HEADLINES

Wednesday, December 1, 2010

Climate Change in the House: Republicans to Axe Pelosi’s Global Warming Committee

from Michelle Malkin


Climate Change in the House: Republicans to Axe Pelosi’s Global Warming Committee: "

**Written by Doug Powers


Is it getting hot in here, or is Nancy Pelosi crazy? House Republicans will most likely bet on the latter:


Republicans will eliminate the House committee created by Speaker Nancy Pelosi to highlight the threat of climate change, Representative James Sensenbrenner, the top Republican on the panel, said today.


In one of her first acts as speaker in 2007, Pelosi, a California Democrat, created the House Select Committee on Energy Independence and Global Warming to draw attention to climate-change science and showcase how a cap on carbon dioxide needn’t be a threat to economic growth.


The good news is that many pro-rationing climate change worry-warts won’t find out about this until they fly home next week from their low-budget meeting in Cancun, Mexico.


Another tidbit:


Drew Hammill, a spokesman for Pelosi, said it’s “very disappointing” that House Republicans will shut the committee and won’t make energy independence and climate change a priority in the next Congress.


President Obama just extended offshore drilling moratoriums and imposed new drilling bans in the Gulf, as well as the Atlantic and Pacific coasts for the next several years, and Pelosi’s spokesman thinks Republicans cancelling some committee meetings will put a serious dent in America’s quest for energy independence?


**Written by Doug Powers


Twitter @ThePowersThatBe




"

Russians to Control Wyoming Uranium Mines

from New Zeal: Security Risk? More Evidence of Mary Jo Kilroy's ...


Russians to Control Wyoming Uranium Mines: "Is this ignorance, insanity or treason?

From The Telegraph;

Two uranium mines in Wyoming are on their way to control by a Russian company now that the Nuclear Regulatory Commission has approved transferring the mines' licenses.

The NRC last week approved the license transfer to a Russian company known as ARMZ which expects to obtain a controlling interest in Canadian-owned Uranium One by year's end. Uranium One holds the licenses for a proposed uranium mine and an existing uranium mine in northeast Wyoming.

The transfer raised concern from Wyoming's congressional delegation, who said the uranium could in theory go overseas and serve against U.S. interests.

The NRC continues to prohibit exporting the uranium.

Thanks to Annie
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Julian Assange Found?

from The Jawa Report


Julian Assange Found?: "Reuters:Wikileaks website founder Julian Assange is in Britain and police know his whereabouts but have refrained so far from acting on an international warrant for his arrest, a British newspaper said on Thursday. The 39-year-old Australian, who founded the whistle-blowing..."

Stimulus!: The animated map

from TigerHawk

Stimulus!: The animated map: "Here is an animated map of "prime recipient awards" under "The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act," the big stimulus law that brought you all those dug up roads last summer. It is interesting that Iowa and Indiana popped up as big recipients before most other states. Was that because of Washington politics, or because those relatively competently run states reacted quickly to the federal"

British Police Have Located Julian Assange But Haven't Arrested Him---YET!

from YID With LID


British Police Have Located Julian Assange But Haven't Arrested Him---YET!: "







Most people assume that Wikileaks founder Julian Assange is hiding out in some underground bunker to make sure that no person in authority can get near him to make an arrest, especially since Interpol issued the arrest warrant yesterday.



The British newspaper the Independent has learned that Scotland Yard has been in contact with Assange's legal team for more than a month but is waiting for further instruction before arresting him. Assange wanted in Sweden on suspicion of rape, sexual molestation and unlawful coercion, but no formal charges have been filed.



In fact the Wikileaks big shot supplied the Metropolitan Police with contact details upon arriving in Britain in October. The police confirmed that they have a telephone number for Mr Assange and are fully aware of where he is staying.

Britain's Serious Organised Crime Agency (Soca) has received the so-called 'red notice' – an international arrest warrant – but has so far refused to authorise the arrest of Mr Assange, who is thought to be in South-east England. Until it does, police forces cannot act.




The delay is said to be a technical one, with sources suggesting Soca needed clarifications about the European Arrest Warrant issued by Swedish prosecutors for Mr Assange, a fast-track system for arresting suspects within the EU. His name was added to Interpol's worldwide wanted list on 20 November, but only publicly revealed on Tuesday night. It has focused even greater attention on the man who has been lying low since releasing 250,000 mostly classified cables from US embassies across the globe.
Assange has supposedly been offered safe haven by the government of Ecuador. However, now the Interpol notice has been issued, it will be very difficult for him to move around the globe unnoticed.
Please email me at yidwithlid@aol.com to be put onto my mailing list.
Feel free to reproduce any article but please link back to http://yidwithlid.blogspot.com
"

Hooray! GOP Already Cutting Costs- Will Eliminate Pelosi Global Warming Junk Science Panel

from The Gateway Pundit


Hooray! GOP Already Cutting Costs- Will Eliminate Pelosi Global Warming Junk Science Panel: "

Pelosi’s House Select Committee on Energy Independence and Global Warming managed to dump millions on costly green projects and eliminate American fossil fuel energy production.



But, that will all change now…

Republicans announced today that they will shut down Pelosi’s global warming junk science committee.

Bloomberg reported:


Republicans will eliminate the House committee created by Speaker Nancy Pelosi to highlight the threat of climate change, Representative James Sensenbrenner, the top Republican on the panel, said today.


In one of her first acts as speaker in 2007, Pelosi, a California Democrat, created the House Select Committee on Energy Independence and Global Warming to draw attention to climate-change science and showcase how a cap on carbon dioxide needn’t be a threat to economic growth.


Republicans, who won control of the House in the Nov. 2 election, have opposed legislative efforts to regulate carbon emissions as a tax on energy. When the panel convened today, Sensenbrenner, a Wisconsin Republican, said that the hearing “will be the last of the select committee.”


