Sunday, September 15, 2013

A Boston Cabbie's Rant

Captured to the best of my ability, verbatim, as I was driven to the airport


You see this? [Taps device on windshield]

This is a Fast-Pass. People can get one for free here, and they still don't. Instead they fumble with cash, tie up traffic.

You know even if I have a one-way fare, drop you off at the airport and come back empty, I still pay five backs. There's an airport fee, a tunnel fee, whatever.

It's like $8.50 if I have a fare. They always get you coming and going in this state.

You shoulda seen a few years ago, the scandal they uncovered with the toll collectors. A lot of the tolls were still paid in cash then.

So they arrested maybe 20 toll collectors. Check this out: they were pocketing hundreds of dollars every hour.

Do the math: everyone of 'em was pocketing hundreds of dollars an hour, $10 thousand or more a day, upwards of $300 thousand a month... $3 million a year. $3 million a year! Each one of 'em.

Guess what, the fix musta been in, 'cause they got charged with misdeameanors. They said, oh, he only stole $30 or 40 bucks. No one ever heard what happened to most of 'em. Probably retired now with a full pension.

Speaking of pensions: you should see what the state troopers are doing here. Let's say you're a state trooper, you pull down $88 grand a year. Your pension is based on your top three earning years, so they'll make sure to get plenty of overtime.

Cops got an easy way to make overtime here. We're the only state in the union that requires every road construction site, no matter how small, got a cop present. Now I see lotsa sites have two cops. Guess what, with two cops, union rules say you gotta have a "site manager", so there's three cops. All that for a piece of road that just got dug up last year and they dig it up again.

I see it over and over again in downtown Boston. They dig up a road, fix something, pave it all up nice and pretty... and six months later they got the same piece of road all dug up again. They say something else broke or they forgot something. Guaranteed there's some kinda scam going on with these guys, there always is here.

Anyhow, back to the state trooper pensions. These guys cram as much OT as they can in before they retire. And they can retire at 52 years old! 52! Can you believe it?

So we have state troopers retiring at age 52 with $180,000-a-year lifetime pensions!

And then they get government jobs and continue working. They got a word for that in the papers here, double-dipping, but no one ever does anything about it. So they're getting $180 grand pensions, maybe an $80 grand salary from another government job, and they get another pension! The things I seen here, you wouldn't believe.

Everything is so corrupt. Something's gotta give.

Right over there [points to overpass]... not too long ago, some lady was drunk driving, drove right off that overpass, stops up traffic for a whole day. Well, they search her purse since she's driving drunk.

She's got, I don't know, four-five EBT cards? You know, the welfare cards.

She's got one card that says "Teresa Gomez", another says "Teresa L. Gomez", another with "T.L. Gomez", and so on. That's not her name, I forgot the real name.

Well, it turns out the state admits there's 24,000 EBT cards with people they can't locate. 24,000! It's costing taxpayers millions in dollars for these welfare scams that people are abusing.

They have stories in the paper about people bringing plastic containers into grocery stores, using 10 or 11 EBT cards, filling up as many containers as they can, shipping the containers of food to their home countries. Maybe Dominican Republic, where they can't get these kinds of cereal or what-not.

Well, the people in the foreign countries sell the stuff and split the money with the person who shipped it here.

All paid for with EBT fraud, WIC fraud, you name it.

I don't see things changing for a while. 9 out of 10 people ain't payin' attention.

Take Mitt Romney, he was a heckuva governor. Every good idea he had to get government working better, the Democrats blocked. Every single one, and he still had a great record. For four years, he never even drew a salary. Not a single dollar.

If a Democrat had served as governor and never taken a salary, the media woulda been blaring that day in and day out.

But with Romney, he's a Mormon. He's this or that. Greedy. Whatever. Mormon or not, I got news for you about the guy in the White House.

He's a Moslem. Look it up, he puts these Moslem Brotherhood guys in all these key positions. Moslem Brotherhood! These are the worst of the worst terrorist types.

I don't believe there's anything like a moderate Moslem. I was here for the Boston Marathon bombing, was right nearby.

There was blood everywhere. Everywhere. Blood on the street with arms and legs blowed off.

I'm a cab driver, believe me, I know Moslems. Most cab drivers around here are Moslems. We gotta wait to use the bathroom so they can wash their feet. They bend backwards to make sure the Moslems got everything they need and the rest of us get treated like dirt.

Never seen a moderate Moslem.

Tell you what, during the Iraq War, if an American chopper got shot down, I'd see these guys high-fiving. They'd be laughing it up, celebrating if Americans got killed. They work here but they hate America, they really do.

Look at that car what got booted.

They torture the working people in this city, they really do.

8am I'm driving around, the working people are all up and going to work.

9am, 9:30am - the freeloaders are sitting on their stoops, drinking and smoking cigarettes, yucking it up, living off the working people.

If you have a car in this city, oh boy, do they torture you. They'll ticket you for no reason, even if you have a parking pass.

They got a meter maid on every corner, it's even worse now with the police contract coming up for negotiation. The last mayor [Menino] left that timebomb waiting. They didn't ever get a contract with the police done over the last three years or so. There's a mayor election in a few weeks and whoever wins has one hell of a problem with that police contract.

Any way, now that the contract is around the corner, they have meter maids everywhere. Everywhere. You park anywhere, it seems like, even legally, and "bam" you got a ticket. The worst thing is, someone else with a car will take the ticket off your windshield, put in on their windshield to protect themselves from getting a ticket!

So now you don't know you got a ticket! Guess what: that happens three times and "bam", you got a boot on your car. Now you're really screwed.

You know what getting a boot off costs? $600 bucks. There's a boot installation fee and a boot removal fee.

And if you got a piece o' crap car: don't even think about abandoning your vehicle. After it's there a while, you get his with a $500 "Abandonment Fee".

There's no way to win around here.

The whole city's corrupt, it's infested with corruption, it's everywhere.

Someday the working people of the city are gonna wake up, because 90 percent of them are asleep right now. But someday they're gonna wake up, they'll have had enough, and then there might be some change.

But right now, this city's headed into the crapper. They say it's a bustling busy city. Well, I've been here for 60 years, and the fraud and corruption keeps getting worse. And at some point, it's gotta end, because there just ain't enough money to keep paying for all of these scams they're running.


Thanks to Cabbie X for the conversation.

Larwyn's Linx: Why is Pete Sessions (R-TX) Blocking a Select Committee on Benghazi?

Send us tips! Bloggers: install a Larwyn's Linx widget. Get real-time news, 24/7, at BadBlue.

