Showing posts with label Protecting America. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Protecting America. Show all posts

Sunday, August 01, 2010

The exquisite combination of Democrat leadership and public sector union bosses: East St. Louis police layoffs to let the criminals 'run wild'

It's happened in Oakland and in Cleveland. Now East St. Louis is paying the price for decades of unsustainable liberal policies.

Joseph Tracy said he’s tired of going to funerals. And now, he suspects he’ll be going to more of them... "It’s open field day now," said Tracy, the pastor of Straightway Baptist Church here. "The criminals are going to run wild."

Gang activity. Drug dealing. Cold-blooded killing. Tracy worries that a decision to shrink the police force by almost 30 percent will bring more of everything... The pastor voiced his concern on Friday at a raucous special City Council meeting at which East St. Louis Mayor Alvin Parks announced that the city will layoff 37 employees, including 19 of its 62 police officers, 11 firefighters, four public works employees, and three administrators. The layoffs take effect on Sunday.

Why were such dramatic steps needed? Take a guess.

City officials wanted police and fire unions to accept a furlough program that would have required employees to take two unpaid days in each twice monthly pay period. If accepted, emergency responders would have seen a pay cut of about 20 percent for the rest of the year.

Parks said the two sides couldn’t reach an agreement...

East St. Louis has been crippled by crime and poverty for decades... The police already rely on other agencies to handle some of the heavy case load. For example, the Illinois State Police routinely work on the city’s homicide investigations.

...Worries about East St. Louis’ crime rate got little sympathy from Councilman Roy Mosley, who gave a 10-minute speech on Friday blasting the city’s police officers.

"We don’t have the money," Mosley said. "You lay off when you don’t have the money. The money’s gone." ...Mosley complained that police officers take patrol cars home, park them in other jurisdictions, and misuse the city’s gasoline.

...The union plans to fight the layoffs and work to get the jobs back.

Mish puts the insanity in stark terms:

"...the union does not care how much blood is spilled as long as its senior officers get paid. Let's do the math. 19 layoffs out of a force of 62 is a massive 30+% layoff. Where is the sense of comradeship? Where is the share the pain fellowship? The union is willing to toss 30% of its membership to the dogs. That's what this has come down to."

Worse still: these are the same kind of out-of-control public sector union bosses -- like Andy Stern -- that control the White House and the Democrat Party.


The Inspired Leadership of Ohio Governor Ted Strickland (D): Federal Stimulus Dollars Went Overseas to Outsourced Call Centers

If you want another delightful example of Democrat leadership in action, please consider Ohio Governor Ted Strickland's masterful performance spending your great-grandchildrens' money.

It turns out that hundreds of thousands in federal stimulus money that was originally sent to Ohio, ended up funding overseas call centers. Foreign customer service reps were handling thousands of requests for rebates related to that delightful "cash-for-coffee-makers" program. You know, the one meant to replicate the historic success of the "cash for clunkers" program that revived the auto industry.

A Texas company hired to administer Ohio's popular appliance rebate program used hundreds of workers in El Salvador to process applications and to answer customers' calls.

...Parago Inc., based in Lewisville, Texas, never told state officials that it would handle rebates from an offshore call center, she said. But state officials never asked, either.

...Strickland, a Democrat, said Thursday the state will do a better job of vetting companies that get stimulus contracts... President Barack Obama's stimulus package gave Ohio $11 million to provide rebates to consumers who buy energy-efficient appliances, including clothes washers, dishwashers and water heaters.

...Upon learning of the El Salvador call center, Ohio officials immediately contacted Parago and asked the company to process the Ohio calls within the United States, she said... But Parago, which has no domestic call centers, had already grabbed thousands of rebate applications, and disrupting the program would have jeopardized rebates to consumers, Patt-McDaniel said.

Isn't central planning wonderful?

As an aside, Strickland faces a formidable and accomplished fiscal conservative named John Kasich, a former Congressman, this November.