Sensenbrenner had advocated extending the panel as a forum to scrutinize Obama administration actions. In an opinion column on Nov. 8 in the Washington newspaper Roll Call, he wrote that the committee was “more qualified than any other” to challenge Obama environmental initiatives that he said may threaten the economy. He acknowledged that other Republicans thought the panel should be eliminated to save money.


“We are going to get rid of waste and duplication in terms of how we run the Congress,” House Republican Leader John Boehner, who is slated to become speaker in January, told reporters today. “We believe the Science Committee is more than capable of handling this issue and in the process save several million dollars.”


Related… The historic cold wave continued in Europe this week. Heavy snow and subzero temperatures swept across Europe, killing at least eight homeless people in Poland, closing major airports in Britain and Switzerland and causing hundreds of highway accidents.

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Barack Obama Won't Even Let People Drill for Oil Anymore [The End]

Barack Obama pledged in March to expand offshore oil drilling. Shortly thereafter, BP spilled 172 million gallons of oil into the water. So now drilling on both coasts and the eastern Gulf of Mexico will be re-banned for years. Hooray! More »







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Commie-Truther Van Jones: FOX News Is Satan (Video)

Adam Sharp picked this up yesterday during commi-truther Van Jones' speech on green redistribution at Wash U in St. Louis:

University officials harassed and roughed up citizen journalist Adam Sharp who came to the event to ask Jones about his racial green views and his cop killer rap music.








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Currency Failures from Argentina to Zimbabwe: A Brief History of Inflation

Presented by Timothy Terrell at the Mises Circle at Furman University: "The Coming Currency Crisis and the Downfall of the Dollar," 13 November 2010.

If you can see this, then you might need a Flash Player upgrade or you need to install Flash Player if it's missing. Get Flash Player from Adobe.








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Sound Bite For The Day: Van Jones Likens Fox News To Satan



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Governor Riley Calls Special Session to Pass Toughest Anti-Corruption Laws in the Country

[Governor's Office] MONTGOMERY - Governor Bob Riley called a special session of the Legislature beginning December 8 to pass anti-corruption reforms that will give Alabama the toughest ethics laws in the country.







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Debt Reduction Versus Government Reduction

It isn't surprising, when you think about it, that the president's debt-reduction commission has come out with a plan that proposes to inflict the greatest pain on contributor benefits (Social Security and Medicare), household budgets, and national defense. The commission was asked to propose ways to reduce debt. It wasn't asked to rethink the size, scope, or charter of government.

If the latter had been its assigned objective, the panel might have come up with proposals that don't concentrate most of the pain of sustaining our current level of government on middle-class household budgets and small businesses. There is no question we need to deal with our spiraling debt, but what the debt-reduction panel has published today is a good example of an outcome based on biased assumptions.

The panel was obviously willing to rethink some assumptions: those about the economic lives of American households and small businesses. Eliminating the mortgage deduction – even just for mortgages over $500,000 – and raising the gas tax by 15 cents per gallon will have their biggest impact on middle-class households. So will delaying eligibility for Social Security, and means-testing to determine the level of benefits. So will taxing employer-provided health insurance as income. So will reducing Medicare benefits. Each of these measures by itself digs deeper into a household's current income; added together they are likely to begin limiting many Americans' lifestyle options, in such basics as the ability to own a home and send children to college while saving for retirement and medical expenses. They have the power to change what it means to be "middle class" in America.

This is a great deal to ask of the people. It would be one thing to ask it while reducing government, its role in the people's lives, and its role the U.S. economy as a whole. More Americans every day, for example, are willing to consider restructuring Social Security: to eventually phase it out or make it entirely a means-tested program for the lowest-income retirees. But the "government-restructuring" aspect of debt reduction clearly came in for almost no rethinking at all. The debt-reduction panel proposes mainly to cut federal spending to pre-2008 levels and set spending caps for the federal agencies, at least through 2020. It also suggests eliminating agricultural subsidies. I can support both these recommendations, but they don't go far enough.

Virtually all the federal agencies would remain in place. Entities like the Environmental Protection Agency, the Departments of Education and Health and Human Services, and the Food and Drug Administration would retain their current portfolios to regulate, litigate, and spend federal tax dollars in ways not envisioned by their charters from Congress. Ukases from the federal regulatory agencies have a significant and growing impact on the people in their economic lives, something small businesses have dealt with for years and individuals are now beginning to understand.  Declining to eliminate or restructure them is a decision about economics – and it will affect the willingness of the people to suffer in tackling federal debt.  And it should.

A debt-reduction proposal that will make it difficult – perhaps impossible – for many people in their 20s and 30s to buy homes, while leaving them to contemplate how federal regulators are driving their utility and health-insurance bills up, is not a proposal likely to keep Americans feeling positive about their estate as citizens. The model of government by which federal agencies prescribe to us what a middle-class lifestyle consists of, and confiscate from us whatever we have above and beyond that, is only a philosophical half-step away at this point. The people are absolutely right to view this prospect with disapprobation and resentment.

Members of the public who object to the proposed measures will be denigrated as whining and irresponsible. Some of them probably are. But that's not the point. The point is that, in the debt-reduction panel's plan, gouging American households to pay down the debt is being done instead of reducing the size of government.  We should eliminate whole federal agencies and many pounds of regulatory tomes before we ask Americans to choose between saving for retirement and buying a home, or between paying for medical care and sending kids to college.  Life by itself imposes choices on us; but when government gets into the business of picking and choosing, or forcing canned choices on us, the silly, subjective question of who's "being a big baby" actually starts infecting our political decisions.  That is 100% detrimental to communal life.

Our contributor benefits are unsustainable. But they are part of a larger problem of unsustainability created by holistic, prophylactic government. We could actually afford both Social Security and Medicare a lot better if government regulation weren't actively suppressing business formation today; if government regulation didn't drive every aspect of the cost of medical practice up; if government regulation didn't drive consumer prices up and make COLAs necessary; and if government regulation didn't divert so much worker compensation from worker income to employers' other mandated, per-worker remissions (non-Social Security/non-Medicare) to the government.