Nation

Why is Pete Sessions (R-RX) Blocking a Select Committee on Benghazi?: Jawa
Feds Want Your ‘Social and Behavioral’ Data in Health Records: WFB
E-ZPasses Get Read All Over New York (Not Just At Toll Booths): Instapundit

Oh Look, More Deflection (Benghazi): Karl Denninger
Bikers Get A Blogger: Time to Ride to Albany: MagNote
FISA Court: Snowden Leak Prompted “Considerable Public Interest": FAS

Benghazi House Select Committee Holdouts: Shoebat
Federal workers want everyone on Obamacare except… federal workers: Jazz Shaw
The Many Imaginary Adventures of Cory Booker!: Morlock

Economy

No Obamacare exemptions for Big Labor? We’ll see: Michelle Malkin
California to Grant Drivers Licenses to Illegal Immigrants: Tim Brown
Police Chief Suspended for Meeting With Sheriff Joe on His Own Time: MB

Scandal Central

Muslim Brotherhood supporter gets Homeland Security promotion: BPR
Walid Shoebat: Obama admin HARASSING, SPYING on him: Scoop
Mourning Christian Woman in Syria: ‘We Blame Obama': Nice Deb

Climate & Energy

New IPCC Report Eases Global Warming Prediction: Rick Moran

Media

‘Gosh, Stacy, There’s No Way @Twitter Could Spot All These Fake Accounts’: R. S. McCain
Kate Mulvey, You're Single at 50 Because You're a Jerk: AWD
The Mainstream Media Cannot Ignore Mark Levin Forever: Jewish Voice

‘Pardon the Interruption’: Check out who’s joining Obama on the golf course: Twitchy
Pirro Torches Obama, says he was played by Putin and 2016 can’t get here fast enough: Scoop
Liberal Group Makes the Case Against Obamacare: Foundry

World

Put Vladimir Putin’s name in the Little Book.: Moe Lane
This Week’s Presidential Tracking Poll: MOTUS
Dare To Question Argentina's Inflation Data, Prepare To Go To Jail: ZH

Sci-Tech

Two Birmingham Men Arrested by UK's New Intellectual Property Crime Unit: Slashdot
Twitter’s Private Filing Signals New Wave of Secrecy: Mashable
Tracking the fortunes reaped by the bankers who tanked the economy: Cory Doctorow

Cornucopia

Documents Prove That Homeland Security Is Being Armed By US Military: PrepperPodcast
Floyd Mayweather defeats Canelo Alvarez with majority decision: Mitch Abramson
DeLoreans getting 'Back to the Future' makeovers: AP

Image: BKeyser
Today's Larwyn's Linx sponsored by: MAKE THE CALL: Demand John Boehner Defund Obamacare!

QOTD: "I think we have more machinery of government than is necessary, too many parasites living on the labor of the industrious." --Thomas Jefferson

Saturday, September 14, 2013

IRS HITMAN LOIS LERNER LIED: Emails Prove She Targeted "Dangerous" Tea Party Groups

Guest post by Investor's Business Daily


Politics: New emails show that the woman at the center of the IRS scandal over special scrutiny of conservative groups' applications for tax-exempt status targeted tea party applications specifically and directed they be held up.

While a possible "wag the dog" attack on Syria and other "phony" scandals like Benghazi have grabbed the headlines, Congress has continued its investigation into the Obama administration's targeting of tea party groups that sprang up in opposition to ObamaCare by the agency charged with enforcing it, the Internal Revenue Service.

In case anyone forgot, Lois Lerner, former head of the Exempt Organizations office of the IRS, who invoked her Fifth Amendment rights rather than tell what she did and knew about the targeting of tea party and other conservative groups, is still being paid with your tax dollars while on "administrative leave."

Yet another reason for her silence has been unearthed by a 2011 email released by the House Ways and Means Committee in which the woman who claimed she had done nothing wrong admitted that the tea party was not only targeted, but targeted at her direction, in response to the Citizens United case that so outraged President Obama because it reaffirmed the free-speech rights of those who oppose him.

In the February 2011 email, Lerner advised her staff — including then-Exempt Organizations Technical Manager Michael Seto and then-Rulings and Agreements director Holly Paz — that a tea party matter is "very dangerous" and something "Counsel and (Lerner adviser) Judy Kindell need to be in on." Lerner added: "Cincy should probably NOT have these cases."

MARK LEVIN: My Answer to Harry Reid's Claim That Conservatives and Tea Party Activists Are 'Anarchists'

Guest post by Mark Levin


Tyranny, broadly defined, is the use of power to dehumanize the individual and delegitimize his nature. Political utopianism is tyranny disguised as a desirable, workable, and even paradisiacal governing ideology.

Plato’s Republic, More’s Utopia, Hobbes’s Leviathan, and Marx’s workers’ paradise are utopias that are anti-individual and anti-individualism. For the utopians, modern and olden, the individual is one-dimensional—selfish. On his own, he has little moral value. Contrarily, authoritarianism is defended as altruistic and masterminds as socially conscious. Thus endless interventions in the individual’s life and manipulation of his conditions are justified as not only necessary and desirable but noble governmental pursuits. This false dialectic is at the heart of the problem we face today.

In truth, man is naturally independent and self-reliant, which are attributes that contribute to his own well-being and survival, and the well-being and survival of a civil society. He is also a social being who is charitable and compassionate. History abounds with examples, as do the daily lives of individuals. To condemn individualism as the utopians do is to condemn the very foundation of the civil society and the American founding and endorse, wittingly or unwittingly, oppression. Karl Popper saw it as an attack on Western civilization. “The emancipation of the individual was indeed the great spiritual revolution which had led to the breakdown of tribalism and to the rise of democracy.” Moreover, Judaism and Christianity, among other religions, teach the altruism of the individual.

Of course, this is not to defend anarchy. Quite the opposite. It is to endorse the magnificence of the American founding. The American founding was an exceptional exercise in collective human virtue and wisdom—a culmination of thousands of years of experience, knowledge, reason, and faith. The Declaration of Independence is a remarkable societal proclamation of human rights, brilliant in its insight, clarity, and conciseness. The Constitution of the United States is an extraordinary matrix of governmental limits, checks, balances, and divisions, intended to secure for posterity the individual’s sovereignty as proclaimed in the Declaration.

This is the grand heritage to which every American citizen is born. It has been characterized as “the American Dream,” “the American experiment,” and “American exceptionalism.” The country has been called “the Land of Opportunity,” “the Land of Milk and Honey,” and “a Shining City on a Hill.” It seems unimaginable that a people so endowed by Providence, and the beneficiaries of such unparalleled human excellence, would choose or tolerate a course that ensures their own decline and enslavement, for a government unleashed on the civil society is a government that destroys the nature of man.

