If you voted for Chicago Barack Obama and got a wittle biddy bit upset over some or all of the Obama scandals, you can now go back to lighting incense to your god. “Transparent” he says. What a laugh! Of course to us Barack Obama is indeed transparent – we see right through him – and his lies.
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Drag a dollar bill through a sewer and you’ll find Barack Obama. Add two zeroes… or one, and you’ll find Michelle Obama. We say this because all of a sudden, after years of flim-flams some Obama supporters are scratching their heads and wondering who Barack Obama really is. Where did their love go? Hells bells, we answered those questions years ago in The Case Of The Missing State Senator.
Its taken them this long to ask these questions? To start wondering and wandering? The mindless young and the color-over-character black Americans who supported Barack Obama in two national elections are increasingly tired of being barebacked by Barack:
“The drop in Obama’s support is fueled by a dramatic 17-point decline over the past month among people under 30, who, along with black Americans, had been the most loyal part of the Obama coalition,” says Keating Holland, polling director for CNN. “It is clear that revelations about NSA surveillance programs have damaged Obama’s standing with the public, although older controversies like the IRS matter may have begun to take their toll as well.”
The survey, released Monday, also shows that 50 percent of Americans say they don’t believe Obama is “honest and trustworthy,” for the first time in his presidency, according to CNN.
“Obama simply cannot be trusted. Obama cannot be trusted on any issue. Obama cannot be trusted by his friends. Obama cannot be trusted by his enemies. Obama cannot be trusted.”
“Like Bush before him, President Obama faces a credibility crisis.
There is a common element to the so-called Obama scandals—the IRS targeting of conservatives, the fatal attack in Benghazi, and widespread spying on U.S. journalists and ordinary Americans. It is a lack of credibility.
In each case, the Obama administration has helped make controversies worse by changing its stories, distorting facts, and lying.
The abuse of trust may be taking a toll on President Obama’s reputation.
A CNN/ORC poll of 1,104 adult Americans June 11-13 shows the president’s job approval rating at 45 percent, down 8 percentage points in a month. [snip]
This month, only 49 percent of Americans say Obama is honest and trustworthy. That is a 9-point drop since May 17-18.”
Because the mindless young and others who voted for Barack Obama, (sometimes twice and sometimes in the same election we might as well add), do not like to read or in any way tax their minds we’ll shorten those two articles rather miraculously into one sentence: “Barack Obama will in flowery terms tell you what you want to hear but after you vote for him he stabs you in the back.”
“When it came time to defend the defenseless or protect and enrich the powerful. Obama made a decision. He protected his powerful friends and provided them with even more government money. Same old Chicago politics. The poor shivered in cold tenements. Obama bought a new house. Now he wants a bigger White House to entertain his Chicago friends.”
Put a dollar bill in Obama’s g-string and he’ll follow you anywhere. In January of 2008 the New York Times gave minimal attention, but more than it does now, to the real Barack Obama:
“When residents in Illinois voiced outrage two years ago upon learning that the Exelon Corporation had not disclosed radioactive leaks at one of its nuclear plants, the state’s freshman senator, Barack Obama, took up their cause.
Mr. Obama scolded Exelon and federal regulators for inaction and introduced a bill to require all plant owners to notify state and local authorities immediately of even small leaks.”
“A close look at the path his legislation took tells a very different story. While he initially fought to advance his bill, even holding up a presidential nomination to try to force a hearing on it, Mr. Obama eventually rewrote it to reflect changes sought by Senate Republicans, Exelon and nuclear regulators. The new bill removed language mandating prompt reporting and simply offered guidance to regulators, whom it charged with addressing the issue of unreported leaks.
Those revisions propelled the bill through a crucial committee. But, contrary to Mr. Obama’s comments in Iowa, it ultimately died amid parliamentary wrangling in the full Senate.
“Senator Obama’s staff was sending us copies of the bill to review, and we could see it weakening with each successive draft,” said Joe Cosgrove, a park district director in Will County, Ill., where low-level radioactive runoff had turned up in groundwater. [snip]
Since 2003, executives and employees of Exelon, which is based in Illinois, have contributed at least $227,000 to Mr. Obama’s campaigns for the United States Senate and for president. [snip]
In addition, Mr. Obama’s chief political strategist, David Axelrod, has worked as a consultant to Exelon.”
And you young fools, black fools, liberal fools, fools’ fools thought you had a chance? Stupid is as stupid does.
It’s not just freezing tenants in Chicago, nor Exelon, that should clue the clueless. There is also ObamaCare. You know that ObamaCare is a gangster government enforced extraction of of your money to give to the insurance companies right? You do know by now that ObamaCare is welfare for insurance companies right?
Did you ever read about The Obama Health Plan Obama Supporters Do Not Want To Discuss. If you want to know why ObamaCare sucks, your money from your pocket to give to health insurance companies that will give you little in return read about the father of ObamaCare.
The father of ObamaCare is the corrupt Obama of Chicago. It’s the same old story with Obama – excoriate insurance companies in public then make deals favorable to them in private. That’s not the only reason ObamaCare sucks (the life out of you and the money out of your wallet) but if you’re wondering why ObamaCare sucks so bad, start there.
After that, you might begin to hunt for the missing president who appears to disappear every time the cops come around. Like us you might begin to ask yourself Where’s Obama?
The “missing president” is now touted by some as a smart strategy to govern. According to this debauched view of proper governance the best way for Obama to get things done is to disappear. Immigration reform, say these advocates of irresponsibility and invisibility, will pass if Obama disappears behind drapes and Michelle’s ample, um, profile.
But for those of us that believe the best way to govern is to propose good policies, explain them honestly to the public with care not to be too too clever, then exert as much effort and influence acquire the legislative votes necessary, this “presence of absence” strategy is fools’ gold.
Advocates of amnesty or what is now called “immigration reform” might do well to remember that Obama made a lot of promises to them before and during his first term – none of which materialized. Young people who expected glorious CHANGE got their pockets picked with only some change left to jingle jangle in their pockets.
Liberals? Hell you got rendition, abuse of civil liberties, FISA, lobbyists, a vegetable garden tended to by someone other than Michelle, DOJ targeting and intimidation of real journalists, and the NSA national security state. Happy?
Blacks? See the disappearing black middle class? See your unemployed young? See affirmative action disappearing (probably next week)? Take a look around if you are an African-American that put the bro ahead of the… well you know what they called Hillary – and realize you are in a Monty Python film. One day all this will be yours.
If you think Barack Obama is standing by you, look again. He just disappeared. You can find him if you look for the person he really is, not the one you imagined.
Want to find the missing president? Drag a dollar bill through a sewer and you hook yourself an Obama.
“In an exclusive sit-down interview with The Brody File, Jeb Bush says that, “Hillary Clinton is a formidable force on the left.”
We sat down with Jeb Bush Friday morning at the Faith and Freedom Coalition event in DC. If Jeb Bush decides to run for president, he will most likely be considered the frontrunner for the GOP nomination.”
“What the crap” you say? Jeb Bush running for president? Nah! Sure George W. Bush, thanks to the incompetent, treacherous, golfing Boob Barack Obama, has higher popularity ratings that Obama… but, but, but, Jeb Bush for President? That’s insane, right? Well if you think that’s insane try this on for size (and try not to think about that second paragraph above):
“Is There Another Elected Obama In Our Future?
Have you noticed first lady Michelle Obama popping up a lot in the media lately? Like announcing the best picture winner at the Oscars? Or promoting healthier eating habits? And she recently touched on economic issues at a Democratic fundraiser for Virginia gubernatorial candidate Terry McAuliffe.
Is the groundwork being laid for another elected Obama in our future?[snip]
She continued, “See, because when I was growing up, a family of four living on a single blue-collar salary could build a solid life without debt and without relying on any form of public assistance… But today, for so many families, that’s no longer possible. Folks are working harder than ever before and doing everything right, and it’s still not enough.”
Sounds like the first draft of a future campaign speech. [snip]
The White House powers-that-be have a plan, and they will implement that plan on their schedule. First, her handlers wanted to create an image, an endearing and noncontroversial one. They do not want to repeat the Hillary Clinton experience, in which the then-first lady alienated half of the country with her thinly veiled ambition and attitude. [snip]
Clinton’s political road to bigger things might have been a little less bumpy if she had been guided by some of the remarkable handlers that paved the way for Barack Obama. Michelle will be the number one heir of that machine. In fact, that may be one of the primary — though surely not the only — reasons the machine continues.
Organizing for America, now Organizing for Action — the president’s personal 501(c)(4) organization that is virtually all political but never seems to be troubled by the fine bureaucrats at the IRS’s nonprofit unit — carries on, raising money to push the president’s message. [snip]
While Michelle is her own woman with her own accomplishments, she would likely embrace virtually all of her husband’s economic policies — and could be even further to the left.
If (when?) Michelle Obama decides to run for office, she will have the Obama machine fully engaged to ensure she wins — the Chicago way if need be.”
Read the entire article if you want to empty your stomach.
