Is Petraeus Falling On His Sword? By Fay Voshell

 

Is Petraeus Falling on His Sword? by Fay Voshell, American Thinker

Was General Petraeus told by the Obama administration to fall on his sword? Was the general told he would be exposed unless he clammed up about Benghazi? Did he decide to blow his own cover before the president could? Could it be he is sitting on stuff that would tempt some in congress to consider the president's impeachment -- and Obama knows it?

There are so many unanswered questions.

But it certainly it is a bit odd that Petraeus's resignation happened several days after the election and several days before he would have testified about Benghazi. It would not be the first time self-immolation was ordered so that a dear leader could survive.

Remember, Petraeus refused to go along with the administration's storyline about Benghazi, disassociating himself and the CIA from the whole debacle. It could be he was ordered to resign. Failure to do so might have meant his affair would be plastered over the media and the mistress targeted. So maybe Petraeus chose to fall on his sword, coming forth with the information about his affair himself and offering his resignation.

Why would this administration target the general, who is widely respected and admired? What might the White House gain from his fall from grace? Perhaps silence about the truth concerning the Benghazi firestorm?

Read more: http://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2012/11/is_petraeus_falling_on_his_sword.html#ixzz2BpmPIrHo

Their Still Standing Strong

 

Their Lives, Their Fortunes, and Their Sacred Honor: Spec Ops Warriors Stand Tall by Russ Vaughn over at American Thinker

In yet another instance of what is becoming a steady series of incredibly stupid misfires, the clueless Obama campaign has decided to adopt the tactics of that memorably successful Kerry campaign in dealing with criticism from the nation's military.  Rather than man up and admit that he perhaps went a bit overboard in taking credit for the Osama raid, and that it's entirely possible that his White House has leaked critical intelligence, Obama is taking the same tack as the thoroughly torpedoed Kerry: attack his military critics by calling them dishonorable liars.

It didn't work for Kerry, and it's not going to work for the campaign of a man who, unlike the turncoat Kerry, has absolutely no military credentials to link him to veterans -- not even to that minority that leans left.  It most assuredly is not going to work with that much larger group of veterans who tend to vote conservative but will vote for those candidates, regardless of party, who are supportive of the military.

But no, the Axelrod/Plouffe bubble factory, correctly believing that a large part of their Democrat Party is inherently anti-military, has chosen the hang-tough Kerry Gambit: deny, discredit, and dishonor.  For those of you unfamiliar with what I'm referring to, the White House handling of the mission to capture or kill Osama bin Laden back in 2011 has created a huge amount of displeasure and dissent within the multi-service special operations community, as well as within the overall military and veterans' communities.  The president's quick rush to grab the glory with his I,I,I, me, me, me speech left a lot of active and former members of the military stone, frosty cold.  As any general or admiral could tell you, top commanders, especially commanders-in-chief, do not rush to claim the glory.  All credit goes to the warriors who carried out the missions, not the politicians and staff weenies involved in the upper-level planning.

Such a rush to snatch credit from the jaws of victory is unseemly and undignified to those who serve to protect this nation -- and especially so when the unseemly, undignified grabber of glory happens to be the commander of all our military forces, a position which demands dignity, gravitas, and a true understanding of the Warrior Code.  Bush, a fighter pilot, had it; Clinton, a draft-dodger, did not; the guy there now and his Chicago advisers don't have the slightest clue.

But worse, in the eyes of those frontline and behind-the-lines warriors who have now posted their displeasure is the total disregard by this White House for operational security.  The unseemly haste with which the Obama spin machine jumped in to blare to the world that Osama had been killed was a grievous intelligence error.  In their eagerness to  seize credit, the politicians in the White House deprived our nation and our forces of the intelligence that would normally flow from the capture of a terrorist headquarters: all the information contained there about our enemy's forces, their structure, their distribution/locations, their communications networks, and their finances.  With one simple White House press release, all that hard-fought-for intelligence was lost.  Forever.  In claiming the glory, Obama insured that all that intel was end-of-story.

Read more: http://www.americanthinker.com/2012/08/their_lives_their_fortunes_and_their_sacred_honor_spec_ops_warriors_stand_tall.html#ixzz24O7mw8Qn

Spot The Haters By Thomas Lifson

 

Spot the haters by Thomas Lifson over at American Thinker

The rhetoric of the left appears to have provoked a terror attack on a leading conservative organization yesterday.  Floyd Corkins II, who shot a guard at the Family Research Council yesterday, appears to have been a gay activist who may have been inspired to violence by rhetoric claiming that opposition to redefining marriage amounts to hate. AP reports:

the shooter made a negative reference about the work of the Family Research Council before opening fire. The officials spoke anonymously because they were not authorized to discuss the ongoing investigation.

David Mariner is executive director of The DC Center for the LGBT Community. He says Corkins had been volunteering at the center for about the past 6 months. Mariner describes Corkins as "kind, gentle and unassuming."

William Jacobson of Legal Insurrection has been following the Southern Poverty Law Center, which raises millions and pays its leadership lavishly, falsely applying the hate label to those with whom it disagrees, including the FRC:

In seeking to justify its hefty salaries, budget and fundraising, SPLC made a very dangerous leap to treating political opponents as "hate groups" and speech it didn't like as "hate speech." (snip)

SPLC continued its agenda against the Tea Party and conservatives when it persisted in claiming that Jared Loughner was "right wing" long after it was clear that was not the case.

