Awesome: CFACT Parachutes For Truth at Durbin Climate Conference With Climategate II Banners (video)

CFACT (the Committee For A Constructive Tomorrow) is an organization that was created in 1985 to promote a positive voice on environment and development issues.

Its co-founders, David Rothbard and Craig Rucker, believed very strongly that the power of the market combined with the applications of safe technologies could offer humanity practical solutions to many of the world’s pressing concerns. A number of leading scientists, academics, and policy leaders would also agree with them and soon joined their effort, along with thousands of citizens from around the country.

Today, this Washington DC-based group is a highly respected organization and its voice can be heard relentlessly infusing the environmental debate with a balanced perspective on environmental stewardship.  With an influential and impressive scientific advisory board, aggressive collegiate program, CFACT Europe, United Nations representation,  Adopt-A-Village project, Global Social Responsibility program, and “Just the Facts” national radio commentary, CFACT has and continues to offer genuine positive solutions to today’s global challenges.

The organization has been termed “invaluable” by the Arizona Republic, it has been lauded for its “effort to bring sound science to the environmental debate” by a former president of the National Academy of Sciences, and has been praised by a respected Boston Globe columnist for “a record of supplying absolutely solid information.”

They garnered widespread media attention at the UN climate change conference after parachuting the truth about Climategate 2.0 onto a Durban beach. 

CFACT held a press conference with Senator Inhofe and released Climate Depot’s new “A-Z Climate Reality Check” special report.

Via Gateway Pundit

 

Rumors: Holder Resigns Late Friday

Repeat. These are just rumors and speculations, and internet rumors seldom pan out (but they’re so much fun!)

More cold water (before I even start) –Holder, in  Thursday’s hearing, did say:  “I have no intention of resigning”…

But we all know he lies. So-

Sipsey Street Irregulars, earlier today…

Noting this is what cynical DC insiders say “just before they throw you under the bus”:

While House Republicans gear up to grill Attorney General Eric Holder about what-he-knew-when about ATF’s botched Operation Fast and Furious at a House Judiciary Committee hearing on Thursday, the White House is signaling they’re standing by the nation’s top law enforcement officer. “As the President has made clear, he believes Eric Holder is an excellent Attorney General who has his full confidence,” White House spokesman Eric Schultz said in a statement to TPM on Wednesday.

***

On Capitol Hill Wednesday, Sipsey Street can report that these rumors swirled:

1. Holder would resign that day to avoid the hearing;

Okay, we can already discount that one.

2. Holder would hold out until the traditional bad news day of Friday to cash in with a “voluntary resignation” that had been demanded by an increasingly nervous White House;

3. Breuer would leave instead of Holder to see if they could save the AG;

4. Holder would desperately cling to his office while firing Breuer;

5. And, last night, that the White House would cling to Holder at Justice because they need him there to maintain the fiction that they still control events because: a. They rest of the rats would desert the Titanic if they thought it was a “save yourselves” moment — that is, that Holder leaving would be a breaking-of-the-dam moment and the entire truth would flood out as conspirators sought their own deals; or, b. Obama is incapable of admitting error and Holder is being kept on board despite the best contrary political advice (and some of this from high roller donors) that he is getting to try to stanch the bleeding with the re-election coming up. Another source said of Obama’s reported pledge to Holder: “Yeah, right. That’s what they say just before they throw you under the bus.” It is important, the source noted, that the denial did not come from White House press secretary Jay Carney, but rather from scandal deflection expert Schultz. “If they meant it,” he said, “Carney would have said it.”

Sipsey also has  this:

Well, that was fun. “Have you no shame?” “No, have YOU no shame?” Eric Holder’s John Mitchell impression.

Wouldn’t be surprised, now that Issa dropped the tactical nuke of more emails “turned over last evening” n(meaning that somebody else has rolled — either Breuer or Weinstein — that Holder’s resignation “for the good of the administration to avoid further distraction will be announced late tomorrow.

Bob McCarty, too: Rumor Mill: Eric Holder to Resign Friday:

This tidbit came in this morning from a well-connected friend, and I wanted to put in on the record just in case it comes true:

“Just heard from a little bird who lives with in the Washington D. C. beltway… Attorney General Holder is going to resign, perhaps by this Friday.”

RELATED:

White House Insider had this to say about Holder on November 30.

And let me say something else on this.  Might seem to be stating the obvious to you here but I want to say it anyways.  Eric Holder is about the most corrupt and…sinister – he’s the most sinister Attorney General this country has seen.  Dangerous.  He’s gone off the reservation all on his own from time to time.  I used to believe everything came through certain people, or a certain person.  But Holder has been running his own game on a lot of this stuff.  He’ll be forced out and then…the-the…and then the American people are gonna start to hear what was going on at Justice.  It won’t come out all at once.  They are working to cover those tracks as we speak – but too many got the goods now.  It’ll come out in drips and drabs.  They’ll try to minimize the damage for ’12.  It won’t work.  Not entirely.  We are seeing to that.  That’s what they are bumping into right now you see.  The political liability that Holder has become.  Back in 2010, they thought they could ride it out.  Delay.  Bury it.  Move one.  And they have been somewhat successful, but the information is getting out, and enough in Congress know they have to act on it or get their own fingers caught up in the machine.  That was seen during the Senate hearing – but that hearing was intended to set up for Judiciary coming up.  And after that…we got the foundation in place to force out a United States Attorney General.  I wasn’t privy to all of that until just recently.  Suspected it.  Had it figured.  Now it’s been confirmed.  What we are waiting on with this now is the on-the-record condemnation of Eric Holder from Democrats.  We have it off the record – but now we need it to go public.  Then the endgame is there.  This part of the plan is nearly done.