In 1995, when Republicans gained the majority in the United States Congress, Kasich was selected to become Chairman of the House Budget Committee. As Chairman, Kasich worked towards balancing the Federal Budget, and was the chief architect of the Balanced Budget Act of 1997. As Chairman of the Budget Committee, Kasich presided over the only U.S. Budget Surplus since 1969.

In 1995, when Kasich assumed the position of Budget Chairman, the U.S. Federal Budget had a deficit of roughly -$163 billion, and upon the conclusion of his tenure as Budget Chairman, the U.S. Federal Budget had a surplus of roughly +$236 billion.

I know that liberals like to claim that Bill Clinton was responsible for the budget surplus -- he wasn't, of course, because who has ever heard of a Democrat trying to cut federal spending on anything besides defense? -- but the person responsible was Rep. John Kasich.

So if you've got five or ten bucks to spare, support Kasich's run against the leftist crank named Ted Strickland. Remember -- Strickland's the guy who used your family's money to staff up call centers in Latin America.

And now he claims he didn't know. Whether it was ignorance or incompetence, the end result was the same. Ted Strickland is a disaster of a governor.

Oh, and Mr. Strickland, if I may offer a word of advice: start researching outplacement services.


Saturday, July 31, 2010

Bill Balsamico: Restaurateur and Master of Political Correctness

Bill Balsamico owns the Casa D'Ice Lounge and Restaurant in North Versailles, Pennsylvania. Bill Balsamico is not the man you go to for political correctness.



Bill Balsamico is not "Papa B", but they have to be brothers from another mother.

Thursday, July 22, 2010

In which I thoroughly refudiate the progressives' hatred of Sarah Palin

Over at CNet, a progressive journalist and an eager band of sycophants reveled in a Twitter gaffe by Sarah Palin.

In order to show just how great an impact her every word can have on society, Palin has inspired a new, vibrant meme on Twitter, one that allows those who were lazy and complacent in high school to finally exercise the relics of their inner literary bent.

#ShakesPalin was spawned by a perfectly spontaneous tweet from Palin concerning the possibility of a mosque being constructed near Ground Zero. She initially tweeted that peaceful Muslims should "refudiate" such an idea.

Now, of course there's no such word as "refudiate." But you know exactly what she's getting at: the repudiation of a refusenik. Or of a refuse collector. She was clearly reaching for an expression of strong negative emotion.

Commenters were plainly entertained:

• "She is a comic, GOP her base, please go away."
• "Do you seriously not know why she keeps getting media attention? The woman is dumb as a post, but people watch stuff about her rabidly. It's all about the ratings and ad revenue. If she were anyone else, her idiocy would have relegated her to yesterday's news, but Sarah Palin is a hot commodity."
• "Please, please, please continue using her as your face and voice, GOP. We want the whole world to think "Republican" every time they see her face or hear her voice."
• "Sarah Palin is going to destroy the Republican Party yet. Morons shouldn't let morons drive."

My response was simplistic -- phrased using short words to improved the odds that leftists might understand the message.

I find it fascinating that the learned observers here pillory Palin for a verbal gaffe while the welfare state the Democrat Party has created is collapsing. That's according to their own "deficit commission".

• The New Deal, the Square Deal, the Fair Deal that created Social Security and the FHA are $45 trillion in the red and are due to collapse in six years

• "Great Society" and the endless Welfare Mentality has crushed the will of inner-city residents, locking them into a culture of dependency on government and inspiring record numbers of single-parent families

• Medicare, Medicaid and related entitlements are underfunded by roughly $50 trillion and will collapse under their own weight in less than eight years

• Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac -- the job shop for connected Democrats like Franklin Raines and Jamie Gorelick -- were protected over the last decade by Barney Frank and Chris Dodd and will now cost the taxpayer as much as $1 trillion

• A failed $1 trillion stimulus program -- guaranteed, we were told, to keep unemployment under 8% -- went primarily to union construction shops and to state public sector employees as band-aids and did more harm than good

• Adding to the massive, crushing deficits for our kids, the Obama Democrats -- ignoring the clear will of the people -- have created huge new entitlement programs in the form of "ObamaCare". This occurred despite the fact that Medicaid was designed to offer medical care to the most needy and that existing government health care programs suffer from $100 billion or more annually from fraud

* Further, the Obama Democrats are killing successful school choice/voucher programs, like the ones in DC, locking kids into the miserable, union-controlled public schools that reward tenure, not merit.