SPLC also moved on to the issue of marriage, and named several groups - including the Family Research Council and the National Organization for Marriage - as hate groups, SPLC Demonizes Supporters of Traditional Marriage:

Time and again SPLC, through its Hatewatch division, seeks to shut down debate by applying the "hate group" or similar epithets to political opponents, and those political opponents almost always are conservative.

Being labeled a "hate group" by SPLC can be devastating, because most of the country is unaware of how politicized SPLC has become....

SPLC is at it again, with a list of 18, "anti-gay"groups, 13 of whom also will make SPLC's upcoming "hate group" list....

Most of these groups are unknown to me,  although a couple are well-known Christian groups, such as American Family Association and Family Research Council (both of these entities will be on SPLC's upcoming Hate Group list).  I don't defend or not defend these groups because I don't know much about them, but based upon SPLC's past performance, the burden should be on SPLC to make the case for including a group on a hate list.

All these groups, with one exception below, were included for having a fundamentalist Christian view of homosexuality and gay marriage.  Oddly, no Orthodox Jewish or Muslim groups were included, even though those religious affiliations have views not much different from fundamentalist Christians....

The inclusion of NOM on this list really is outrageous, and typical of how SPLC seeks to demonize a mainstream conservative (and in this case, constitutional) view.  The explanation SPLC gives for including NOM is flimsy and filled with innuendo.

And so it came to pass, support for retaining the centuries old definition of marriage as one man, one woman, routinely now is labeled as "hate speech" on campuses and increasingly in the liberal-dominated media.  Groups which support retaining the definition now are hate groups - with SPLC cited as the authority.

With the SPLC fanning the flames, the Chick fil-A company has been subjected to vandalism, protests, and charged with serving "hate" (This from famous Chicago chef Art Smith,  reportedly a favorite of the Obamas when dining out) merely because its president does not favor redefining marriage. 

Read more: http://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2012/08/spot_the_haters.html#ixzz23jTykQA0

Three Truths To Consider This November By Simon de Hundehutte

 

Three Truths to Consider This November by Simon de Hundehutte over at American Thinker

Every once in a while, America has to be like Steve McQueen in that scene from the 1973 film Papillon, where he sticks his head through his prison bars and asks, "How do I look?"

Anyone who's awake knows that America "ain't looking too pretty" these days.  Take for example the Declaration of Independence's quintessential phrase, "life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness."  What does that look like to citizens today?  For a great number of people, that phrase most certainly means something very, very different from what it meant to the patriots at the time it was originally penned.

So, how does the way we think about this phrase reveal how we see ourselves and, ultimately, whom we will choose to represent us?

Since America is the land of "We the People," it is certainly all about who we are.  What do we "look like"?  How do we think and reason?  Who are we at the very core of our being?

Ultimately, a democratic people living in a republic truly ends up getting the government it deserves -- a government that matches its ideals.

Read more: http://www.americanthinker.com/2012/08/three_truths_to_consider_this_november.html#ixzz23LjDnq3H

Obama Needs to Show His Sealed Documents First.

 

Liars, Damned Liars, and Harry Reid by Dov Fischer over at American Thinker

Harry Reid wants to see more of Mitt Romney's past income-tax filings.  Debbie Wasserman Schultz wants to see 23 years of his taxes.  This, from the die-hard supporters of a candidate who will not release his college transcripts or so much more.

I want to know how Barack Obama got into Columbia University for undergraduate school.  I want to see his application.  Did he seek extra consideration, as did Elizabeth Warren in applying for her academic opportunities, by claiming to be a member of a demographic group favored by affirmative action?  I imagine that he did not falsely claim special treatment on a theory of being foreign-born, but I would like to know for sure.  It is immaterial where he was born -- I want to know whether he claimed on his applications, as his book publisher later would write about him, that he had overcome the disadvantages of being foreign-born.  What did he write to the dean of admissions of Columbia University about his childhood, his education, his background?  Every college-transfer application to Columbia requires that the student write a narrative, tell his story, explain why he deserves a crack at the Ivy League after a brief sojourn at a lesser institution.

I want to know who funded his college education.  Columbia costs an arm and a leg.  Did Barack Obama have benefactors, admirers of his youthful promise, paying his way?  Did he take loans?  If so, how did he qualify?  Or did he win exceptional scholarship and grant-funding?  If he received assistance -- and good for him if he did -- what was the narrative that he presented to qualify?  Did he speak of the challenges of being reared in Hawaii, a black youngster reared by a white grandmother who stood in as surrogate for his mom?  Did he speak of having overcome educational disadvantages overseas?  Did he boost his appeal for assistance by claiming to be foreign-born?  Like Harry Reid and Debbie Wasserman Schultz, I also want to know more about the leader of the free world.