A presidential debt-reduction panel should not be proposing to us that Americans accept a reduced lifestyle so that the current footprint of government doesn't have to change. As we say in the military, that's bass-ackward. It's what this panel has just done. I'm sure the panel did what it was asked to do, but it was asked to do the wrong thing.

J.E. Dyer blogs at The Green Room, Commentary's "contentions" and as The Optimistic Conservative.  She writes a weekly column for Patheos.








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History Tells Us Why The Deficit Reduction Effort Is Doomed To Fail

Deficit hawks including Thomas Edison, Calvin Coolidge, Strom Thurmond and Bob Dole have all failed to stop the national debt from growing. George Washington thought $83 million was bad. Today we're close to $14 trillion.

Gus Lubin | Dec. 1, 2010 | Business Insider

EXCERPTS:

"I sincerely believe… that the principle of spending money to be paid by posterity under the name of funding is but swindling futurity on a large scale."
"Viewing government borrowing so lightly, he believes, encourages the government to spend freely and to promote more and more governmental activities. In his view the result will be more and more restricted, and that ultimately the totalitarian state may emerge." [Yale economist Fred Rogers Fairchild]
"Unless we as a people begin to practice ''self-denial and collective discipline" we will be forced to endure "cuts in progressive public spending, a decline in our international influence, and a growing cynicism about our collective historical destiny." [billionaire Pete Peterson]
"The president's budget which passed the House and Senate this week we'll make the crisis much much worse. Rather than getting spending under control it — spending out of control. Rather than keeping taxes low to create jobs it chases ever higher spending with ever higher taxes and results in ever higher debt. An unprecedented. Unsustainable. Increase in — It doubles our national debt in five years in triples our debt in ten years. Put simply. The Democrats' budget spends too much, taxes too much and borrows too much from our kids and their kids." [Rep. Paul Ryan]
"The current federal debt explosion is being driven by an inability to stem new spending initiatives. Having appropriated hundreds of billions of dollars on new programs in the last year and a half, it is very difficult for Congress to deny an additional one or two billion dollars for programs that significant constituencies perceive as urgent. The federal government is currently saddled with commitments for the next three decades that it will be unable to meet in real terms." [Alan Greenspan in WSJ]

FULL ARTICLE

RELATED ARTICLES:

Debt clock – watch it grow in real time

Why Spending Must be Cut

The Job-Killer Tax

Will Republicans trade a bad START for temporary tax cuts?

Keynesian Economics Is Wrong: Economic Growth Causes Consumer Spending, Not the Other Way

Value Added Tax (VAT) would add 10% – 20% to prices

The Dollar Meltdown: Surviving the Impending Currency Crisis with Gold, Oil, and Other Unconventional Investments

Factors that will Determine the Future

The 'Build America' Debt Bomb

Senator Judd Gregg on the inevitable fiscal meltdown

What's Next? Buckle Up

The Great Weaponless Conquest of America

My Name's America and I'm a Debt-a-holic

Is America Growing Up?

Uncle Sam Ponzi








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House GOP scuttles nutrition bill at center of first lady's anti-obesity drive

Democrats pulled the bill because of a GOP amendment but promise it will come up for another vote.








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Republicans cut House climate panel

Rep. Jim Sensenbrenner (R-Wis.) said that Wednesday morning's hearing by the panel would be the last.








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Obama Is Sweet-Talking Pyongyang And Tehran Is Failing

Naively thinking that Pyongyang and Tehran could be sweet-talked out of their nuclear programs was one of President Obama's earliest foreign policy blunders. Despite initial giddy expectations that the Obama Administration would achieve a breakthrough in the six-party talks, Pyongyang quickly sent clear signals that it would not adopt a more accommodating stance. But in response to its series of rapid-fire provocations in 2009, the Obama Administration realized that that approach was a failure and reversed its policy 180 degrees to adopt a two-track strategy of pressure and conditional negotiation.

Now we hear that North Korea has admitted to having thousands of uranium enriching centrifuges at their Yongbyon nuclear facility, validating Bush Administration assertions that it was pursuing a covert uranium-based nuclear weapons program.

And there are reports that, since 2005, Pyongyang has transferred 19 missiles to Tehran. These missiles are capable of reaching Western Europe and even Moscow—making Iran an even greater threat to peace and stability in the Middle East and around the world. Despite these developments, President Obama and his friends in the EU have called for yet another round of talks on Iran.

As national security expert Kim Holmes of The Heritage Foundation pointed out in recent remarks about the dangers of the Obama Doctrine, the President's open-hand and seat-at-the-table approach has not resulted in much cooperation from either rogue regime. If anything, they have become even less cooperative than when Bush was President. This approach, Holmes argues, has produced no tangible diplomatic results and has even had the adverse effect of alienating our traditional allies.

Many countries are looking to the U.S. for stronger global leadership in containing Iranian and North Korean nuclear efforts. Isn't it time the President listened?

Lee Lukoff is currently a member of the Young Leaders Program at the Heritage Foundation. For more information on interning at Heritage, please visit: http://www.heritage.org/about/departments/ylp.cfm








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Seven Years of Bad Policy: Government Maintains Offshore Drilling Ban

As the rest of the world continues to drill off its respective coasts, the United States is heading in the opposite direction.

The Obama Administration announced that the eastern Gulf of Mexico and the Atlantic and Pacific coasts will not be part of the government's 2012–2017 Outer Continental Shelf program, effectively banning drilling in those areas for the next seven years.

The decision is a reversal from the President's announcement in March in which he opened access to waters for offshore drilling in the Atlantic and eastern Gulf of Mexico. But even that decision did more to tighten offshore oil and gas explorations than open it. That proposal canceled four lease sales in Alaska that were already pending. And it was just last month, when the Administration lifted the six-month ban on deepwater drilling, that Interior Secretary Ken Salazar said, "There will always be risks associated with deep-water drilling … [but] we have reached a point where we have significantly reduced those risks."

If that's the case, and the industry demonstrates that it can drill safely, the government needs to step aside and let companies determine whether these projects are economically feasible.