Fingers crossed.

SEE ALSO:

AWR Hawkins at Big Government: Impeachment isn’t Enough – Holder Needs to be Handcuffed:

Holder replied by asking, “Have you no shame?” And Issa countered with, “Have YOU no shame?”

This is a teachable moment folks: Holder has grown so accustomed to the success of his own hypocrisy that he took offense to being called out on the carpet. He took offense to being compared to Mitchell when the truth is, Mitchell’s family should be offended that one of their own was compared to Holder.

At another point, when Holder defended his handling of the matter by saying the DOJ had provided an “unprecedented” amount of information to Congress already, Issa went into smackdown mode: “Unprecedented would be an attorney general who knew nothing about something where his own present chief of staff was intimately familiar.” (Issa’s comments were referencing Gary Grindler, Holder’s current chief of staff who, as an Acting Deputy Attorney General attended a briefing on Fast and Furious in March 2010.)

As for Sensenbrenner, he came across as a Congressman determined to get to the bottom of this mess. It was he who warned that Holder could face impeachment if he didn’t come clean.

With all respect to Sensenbrenner, I think we’re past impeachment. It’s jail time. Holder does not deserve to be in the society of free people.

UPDATE:

A call from Rep Gowdy for Holder to resign “now”, via the Daily Caller:

South Carolina Republican Rep. Trey Gowdy told Fox News anchor Bill Hemmer on Friday morning that Attorney General Eric Holder “needs to go now.”

Gowdy, who has been intimately involved with the House oversight committee investigation into Operation Fast and Furious, became the 54th congressman to demand Holder’s resignation. Gowdy adds that he backs Wisconsin Republican Rep. Jim Sensenbrenner’s suggestion “100 percent” that impeachment proceedings may be necessary to remove the attorney general from office.

Hemmer asked if the oversight committee has the power to impeach Holder. Gowdy responded, “Absolutely.”

UPDATE II:

Sign the petition: Fire Holder

29,728 Letters and Emails Sent So Far

Video: Congressmen Celebrate ‘Obama Day’ on Capitol Hill: 12/8/11

In the Catholic Church, December 8 is the feast day of the Immaculate Conception of the Blessed Virgin Mary.

But in Washington DC, it’s OBAMA  Day! And oh, what an extra special Obama Day it was -

Courtesy of the RNC.

And At long last Issa is now saying, out in the open, what so many of us have have been saying all year: They Made a Crisis to Limit People’s 2nd Amendment Rights

Chairman Issa had resisted making the assertion that Fast and Furious was an attack on the 2nd Amendment because it is such a serious – surreal charge. Would the top law enforcement officer of the United States really do such a thing? It’s almost unthinkable. But look at Holder’s history of lies and corruption, and the nefarious cabal of leftists with whom Obama surrounds himself, and the awful truth becomes fathomable.

Holder’s days are numbered.

Via Gateway Pundit:

Video: Issa Calls Holder a “Hostile Witness” at Today’s Hearing

Sparks flew during this exchange between Chairman of the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, Darrell Issa and Attorney General Eric Holder, whom Issa deemed a “hostile witness” because he has come before the committee and said he would clean house, yet no house has been cleaned. Issa bitterly noted that he had asked that the Atty General testify under oath, and was his request was denied.

He also charged “the IG is not in our opinion qualified to investigate, and has overstepped the line.”

Did you notice how “the Gentlewoman from Texas” interrupted every time Issa started making a dangerous (to Holder) point.

See also:

Kerry Picket of the Washington Times on the raucus final moments of the hearing, today: Issa compares Holder to Nixon AG Mitchell; Holder compares Issa to Joe McCarthy

“Are you aware that you are in fact, by doing so, in the fact that we already issued from the oversight committee a subpoenea, you are standing in contempt of Congress unless you have a valid reason that you express it,” Issa said.  ”That you provide logs which you have refused to have provide for the other information. Otherwise, you leave the committee no choice but to seek contempt for your failure to deliver or to cite a Constitutional exemption.”

Holder responded, “We will respond in a way that is consistent with the way in which the Justice Department has always responded to those kinds of…”

Issa interrupted saying, “That’s not the question Mr. Attorney General.”

When order was restored by Chairman Lamar Smith, Texas Republican, Holder continued, ”…will respond in a way that other Attorneys General have…other justices have…”

At this point things became particularly intense between Mr. Issa and Mr. Holder. Issa reached back to a Watergate era reference comparing AG Holder to President Nixon’s Attorney General John Mitchell, who was sentenced to 19 months in prison due to his involvement with the Watergate scandal.

“John Mitchell responded that way too,” said Rep. Issa to Holder.

Holder asked Chairman Smith if the John Mitchell reference “was called for.” Holder then proceeded to compare Congressman Issa to the late Senator Joseph McCarthy, the politician famous for heading up the 1950′s hearings that sought to investigate communist infiltration in the U.S. government.

“The reference to John Mitchell. Let’s think about that,” said AG Holder. “Think about that. At some point, you know as they said at the McCarthy hearings, ‘Have you no shame?’”

Video at the link.

Video: Issa’s Blistering Opening Statement at Today’s Fast and Furious Hearing: “I Have No Confidence In A President That Has Confidence In This Attorney General!”

Rep. Darrell Issa (R-CA),Chairman of the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, delivered a blistering opening statement at the House Judiciary Committee Oversight Hearing of the Department of Justice. He blasted the DOJ for facilitating the deadly repercussions of Operation Fast and Furious. He noted that his committee is now starting to get to the truth about the heinous operation.