On September 17, 1787, at the conclusion of the Constitutional Convention in Philadelphia, Delegate James Wilson, on behalf of his ailing colleague from Pennsylvania, Benjamin Franklin, read aloud Franklin’s speech to the convention in favor of adopting the Constitution. Among other things, Franklin said that the Constitution “is likely to be well administered for a Course of Years, and can only end in Despotism as other Forms have done before it, when the People shall become corrupt as to need Despotic Government, being incapable of any other. . . .”

Have we “become corrupt”? Are we in need of “despotic government”? It appears that some modern-day “leading lights” think so, as they press their fanatical utopianism. For example, Richard Stengel, managing editor of Time magazine, considers the Constitution a utopian expedient. He wrote, “If the Constitution was intended to limit the federal government, it sure doesn’t say so. . . . The framers weren’t afraid of a little messiness. Which is another reason we shouldn’t be so delicate about changing the Constitution or reinterpreting it.” It is beyond dispute that the Framers sought to limit the scope of federal power and that the Constitution does so. Moreover, constitutional change was not left to the masterminds but deliberately made difficult to ensure the broad participation and consent of the body politic.

Richard Cohen, a columnist for the Washington Post, explained that the Constitution is an amazing document, as long as it is mostly ignored, particularly the limits it imposes on the federal government. He wrote, “This fatuous infatuation with the Constitution, particularly the 10th Amendment, is clearly the work of witches, wiccans, and wackos. It has nothing to do with America’s real problems and, if taken too seriously, would cause an economic and political calamity. The Constitution is a wonderful document, quite miraculous actually, but only because it has been wisely adapted to changing times. To adhere to the very word of its every clause hardly is respectful to the Founding Fathers. They were revolutionaries who embraced change. That’s how we got here.” Of course, without the promise of the Tenth Amendment, the Constitution would not have been ratified, since the states insisted on retaining most of their sovereignty. Furthermore, the Framers clearly did not embrace the utopian change demanded by its modern adherents.

Lest we ignore history, the no-less-eminent American revolutionary and founder Thomas Jefferson explained, “On every question of construction, carry ourselves back to the time when the constitution was adopted, recollect the spirit manifested in the debates, and instead of trying what meaning may be squeezed out of the text, or invented against it, conform to the probable one in which it was passed.”

Thomas L. Friedman, a columnist for the New York Times and three-time Pulitzer Prize recipient, is even more forthright in his dismissal of constitutional republicanism and advocacy for utopian tyranny. Complaining of the slowness of American society in adopting sweeping utopian policies, he wrote, “There is only one thing worse than one-party autocracy, and that is one-party democracy, which is what we have in America today. One-party autocracy certainly has its drawbacks. But when it is led by a reasonably enlightened group of people, as China is today, it can also have great advantages. That one party can just impose the politically difficult but critically important policies needed to move a society forward in the 21st century.”

Of course, China remains a police state, where civil liberties are nonexistent, despite its experiment with government-managed pseudo-capitalism. Friedman’s declaration underscores not only the necessary intolerance utopians have for constitutionalism, but their infatuation with totalitarianism.

It is neither prudential nor virtuous to downplay or dismiss the obvious—that America has already transformed into Ameritopia. The centralization and consolidation of power in a political class that insulates its agenda in entrenched experts and administrators, whose authority is also self-perpetuating, is apparent all around us and growing more formidable. The issue is whether the ongoing transformation can be restrained and then reversed, or whether it will continue with increasing zeal, passing from a soft tyranny to something more oppressive. Hayek observed that “priding itself on having built its world as if it had designed it, and blaming itself for not having designed it better, humankind is now to set out to do just that. The aim . . . is no less than to effect a complete redesigning of our traditional morals, law, and language, and on this basis to stamp out the older order and supposedly inexorable, unjustifiable conditions that prevent the institution of reason, fulfillment, true freedom, and justice.” But the outcome of this adventurism, if not effectively stunted, is not in doubt.

In the end, can mankind stave off the powerful and dark forces of utopian tyranny? While John Locke was surely right about man’s nature and the civil society, he was also right about that which threatens them. Locke, Montesquieu, many of the philosophers of the European Enlightenment, and the Founders, among others, knew that the history of organized government is mostly a history of a relative few and perfidious men co-opting, coercing, and eventually repressing the many through the centralization and consolidation of authority.

Ironically and tragically, it seems that liberty and the constitution established to preserve it are not only essential to the individual’s well-being and happiness, but also an opportunity for the devious to exploit them and connive against them. Man has yet to devise a lasting institutional answer to this puzzle. The best that can be said is that all that really stands between the individual and tyranny is a resolute and sober people. It is the people, after all, around whom the civil society has grown and governmental institutions have been established. At last, the people are responsible for upholding the civil society and republican government, to which their fate is moored.

The essential question is whether, in America, the people’s psychology has been so successfully warped, the individual’s spirit so thoroughly trounced, and the civil society’s institutions so effectively overwhelmed that revival is possible. Have too many among us already surrendered or been conquered? Can the people overcome the constant and relentless influences of ideological indoctrination, economic manipulation, and administrative coerciveness, or have they become hopelessly entangled in and dependent on a ubiquitous federal government? Have the Pavlovian appeals to radical egalitarianism, and the fomenting of jealousy and faction through class warfare and collectivism, conditioned the people to accept or even demand compulsory uniformity as just and righteous? Is it accepted as legitimate and routine that the government has sufficient license to act whenever it claims to do so for the good of the people and against the selfishness of the individual?

No society is guaranteed perpetual existence. But I have to believe that the American people are not ready for servitude, for if this is our destiny, and the destiny of our children, I cannot conceive that any people, now or in the future, will successfully resist it for long. I have to believe that this generation of Americans will not condemn future generations to centuries of misery and darkness.

The Tea Party movement is a hopeful sign. Its members come from all walks of life and every corner of the country. These citizens have the spirit and enthusiasm of the Founding Fathers, proclaim the principles of individual liberty and rights in the Declaration, and insist on the federal government’s compliance with the Constitution’s limits. This explains the utopian fury against them. They are astutely aware of the peril of the moment. But there are also the Pollyannas and blissfully indifferent citizens who must be roused and enlisted lest the civil society continue to unravel and eventually dissolve, and the despotism long feared take firm hold.

