Friday Free-For-All: A Scandal-Plagued “Lightworker”

‘Show us the way, O Lightbringer!’: @WhiteHouse photo deifies Obama

Weasel Zippers: National Journal Poll: 85% Of Americans Think Government Is Spying On Their Communications…:

Via National Journal:

Big Brother is watching. And listening, and reading. And using your purchasing and communications history to hone algorithms that predict what you will buy and click on next.

Most Americans fear their privacy is eroding in all of those ways and more, the latest Allstate/National Journal Heartland Monitor Poll has found. In an era of spreading surveillance cameras, cascading revelations about government’s collection of domestic and international communications, and online advertising triggered by users’ purchasing history, the survey said that an overwhelming majority of Americans believe that business, government, social-media sites, and other groups are accessing their most personal information without their consent. […]

John Hayward, Human Events: Did the IRS finally fire somebody? Maybe!:

A few days ago, there was finally news that a Washington figure in the scandal, Rulings and Agreements director Holly Paz, was leaving that position.  Eliana Johnson at National Review followed up and found an IRS source who claimed Paz has indeed been fired, which would make her the very first scandal-related termination:

The source says Paz was fired last Friday, and a second IRS source tells National Review Online that Paz “dropped off the edge of the world” that day, and that her agency-issued computer, phone, and Blackberry show no activity since then. The IRS would not confirm or deny reports of Paz’s firing, citing her right to privacy as protected by federal law. 

As of Thursday, the voice mail on Paz’s work phone remains active and callers are asked to leave a message for Paz, though nobody answered repeated calls placed to that number. Calls to the mobile phone number listed under Paz’s name in the IRS’s internal directory are sent straight to voice mail, and indicate her mailbox has not yet been set up.

Read that boldfaced line again slowly.  Get angry.  Read it again.  Get angrier.

Johnson reviews the brief against Paz, including the amazing discovery that she was actually hovering menacingly in the background while her subordinates were asked if anyone gave them orders to carry out the Tea Party persecution.  She was in the room during “virtually every one of the interrogations or interviews with her own subordinates,” according to House Oversight chair Darrell Issa (R-CA).

WHD: IRS Targeting Coincided With Obama’s Bashing of Groups

The people occupying this White House, from the president on down, have never really had great respect for Office of the Presidency and the awesome power they wield. Whether it’s putting their feet on the furniture, going Friday casual in the Oval Office, doing politics 24-7, or attacking private citizens, Obama and his minions don’t get where they are.

The IRS scandal is what happens when the responsibility these people have been given for The Peoples’ House is abused by having the president personally tear into private citizens. The machinery of government gets cranked up and relentlessly follows the lead of the person in charge.

My Latest At The Conversation:

Judicial Watch: $878 Mil Later TSA Behavior Program Can’t Spot Terrorists:

In yet another egregious example of government waste, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) continues funding an ineffective 6-year-old program that’s supposed to spot terrorists at airports but has failed miserably despite burning through a ghastly $878 million.

Incredibly, the feds seem to have no intention of killing the costly experiment, known as Screening of Passengers by Observation Techniques (SPOT), which is used by the Transportation Security Administration (TSA) to single out terrorists. SPOT was launched in 2007, has 2,800 workers—special Behavior Detection Officers—and is supposed to identify potential terrorists through behavioral clues. It was implemented with great fanfare as an innovative way to enhance aviation security after Islamic terrorist slammed commercial planes into the World Trade Center and Pentagon.

Instead, it has accomplished little though it keeps getting boatloads of taxpayer money. A new federal audit outlines the program’s latest problems but it’s hardly the first time the failures are officially documented. A few years ago a separatefederal probe found that SPOT failed to detect terrorists at U.S. airports on nearly two dozen occasions. As a result the terrorists slipped right through “security” checkpoints and actually boarded commercial airplanes, the investigation found.

In fact, federal investigators discovered that at least 16 of the terrorists who evaded the specialized Behavior Detection Officers were later charged or pleaded guilty to terrorism charges after slipping through eight different U.S. airports with SPOT programs. Making things worse, most of the airports where terrorists boarded planes ranked among the top 10 highest risk on the TSA’s Airport Threat Assessment list. Read more about this scandal in this Judicial Watch report.

Big Journalism: CBS NEWS: SHARYL ATTKISSON’S COMPUTER HACKED ‘MULTIPLE TIMES’:

Last month, CBS investigative reporter Sharyl Attkisson said that she believed her computer had been compromised and that the matter was under investigation within CBS News. Through a series of tweets released Friday, Attkisson reported that an internal CBS investigation conducted by a cyber security firm, confirmed that her computer has been hacked. Data was extracted and the investigation into the hacker is ongoing…

Shenandoah: We Know More about NSA Whistleblower Edward Snowden in 48 hours than Barack Obama in 6 Years:

Last night on Mark Levin’s radio program he made a stunning statement which hit home more than any news item or “shocking” revelation about all of the scandals combined relating to the past year and to be quite honest I do not think he realized the impact of his words (paraphrased):

“We know more about Edward Snowden than we do Barack Obama.”

Guess what?

He is 100% correct.