Everything this government touches has turned to crap and simply confirms the wisdom of our country's founders. They designed the Constitution to prevent federal intrusion into all of these areas. And liberal Democrats, starting with FDR, did everything they could to turn our founding document into a "living and breathing" contract.

Do you have a "living and breathing" mortgage? Do you get to change the terms of your car loan? How about other laws? Get to change those, 'cause they're living and breathing?

The modern Democrat Party is the enemy of freedom. Vote for the most conservative Republican candidates you can to prevent the collapse of this society.

It's November or never. Because the country hangs in the balance.

And that's not me saying that --- that's Obama's own deficit commission. The fuse on the time-bomb has all but burned away.

Ohhhhh, check it out -- Sarah Palin made a boo-boo!

Hat tip: Mark Levin.

Sunday, July 18, 2010

Two Photos That Illustrate the Unfettered Lunacy of the Democrat Party

Welcome to the logic of the left.



The TSA under Janet NapoliReno is busy spending hundreds of millions of the taxpayers' dollars on sophisticated full-body scanners capable of detecting weapons and explosives almost at the molecular level. Every airline passenger -- flying internationally or domestically -- will soon be subject to even more intrusive scans than the current regimen requires. No fluids. Take your shoes off. No jackets. Scan all of your bags.

And this is all hunky-dory with the left.


Yet somehow, it's controversial to demand security on our southern border as website after website documents the unchecked flow of armed illegals smuggling drugs and thousands of humans into the country each month.

Somehow that's controversial.


Idea: Mark Levin.


Friday, July 09, 2010

Martin Luther King, Jr. was a Tea Party activist -- and would reject the divisive rhetoric of Barack Obama and Eric Holder

I can say with conviction that Martin Luther King, Jr. was a Tea Party activist.

I am happy to join with you today in what will go down in history as the greatest demonstration for freedom in the history of our nation.

Five score years ago, a great American, in whose symbolic shadow we stand today, signed the Emancipation Proclamation. This momentous decree came as a great beacon light of hope to millions of Negro slaves who had been seared in the flames of withering injustice. It came as a joyous daybreak to end the long night of their captivity.

But one hundred years later, the Negro still is not free. One hundred years later, the life of the Negro is still sadly crippled by the manacles of segregation and the chains of discrimination...

In a sense we have come to our nation's capital to cash a check. When the architects of our republic wrote the magnificent words of the Constitution and the Declaration of Independence, they were signing a promissory note to which every American was to fall heir. This note was a promise that all men, yes, black men as well as white men, would be guaranteed the unalienable rights of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.

It is obvious today that America has defaulted on this promissory note insofar as her citizens of color are concerned... So we have come to cash this check — a check that will give us upon demand the riches of freedom and the security of justice.

...Now is the time to make justice a reality for all of God's children.

...But there is something that I must say to my people who stand on the warm threshold which leads into the palace of justice. In the process of gaining our rightful place we must not be guilty of wrongful deeds. Let us not seek to satisfy our thirst for freedom by drinking from the cup of bitterness and hatred.

We must forever conduct our struggle on the high plane of dignity and discipline. We must not allow our creative protest to degenerate into physical violence. Again and again we must rise to the majestic heights of meeting physical force with soul force. The marvelous new militancy which has engulfed the Negro community must not lead us to a distrust of all white people, for many of our white brothers, as evidenced by their presence here today, have come to realize that their destiny is tied up with our destiny. They have come to realize that their freedom is inextricably bound to our freedom. We cannot walk alone.

