October 24, 2009

Obama: Let's Wreck This Economy For The Fictional One I Support


"From China to India, from Japan to Germany, nations everywhere are racing to develop new ways to produce and use energy," he said. "The nation that wins this competition will be the nation that leads the global economy. I am convinced of that. And I want America to be that nation."

A reasonably bright teenager can tell you that a country that powers itself exclusvely by "clean energy" simply for the sake of being green puts itself at a severe disadvantage against those economies that go with a with a less-restrictive approach that leverages existing technology. It is common sense.

Sadly, you can guess which small-minded ideologue has very little of that.

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Windows 7 Installation Stories?

When we finally replaced our ancient Dell desktop in August we bought a box that came installed with Vista Home Premium and the promise of a free copy of Windows 7 OS when it came out in October.

Last night I ordered the version compatible with my system, and I'm expecting Windows 7 in the mail sometime next week. Online reviews I've read have mostly been encouraging, but I was wondering if any of you have installed Windows 7 over Vista and what your experiences were.

If you've made the upgrade tell us what you thought of it in the comments.

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About the Obama Thesis Hoax

When you were younger, your parents probably told you that "if it looks too good to be true, it probably is."

That bit of homespun wisdom should have been applied to a blog post that claimed tertiary knowledge of a Barack Obama college thesis lambasting both the free market system and the Constitution.

The authors claim a defense of satire now that the blog entry was disclosed as such, though that warning came far too late for those that managed to push the story to multiple web sites and even talk radio.

If people had carefully read the entry before promoting it, however, this paragraph offered a big red flag:


In the paper, in which only the first ten pages were given to the general media, Obama decries the plight of the poor: &qout;I see poverty in every place I walk. In Los Angeles and New York, the poor reach to me with bleary eyes and all I can do is sigh.&qout;

When the blog entry claimed that the first ten pages of the President's thesis was given to the general media and not one soul wrote or talked about it that should have sent up huge warning flares that something was wrong with this story.

That no one bothered to contact Joe Klein to see if the document reportedly released to him been, is an example of shoddy fact-checking.

Sadly, this gives the left wing blog Media Matters more than enough excuse to run a headline that begins "So desperate they'll believe anything—" and have some justification for doing so. Michael Ledeen was quick to post a column noting that he'd been duped by the thesis hoax, which was a responsible way to handle such a situation.

Now, if we can only get the same Media Matters partisans that gloated over this incident to develop or even borrow the integrity to admit they were duped by a lying ACORN Philadelphia employee, we can call it a good day.

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October 23, 2009

Obama's War on the Media

Considering last night's failed attempt to censor Fox News, it wouldn't be irresponsible to wonder if the Obama White House had a direct hand in this Media Matters memorandum dedicating resources to the destruction of the only significant dissident mainstream media outlet in the United States.


An official at a Democratic-leaning organization sends on a memo the group Media Matters is circulating today to progressive groups, calling Fox "a lethal 24/7 partisan political operation" and rallying a coalition of groups to join the White House assault on the network.

"The danger to progressive causes and the institution of journalism has become too significant to ignore," says the introduction to a memo by Media Matters founder David Brock. "At Media Matters, we believe it is of paramount importance that progressive leaders have the information necessary to understand exactly what Fox News has become. We hope this brief memorandum will assist you in reaching your own decision on how best to engage this threat."

A co-worker asked me to explain to him why the White House was targeting Fox.

Essentially, the White House views FOX as a gateway between the distributed network reporting being done by the blogosphere and the traditional media.

Fox amplified the charges against Van Jones, leading to his ouster from his White House appointment before other media even reported on the controversy. Fox also promoted the investigation of a pair of filmmakers that exposed a series of ACORN offices as being supportive of tax fraud for the purposes of child sex trafficking. The embarrassing string of videos—with more waiting in the wings that have yet to be broadcast—forced the Democrats in Congress and private donors alike to sever ties with the group, which was trained by the President himself and with which he maintains close ties. Likewise, Fox has helped to focus attention on other radicals in Obama's government with profiles of Administration officials and hangers-on that the President would prefer unreported.

