Crossposted from Flopping Aces

UPDATE: See my later post with video of Cavuto’s interview with the author of this piece ‘o’ turd legislation. Turns out he’s a real newbie… a fresh face from January, and already somebody’s “water boy”.

Trust me.. you don’t want to hear my own commentary. Read it and weep. From Byron York at the Washington Examiner today:

It was nearly two weeks ago that the House of Representatives, acting in a near-frenzy after the disclosure of bonuses paid to executives of AIG, passed a bill that would impose a 90 percent retroactive tax on those bonuses. Despite the overwhelming 328-93 vote, support for the measure began to collapse almost immediately. Within days, the Obama White House backed away from it, as did the Senate Democratic leadership. The bill stalled, and the populist storm that spawned it seemed to pass.

But now, in a little-noticed move, the House Financial Services Committee, led by chairman Barney Frank, has approved a measure that would, in some key ways, go beyond the most draconian features of the original AIG bill. The new legislation, the “Pay for Performance Act of 2009,” would impose government controls on the pay of all employees — not just top executives — of companies that have received a capital investment from the U.S. government. It would, like the tax measure, be retroactive, changing the terms of compensation agreements already in place. And it would give Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner extraordinary power to determine the pay of thousands of employees of American companies.

The purpose of the legislation is to “prohibit unreasonable and excessive compensation and compensation not based on performance standards,” according to the bill’s language. That includes regular pay, bonuses — everything — paid to employees of companies in whom the government has a capital stake, including those that have received funds through the Troubled Assets Relief Program, or TARP, as well as Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.

The measure is not limited just to those firms that received the largest sums of money, or just to the top 25 or 50 executives of those companies. It applies to all employees of all companies involved, for as long as the government is invested. And it would not only apply going forward, but also retroactively to existing contracts and pay arrangements of institutions that have already received funds.

In addition, the bill gives Geithner the authority to decide what pay is “unreasonable” or “excessive.” And it directs the Treasury Department to come up with a method to evaluate “the performance of the individual executive or employee to whom the payment relates.”

The bill passed the Financial Services Committee last week, 38 to 22, on a nearly party-line vote. (All Democrats voted for it, and all Republicans, with the exception of Reps. Ed Royce of California and Walter Jones of North Carolina, voted against it.)

continue reading in full… bill comes to House vote this week

Also:

Obama Administration To Release Another Terrorist From Gitmo

The new Obama world…..release those guilty as sin:

The U.S. Justice Department has decided to release another detainee from Guantanamo, a Yemeni named Ayman Saeed Abdullah Batarfi. It is not entirely clear why Batarfi has been cleared for release. But we can be reasonably sure, based on Batarfi’s own freely given testimony, that he was no innocent swept up in the post-9/11 chaos of Afghanistan, as his lawyers claim.

Batarfi first traveled to Afghanistan in 1988 to fight the Soviets. The government claims he was trained at the Khalden camp, which graduated hundreds of al Qaeda members, but Batarfi denies this. Batarfi has admitted to participating in at least one nighttime raid against Soviet forces. This is important because it shows that he was willing to participate in hostilities from a young age–and was not merely a humanitarian adventure seeker in Afghanistan.

Batarfi then went to Pakistan, where he became an orthopedic surgeon. From there, things get really interesting.

There are at least three aspects of Batarfi’s testimony given before his administrative review board hearings at Gitmo that are noteworthy. Keep in mind that these hearings were not interrogations, and the detainees had the option of not participating, or simply issuing blanket denials, as some detainees did.

First, Batarfi admitted that he was an employee of al Wafa, a charity that has been designated a terrorist organization. Al Wafa is discussed in brief in the 9/11 Commission’s report as an al Qaeda front. The unclassified documents released from Guantanamo are littered with references to the organization. It is clear that al Wafa actively supported al Qaeda and the Taliban in a variety of ways–from transporting jihadists to Afghanistan (often through Iran) to purchasing sophisticated weaponry. Al Wafa was not a real charity–it was a terrorist front group, and Batarfi admitted to working for the group for several months in 2001. He says he left the organization after it was designated as a terror-supporter, but this was most likely just Batarfi’s way of trying to explain away his al Wafa ties. As we will see below, he was at Tora Bora after the designation on al Wafa came down.

Thomas Joscelyn goes on to detail the fact that Batarfi met and was instrumental in getting medical equipment for Yazid Sufaat, one of al-Qaeda’s main anthrax researcher, AND met with Osama bin-Laden a few months after 9/11.