Upon taking the oath of office on January 20, 1981, in his first inaugural address President Ronald Reagan told the American people:

If we look to the answer as to why for so many years we achieved so much, prospered as no other people on earth, it was because here in this land we unleashed the energy and individual genius of man to a greater extent than has ever been done before. Freedom and the dignity of the individual have been more available and assured here than in any other place on earth. The price for this freedom at times has been high, but we have never been unwilling to pay that price. It is no coincidence that our present troubles parallel and are proportionate to the intervention and intrusion in our lives that result from unnecessary and excessive growth of government. It is time for us to realize that we are too great a nation to limit ourselves to small dreams. We’re not, as some would have us believe, doomed to an inevitable decline. I do not believe in a fate that will fall on us no matter what we do. I do believe in a fate that will fall on us if we do nothing.


Read more in Ameritopia, by Mark Levin

Larwyn's Linx: A Real Vote to Defund Obamacare

Send us tips! Bloggers: install a Larwyn's Linx widget. Get real-time news, 24/7, at BadBlue.

Nation

A Real Vote to Defund Obamacare: Amy Payne, Foundry
Obama's Insane Clown Posse: Blasted Fools
20 million illegals in US, say former border patrol officers: DC

Federal Government's War On God Continues: Nice Deb
Jim DeMint Schools Putin on American Exceptionalism: Matthew Burke
5 Americans Who Were Murdered For Being White: John Hawkins

All your private data are belong to…ehh, whoever: Cold Fury
Forty-three House Republicans back bill to defund ObamaCare: Elise Viebeck
Notes Made on 9/11/2001 from Brooklyn Heights: American Digest

Economy

CPFB seeks to monitor 80% of U.S. credit cards: Exam
People Leaving Missouri and Millions of Dollars With Them: Duane Lester
Amnesty Might Make Sense If Illegals Couldn't Get Welfare: AmmoLand

“Indiana case may become Big Labor’s newest weapon”: Protein Wisdom
Santelli Rants Against The Intellectual Arrogance Of The "Intellectuals": ZH
More than 400 Union Officials Made Over $250K in 2012: WFB

Far-Right Religious Extremists Attack Public Education: R.S. McCain
(Legally) Burn Them All To The Ground: Karl Denninger
India Housing Bubble Bursts; Panic Coming Next: Mish

Scandal Central

TSA Agent Arrested for Smuggling Illegal Aliens: WFB
Donations to Boehner Questioned by FEC: Sabrina Eaton, Plain Dealer
Social Security's $1.3 billion in overpayments: Blake Ellis, CNN

Climate & Energy

EPA Offering Teachers “Free Lesson Plans” On Global Warming: WZ
Met Office: Hey, Did We Mention That One Year Of Arctic Cooling Isn’t Significant?: RWN
Study: 114 Out Of 117 Global Warming Predictions Wrong: Blurbrain

Media

Rick Stengel Is at Least the 21st Journalist to Work for the Obama Administration: Elspeth Reeve
How a False Narrative Led to the Dodd-Frank Act: John Tamny
Recalled Colorado Senator gets shut down by CNN host for blaming ‘voter suppression’: Scoop

“Fascist” Sen. Feinstein Wants to Regulate the 1st Amendment: GWP
Washington Post: Obama Isn’t A Catasrophic Mess, This Is All Standard Negotiation On Syria: RWN
Glenn Beck asks: ‘Where are the anti-war people?’: Twitchy

World

Another Message From Bill Brown #2MBikersToSaveAmerica: Zilla
Dangerous Times: Putin the Peacemaker vs. Obama the Warmonger: James Lewis
Gene Simmons Defends Tebow: ‘If he was wearing a burqa, they wouldn’t dare say anything’: BPR

One Other Troubling Thing About the Muslim Poem Replacing The Pledge of Allegiance: Aaron Goldstein
Breaking: Is U.S. Government Harassing Walid Shoebat?: Shoebat
Army vet sues Michigan for rejecting his "Infidel" license plate as "offensive": JihadWatch

Sci-Tech

What if Marissa Mayer went to jail?: I, Cringely
Google swaps out MySQL, moves to MariaDB: Jack Clark, The Register
Twitter Announces It Filed For IPO Via Tweet: ABC

Cornucopia

Keep Scrolling: C&S
Sarah Says...: iOTW
Justin Bieber to Join Ben Affleck in ‘Batman vs. Superman’… as Robin?: Marlow Stern

Image: Philippine government, Muslim rebels agree to ceasefire
Today's Larwyn's Linx sponsored by: MAKE THE CALL: Demand John Boehner Defund Obamacare!

QOTD: "Freedom is lost gradually from an uninterested, uninformed, and uninvolved people..." --Thomas Jefferson

Friday, September 13, 2013

TIME MAGAZINE: Sanitized For Your Protection

You learn something every day.

Hey, you know Time puts out four covers for four different areas of the word?

I didn't know that.

But they do. They have a US cover, a Europe/Middle East/Africa cover, an Asia cover, and a South Pacific cover.

Yeah I don't get how they divided the world up myself.

But anyway.

So they have four covers.

Based on the covers, one person is dominating the world's interest... but not in the whole world.

Here's a suggestion for Time: how about different covers for red states and blue states? You could have Obama or Michelle's guns on every cover in the blues and the latest diversion (e.g., Miley Cyrus) in the reds.


Hat tip: BadBlue News.

EVERY SINGLE PENNY: The Obamacare Speech a Real Speaker of the House Would Give

Line in the Sand, a speech by Speaker of the House ___________________

The ill-named Affordable Care Act -- also known as Obamacare -- has been a "trainwreck" according to its very architects since day one. From the CLASS Act, to the delay of the Employer Mandate, to exempting Congress from the law, the sheer size and complexity of this partisan bill makes it virtually impossible to implement.

I and my peers, all of us, we took an oath to uphold the Constitution. And today we are going to stand by that oath and defend the Constitution of the United States.

This bill was passed in an unconstitutional fashion -- with bribes and payoffs and other skulduggery -- by a single party that temporarily held power during the 110th Congress. The bill consisted of thousands of pages and not one person was permitted to read the bill before it was voted upon.

This bill fundamentally changes the relationship of the citizen to the government.

This is an unconscionable violation of representative government. Nancy Pelosi famously told us we had to pass the bill to find out what's in it. Now we know, and it's an unconstitutional disaster.

Because a single judge bows to some unknown pressure, and changes his vote at the last minute to rewrite a bill that is clearly unconstitutional... because, unlike every other entitlement program, Democrats had no Republican support for this bill...

Because Democrats used every underhanded tactic -- bribes, payoffs and corporate reacharounds -- possible to pass a bill that not one of them read before voting upon...

Because the IRS, already caught punishing groups based upon their political and religious affiliations, will be the enforcers of Obamacare... because radical, left wing groups like La Raza and ACORN will be hired as "Obamacare Navigators" with access to their political opponents' most sensitive health care data...