As we walk, we must make the pledge that we shall always march ahead. We cannot turn back... ...I say to you today, my friends, so even though we face the difficulties of today and tomorrow, I still have a dream. It is a dream deeply rooted in the American dream.

I have a dream that one day this nation will rise up and live out the true meaning of its creed: "We hold these truths to be self-evident: that all men are created equal."

I have a dream that one day on the red hills of Georgia the sons of former slaves and the sons of former slave owners will be able to sit down together at the table of brotherhood.

I have a dream that one day even the state of Mississippi, a state sweltering with the heat of injustice, sweltering with the heat of oppression, will be transformed into an oasis of freedom and justice.

I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character.

I have a dream today.

...I have a dream that one day every valley shall be exalted, every hill and mountain shall be made low, the rough places will be made plain, and the crooked places will be made straight, and the glory of the Lord shall be revealed, and all flesh shall see it together.

...This will be the day when all of God's children will be able to sing with a new meaning, "My country, 'tis of thee, sweet land of liberty, of thee I sing. Land where my fathers died, land of the pilgrim's pride, from every mountainside, let freedom ring."

And if America is to be a great nation this must become true. So let freedom ring from the prodigious hilltops of New Hampshire. Let freedom ring from the mighty mountains of New York. Let freedom ring from the heightening Alleghenies of Pennsylvania!

Let freedom ring from the snowcapped Rockies of Colorado!

Let freedom ring from the curvaceous slopes of California!

But not only that; let freedom ring from Stone Mountain of Georgia!

Let freedom ring from Lookout Mountain of Tennessee!

Let freedom ring from every hill and molehill of Mississippi. From every mountainside, let freedom ring.

And when this happens, when we allow freedom to ring, when we let it ring from every village and every hamlet, from every state and every city, we will be able to speed up that day when all of God's children, black men and white men, Jews and Gentiles, Protestants and Catholics, will be able to join hands and sing in the words of the old Negro spiritual, "Free at last! free at last! thank God Almighty, we are free at last!"

Martin Luther King, Jr. believed in the Constitution and the Declaration of Independence. He believed in a color-blind society.

And one other thing: Martin Luther King, Jr. was a Republican.

As all color-blind citizens of these United States are -- and must be.


The Timeless Wisdom of Bob "Sour Grapes" Inglis: Teabaggers Dividing America, Could Result in Car-Bombs and Beheadings

Congressman Bob Inglis lost his GOP primary bid in South Carolina a couple of weeks ago, guaranteeing he would not serve a seventh term. And instead of dealing with the loss in a magnanimous way, the sore loser started spewing the typical RINO crap.

NewsBusters transcribed several of his most outrageous statements, including this classic:

It's a real concern, because I think what we're doing is dividing the country into partisan camps that really look a lot like Shia and Sunni... It's very difficult to come together to find solutions.

A quick check of the records led me to the following statistics that confirm Inglis' metaphor:

  Deaths caused by Sunni-Shia sectarian violence since 2001: 11,328
  Deaths caused by conservatives defending the Constitution since 2001: 0

Good riddance, nimrod.

And should Lindsey Graham not get a six-week refresher course in the Constitution, this could be a preview of 2014's coming attractions.


Tuesday, July 06, 2010

And They Told Me Print Was Dead...

...Tell me you could resist Guns & Ammo's August 2010 banner headline:

 The .45-70 Bulldog Gatling: Hand-Cranked Hellfire 

The article's only available in the print edition for the moment, but here's a Flickr photo of the 19th-century Phalanx.

Daddy like.