Over and over again, Batarfi claimed that he just happened to run into and consort with terrorists without knowing who they were.

~~~

Batarfi and his attorneys have apparently been able to sell this story to the DOJ. On its face, it does not make any sense. And there is much more to Batarfi’s story and the unclassified files on him. He admitted he purchased cyanide, but claims it was for dental fillings. He admitted he stayed at various al Qaeda and Taliban guesthouses, but says he didn’t realize they were facilities associated with Osama bin Laden at the time. Batarfi met the Taliban’s health minister in 2001 because, well, that’s just the sort of thing an al Wafa employee would do.

So this man say’s it was all a coincidence meeting bin-Laden, during a point in time where the whole world was frantically looking for him, and the Obama DOJ buys it hook, line and sinker.

As the father of one of those killed on 9/11 said a few months ago….it’s unbelievable:

“To me it’s beyond comprehension that they would take the side of the terrorists,” said Peter Gadiel, whose son, James, was killed at the World Trade Center on 9/11. “Many of these people have been released and been right back killing, right back at their terrorist work again.”

Finally:

Pelosi “Dead Set” Against Murtha Corruption Probe…May Go Ahead Anyway

Nancy “Drain That Swamp” Pelosi is dead set against any investigation over corruption against members of their own party…..but it may still happen anyways:
(more…)

From Red Maryland

Via Paul Chesser’s excellent piece at the American Spectator, we have more evidence of the spectacular failure of Europe’s cap and trade scheme:

Germany’s renewable energy companies are a tremendous success story. Roughly 15 percent of the country’s electricity comes from solar, wind or biomass facilities, almost 250,000 jobs have been created and the net worth of the business is €35 billion per year.But there’s a catch: The climate hasn’t in fact profited from these developments. As astonishing as it may sound, the new wind turbines and solar cells haven’t prohibited the emission of even a single gram of CO2.

Even more surprising, the European Union’s own climate change policies, touted as the most progressive in the world, are to blame. The EU-wide emissions trading system determines the total amount of CO2 that can be emitted by power companies and industries. And this amount doesn’t change — no matter how many wind turbines are erected.

Experts have known about this situation for some time, but it still isn’t widely known to the public. Even Germany’s government officials mention it only under their breath. No one wants to discuss the political ramifications.

It’s a sensitive subject: Germany is recognized worldwide as a leader in all things related to renewable energy. The environmental energy sector doesn’t want this image to be tarnished. Under no circumstances does Berlin want the Renewable Energy Law (EEG) — which mandates the prices at which energy companies have to buy green power — to fall into disrepute.

At the same time, big energy companies have an interest in maintaining the status quo. As a result, no one is pushing for change. Everyone involved is remaining silent.

And there you have it. Cap and trade does nothing to reduce carbon emissions or halt global warming. But that was already a well known fact, if you had the eyes to see it.
(more…)

by Laryn

The US debt is so large that America couldn’t qualify to join the EU.
President Obama expects the deficit level to be 12% of GDP this year larger than Great Britain’s record 10% deficit to GDP.

According to Heritage, Obama will quadruple the deficit this year.

The media does not want to dwell on these facts but there’s more…
The Institute For Policy Innovation released these facts in time for the Tax Day Tea Party Protests:

Ten Tax Facts for Tax Day Tea Parties

President Barack Obama and the U.S. Congress have gone on a spending and debt spree that the country cannot afford. As a result, a spontaneous grassroots movement is emerging from every corner of the nation with a message for Congress and the president: Stop spending us into an inevitable spiral of debt and higher taxes … now!

To that end, groups of Americans will be meeting in towns and cities across the nation on April 15 for “Tax Day Tea Parties” (think Boston Tea Party, not biscuits and fine English china). These “Ten Tax Facts” are our effort to make sure the American people are well- informed as they gather together to express their concern about the direction Washington is headed.

#1 .Under the Obama budget, the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) projects that the national debt will double over the next five years; and it will triple over the next 10 years to $17.3 trillion.

#2. Under the Obama budget, CBO projects that the national debt will soar over the next 10 years from 40 percent of GDP today to a shocking 82.4 percent. (Ronald Reagan left office with the national debt at 42 percent of GDP).

#3. The president’s budget also states that total federal borrowing will grow by $2.7 trillion this year alone, an increase of 27 percent in one year!

#4. The budget President Obama proposes for this year increases federal spending by an incredible 34 percent over the previous year, with a total of $4 trillion in federal spending, the highest ever.

#5. The federal budget deficit (not the national debt) would reach $1.845 trillion this year, according to the CBO, the highest ever. That would be more than seven times Reagan’s largest budget deficit of $221 billion, which caused so much consternation among Reagan’s critics.
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Crossposted from Flopping Aces

In a House Judiciary committee, the attorney for the Pennsylvania Republican State Committee, Heather Heidelbaugh, testified that ACORN whistleblower, Anita Moncrief, was informed by the NYTs reporter, Stephanie Strom the paper was killing a late October 2008 story of the Obama-ACORN link because “it was a game changer” in the election.

Philadelphia’s Michael Tremoglie writes in his article of The Bulletin:

Heather Heidelbaugh, who represented the Pennsylvania Republican State Committee in the lawsuit against the group, recounted for the Committee what she had been told by a former ACORN worker who had worked in the group’s Washington, D.C. office. The former worker, Anita Moncrief, told Ms. Heidelbaugh last October, during the state committee’s litigation against ACORN, she had been a “confidential informant for several months to The New York Times reporter, Stephanie Strom.”

Ms. Moncrief had been providing Ms. Strom with information about ACORN’s election activities. Ms. Strom had written several stories based on information Ms. Moncrief had given her.

During her testimony, Ms. Heidelbaugh said Ms. Moncrief had told her The New York Times articles stopped when she revealed that the Obama presidential campaign had sent its maxed-out donor list to ACORN’s Washington, D.C. office.

Ms. Moncrief told Ms. Heidelbaugh the campaign had asked her and her boss to “reach out to the maxed-out donors and solicit donations from them for Get Out the Vote efforts to be run by ACORN.”

Ms. Heidelbaugh then told the congressional panel:

“Upon learning this information and receiving the list of donors from the Obama campaign, Ms. Strom reported to Ms. Moncrief that her editors at The New York Times wanted her to kill the story because, and I quote, “it was a game changer.”’

Since many will seize on the “she said, she said” moment here, let’s recap Anita Moncrief for those not in the know.

Ms. Moncrief only made her first contacts with the PA Republican State Committee *after* the NYTs decided to “spike” the story.