Because jobs are being destroyed. Because good jobs are disappearing before our very eyes as small businesses are driven not to hire by the law. Because full-time jobs are turning to part-time jobs. Because employers are slashing benefits for spouses and other family members to adapt to a law no one read.

Because the lies that were told to sell this bill were as awful as they were brazen... Because you can't keep your policy, you can't keep your doctor, you can't keep your plan, you can't keep your insurer, and you will pay far more, not far less...

Because Democrat lobbyists and staffers are raking in million advising companies how to comply with the tens of thousands of pages of regulations that this law has spawned... Because they have built a law so complex that no one can possibly understand its effects without paying off the very people who created it!

Most of all, because the people who want Obamacare most are the very same people who have exempted themselves from the law! Obamacare waivers have been issued for Congress, staffers, unions, special interest groups...

I have a question for President Obama and the Democrats? Aren't the American people the most important special interest group Congress serves? The vast majority of Americans want a waiver from Obamacare, just like the lobbyists and the other Beltway elites.

True to my word, Republicans will not shut down the government. We have passed a continuing resolution that funds every single aspect of the federal government except for Obamacare. Every single penny.

But we are drawing a line in the sand when it comes to the trainwreck of Obamacare. We want at least a year delay in its implementation, just like Congress, just like the unions, just like the employers subject to the mandate, and just like other Democrat special interests got.

So if Democrats want to shut down the government, so be it. The House Continuing Resolution funds the entirety of the government -- every single penny -- just not the trainwreck called Obamacare, which President Obama has already defunded for his pals. The vast majority of the American people have told us over and over again: we want a waiver from Obamacare too, just like Congress got.

Call up your Representative and Senators now and tell them: we want a waiver too. Pass the House Continuing Resolution and delay Obamacare now.


STAR DRECK: EPA plans to shut down coal plants by requiring they use technology from the future that has yet to be invented

Mr. Peabody, does the Wayback Machine have a setting for the year 2030?

This past spring, EPA pulled its first attempt at a greenhouse gas emission standard for new power plants, fearing it was so draconian that it wouldn't stand up in a federal court...

The Washington Post reports that the agency is about to take a second stab at stacking the deck against new coal-fired power plants:

According to those familiar with the new EPA proposal, the agency will keep the carbon limit for large natural gas plants at 1,000 pounds but relax it slightly for smaller gas plants. The standard for coal plants will be as high as 1,300 or 1,400 pounds per megawatt hour.

However, the average coal plant emits 1,768 pounds of carbon dioxide per megawatt hour, meaning new plants will need carbon capture and sequestration (CCS) technology--something that is a long way from being viable. Jeffrey Holmstead, who represents coal-fired power plant owners and is a former EPA official in the President George W. Bush administration, told the Post, “As a practical matter, this means that the new proposal will still stop any new coal-fired power plants for the foreseeable future.”

The International Energy Agency doesn't expect CCS technology to be routinely used by power generators until 2030. That’s years away. In the meantime, we need to continue improving the efficiency of current coal-fired technology and continue investing in CCS research instead of writing off an abundant and economical energy source.


The only campaign promise that President Obama appears to have kept with was his 2008 pledge to make "electricity prices necessarily skyrocket".

"Under my plan of a cap and trade system, the price of electricity would necessarily skyrocket. Even regardless of what I say about whether coal is good or bad. Because I’m capping greenhouse gases, coal power plants, you know, natural gas, you name it — whatever the plants were, whatever the industry was... [t]hey will pass that money on to consumers." --Barack Obama, 1 November 2008


He can run, he can hide, he can evade, he can blame Bush and James Buchanan. But this is one campaign promise Barack Obama actually followed through with. And you. Ain't. Seen. Nothing. Yet.


Larwyn's Linx: We're about done asking nicely with our words...

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Nation

We're about done asking nicely with our words...: III Percent
The First Time, They Come In Peace: Zilla
Congress' border efforts are bunk, say border sheriffs: USA Today

The Establishment’s Projection: Erick Erickson
Why Democrats Have Reason to Fear: Charlie Cook
Follow Alinsky: Call Obama's Bluff: CFP

The Epic Meltdown of the Gun Grabbers: Michelle Malkin
Harry Reid: “…ANARCHISTS! Anarchists roaming the halls!”: Moe Lane
Putin: Don't Worry, I'm Not Going to Bend You Over Or Anything: Ace

House Intel Chairman Rogers on Syria and Benghazi: Hugh Hewitt
What Obama’s Truth Team said about Romney and Syria in '12: Twitchy
Biden slams ‘Neanderthal crowd’ in House for blocking VAWA renewal: Twitchy

Economy

Another Union Boss Slams Obamacare: WZ
Is War Now "Inevitable"?: ZH
MD's O'Malley Signs Gun Control Bill; Employers Leave State: Tatler

Michelle Launches Courageous Program Urging People To Drink Water: Glob
Florida bans Obamacare navigators from county health departments: BPR
Where are the Jobs?: Mish

Scandal Central

SO SHUT IT DOWN: Karl Denninger
Gowdy: ‘Not a Single Person Has Been Brought To Justice On Benghazi’: Nice Deb
Did you see how WH marked Benghazi anniversary?: Twitchy

Climate & Energy

Obama's War on Energy: Power Line

Media

Why the Media Will Never Treat Conservatives Fairly: Erick Erickson
What Ricochet is Up Against: Rob Long, Ricochet
Dirty Tricks on Twitter: Bloggers Targeted with Fake Followers: Hideout

CBS Omits Attkisson's Scoop on Kerry's Benghazi Denial: CNS
Nobody Escapes the Progressive Inquisition: Taki's Mag
Who's a journalist?: James Lileks, Ricochet

World

Fast & Furious: Libyan Edition: RS
Will Obnoxious College Students Ever Scream “War Criminal” At Obama?: Glob
Muslims Wish Jews a Happy Yom Kippur with Rocks, Bricks and Automatic Weapons: Blazing Cat Fur

Death Comes to America: MOTUS
Emboldened by Morsi ouster, Tunisia and Libya are not far behind: BNI
A Matter of Trust: Shayne

Sci-Tech

The legacy of Danny Lewin, the first man to die on 9/11: Todd Leopold, CNN
The Game That Detects a Cheating Spouse: Bruce Kasanoff
Choose your poison: Why the United States hasn't destroyed all of its chem weapons: Vocativ

Cornucopia

The One Thing I Didn’t Know About 9/11 – Steve Buscemi: IMAO
Biggest Loser of 2013: the Political Class: Scott Rasmussen
The Muslim Brotherhood in America - A Course in 10 Parts: Democracy Under Attack

Image: Better Call Saul is Happening! Breaking Bad (Kind Of) Lives On!
Today's Larwyn's Linx sponsored by: MAKE THE CALL: Demand John Boehner Defund Obamacare!