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Update II: MoonOnPluto in our comments section reports on what is happening in Turkey from his home there. Syria, the NSA scandals, the IRS scandals, Benghazi, and other scandals continue to dominate the news. For us the most important story of the day in the long run is this report from Bloomberg: Spy agencies sharing data with “thousands” of firms:
“This raises a number of interesting questions and concerns. First, are cooperating firms gaining competitive advantages against non-cooperating (and/or unaware) firms in the same market? That kind of distortion would corrupt markets in favor of snitching as a survival tactic, would it not? Second, are there political organizations that have this kind of friendly relationship with intelligence services that give them a competitive advantage? Two months ago, one might have laughed off such a suggestion, but after what took place at the IRS, it’s a little more difficult to dismiss.
The part about the Microsoft bug reporting is especially interesting in light of the Attkisson story today, too.”
We emphasize the sentence that raises the possibility of “political organizations” getting assistance from intelligence services. “Political organizations” is a polite way to say Barack Obama’s CREEP – the committee to re-elect the president. That was Nixon’s name for his campaign organization, Obama’s was called OFA, although we use OAF. Did the Obama OAFs get data mining information from the NSA or other intelligence organizations. We’ve been discussing that possibility in the comments section this this NSA scandal exploded this past week (yeah, it’s been only a week). We’re not a minority in our thinking: 57% Fear Government Will Use NSA Data to Harass Political Opponents
What does Bambi do now? Go against the American public which does not want intervention? Go against his base which is already uneasy with his George W. Bush III warmonger persona? Are “wag the dog” type do-something/anything to get away from the scandals sure to follow? What will Syrian Tony Rezko do?
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Bill Clinton is laughably inarticulate. The man cannot stitch together two words that make sense. Bill Clinton does not know how to employ the English language to make a point, let alone an complete argument. Bill Clinton’s rhetorical skills are nonexistent. Furthermore, Bill Clinton is incapable of skewering opponents verbally.
You have to believe all the above to miss or choose to ignore Bill Clinton’s latest resounding slap on Barack Obama’s puss.
Regular readers will recall our last guided tour through Borgia Italy (a.k.a. America 2013) concerned the published reports of a “secret deal” in which Bill Clinton would put aside his disgust with Barack Obama then spectacularly endorse and campaign for Barack Obama. In turn Barack the treacherous Boob would endorse Hillary Clinton 2016.
According to the book that purports this “secret deal” really did happen Bill Clinton kept his part of the deal but soon after the election treacherous Barack Obama let it be known that he wanted to remain “neutral”. “Bill Clinton went ballistic and threatened retaliation” the book states.
In order to placate Bill, treacherous Barack Obama went on 60 Minutes with Hillary Clinton and embarrassed himself, Hillary and the once prestigious show itself. If Obama thinks that one TV appearance pays a debt and he can back out on his purported “secret deal” promise…. Well this is how the book phrases it:
“He may yet try to back out of his promise to Hillary Clinton. But as Obama’s presidency sinks deeper into scandal and inaction, the question is — will Clinton even still want his endorsement?“
The book states “Bill Clinton went ballistic and threatened retaliation.” Did we witness the beginnings of retaliation even as Big Media misses the obvious? Here’s what happened according to the entirely unreliable Maggie Haberman of Politico:
“At another point during a closed-press event Tuesday, Clinton implied that Obama or any president risks looking like “a total fool” if they listen too closely to opinion polls and act too cautiously. He used his own decisions on Kosovo and Bosnia as a point of reference. [snip]
Clinton repeatedly said it would be “lame” to blame a lack of intervention on opposition in polls or among members of Congress.
If Clinton had ever blamed a lack of action because “there was a poll in the morning paper that said 80 percent of you were against it … you’d look like a total wuss,” he said. “And you would be. I don’t mean that a leader should go out of his way or her way to do the unpopular thing, I simply mean when people are telling you ‘no’ in these situations, very often what they’re doing is flashing a giant yellow light and saying, ‘For God’s sakes, be careful, tell us what you’re doing, think this through, be careful.”
Clinton continued, “But still they hire their president to look around the corner and down the street, and you just think – if you refuse to act and you cause a calamity, the one thing you cannot say when all the eggs have been broken, is that, ‘Oh my God, two years ago there was a poll that said 80 percent of you were against it.’ Right? You’d look like a total fool. So you really have to in the end trust the American people, tell them what you’re doing, and hope to God you can sell it” and that it turns out okay in the end.”
Don’t be distracted by the policy Bill Clinton is discussing. Ask yourself instead if there was a different set of phrases, less insulting terms, Bill could have used to describe current Barack Obama policy? Notice how Bill Clinton is referencing a “president”, a “leader” in his acid comments. Who could that possibly be? Ask yourself if the terms Bill Clinton wielded are personal attacks in nature? The answer is yes. Bill Clinton is sufficiently skilled in the English language to discuss a policy and not use words such as “lame” (this one must particularly hurt Barack because it was paired with “blame”. Bill telling Obama it is “lame to blame” strips Obama of his favorite tactic), “wuss” and “fool“.
As to the policy Bill Clinton is discussing this appears to be a bit of legerdemain. We’re not sure what Bill Clinton is proposing. For that matter we are not sure what Hillary Clinton is proposing. The DailyBeast sees a Hillary policy on Syria:
“Last summer, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, CIA Director David Petraeus, Defense Secretary Leon Panetta, and Joint Chiefs Chairman Martin Dempsey all supported arming vetted, moderate elements of the Syrian opposition but were rebuffed by the White House. Hillary Clinton told the New York Times in February she had been an advocate for more forceful action in Syria, a move seen by many as an attempt to distance herself from Obama’s Syria policy just before she left office and in advance of her 2016 presidential run.“
That last bit is pretty smart. In Borgia Italy do not look at policy, look at direction and purpose of the players. After Obama’s vapid campaigns of personal attacks, fear and smear and, as Seinfeld would say, about nothing, policy takes a seat outside the carriage. Look instead to the players hiding behind tapestries, the knives sheathed ‘neath velvets and brocades. Occasionally the knives do come out, but there has to be purpose and opportunity. Bill Clinton has a shiv to stick, with a target to strike.
Are there any “moderate” elements left in the Syrian insurrection against Assad? We doubt it. It certainly is too late now to find them. Bill and Hillary might be proposing the policy we had during the Iran-Iraq War of arming the side that’s losing to keep anyone from winning and thereby keeping everyone off balance. For purposes of our discussion the policy argument is near irrelevant. What matters is the choice words Bill said, and why he said them.
Is this just “retaliation” or is Bill in the “zig” mode after the “zag”? Republicans/conservatives, Obama Dimocrats (Obamacrats) and for that matter many Democrats do that understand that Bill Clinton always zigs and zags his way to a goal. Remember “era of big government” is over even as he proposed small programs upon small programs popular with middle class Americans? It was zig and zag Bill style. Now Bill is zigging. Why is Bill zigging now? Always kick a Boob when he is down. And Boob Obama is down.
According to the latest Gallup, Fox News polls: Public opposes broad NSA collection of records. The results from these polls spell trouble for Obama. The Fox News poll has Obama approval at 44% (Eric Holder is at 29%). Is Obama “honest and trustworthy” has a 48% split down from the 73% he garnered in 2009. On the economy few are happy. Most think we are in either a recession or a downturn. Most think Obama is as “transparent” as George W. Bush was. 64% believe the government is “too big”.
The poll results indicate most Americans (63%) believe the Department of Justice seizure of reporter phone records is “for political reasons” and that Eric Holder should resign (52%). The NSA scandal is viewed by 62% as “An unacceptable and alarming invasion of privacy rights”. 58% have lost confidence in the IRS. 68% believe the White House either knew or initiated the IRS was targeting conservative groups. 66% believe the attacks on conservatives by the IRS were high level officials punishing political opponents. 76% believe ObamaCare has to be yanked from the IRS. 55% oppose ObamaCare.
66% of Americans are following the Benghazi scandal closely. 59% think Obama could have done more to protect the Benghazi consulate. 55% think Hillary Clinton could have done more. 56% think Obama did not do more because of his reelection campaign.
As to investigations: On the “IRS targeting of hundreds of conservative and Tea Party groups for special scrutiny” 78% think Congress should continue to investigate. DOJ “monitoring of certain journalists as part of its leak investigations? 76% want more investigations. “The Obama administration’s handling of the terrorist attack on the U.S. consulate in Benghazi, Libya that resulted in the deaths of four Americans?” 73% want more investigations.
Recently we asked, “what is your favorite scandal”? This poll has it IRS 28%, DOJ 28%, Benghazi 23%.
Bill Clinton sees the trouble Obama is in. Hillary Clinton has her glasses on and sees the same thing. Even the not-too-bright Walter Shapiro sees the mess Obama in and has advice for an imaginary 2016 candidate not named Hillary or Joe. The advice is “How to Break with President Obama“.