Ms. Moncrief makes for an unlikely ACORN villian. She was (is?) an Obama supporter, and still a devoted Democrat. But she has been disillusioned with ACORN’s agenda after working with them since 2005.

The ACORN head honchos dismiss her as merely a “disgruntled employee”, emphasizing her own sketchy past to diss the messenger. She was let go when she put $3000 approx on the company expense account. She has apologized and is making recompense for the misappropriated funds.

Seems rather harsh in light of the admitted ACORN scandal by founder, Wade Rathke… who kept his brother Dale on the ACORN payroll for a decade, and covered up his embezzlement of $1 million to not only the public, but to the ACORN inner circle themselves. Obviously, Ms. Moncrief was disadvantaged by no ties to Rathke at birth. But the double standard is undeniable. If they can cover up a mil, keeping on what would be a loyal ACORN worker willing to pay back $3000 in expenses should be a no brainer.

Since her last days in ACORN and life post-ACORN, Ms. Moncrief’s open transfer of the inside knowledge wealth has spoken for itself. Her exposé of ACORN isn’t because of her expense incident… it is to reveal the political power grab by a non-profit, using the poor as their mantra.

In John Fund’s WSJ article last October, Mr. Moncrief’s testimony in a Pennsylvania court while investigating ACORN’s voter fraud charges also included confirmation that the Obama campaign had provided ACORN with “…lists of potential donors by several Democratic presidential campaigns, including that of Barack Obama, to troll for contributions.” A relationship that could constitute a violation of federal election laws.

The Obama campaign denies it “has any ties” to Acorn, but Mr. Obama’s ties are extensive. In 1992 he headed a registration effort for Project Vote, an Acorn partner at the time. He did so well that he was made a top trainer for Acorn’s Chicago conferences. In 1995, he represented Acorn in a key case upholding the constitutionality of the new Motor Voter Act — the first law passed by the Clinton administration — which created the mandated, nationwide postcard voter registration system that Acorn workers are using to flood election offices with bogus registrations.

Ms. MonCrief testified that in November 2007 Project Vote development director Karyn Gillette told her she had direct contact with the Obama campaign and had obtained their donor lists. Ms. MonCrief also testified she was given a spreadsheet to use in cultivating Obama donors who had maxed out on donations to the candidate, but who could contribute to voter registration efforts. Project Vote calls the allegation “absolutely false.”

She says that when she had trouble with what appeared to be duplicate names on the list, Ms. Gillette told her she would talk with the Obama campaign and get a better version. Ms. MonCrief has given me [John Fund] copies of the donor lists she says were obtained from other Democratic campaigns, as well as the 2004 DNC donor lists.

Ms. Moncrief was also upset at ACORN’s protection mob tactics in their “Muscle for Money” campaign to intimidate businesses into contributing grants. Per another story by Tremoglie just days ago:

Ms. Moncrief testified, at the time, the money obtained from donors on the list was allegedly to be used for voter registration drives. According to Ms. Moncrief, “There really isn’t a difference between Project Vote and ACORN.” She said they have the same staff and share the same offices.

If proven, ACORN and Project Vote could at the very least, lose their tax-exampt status for engaging in politically partisan activities. ACORN’s questionable activism extended into what Ms. Moncrief called a “Muscle for the Money” program.

Ms. Heidelbaugh told the panel that Ms. Moncrief said there were two programs with that name — one official and one unofficial. The official program is the marketing name ACORN gives for its voter registration drives.

But the unofficial program, is directed at corporations for donations. Ms. Heidelbaugh quoted from Ms. Moncrief testimony,

“[ACORN was] paid by SEIU (the Service Employees International Union) to harass a man named Mr. Rubenstein, and they wanted me to go out — the D.C. local did, wanted me to go out and break up a banquet dinner, protest out in front of his house…. it was always referred to as ‘Muscle for Money’ because they would go out there, intimidate these people, protest … And instead of, you know, reforming the way they did the rapid anticipation loans, they ended up giving money to the ACORN tax sites … The companys would pay money to get the protesting to stop….the insiders at ACORN called it “protection”… programs were carried out against Sherwin Williams, Jackson Hewitt, H&R Block, the Carlyle Group and Money Mart.”

Tho Ms. Moncrief doesn’t speak much about the current POTUS, she has plenty to say on her blog about ACORN, the Sandlers, John Podesta and George Soros. In her four-part series, “ACORN And The Sandlers”, she reproduces a 2006 memo sent by Zach Polett, Project Vote Executive director and director of ACORN Political Operations about the “Proposed Process for Developing a 5-Year ACORN Political Business Plan” that focuses on “…build the kind of long-term, permanent electoral capacity that progressives need to take back power in America.”

She then describes how they set the stage for the foreclosure break-ins as publicity, and speaks of another internal memo stating goals: “”Electoral plans redistricting and holding congress and 2010 Gubernatorial races (47)…Senate in 2010c Questions about getting to 60 in 2008. So 2010 becomes an additional push for more seats. “

While Ms. Moncrief may be a liberal progressive at heart, she also recognizes a mob scam when she sees one. From her blog diaries:

Obviously preparing for power was not meant for the poor, but for the Democrats that are currently in office with the dubious help of ACORN and generous donations from the Sandlers. To some it may appear that the Sandler’s donated more than just their money, but also structural support to ACORN and the Democratic Party. Besides site training by staff for ACORN, according to ACORN insiders, the Sandler funded Pro Publica referred the Advance Group to ACORN for crisis PR. Pro Publica has also been accused by some of managing the news.

The phrase preparing for power resonates not only with ACORN and the Sandlers, but also with the events that I testified about and reported to the New York times in 2008. In September of 2007, I prepared a listing of all of the Chicago area donors in anticipation of a fundraising trip by either Karyn Gillette (Project Vote Development Director) or Zach Polett. Sometime after this fundraising trip, as I have testified in court, ACORN received the Obama donor list. In addition to this, Zach Polett gave a pep talk to staff at a retreat in November of 2007, and mentioned that he had the opportunity to supervise Barack Obama and that ACORN produces leaders and gets results.

ACORN’s results appear to be one sided in nature with direct benefit going to their strategic partnerships, the Sandler’s, who have not returned calls for comment, could be held liable in the same way that ACORN attacked Household Finance. Lisa Ranghelli in her reports details how

… ACORN was directly influential in the successful pursuit of a multi-state lawsuit against Household by Attorneys General in every state, resulting in a settlement of $484 million in direct compensation to borrowers. During the Household campaign, ACORN also helped hundreds of borrowers in several states get thousands of dollars back from Household in fees, credit insurance, significant loan modifications, and in some cases refinances into better loans.

BTW, Ms. Moncrief’s blog is a plethora of inside info. No wonder that ACORN has now labeled one of their own the enemy. Still, she remains a dedicated Democrat, seeking to expose the shadier side of power within her chosen party.