QOTD: "What is amusing... is the constant state of shock of supposedly serious people who are stunned that despite the Fed being constantly in the markets, and buying up trillions in securities, the US economy has not responded in a favorable manner. Of course, nobody has pointed out that if all it took to generate growth out of thin air without consequences was for the Fed to print, i.e., monetize debt, this would have started 100 years ago in 1913, and by now the US economy would be so advanced it would be colonizing Uranus. Logic, however, is not a Keynesian economist's best friend." --Tyler Durden

Thursday, September 12, 2013

"A great country finds itself held hostage to the ego of a small man"

Guest post by Daniel Pipes


The Obama administration's diplomatic acrobatics over Syria of the past three weeks prove that the president and his team are in way over their heads, amateurs in the deadly game of war and peace. (One wonders if Valerie Jarrett is making the key decisions in this instance, as in so many others.)

Lurching from self-imposed trap (the "red line" statement) to self-inflicted crisis (the need for congressional approval), the administration erodes the credibility of the U.S. government and increases the dangers facing Americans. Enemies of the United States, its allies, and modern civilization itself will take succor in this ignominious performance and grow in strength.

That Obama seems driven to defend his own honor and credibility, regardless of cost, makes this episode particularly troublesome. A great country finds itself held hostage to the ego of a small man.

In short, Americans are finally starting to see the consequences of electing and re-electing arguably the worst politician in modern times to inhabit the White House, consequences that will only become more apparent in the years ahead.


For more information, visit DanielPipes.org.

IRS-GATE REIGNITES: Left-Wing Hit-Man Lois Lerner Indicted By Her Own Spiteful Words

That's not a typo. Yes, I said "hit-man". I mean, have you seen a picture of Lerner? That's a man, man.

Sorry, that's cruel, I know. But when these despicable hacks use their power and the instrumentalities of government to target political opposition, well, it's clear they are not real Americans. In fact, they despise the American form of government. They loathe free speech. And, most of all, they will use any scheme, no matter how unlawful, to retain their white-knuckled grip on power.

Congress's investigation into the IRS targeting of conservatives has been continuing out of the Syria headlines... [and the latest revelations] raise doubts about IRS claims that the targeting wasn't politically motivated and that low-level employees in Cincinnati masterminded the operation.

In a February 2011 email, Ms. Lerner advised her staff—including then Exempt Organizations Technical Manager Michael Seto and then Rulings and Agreements director Holly Paz—that a Tea Party matter is "very dangerous," and is something "Counsel and [Lerner adviser] Judy Kindell need to be in on." Ms. Lerner adds, "Cincy should probably NOT have these cases."

...Earlier this summer, IRS lawyer Carter Hull, who oversaw the review of many Tea Party cases and questionnaires, testified that his oversight began in April 2010. Tea party cases under review are "being supervised by Chip Hull at each step," Ms. Paz wrote to Ms. Lerner in a February 2011 email. "He reviews info from TPs, correspondence to TPs etc. No decisions are going out of Cincy until we go all the way through the process with the c3 and c4 cases here." TP stands for Tea Party, and she means 501(c)(3) and 501(c)(4) nonprofit groups.

The emails also put the targeting in the context of the media and Congressional drumbeat over the impact of conservative campaign spending on the 2012 elections. On July 10, 2012 then Lerner-adviser Sharon Light emailed Ms. Lerner a National Public Radio story on how outside money was making it hard for Democrats to hold their Senate majority.

The Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee had complained to the Federal Election Commission that conservative groups like Crossroads GPS and Americans for Prosperity should be treated as political committees, rather than 501(c)(4)s, which are tax-exempt social welfare groups that do not have to disclose their donors.

"Perhaps the FEC will save the day," Ms. Lerner wrote back later that morning.

That response suggests Ms. Lerner's political leanings, and it also raises questions about Ms. Lerner's intentions in a separate email exchange she had when an FEC investigator inquired about the status of the conservative group the American Future Fund. The FEC and IRS don't have the authority to share that information under section 6103 of the Internal Revenue Code...

Ms. Lerner famously invoked her right against self-incrimination rather than testify under oath to Congress. The House Oversight and Government Reform Committee reported this summer that its investigation had found Ms. Lerner had sent official IRS documents to her personal email account, and many questions remain unanswered. Democrats want to pretend the IRS scandal is over, but Ms. Lerner's role deserves much more exposure.

Lerner is a disgrace. If we had effective leaders in the House, she'd be serving time in Leavenworth, knitting sweaters for "Big Wanda".


Hat tip: BadBlue News.

AWESOME: Colorado Voters Abort Democrat State Legislators Who Sided With Rapists Over Victims

Guest post by Investors Business Daily


Rights: Colorado voters on Tuesday ousted two leading supporters of stricter gun control laws, saying "ready, aim, fired" to those who would deny movie patrons and college women the right to armed self-defense.

One would think that Colorado, the site of the tragedies at Columbine and the Aurora movie theater, the purple state where President Obama accepted his first nomination amidst faux Greek columns, would be the least receptive of states for the arguments of Second Amendment defenders.

Colorado state Senate President John Morse and Sen. Angela Giron found out differently on Tuesday as they were ousted by gun rights advocates in a recall election.

Colorado voters were persuaded that the perils of an unarmed citizenry and the spread of gun-free zones place the public in greater peril at the hands of the unhinged and criminal predators in their midst, and perhaps perceived the common thread in such tragedies — the absence of people willing and able to shoot back.

The National Rifle Association, which donated about $360,000 to support the recalls, in particular hailed Morse's loss, telling the Denver Post it "is proud to have stood with the men and women in Colorado who sent a clear message that their Second Amendment rights are not for sale."

Some would suggest this just demonstrates the power of the gun lobby, but Sen. Lois Tochtrop, an Adams County Democrat and longtime Second Amendment activist, thinks it's just a natural reaction to an overreach by Democrats in messing with gun rights.

Tochtrop feels the recall election was a reaction to seven gun-control measures introduced in the session, including a proposal by Morse. His law would have assigned liability for assault-style weapon damages to manufacturers and sellers.

Morse killed it at the 11th hour because he didn't have the votes to pass it through the Democratic-controlled Senate.

"I feel like all these gun bills have done — to quote the last words in the movie 'Tora! Tora! Tora!' — is to awaken a sleeping giant," Tochtrop said during the debate.