Along with a handful of other responsible watchdog media, Fox News has been the conduit that led these scandals from the political blogosphere to the mainstream news, and the Obama Administration is attempting to retaliate against Fox News in the strongest possible way. The goal is to both stop Fox News from reporting stories damaging to a floundering Presidency, and to warn other news outlets that they will be targeted by Obama and his allies if they step out of line and report those news stories deemed detrimental to the President.

Leaking the Media Matters memo to the Politico was no accident. It is a carefully-calculated assault designed to terrorize journalists, pundits, newspapers and networks into silent obedience. The goal is to censor all speech against the Administration, by threatening retaliation against critics by the deep-pocketed activist groups that function as shock troops.

In their hearts, the President and his allies share the distaste of a free press which stains all would-be tyrants. They will push back hard against being exposed, and the plot to pummel Fox News into silence is only a small part of a Administration's larger plan to bully the media into submission.

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October 22, 2009

White House Tries to Ban Fox News From Press Pool

Honestly? I never thought they'd take it this far.


Today the White House stepped up its attack on Fox News, announcing that the network would no longer be able to conduct interviews with officials as a member of the Press Pool. The Pool is a five-member group consisting of ABC, CBS, CNN, Fox News and NBC organized by the White House Correspondents Association. Its membership is not subject to oversight by the government.

Before an interview with "Pay Czar" Kenneth Feinberg, the administration announced that Fox News would be banned from the press pool. This marks the first time in history that an administration had attempted to ban an entire network from the press pool.

I cannot recall any Administration in my lifetime so desperately intent on restricting and controlling the media's access to information. This is a blatant attempt at censorship by exclusion.

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Obama: Republicans "Do What They're Told"

More of that famous Obama post-partisanship:




"Democrats are an opinionated bunch. You know, the other side, they just kinda sometimes do what they're told. Democrats, y'all thinkin' for yourselves."

Yes, he said Democrats—the same group that demands lock-step conformity from the media and their own followers or else starts a war with them—are the party that thinks for themselves.

Wow.

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October 21, 2009

Farrakhan Angling for Obama Cabinet Position

Nutty statements are a prerequisite, right?


Nation of Islam leader Minister Louis Farrakhan told an audience in Memphis he believes the H1N1 flu vaccine was developed to kill people, a witness said.

Farrakhan, 76, spoke for nearly three hours Sunday at a gathering to observe the religious group's Holy Day of Atonement, which also marked the 14th anniversary of the Million Man March in Washington, the (Memphis) Commercial Appeal reported, citing a source who attended the speech.

"The Earth can't take 6.5 billion people. We just can't feed that many. So what are you going to do? Kill as many as you can. We have to develop a science that kills them and makes it look as though they died from some disease," Farrakhan said, adding that many wise people won't take the vaccine.

The medical research community hasn't exactly covered themselves in glory in the past, but asserting there is a widespread genocide being perpetrated under the public's already supicious eye is borderline insane by any measure.

Which I guess means he'll end up formulating the administration's economic policy...

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It's Time to Question Democratic Party Involvement.

Remember the claims of ACORN officials that the string of sex-slavery sting operations perpetrated by a fake pimp and prostitute getting advice from ACORN on how to commit fraud were isolated incidents, and that James O'Keefe and Hannah Giles were thrown out of ACORN offices in other cities such as Philadelphia?


Update: Updated with new link.

Alternative, but very slow (due to heavy traffic?) video link at HopeForAmerica.







Eh, not so much "thrown out" as "welcomed with open arms."

ACORN Philadelphia Office Director Katherine Conway-Russell flat-out lied on camera to the media. ACORN CEO Bertha Lewis continues to lie to the media, claiming that these incidents are isolated. The media repeated their claims unquestioningly.

Now that ACORN has been exposed—yet again—as lying about their willingness to support the creation of brothels for the purpose of juvenile prostitution, will the media outlets that repeated those falsehoods decide to re-report on the truth of this story? Will they issue corrections?

Hannah Giles and James O'Keefe have shown the unedited footage from every ACORN visit they've made, from Baltimore, Washington DC, New York, San Bernardino, San Diego, and the unedited video from Philadelphia will soon be released. Other videos from other ACORN sting operations are rumored to be lurking in the wings.

How much longer can supporters of this criminal enterprise continue to insist they are being unfairly maligned, when every single meeting that Giles and O'Keefe had with ACORN officials led to cooperation in the furthering of a plot to establish a facility for the explicit purpose of juvenile sex slavery?