Sunday, July 04, 2010

Photo: July 4th at Turner Field

Papa B emails this photo from his iPhone:



Top 3 Reasons SCOTUS Nominee Elena Kagan Must Be Filibustered

 3   She believes that the government can abitrarily ban books and movies:

Elena Kagan argued on behalf of Citizens United essentially stating it would not be a violation of the First Amendment to have movies or even books banned. Of course, she only meant certain movies/books for specific times, but even so, I believe the point remains... all tyrants find a pretext for their tyranny. That tyranny may even begin with a humble, caring act, but one day we awake to find we have lost all freedom. When it comes to our rights, the freedom of speech is not one I am willing to mess around with. I could never support a Supreme Court nominee like Elena Kagan.

 2   She does not believe in The Bill of Rights -- and, in particular, the Second Amendment:

Kagan has spent her professional career implementing anti-gun initiatives as a clerk to Justice Thurgood Marshall, as counsel for the Clinton Administration and as President Obama’s Solicitor General. Furthermore, Kagan’s testimony before the Senate Judiciary Committee confirms a hostility to the idea that the 2nd Amendment is an individual right of all Americans incorporated against state action restricting that right. The fact of the matter is that Elena Kagan will vote to uphold every local, state and federal restriction of the right of Americans to 'keep and bear Arms...'

...When Kagan served the Clinton Administration, she showed a strong hostility to gun rights. The L.A. Times reported on may 11th of this year that Kagan “drafted an executive order restricting the importation of certain semiautomatic assault rifles.” Kagan’s political activism in implementing a gun control agenda was a political act, yet this nominee has yet to explain her constitutional justification for that executive order.

 1   She believes the federal government has unlimited, tyrannical power over the individual:

On Tuesday evening, Senator Tom Coburn (R-Okla.) posed a hypothetical question to Supreme Court nominee Elena Kagan: If Congress passed a law that said Americans "have to eat three vegetables and three fruits, every day ... does that violate the Commerce Clause?"

"Sounds like a dumb law," Kagan replied.

"Yeah, I got one that's real similar to it that I think is equally dumb," Coburn shot back, referring to Obamacare's mandate requiring individuals to buy health insurance. "I'm not going to mention which one it is."

Kagan wouldn't say whether or not she believes the Commerce Clause allows the federal government to pass a law requiring Americans to eat fruits and vegetables.

* * * * * * * * *

Banning books. Rejecting our God-given right to self-defense. Authorizing the federal government to mandate what you can eat.

If our nation's founders could see how close this woman is to a lifetime role on the Supreme Court, they would weep.

What can you do? For starters, call Lindsey Graham's office (in fact, call all six of his offices) and politely but firmly describe to his staffers the three reasons Kagan must be blocked. Ask for their email addresses and send them a link to this post. Ask for a commitment that Graham do everything in his power to block Kagan. Then call the rest of the Republicans on the Senate Judiciary Committee.

Her complete rejection of the Declaration and Constitution unquestionably disqualify her from a lifetime appointment to the nation's highest court.


Friday, July 02, 2010

Pure Karma: Steele calls it 'a war of Obama's choosing'

Boy Moto offers a different take on Michael Steele's controversial remarks on Afghanistan. And, indeed, it warrants analysis:

Some have overtly treated Michael Steele with hostility, with many frustrated conservatives expressing disagreement with some of his more controversial and tenuous remarks.

While he is far from perfect, removing him could be more destructive -- and rather pointless to boot.

However, give credit where credit is due. This is golden irony offered from Mr. Steele. He is absolutely on target with this offering, (even if I personally disagree with any conception, suggesting the U.S. cannot win 'again' in Afghanistan):

"Keep in mind again, federal candidates, this was a war of Obama's choosing. This was not something that the United States had actively prosecuted or wanted to engage in," he said. "But it was the president who was trying to be cute by half by building a script demonizing Iraq, while saying the battle really should be in Afghanistan. Well, if he is such a student of history, has he not understood that you know that's the one thing you don't do, is engage in a land war in Afghanistan?"

The other day, we watched an utterly dishonest Mr. Obama offering numerous lies on many subjects.