Larwyn's Linx: America vs. DC

Send us tips! Bloggers: install a Larwyn's Linx widget. Get real-time news, 24/7, at BadBlue.

Nation

America vs. DC: Jen Kuznicki
82 Percent of Republicans Want Obamacare Defunded in CR: FW
Obama is a laughing stock: Glenn Reynolds

‘Brutal’: Fox News montage skewers Obama admin’s Syrian disaster: Twitchy
AWESOME: Bikers ride to the Capital to remember 9-11 victims: Scoop
Number of People Who Showed Up For “Million Muslim March” . . . 21: WZ

Two Different Perspectives on the Colorado Recall: Ace
Syrial Losers: Ann Coulter
Chicago abolishes gun registry in place since 1968: Renita Young

Economy

Pass Amnesty to to Fill the Jobs Whose Former Holders We Laid Off: Ace
One California — or two?: Victor Davis Hanson
Health law challenge is back: Lyle Denniston, SCOTUSblog

Scandal Central

One Year Since Benghazi: Matthew Vadum
Former EPA Administrator Defiant over Use of Email Aliases: PJM
John Kerry’s Syria ‘Expert’ Fired for Fraudulent Credentials: Bryan Preston

Psaki Can’t Give Straight Answer on Suppression of Benghazi Witnesses: WFB
Russian President Putin makes plea to U.S. in NYT op-ed: Greta
Judicial Watch Issues Special Report on Anniversary of Benghazi Massacre and Cover-Up: JW

Climate & Energy

A Science-Based Rebuttal to Global Warming Alarmism: Watts
The EPA Is Ready To Veto A Project...That Doesn't Yet Exist: Daniel McGroarty
The New Gestapo: CDN

Media

Networks Ignore John Kerry's Refusal To Let Benghazi Survivors Testify to Congress: Matthew Balan
CNN Poll: Support for Obamacare Drops Below 40%: Foundry
Flashback Video Open Thread: Team Lightbringer Mocks Romney for Saying Russia Is Our Foe: Stephen Kruiser

The 25 Most Influential People On The Right For 2013: John Hawkins
West: It wasn’t a phony scandal for Glen Doherty: Scoop
9/11: Compare and Contrast: Borepatch

NBC Gives More Time to Hillary Clinton Getting an Award Than to Benghazi Anniversary: Kyle Drennen
Chris Matthews Decries Violent NYC Riot, Forgets It Was Fomented by Colleague Sharpton: Scott Whitlock
Better Call Saul is Happening! Breaking Bad (Kind Of) Lives On!: Glen Tickle

World

State Department Funds O’Bagy’s Pro-Rebel Syria Lobbying: Bryan Preston
Obama State Department Continues to Ignore Benghazi, 9/11 Anniversaries: Jeryl Bier
Sen. Ted Cruz’s major foreign policy speech at Jesse Helms Lecture Series: Scoop

British shocked at NHS hospital death rates: among the world’s worst and far inferior to U.S.: David Freddoso
Never forget – Obama apologized to terrorists on 9-11-2012: FAM
Russia to build second nuclear plant for Iran, deliver S-300: Hayom

Sci-Tech

New wave of tablets with Intel Bay Trail chip will start at $99: Agam Shah, IT News
Google, Intel cement ties on Chrome OS, could weaken Wintel: Agam Shah, PC World
Google Glass app Blue puts real-time baseball info in your eye: Timothy J. Seppala, Engadget

Cornucopia

There are so many reasons for conservatives to like Hillsdale College: CI
Photo gallery: 8 WWII vets getting French Legion of Honor: AirForceTimes
Obama’s Syria Speech: The Red Queen’s Commentary: MOTUS

Image: AWESOME: Bikers ride to the Capital to remember 9-11 victims
Today's Larwyn's Linx sponsored by: MAKE THE CALL: Demand John Boehner Defund Obamacare!

QOTD: "A Democratic strategist who works closely with the White House, and who requested anonymity to avoid political retribution, told me, "This has been one of the most humiliating episodes in presidential history." ... As he faced an international and constitutional crisis, Obama and his team were in a familiar state: isolated, insular, and alone." --Guy Benson

Wednesday, September 11, 2013

Were VW’s U.S. workers threatened into signing UAW cards?

Guest post by Labor Union Report

With its future hinging on unionizing the American factories of foreign automakers, the United Auto Workers has been desperately courting Volkwagen’s 2700 employees Tennessee since 2011.

According to news reports on Wednesday, a majority of Volkswagen AG’s employees in Chattanooga have signed union authorization cards indicating the desire “to join VW’s Global Works Council and supporting cooperative and collaborative relations with the company.”

The UAW is claiming that the cards are as valid as the workers having voted in an election.

The question that is not being posed, however, is: Were the majority of VW’s workers’ signatures were gathered based on threats, coercion and fear?

You may recall that, back in June, Stephan Wolf, a high-ranking German union official with Volkswagen AG issued an ultimatum to VW’s American workers in the press:

“We will only agree to an expansion of the [Tennessee] site or any other model contract when it is clear how to proceed with the employees’ representatives in the United States.”

Unlike the U.S., under Germany’s co-determination labor relations model, unions have seats on corporations’ boards of directors and, as such, have a say in how a company is managed.

via Automotive News:

Employee representatives at VW also get a say in new products and investments through the company’s global works council, which includes representatives from all of its organized plants.

That may give labor leaders at VW enough power to follow through on the threat made by Wolf, the deputy chairman on the global works council.

This comment was quickly seized on by the UAW’s president, Bob King, who followed up with:

If I was a worker, if I was a member of the Chattanooga community, and I wanted to have the best chance of getting new investment and new product, I would want a voice on the world employee council,” King said. “I would want somebody there representing the interests of Chattanooga. I wouldn’t want a decision made where every other plant in the world has representation there, and I don’t have somebody speaking up for me.” [Emphasis added.]

What labor leaders implied was that without representation on VW’s employee council through the UAW, Chattanooga would not receive the hoped-for expansion.

This statement was likely repeated over and over again by UAW organizers in order to coerce them into signing cards and, if that is the case, it could very well be a violation of the Tennessee employees’ rights under the National Labor Relations Act.

AFL-CIO Looks to Turn All of America Into Detroit

Guest post by Eric Boehm

One of the major themes to emerge from this week’s national conference of the AFL-CIO in Los Angeles is a push to expand union organizing beyond the traditional collective bargaining agreement and into every workplace.

And after some brief flirting, the AFL-CIO is ready to go steady with “workers centers,” which are popping up around the nation to help organize workers in the service sector. Members of the AFL-CIO, an umbrella group for dozens of labor unions, approved a resolution this week to establish a more formal connection between the union and the workers centers that it has, in many cases, helped to start.