During his time at Columbia, what were his grades?  Everyone is entitled to a bad grade or two or three.  You run into a tough professor or one who, though brilliant, is garbled and incoherent.  Or someone whose code you simply cannot crack.  However, a student who glides from Columbia University into Harvard Law School typically will have quite impressive a string of fabulous grades.  I want to know what his grades were at Columbia.  We all gained the opportunity to learn Al Gore's grades at Harvard, as well as John Kerry's and George W. Bush's grades at Yale.  We learned that Bush, a "C" student with a 77 average, had scored one point higher than Kerry, who graduated with a 76 GPA.  Bush got a "D" in astronomy, while Kerry scored four "D" grades as a freshman.  That year alone, Kerry scored 68 in each of two history courses and a 69 in political science.  Indeed, the media could compare them.  I want to know Barack Obama's grades at my alma mater.  It seems that a 78 average is all it would take to register Barack Obama as a genius on the "American Presidency Academic Scale."  Why is a brilliant thinker, whose ostensible brilliance raised him to be president of Harvard Law Review even though he never published any scholarship on his own, holding back?

Wasserman Schultz wants to see Romney's tax returns from 23 years ago?  I want to see Barack Obama's application to Harvard Law School.  Did he simply attach a fabulous, superlative transcript of straight As earned at Columbia with letters of recommendation from the university's most prominent faculty members, along with a sparkling grade on the uniform Law School Admissions Test?  If so, good for him.  He should be proud to share it with the public.  I want to see it.

What did he tell Harvard in the all-important personal essay that applicants must submit with their packages?  Was it an essay about how he had spent his summer?  Was it about the disadvantages he had to overcome in his life?  There is no reason for a person reared by his grandmother to be ashamed to share that document with the public.

Read more: http://www.americanthinker.com/2012/08/liars_damned_liars_and_harry_reid.html#ixzz22sP6A1E8

Chicago Native Has Questions For His Mayor By Rosslyn Smith

 

Chicago Native Has Questions for His Mayor by Rosslyn Smith over at American Thinker

Last Sunday a man who was born and raised in Chicago asked a few questions for Chicago mayor Rahm Emanuel on a Chicago blog.

Recent comments by those who administer our city seem to assume that the city government can decide for everyone what are the "values" that must be held by citizens of Chicago. I was born and raised here, and my understanding of being a Chicagoan never included submitting my value system to the government for approval. Must those whose personal values do not conform to those of the government of the day move from the city? Is the City Council going to set up a "Council Committee on Un-Chicagoan Activities" and call those of us who are suspect to appear before it? I would have argued a few days ago that I believe such a move is, if I can borrow a phrase, "un-Chicagoan."

The value in question is espousal of "gender-free marriage." Approval of state-sponsored homosexual unions has very quickly become a litmus test for bigotry; and espousing the understanding of marriage that has prevailed among all peoples throughout human history is now, supposedly, outside the American consensus. Are Americans so exceptional that we are free to define "marriage" (or other institutions we did not invent) at will? What are we re-defining?

Read more: http://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2012/07/chicago_native_has_questions_for_his_mayor.html#ixzz22Dp5xgcF

Obama Vs. God On Work And Welfare By Jan LaRue

 

Obama vs. God on Work and Welfare by Jan LaRue over at American Thinker

President Obama produced political tremors last week when he said in Roanoke that individual success comes from government so we need to give back by paying higher taxes. Combined with his executive order allowing states to opt out of requiring work for welfare, it's a 10 on the Richter scale.

Contrary to Obama's spinners, he wasn't taken out of context. If it was a gaffe, he got stuck on stupid by repeating, "look, if you've been successful, you didn't get there on your own. You didn't get there on your own." His only "gaffe" was revealing his inner socialist.

The day before Obama's "you didn't build it" speech, he instructed Secretary of Health and Human Services Kathleen Sebelius to allow the states to exempt welfare recipients from work requirements under the bipartisan 1996 welfare reform act, "Temporary Assistance for Needy Families" (TANF), signed into law by then-President Bill Clinton. The exemption is clearly a violation of TANF and other federal statutes.  Obama's order is one more of his several infringements of congressional authority.

Obama hasn't explained why, since government "built" the welfare system, he's exempting recipients from giving back by working. It makes sense if his goal is fundamentally transforming the United States into a welfare state. It would explain why Obama's Department of Agriculture is pushing more people to sign up for food stamps, which are now handed out to more than 46 million people, a 50 percent increase since 2008.

Here's a better idea: In addition to enforcing work requirements on those who are able, condition welfare and unemployment benefits on "paying it forward." As soon as recipients are gainfully employed, require them to begin repaying benefits based on their income level. This won't work, of course, unless the benefits end at some point.

Obama tries to justify his progressive agenda with Scripture, such as when he misapplied "my brother's keeper" to support wealth redistribution. He doesn't have a prayer aligning his welfare-without-work order with the Apostle Paul's admonition: "If anyone isn't willing to work, he should not eat" (2 Thessalonians 3:10).

Paul, unlike Obama, is consistent with Moses, who required the needy to work for their welfare: "When you reap the harvest of your land, you are not to reap all the way to the edge of your field or gather the gleanings of your harvest. Leave them for the poor and the foreign resident; I am Yahweh your God" (Leviticus 23:22).