But there are other idiot voices in Big Media doing all they can to save Barack Obama from his treacheries and incompetence. Joan Walsh wants Hillary Clinton to immolate herself like Joan of Arc in order to save the treacherous boob dauphin:
“Hillary must own 2014
Twitter’s a nice start. But if she wants to get serious about 2016, she needs to get involved in the 2014 midterms [snip]
It’s understandable: liberals are demoralized by the media hyping phony White House scandals, most notably Benghazi and the IRS mess, and they’re divided over revelations about the ever-growing national security state under President Obama. The media, meanwhile, seems to sense that Scandalgate is almost played out, while the genuine controversy over the NSA revelations is never going to gain traction with the audience, which polls show support security state overreach. So hey…Hillary!
But acting like we’re all going to be delivered into a parallel Democratic administration where everything is one long Tumblr tribute to said Democrat’s coolness is in some ways a return to the wishful thinking that troubled the otherwise brilliant Obama 2008 campaign. If the glass-ceiling cracker is going to shatter it this time, she needs to gear up with more than Twitter and shout-outs to the folks behind “Texts with Hillary”: She has to make the 2014 midterms a referendum on GOP obstruction, and campaign like her presidency depended on it. Because it does.
Joan Walsh proclaims herself a Hillary supporter but really only wants to throw Hillary overboard to serve as Barack Obama’s life preserver. It is Barack Obama that is going to have to “make the 2014 midterms a referendum on GOP obstruction” of his abominations and it is Barack Obama that must “campaign like her his presidency depended on it.” Hillary Clinton should do exactly the opposite of the suicide strategy advised by MSNBC’s Joan Walsh:
“I started thinking about Clinton’s role in 2014 a couple of weeks ago, discussing her increasingly likely 2016 run on “Hardball.” Chris Matthews asked how bold a campaign she needed to run, and whether somehow, she had to run against or otherwise separate herself from Obama. If not, who or what was she running against?
It was pretty obvious to me: She cannot and should not separate herself from the president, and she’s running against the increasingly unhinged Republican Party that impeached her husband because they couldn’t beat him at the polls, and then tied her boss in knots of scandal and obstructionism when they couldn’t beat him, either.
Clinton can’t run against Obama because she worked for him — but also because she needs to consolidate the Obama coalition and make it a Clinton coalition. There are still embers of bitterness over the 2008 primary, and any effort to distance herself from the president, real or imagined, could fan them. Besides, Al Gore made a mistake by running away from Clinton record; Clinton’s 2016 message should be that she will consolidate the gains of the Obama presidency, from health care reform to banking regulation to women’s rights, and extend them. She will complete the president’s work by vanquishing his intransigent, unreasonable, race-baiting foes. And she is uniquely positioned to do it.”
It’s stunning to think that Chris Matthews O’Tingles has a better grasp on reality than Joan Walsh on the question of Hillary running from Obama as fast as she can and as far as she can. Joan Walsh has been shoveling that shi.. stuff about Hillary tying herself to Obama for a while now.
It is comical to read Joan Walsh as she states “There are still embers of bitterness over the 2008 primary.” But Walsh presumes the “bitterness” comes solely from Obama supporters and therefore Hillary cannot be suspect of “distancing herself” from Obama. Well we have news for Joan Walsh: once Hillary Clinton gets the nomination the blood of Obama supporters will flow, like excrement from Chris Matthews, through the halls of party headquarters.
No thanks Joan Walsh. Hillary Clinton has her own coalition. Hillary Clinton does not need Obama supporters to win the presidency. Hillary’s best bet is to gull the fools that voted for Obama during the nomination then chop heads once she has control of the party. Walsh like her fellow DailyKooks wants Hillary to destroy herself to save Obama:
“But Clinton can’t just begin to make this case in 2015 or 2016; she needs to be part of a Democratic team making the 2014 midterms a referendum on the uncompleted business of the Obama presidency – and on the GOP’s outrageous abuse of its minority status to block everything from popular legislation to agency nominations to thwart this Democratic president, the last one, and likely the next. If voting patterns follow the modern electoral norm, 2014 turnout will resemble 2010 turnout, not the Democratic waves of 2008 and 2012, and result in more power for the obstructionist GOP in the House and Senate.
Clinton has enormous political capital with the Democratic base, and beyond it. She needs to spend some of it turning out voters in 2014, or the presidency might not be a prize worth winning, except as another title in your Twitter bio.”
Joan Walsh must think that ObamaCare is popular. Joan Walsh must think that Obama is proposing “popular legislation”. Joan Walsh needs to get her head out of Obama’s rear end and see the light. Reading the latest polls might be a good idea for Joan.
The truth is that Joan Walsh knows what she suggests is crap. Walsh wants Hillary Clinton to campaign to save Obama’s presidency in 2014 because Walsh knows Obama is not popular and that Obama can campaign all he wants, like he did in 2010, but that he will lose.
Why should Hillary Clinton destroy herself to help Obama? Hillary has her own problems to take care of.
“A State Department whistleblower has accused high-ranking staff of a massive coverup — including keeping a lid on findings that members of then-Secretary Hillary Clinton’s security detail and the Belgian ambassador solicited prostitutes.
A chief investigator for the agency’s inspector general wrote a memo outlining eight cases that were derailed by senior officials, including one instance of interference by Clinton’s chief of staff, Cheryl Mills.
Any mention of the cases was removed from an IG report about problems within the Bureau of Diplomatic Security (DS), which provides protection and investigates crimes involving any State Department workers overseas.”
“US Ambassador to Belgium Howard Gutman, with his wife in Brussels, was investigated over claims he solicited prostitutes.
“It’s a coverup,” declared Cary Schulman, a lawyer representing the whistleblower, former State Department IG senior investigator Aurelia Fedenisn.“The whole agency is impaired.
“Undue influence . . . is coming from political appointees. It’s coming from above the criminal- investigation unit,” added Schulman, whose client provided the document with the revelations.
Some of the revelations were first reported by CBS News.
Among the bombshell findings:
* A DS agent was called off a case against US Ambassador to Belgium Howard Gutman over claims that he solicited prostitutes, including minors.
“The agent began his investigation and had determined that the ambassador routinely ditched his protective security detail in order to solicit sexual favors from both prostitutes and minor children,” says the memo.
“The ambassador’s protective detail and the embassy’s surveillance detection team . . . were well aware of the behavior.”
Undersecretary of State for Management Patrick Kennedy ordered the investigation ceased, and the ambassador remains in place, according to the memo.
Gutman was a big Democratic donor before taking the post, having raised $500,000 for President Obama’s 2008 campaign and helping finance his inaugural.
* At least seven agents in Clinton’s security detail hired prostitutes while traveling with her in various countries, including Russia and Colombia.
Investigators called the use of prostitutes by Clinton’s security agents “endemic.”
Some of the agents cavorted with the prostitutes in the same hotel that Hillary Clinton stayed at. These agents were slapped on the wrist and nothing more. The investigation further revealed that the Special Investigations Division (SID) shut down the, um, probes.
“The incident in Colombia occurred prior to the scandal involving President Obama’s Secret Service detail in Cartagena, Colombia, but the State Department’s misconduct did not come to light until now.
The memo references a “rumor” that after the Secret Service hooker scandal broke, Clinton asked the agent-in-charge of her security detail whether any “similar activities” had happened. “The response was: ‘No,’ ” according to the memo.
In the coverups and shut down, um, probes, the subjects of the investigation are “Obama people”. One is Brett McGurk, an aborted Obama nominee who had to withdraw his name from nomination due to extramarital affairs with a reporter and other reasons. The other is the disgusting Howard Gutman who attacked Sarah Palin in 2008 regarding her “parenting skills.” Gutman is an Obama bundler who raised $500,000 for Obama in 2008.
Hillary will be able to make the strong case that she inquired and was either lied to or misled. Hillary can cite the very memorandum the New York Post and CBS News rely on for their reports. But this does not mean that Hillary is in the clear.
As much as it will be a temptation for Hillary supporters to shout “look, a squirrel” and allege that this State Department scandal, and it is a scandal, is a squirrel set free by Barack Obama in order to distract from his troubles it is a squirrel that won’t hunt. Hillary needs to deal with this.
First, Hillary has to check with herself to see if she is too loyal to those that work for her. We’re not saying Cheryl Mills should be thrown under the bus but at some point Hillary has to clear up exactly what happened here.
The biggest danger for Hillary Clinton however is the case that can be made that she did not run the State Department well. In light of all the Obama scandals that will not go away - this allegation is a mortal threat to her.
Hillary Clinton did not have the authority to give a “stand down” order in regards to Benghazi. Hillary Clinton did not have the authority to arrest a video producer in California. We still do not know what happened in Benghazi. Someone(s) in the White House knows what happened in Benghazi and who did what to whom.
Benghazi is an Obama scandal and Hillary should assist Congress as much as possible. A few leaks from HillaryLand should be sprinkled over the next few months, and especially in September when Congress comes back from recess. We also would not mind if hearings on Benghazi took place during next year’s election campaigns.