Offshore oil and gas drilling would create jobs and increase energy supplies without cost to the taxpayer. In fact, it would create revenues for financially strapped state governments and increase revenues for federal governments. But the United States won't fully realize those benefits.

The Wall Street Journal reports:

In other parts of the world, however, deep-water drilling has continued at a frenetic pace. The industry is moving full speed ahead in places like the Gulf of Guinea, the Mediterranean and the Turkish Black Sea. But nowhere is that more apparent than in Brazil, where state-run Petroleo Brasileiro SA, known as Petrobras, last month began production in one of the largest oil fields discovered in the Western Hemisphere in 30 years. And a recently discovered field nearby could contain the equivalent of 15 billion barrels of oil, say Brazilian regulators, equal to almost two-thirds of the total proven deposits of crude in the U.S.

If the Administration were rationally governing by weighing the economic benefits of offshore oil and gas drilling versus the risks of doing so, this decision would be a no-brainer. But instead our government is catering to the demands of environmental groups, and the companies that want to create jobs will go elsewhere to drill.








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Stunner. Obama’s Peace Partners Vow Not to Recognize Israel

Another day, another blow to Obama's fantasy foreign policy.

U.S. President Barack Obama sits with Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas (L) at the White House in Washington, June 9, 2010. Obama hosted Abbas at the White House on Wednesday seeking to ensure that fallout from Israel's Gaza flotilla raid does not derail fragile U.S.-led peace efforts. (REUTERS)

Well who could have seen this coming?
Obama's Palestinian peace partners announced this weekend that they will never recognize Israel.
The Jerusalem Post reported:

The Fatah Revolutionary Council concluded its fifth convention in Ramallah over the weekend by declaring its refusal to recognize Israel as a Jewish state.

The council also urged the Palestinian Authority leadership to work toward foiling a new Israeli law requiring a referendum before any withdrawal from Jerusalem and the Golan Heights that has not been passed by two thirds of the Knesset.

The Palestinians are opposed to any understandings between Israel and the US that could harm their interests, the council said.

"The council affirms its rejection of the so-called Jewish state or any other formula that could achieve this goal," said a statement issued by the council.

"The council also renews its refusal for the establishment of any racist state based on religion in accordance with international law and human rights conventions."

Abbas made a similar statement back in September. In July Abbas said the Palestinians were ready to wage war on Israel.








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Perfect. TIME Mag Readers Push Assange For Person of Year

Perfect. After years of propping up communists, radicals and anti-American thugs, this far left mag is about to outdo itself. TIME's readers are about to vote for anarchist Hillary-hating traitor Julian Assange as 'Person of the Year.'

Assange is gaining on anti-Israeli pro-Hezbollah Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan in the voting. The meat dress woman is currently in second place.

Via TIME:

Could the man on Interpol's most wanted list also be Time's Person of the Year?

If it were up to the magazine's readers, Julian Assange, founder of the controversial whistleblower website WikiLeaks, would certainly have a shot.

More than 90,000 readers have voted for the 39-year-old Australian, placing him in third place, alongside comedians Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert.

Strangely, leading the pack is Recep Tayyip Erdogan, the prime minister of Turkey. And in second place is pop singer Lady Gaga.

"For better or for worse, Julian Assange has changed the accessibility to knowledge of the two wars that involve the U.S., within a matter of months," Lauren Zalaznick, president of NBC Universal Women and Lifestyle Entertainment Networks, told Time. "He has also put journalistic integrity on a knife-blade edge: What is the responsibility of the journalist to make public or keep private?"

Are we looking at a Nobel Prize for the traitor, too?
Heck, if junk scientist Al Gore can win anyone can.








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A Wall Street Journal Column Understates the Size of U.S. Manufacturing

By Alan Reynolds

The Wall Street Journal's December 1 "Ahead of the Tape" column, by Kelly Evans, says "manufacturing is a relatively small part of the economy; It employs about 9% of the work force and accounts for about the same percentage of GDP." Actually, manufacturing accounts for about 12 percent of nominal GDP.  But that, too, is misleading.  

Chicago Fed economist William Strauss explains why neither U.S. manufacturing's share of employment nor its share of GDP captures the actual strength of manufacturing:

Between 1950 and 2007 (prior to the severe recession), manufacturing output was just over 600% higher while over the same period growth in real GDP of the U.S. was only a slightly lesser 560%. Yet, the manufacturing share of GDP declined markedly over this period as measured in current dollar value of output. In 1950, the manufacturing share of the U.S. economy amounted to 27% of nominal GDP, but by 2007 it had fallen to 12.1%. How did a sector that experienced growth at a faster pace than the overall economy become a smaller part of the overall economy? The answer again is productivity growth. The greater efficiency of the manufacturing sector afforded either a slower price increase or an outright decline in the prices of this sector's goods. As one example, inflation (as measured by the Consumer Price Index) averaged 3.7% between 1980 and 2009, while at the same time the rise in prices for new vehicles averaged 1.7%. So while the number (and quality) of manufactured goods had been rising over time, their relative value compared with the output of other sectors did not keep pace. This allowed manufactured goods to be less costly to consumers and led to the manufacturing sector's declining share of GDP.

Those who imagine "we don't make anything anymore," as Donald Trump claims, don't grasp the magnitude of America's industrial productivity gains.

In reality, the U.S. is by far the world's largest manufacturer, with China trailing by 22 percent according to U.N. data for 2008 and arguably much more when we're not in recession.

A Wall Street Journal Column Understates the Size of U.S. Manufacturing is a post from Cato @ Liberty - Cato Institute Blog








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Former Dept Of Defense Inspector General Calls for Vetting/Investigation of Military Muslim Clerics

It is important to point out here about the 20,000 Islamic attacks since 911 that each one had the imprimatur of a Muslim cleric.

It also bears noting that lying and deceiving to advance Islam is a religious mandate. Case in point, Imam Al-Awlaki. So the idea that Muslim clerics in the military are being vetted by the Muslim Brotherhood, Hamas group ISNA is incredulous. Is it any wonder that the Fort Jihad Jihadi, Major Hasan, was an acting Muslim leader?