Read more: http://www.americanthinker.com/2012/07/obama_vs_god_on_work_and_welfare.html#ixzz21MQWCCGa

Yesterday's Heroes And Today's Commander-In-Chief By Jeffrey Folks

 

Yesterday's Heroes and Today's Commander-in-Chief by Jeffrey Folks over at American Thinker

James Donovan's recent book, Blood of Heroes (New York, 2012), is an extraordinarily moving account of the men who died at the Alamo in 1836.  Donovan's book records the determination of those who joined Col. William Travis, Davy Crockett, and Jim Bowie to defend their way of life, even in the face of almost certain death.  Their dedication set the stage for Texas independence and for its later admission to the United States.  One can only marvel at the devotion to the idea of liberty shared by this ragged band of brothers.

One is also struck by the contrast with the less than heroic political leaders on today's national stage.  In the weeks before the final assault on the Alamo by Santa Anna's forces, Col. Travis issued a number of appeals for assistance.  Several relief parties were eventually organized, but they came too late to save the Alamo defenders, all of whom died when the Mexican army overran the fort on March 6, 1836.  In each of these appeals, Travis made clear his determination to remain at his post until the bitter end.  He understood that his forces were all that stood between Santa Anna and the Anglo settlements to the east, and that if his small contingent did not halt or at least delay the Mexican advance, those poorly defended settlements would face rape, pillage, and murder.  As he stated in one appeal after another, Travis was determined to defend his people, with absolutely no regard for his own self-interest.

Barack Obama is no Col. Travis, as is obvious from his willingness to pander to every special interest that controls votes, including those interests, such as illegal aliens, that are injurious to the United States.

Unlike Travis, who faced an enemy more than 100 times the strength of his forces and made a conscious decision to sacrifice all in defense of his people, our current president is not even willing to enforce the existing law on illegal immigration or to demonstrate leadership on deficit reduction, energy independence, and a host of other issues.  He sits in his comfortable quarters in the White House -- when not vacationing in Hawaii or playing golf -- and there he plots a re-election campaign that divides Americans, setting one group against another.

When news of the Alamo massacre reached the Anglo settlements to the east and the broader audience of American citizens who supported Texas independence, the cry "Remember the Alamo" went up almost immediately.  That cry united the hastily formed regiments under Sam Houston that soon defeated Santa Anna at San Jacinto and achieved independence.  It also inspired thousands of Americans to immigrate or send aid to the newly independent nation.  In other words, it united all who supported Texas independence, inspiring them to make sacrifices of their own on behalf of liberty.

Read more: http://www.americanthinker.com/2012/07/yesterdays_heroes_and_todays_commander-in-chief.html#ixzz21BLFuBzF

The Marxist Heart Of Darkness By Bruce Walker

 

This is an eye opener and at the same time spooky.

The Marxist Heart of Darkness by Bruce Walker over at American Thinker

Those who doubted Obama's immersion in Marxism now have a perfect window into his soul -- namely, in the form of the stunning class warfare remarks he recently made in Roanoke, Virginia.

We must grasp, however, what Marxism is and what it is not.  Marxism is not a political philosophy to help the poor at the expense of the rich, and it is not a design for a utopian future.  Marxism is simply a Heart of Darkness, a Siamese twin of Nazism, a curse on all humanity committed to three themes: (1) hatred, (2) misery, and (3) lying.   

Marxism is neither a science nor a system of belief.  It is a rationale for seizing power and terrorizing all those who are not its cadres.  Marxism -- English Socialism, or "Ingsoc" -- was the secular religion of George Orwell's Oceania.  In Orwell's masterpiece, 1984, the interrogator of Winston Smith explains the goals of Ingsoc: "Power is not a mean, it is an end.  One does not establish a dictatorship in order to safeguard a revolution; one makes a revolution in order to establish a dictatorship.  The object of persecution is persecution.  The object of torture is torture.  The object of power is power."

Stefan Possony in 1953 noted: "Kinetic communism often is termed an 'ideology,' as if the communist movement were held together by a bond of idealism, with individuals succumbing to communism because of its ideological attraction[.]"  He further explains that "communists are the heirs of the Mongols who conquered, not because they had an attractive ideology, but because they outperformed opponent in the fields of strategy and tactics" (A Century of Conflict, Possony).

Lunacharsky, the first Soviet commissar for education, proclaimed: "We hate Christianity and Christians; even the best of them must be looked upon as our worst enemies.  They preach love of our neighbors and mercy, which is contrary to our principles.  Down with the love of our neighbor; what we want is hatred"  (emphasis added).

Hatred is helped when people are in pain, so creating gratuitous misery is a goal of Marxism.  A key maxim of Marxism is "The worse, the better."  The Soviets were not bashful about announcing what they wanted: "The misery and oppression of the masses must be intensified to an extraordinary degree" (Sixth Party Congress of the International at Moscow).  Knickbocker, in his 1941 book about totalitarianism in Europe, observed: "Even before the war, in both Germany and Russia, the omnipotent, omnivorous State had devoured all but a vestige of happiness.  As the two regimes of hatred went forward along their respective paths each lost gradually even the desire to promote the happiness of anyone, even of its own people" (Is Tomorrow Hitler's?, Knickerbocker).