But back to the NYTs. I told you a bit of Ms. Moncrief’s story in order to shed more light by the expected “hearsay by hearsay” accusations against the NYTs for killing an story that may have affected the outcome of the 2008 Presidential election.

And exactly what does ACORN, the Times and reporter Strom have to say for themselves against these accusations?

“None of this wild and varied list of charges has any credibility and we’re not going to spend our time on it,” said Kevin Whelan, ACORN deputy political director in a statement issued last week.

Stephanie Strom was contactee for a comment, and The New York Times’ Senior Vice President for Corporate Communications Catherine Mathis replied with an e-mail in her place.

Ms. Mathis wrote, “In response to your questions to our reporter, Stephanie Strom, we do not discuss our newsgathering and won’t comment except to say that political considerations played no role in our decisions about how to cover this story or any other story about President Obama.”

Two facts are certain. First: the New York Times had the ACORN-Obama story via Moncrief’s long term relationship with Strom; and second: they did not run it. They may deny that their refusal to run the story was not politically motivated. But they will also find it hard to defend what is news today, was also not news back in October.

And they wonder why their business is going down the toilet. But with the 1st Amendment as cover, they will escape any scrutiny.

also:

Daniel Hannan On MSNBC

Man o’ man, we need to import this guy over to America:

From Red Maryland

…you know you’re over the target,” was a phrase much used by Mike Huckabee during the Republican primaries. I’m no fan of Huckabee, but the cliché is accurate.

To wit: progressive muckety muck Michael Tomasky’s reaction to my Examiner piece about the move to change the lyrics to Maryland, My Maryland. :

He states that he disagrees with my conclusions and adds the snarky insult, “At any rate. Maryland is a liberal state, Brother Newgent, like it or not. Let’s get with the times.”

Only, Tomasky never actually addresses my argument. In fact, he adds more strength to it. (more…)

by Stephen Moore:

In his press conference last Tuesday, Barack Obama said that America must reject the “borrow and spend” policies of the past in favor of a strategy of “save and invest.” Sounds good. So why is Obama proposing to borrow and spend more than any president in the history of the republic? Already in the first 45 days of his administration, the federal government has authorized more debt spending than Ronald Reagan did in eight years in office.

Then last week the Democrats’ own Congressional Budget Office found that the ten-year deficits of the Obama plan will be about $2.3 trillion higher than the $6.97 trillion the White House is projecting. This is the policy of the party that was swept back into power in 2006 and 2008 promising a return to an era of fiscal responsibility.

Welcome to the Obama doctrine. It is built on the high stakes economic gamble that the public and the bond markets will tolerate trillions of dollars of borrowing to pay for massive expansions in government spending on popular income transfer programs. The corollary to this doctrine is that the left will create a political imperative to jack up tax rates to pay for higher spending commitments made today.

But the news on the red ink front is much worse than the president or even the CBO’s budget report suggests. If all of Obama’s “transformational” policy objectives–from global warming taxes to universal health care to doubling the Department of Energy’s budget–are enacted, the debt is likely to increase from about 40 percent of GDP today to close to 100 percent of GDP by 2018. The ten-year debt is likely to be at least $6 trillion higher–or more than one-half trillion of higher deficits a year from now until forever–than the Obama budget projects. (more…)

by Laryn

The protest over President Obama’s commencement speech at Notre Dame just became a little more interesting.

Bishop John D’Arcy of the Diocese of Fort Wayne-South Bend, whose territory includes the Catholic university, is boycotting the presidential visit.

D’Arcy cited the president’s funding of embryonic stem cell research beyond the 73 strains that President Bush had approved.

“While claiming to separate politics from science, he has in fact separated science from ethics and has brought the American government, for the first time in history, into supporting direct destruction of innocent human life,” D’Arcy said.

The Associated Press noted: “D’Arcy’s boycott comes 25 years after former New York Gov. Mario Cuomo gave a speech at Notre Dame in which he argued that Catholic politicians like himself could oppose abortion without trying to outlaw it. Cuomo said bishops shouldn’t try to make their anti-abortion sentiments the law of the land until they had convinced their own flocks to stop having abortions.”

Cuomo is a Catholic while Obama is a non-denominational Protestant.

Obama’s expansion of abortion-funding also drew criticism.

“As a Catholic University, Notre Dame must ask itself, if by this decision it has chosen prestige over truth,” D’Arcy said.

Obama would be the sixth sitting president to address Notre Dame. That list includes President Reagan.

I guess they want to protest one for the Gipper. (more…)

Crossposted from Flopping Aces

Michelle Bachman (R-MN) is another Pit Bull with lipstick!

Constitutionally Clueless

Rep. Michelle Bachman (R-MN) asks Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner what authority he has under the U.S. Constitution for the radical actions he is taking. The look on Sec. Geithner’s face is tinged with vintage Obamesque arrogance matched with the deer in the headlights cluelessness that has become a hallmark of Poor Timmy’s short tenure at Treasury.

It’s as if he doesn’t even understand the question. The Constitution? What’s that got to do with my plan to seize private property?

And Bachman doesn’t let it go at that. See the video here (start at 55 seconds).

Rep. Manzullo Calls Geithner’s Power Grab “Radical”

Congressman Don Manzullo (R-IL) grills Geither on the lack of specifics for the radical plan to allow the federal government to seize businesses it deems a risk to the financial health of the U.S. economy (anyone remember the Bolshevick Revolution?)

Rep. Manzullo: “You realize how radical your proposal is…you’re talking about seizing private business and if it’s a prudent and carefully designed proposal you would have the answers to some of my questions.”

Two more GOP Reps who show they aren’t afraid to take on the Obamalith!

Our leaders are doing their job. What are YOU doing to help?

Also:

Economic Freedom Under Assault as Obama Forces General Motors CEO to Resign

When you take Obama’s dollar, you will do what Obama says!

GM CEO resigns at Obama’s behest
By MIKE ALLEN
Politico
March 29, 2009

The Obama administration asked Rick Wagoner, the chairman and CEO of General Motors, to step down and he agreed, a White House official said.
(more…)

From Red Maryland

–by Richard E. Vatz

Gov. Martin O’Malley has indicated he is going to sign into law in the next few weeks new restrictions on Maryland’s death penalty. The limits will allow the state’s prosecutors to seek the ultimate penalty in qualified cases only wherein the evidence against the accused includes DNA and/or biological (with the possible addition of fingerprints) evidence or crime videotape. In addition, if there is videotape evidence of a legal confession, that would be acceptable as well.