“Mr. Attorney General, today I hope you will not point fingers and say that somehow this is not organic. There is nothing more organic than (a)  law enforcement officer being gunned down because of a failure to protect within the DOJ. There is nothing more organic than Congress’s responsibility in following up on Congress being LIED TO. “

He also stated that he had no confidence in a President that has confidence in Attorney General Holder!

See American Freedom for more videos from the hearings.

One more thing:

I forgot to mention -  This hearing marks the beginning of the end for Holder. His days are numbered. Republicans have clearly had it with the lies, obfuscations, misdirections, and obstruction. If he doesn’t step down willingly,  they will move to have him impeached.

Liveblogging: Fast and Furious Hearing

Watch it live, here.

Attorney General Eric Holder testifies before the House Judiciary Committee today about when he first became aware of the tactics used by the ATF’s failed sting operation aimed at gun smugglers.

Previously, Holder vowed that the tactics used during operation Fast and Furious would never be used again by the Justice Department.  The operation allowed guns to be smuggled across the U.S.-Mexico border in order to establish links between arms dealers and drug cartels.

The Attorney General has also said that the Justice Department never knowingly provided Congress with false information about Fast and Furious, a charge leveled by House and Senate Republicans. Mr. Holder will testify before the full House Judiciary Committee.

I can tell you right now, it’s going to be frustrating to sit through the thick skulled Democrats’ attempts to misdirect and whitewash. It’s started already with John Conyers, who’s speaking now about the importance of ending gun violence —blablabla. You know how we do that, Senator? We prosecute the members of the Obama administration who are complicit in increasing gun violence through their disastrous gunwalking policies.

Oh my God. He’s now saying Eric Holder has achieved “impressive results” in the area of gun trafficking and civil rights – DOJ whistleblower, J Christian Adams would beg to differ! (Read Injustice: Exposing the Racial Agenda of the Obama Justice Department).

Issa takes exception to Conyer’s comments – The question is about gun control – not controlling the guns and drugs flooding across the border, he said.

Wow, Issa is letting Holder have it with both barrels: (paraphrasing):

I hope you don’t point your finger in people’s faces saying this isn’t organic – there’s nothing more organic then border patrol agent, Brian Terry being dead with fast and furious guns.

…

The president has said he has full confidence in the Atty General – I have no confidence in a president who has no problem with the etc….

Another Dem speaking now – yep, it’s clear that they’re going to use this hearing to promote increased gun control laws. His comments have no relationship – none at all -  to the subject at hand – (the fact that the ATF under Holder, sold thousands of guns to straw purchasers and allowed them to walk across the border to kill people with.)

I don’t know how the Republicans can keep their composure while these morons misdirect and obfuscate.

Now Holder is saying that the gunwalking was inexcusable, and when he heard about it, he immediately took action….blablabla…

He too, is using the hearing as a forum to push gun control.

A reminder, via Ann Barnhardt:

Psychopaths ‘like Eric Holder, Barack Obama, Nancy Pelosi, and all the rest, feel nothing when they lie and thus do it almost constantly. Oaths are something that they laugh at as the domain of stupid religious rednecks. If we don’t acknowledge this plain, obvious truth and stop treating these people as if they are psychologically normal and honorable and presuming that they are honest and bound by any oath, then they will destroy all of us with their lies and deceit.’

As Holder yammers on and on about all of his “progress” stopping the flow of guns across the border, he offers no explanation as to why this operation existed. None.

Lamar Smith, deferring Fast and Furious questions to his colleagues, opts to ask Holder questions about Elena Kagan’s nomination to the Supreme Court, and her involvement while working for the Obama administration, with the health care bill.

He’s asking why the Department has refused to comply his queries about the case – is he asserting a legal privilege? Holder is giving a long, confusing answer -Lamar concludes, no – he hasn’t asserted illegal privilege.

Smith says, “is there any reason why I should not get the documents, and interview the people I need t talk to?”

Looks like Smith is getting a little frustrated from repeatedly hitting Holder’s stonewall.

Conyers is throwing softballs now. Time to get up and refresh my coffee.

Rep. James Sensenbrenner (Wis) seconds Senator Grassley’s call for Asst. AG, Lanny Breuer to step down. Whoa!  Sensenbrenner threatens Holder with the “I” word – impeachment – out of his frustration with the DOJ’s obstruction.

Holder says “no one in the Justice Dept. has lied.” They have only made misleading statements.

Doubling. Down.

Sensenbrenner’s use of the “I” word has clearly ruffled some feathers in the hearing with other congressmen rising up to ask for clarification. Apparently, Sensenbrenner hasn’t been entirely clear about who he means to see impeached.

Now they’re taking a break so the House can vote on some bills.

The big takeaway so far – Holder is doubling down – he thinks he can just brazen his way through this. At least one Republican is considering Holder’s impeachment as one possible recourse.

Follow live tweets on #fastandfurious hashtag.

UPDATE:

The Right Scoop: Fireworks! Issa grills Holder over withholding documents about Fast and Furious

Newtmentum: Gingrich front-runner in 3 of first 4 states to vote

A CNN Poll, just out, has Newt winning in three of the first four states to vote in the Republican primaries.

The CNN/Time/ORC International Polls, released Wednesday, indicate that strong support from the tea party movement is contributing to the former House speaker’s surge among likely Republican primary voters and caucus-goers. But the poll also suggests that this race is far from over, with less than half the people questioned in each state saying their minds are made up.