Michelle Malkin: Barack Obama’s “Social Innovation” slush fund:

Before President Obama took office, I warned that Democrats planned to steer untold amounts of taxpayer dollars to his shady community-organizing pals. The Dems’ 2008 party platform proposed the creation of a“Social Investment Fund Network” to subsidize “social entrepreneurs and leading nonprofit organizations (that) are assisting schools, lifting families out of poverty, filling health care gaps and inspiring others to lead change in their own communities.”

Investigative journalist James O’Keefe’s pioneering work helped bring down the fraudsters of ACORN. But a thousand other ACORN-style knockoffs have metastasized in the shadows. Not long after Obama took office, big-government Democrats and Republicans handed him the $6 billion mandatory “volunteerism” package known as the “SERVE America Act.” The boondoggle fueled legions of new government “volunteers,” including a Clean Energy Corps, an Education Corps, a Healthy Futures Corps, a Veterans Service Corps and an expanded National Civilian Community Corps for disaster relief and energy conservation.

In addition to creating thousands of make-work jobs and boosting bloated national service bureaucracies, the legislation also carved out a left-wing slush fund known as the Social Innovation Fund. In its four-year existence, SIF has doled out $140 million to 20 handpicked grant-making organizations, which in turn have chosen 197 “promising nonprofits” for government support.

Ben Shapiro, Big Government: RUBIO: ‘WE’RE WASTING OUR TIME’ WITH CURRENT VERSION OF IMMIGRATION BILL:

On Thursday morning, Sen. Marco Rubio (R-FL), the key Republican member of the so-called Gang of Eight behind the current immigration reform bill, said that he would drop his support for the bill if Democrats insisted on a provision allowing newly-legalized illegal immigrants to sponsor their gay partners’ immigration. “If this bill has something in it that gives gay couples immigration rights and so forth, it kills the bill,” he said. “I’m done. I’m off it, and I’ve said that repeatedly. I don’t think that’s going to happen and it shouldn’t happen. This is already a difficult enough issue as it is.”

The Shark Tank: Immigration Talks Break Down In the House of Representatives:

According to Republican Congressman  Dennis Ross (R-FL), who is a strong supporter of  border security and E-Verify, the immigration reform talks in the U.S. House of Representatives have broken down. In an interview with the Shark Tank in Washington, D.C., Ross said that Congressman Sam Johnson, who is part of the “Gang of Eight”  immigration reform group in the House, has told him the immigration reform talks broke down Wednesday night. – See more at: http://shark-tank.net/2013/06/14/immigration-talks-break-down-in-the-house-of-representatives/#sthash.vCgUqlJT.dpuf

According to Republican Congressman Dennis Ross (R-FL), who is a strong supporter of border security and E-Verify, the immigration reform talks in the U.S. House of Representatives have broken down. In an interview with the Shark Tank in Washington, D.C., Ross said that Congressman Sam Johnson, who is part of the “Gang of Eight” immigration reform group in the House, has told him the immigration reform talks broke down Wednesday night.

Gateway Pundit: Catholic Association Blasts Pelosi For Suggesting Late-Term Abortion is “Sacred Ground”:

Via The Christian Post:

Immediately following Pelosi’s remarks on abortion, Maureen Ferguson, senior policy advisor for The Catholic Association, issued a response that was shared with The Christian Post.

“After witnessing firsthand the atrocious human rights abuses taking place inside America’s late-term abortion clinics, it is amazing that this did not touch Nancy Pelosi’s heart. What we learned from the Gosnell trial, and what we understand is going on inside other clinics, is not only human rights abuse, but it also puts women in harm’s way.”

Ferguson continues, “The only difference between the Gosnell ‘after-birth’ abortions and legal late-term abortions is the location of the baby at the time of death. Andcontrary to Pelosi’s extreme claim that the Franks’ bill is ‘disrespectful’ to women, the majority of women are opposed to late-term abortions, according to a recent Gallup poll.”

Weasel Zippers: MSNBC Host Karen Finney: Wanting To Ban Race-Based Abortion Is “Whacked Out”…

Ummm….

Via Newsbusters:

Former DNC Communications Director and NARAL Pro-Choice America board member Karen Finney recently received her own weekend show on MSNBC and it appears that her radical views on abortion will be a regular theme across the “Lean Forward” network.

Appearing as a guest on Now w/Alex Wagner on June 13, Finney claimed that Rep. Trent Franks’ (R-Ariz.) efforts to ban abortions based on race demonstrate that “the guy is whacked out anyway.”

It used to be that everyone understood that race based abortions were heinous and evil…Now  opposition to such abortions are “whacked out?”

My Latest At The Conversation:

White House Wants You To Know President Is Still ‘The Lightworker’

Cummings Backtracks: IRS Case Not Solved

Rep Stockman requests subpoena of NSA’s White House, IRS phone logs

Rep. Jeff Duncan Questions IRS Training With Automatic Rifles (Video)

‘Rampant Injustice’: The IRS And DOJ Raid Small Businesses With Paramilitary, Gestapo Style Tactics

All In: Chris Hayes Identifies Infamous Racist Governor George Wallace As Republican

Embattled ATF Nominee B Todd Jones Grilled By Grassley and Cruz At Senate Judiciary Hearing (Video)

 

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