The new restrictions constitute perhaps the most irresponsible legislation in memory. According to SUN reporter Julie Bykowicz, “Maryland’s evidentiary limitations will become the most stringent of any of the 35 states that have capital punishment on the books.” This will be the case perhaps because legislating what specific type of evidence is necessary to prove guilt, about which expertise is lacking among many legislators, is inferior to legislating the LEVEL of proof necessary, about which less specific expertise is required among legislators.

Maryland’s Attorney General Doug Gansler has called the original Senate proposal “ill-prepared, ill-thought out, awkward and clumsy.” He was being much too indulgent.

Legislative persuasion on critical matters usually involves, at least to some degree, the merits of a bill, not just party politics, constituent support and deal-making. Some of the most public persuasion by supporters of the bill has simply ignored major arguments opposing the proposed legislation.

Let’s first put aside some permanently inconclusive issues:

Deterrence? This argument will never persuade either side to reconsider, even though, parenthetically, the preponderance of evidence establishes that serious, consistent, and relatively timely use of the death penalty does prevent some homicides.

Racial bias? This argument will also never convince either side to reconsider, because it is impossible to prove. One should note, however, that even the much-misinterpreted Paternoster Study found no discrimination in use of the death penalty in Maryland regarding the race of the defendant. Regarding the race of victims, if there is a desire to even-up use of the death penalty among those who kill blacks and those who kill whites, let the prosecutors increase its use in the latter situations.

But with the new legislation, there are other fish to fry. (more…)

By Barry Rubin

It is silly to say that the Pat Oliphant Cartoon in the New York Times and many newspapers around the world is antisemitic. But it’s also a bad mistake because the cartoon deserves serious analysis to show just how dangerous and wrong it is, in ways that not only hurt Israel but all Western democracies.

You can see the cartoon at this URL or view it at the end of this article:

http://news.yahoo.com/comics/uclickcomics/20090325/cx_po_uc/po20090325

Let’s deconstruct the cartoon to show the basic ideas that underlie it and that make it lie.
To begin with, it is not a very good cartoon and bears a striking resemblance to anti-Israel propaganda cartoons in its crudity and one-sidedness. Aesthetic decline has accompanied political crudeness. It doesn’t just say: these people are wrong but these people are 100 percent evil and hateful. The next step is, of course, they deserve to die and their state deserves to be wiped off the map. Is that what Oliphant thinks? Who cares? That’s what he said.
On the left is a huge figure. On the right is a small figure. The implication that need not be spoken here is that the big figure—the powerful side—must be wrong. Oliphant like many or most Western intellectuals, academics, and policymakers, still doesn’t understand the concept of asymmetric warfare. In this, a weaker side wages war on a stronger side using techniques it thinks can make it win. What are these techniques? Terrorism, indifference to the sacrifice of its people, indifference to material losses, refusal to compromise, extending the war for ever. This is precisely the technique of Hamas: let’s continue attacking Israel in order to provoke it to hit us, let’s target Israeli civilians, let’s seek a total victory based on genocide, let’s use our own civilians as human shields, and with such methods we will win. One way we will win is to demonize those who defend themselves, to put them in positions where they have a choice between surrender and looking bad. This cartoon is a victory for Hamas. But it is also a victory for all those who would fight the West and other democracies (India, for example) using these methods. Remember September 11?

The big figure has no head, and hence is not a human being. Israelis are not human. Moreover the headless figure is irrational. We are to believe that Israel attacked Gaza for no reason. Forget about thousands of rockets, hundreds of mortar shells, and scores of cross-border attacks. The tiny figure on the right is no threat. So there is no reason to attack it. Attacking is immoral and irrational. The same could—and has—been said about al-Qaida, Hizballah, Pakistani terrorists striking at Mumbai, etc. (more…)

Hi all,
This is the information for the Maryland National Tax Day Tea Party

Wednesday April 15, 2009
12 noon to 2 p.m. at Campbell Park Dock/Boardwalk
Annapolis Harbor Dock Street

E-mail:
annapolisteaparty@gmail.com contact Delegate Don Dwyer

Parking
Navy Stadium park & ride 1.5 mile walk
Park free zones
Weekly rates in garages are good.

Bring your own signs expressing your feelings about taxation without representation and tea bags.

By Dick Morris

President Obama’s glib assertion that his reduction in tax deductions will not reduce donations is absurd. His pathetic defense at his press conference – that he would still give a $100 dollar check to charity even if he only got $11 less of tax deduction from it was both disingenuous and beside the point.

And his comment that his reduced deduction would only impact one or two percent of the nation misses the point that it is these folks who are doing almost half of the donating.

In 2006, the most recent year for which data is available, four million taxpayers had adjusted gross incomes of $200,000 or more. They comprised 3% of the tax returns, made 31% of the income, but donated 44% of all charitable contributions. Together, they provided charity with $81 billion in that year.

Obama’s plan will cost them $10 billion in extra taxes on the income they allocated to charitable donations. How can the president be so glibly certain that they will not curtail their charitable contributions by a like amount or even more?

Imagine all the harm Obama’s program will cause. Churches will be hit most hard. They account for the largest share of charitable donations, but universities, disease research, hospitals, soup kitchens, and cultural institutions will also be hard hit. So will international relief efforts that funnel aid abroad through churches or directly.

It is totally dishonest for Obama to pretend that his curtailment of these deductions won’t hurt the poor. It will most directly impact them since most of the charities Obama is hurting focus on helping the impoverished.

This proposal is not about saving money. It is about controlling it. By, in effect, transferring at least $11 billion a year from private philanthropy to government spending, Obama empowers the public sector at the expense of the voluntary one.
(more…)

Crossposted from Flopping Aces

The Chicago Trib reports how Rahm Emanuel scored big at Freddie Mac!

The collapse of mortgage giants Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac were key elements in the financial meltdown of 2008. It’s no secret that Democrats under Bill Clinton had used both organizations as personal piggybanks to reward loyal friends. Note: President Bush put a stop to such gross patronage during his Administration.

We all know about the tens of millions in bonuses Fannie Mae paid to Franklin Raines, former Clinton White House Budget Director and Jamie Gorelick, former Clinton Deputy Attorney General. (So far no angry ACORN protests outside their palatial homes and no demand by Democrats in Congress that the money be returned).

But what continues to go largely unreported is the role that White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel played at Freddie Mac and the compensation he earned for showing up for board meetings six times a year. Later, as a candidate for congress Emanuel received more in campaign contributions from Freddie Mac than any other candidate.