Read more: http://www.americanthinker.com/2012/07/the_marxist_heart_of_darkness.html#ixzz2153PcseI

Why I'm Boycotting The Olympics: IOC Admits Muslims Prevented The Honoring Of Murdered Israeli Athletes By Rob Miller

 

Why I'm Boycotting the Olympics: IOC Admits Muslims Prevented the Honoring of Murdered Israeli Athletes by Rob Miller over at American Thinker

The Olympics are due to start in London.  But I will not be watching them, discussing them, or even thinking about them, and I urge anyone with a claim to human decency to do the same.

In 1972, at the Olympics in Munich, PLO terrorists murdered 11 Israeli athletes.  The games, of course, went on, and there has never been any effort to memorialize the victims.

On this, the 40 ^th anniversary of this barbarism, the families of the victims, led by Munich widow Ankie Spitzer, petitioned the International Olympic Committee to honor the memory of the murdered athletes with a minute of silence, something most Western countries were in favor of:

Munich widow Ankie Spitzer spearheaded the campaign by launching an online protest, which has since garnered support from across political spectrums in several countries including Israel, Canada, the UK, Australia, the US, Belgium and Germany.

In the latest development, some 140 Italian parliamentarians signed a letter to [IOC president] Rogge this week, calling for minute's silence to be instituted.

The appeal was driven by Italian Jewish MP Fianna Nirenstein, who is vice president of the parliamentary commission on foreign affairs, and who said the gesture would mark "a moment of pity for these murdered athletes and a firm condemnation of terror".

In a letter launching her campaign for an official silence to mark the 40th anniversary of the Munich Massacres, Spitzer wrote:

"Silence is a fitting tribute for athletes who lost their lives on the Olympic stage. Silence contains no statements, assumptions or beliefs and requires no understanding of language to interpret."

Read more: http://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2012/07/why_im_boycotting_the_olympics_ioc_admits_muslims_prevented_the_honoring_of_murdered_israeli_athlete.html#ixzz2157Bqysg

Does The CFTC Know Their Butt From A Hole In A Ground?

 

After reading this article, I’m am  really getting a bad attitude with anything related to government more and more each day. The phrases “Do they know their butt from a hole in the ground?’ and “Clueless” keep coming to my mind. They need to find someone who know what they doing.

Time to Clean House at the CFTC by Paul B. Matthews over at American Thinker

While most of the American media focused much of the past week on where Mitt Romney invested his money, or exactly what his role was at Bain Capital a decade and a half ago, another major financial scandal has hit the American financial markets with little to no fanfare.

For the second time in less than a year, a large Futures Commission Merchant (FCM) has collapsed after firm officials stole customer money to fund business operations and their exorbitant lifestyles.

With last week's collapse of Peregrine Financial, the U.S. Congress should be asking, "Do any of the field examiners and their managers at the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) have any clue what they are doing, particularly since they signed off on the firm's financial statements as recently as January 2012?"

Peregrine collapsed after its founder could no longer hide his theft of approximately $200 million in customer funds.  In a detailed suicide note outlined in Russell Wasendorf, Sr.'s federal arrest affidavit, he admitted he was able to fool incompetent government regulators for a period of twenty years using nothing more than a post office box, a scanner, Photoshop, Excel, and an inkjet printer.

As a certified public accountant (CPA), I am stupefied at the sheer lack of sophistication used in this fraud.  As a taxpayer, I am horrified by the absolute lack of competence or pure laziness exhibited by regulators at the CFTC.

According to the arrest affidavit, this fraud was perpetrated by Mr. Wasendorf's ability to do nothing more than create and pass off fictitious bank statements to government regulators.  It was really that simple.

Unfortunately for the CFTC, the level of simplicity is exactly why this should never have occurred.

In any entry-level audit course, students are taught to use "professional skepticism" with regard to all aspects of an audit.  In this case, the CFTC clearly failed to live up to this mantra.

The indications that fraud was likely occurring at Peregrine were about as numerous as grains of sand at a beach.

First, Mr. Wasendorf was the only person allowed to see firm bank statements at Peregrine.  Moreover, all such bank correspondence was to be directed to him, and all bank letters were to be delivered to his office unopened.

Mr. Wasendorf was also the only person at Peregrine allowed to interact with any person from their bank (US Bank).  In addition, he was the only person in the entire firm allowed to have access to their online banking portal.

These simple facts should have been known to any regulatory auditors doing their job.  As part of any audit, auditors are supposed to interview multiple sources from inside and outside the firm in an effort to document the firm's internal controls.  Had this simple process been done just one time in the past 20 years, this fraud would not have been able to be carried out for as long as it did.

Read more: http://www.americanthinker.com/2012/07/time_to_clean_house_at_the_cftc.html#ixzz20zJiSegw

My Problem Is I'm Too Good By Clarice Feldman

 

My Problem Is I'm Too Good by Clarice Feldman over at the American Thinker

A dear, now deceased, relative used to say, "My problem is I'm too good," without realizing the humor of that self-evaluation. I was reminded of that this week, when for the first time President Obama acknowledged he just might have a teeny flaw.

"The mistake of my first term - couple of years - was thinking that this job was just about getting the policy right. And that's important. But the nature of this office is also to tell a story to the American people that gives them a sense of unity and purpose and optimism, especially during tough times.