ACORN is a cancerous product of the Democratic Party, and cannot be separated from it. It has been trained and given advice from the President of the United States himself. It is closely tied to the SEIU thugs that have attacked and intimidated American citizens. ACORN is a criminal enterprise that has been accused of countless acts of voter registration fraud, and which has been accused of stealing elections. It's officials have participated in embezzlement, fraud, intimidation, and cover-ups. As this latest sting video shows, ACORN is little better than the mafia, willing to accept even the most depraved criminal activity.

The Americans public must demand that independent prosecutors be appointed and given the resources necessary to thoroughly investigate ACORN, and yes, that is a serious problem for the Democratic party, both politically and perhaps criminally.

ACORN has invasive, perhaps inseverable ties to the very highest level of the Democratic establishment. If the Obama White House and Justice Department continue to refuse to investigate ACORN, then we will have little choice but to assume that they are guilty of collusion and racketeering themselves...



But then, there isn't much doubt, is there?

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October 20, 2009

Hersh: Pentagon Out to Ruin Obama

From the always fascinating Seymour Hersh:


"A lot of people in the Pentagon would like to see him [Obama] get into trouble," he said. By leaking information that the commanding officer in Afghanistan, Gen. Stanley McChrystal, says the war would be lost without an additional 40,000 American troops, top brass have put Obama in a no-win situation, Hersh contended.

"If he gives them the extra troops they're asking for, he loses politically," Hersh said. "And if he doesn't give them the troops, he also loses politically."

The journalist criticized the president for "letting the military do that," and suggested the only way out was for Obama to stand up to them.

"He's either going to let the Pentagon run him or he has to run the Pentagon," Hersh said. If he doesn't, "this stuff is going to be the ruin of his presidency."

Funny. I thought Obama was doing a pretty good job of destroying his Presidency on his own.

As for Hersh, he's had some notable successes, and some equally spectacular duds. How are Dick Cheney's death squads working out for you, Seymour?

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Justice Department: African-Americans in NC Town Aren't Smart Enough to Vote Without Help

Enjoy the post-racial present, where a African-American Attorney General reporting to a mixed-race President can tell a majority-black community that they are too dumb to vote in their own self-interest.


Voters in this small city decided overwhelmingly last year to do away with the party affiliation of candidates in local elections, but the Obama administration recently overruled the electorate and decided that equal rights for black voters cannot be achieved without the Democratic Party.

The Justice Department's ruling, which affects races for City Council and mayor, went so far as to say partisan elections are needed so that black voters can elect their "candidates of choice" - identified by the department as those who are Democrats and almost exclusively black.

The department ruled that white voters in Kinston will vote for blacks only if they are Democrats and that therefore the city cannot get rid of party affiliations for local elections because that would violate black voters' right to elect the candidates they want.

This is a highly insulting and abusive overreach of power from the Holder DoJ, and an arrogant one as well. In no uncertain terms, Holder's DOJ is insisting that their poor dumb country cousins can't figure out how to vote "right" without the visual cue of a party affiliation to guide them.

Presumably, the inherent racism in the DOJ position assuming that African-Americans must vote Democrat to be voting in their own self interest goes utterly unnoticed.

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No Surprises Here: WaPo/ABC Skews Poll for Public Option

Mercy me:


The sampling comprises 33% Democrats, as opposed to only 20% Republicans. That thirteen-point spread is two points larger than their September polling, at 32%/21%. More tellingly, it's significantly larger than their Election Day sample, which included 35% Democrats to 26% Republicans for a gap of nine points, about a third smaller than the gap in this poll. Of course, that's when they were more concerned about accuracy over political points of view.

Remember when I wrote that poll watchers need to remember the recent Gallup poll on party affiliation? Gallup polled 5,000 adults and found that the gap between Democrats and Republicans had closed to the smallest margin since 2005, six points, and had been reduced more than half since the beginning of the year. For the WaPo/ABC poll, though, their sample gap has increased almost 50% during that time.

Given that skew, it's hardly surprising that they find a 57% approval rating for Obama, up three points since last month, almost the entirety of the gap increase since the last poll. His 48% tie on health care should be a significant disapproval instead, and the 45%/51% slide on the deficit has probably expanded at the same rate as the deficit in a survey with a realistic sample.