Stealth coup. They have all their people in strategic places.

Imam Al-Awlaki was the go-to Muslim cleric for reporters scrambling to explain Islam after 911; he was the same imam who guided the 911 Muslim attackers to commit jihad. Al-Awaki was the "spiritual adviser" to three of the hijackers who attacked America on Sept. 11, 2001. He guided the 911 jihadis, the Fort Hood Major Muslim, the Christmas day  bomber. He was the imam at the respected Dar al Hijreh mosque while being the go-to Muslim for big media for information on Islam. Exactly like un-indicted co-conspirator, Hamas groups CAIR and ISNA being the go-to guys for media now.

That al-Awlaki was go-to guy for the media right after 911 best exhibits the practice of taqiyya, and taqiyya should have been the focus of the Times piece. According to one FBI agent, al-Awlaki "was at the center of the 9/11 story."

Taqiyya, or not showing their faith openly by means of pretense, dissimulation, or concealment, is a special type of   LYING that is taught and used by Shi'a Muslims, cf. Sunni Muslims and Taqiyya. "Taqiyya" (or taqiyyah) is related to the terms "taqwa'" and "taqi'" -- all have the root meaning of "guarding" something, in this case, the Islamic faith.

Taqiya is required [in Islam].

EXCLUSIVE: Former Defense IG Raises Concerns About Military Chaplain Vetting  FOX

A former inspector general for the Defense Department is calling on Congress to investigate and oversee the vetting process for Muslim clerics who are nominated to serve as U.S. military chaplains.

In a letter sent earlier this month to Sen. Dianne Feinstein, chairwoman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, former Inspector General Joseph Schmitz outlined what he believes is the potential risk to national security posed by the military's current chaplain vetting system. 

Among the concerns Schmitz outlined in his letter, which was obtained by FoxNews.com, are:

— Reports that Army Maj. Nidal Hasan, accused of 13 counts of murder in last year's Fort Hood massacre, acted as a Muslim lay leader and received training from one of the approved civilian religious groups involved with the Defense Department chaplain program. 

— The identification of the Islamic Society of North America (ISNA), one of two endorsing agencies used by the U.S. military in its approval process for Muslim chaplains,as an unindicted co-conspirator in the 2008 Holy Land Foundation terror fundraising trial.  

— The naming of the ISNA's former endorsing agent, Dr. Louay Safi, as an unindicted co-conspirator in the 2003 trial of Sami Al-Arian, who pleaded guilty to one count of fundraising for the terrorist organization Palestinian Islamic Jihad. Safi is also the subject of a whistleblower investigation.

"The November 2008 criminal conviction in Texas of the Holy Land Foundation (HLF) as a front for Hamas, naming of the DoD's Chaplain Endorsing Agents, the Islamic Society of North America (ISNA), as an unindicted co-conspirator (among others), suggests that terrorist organizations can and do disguise themselves as charitable organizations," Schmitz wrote to Feinstein.

"The November 2009 Fort Hood massacre by a commissioned Army officer who served as a lay Muslim leader at Fort Hood demonstrates that international terrorist organizations can also try to disguise their agents as chaplains and religious lay leaders," he added.

In a statement to FoxNews.com, Feinstein, D-Calif., said:

"We recently received the letter and staff is reviewing it carefully and making inquiries into how all chaplains are vetted by the Defense Department. Certainly chaplains should be carefully interviewed and backgrounds checked, regardless of their religion."

Christians, Jews, Hindus are not blowing people up in the name of their religion, dhimmi Dianne.

Prospective military chaplains currently are recommended to the U.S. military by outside religious organizations, which in turn select an endorsing agent who is charged with issuing and withdrawing the chaplains' credentials for the Defense Department. Candidates undergo the same fingerprinting and background check required of members of the military, but Schmitz maintains this is not an adequate screening.

Schmitz says he made a series of recommendations for vetting chaplain nominees six years ago that were not implemented by the Defense Department. In his Nov. 8 letter to Feinstein, he wrote that he had recommended that nonreligious criteria be established to justify the withdrawal or removal of a religious organization or its agent from participating in the DoD chaplain program. Examples of such criteria could include:

— Advocating the violent overthrow of the U.S. government; 

— Being listed on a watch list as a terrorist organization; 

— Conviction of a religious organization or its principal leaders in connection with terrorism; 

— Conviction of endorsing agents in connection with any criminal activity.

He said he also recommended developing screening procedures for collecting information from sources, including  FBI databases relating to chaplains, supporting religious organizations and endorsers.

But Schmitz says his recommendations were shot down by the Armed Forces Chaplains Board, which called those suggestions "legally problematic." His account is confirmed by the department response to the 2004 report.  

"Legally problematic?" Which legal system? The sharia? Surely the constitution protects our right to preserve and defend from nations both foreign and domestic.

 

Defense Department spokeswoman Eileen Lainez told FoxNews.com that some of Schmitz's recommendations have since been incorporated into vetting policy.

 

Now, Lainez said, any individual or religious organization shall be rejected or removed from participation in the DoD chaplain program if they're under indictment; have been convicted of a terrorism-related offense or other offense threatening national or economic security; or if their name appears on the annual State Department list of Foreign Terror Organizations.

 

"In addition, following the release of the Fort Hood report, this policy has been under review to see if there are other additional criteria that can be included," Lainez said. 

 

In his letter, Schmitz asked Feinsten to ask the Defense Department to take another look at his earlier, non-implemented recommendations. 

 

Citing reports that Hasan acted as a lay leader, a sort of substitute or part-time chaplain required to undergo a vetting process similar to those of full-time chaplains, he wrote in an email to FoxNews.com:

 

"Somebody ought to challenge the DoD on precisely how it vets its chaplains as well as its chaplain 'endorsing agents' to ensure non-complicity in terrorism or criminal activities, and who, if anyone, vetted Major Nidal Hasan as a so-called 'Muslim lay leader' at Fort Hood." 