"It's funny - when I ran, everybody said, well he can give a good speech but can he actually manage the job?"

bgates and hit & run , those wise guys, chimed in immediately.

Bgates:

"I also shouldn't have skimped on those bargain basement vacations, and it wouldn't have killed me to play some golf or watch some basketball once in a while either."

"And I should have been tougher on those kikes."

Barack Obama: Needs to talk more

Nancy Pelosi: Too reverent towards our founding documents

Magic Johnson: Not enough time spent with the ladies

Hit & run:

"I also shouldn't have accepted so much personal responsibility for the lack of any meaningful recovery in the economy and endeavored to blame other people and events more. Oh, and technology. I should have blamed technology more."

ABC noted that this sort of self-analysis by politicians often lends itself to lampooning:

Call it "too much substance, not enough style?" President Barack Obama says his biggest mistake since getting to the White House three and a half years ago has been his tendency to tackle the job as national policy wonk rather than the inspiring figure he cut in the 2008 campaign. [snip]

Presidents - politicians in general - tend to sidestep questions about their biggest mistake in office, though they sometimes stumble spectacularly over them ( as George W. Bush did in April 2004), or offer up a self-serving answer that might be lampooned as "I just love America too much." Obama seems to be saying that, dagnabbit, he just took the job too gosh-darn seriously. Republicans wasted little time in mocking the answer. Republican National Committee spokesman Tim Miller tweeted "I'd go w/ utter economic failure."

I wonder what the media would do if asked what its major flaw was.

Read more: http://www.americanthinker.com/2012/07/my_problem_is_im_too_good.html#ixzz20hmxHbu1

 

Hard Days Ahead For ObamaCare By Christopher Chantrill

 

Hard Days Ahead for ObamaCare by Christopher Chantrill over at American Thinker

Don't bet on ObamaCare.  It's not going to turn into a political winner like Social Security and Medicare.  So writes the excellent Jay Cost. 

Because Social Security and Medicare do not discriminate between citizens, there has yet been no political coalition powerful enough to alter them. Everybody expects to benefit from them, so it has been impossible to implement even common-sense reforms.

But ObamaCare is different.

Obamacare has no such insulation from reformers because it discriminates between classes of citizens. Indeed, Democrats played all kinds of favorites[.]

Some people do better from ObamaCare, and some do worse, writes Cost.

But the bigger problem is the middle class already has health insurance.  Most people will do worse under ObamaCare.

That's the trouble with universal government programs.  You start out with a simple concept, like universal health insurance, and you end up screwing the majority to serve the favored few.  Some people get a special deal because they are helpless victims, others because they are powerful special interests.  Pretty soon everyone is gaming the system.

You end up with injustice.  It's nobody's fault; not really.

Justice requires that equal people be treated the same and different people differently, yet no government bureaucracy has the bandwidth to cater to all the different needs.  Fortunately ruling elites have developed a solution to this problem.  They tell us rubes over and over that their simplification and centralization schemes are just wonderful, and that the problems could be solved if only the rich paid their fair share.  But eventually people start wandering off and discovering nasty things under the rocks.

Read more: http://www.americanthinker.com/2012/07/hard_days_ahead_for_obamacare.html#ixzz20KgA75xh

Close Down The TSA! By Pamela Geller

 

Close Down the TSA! by Pamela Geller over at American Thinker

It got hardly any notice in the mainstream media, but the New York Post did report on June 24 that "a JFK Airport terminal had to be evacuated and hundreds of passengers marched back through security screening all because one dimwitted agent failed to realize his metal detector had been unplugged."  The Post called this an example of "the TSA's bungling," but actually it was a telling indication of what is wrong with our airport security procedures, and it shows why the TSA should be shut down altogether.

"The chaos at Terminal 7," the Post reported, "was caused by screener Alija Abdul Majed, who had manned Lane No. 1 during the morning shift with no idea his metal detector had no juice, sources said."

A Muslim TSA screener, Alija Abdul Majed, left his screener unplugged for hours.  This was no accident.  This was a dry run.  Majed, said the Post, failed "to realize that alert lights never flashed once as streams of passengers filed through the dead detector."  Yeah, right.

We have devout Muslim screeners screening for devout Muslims?  This defines insanity.  Nor is it the first such incident.  The Post reported in June 2011 that "chilling Islamic graffiti found in the bathroom of a jet due to take off from Newark Airport was inexplicably erased by a cleaner after the Transportation Safety Administration waited 47 critical minutes to contact cops."

We have an entire government agency, the Transportation Security Administration (TSA), dedicated to protecting us from terrorists who are largely Muslim.  We have torturous security procedures at every stage of air travel.  We bear unfathomable costs in taxpayer dollars, and even worse, we have to put up with the surrender of privacy and individual rights because of Islamic jihad -- because of the 9/11 Muslim terrorists, and because of the British Muslims who planned to blow up seven planes and kill 4,000 Americans and/or Britons in the name of Islam in 2006, and because of Richard Reid, the Muslim with the exploding shoes, and because of the Christmas Day bomber, the Muslim with the exploding crotch.