The purposeful skewing of the polling data is an old political trick, and one increasingly popular among the media, especially when they are more interesting in influencing the news than reporting it. That Dan Balz and Jon Cohen of the Washington Post would use such obviously flawed data suggests they are more interested in advocacy than journalism.

The public does not support government-run health care.

Americans shocked politicians this summer with their opposition to another government takeover, and the they they were none too subtle about it as they showed up at townhall meetings, rallies, and marches.

No amount of media deception can change the fact that Americans are rejecting Obamacare, the media promoting it, and the politicians that an increasing number of Americans feel were put into office not by the American people, but by the media and special interests.

The media and their allied progressive politicians are increasing playing to an audience of themselves.

No wonder Fox News is causing the White House to scream in anger.

Along with a handful of newspapers and new media, they're the only "honest" news left.

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Bloody Chicago

This morning, with the image of a honor student Derrion Albert being beaten to death by a Chicago mob still fresh in out minds, we discover that Chicago's police have all but stopped hiring new officers to fill almost 600 vacant positions:


To save $10 million, Daley's 2009 budget slowed police hiring to a crawl -- with only 200 officers expected to be hired all year.

But, as city revenues plummeted, City Hall opted not to maintain even that snail's pace. Only one class of 46 officers entered the police academy this year.

As of Oct. 9, the Chicago Police Department was 591 officers short of its authorized strength of 13,500 -- and that's not counting hundreds of other officers on duty- and non-duty disability.

As citizens are barred from defending themselves by restrictive gun control, expect the decline in the number of officers to be taken advantage of by criminals.

Things will get worse in Chicago before they get better, and the citizens will have no one to blame but themselves for becoming willing victims.

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October 19, 2009

An Armed Society...


The FBI says the number of police officers slain in the line of duty fell sharply last year.

Bureau statistics list 41 law enforcement officers killed in 2008. The list includes one FBI agent, Sam Hicks, who was shot and killed during a drug raid outside Pittsburgh.

Felony killings of police officers haven't been that low since 1999, although police officer support groups — which use different standards to count officer killings — say the number of officers killed hasn't been this low since the 1960s.

It doesn't fit any of the preferred narratives, so don't count on seeing this reported in too many places.

This is especially true considering it occurred during a year where concealed carry permit applications skyrocketed nationwide, along with the sale of ammunition, handguns, and so-called assault rifles.

Gun sales went up, and the killing of law enforcement officers went down. Just another inconvenient truth.

Posted by: Confederate Yankee at 03:18 PM | Comments (12) | Add Comment
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Yes, We Cannabis

You'll be hearing that quip a lot:


Federal drug agents won't pursue pot-smoking patients or their sanctioned suppliers in states that allow medical marijuana, under new legal guidelines to be issued Monday by the Obama administration.

Two Justice Department officials described the new policy to The Associated Press, saying prosecutors will be told it is not a good use of their time to arrest people who use or provide medical marijuana in strict compliance with state law.

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A White House Comfortable with Genocide?

You cannot expect to hold a person responsible all the actions and/or beliefs of their associates, but it is certainly fair to wonder about their judgment if the actions or beliefs are both particularly heinous and part of their core character.

That was part of the reason so many people were concerned about President Barack Obama's long-running association with terrorists Bill Ayers and Bernadine Dohrn, a relationship that may have extended as far back as the 1980s, when Dohrn, Ayers, and Obama were part of the same community in Manhattan (Obama was a student at Columbia and beginning to explore political activism at the time Ayer's was at Bank Street College of Education. Bernadine Dohrn? She was sent to prison for a short time for refusing to cooperate with authorities and tell them what she knew about the 1981 Brinks armored car robbery across the Hudson River in Rockland County that left two police officers and a security guard dead).

Ayers and Obama are better known for their collaboration on multiple projects in Chicago, including the Woods Fund and the Chicago Annenberg Challenge, Obama's first an only executive experience prior to winning the White House (and a verified failure), and for Ayers and Dohrn hosting Obama's very first political fundraiser in their home.