The most important lesson for everyone is that we are in Borgia Italy not 21st century America. That means, Hillary, that you should watch your back. There are knives behind those tapestries.
Update: MoonOnPluto in our comments section reports from Turkey. In one of his earlier comments MoonOnPluto writes:
“its becoming increasingly hard to communicate by internet here…..The state is being clever…they have not turned off the internet, they have slowed it to such a crawl that it has barely able to post (that way they can say they did not turn it off), you cannot watch videos, streaming is impossible…Facebook and Twitter is all but impossible in the cities of Istanbul and Ankara, it has I have been informed been turned off completely in the taksim area of istanbul and other likely protest areas (which i must add is home to all the major foreign hotels like Hilton, Marriot, Intercontinental). Hotels i believe have been told at present once those rooms empty near Gezi, not to relet them until authorised by the Govt. I am barely online here in SW Turkey, hence you understand how hard it is to get news to you. I am worried because some of the sources i have heard from have suddenly gone silent on FB. One friend in particular has not been heard from since Monday and she was posting regularly.
There is only one station here brave enough to show whats going on and that is a station called HALK TV, it seems to be the only one not controlled by the authorities. There have been various fake protestors infilitrated to create trouble.”
There’s more at that comment to read and more on the developments in Turkey from MoonOnPluto. Some of the people of Turkey are fighting their government to recapture and retain their dwindling liberties.
Er, sure, let’s prosecute reporters for all of the leaks they publish. Except for the ones we want published, though … right? Both ends of Pennsylvania Avenue leak information to reporters (and bloggers, for that matter) all the time. Most of it isn’t classified, but it if it wasn’t at least sensitive, it wouldn’t need to be leaked. It would end up in a press release that few bother to read at all.
We now know what part of the divide, which we write about below, Peter King falls into.
At this hour, on multiple battlefronts, what is at stake is government of the people, by the people and for the people. How we divide on the essential question of the day mostly scrambles the party line divisions. The side which prevails will determine if we remain a defiant and free people or if we surrender our liberties.
We are either going to fight back against the national security state which tramples on the Bill of Rights or we will see the democratic twilight’s last gleaming.
* * * * * *
We’ve been watching as Barack Obama supporters stay true to their Stalinist roots and applaud positions they used to denounce under a different president and a different candidate for the nomination. The cult of personality is strong with that cohort.
We’re also watching as Republicans/conservatives who should have learned after these past few years to distrust the national security state revert to form and denounce the information providers and applaud overwhelming government power. The very same people who have watched Barack Obama subvert the First Amendment, the Second Amendment, the Fourth Amendment, the Tenth Amendment, then hide behind the Fifth Amendment now turn their back on the God given majesty of the individual American into whose home the king may not enter without force of constitutional law.
Barack Obama’s cult of personality is gleeful today citing the latest PEW poll in which a majority of Americans support the NSA programs if they help catch terrorists. Benjamin Franklin, can you hear us now? To their everlasting shame, it is Obama Dimocrats who bring about those majority results by completely changing their opposition to such oppression under George W. Bush to support for these obaminations under their cult of personality leader.
“The American Civil Liberties Union on Tuesday filed a lawsuit against the Obama administration over its “dragnet” collection of logs of domestic phone calls, contending that the once-secret program — whose existence was exposed by a former National Security Agency contractor last week — is illegal and asking a judge to both stop it and order the records purged. [snip]
The program “gives the government a comprehensive record of our associations and public movements, revealing a wealth of detail about our familial, political, professional, religious and intimate associations,” the complaint says, adding that it “is likely to have a chilling effect on whistle-blowers and others who would otherwise contact” the A.C.L.U. for legal assistance. [snip]
The program “gives the government a comprehensive record of our associations and public movements, revealing a wealth of detail about our familial, political, professional, religious and intimate associations,” the complaint says, adding that it “is likely to have a chilling effect on whistle-blowers and others who would otherwise contact” the A.C.L.U. for legal assistance. [snip]
The government has now declassified the existence of the program on domestic call record “metadata.” And the A.C.L.U. itself is a customer of Verizon Business Network Services — the subsidiary of Verizon Communications that was the recipient of a leaked secret court order for all its domestic calling records — which it says gives it direct standing to bring the lawsuit.
We’ll stand with the ACLU on this one. While we understand that some, such as John McCain, are honorable in their beliefs that the war on terrorism requires what George W. Bush did and what hypocrite Barack H. Obama is doing much worse, we believe that our side of the divide is the correct side to be in. We too want to oppose terrorism and fight the terrorists but we will not support a destruction of our rights for a false security.
“Such methods are in demand. But you can’t just listen to the phone call in Russia; you need a special order from court. This is how this should be done in civilized society while tackling terrorism with the use of any technical means. If it is in the framework of the law, then it’s ok. If not it is unacceptable,” Putin said answering the question of RT’s Editor-in-Chief Margarita Simonyan. Commenting on Obama’s statement that “You can’t have 100 per cent security and 100 per cent privacy,” Putin disagreed, saying it is possible if done within the law.
We have fallen far when the Russian President lectures an American President about the rule of law; the Russian President sounds more like Benjamin Franklin and the American President sounds more like Stalin.
The war on terrorism must be fought by fighting the terrorists not violating the rights of American citizens. The politically correct will have the government search everyone instead of targeting those whose profiles fit terrorist profiles. To fight the war on terror do not infringe on the rights of Americans. Instead search those who are likely to commit terrorism. Stop subverting the rights of Americans and start killing Muslim killers. Do not target Methodist grandmas, target young male Muslims whose license plates are “terrorista #1″ and Muslim men in the American military who shout paeans to Allah while killing Americans in Fort Hood.
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In order to escape the Hydra head of scandals that are slowly turning him into stone, Barack Obama will fly to Berlin, Germany next week. Barack Obama thought he could go back to Berlin and bathe once again in adulation instead of hecklers. But now this might all go badly.
European leaders are horrified at what has been revealed. If German citizens decide to protest against Barack Obama at the Brandenburg Gate our humiliation will be complete. First a Russian President lectures a corrupt American President. Then possibly German citizens protesting what American citizens should be protesting. Americans should be at the barricades hanging from lampposts the priests of the Cult of Obama who dare to sacrifice our Bill of Rights for a false security god.
At the beginning of this year we published a series of articles under the title “Unravel”. Our Unravel #4 was Egypt – Why Won’t Obama Demand Morsi Resign? We now ask the same question about Turkish Islamist dictator wannabee Tayyip Erdogan.
Turkish citizens are fighting against Erdogan in the streets.
“Hi…Yes I am still in Turkey until Sunday, I am currently in the south western tip, there are still regular protests but what is going on in the big cities is nothing short of state sponsored terror and violence and flagrant intimidation, abuse and assault against peaceful protestors.
they need help and support and the turkish media is doing its best to ignore it under fear from the ruling party…this is not a democratic country anymore like it was under Ataturk ideals.”
Turkey’s citizens are fighting for their freedom. American citizens make excuses to surrender ours.
”Dear friends, currently the mainstream global media is keeping an eye on Taksim, Istanbul. Thus, the police forces have backed off and they have remarkably scaled down the number of attacks against the protesters. However, in the meantime the police terror in Ankara as it is now is on a much larger scale compared to the very beginning of Istanbul attacks. Tear gas is relentlessly being thrown inside apartments, people are suppressed by plastic bullets, illegal custody and physical assault. Things have escalated quickly and the scale of these attacks are rapidly increasing. We need to make benefit of social media once again to show the world what’s going on in Ankara right now. Here is a message from the people of Ankara: ”We have supported the protesters of Istanbul from the beginning, and now it is your turn to support us and the rest of Turkey. This resistance is clearly not limited to Istanbul, it has taken over all of the country. The festive atmosphere in Istanbul is just a trick to fool global media and soothe off the masses, yet nothing has been accomplished yet and things have just started actually.”
Today the government began its assault on Takim Square. Turkish citizens are resisting. In America the government continues its assault on individual rights and Obama supporters and others applaud.
Everyday the American people witness new scandals and abuses. Yesterday two new ones reared up. The IRS attack on political opponents using the full power of the state continues and Obama apologists continue to deny to themselves that something very wrong has happened to their hope and change.
The Department of Justice too continues its assaults against the Constitution. Excuses are made by Obama apologists here too.
The Benghazi scandal still remains without answers because the government cover up continues. American citizens sit back and watch their TV entertainments as Obama and others continue to lie to them.
For all that is wrong we do not counsel despair. We side with those that will fight for a new birth of freedom. These scandal floods are rousing the American people like a splash of cold water on a napping millennial. Historically the American giant slumbers and is slow to awaken but when the eyes open and the body rises, tyrants fall.
Update: There are some who question our contention that Snowden should have released his information to the American voter before the 2012 election. We respond in this comment HERE and in subsequent remarks in the comments section of this article.