 

In his letter to Feinstein, he also argued that the 2008 Holy Land Foundation terror fundraising trial in itself should be enough to reconsider the organizations currently tasked with endorsing chaplain candidates. During that trial, prosecutors named the ISNA, among other well-known Muslim organizations, as an unindicted co-conspirator in the case that convicted a Texas charity of acting as a front for Hamas. (A court document unsealed two weeks ago reaffirms the prosecution's stance that ISNA, among other groups, was tied to HLF's fundraising for Hamas.) 

 

Yet, ISNA remains one of two ecclesiastical endorsing agencies used to vet Muslim chaplain candidates for the military.  

 

ISNA did not reply to requests for comment. 

 

Schmitz also specifically named ISNA's chaplain endorsing agent, Dr. Louay Safi, who acted on behalf of ISNA and until recently was one of two Defense Department Muslim chaplain endorsing agents for the entire U.S. military.

 

Safi, who has participated in Pentagon programs since at least 2005, was named as an unindicted co-conspirator in the 2006 Al-Arian case. (During the trial, Safi was identified as "Unindicted Co-Conspirator Four," and evidence from the case included wiretapped phone conversations between him and Al-Arian.) 

 

Safi is also the subject of a whistleblower complaint filed late last year by a contractor who expressed concern with Safi's participation in a lecture on Islam to soldiers at Fort Hood before their deployments in the weeks after the deadly shooting there.

 

Safi was suspended from participating in military lectures pending the outcome of the whistleblower investigation, according to email records that were obtained by FoxNews.com. But he continued to act as one of two Muslim chaplain endorsing agents working with the Defense Department.

 

Until a week and a half ago, Safi's name appeared on the DoD's website listing of ecclesiastical endorsing agents. But on Nov. 18, a spokeswoman for the Defense Department said Safi was no longer an endorsing agent, and that a request had been submitted to change the website back in June. Safi's name was removed from the site later that evening. 

 

When reached by phone, Safi told FoxNews.com:

 

"I left ISNA, I am now with another institution. I moved on to another career."

 

He also said that he was unaware of any whistleblower complaint or investigation. 

 

"That's probably something you read on some blog that is not true," he said. "There was nothing — not that I'm aware of."

lol.

Something on "some blog." Yes, of course, because the blogs are the only ones reporting the facts.

 








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Irony: Global warming alarmist bureacrats party it up in Cancun while Britain freezes

Via Instapundit:
Meanwhile: While our leaders discuss the fight against climate change in Cancún, hundreds of UK schools are shut down by global warming
While world governments gather in Cancún in order to fight climate change, global warming hits the United Kingdom:

"The UK has been experiencing the earliest widespread snowfall since 1993 … One Rothbury resident describes it as the worst weather to hit the region in over 20 years [and the motoring organisation named the] AA said it was on course to have one of its busiest days in its 105-year history."
We're gettin' a little bit fed up with it now, you know, I mean it's taken me an hour and a half to dig myself into the shop this mornin'…
"The coldest place in the UK on Sunday night was Altnaharra in northern Scotland, which recorded a low of -16.1C (3F).

...We must hope that world leaders in Cancún soon come up with a workable plan, because global warming has also been causing Scotland to struggle, with

forecasters warning that the cold snap will get worse this week, with temperatures plunging as low as -20C.

The coldest overnight temperature in the UK was Altnaharra in northern Scotland, which recorded a low of -16.1C.
Oh, the irony...







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NJ Judge jails man 7 years for owning legal guns, lets man free for having sex with animals

This is way beyond bordering on the absurd. In New Jersey a man has been jailed for 7 years because he was found to have 2 guns in his trunk that he owned legally. The same judge that sentenced the man let another guy go free for having sex with farm animals. From Phylly.com via memeorandumFamily: New Jersey man serving 7 years for guns he owned legally
Police ... found two handguns in the trunk of Brian's car. And now Brian... a graduate student with no prior criminal record, is serving a seven-year prison sentence for weapons charges.

... his father and attorney claim that the Burlington County Prosecutor's Office and the former Superior Court judge who tried the case ignored evidence that proved Brian had the guns legally.

...(the police) found two handguns, both locked and unloaded as New Jersey law requires.

Aitken had passed an FBI background check to buy them in Colorado when he lived there, his father said, and had contacted New Jersey State Police and discussed the proper way to transport them.
What about the right for the people to bear arms "SHALL NOT BE INFRINGED" do people not understand, especially in the ruling class? The big irony comes at the end of the piece. The trial was overseen by Superior Court Judge James Morley, who Chris Christie did not reappoint to the bench and for good reason:
A few weeks after Aitken's trial over the summer, Morley learned that Christie was not going to reappoint him, due in part to a 2009 case in which he dismissed animal-cruelty charges against a Moorestown cop accused of sticking his penis into the mouths of five calves. Morley said there was no way of knowing whether the calves had been "puzzled" or "tormented" by the officer's actions.

Nappen thinks the animal-cruelty case exemplifies poor decision-making by Morley.

"Brian didn't receive oral sex from calves; he only lawfully possessed firearms," Nappen said.
More on the calf case here: Judge: No Proof Cows 'Tormented' By Oral Sex. Good grief. 