Rahm Emanuel’s profitable stint at mortgage giant
By Bob Secter and Andrew Zajac
Chicago Tribune
March 26, 2009

…Because of Freddie Mac’s federal charter, the board in Emanuel’s day was a hybrid of directors elected by shareholders and those appointed by the president.

In his final year in office, Clinton tapped three close pals: Emanuel, Washington lobbyist and golfing partner James Free, and Harold Ickes, a former White House aide instrumental in securing the election of Hillary Clinton to the U.S. Senate. Free’s appointment was good for four months, and Ickes’ only three months.
…
Freddie Mac board did most of its work in committees. Yet proxy statements that detailed committee assignments showed none for Emanuel, Free or Ickes during the time they served in 2000 or 2001. Most other directors carried two committee assignments each.
…
[B]uried deep in corporate and government documents on the Freddie Mac Freddie Mac scandal is a little-known and very different story involving Emanuel.
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From Red Maryland

So, it’s been nearly three years since Bob Ehrlich stopped being governor of Maryland but the Baltimore Sun’s Laura Vozzella can’t quite get over it.

The Cordish Cos. has picked a surprising ally in its bid to put slots at Arundel Mills mall: Team Ehrlich.

Bob Ehrlich pushed hard for slots while governor but sharply criticized how Martin O’Malley pulled it off. Yet to help make his case for slots in Anne Arundel, Cordish has tapped Ehrlich communications guru Paul Schurick and others at Womble Carlyle.

Now this apparently will be news for Ms. Vozzella, but once people leave government office they still need to get a paycheck. Mr. Schurick works for Womble Carlyle, a fairly significant law and lobbying firm. One is hard pressed to understand why, exactly, the Cordish Company selecting Womble Carlyle is newsworthy… because it really isn’t… unless your real agenda is to try to perpetuate a hypocrisy smear directed at Governor Ehrlich over his sponsorship of slots while he was governor and his principled opposition to the dog’s breakfast of political payoffs that the O’Malley regime eventually enacted.

In fact, one would think that if Cordish was hiring a firm for reasons other than competence then hiring Womble Carlyle, who lists Governor Ehrlich as the head of its Baltimore office, to lobby the O’Malley administration would not be among the best moves possible.

The fatuous nature of Vozzella’s column is clearly evident in this bit of nonsense:

Finally, Womble Carlyle has a client other than governor-in-waiting Ehrlich!

I seems like her nose is a bit out of joint because Mr. Schurick told her that the firm doesn’t reveal its client list.

“We don’t discuss our client relationships with anyone other than our clients,” Schurick said.

Just to help Ms. Vozzella out, I think we can safely conclude that Womble Carlyle has more clients than Governor Ehrlich:
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By Dick Morris

In more normal times, we would not need Mark R. Levin’s treatise Liberty and Tyranny: A Conservative Manifesto. We would know which side to be on and the points in his Manifesto would be, well, manifest.

But in this day, when a socialist sits in the White House, committed to expanding what Levin calls the “soft tyranny” of government regulation to every aspect of our economic and corporate life, we all need to read and remember what Levin writes in his new book.

Get Liberty and Tyranny: A Conservative Manifesto

Levin defines, again for us, what it means to be free and in the private sector. Why do we need this reminder? Don’t we all remember from the Reagan days?

But the more you read Levin’s remarkable book, the more you realize how we have all been lured into socialism, how much we have already surrendered. Liberty and Tyranny makes us understand who we are, where we want to go, and what the detours we must eschew along the way are. (more…)

by Frederick Meekins

The church was instituted by God in part to stand as a defensive bulwark to protect against erroneous doctrine and spiritually damaging heresies from contaminating the minds of believers and thus to an extent soften the blow of a continually degrading culture. However, often those in positions of religious leadership are so hopelessly detached that when confronted with warnings as to the spiritual dangers threatening both the individual and society they offer little in the way of a viable response grounded in a Christian worldview and instead prattle on about matters few actually care about at best or at worst condition the average congregant to eventually acquiesce to the expanding technocollectivist agenda. This trend is evidenced in the inordinate emphasis upon COMMUNITY rather than Scripture as the authoritative source of values in an increasing number of ecclesiastical circles.

In my column “Just Because You Don’t Understand Doesn’t Mean Its Not Real: Most Epistemologically Unprepared For Bioenhancement Nightmares”, I went into lengthy detail how the Transhumanist movement presented not only a threat to traditional conceptions of liberty as it simultaneously veered off into either total anarchy or nearly absolute control but also threatened what it means to be a human being itself. As an important message I felt the broader church might be in need of hearing, I decided to post it at a website where pastors, ministers, and Christian researchers of various types could publicize their homiletic endeavors to share with their peers and other interested believers.

Though my essay did not contain a single profanity and was completely nonpartisan as it did not mention a single word about Democrats or Republicans but instead focused on the moral implications of the Transhumanist philosophy, the site administrator responded, “It appears that you have some great points and some powerful truths that perhaps should be considered. However, I am unable to approve it for posting to your contributor page at this time because it is simply not a sermon of a type that would be useful to very many other pastors that use our website.”

Frankly, other than the campaign to remove God and Christ as the basis of our cultural foundation and to forbid the utterance of these holy names so that souls might be damned, what other issue is more relevant to the 21st century pulpit than the efforts to undermine innocent human life and now the very creation as we know it? Furthermore, this simmering contempt for the distinct uniqueness of human life stretches all the way to the highest levels of government, industry, and academia. (more…)

Crossposted from Flopping Aces

It was only six days ago I warned that the world had put the US dollar on a death watch. At that writing, a UN panel, backed by Russia, was pushing to replace the US dollar as the world’s reserve currency with a basket of international currencies instead.

In a not so surprising move, China joined the choir, advocating the dollar demotion, but with a twist. Bejing’s central bank governor, Zhou Xiaochuan, proposed creating a currency made up a basket of global currencies and controlled by the International Monetary Fund … saying it would help “to achieve the objective of safeguarding global economic and financial stability.”

Zhou did not mention the dollar by name. But in an unusual step, the essay was published in both Chinese and English, making clear it was meant for a foreign audience.

China has long been uneasy about relying on the dollar for the bulk of its trade and to store foreign reserves. Premier Wen Jiabao publicly appealed to Washington this month to avoid any response to the crisis that might weaken the dollar and the value of Beijing’s estimated $1 trillion in Treasuries and other U.S. government debt.