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We are really tired and disgusted with the “look! a squirrel” crowd. This morning (at 3:11 a.m.) Mickey Kaus shouted “look! a squirrel” and proved how stupid this “squirrel” stupidity is.
Kaus wrote “the NSA Squirrel” to argue that this latest Obama scandal NSA version is a distraction concocted by the White House to sneak through immigration reform. An astute comment to the Kaus “squirrel” foolishness deserves attention and publishing every time someone shouts “Look! a squirrel”:
“Exactly. Mickey’s concern is the immigration bill, so the NSA scandal seems like a distraction, and so it looks like it may have been exposed as a distraction. Similarly, some people who think Benghazi is the biggest scandal think the NSA and IRS scandals are happening to distract people from Benghazi.
But containing a wildfire with a backfire makes no sense if the backfire is bigger than the wildfire and burns out of control. Many people are willing to see Benghazi as just a tragic but distant screwup, but everybody deals with the IRS and expects it to be apolitical, and everybody resents being snooped on by the NSA. Sure, the NSA scandal takes the focus off the immigration bill, but the cumulative weight of these scandals makes the administration look some combination of incompetent and evil, which lessens support for anything the administration wants.”
That is exactly correct. We also applaud the writer for recognizing that you can be “incompetent and evil” at the same time. That’s why we call Barack Obama a “treacherous Boob“. We recognize that “Obama cannot be trusted” but that also Obama is a clown constantly stepping on his big feet, or over his Dumbo sized floppy ears. Barack Obama is a treacherous Boob and these Hydra scandals are not “squirrels”.
The utter stupidity of the “squirrel” hunters generally and Kaus when he is squirrel hunting in particular came late today as the “leaker” of the NSA scandal uncloaked himself in an interview with Glenn Greenwald and Laura Poitras.
The NSA leaker is Edward Snowden and this is not an Obama “squirrel” operation. No doubt certain “squirrel” hunters will now say this is truly a super secret cover operation, an even more super clever Obama “uber-squirrel” three dimensional chess operation, and somehow link Hong Kong to this new brilliant Barack Obama genius ploy. Sorry we ain’t buying that sack of nuts to feed to the squirrels we see in the park.
“Edward Snowden: I mistakenly believed in Obama’s promises
Edward Snowden, the self-revealed whistle-blower at the National Security Agency, explains that part of the reason he decided to come forward was because President Obama did not roll back the surveillance measures put into place by the Bush Administration.
“A lot of people in 2008 voted for Obama. I did not vote for him. I voted for a third party,” Snowden said in an interview with the Guardian. “But I believed in Obama’s promises. I was going to disclose it [but waited because of his election]. He continued with the policies of his predecessor.”
Snowden acknowledged that he watched Obama struggle as he attempted to justify the surveillance programs during his press conference on Friday.
“My immediate reaction was he was having difficulty in defending it himself,” Snowden said about Obama. “He was trying to defend the unjustifiable and he knew it.”
Snowden referred to a “grassroots movement” planning to take to the streets on July 4 in defense of the Fourth Amendment. The movement is called “Restore The Fourth Amendment,” and grew out of the Reddit community.
“I have been surprised and pleased to see the public has reacted so strongly in defence of these rights that are being suppressed in the name of security,” Snowden said in the interview.”
Follow our thinking while we explain why we are pleased Snowden released the information he gave to the Guardian but Snowden is NOT A HERO.
Snowden contributed and voted for Ron Paul for president. That Reddit “community” is chock full of nuts in love with Barack Obama and the Occupy Wall Street loons. That’s all fine. We believe in broad coalitions on issues like this and we encourage a strong response against what the American government is up to in this PRISM corruption. Indeed we previously wrote:
“On civil liberties, freedom, liberty, and the Constitution things just got a whole lot worse. The latest scandals are dangerous and worthy of revolutionary uprising.”
We get it. Snowden did good when he released this type of information. We also appreciate that he understands that the hammer is going to come down on his head and he is willing to pay the price for his act of civil disobedience. We worry for the family and friends he cares about but that through his actions he has exposed to danger.
We get it. But Snowden must be condemned for the most disgusting quote of the many disgusting quotes of the day which include those from Obama supporters who now defend Obama even as they condemned George W. Bush for doing less of the same types of outrages.
“I think I have just read about the man for which I have waited.Earmarks of a real hero. guardian.co.uk/world/2013/jun…
— Glenn Beck (@glennbeck) June 9, 2013
I was just with Dan Ellsberg as he learned out about Edward Snowden. He called Snowden a hero, said he’s been waiting for him for 40 years.
— Trevor Timm (@trevortimm) June 9, 2013
“When you’re in positions of privileged access like a systems administrator for the sort of intelligence community agencies, you’re exposed to a lot more information on a broader scale then the average employee and because of that you see things that may be disturbing but over the course of a normal person’s career you’d only see one or two of these instances. When you see everything you see them on a more frequent basis and you recognize that some of these things are actually abuses. And when you talk to people about them in a place like this where this is the normal state of business people tend not to take them very seriously and move on from them.”
“But over time that awareness of wrongdoing sort of builds up and you feel compelled to talk about. And the more you talk about the more you’re ignored. The more you’re told its not a problem until eventually you realize that these things need to be determined by the public and not by somebody who was simply hired by the government.“
Daniel Ellsberg when he released the Pentagon Papers to the New York Times stated that there is a mindset in elite institutions dealing with intelligence matters that they know more than the general public and are wiser than the general public. Ellsberg stated that at some point however he realized this elitism was wrong and that the public needed to know what was happening. Ellsberg quoted the great Declaration as his motivation, let Facts be submitted to a candid world.
So we find ourselves today, applauding Snowden for releasing the PRISM information but angry at him for his elite world view. Snowden could have released all his information in 2012 during the election and had the public discussion he now says he wants. But he sought to protect Barack Obama first.
Snowden held back the truth because he thought he knew better than the American people. We doubt that he withheld this information in order to see if Mitt Romney would win. Snowden chose to protect Barack Obama instead of telling the American people the truth at a time when it would have mattered. We’ve seen this Obama protection from many before Snowden.
We do not think he is a hero. Snowden should have revealed this information in 2012 after the conventions so that the voters could pass judgment on these abuses of constitutional government
But Snowden protected Obama over his own principles. We applaud what Snowden did but we condemn him for protecting Barack Obama instead of providing the truth to American voters.
As much as we are pleased that this hideous governmental overreach has been exposed by Snowden we condemn him for putting his judgment over the American voter. And by the way if he “believed” Barack Obama as he states, he is not the brightest bulb in the chandelier.
The squirrel hunters are not the brightest either. All the scandals matter and all the scandals must be investigated and prosecuted.
Update II: Is this the music for Obama Dimocrats PRISM spy scandal? It certainly fits lovelorn Big Media as it sings to the object of adulation – Barack:
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Update: In California today the Peking Duck is meeting with the Lame Duck on of all things “cyber-security”. Maybe China will fight for our freedoms? But forget the ducks. We want to know what came first in this chicken or the egg story:
“The President has put in place an organization with the kind of database that no one has ever seen before in life,” Representative Maxine Waters told Roland Martin on Monday. “That’s going to be very, very powerful,” Waters said. “That database will have information about everything on every individual on ways that it’s never been done before and whoever runs for President on the Democratic ticket has to deal with that. They’re going to go down with that database and the concerns of those people because they can’t get around it. And he’s [President Obama] been very smart. It’s very powerful what he’s leaving in place.”
Did the NSA in any way help Obama CREEP in 2012? What did Google know and when did Google know it? The denials from internet companies and the Obama government are increasingly revealed as lies if we are to believe the latest report from Britain’s The Guardian: PRISM “collection directly from the servers”. What did Obama and his allies at Google know and when did he and they know it? Inquiring minds want to know.
On November 13, 2008 we wrote the article that can be found at the top of the left hand column of this website. That November 13, 2008 article is titled Obama Is The Third Bush Term. Our critique in that article included Obama’s promise to oppose FISA (indeed Obama promised to lead a filibuster against FISA) legislation during the presidential campaign but once the nomination was assured Obama voted FOR FISA.
We followed that Obama Is The Third Bush Term article with one titled Obama Is The Third Bush Term, Part II Guantanamo. We wrote, “The third George W. Bush term – starring Barack W. Obama – will be just as exciting, more corrupt, inept, dangerous and debilitating.” We pointed out Obama’s history of lies on this issue and that no facts or political realities had changed once he became president. Obama flim flammed on this issue and the corrupt left and the corrupt Dimocratic Party went along with the lies.
“It is well past time for Republicans to recognize how they hurt the country when they abandoned their alleged principles with unwavering support of irresponsible, if not criminal, George W. Bush policies and begin to intelligently oppose Barack Obama.