Perhaps his biggest fabrication is the subtle implication that his administration holds some responsibility for the finished job in Iraq. Of course, that is utter nonsense. It should not only be ridiculed -- but highlighted -- as another example of Obama's gargantuan dishonesty. We all know, had Obama succeeded in his Senatorial agenda, that we would have a humanitarian disaster on our hands in Iraq.

Few seem to note that the jihadists had their asses kicked in Iraq, and predictably have reformulated along the Pakistani-Afghan border in order to recover some semblance of order.

Mr. Steele, however, turns the tables quite nicely here. He could even have asked, what happened to the Obama Doctrine? The one that declares the U.S. should not "meddle" in the affairs of others?

The Democrats' cheap, dishonest and ugly rhetoric, designed solely to gain power, debased an admirable mission in Iraq (which they overwhelmingly voted for -- including Clinton and Biden). With an honest media, their turncoat mantra would have been laughable; certainly it was unserious. Obama personally advocated a sophomoric concept suggesting this Global War on Terrorism Man-Made Disasters need only occur in one place: Afghanistan. It is actually quite possible, Steele implies, that then-candidate Obama could have encouraged the radical Muslim militants to see Afghanistan at the front line, once again.

Of course, the McCain campaign never bothered to challenge the provinicial offering from candidate Obama. The Illinois Senator had advocated some sort of delusional isolationist folly in which freedom and Democracy meant nothing.

McCain could have turned the tables, as Mr. Steele did, with the simplistic challenge: "I am surprised Mr. Obama does not seem to care about the millions of formerly oppressed human beings in Iraq... the rape rooms, torture, millions of murders and utter depravity."


Thursday, July 01, 2010

Cincinnati Tea Party Founder Mike Wilson Puts His Career On Hold To Run Against Leftist Crackpot Connie Pillich

Correspondent Amalaur filed this report from the heart of Tea Party country in southwestern Ohio.

Cincinnati Tea Party founder Mike Wilson is a patriot. He left a successful IT career to try and make a difference in Ohio... and is running for Ohio House District 28.

Unsurprisingly, he won the Republican nomination through name recognition alone (getting good coverage on Instapundit never hurts).

But the general election will be considerably tougher. As was the case in 2008, the radical Marxist crackpot Connie Pillich (I hear that's the phraseology she prefers) will be his opponent. Supported by union bosses and willing to spend taxpayers' money until the next seven or eight generations are broke, Pillich is about as radical a leftist as Ohio has ever seen from a major political party.

To give you an example, Ohio's budget deficit will soon approach $10 billion. So what's The Pillich Plan™?

Why, spend billions more, of course! She favors the incredibly practical Ohio light rail system that will cost taxpayers heaven knows how much -- say a billion or more before it's all said and done -- and, by golly, it could attract well over two dozen riders!

Say, but doesn't Shelbyville have a monorail system? Well, dammit, we need one too!.

But I digress. Tonight Wilson held a fundraiser at Doctor Jay's house, one in a series of events to face off on TV with the unions who are backing Pillich (if you've got a few spare bucks, click here to help get the message out).

His speech was a great one and, while this is not a perfect transcript, should reflect his words pretty well. Note: I did not see any teleprompters in the room.

I can't overstate the importance of this race... this time, we're really at a crossroad. I honestly believe it's one of the most important elections in our lifetime. We are standing at the edge of a cliff and the consequences of stepping off are dire. Do we want to be like lemmings?

We have a clear choice this time, and we can't always say that. At the federal level, the legacy of debt we're leaving is truly immoral. At the state leve, it's the same. We have enormous deficits... roughly an $8 billion budget deficit.

The good news is that our state constitution mandates a balanced budget. Unlike the federal government, we can't print money.

You know what the business climate is like at the state level. In 1970, Ohio was 5th in business climate. In 2010, Ohio is at 47th. We've lost 410,000 jobs under Governor Strickland.