~~~

To better insulate countries from the ills of one country or one currency, Zhou said the IMF should create a “reserve currency” based on shares in the body held by its 185 member nations, known as special drawing rights, or SDRs.

He said it also should be used for trade, pricing commodities and accounting, not just government finance.

As of yesterday, Treasury Secretary Geithner and Fed Reserve Chairman Bernanke both stated they would renounce any any proposal to move towards a global currency. The top EU economist also added his support for the dollar.

UPDATE: Apparently not every EU official is thrilled with the US spending plans… news today of the EU President labeling the Obama spending plans “the road to hell”.

The head of the European Union slammed President Barack Obama’s plan to spend nearly $2 trillion to push the U.S. economy out of recession as “the road to hell” that EU governments must avoid.

The blunt comments by Czech Prime Minister Mirek Topolanek to the European Parliament on Wednesday highlighted simmering European differences with Washington ahead of a key summit next week on fixing the world economy.

It was the strongest pushback yet from a European leader as the 27-nation bloc bristles from U.S. criticism that it is not spending enough to stimulate demand.

During Obama’s press conference ( Transcript here) later that evening, Obama found himself caught in one outright lie, followed rapidly by pronouncing the dollar “strong”. This was in response to a question by FOX’s Major Garrett on the proposal to move away from the dollar as the reserve currency, and in the wake of the EU and G20 countries refusing to follow Obama down his government spending spree.

The first reponse right after the CNN question is the outright lie about asking other countries to spend…

Well first of all, I haven’t asked them to do anything. What I suggested is, is that all of us are going to have to take steps in order to lift the economy. We don’t want a situation in which some countries are making extraordinary efforts, and other countries aren’t, with the hope that somehow the countries that are making those important steps lift everybody up.

What a crock of doublespeak. As I pointed out in my post yesterday that Obama had penned an international op-ed to the masses, attempting to gin them up against their leaders who are resisting the call by both Geithner and Obama for their increased spending. And by doing so, he was setting them up to be the scapegoats if his lone ranger spending policies failed.

Obama then followed it up – using approx 2/3rds of his answer to justify and cite support for the global spending – the same spending he said he didn’t suggest – by like the minded, recently elected liberal leaders of Australia (Kevin Rudd) and Britain (Gordon Brown).

By dancing with words, Obama sought to deny his actions by backing up his actual intent – done so by “circling the wagons” in conjunction with other leaders.

Either Mr. Garrett was unaware of Obama’s op-ed plea, or he had no opportunity for a follow up question.

But the art of word parsing is this TOTUS’ specialty. In Obama’s language, because he did not specifically did not use the words “spend more” means he wasn’t telling them to spend more. Yet others don’t hear it that way. Time Magazine interpreted Obama’s statement: “It’s very important to make sure that other countries are moving in the same direction, because the global economy is all tied together.” as an insistence that the world’s top economies adopt aggressive, America-sized spending programs. And the EU countries have accepted his “global” ovatures as meaning the same.

After the two minutes of deny/redefine, Obama addressed the dollar’s health…

…. I would just point out that the dollar is extraordinarily strong right now. And the reason the dollar is strong right now is because investors consider it – the United States – the strongest economy in the world.. and with the most stable political system in the world. So you don’t have to take my word for it. I think that there is a great deal of confidence that ultimately, although we are going thru a rough patch, that the prospects for the world economy are very very strong.