Read more: http://www.americanthinker.com/2012/07/close_down_the_tsa.html#ixzz20EZ6wuSf

Poll: Obama Over-Reached On F&F Executive Privilege by Thomas Lifson

 

Poll: Obama over-reached on F&F executive privilege by Thomas Lifson over at American Thinker

The mainstream media cofferdam around the Fast and Furious scandal didn't work. Reassurances from Democrats and their media lickspittles that this is just a "fishing expedition" have been to no avail. The Hill has taken a poll, and discovered that the cover-up isn't working.  Neil Stanage writes:

A clear majority of likely voters believes President Obama has exercised his executive power inappropriately - particularly in blocking the release of documents relating to Operation Fast and Furious, according to a new poll for The Hill. (snip)

Sixty-one percent of independents said they disapproved of the president's actions, and just 25 percent approved. Among Republicans, opposition to the president's use of executive privilege was more entrenched at 78 percent.

Even 28 percent of Democrats, and 30 percent of self-identified liberals disapproved of Obama's position.

Read more: http://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2012/06/poll_obama_over-reached_on_ff_executive_privilege.html#ixzz1yoYgrH2j

Wake Up, Religious Conservatives: A Summons To Outrage By Fay Voshell

 

I been wondering why other churches hadn’t follow suit of the Catholic Church. Don’t they care their freedom to worship and talk about Jesus and God are being taken away? Haven’t they woke up to what is going on? Or just don’t care? Or just staying quiet to get along?  Or is it nobody is spreading the news their in? You tell me.

 

Wake Up, Religious Conservatives: A Summons to Outrage by Fay Voshell over at American Thinker

Observers of the religious and political scenes in America should have taken notice when President Obama deemed Christian religious symbols too offensive to be seen during his economics speech at Catholic Georgetown University in April of 2009.  The offending symbols, including the ancient monogram IHS representing Christ's name, were covered with a dark cloth.

Looking back, the funereal covering was a pivotal sign that the Obama administration was openly hostile to Catholics and would attempt to diminish the Church's influence in America while asserting the supremacy of the president and the leftist secular state.

One of the most egregious examples of persecutory behavior toward faith-based institutions on the part of our left-leaning administration has been the attempt to jettison constitutionally guaranteed protection of religious freedom by insisting that church-run institutions, Catholic and Protestant alike, provide access to abortifacients and sterilization in health insurance plans for their employees.  If the order is observed, the funeral of the Church is assured, as the Church would be completely absorbed by the State, totally subject to the State's mores.

To their credit, since the egregious assault by the current administration on the Church's first amendment rights, Catholic leaders have reacted vigorously, sowing distinct signs of life.

As of the writing of this article, some 43 Catholic institutions have filed lawsuits against the government.  Catholic bishops have united in opposition to the intrusion of the state into religious affairs.  They realize that for the first time in American history, an administration has egregiously violated the line between church and state by advancing what is essentially a government takeover of private religious institutions.  They now see that the Obama administration is intransigently pro-abortion, as well as firmly against traditional marriage.

Read more: http://www.americanthinker.com/2012/06/wake_up_religious_conservatives_a_summons_to_outrage.html#ixzz1yikpzIYm

Service: A Touching Testament To Our Heroes In Uniform By Elise Cooper

 

Service: A Touching Testament to Our Heroes in Uniform by Elise Cooper over at American Thinker

Marcus Luttrell with James D. Hornfischer has written another emotional story that the reader will not want to put down.  Titled Service, this one is the sequel to the compelling and gripping Lone Survivor.

(Lone Survivor chronicles what happened to Marcus in Afghanistan.  It documents a reconnaissance mission, Operation Redwing, in June 2005 when four US Navy SEALs were dropped into the mountainous region between the Afghan-Pakistan borders to observe the activities of a top al-Qaeda leader.  It is believed that local goat herders who had crossed the SEALs' path, yet were released by them, informed the Taliban of the SEALs' whereabouts.  After an intense firefight, three of the four SEALs were killed.  The local villagers rescued Luttrell, who had received multiple fractures and wounds.  After fighting off the Taliban from attempting to extract Luttrell, the villagers eventually sent an emissary to the nearest U.S. base.  Unfortunately, the first rescue mission helicopter was shot down, but a second attempt was successful.)

Service, for its part, is a very moving tribute to those who selflessly put their lives on the line out of love for their country, sometimes paying the ultimate price.  In Service, Luttrell provides more facts about Operation Redwing and the mission to rescue him.  There is also a very detailed description of conditions in Ramadi, Iraq, from 2006 to 2008, involving American troops and the Iraqi citizens.  American Thinker interviewed Marcus about his book and thoughts regarding the War on Terror.

Marcus told American Thinker that as he was recovering from his wounds, he thought about G-d, country, and family.  Service was written to honor all.  He wanted people to understand that "it's going above and beyond yourself for the better good of everybody.  I get more of a reward for helping others than helping myself.  Our Founding Fathers knew that.  I wanted to point out in the book that soldiers are fighting for our freedoms.  Just look up at our flag.  That is the most perfect representation of why we do what we do.  We have endured the chaos, terror, and horror that happened over there.  We fight for our flag.  In Lone Survivor, I explained my mentality, that the bad guys dropped two towers in one of my cities, and I wanted to get them."