The labor movement cannot be confined within bargaining units defined by government agencies or limited to workplaces where a majority of employees votes “Yes” in the face of a ruthless campaign by their employer to deny them representation,” the resolution reads.

The union said it would seek to organize workers who are not in traditional collective bargaining agreements and would “mobilize these new members in electoral and other political efforts and in support of organizing drives and collective bargaining campaigns.”

To achieve that end, the AFL-CIO pledged to work more closely with “workers centers” and with foundations providing seed money to those centers.

In many cases, these workers centers have morphed into front groups for unions by using Occupy-style tactics and threats of lawsuits to make employers comply with their demands, despite the lack of a collective bargaining agreement.

TAEGAN GODDARD: Deluded Kook -- or Lying Crapweasel?

I know, I know: 'Who or what is a Taegan Goddard?', you may ask. No, it's not an inner thigh rash.

He's a writer for Roll Call, the official periodical of the entrenched Beltway establishment and a dedicated enemy of the American Constitution. If the issue involves promoting big government, no matter how insane, Goddard can be counted on to find a left-wing kook to quote as if that represents a mainstream opinion.

However, if the issue involves promoting normal people -- who live outside the Beltway -- or limited government, Goddard will find a way to ignore or diminish the effort.

Obamacare is one of his favorite programs -- no matter the fact that the entire federal government is teetering on bankruptcy, Cloward-Piven style, as unfunded liabilities near $100 trillion and 40 cents of every dollar the government currently spends is borrowed from generations yet unborn.

Arithmetic was never one of Goddard's strong suits, it would seem.

But when it comes to promoting a program like Obamacare, Goddard is willing to market the most egregious of lies. Consider this classic bit of propaganda -- truly one for the history books -- from earlier this week:

Obamacare Did Not Lead to Increase in Part Time Jobs


The Obama administration contends that since the Affordable Care Act became law, more than 9 out of 10 new jobs created have been full-time.

“The Affordable Care Act continues to improve the functioning of labor markets in a range of ways including helping to slow the growth of premiums, creating affordable new options for small businesses, reducing the ‘job lock’ that can keep workers from taking the best job for them, and generally improving health outcomes and reducing absenteeism. We are already seeing tangible changes in affordability, including premium growth at less than one-third the rate of the late 1990s and early 2000s.”

Jared Bernstein: “You want to hate on Obamacare, I can’t stop you… But the fact is that for now, there’s nothing to see here, folks. Move along, please.”

Now, you have to be a very special kind of ignorant -- or quite a liar -- to rewrite White House press releases as fact. Especially after such gems as "If you like your plan, you can keep your plan", "the average family will see health care premiums will go down by $2,500 a year", and "No one will have to stop seeing their doctor".

Yes, Obamacare has really "improve[d] the functioning of labor markets", that is, if you consider imploding the private sector as "improvement". Got Alinsky?

Take the Obama administration's very own Labor Force Participation Rate, which is the percentage of folks who should be working who aren't. It's now at a 34-year low and still dropping.


And a full one-sixth of the U.S. is now on food stamps, another all-time record.

Yea! The economy's doing swell!

And how about about his ludicrous headline, which is as succinct as it untruthful, "Obamacare Did Not Lead to [an] Increase in Part Time Jobs"?

Goddard, seemingly unfamiliar with new technologies like Google News, failed to use the oh-so-difficult search string health care part-time workers. This would have led him to trip over such stories, written in the last 30 days alone, as:

Obamacare, tepid US growth fuel part-time hiring (CNBC, Reuters)
With Eye on ObamaCare, Companies Move to Cut Workers’ Hours (Fox Business)
Local governments cutting hours over Obamacare costs (Washington Post)
Trader Joe's To Drop Health Coverage For Part-Time Workers Under Obamacare (Huffington Post)
Mort Zuckerman on PBS: Obamacare to spike part-time work from 25 percent of all jobs to 50 percent (PBS)
CFOs Lean on Part-Time Workers (WSJ)
Some employers cutting hours for part-time workers to avoid new insurance mandate (Winston-Salem Journal)
Health Reform Turning U.S. Into Part-Time Nation (Fox Business)
SeaWorld to cut workers’ hours (Tampa Tribune)
Restaurateurs, wary of health care costs, eye workers’ hours (Dallas Morning News)

And those are just the first ten I found.

So you have to be a special kind of stupid -- or a rank propagandist -- to try and foist articles like this on the American public.

It's sick. And I'm sick. I'm literally disgusted with people like Goddard, who are helping destroy the fabric of this country in pursuit of some insane Utopian fantasy that can't work, won't work, and has never worked in all of human history.

Goddard believes in the supremacy of a few master planners: some bureaucrats in Washington who will reward his misanthropic behavior with accolades, financial rewards or access to all the right parties. Who knows what his true motivations are?

Perhaps he'll offer us his perspective in the comments.

Or perhaps not, since he seems only able to regurgitate the agitprop of a few far Left Marxists controlling the Democrat Party.

Roll Call should be ashamed for publishing these naked lies, Leni Riefenstahl-style, as if Americans are as dumb as Goddard thinks we are.

But then again, based upon its Alexa traffic ranking this year, the market is offering its own solution to Roll Call's Goddard problem.


Related: Roll Call Embarrassment Taegan Goddard Still Shilling for Obamacare While Unions, Congress and Special Interests Bail.

You Risk Touching Off World War III, Mr. President -- And For What?

Guest post by Investors Business Daily


Syria: As a Chinese warship joins Russian ships in the Mediterranean, we should remember a cruise missile attack on an Israeli warship. President Obama should understand that Syria and Hezbollah have missiles, too.

As the Obama administration continues to deploy its comical weapons, with Secretary of State John Kerry promising America any attack on Syria will be "unbelievably small," a Chinese warship deploys off the Syrian coast, joining its Russian counterparts in what used to be an "American lake," the Mediterranean Sea.

The People's Liberation Army has dispatched the amphibious dock landing ship Jinggangshan, a move that follows the announcement that Russia is sending three more ships — two destroyers and the missile cruiser Moskva — to the eastern Mediterranean to bolster forces that already include three other warships dispatched over the last two weeks.

All are a pointed reminder that we are not the only player that has pieces on the board.

Launched in 2011, the 19,000-metric-ton Jinggangshan is a 689-foot-long warship that can carry 1,000 soldiers, helicopters, armored fighting vehicles, boats and landing craft, according to a report in the China Daily.

China is reportedly worried that a Syrian strike and its aftermath could send oil prices skyrocketing, which would be bad news for the Chinese economy.