According to the poll, one-third of likely GOP caucus participants in Iowa say they are backing Gingrich. Thirteen points back, at 20% is former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney, who’s making his second bid for his party’s nomination. Rep. Ron Paul of Texas, who’s making his third run for the presidency, is at 17%, with Texas Gov. Rick Perry at 9%, Rep. Michele Bachmann of neighboring Minnesota at 7%, former Sen. Rick Santorum of Pennsylvania at 5% and former Utah Gov. and former ambassador to China Jon Huntsman at 1%. Both Bachmann and Santorum have been crisscrossing Iowa.

Iowa’s Jan. 3 caucuses kick off the presidential nomination contest, with New Hampshire’s primary going second, one week later, on Jan. 10.

In New Hampshire,  35% of likely back Romney, 26% supporting Gingrich and 17% backing PaulHuntsman, who’s been spending nearly all of his time campaigning in New Hampshire, is at 8%, with everyone else in the low single digits.

In South Carolina,  43% of likely GOP primary voters  are backing Gingrich, with Romney a distant second at 20%, Perry at 8%, Bachmann and Paul each at 6%, Santorum at 4% and Huntsman at 1%.

It’s the same story in Florida, the fourth statewide contest on the calendar. According to the poll, 48% of people likely to vote in Florida’s Jan. 31 GOP primary say they support Gingrich, with Romney a distant second at 25%, Paul at 5% and everyone else in the low single digits.

Newt is also winning out in the latest blogosphere polling, as you can see at RWN.

If you have doubts about Newt, (and who doesn’t?), this interview with a skeptical Glenn Beck *might* help allay your concerns. Beck asks some tough questions, and Gingrich doesn’t shy away from answering them.

Part One:

Part Two:

SEE ALSO:

Newsbusters: Bozell Statement: Newt Was Found Innocent Nearly 13 Years Ago — Networks Have Yet To Report It:

Following the recent threats from Nancy Pelosi and the heavy brush with which the media are painting Newt Gingrich as unethical, the Media Research Center is now calling on the networks to seize the moment and report the truth from nearly 13 years ago.

It has been 4,689 days since the IRS formally cleared Newt Gingrich of any violation of tax law.  It’s been 4,689 days since ABC, CBS, and NBC have had the opportunity to report it. What the heck.  Why not today?  Now is the time for these networks to report the truth for once.  The networks owe it to the American people to report the fact that in 1999 the IRS completely vindicated Gingrich.

And in case you haven’t seen this yet – some Newt nostalgia from 1995 via The Atlantic:

Ah, 1995. Bill Clinton was president, Newt Gingrich was the House’s feisty new speaker, and Chris Farley was still alive.

At this April 5 meeting of the House Republican Conference, John Boehner introduced Gingrich, only to have Farley appear from the wings and present a last-minute agenda to round out the new Republican Congress’s first 100 days in power.

Fast and Furious News Round-up: Grassley Says It’s Time For Asst. AG Breuer To Step Down

While mounting evidence now shows otherwise,  Assistant Attorney General Lanny A. Breuer told Congress back in February 2011, that he knew nothing about the gun walking tactics which had been used in Operation Fast and Furious.

AWR Hawkins reports at Big Government:

His contention was that he only learned of the tactics once Border Patrol Agent Brian Terry had been killed in December 2010. only learned of the tactics once Border Patrol Agent Brian Terry had been killed in December 2010.

More recently, however, Breuer has decided he knew about the gun walking aspects of Fast and Furious as early as April 2010. But he continues to carry water for the DOJ by saying that although he knew, he never took the time to tell Holder about the gun walking.

How many lies can these people tell before someone changes the locks on their office doors and takes away their parking credentials?

Senator Charles Grassley, for one, has had enough, and just today officially called for Breuer’s resignation from the Senate floor.

Said Grassley:

The Justice Department had publicly denied to Congress that ATF would ever walk guns. Yet the head of the Criminal Division, [Lanny] Breuer knew otherwise and said nothing.

It is past time for accountability at the senior levels of the Justice Department. That accountability needs to start with…Mr. Breuer. I believe it is time for him to go.

There’s blood in the water, now – expect a frenzy of calls from Congress for Breuer’s head. They are getting closer….

Yesterday, on Fox News Megyn Kelly presided over a rare instance in which a liberal and conservative lawyer actually agreed with each other.  Jay Sekulow of the ACLJ and former federal prosecutor for the Southern district of NY, John Flannery both called for accountability in the Justice Dept. for Fast and Furious, especially in regards to Breuer whose actions can no longer be defended.

Ace’s headline almost says it all, but do continue reading: ATF Emails: Hey, Let’s Use These Long-Gun Sales We’ve Demanded Gun Shop Owners Sell To Cartels To Justify Cracking Down on Long-Gun Sales

Ace isn’t a believer, yet? What is it going to take?

Chron.com: Sen. Cornyn questions feds’ alleged drug-money laundering scheme:

Texas Sen. John Cornyn has criticized an alleged sting operation in which U.S. narcotics agents laundered drug proceeds for Mexican drug cartels in hopes of tracing the money up the organizations’ chain of command.

Cornyn said the tactic “bears eerie similarities” to the gun-trafficking scheme known as Operation Fast and Furious.

Sunday’s New York Times reported that undercover agents mostly from the Drug Enforcement Administration have laundered millions in drug proceeds to cartels across the border to learn more about the organizations’ leadership and assets.

Cornyn suggested the DEA tactic parallels the “gun-walking” in Fast and Furious, in which Phoenix field agents with the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives did not intercept illegally bought guns but instead followed the trail of them in hopes of building a case against cartel kingpins.