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Hypocrisy with a side of bias: NYT publishes WikiLeaks documents, refused to publish CRU emails prov

The bias is breathtaking. Let me remind you from a prior post of mine back in November 2009: New York Times (!) Refuses To Pubish "Illegally Obtained" Emails Proving Global Warming Is A Fraud. The same New York Times that released countless national security information via WikiLeaks, illegally obtained and all, refused last year to publish the leaked emails from the University of East Anglia Climatic Research Unit, also known as CRU, saying that they were illegally obtained. But they never gave evidence that they were illegally obtained. Fact is, they were intentionally leaked by a whistelblower rather than being taken by a hacker.  From the memory hole - in this case the Volokh Conspiracy via Instapundit: NYT Policy on Illegally Acquired Documents

The NYT's environmental blog, Dot Earth, covered the disclosure of e-mails and other files from the University of East Anglia's Climate Research Unit, noted that the files are available on various other website, but did not reproduce any files on its site. As Andrew Revkin explained in the post:
The documents appear to have been acquired illegally and contain all manner of private information and statements that were never intended for the public eye, so they won't be posted here.
Am I wrong in thinking that this is a change in policy for the NYT? Hasn't the Grey Lady published illegally obtained documents on national security and other matters in the past?
Fast forward to today where the NYT is once again publishing illegally-obtained documents with national security implications. I followed up my prior post with this one also in 2009: Hypocrisy with a side of bias: NYT linked to hacked Palin's emails, refuse to publish CRU emails proving global warming is a lie.

UPDATE: Don Surber beat me to the punch (again). Via Instapundit:
1. From the New York Times: "Answers to Readers' Questions About State's Secrets."
Not allowed to be asked: Why did you publish these and not the Climategate e-mails?
That's what I get for scheduling my posts throughout the day rather then letting them out as I write...







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'Permitorium' will restrict production, force gas prices up

'Permitorium' will restrict production, force gas prices up

Sacrifice: Obama May Delay Hawaii Vacation To Push Tax Hikes

In January 2009, before he signed his failed $787 billion stimulus bill into law, Barack Obama lectured America saying,
"Everyone must sacrifice for the greater good… Everyone must have some skin in the game."

Now after blowing $10 million on drunken White House parties and taking his family on vacation after vacation, including an exotic getaway to southern Spain, the the president is ready to sacrifice.

President Obama may delay his vacation in order to reach a deal on the Bush tax cuts. Obama wants to raise taxes on business owners.
CNN reported:

President Barack Obama is considering at least a short delay to the start of his holiday vacation in Hawaii so he can try to work out a deal with congressional Republicans on the Bush tax cuts that expire December 31, CNN has learned.

Two senior administration officials tell CNN the White House has been getting signals that the lame duck session of Congress could drag on past December 18, when the president is scheduled to depart for Hawaii.

Obama has privately said he is willing to stay in Washington until Christmas Eve if necessary to finish the contentious debate over taxes, the officials said.

Of course, if Obama would just agree to not raise taxes he could be on a plane to Hawaii tomorrow.








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Far Left Clinton-Appointed Judge Finds Mandatory Health Care Requirement in Constitution

A far left Clinton-appointed judge dismissed a lawsuit challenging the Obama-Pelosi regimes universal health care bill. Judge Norman K. Moon believes that mandatory health care is listed in the US Constitution. If falls under the same clause that says goverment can force you to buy hula hoops and yoyos.

U.S. District Judge Norman K. Moon says government can force you to buy Obamacare.

The AP reported:

A federal judge on Tuesday dismissed Liberty University's lawsuit challenging the Obama administration's new federal health care law, declaring that a provision requiring most individuals to obtain insurance is constitutional.

The ruling by U.S. District Judge Norman K. Moon in Lynchburg is the second court decision upholding the law, following one in Michigan in October. University law school dean Mathew Staver said in a telephone interview that he will promptly appeal the ruling to the 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Richmond.

Attorneys general from several states have filed another lawsuit in Florida, and a separate challenge by Virginia Attorney General Kenneth Cuccinelli is pending in federal court in Richmond.

Both sides expect the issue to ultimately be decided by the U.S. Supreme Court.

Never Forget: Elections have consequences.








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Awesome New American Wonderwall Gun Is A “Game Changer”

The new Wonderwall Gun, nicknamed "The Game Changer".

Via The Sun -

Here is the new Taliban-busting rifle – a Star Wars-style weapon so powerful it can shoot through WALLS.

Dubbed the "Game Changer," the XM-25 fires a massive round which can be programmed by computer to explode after travelling any set distance.

This effectively turns the bullet into a grenade which penetrates hiding places and then blows up – meaning concealed enemy fighters are denied cover.

Military chiefs believe the £20,000 (approx. $36,000) American-made gun, seen above being demonstrated by a US soldier, will transform the fortunes of Our Boys battling in the Afghanistan war zone.

Insurgents often take pot shots at troops from buildings and then duck down and hide behind walls or in trenches.

Until now it has been hard to hit back with conventional light weapons. But the XM-25′s huge 25mm round, capable of being fired the length of eight football pitches, will leave rebel gunmen with nowhere to hide.

The first XM-25s have already been distributed to US combat units and could be given to British Special Forces.

US Army spokesman Lt Col Christopher Lehner said: "Tactics will be rewritten. The only thing we can see enemies being able to do is run away."

Tactics will be rewritten?  Excellent!









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Obama Blocks US Companies From Drilling Off Coasts – Cuba Will Proceed With Drilling Plans

When Obama talks about "Job Creation" don't believe it.

For decades, democrats have blocked one effort after another to responsibly develop the energy resources our country possesses, transforming vast areas of opportunity into "The No Zone."

Because of current U.S. policy, U.S. companies are prohibited from developing oil fields that lie in Cuban waters and come within 50 miles of Florida. However, Cuba is exploring and potentially developing these oil fields, estimated by the U.S. Geological Survey to possess more oil than the Alaska National Wildlife Refuge, and Cuba is partnering with China and other countries, such as Spain, France, and Canada.

The Castro Regime will begin drilling off the coast of Florida next year and will go deeper than the Deepwater Horizon rig that exploded in the Gulf of Mexico in April.

But, US companies are not so fortunate.
The Obama Administration today issue a massive new ban on offshore oil drilling in the eastern Gulf of Mexico or off the Atlantic and Pacific coasts.
The Washington Post reported, via FOX Nation:

Obama administration officials will announce Wednesday afternoon they will not allow offshore oil drilling in the eastern Gulf of Mexico or off the Atlantic and Pacific coasts as part of the next five-year drilling plan, according to sources briefed on the plan, reversing two key policy changes President Obama announced in late March.

