or conceited, and he still isn't. When people said recently that they were surprised he could paint, he laughed: "Some people are surprised I can even read."

Coverage of the opening of his presidential library Thursday was wall to wall on cable, and a feeling of affection for him was encouraged, or at least enabled, by the Washington press corps, which doesn't much like Mr. Obama because he's not all that likable, and remembers Mr. Bush with a kind of reluctant fondness because he was.

But to the point. Mr. Obama was elected because he wasn't Bush.
Mr. Bush is popular now because he's not Obama.

Needless to say, liberals are not amused.


Democrats Worry About Suffering 'Political Price' Of Obamacare in 2014 As They Suffered In 2010 Midterms

By Susan Duclos

Quick flashback to a Washington Post report, showing that Democrats lost control of the House of Representatives because of their Obamacare vote:

A top Democrat acknowledged Thursday that President Obama’s health care bill hurt his party in 2010. And a new study suggests it cost the Democrats something pretty specific: their House majority.

“It was clearly a liability in the last election in terms of the public’s fear,” House Minority Whip Steny Hoyer (D-Md.) said Thursday during a briefing with reporters.
The study, by five professors from institutions across the country, looks at the health care bill alongside other contentious votes in the 111th Congress and determines that, more so than the stimulus or the cap-and-trade energy bill, it cost Democrats seats. In fact, they lost almost exactly the number of seats that decided the majority.

The study ran 10,000 simulations of a scenario in which all vulnerable Democrats voted against the health care bill and found that the rejections would have saved Democrats an average of 25 seats, which would have made the House parties close to a tie. (Republicans won 63 seats overall, but the study suggests around 25 of them would have been salvaged.)

Depending on what polls you look at, either a majority or plurality of Americans continue to be opposed to the Obamacare law Democrats passed, and suffered massive defeats for passing, in the 2010 midterm elections.

Democrats in 2013, are concerned about the "political price" they will pay in the 2014 midterms due to the roll-out of Obamacare and the continued unpopularity of the healthcare law Democrats and Obama forced on Americans.

Democrats in both houses of Congress said some members of their party were getting nervous that they could pay a political price if the rollout of the law was messy or if premiums went up significantly. 
President Obama’s new chief of staff, Denis R. McDonough, fielded questions on the issue for more than an hour at a lunch with Democratic senators. 
Senator Jeanne Shaheen, Democrat of New Hampshire, who is up for re-election next year, said, “We are hearing from a lot of small businesses in New Hampshire that do not know how to comply with the law.” 
In addition, Mrs. Shaheen said, “restaurants that employ people for about 30 hours a week are trying to figure out whether it would be in their interest to reduce the hours” of those workers, so the restaurants could avoid the law’s requirement to offer health coverage to full-time employees. 
The White House officials “acknowledged that these are real concerns, and that we’ve got to do more to address them,” Mrs. Shaheen said. 
Senator Tom Harkin, Democrat of Iowa and chairman of the appropriations subcommittee on health care, said he was extremely upset with Mr. Obama’s decision to take money from public health prevention programs and use it to publicize the new law, which creates insurance marketplaces in every state. 
“I am greatly disappointed — beyond upset — that the administration chose to help pay for the Affordable Care Act in fiscal year 2013 by raiding the Public Health and Prevention Fund,” Mr. Harkin said.

Democrats are right to be worried because as their votes for Obamacare, against the will of the majority of Americans, cost them the House in 2010, it could very well cost them control of the Senate in 2014.

Out of the 21 Democratic Senate seats that are on the ballot in the 2014 midterm elections, 14 of them voted for Obamacare in 2009 (Roll call here), excluding those retiring.

Senator Jeanne Shaheen (D-NH) and Senator Tom Harkin (D-IA), both quoted above expressing concerns, voted for Obamacare as well.

The others are Mark Begich (D-AK), Mark Pryor (D-AR), Mark Udall (D-CO), Richard Durbin (D-IL), Mary Landrieu (D-LA), Al Franken (D-Minn), Tom Udall (D-NM), Kay Hagan (D-NC), Jeff Merkley (D-OR), Jack Reed (D-RI), Tim Johnson (D-SD), and Mark Warner (D-VA).

 If the GOP leadership is smart, with every new study showing that health claims will spike an average 32% under ObamaCare, with some states seeing claims rise as much as 80%, they will hammer home the point that the Democratic Senators listed above, all on the 2014 midterm ballot, voted for it.


Republicans have an opportunity to capitalize on the fact that Obamacare is still highly unpopular and as the more egregious aspects of Obamacare are felt throughout the country, they should be linking each and every one of them to the Democrats that voted for it and were not on the ballot in the 2010 midterms.

There should already be television ads hammering the point home.

Example- TV Ad:

Narrator- Alaska health insurance premiums have risen 30%-80% due to Obamacare and Senator Mark Begich voted for it.

The RNC has a prime opportunity to take control of the Senate in 2014, what are they waiting for?