Speaking to reporters by phone, Cornyn said he also remains concerned that Mexican authorities might not have received enough information about the Fast and Furious gun sting or the alleged drug-money laundering scheme.

“This is enormously unhelpful in terms of disrupting that very important relationship between the U.S. government and law-enforcement agencies, and President [Felipe] Calderón and the law-enforcement agencies in Mexico to combat and suppress the cartels,” Cornyn said. ”It’s really been a disaster.”

Previously (this week):

Fast and Furious News Round-Up: Cash-Walking Now?

Senator Grassley Offers Sneak Preview Of December 8th House Judiciary Committee Hearing On Senate Floor

Republican Senators Need to Correct an Error and Jump on The Eric Holder Resignation Bandwagon

Obama Administration Classifies Fort Hood Shooting As “Workplace Violence”

“We have no Commander and Chief!” Congressman Allen West tweets in frustration:

Although I can forgive the Obama administration for not “jumping to conclusions” in the first 24 hours of the Fort Hood shooting, (even though it was obvious it was a terrorist attack the moment the words, “Allahu Akbar” came out of the shooter’s mouth), two plus years later their obstinate disregard for the truth is a perverse joke.

Fox News reports:

Sen. Susan Collins on Wednesday blasted the Defense Department for classifying the Fort Hood massacre as workplace violence and suggested political correctness is being placed above the security of the nation’s Armed Forces at home.

During a joint session of the Senate and House Homeland Security Committee on Wednesday, the Maine Republican referenced a letter from the Defense Department depicting the Fort Hood shootings as workplace violence. She criticized the Obama administration for failing to identify the threat as radical Islam.

***

The chairman of the Senate Homeland Security Committee, Connecticut independent Sen. Joe Lieberman, said the military has become a “direct target of violent Islamist extremism” within the United States.

“The stark reality is that the American service member is increasingly in the terrorists’ scope and not just overseas in a traditional war setting,” Lieberman told Fox News before the start of Wednesday’s hearing.

In June, two men allegedly plotted to attack a Seattle, Wash., military installation using guns and grenades. In July, Army Pvt. Naser Abdo was accused of planning a second attack on Fort Hood. And in November, New York police arrested Jose Pimentel, who alleged sought to kill service members returning from Iraq and Afghanistan.

Both Pimentel and Abdo also allegedly drew inspiration from al-Awlaki and the online jihadist magazine Inspire, which includes a spread on how to “Make a Bomb in the Kitchen of Your Mom.”

Rep. Peter King of New York, the Republican chairman of the House Homeland Security Committee, said military service members are “symbols of America’s power, symbols of America’s might.”

“And if they (military personnel) can be killed, then that is a great propaganda victory for al Qaeda,” King told Fox News.

I think I see more instances of “workplace violence” in our military’s not-so-distant future.

Hat tip: Weasel Zippers

Video: Rush Unleashes on the “Stupid!” RNC For Being Too Soft on the “Despicable Divider” Obama

El Rushbo, sounding sick to his stomach, right after hearing Obama’s class warfare speech, yesterday, articulated my own feelings, on the RNC’s craven reluctance to attack Pharaoh Obama on a personal level:

Smitty says:

Don’t back down, double down. The country is at stake. Let’s find out who the little children are at GOP HQ and gently toss them in the broom closet until after the election next November.

Be sure to read the rest of his commentary at The Other McCain.

 

 

Obama Pushes Big Government Agenda In Pearl Harbor Statement

This guy just can’t give it a rest. A day of remembrance has to become a day of pushing his left-wing agenda.

The Washington Times reports:

In a statement, Mr. Obama praised World War II veterans “who overcame the Depression, crossed oceans and stormed the beaches to defeat fascism, and turned adversaries into our closest allies.”

Good so far –

“When the guns fell silent, they came home, went to school on the G.I. Bill, and built the largest middle class in history and the strongest economy in the world,” Mr. Obama said. “They remind us that no challenge is too great when Americans stand as one.”

Uh -

The president’s “stand as one” theme featured prominently in his speech in Kansas on Tuesday when he called for wealthier Americans to pay more in taxes, part of his endeavor to correct inequalities in wealth that Mr. Obama called “the defining issue of our time.”

Entire statement, here.

Related:

A good piece at RCP by David Harsanyi: Obama vs. Capitalism:

In Teddy Roosevelt’s era, President Barack Obama explained to the nation this week, “some people thought massive inequality and exploitation was just the price of progress. … But Roosevelt also knew that the free market has never been a free license to take whatever you want from whoever you can.”

And he’s right. Even today there are people who believe they should have free license to take whatever they want from whomever they can. They’re called Democrats.

Yet the president, uniter of a fractured nation, the mighty slayer of infinite straw men, claims that some Americans “rightly” suppose that the economy is rigged against their best interests in a nation awash in breathtaking greed, massive inequality and exploitation. Or I should say, he’s trying to convince us that it’s the case.

Mickey Kaus: What was the matter with Kansas:

2) It’s pathetic if the mighty U.S. is really forced to beg corporations to produce here out of Warren-Buffetesque philanthropic urges. But it’s especially pathetic for American liberalism, which has always been most appealing when it stood up against the condescension of “alms givers”–but which now celebrates wealthy philanthropists with nauseating ease (a trend I blame, in very small part, on my old employer Slate, with its annual “Slate 60″ charity porn feature). “Giving back” is the credo of Hollywood celebrities, not New Deal liberals.  Democrats are supposed to be the party of government–government that establishes a foundation for the essential dignity of working people–not the party that sucks up to the Google guys and the Gates Foundation.