Democrats, Dimocrats, and Republican must realize the essential facts about Obama: (1) Obama is a flim-flam man; (2) Obama is a confidence artist who only cares about his advancement; (3) Obama race-baited his way, with help from powerful Dimocrats like Dean/Brazile/Pelosi/Kennedy/Kerry to the Democratic nomination; (4) It was only disgust with George W. Bush and the massive economic crisis during the last month of the election that allowed Obama to overcome John McCain’s lead; (5) Obama employs distraction as a key weapon to forswear responsibility; (6) Obama never takes responsiblity. Further, Democrats, Dimocrats, and Republicans must realize that
Obama simply cannot be trusted. Obama cannot be trusted on any issue. Obama cannot be trusted by his friends. Obama cannot be trusted by his enemies. Obama cannot be trusted.
We were able to write what was apparent to anyone not willfully shutting their eyes because we stuck to our principles, not our party in 2008. If America is to survive Barack H. Obama it will do so only if principled Independents, principled Republicans and the few remaining principled Democrats and Dimocrats unite to oppose Barack H. Obama and drive him and his Chicago hoods from office.
It won’t be easy to stick to principles. We know. We’ve lost a lot of friends and a lot of opportunities for speaking out and opposing Barack Obama.
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In January 2009 we posted five pictures of Obama morphing into George W. Bush on the lower right column of this website. Some of our commenters protested and asked we take the pictures down. Other commenters voted to keep the pictures up. The protests were mostly for esthetic reasons. Most of our commenters understood that Obama flim flammed and lied and that he was Bush without the decency.
“In stark legal turnaround, Obama now resembles Bush
WASHINGTON — President Barack Obama is morphing into George W. Bush, as administration attorneys repeatedly adopt the executive-authority and national-security rationales that their Republican predecessors preferred.
In courtroom battles and freedom-of-information fights from Washington, D.C., to California, Obama’s legal arguments repeatedly mirror Bush’s: White House turf is to be protected, secrets must be retained and dire warnings are wielded as weapons.
“It’s putting up a veritable wall around the White House, and it’s so at odds with Obama’s campaign commitment to more open government,” said Anne Weismann, chief counsel for Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, a legal watchdog group.”
Of course we now realize our morph pictures and “Obama is the third Bush term” messaging is unfair – to George W. Bush. As detestable as we at the time found George W. Bush to be we have to admit there was a degree of integrity and honesty to what he said that is entirely missing in anything Barack Obama says/reads/writes.
George W. Bush took responsibility and called himself the “decider” whereas Barack Obama seeks to blame someone (often George W. Bush) else or as on his recent drone speech pretends he is not in charge. Obama’s “this is not who we are” platitudes on drones or forced feedings are substitutes for not stopping policies which he has the authority to stop.
“The gist of the defense was that, in contrast to what took place under the Bush Administration, this form of secret domestic surveillance was legitimate because Congress had authorized it, and the judicial branch had ratified it, and the actual words spoken by one American to another were still private. So how bad could it be?
The answer, according to the mathematician and former Sun Microsystems engineer Susan Landau, whom I interviewed while reporting on the plight of the former N.S.A. whistleblower Thomas Drake and who is also the author of “Surveillance or Security?,” is that it’s worse than many might think.
“The public doesn’t understand,” she told me, speaking about so-called metadata. “It’s much more intrusive than content.” She explained that the government can learn immense amounts of proprietary information by studying “who you call, and who they call. If you can track that, you know exactly what is happening—you don’t need the content.”
For example, she said, in the world of business, a pattern of phone calls from key executives can reveal impending corporate takeovers. Personal phone calls can also reveal sensitive medical information: “You can see a call to a gynecologist, and then a call to an oncologist, and then a call to close family members.” And information from cell-phone towers can reveal the caller’s location. Metadata, she pointed out, can be so revelatory about whom reporters talk to in order to get sensitive stories that it can make more traditional tools in leak investigations, like search warrants and subpoenas, look quaint. “You can see the sources,” she said. When the F.B.I. obtains such records from news agencies, the Attorney General is required to sign off on each invasion of privacy. When the N.S.A. sweeps up millions of records a minute, it’s unclear if any such brakes are applied.
Metadata, Landau noted, can also reveal sensitive political information, showing, for instance, if opposition leaders are meeting, who is involved, where they gather, and for how long. Such data can reveal, too, who is romantically involved with whom, by tracking the locations of cell phones at night. [snip]
Binney, who considered himself a conservative, feared that the N.S.A.’s data-mining program was so extensive that it could help “create an Orwellian state.”
As he told me at the time, wiretap surveillance requires trained human operators, but data mining is an automated process, which means that the entire country can be watched. Conceivably, the government could “monitor the Tea Party, or reporters, whatever group or organization you want to target,” he said. “It’s exactly what the Founding Fathers never wanted.”
“We have arrived at a defining moment for the progressive movement in this nation.
The New York Times editorial board, which has generally given this president a lot of leeway throughout his career, wrote a scathing denunciation Friday of the Obama administration’s use of data mining, claiming that “the administration has now lost all credibility” on the issue of balancing civil rights with national security.
Every progressive with even a shred of moral consistency should side with the New York Times against the White House.
The events of the past month – from the Associated Press subpoena to the James Rosen search warrant to the revelation that our government has been indiscriminately collecting phone records data – have forced liberals to make a choice between complacency and outrage, between keeping silent because one of our own is in the White House and calling him out on betraying the principles for which we have fought for so long.
Consistency has never been the fiber of political discourse but it is nonetheless a vital ingredient of credibility.
Progressives rightly denounced the overreach of the Bush administration when it came to abuses of the Patriot Act. We should just as strongly denounce the expansion of those abuses by this administration.
Many of us did not buy the previous administration’s excuse that overreaching infringement upon the civil rights of ordinary Americans was a necessary step in keeping those same ordinary Americans safe. We should not buy it from this administration now, simply because this president is ostensibly one of us. [snip]
Progressives should stand with the Times on this. Otherwise, we are just rooting for the name on the jersey, and not for the values that the jersey represents.”
That “denunciation” is so weak we can barely rouse a yawn. The “progressives”, which we once fancied ourselves to belong to, had their test in 2007/2008 and failed. There’s not much value in these diluted protests even though Barack Obama cannot be happy to see these clowns pouting and weeping.
For those that think we are looking a gift horse in the mouth consider this:
“The National Security Agency pushed for the government to “rethink” the Fourth Amendment when it argued in a classified memo that it needed new authorities and capabilities for the information age.
The 2001 memo, later declassified and posted online by George Washington University’s National Security Archive, makes a case to the incoming George W. Bush administration that the NSA needs new authorities and technology to adapt to the Internet era. [snip]
Americans learned about one upshot of NSA’s philosophy this week when Washington acknowledged two of its subsequent surveillance programs: One that tracks the phone records of millions of Americans and one that accesses the servers of several major Internet companies, including Facebook, Google and Apple. The revelations were first reported by Britain’s Guardian newspaper and the Washington Post. [snip]
NSA’s phone-tracking program and its PRISM Internet monitoring program both suggest U.S. officials continue to take to heart NSA’s “rethought” interpretation of the Fourth Amendment. Rather than tracking only Americans suspected of crimes or involved with terrorism, since 2006 NSA has collected the records of everyone, then returned to a secret federal court to get authorization to target specific individuals more closely.
President Barack Obama defended the surveillance on Friday on his visit to California to meet with Chinese President Xi Jinping.”
Barack Obama and his gang of Chicago hoods have attacked the First Amendment, the Second Amendment, the Fourth Amendment, the Tenth Amendment and hidden behind the Fifth Amendment.
“The National Security Agency and the FBI are tapping directly into the central servers of nine leading U.S. Internet companies, extracting audio and video chats, photographs, e-mails, documents, and connection logs that enable analysts to track foreign targets, according to a top-secret document obtained by The Washington Post.
The program, code-named PRISM, has not been made public until now. It may be the first of its kind. [snip]
PRISM was launched from the ashes of President George W. Bush’s secret program of warrantless domestic surveillance in 2007, after news media disclosures, lawsuits and the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court forced the president to look for new authority.
Congress obliged with the Protect America Act in 2007 and the FISA Amendments Act of 2008, which immunized private companies that cooperated voluntarily with U.S. intelligence collection. PRISM recruited its first partner, Microsoft, and began six years of rapidly growing data collection beneath the surface of a roiling national debate on surveillance and privacy. Late last year, when critics in Congress sought changes in the FISA Amendments Act, the only lawmakers who knew about PRISM were bound by oaths of office to hold their tongues. [snip]
Firsthand experience with these systems, and horror at their capabilities, is what drove a career intelligence officer to provide PowerPoint slides about PRISM and supporting materials to The Washington Post in order to expose what he believes to be a gross intrusion on privacy. “They quite literally can watch your ideas form as you type,” the officer said.”
What we have learned recently is that the IRS cannot be trusted. Not only did the IRS target political viewpoints for abuse, the IRS also provided names of donors to political organizations to the opponents of those organizations. Now we are told to trust the NSA.
This is not time to trust and verify. It is time to investigate and impeach. These recently uncovered Obama scandals (none by American Big Media) are a signal of the deep corruption that has moved from Chicago to the nation’s capital.