We have a choice as to how we fix this. We can embrace the free market and reject socialism, or we can continue on the path of high taxes and millions of pages of regulations.

Unlike my opponent, I've signed the Americans for Tax Reform tax pledge. I will not vote for a tax increase in the legislature. My opponent [Connie Pillich] and Gov. Strickland have already voted to increase taxes.

The $8 billion deficit was not unanticipated. We took $6 billion from stimulus funds... we stole the rainy day fund... and added a retroactive tax increase going back to the first of the year. My opponent [Pillich] already said we don't have control over what we spend. Then why are we electing you? Leave office and we can save your salary!

Ohio needs a 4% sales tax increase to close the budget.

Bottom line: we're going to drop from 47th, because New Jersey elected Chris Christie. Christie rejected calls for more spending and cut spending instead. He fought the unions. He stuck to his principles. It's common sense. It's not that hard.

...We have some tough decisions to make to get the state budget back under control. We need worker's comp reform. As for right-to-work legislation, I am not an anti-union guy. But at the same time, some unions are out defending the indefensible. Throughout our history, they've protected workers. But workers have the right to join... so why should we live in a state where you're forced to join a union?

...Consider that Oklahoma has 4% unemployment, low taxes, lower regulation... Nebraska's unemployment is 5%, Utah 6%, Texas 7.5%.

The high-tax, high-regulation states are dying: Ohio with high unemployment, Michigan 17%, California 15%, New York 13%. We know what works and what doesn't.

In my race, we have an opportunity to take back my seat as a conservative Republican. The most important vote I'll cast is for House Speaker. In Congress, Steve Driehaus voted for Nancy Pelosi as Speaker. Connie Pillich voted for the most liberal Speaker in Ohio history.

If we get Kasich elected along with a few conservatives, we can make a difference. Rahm Emanuel said, "Never let a crisis go to waste". We can change the momentum in Ohio. All of you being here recognize that and together we can make a difference.

My opponent will spend half a million on this race. She has the unions' money. I have you. And I'm telling you right now that we're going to win this race [applause].

They've got half a million dollars to spend saying that I'm a racist extremist. I have you to tell people the truth about me.

But, as you're well aware, this isn't about me. I've got three kids: 10, 8 and one about to turn 6. This is about their future. I've got a great career in IT. But although I don't need this, they need this...

...We have a chance to course-correct from socialism to the free-market. It's important that we do this now. Thank you for your support, both financial and in terms of getting the word out.

As the founder of one of the first and strongest Tea Party activist groups in the U.S., Wilson is a grass-roots organizer of the first order and one who deserves conservatives' support.


Wednesday, June 30, 2010

Oops! 2002 Document: In Case of Spill, Thad Allen Indicated That Coast Guard Incident Commander (Future Thad Allen) Should Waive Jones Act

USCG Admiral Thad Allen has spent a lot of time of late in front of the television cameras after the White House realized he made a much better face-man than, say, Janet Napolitano (oops -- did I say that out loud?).

 

 

Perhaps some of this time would have been better spent in front of a web browser, where he might have Googled his own 2002 recommendations from the 2002 International Oil Spill Conference (PDF).

Among the national issues identified back in the days of the evil Emperor Chimpy McBushitlerburton was this gem:

Put simply, this document summarizes the '2002 Spill of National Significance Exercise' in -- you guessed it -- the Gulf of Mexico.

A certain Vice Admiral by the name of, uhm, Thad Allen was in command of the entire region.

On page 3 of the document, a process to instantly waive The Jones Act was put in place.

The responsible party (steward) of the process is the United States Coast Guard (USCG).

MARAD (the United States Maritime Administration, responsible for naval defense readiness reserve) and Customs are also involved in vetting the waiver.

In short, Admiral Thad Allen should have instantly requested a waiver of the Jones Act, according to his own 2002 spill response exercise. In fact, the exercise that he helped spearhead identified it as a key -- key! -- issue.

Why isn't this a scandal?