At least Elizabeth Warren only wanted rich businessmen to pay higher taxes. It’s a sign of liberalism’s humiliating inability to do enough with those taxes that left-wingers now seek to substitute The Giving Pledge.

Heh.

SEE ALSO:

Dan Collins at The Conservatory: Texas, Kansas, Arkansas . . . They All End with -as

Obama gave a big, dumb speech about the economy in Kansas, and pulled a Spinal Tap by being happy to be in Texas. Once again, it’s a good thing he’s so evidently a genius, or this would be held to demonstrate stupidity.

Obama Pressures Congress To Go Easy On Iran

100-0.

The US Senate approved a proposal to penalize foreign financial institutions that do business with Iran’s central bank, 100-0.

How often does the Senate vote unanimously for or against anything?

And yet according to Republican Senator Mark Kirk,  the Obama administration is urging US lawmakers to soften the proposed sanctions.

The Jerusalem Post reports:

The Senate approved the proposal last week 100-0 despite lobbying against it by Obama administration officials, who argued that threatening US allies might not be the best way to get cooperation in action against Iran.

A similar measure is pending in the House of Representatives; both chambers must agree on the same version before it can become law.

Kirk said on Tuesday that the administration had written to some lawmakers’ offices and “proposed what they describe as technical fixes” to the Kirk-Menendez amendment.

But Kirk complained: “They are not technical fixes at all. They are meant to undermine the amendment.” He and Menendez have written to fellow lawmakers as well, urging them to “stick with” the Senate-passed proposal, Kirk said at an event on Iran’s nuclear program, sponsored by the conservative American Enterprise Institute think tank.

***

A senior Senate Republican aide said the document that the administration sent to lawmakers’ offices proposed lengthening, from 60 to 180 days, the grace period in the Kirk-Menendez proposal before sanctions would kick in for non-oil transactions with Iran’s central bank.

The administration also sought to “water down the penalties” on foreign banks that do business with Iran’s central bank, the Senate aide said. The administration favored imposing “strict conditions” on such foreign banks, rather than the all-out cutoff from the US financial system that is in the Kirk-Menendez amendment.

Kirk charged that the Obama administration was simply trying to find “a way out for the administration, to say that a nuclear Iran is unacceptable, but to take no effective action against the central paymaster” of the country’s nuclear architecture.

I’d say “unbelievable”, but – I’m way past being surprised by anything this administration does.

Hat tip:Doug Ross who notes  He’s doing precisely what he was taught to do.

Audio: Former NRA Chairman On The Roger Hedgecock Show: Sharon Bialek was terminated before Herman Cain was even hired

Biff Naylor

The Right Scoop reports:

The former NRA Chairman, Biff Naylor, who hired Herman Cain says that Sharon Bialek was terminated before Herman Cain was even hired and thus he never met her. On top of that she propositioned him (Naylor) for dinner once because she thought he was handsome, which he promptly turned down as he was happily married.

Naylor also says he knew the other two that said Cain harassed them, and that whatever they took exception to was so minor that it wasn’t even reported to the executive committee or the board.

He said that Herman Cain did not have any kind of a reputation for womanizing, and claims he did some interviews a few weeks ago,  but failed to get his defense of Cain out there. He should have been shouting this story from the rooftops.

Bialek’s story was that “as a diligent worker who had successfully raised money for the NRA’s Educational Foundation”, she was let go unexpectedly in 1997.

As The Politico had dutifully reported:

Bialek said she and her boyfriend were invited to a party by Cain in his hotel suite the final night of the NRA May 1997 convention in Chicago. She also said she sat next to Cain at a convention luncheon where he “spoke to me extensively.”

When she was fired a month later, her boyfriend suggested she contact Cain for help, which she did. Cain called her back and said he’d been unaware she was fired. She suggested they meet for coffee while she was in Washington, where the NRA’s offices are located.

Her boyfriend booked her a room at the Capital Hilton, which she discovered, she claimed, that Cain had intervened to get her a better suite: “I upgraded you,” she quoted him saying.

You know the rest. It always sounded like a flaky BS story, and now we know. He hadn’t met her at the luncheon because the lying floozy was fired before he even came on.

Good News: RNC Recommends Kid Gloves Treatment of Our Special, Historic President in 2012

Attacking him personally is just too doggone dangerous, they say.

Republicans on a private Republican National Committee conference call with allies warned Tuesday that party surrogates should refrain from personal attacks against President Barack Obama, because such a strategy is too hazardous for the GOP.

“We’re hesitant to jump on board with heavy attacks” personally against President Obama, Nicholas Thompson, the vice president of polling firm the Tarrance Group, said on the call. “There’s a lot of people who feel sorry for him.”

Recent polling data indicates that while the president suffers from significantly low job approval ratings, voters still give “high approval” to Obama personally, Thompson said.

Voters “don’t think he’s an evil man who’s out to change the United States” for the worse–even though many of the same survey respondents agree that his policies have harmed the country, Thompson said. The upshot, Thompson stressed, is that Republicans should “exercise some caution” when talking about the president personally.

Serious question: Are there Communist moles working at the RNC, now? They’re going to mute the truth about a guy who has taken a wrecking ball to the US economy in order to make the campaign season more palatable to people who FEEL SORRY for him? People who are still suffering from “white guilt” syndrome don’t need to be condescended to with focus group tested talking points. They need to be shaken and slapped out of it.  Good lord – don’t they get it at the RNC? This is what people hate about polished politicians, and it’s why Newt Gingrich is clobbering Mitt in the polls right now. He’s not letting anyone bully him into being “kind and gentle” with Obama.

In case  the RNC forgot,  we already tried a lukewarm strategy like that  – it’s called the McCain campaign, and it went down in flames.