Were that true, why are we having this conversation? Why is China, our largest investor, plus Russia and the UN floating the very serious proposal to knock the dollar off it’s lofty perch?

Well… that was then, and today’s a new day. And evidently the parsing of words means a great deal. Because Geithner does a 90% turn in a CFR interview chit chat, suggesting that he is “open” to the Chinese compromise proposal.

“I haven’t read the governor’s proposal. He’s a very thoughtful, very careful distinguished central banker. I generally find him sensible on every issue,” Geithner said, saying that however his interpretation of the proposal was to increase the use of International Monetary Fund’s special drawing rights — shares in the body held by its members — not creating a new currency in the literal sense.

“We’re actually quite open to that suggestion – you should see it as rather evolutionary rather building on the current architecture rather than moving us to global monetary union,” he said.

“The only thing concrete I saw was expanding the use of the [special drawing rights],” Geithner said. “Anything he’s thinking about deserves some consideration.”

The continued use of the dollar as a reserve currency, he added, “depends..on how effective we are in the United States…at getting our fiscal system back to the point where people judge it as sustainable over time.”

Apparently the absolute confidence in the dollar stated in the preceding hours has it’s caveats….

Despite all the Obama administration denials, everything they are doing – in conjunction with “Helicopter Ben” Bernanke, busy in the back room printing an overabundance of US currency in order to meet Geithner’s toxic asset buy up – is laying the foundation for the creation of a global currency. The dollar devaluation depends upon the bet that flooding the world with undervalued US dollars will result in the ability to repay that debt quickly with increased revenue from a rejuvenated US economy.

In light of much of the world’s vote of “no confidence” in the dollar… most especially that of our largest foreign investor… the gambling stakes are especially high. Obama and his economic team can mouth all the positive platitudes in the world, but it will still not “change” the course they have chosen to trod with unprecedented spending, instead of Congressional belt tightening.

Playing with the status of the dollar is a large gamble for Obama to take using the taxpayers’ earnings as the ante. And that is indeed “change” we can believe in.

Also:

GOP Fighting Back

What a shame the Obama cheerleaders in the “news” media won’t cover this!

In the wake of the AIG bonus scandal the House Republican Conference put together this video of Democrats in both the House and Senate expressing confidence that Obama’s stewardship of public funds used in the stimulus bill would be oh-so-much better than during the Bush years. What a laugh!

“Congress and the new Administration will ensure that TARP funds are used for lending to American workers and small businesses – so we can lift our economy out of recession – and not for the enrichment of a privileged few.” — House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, January 21, 2009

See The House GOP Conference site: Holding Democrats Accountable for more. (more…)

From Red Maryland

–by Richard E. Vatz

We tend to get presidents who lack the most offensive personal qualities of their predecessors. It is similar to the hiring of executives. At Towson we had a terrible provost years ago, and when we chose the new one (who has already been hired to be a president at West Virginia University), we made sure he was as honest and transparent as the former was bureaucratically dishonest and opaque.

When Richard Nixon’s peculiarities and deviousness rubbed practically the entire country the wrong way, we chose President “Normal Man,” Gerald R. Ford, as his successor.* [*Reader "Lefty" claims that it is inaccurate to claim that "we" chose Ford, since it was Nixon who chose him post-Agnew, but I do believe it was Ford's antithetical-to-Nixon ethos which led to his being chosen.]

Some felt President Ford was not brilliant, so we chose brilliant-but-weak Jimmy Carter as President.

The weak and affected Jimmy Carter, who gave an exclusive interview to PLAYBOY, quoted his 12-year-old daughter in a presidential debate, and caved in response to Iran’s hostage-taking was replaced by a non-peculiar, strong foreign-policy president, Ronald Reagan.

Last November, when the country had had enough of the inarticulate, uncool and generally unavailable President George W. Bush and the supercilious Vice President Dick Cheney, we chose the rhetorically gifted, personally attractive and ubiquitous Barack Obama who is giving us the “Hail Fellow Well Met” presidency.

President Obama is simply the most likable (by just about everyone) president since Ronald Reagan, and even more people like Mr. Obama. His rhetorical style combines policy wonkishness (out of favor since President Bill Clinton ) with the friendly, “common man/populist” approach; thus, we have the style of the dropped g’s (“buildin’,” “fightin’,” etc.) and the consistent pronunciation of “to” as “ta.” It is an unusual combination, which so far has won him personal popularity while support for his “soak-the-rich” domestic policies (heading toward eliminating income tax obligations for a near-majority of the electorate and raising taxes on only 5% of the population) and weak, ineffective foreign policy (with measurable goals, such as ensuring that Iran will not obtain nuclear weapons) is falling.
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by Regina Sztajer

In less than two months time since President Barack Obama took office his promises are fast disappearing. The great orator promised transparency and prosperity and what we got was an enormous stimulus bill that no one read but rather passed before the Congress could be stopped. He is spending money in the trillions and has an enormous appetite to spend our tax payer money. Joe the plumber from campaign days was correct when he said to Obama, “What do you mean you want to share the wealth? ”

So far to he has appointed tax cheats and lobbyists to his cabinet. He has used fear mongering to cover up his massive social spending and wealth-destroying taxes. Does Obama worry that his spending will push the economy off a cliff? The man is frightening in his deceit and the American people are beginning to revolt. They don’t want to live under Socialism but rather a Democracy in the land of the free and the home of the brave. People are angry and on April 15, tax day, they will express their outrage on National Tea Party Day.

Our Colonial fore bearers protested the British before our Revolutionary War because they were taxing us unfairly. “It was taxation without ” Boston Tea Party. “Today we use tea bags!!! In Maryland we will have a tea party in Annapolis on April 15. Come bring posters of protest and your tea bags. If you plan to have your own tea party go to www.teaparty.com for more information www.TaxDayTeaparty.com or call the Maryland Republican Party for information about the protest on April 15.
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