And why is legacy media asleep at the wheel as we near day 73 of the worst maritime environmental disaster in American history? Could it be that President Not-Bush is in office?


Hat tip: CD.

Monday, June 28, 2010

An open letter to Republican members of the Senate Judiciary Committee

Republican Members of the Senate Judiciary Committee,

Pursuant to the Elena Kagan confirmation process, I would like to call your attention to a little-known fact related to the role of the minority party on the committee. That is, Rule IV of the Judiciary Committee states that "at least one member of the minority party must vote to end debate in committee."

For Elena Kagan to move to a vote in the Senate, at least one Republican on your committee must accede to end debate. I suggest you hold firm and refuse to end debate.

This Democrat-controlled Congress and this Democrat President have declared war on the American people. Against the clear wishes of the people:

• they have passed a multi-trillion dollar bonanza of federal spending aimed at saving government, not private sector jobs, thereby rewarding their union supporters at the expense of subsequent generations;

• they have rammed through, without a single Republican vote, a brand new entitlement program -- socialized medicine -- when the country can least afford its existing entitlements;

• they are attempting to use unaccountable bureaucracies like the EPA to levy crushing new energy taxes, which will allow an unelected, fourth branch of government to completely control industrial policy;

• they aim to jam through thousands of pages of financial regulation that not a single representative has read, the effects of which cannot be predicted, and that doesn't address the root cause of the economic meltdown: the government-sponsored entities Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac;

This egregious band of career, Leftist politicians have made a mockery of representative government because, even as the American people prepare to boot them out of office in November, they plot to defy the will of the people.

In a set of moves unprecedented in American history, Democrats intend to use the lame-duck session combined with budget reconciliation to do what the American people have rejected. They intend to pass their radical agenda despite what 75-80% of the American people want. They intend to flip off the citizenry, bypass the filibuster and violate their oaths to uphold the Constitution.

This band of Statists has declared war on the GOP and the American people.

It's time to stop playing patsy and refuse to vote Kagan or any other non-originalist nominee out of commitee.

Stonewall everything.

They've Pearl Harbored the American people enough. It's time for our Midway.


Paging Jonathan Alter--Joint Chiefs Chairman Slams Obama's Insane Spending: Says Nation’s Debt is Biggest Threat to National Security

Paging Mr. Alter... Mr. Alter... It's time for you to unleash your dogs of demagoguery...

Another member of the military's top brass has roundly criticized the President and the Democrat-controlled Congress; in this case, pointing to their catastrophic levels of deficit spending. Little-publicized were last week's comments by Admiral Mike Mullen, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs, at a breakfast hosted by The Hill newspaper.

Adm. Mike Mullen... renewed his warning that the nation’s debt is the biggest threat to U.S. national security.

“I was shown the figures the other day by the comptroller of the Pentagon that said that the interest on our debt is $571 billion in 2012,” Mullen said at a breakfast hosted by The Hill. “That is, noticeably, about the size of the defense budget. It is not sustainable.”

Even under the rosy projections of the Obama White House, which thus far have proven to be worse than if you'd used a dartboard, the deficit is dangerously high.


The Obama/Democrat budget doesn't contemplate closing the deficit for as far as the eye can see.


Despite the utter failure of every spending program they've tried -- starting with the $860 billion "Stimulus" package -- the Democrats continue to shovel the taxpayers' hard-earned dollars into their cash furnace.


Worse still, they are creating deficits that endanger the ability of the country to survive: not simply from a national security perspective, but from the standpoint of risking a total economic collapse.


What happens when our interest costs become unsustainable? Barack Obama and his left wing sycophants in Congress will be long gone, having left their legacy of misery and destruction to our heirs.

Perhaps the laughingstock of a "journalist" -- Newsweek's Jonathan Alter -- can co-author another hit piece with David Axelrod similar to the one that took out General McChrystal.

Odds are Alter can get Mullen fired for the same offense -- for telling the truth.