The RNC had better get a clue and fast, because Obama has nothing holding him back from attacking his opponent (whomever it turns out to be) in the worst possible ways. In fact it has been predicted that 2012 will be the most brutal campaign season ever. And guess what? They’ll be using racial politics and class warfare because that’s what they’re good at.

William L Gensert at The American Thinker advises Repubs to beat Obama back.

Barack Obama will fight dirty.  The nation needs a candidate who will do the same.  After all, anyone who thinks that one of Herman Cain’s accusers, Sharon Bialek, living in the same building as David Axelrod is a coincidence is delusional.  Obama will run the most negative campaign in recent history.  There will be allegations of racism, of corruption, of incompetence.  The Republican nominee needs to understand that in order to beat someone at mud-wrestling, you must get in the mud.

Friedrich Nietzsche wrote in Beyond Good and Evil that “he who fights monsters should see to it that he himself does not become a monster.”  No truer words were ever written.

Yet to do battle with Mr. Obama, any candidate will have to become something of a monster, aggressive and unremitting, without pause or embarrassment.  Nothing should be off the table: Obama’s associations with Bill Ayers, the former terrorist; his decades-long relationship with the race-baiting Jeremiah Wright, the religious zealot of “God damn America” fame; all the czars and disastrous nominations like Van Jones, an avowed “truther,” and Elizabeth Warren, who takes credit for the moral underpinnings of the OWS crowd, and Craig Becker, Obama’s recess appointment to the NLRB who is busy pushing through a pogrom of forced unionization and governmental control of industry by regulatory fiat, and Lisa Jackson, who as head of the EPA has made it her life’s goal to destroy America’s manufacturing, electrical generation, and fossil fuel industries, also through regulation, and the failed and incompetent Eric Holder, with his Fast and Furious program, where the administration sought to bolster support for gun control by deliberately arming Mexican drug cartels, resulting in hundreds of deaths in Mexico and one in America…as well as all the golf, all the vacations, the crony capitalism, the disregard for the Constitution.  On and on it goes, because Barack Obama has provided, in less than three years, plenty of ammunition to do battle against his most dismal presidency.

The Republican candidate cannot take the high road like John McCain and refuse to fight.  Barack Obama will not be constrained; he will use whatever he can against whoever is his opponent, without reservation, including every underhanded trick and lie at his disposal.  The legacy media will not only support him in this, but they will be complicit in his dirty politics

While conservatism is a set of principles for economic governance, liberalism is a religion for world control.  Like any creed, it must be believed wholeheartedly.  Then, all else loses significance.  The rule of law, moral convention, and civility mean nothing to someone confident that he is on the side of what is right and just.  As long as such people are true to the liberal faith, no law or ethic need apply to their actions.

The Republicans have to understand that mindset and get dirty — fight with both hands — for this election will be a battle to the death for the nation, and perhaps the world.

Barack Obama is the ultimate of bullies.  Yet, like most bullies, it is the challenge he fears, the truth he despises.  The ultimate terror for Barack Obama is that the world will see who he really is: a petty man of little talent and few gifts.

Once again, I quote Ann Barnhardt because she has the guts to define what we’re dealing with in the bluntest terms:

Psychopaths ‘like Eric Holder, Barack Obama, Nancy Pelosi, and all the rest, feel nothing when they lie and thus do it almost constantly. Oaths are something that they laugh at as the domain of stupid religious rednecks. If we don’t acknowledge this plain, obvious truth and stop treating these people as if they are psychologically normal and honorable and presuming that they are honest and bound by any oath, then they will destroy all of us with their lies and deceit.’

We need to be ruthless, too – while still honoring the truth and common decency.  With the truth on our side, we can drag Obama  through the mud of his own recent radical past, and his current track record as President. It’s okay to visit all of the scandals, and list all the things he’s doing to hurt the economy and it’s okay to ask the question, why? Why is he doing this to our great country? That question needs to be asked.

Other points of view:

AoSHQ:

I don’t know what this advisory means because “personally” means a lot of different things.

If they mean “it’s dangerous to claim he’s evil and deliberately wishes to plunge the country in Cloward-Piven chaos,” I agree, that is dangerous. Those in the middle do not believe this (because if they did believe this, they sure wouldn’t be in the middle!) and that’s too much of a buy-in to expect the politically unaffected to kick in, intellectually.

On the other hand, is it “personal” to note he’s a Stuttering Clusterf***k of a Miserable Failure? Okay, yes, with the swears, that’s personal; but pointing out someone’s policies are a complete and utter failure — most likely because they are based on a wrongheaded and thick-witted ignorance/denial of the workings of the real world — that’s not personal.

Ace notes in his next post that Obama’s class warfare speech today in Kansas was actually a rebuke of capitalism and an embrace of European style Socialism even as we watch it go down in flames:

But Europe is probably going to plunge into something in between a recession or a depression, and may erupt in violence and political disorder.

And Europe is Obama’s lodestar. That’s where he wants to take us. To the extent we haven’t gotten there yet, it’s because Americans are soft, lazy bitter clingers who hate other sorts of people (and their politico-economic systems).

So Europe’s 60 or 70 year history with socialism is about to end in violent upheavals and misery… and here’s this ignoramus saying that it’s capitalism which is the proven failure.

The SCOAMF knows what he’s doing.