Through all of their relationship, Ayers and Dohrn were minor celebrities for their terrorism within the welcoming confines of Hyde Park's liberal elite. Obama knew Ayers and Dohrn were leaders of a terrorist group. He knew they had literally declared war against the United States. And he more than likely knew that Ayers, Dohrn, and the other terrorist leaders of the Weather Underground had dreams that included the imposition of communism on the United States, and the genocide of 25 million Americans in concentration camps.

It turns out Ayers and Dohrn aren't the only associates of Barack Obama comfortable with genocide. We can also include one of his closest four advisers, Anita Dunn. Victor David Hanson is among those outraged over Dunn's admiration of the greatest ">mass killer in human history:


I am not a big fan of saying that officials should resign for stupid remarks. But interim White House communications director Anita Dunn's praise of Mao Zedong as a "political philosopher" is so unhinged and morally repugnant, that she should hang it up, pronto.

Mao killed anywhere from 50 million to 70 million innocents in the initial cleansing of Nationalists, the scouring of the countryside, the failed Great Leap Forward and Cultural Revolution, Tibet, and the internal Chinese gulag. Dunn's praise of a genocidal monster was no inadvertent slip: She was reading from a written text and went into great detail to give the full context of the remark. Moreover, her comments were not some student outburst from 30 years ago; they were delivered on June 5, 2009. Her praise of Mao's insight and courage in defeating the Nationalists was offered long after the full extent of Mao's mass-murdering had been well documented. Mao killed more people than any other single mass killer in the history of civilization.

Once again, someone close to the President is found to be an admirer of political genocide. In that context, perhaps the Oath Keepers aren't so radical after all... at least as it comes to being willing to resist unlawful orders.

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October 18, 2009

Applying Rights Equally

A letter to the editor in the Arizona Daily Sun asks an interesting question:


If I understand it correctly, a lot of folks are saying health care is a right for all and we all should help pay for it. I'm wondering: Since owning a gun is a right, do you think everyone can chip in and get me a new rifle?

That sounds like a better use of tax dollars than most.

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October 16, 2009

I don't Get the Controversy

It's the only thing she's ever posted online that was worth the amount of time it took to understand it.

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Re-grinding the Lancet

Reality Check:


IraqÂ’s government said at least 85,000 Iraqis were killed from 2004 to 2008, officially answering one of the biggest questions of the conflict - how many perished in the sectarian violence that nearly led to a civil war.

What remains unanswered by the government is how many died in the 2003 US invasion and in the months of chaos that followed it.

A report by the Human Rights Ministry said 85,694 people were killed from the beginning of 2004 to Oct. 31, 2008 and 147,195 were wounded. The figures included Iraqi civilians, military and police but did not cover US military deaths, insurgents, or foreigners, including contractors. And it did not include the first months of the war after the 2003 US-led invasion.

The Associated Press reported similar figures in April based on government statistics obtained by the AP showing that the government had recorded 87,215 Iraqi deaths from 2005 to February 2009. The toll included violence ranging from catastrophic bombings to execution-style slayings.

The infamous Lancet study cited by every major media outlet and liberal blog was only off about half a million. I'll be expecting apologies for pushing this politically-concocted propaganda any minute now...

I wonder how many of the Lancet guys dabble in global warming research...

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Ballon Bust?

Uh... this doesn't seem to match the Heene family balloon boy story:



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White House to Use Hollywood For Propaganda Push

By itself, this isn't unexpected:


President Barack Obama will return to Texas today for the first time since taking office nine months ago, sharing the stage with former President George H.W. Bush in a forum designed to "engage the nation" in a renewed conversation on volunteerism.

Volunteerism is a great thing and I strongly believe in it. I'm glad that a former and current President can get together to promote the idea of volunteerism.

But like so many things that President Obama has his hands on, there is a perverse selfishness and ideological opportunism associated with this effort.

Big Hollywood has now linked the Administration with the Entertainment Industry Foundation (EIF) in a bid to use 60+ television programs to push for people to volunteer... for left wing political advocacy.

Here is a listing of the shows, by network, that have signed on to participate in stealth propaganda campaign organized by the White House and their allies in the entertainment industry.

We thought it was bad when the White House tried to use the National Endowment for the Arts (NEA) to push progressive political propaganda.

Obviously, they've set their sights on casting a much greater net, trying to co-op network and cable television to indoctrinate both adults and children.

Posted by: Confederate Yankee at 11:02 AM | Comments (1) | Add Comment
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