American Thinker asked Marcus if he could expand on some of the details talked about in Service.  He noted that even though his rescuer, Gulab, had to endure his car being blown up and his house burned down, "he told me that he would save me again if he had to do it all over, because that is what a man does, no matter what are the consequences.  They still follow the 1,000-year-old traditions.  That is why I am here today, because they respected the tradition to help me.  I hope that Americans recognize that there are very good people out there in these countries."

Read more: http://www.americanthinker.com/2012/06/service_a_touching_testament_to_our_heroes_in_uniform.html#ixzz1ydJY3vdh

Another Sign Dems Are Writing Off Obama By Thomas Lifson

 

Another sign Dems are writing off Obama by Thomas Lifson over at American Thinker

The grown-ups in the Democratic Party are looking beyond what they anticipate will be Barack Obama's single term, and positioning themselves to survive the aftermath. How else to explain the words of "Obama surrogate" Ed Rendell, former governor of Pennsylvania and Chairman of the Democratic National Committee,  and Hillary Clinton acolyte?  Bill McMorris of the Washington Free Beacon reports:

A top Obama surrogate said the president will not have to worry about a swooning media or crowds overcome by fainting spells in 2012.

"The media and the population saw him as this transformative figure [in 2008]; he was the first serious black candidate, a new, young, promising figure," said former Pennsylvania Gov. Ed Rendell. "People have sobered to that; the newness has faded and people now see him as another practical politician."

Rendell is known for being blunt, a theme he touches on in his new book, A Nation of Wusses, and a trait that has gotten him in hot water on the campaign trail.

Read more: http://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2012/06/another_sign_dems_are_writing_off_obama.html#ixzz1yXF6Jcyq

Why Liberals Are Selfish By Kyle Becker

 

Why Liberals Are Selfish by Kyle Becker over at American Thinker

It is a constant refrain on the left that conservatives are "selfish."  Those who want to work and keep the fruits of their own labor are castigated as self-centered and greedy, while progressives are held out to be all-compassionate and kind for supporting government-run programs for every malady under the sun.

Enough of that rubbish.

The term "selfish" in various contexts implies that someone wrongfully holds onto or gains something at the expense of another.  While conservatives and most political moderates uses the term "selfish" to deride those who take things that do not belong to them -- in other words, what that person did not produce or receive voluntarily from another -- the modern left uses the term "selfish" to upbraid those who want to hold onto something of their own that is demanded by another.

The left therefore seems to assume that the life, labor, and property of any individual are the possession of "society."  This is a tribal, mystical, and frankly demeaning notion that is anything but concordant with civilized peoples.

If a person is born into the world and has the potential of leading his own life, which culminates in that person's death and no other's, then it is logical and moral to look at that living being as a totality.

In reality, a human being is not a cog in a machine, or a blob of protoplasm in a swamp of humanity, or whatever analogy reflects a part of a whole being subordinate to the whole.  He is a sentient being, alive within the cosmos, and should be afforded every opportunity to direct his own inseverable experience, so long as he does not impinge on others' right to do so.

It only follows, then, that choice and voluntarism should follow in every sphere of life and without artificial boundary.  As in society, as in economy, as in politics, as in private life.

So in the course of a person supporting his own life, as capitalist economies allow the overwhelming majority of humanity to do, it is wrong for another legally and morally co-equal human being to extract life and labor from him.  Coercive redistribution is a violation of the voluntary nature of the free economy; whether to work or to starve is a choice all people are capable of making.  Reality is not coercive; it is instructive. 

As the preconditions of voluntarism and choice vary in the economy, the definitions of "selfishness" tend to become altered in the language.  In a free economy, people trade their labor at their own discretion.  It thus becomes a moral affront akin to "selfishness" to take the fruit of another person's labor, since one is free to work hard himself and is expected to trade value in kind.

In a socialist economy, withholding labor is considered "selfishness."  Enslavement to the central managers and to one another follows of its own accord.

Read more: http://www.americanthinker.com/2012/06/why_liberals_are_selfish.html#ixzz1yKxntkt9

If We Took the Constitution Seriously, Obama Would Be Impeached By Michael Filozof

 

If We Took the Constitution Seriously, Obama Would Be Impeached by Michael Filozof over at American Thinker

If the citizens of this Republic still took the Constitution seriously, Obama would be impeached for his decision to unilaterally grant amnesty to certain illegal aliens.

Article 1, Sec. 8 of the Constitution, which enumerates the power of Congress, states that "Congress shall have the Power To... establish an [sic] uniform Rule of Naturalization." Congress has passed numerous laws pertaining to immigration and naturalization, including laws requiring the deportation of illegals.

The role of the President, according to Article II, Sec. 3, is to "take Care that the Laws be faithfully executed." Obama's refusal to execute Congress's immigration laws (or, for that matter, Congress's Defense of Marriage Act) is an impeachable offense. Article II, Sec. 4 states that the President "shall be removed from Office on Impeachment for... Treason, Bribery, or other High Crimes and Misdemeanors." The deliberate failure to enforce valid immigration law and allow hordes of foreigners to live and work in the U.S. is, arguably, "treason," and doing so in an election year to appease Hispanic voters could certainly be considered "bribery."

Read more: http://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2012/06/if_we_took_the_constitution_seriously_obama_would_be_impeached.html#ixzz1xxVoLC8u