Allahpundit:

I do think they’re right, though, about people liking or pitying O more than you’d expect given the relentless dreariness of his term. That’s what I was getting at last week when I wrote about his surprisingly high job approval numbers, and why I’ve written several times about how O’s perceived culpability for the protracted awfulness of the economy might actually shrink the more protracted that awfulness is. As bad as he’s been, he can always argue that he was handed a terrible hand; even if voters decide he’s too risky to bet on again, they’re bound to wonder if he’s being blamed for something no one realistically could have fixed in four years. There’ll be some electoral sympathy for him. The RNC’s simply trying to figure out how to keep it as dormant as possible.

MORE:

Mike Hendrix is with me: “This party is too dumb to live”:

Good Lord, what vapid, spineless crap. As Mike Walsh says:

Gee, if Obama’s personal-approval numbers are still high, why would you want to take them down? Let them stay there, lest the Democrat-Media Complex accuse you of being a blue meanie.

It’s not Obama’s policies that are the problem, it’s Obama and everything he represents and stands for. Engage the president on the deepest, most potent level, or join John McCain and Bob Dole on the ash heap of history.

Please see this post for a further explanation to clueless RINO milksops. If this is their idea of how to save the country, then they need to go ahead and climb up onto that aforementioned ash heap just as quickly as possible. The sooner they get the hell out of the way, the less time and trouble we have to waste elbowing them aside. And time is something we don’t have a whole lot of.

GOP FactChecks Obama’s Osawatomie Class Warfare Speech

I live tweeted Obama’s Osawatomie class warfare speech for Sulia. One of my comments that got retweeted a few times: This speech is so full of fraud and deceit, it’s painful to listen to it.

The GOP factchecked, here:

Obama Can Give Yet Another Speech With Lofty Rhetoric, But No
Amount Of Words Can Hide His Record Of Failure
_____________________________________________________________________
OBAMA RHETORIC: BANKS MAKING RISKY BETS
Obama: “The new law bans banks from making risky bets with their customers’ deposits, and takes away
big bonuses and paydays from failed CEOs, while giving shareholders a say on executive salaries.” (President
Barack Obama, Speech, Osawatomie, KS, 12/6/11)
FACT CHECK: Obama Cites Rules That Were Delayed After Personal Lobbying By Jon Corzine
President Obama: Jon Corzine Is “Our Wall Street Guy.” “The rollout also provided a showcase for
Corzine, the former Goldman Sachs CEO whom Obama referred to as ‘our Wall Street guy’ at a meeting of
Democratic governors in Chicago on Friday.” (Claire Heininger, “Corzine Profile Rises In Obama Camp,” The Star-Ledger (NJ), 6/23/08)
Corzine’s Firm Borrowed Cash From Its Customers, “A Serious Violation Of Wall Street Rules.” “In
the last days before MF Global’s collapse, the firm was borrowing cash from its customers without
backing the loans, a serious violation of Wall Street rules that regulators believe contributed to $600
million of missing money.” (Ben Protess, “MF Global Is Said To Have Used Customer Cash Improperly,” The New York Times, 11/17/11)
 “At Least Some Of The Borrowed Customer Cash Was Used To Pay Off Bad Bets Made By MF
Global, Regulators Suspect, Meaning The Money Is Not Simply Missing. It Is Gone.” (Ben Protess,
“MF Global Is Said To Have Used Customer Cash Improperly,” The New York Times, 11/17/11)
 $1.2 Billion Is Missing. “The court-appointed trustee overseeing MF Global’s bankruptcy says up
to $1.2 billion is missing from customer accounts, double what the firm had reported to regulators
last month.” (Marcy Gordon, “MF Global Trustee Says $1.2B Or More Missing,” The Associated Press, 11/21/11)
Yesterday The CFTC Approved The “MF Global Rule” Which Would Bar Wall Street “From Using
Client Funds To Buy Foreign Sovereign Debt.” “Federal regulators approved tougher constraints on
Wall Street risk-taking on Monday, adopting the ‘MF Global rule,’ named after the collapsed brokerage
firm that is believed to have improperly used hundreds of millions of dollars of customer money. The new
rule will limit how the brokerage industry can invest customer money, largely barring firms from using
client funds to buy foreign sovereign debt. It also prevents a complex transaction that allowed MF Global,Fact Check: Obama In Kansas
Obama Can Give Yet Another Speech With Lofty Rhetoric, But No
Amount Of Words Can Hide His Record Of Failure
_____________________________________________________________________

Read the rest at the site.

SEE AlSO:

WHD on the President’s dangerous and extreme rhetoric: A “Fair Shot?” Oh, the Incivility!

John Hayward, Human Events(who also live tweeted for Sulia:

President Obama spoke in Osawatomie, Kansas today, speaking in the vein of the “New Nationalism” speech Teddy Roosevelt​ gave there a century ago.  There was a lot of the usual Obama stump content, including pleas for infrastructure spending, demands for the rich to “pay their fair share,” and the traditional shout-out to Warren Buffett​’s secretary – a perennial class-warfare martyr who pays a higher tax rate (but a miniscule fraction of the tax dollars) coughed up by her boss.  She belongs on Mount Rushmore at this point.

Buried beneath the tired Obama 2012 campaign claptrap – and I wonder if even some of the President’s dwindling base of fervent supporters aren’t growing weary of hearing the exact same focus-grouped phrases tediously repeated, over and over again – were two central ideas, tied back to the “New Nationalism” theme.  First: it’s crucial for America to collectively recover its economic greatness by pitching in, paying fair shares, and working together under the direction of a benevolent government that will coach Team America to Win The Future.  Second: everyone should play by the same set of rules.

These two ideas are entirely contradictory.  The Obama presidency comes off as deranged because it’s impossible to reconcile them without going mad.

Keep reading. I said basically the same thing – only I was a little pithier (see above tweet).