Our Big Pink memo to Bill Clinton: “you better get a clue.” Barack Obama is campaigning with the only Republican that polls say has a shot against Hillary Clinton 2016 (Gallup: America’s got a fee-vah and the only prescription is more Chris Christie) and Samantha Power who called Hillary a “monster” is getting a big job along with a bigger job for Hillary hater Susan Rice and you won’t speak out against the threat to America and the world represented by Barack Obama? Get a clue Bill.
“Behind the Rise in House Prices, Wall Street Buyers
The last time the housing market was this hot in Phoenix and Las Vegas, the buyers pushing up prices were mostly small time. Nowadays, they are big time — Wall Street big.
Large investment firms have spent billions of dollars over the last year buying homes in some of the nation’s most depressed markets. The influx has been so great, and the resulting price gains so big, that ordinary buyers are feeling squeezed out. Some are already wondering if prices will slump anew if the big money stops flowing.
“The growth is being propelled by institutional money,” said Suzanne Mistretta, an analyst at Fitch Ratings. “The question is how much the change in prices really reflects market demand, rather than one-off market shifts that may not be around in a couple years.”
Wall Street played a central role in the last housing boom by supplying easy — and, in retrospect, risky — mortgage financing. Now, investment companies like the Blackstone Group have swooped in, buying thousands of houses in the same areas where the financial crisis hit hardest. [snip]
Those gains, in turn, have been at the leading edge of rising home prices nationwide. [snip]
Investment companies are buying up rundown homes at a time when ordinary people can’t or won’t. [snip]
That is helping to shore up prices and create confidence in the broader markets.
“When people write the story of this housing recovery, these investors will be seen to have helped put the floor under the housing market,” said David Bragg, an analyst at Green Street Advisors. “In some of the key markets, that contributed to the recovery.” [snip]
“The thing that scares me is the values going up so quickly,” said Mr. Cusumano. “That’s what happened before and that’s what’s scaring me. Is this going to happen again?” [snip]
In a sign of the potential peril ahead, some of the investment firms have recently taken the first steps to cash out.”
It’s a pump and dump. It’s pump, dump, slump. The Federal Reserve is pumping up the stock market and investment firms are pumping up the housing market. It is all a fake. The suckers are coming in and the big money is getting out. The big money will do well, the suckers… chumps.
The rise in home prices and real estate generally has been hyped as the great indicator of the recovered Obama economy. But it’s just a gilded invitation to a Red Wedding:
“Report: US hasn’t seen expected ‘Great Recovery’
The expected U.S. “Great Recovery” hasn’t materialized and the economy has fallen short of even normal growth, according to a forecast released Wednesday.
The second-quarter UCLA Anderson Forecast said the growth of real gross domestic product – meaning the inflation-adjusted value of goods and services produced – is too small to help the nation climb out of its slump.
The figure was 15.4 percent below a “normal” growth trend, forecast director Edward Leamer wrote.
“To get back to that 3 percent trend, we would need 4 percent growth for 15 years, or 5 percent growth for eight years, or 6 percent growth for five years, not the disappointing twos and threes we have been racking up recently,” he said.
“It’s not a recovery. It’s not even normal growth. It’s bad,” he wrote.”
It’s Borgia Italy. According to the report, “The figures will get a boost from a recovering housing market….” What “recovering housing market”?
“Unemployment should fall to 6.9 percent next year and 6.6 percent by 2015, according to the forecast – partly due, however, to discouraged workers dropping out of the labor force.
Leamer said that while jobs are being created, “the tepid growth continues to obscure the nation’s most fundamental problems: too much government spending funded with too much borrowing, too little national savings to cover late-in-life health care issues and too many workers lacking the skills to compete in the modern economy,” according to a University of California, Los Angeles press statement.
In addition, the jobs being created may not provide workers with a secure future and the education system is failing to provide skills such as analytical thinking that will be crucial for future workers, he wrote.”
It’s Borgia Italy. It’s America in Barack World. It’s the Age Of Fake. This past Saturday we were treated with a full Borgia Italy story:
“Obama was pushed by Clintons into endorsement of Hillary in 2016: book
President Obama made a secret deal to support Hillary Clinton when she runs for president in 2016, campaign sources say, payback for the support her husband gave him in 2012.
Bill Clinton’s animosity toward Obama is legendary. A year before the last election, he was urging Hillary to challenge the sitting president for the nomination — a move she rejected.
According to two people who attended that meeting in Chappaqua, Bill Clinton then went on a rant against Obama.”
Our regular long time readers will recall the behind the tapestry Borgia Italy machinations and long knives which we wrote about as they happened. The worry was such in the Obama CREEP that they began to run ads in late 2011 in order to pump up Obama’s poll numbers and prevent a Hillary challenge. This is some of what we wrote in June 2011:
“When we talk about “save the world” it is in the sense that someone has to be around to talk sense when American ally Mubarak is flung out and a wide open invitation to the Muslim Brotherhood is issued by Obama.
The bus might blow up this September and someone must be there to prevent treachery and boobery from killing us all. But at the same time, the bus must be stopped and there is only one person who can stop it and not blow it up too.
* * * * * *
Every American should be agitated by the prospect of no Hillary to block or inside-organize against Barack Obama, particularly as September approaches. Hillary Clinton will be indispensable this September when at the United Nations plots to destroy Israel will rise once more and there must be someone genuinely committed to the security of Israel.”
Susan Rice was at the U.N. doing Barack Obama’s bidding in 2011. It was urgent to get rid of Obama. We were able to explain only partially in that article what was going on behind the scenes even as Bill Clinton kept up his attacks on Barack Obama.
“By summer we were led to understand something was going to happen in September that might cause a change in the line of succession in the United States. Originally Barack Obama was set to stab Israel in the back at the United Nations and that Obama treachery would have had domestic consequences and a possible resignation. But that treachery was averted by Palestinian bumbling and miscalculations at the U.N. and a smart Hillary Clinton.
Something else, something much more important, then happened on September 13. As we tried to piece together the information we received piecemeal, in order to finish our promised articles, more information came into our possession.
The information we received was that votes were being taken at labor union executive meetings asking about Barack Obama. What we were told, from long time reliable friends and sources, was that certain U.S. Senators and Democrats were requesting union locals to survey their boards on the question of whether Barack Obama deserved reelection. What was odd was that the unions were asked to tape record the responses and provide them to these senators.
The responses were not what our sources expected. What we were told happened at these private executive board meetings was a wave of yelled anger against Barack Obama. The board members who did the most yelling and expressed the most anger were black women and black men members of the various executive committees.
As we called other sources to ask about the meaning of these votes, to be tape recorded, we were asked to let things play out and not expose these votes. We complied with these requests so that the meetings could proceed without interruption. We complied because there were other activities and non-activities which persuaded us that was the right course to take.”
On September 13, 2011 the victory by Republican Bob Turner in the race for the district formerly represented by Anthony Weiner forced Barack Obama’s hand at the United Nations. The fear was that in a district that should have been an easy win for an Obama Dimocrat the power player Obama Dimocrat lost and the big issue was Israel. The public calls by people like Schoen and Caddell for Hillary Clinton to challenge Barack Obama were doomed to go unanswered.
Barack Obama was worried about a potential Hillary Clinton challenge in 2012. We repeatedly wrote that Hillary would not openly stage a nomination fight. The fight was behind the scenes, behind tapestries, with long swords and short knives. After the potential coup was prevented in late 2011 Barack Obama thought he was through with the Clintons. But once again Obama was wrong:
“For his part, Obama wasn’t interested in Bill Clinton upstaging him during the presidential campaign. He resisted giving him any role at the convention.
But as last summer wore on, and Democrat enthusiasm waned, chief political strategist David Axelrod convinced the president that he needed Bill Clinton’s mojo.
A deal was struck: Clinton would give the key nominating speech at the convention, and a full-throated endorsement of Obama. In exchange, Obama would endorse Hillary Clinton as his successor.
Clinton’s speech was as promised; columnists pointed out the surprising enthusiasm in which he described the president. It also lived up to Obama’s fears, as more people talked about Clinton’s speech in the weeks following than his own.”
Again, we wrote about the lunge and parry of the Bill Clinton speech in North Carolina. Bill deliberately provoked Barack by demonstrating real oratorical skills he knew would overshadow Obama’s flaccid skills.
Bill Clinton also kept Barack Obama waiting in the back as Bill provided the full speech the Obama henchmen had earlier tried to shorten. Valerie Jarrett and Barack ‘I won’t be kept waiting’ fumed even as Barack had to force a smile – knowing full well that Bill knew that Barack knew that Bill knew that Barack knew that there was nothing Barack could do because he needed Bill more than Bill needed Barack.
There were other bits of fighting which we documented. On Bill Clinton speech night it was Monica Lewinsky’s Rabbi that spoke at the invitation of Obama’s convention planners. The night before the Bill Clinton speech a video of Ted Kennedy endorsing Obama over Hillary in 2008 was the main attraction. Bill Clinton’s closest aide, Doug Band, let it be known he was voting for Mitt Romney. Bill Clinton had some good things to say to Paul Ryan and Youtube was there. Bill Clinton also defending Mitt Romney on the most important line of attack, Bain Capital, launched by Obama’s thugs.