During that announcement–less than a month before the BP oil spill–Obama and Interior Secretary Ken Salazar said they would open up the eastern Gulf and parts of the Atlantic, including off the coast of Virginia, to offshore oil and gas exploration.

The announcement is sure to please environmentalists while angering oil and gas companies as well as some lawmakers from both parties who have pressed for continued offshore energy exploration in the wake of massive Gulf of Mexico spill.

According to multiple individuals briefed on the plan, the Obama administration will proceed with scoping for possible drilling in the central and western Gulf of Mexico and in the Arctic as part of the upcoming 2012-2017 Outer Continental Shelf program, while keeping the other areas off limits.

The administration is likely to conduct a new environmental assessment of Shell's plan to conduct drilling in the Arctic, the sources added.

More… Since the deepwater drilling ban was lifted in October the Obama Administration has also refused to issue many permits in the Gulf.








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FCC to move on net neutrality despite opposition from congress

FCC to move on net neutrality despite opposition from congress

Food Safety Bill Lands On The Dung Heap: Thank God For Incompetence!

I wish I had Photoshop so I could put Harry Reid's melon on this dude's body. Alas.

Harry Reid is going to have a lumpy stocking this Christmas:

A food safety bill that has burned up precious days of the Senate's lame-duck session appears headed back to the chamber because Democrats violated a constitutional provision requiring that tax provisions originate in the House.

By pre-empting the House's tax-writing authority, Senate Democrats appear to have touched off a power struggle with members of their own party in the House. The Senate passed the bill Tuesday, sending it to the House, but House Democrats are expected to use a procedure known as "blue slipping" to block the bill, according to House and Senate GOP aides.

The debacle could prove to be a major embarrassment for Senate Democrats, who sought Tuesday to make the relatively unknown bill a major political issue by sending out numerous news releases trumpeting its passage.

Well, this is a fitting end to crappy legislation and also a fitting beginning to a cram-it-through lame duck legislative session that seems intent on completely ignoring the will of the people on a myriad of topics.

The Democrats, in their haste to get their last hippie dreams realized, stink it up. Yes, this is called schadenfreude.








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http://biggovernment.com/dmitchell/2010/12/01/obamas-fiscal-commission-misleads-with-dishonest-washington-budget-math/

http://biggovernment.com/dmitchell/2010/12/01/obamas-fiscal-commission-misleads-with-dishonest-washington-budget-math/

Constitutional Flub by Senate May Lead to Delay of Inflationary Food Bill Till Next Year

Yesterday, the Senate passed a bill that for all intents and purposes makes food a controlled substance.  As Senator Tom Coburn described it in an op-ed last week:
The so-called FDA Food Safety Modernization Act of 2010, which the Senate will vote on after Thanksgiving, only expands a disjointed, duplicative and ineffective food safety bureaucracy. The Government Accountability Office has consistently called this bureaucracy "high risk due to (its) greater vulnerabilities to fraud, waste, abuse and mismanagement."

Far from offering common-sense reforms, this bill doubles-down on the status quo — which failed to prevent the salmonella outbreak — with 250 pages of new bureaucracy and regulations. Expanding the Food and Drug Administration will harm small businesses and raise prices at the grocery store — all without having a meaningful impact on food safety.Rather than spending billions of dollars, forcing food companies to comply with new regulations, and saddling consumers with increased food prices, we should pursue reforms that will allow regulatory agencies to more effectively and efficiently prevent outbreaks. When Congress returns, my colleagues should reject the false assumption that growing government means safer food and instead promote market forces that work
Yesterday the bill sailed through the Senate and was sent back to a committee to reconcile the House and Senate versions of the legislation. However according to Roll Call, a Senate screw-up has angered some House members and may cause the bill being delayed until the new Congress gets seated next year. All because the progressives in the Senate forgot about the constitution.

The Senate version of the bill includes new tax provisions violating the constitutional provision requiring that tax provisions originate in the House.
By pre-empting the House's tax-writing authority, Senate Democrats appear to have touched off a power struggle with members of their own party in the House. The Senate passed the bill Tuesday, sending it to the House, but House Democrats are expected to use a procedure known as "blue slipping" to block the bill, according to House and Senate GOP aides.
Blue slipping is a rejection slip given to Senate tax and spending bills which have not originated in the House in the first place, per the House's interpretation of the Origination clause of the Constitution.
The debacle could prove to be a major embarrassment for Senate Democrats, who sought Tuesday to make the relatively unknown bill a major political issue by sending out numerous news releases trumpeting its passage.

Section 107 of the bill includes a set of fees that are classified as revenue raisers, which are technically taxes under the Constitution. According to a House GOP leadership aide, that section has ruffled the feathers of Ways and Means Committee Democrats, who are expected to use the blue slip process to block completion of the bill.
"We understand there is a blue slip problem, and we expect the House to assert its rights under the Constitution to be the place where revenue bills begin," the GOP aide said.
The blue slip could lead to one of two likely outcomes. Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) could simply drop the issue and let the next session of Congress start from scratch, a strategy that would allow him time in the lame-duck session to tackle other last-minute priorities, such as the expiring 2001 and 2003 tax cuts, a long-term continuing resolution, an immigration bill and a repeal of the military's ban on openly gay service members.

Or he could try to force the issue in the Senate after the House passes a new version of the bill. But in order to do that and still tackle the other issues, he would need a unanimous consent agreement to limit debate.
According to Senate GOP aides, a unanimous consent agreement is all but certain to be a nonstarter because the bill's chief opponent, Sen. Tom Coburn (R-Okla.), will not agree to such a deal.
Coburn "will object and demand changes as [he has] from the get-go," a GOP aide familiar with the situation said.
It would be very ironic if this legislation designed to make food much more expensive, gets killed because of the progressives who ignored the Constitution to force the health care bill down our throats. We know that most members of the Senate do not read the Constitution, in this case it may be a good thing. Let's hope this oppressive piece of legislation, that will raise food prices on all of us gets "blue slipped" 
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