What was Bill Clinton up to? Charles Krauthammer called Bill Clinton “a double agent for the GOP”. Bill Clinton knew it was up to Mitt Romney to make the case and sadly it was increasingly clear that Mitt Romney might make a good president but his campaign skills were sub par along with his campaign.
Bill Clinton also knew he had to gull dimwitted Obama supporters away from their Hillary hate. Bill and HillaryLand knew that the Obama hierarchy of Hillary hate would not abide Hillary but the voters could be swayed. Bill swayed.
“But after his re-election, Obama began to have second thoughts. He would prefer to stay neutral in the next election, as is traditional of outgoing presidents.
Bill Clinton went ballistic and threatened retaliation. Obama backed down. He called his favorite journalist, Steve Kroft of “60 Minutes,” and offered an unprecedented “farewell interview” with departing Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.
The result was a slobbering televised love-in — and an embarrassment to all concerned.
It is just one of the debacles that have marked Obama’s second term, from Benghazi to the IRS scandal. While he was effective on the campaign trail, once in the Oval Office, he becomes a different person, one who derives no joy from the cut and thrust of day-to-day politics and who is inept in the arts of management and governance.
Obama has made a lot of promises — and nothing ever happened. [snip]
He may yet try to back out of his promise to Hillary Clinton. But as Obama’s presidency sinks deeper into scandal and inaction, the question is — will Clinton even still want his endorsement?“
Only Bill Clinton or Hillary Clinton can confirm or refute this “deal” report. Much of it jibes with what we have been told. Um, what, um, difference, um at this point, um does this make – to borrow the Hillary sentence that makes many see red?
If you think that we live in a 21st century democracy of the people, by the people, and for the people, we understand why you are outraged and will scream at the idea of a “deal”, especially one with such dastardly results.
For those whose political passports read “Borgia Italy” the anger is not as treasured as compared to what comes next. For Bill and Hillary Clinton we will continue to monitor their war against Barack Obama. As we have written:
“In 2016 the greatest threat to Hillary Clinton is once again Barack Obama – and his legacy of weakness and profligacy. Tie Hillary Clinton to Barack Obama and she loses.”
For the Democratic Party it is important to fumigate the Obama thugs from the party. The only way to do that is to give the Clintons control, have a bloodbath in the party, then proceed to accomplish things for the country in a healthy issues fight, not race-baiting, with the Republican Party.
Tom Donilon was a Hillary hater and an all around horror. Now, Donilon out, Rice to be new National Security Adviser. Susan Rice on Benghazi is nothing compared to the treachery against Israel that was planned for September 2011 by the same Susan Rice. Samantha Power to replace Rice at UN is the apex of treachery and horror:
“In 2002, Power told a Berkeley interviewer that she would advise a President to put together a “massive” Western military coalition to occupy Israel and the Palestinian territories in order to impose “a solution on unwilling parties.” On top of that, she told Harry Kreisler that this should be done even though it “might mean alienating a domestic constituency of tremendous political and financial import.” That would be the Jews in America, in case the subtlety didn’t come across:”
So, what is your “favorite” Barack Obama scandal? Don’t restrict yourself to just the latest Obama scandals. We still harken to Exelon and Obama days in Illinois and there’s always Antoin “Tony” Rezko. Go ahead. Pick a favorite. Don’t worry, you have time to decide as the Barack Obama scandals are not going away anytime soon.
The Barack Obama scandals had been scheduled by Big Media to expire this week, but alas alack, the death announcements were premature. If anything here we are at the end of May day and we feel we are on the off season train to Palm Beach with the Ale and Quail Club.
The Obama scandals were supposed to end this past week but instead at the very end of Friday we receive news guaranteed to breathe continued life into the Obama scandals for next week:
“The Internal Revenue Service (IRS) declined Friday afternoon to meet a Senate Finance Committee deadline for answering detailed questions about the origins of the IRS scandal. The questions had been submitted jointly nearly two weeks ago by Chairman Max Baucus (D-MT) and Ranking Member Orrin Hatch (R-UT). [snip]
Baucus and Hatch wanted to know who at the IRS made the decision to target conservative organizations, as well as who was aware of the conduct, and what specific actions they took to address it once they found it. They demanded that the IRS respond to each of the forty-one questions asked “no later than May 31, 2013.”
Does anyone think this is going to shut down the Barack Obama IRS scandal? At the end of next week, June 7, Benghazi answers are due from the State Department in response to a subpoena. Will the stonewall continue? The stonewall will only keep the story boiling hot.
“While the developing scandal over the targeting of conservatives by the tax agency has largely focused to date on its scrutiny of groups with words such as “tea party” or “patriot” in their names, these examples suggest the government was looking at a broader array of conservative groups and perhaps individuals. Their collective experiences at a minimum could spread skepticism about the fairness of a powerful agency that should be above reproach and at worst could point to a secret political vendetta within the government against conservatives.
The emerging stories from real people raise questions about whether the IRS scrutiny extended beyond applicants for tax-exempt status and whether individuals who donated to these tax-exempt organizations or to conservative causes also were targeted.
Former IRS leaders have apologized for inappropriate scrutiny of conservative organizations. They haven’t to date, however, divulged who developed the criteria, how they were developed or when and how they extended to groups associated with conservative causes that didn’t have “tea party,” “patriot” or similar catchwords in their names.
Widening congressional investigations and federal lawsuits are likely to reveal more about the scope and intent of the inappropriate treatment of conservative groups by the IRS. The House Ways and Means Committee plans a hearing Tuesday to allow victims to testify for the first time. In earlier hearings, one IRS official pleaded the Fifth to avoid answering questions.”
The stonewall won’t work. Maybe charm will work? This week corrupt Eric Holder gave whorehouse massages to Big Media and promised never to screw them again, promise. It was all a misunderstanding darlin’ I’ll never do that to you again. I’ll never beat you ever ever again. I was just angry and lost my temper and you know you deserved it anyway, right? Kiss me honey. Show me you love me even when I punch you in the face and brutally screw you.
“The first is that—unlike the IRS and Benghazi scandals—the facts of the DOJ’s press intrusions are clear and uncontested. We know Justice has seized records of reporters, that Attorney General Eric Holder himself signed onto a warrant that suggested a journalist was a “co-conspirator” in a national-security leak. We also know that government has violated its own guidelines on probing journalists.
So this is a scandal that can’t be ignored or dismissed as a Republican witch hunt. Moreover, it is a scandal that has, for once, outraged two groups that Mr. Obama deeply depends on for his political success: the press and liberal activists. [snip]
The White House’s evasiveness on the press scandal has suddenly got the press corps wondering what else this administration isn’t being straight on.
It has even led to the extraordinary sight of major media outlets this week banding together to boycott meetings planned by Eric Holder to discuss Justice’s press investigations. The organizations balked because the meetings would be off the record. Since the press is not known for resisting the spin of anonymous Obama officials, this reaction is progress.
Will it last?
Not it won’t last. The “probing” will continue and the press will adopt to the “probing”. Street whores are used to getting into novel and awkward positions when they are getting probed. No, it won’t last. But this does provide a chalk outline of the overall Obama strategy on the Obama scandals. Priority #1 is to get the press back on it’s side of the bed and into position for further probing:
“That’s why, of all the scandals, the White House is pouring the most effort into damage control on Justice.”
That’s the ticket. Get Big Media to accept the new positions on their side of the bed, give Big Media a ten cent tip post most excellent probing and that will get them to not cover the IRS and Benghazi scandals – nor the many others.
Will it work? “The particular significance of Justice’s press scandal is that it has deprived Mr. Obama of support at a time when he is vulnerable on so much else.”
If Big Media decides it wants more than a ten cent tip and a slap across the ass and face after they have been probed then hilarity ensues. Next week, the Obama scandals continue. Next up for the spotlight: Benghazi.
We see right through the most transparent president ever and the latest stunt is to have corrupt Eric Holder corrupt the press with an off the record session to explain why it is that his lies are not perjury and why he should be allowed to investigate himself. You really can’t make this stuff up, it is strictly “made in Chicago”.
The shocker in this mess is that the New York Times refuses to go along with this off the truth off the record massage parlor trick. Jake Tapper is on the job mocking the DNC for stating that any news bureau not attending the off the record whorehouse de-briefing “forfeits your right” to gripe.
Last week many in Big Media predicted and pre-celebrated the end of Obama scandals on this Memorial Day week. The reasoning was that with congress in recess and Barack Obama again on tour all would soon be well and the Barack Obama scandals forgotten or at least defanged of bite:
“The golden roar of the Obama scandals may whimper to an end today. As Congress adjourns for Memorial Day recess, a ten-day break from hearings, hearings, and more hearings threatens to push the various controversies out of the public eye, leaving the GOP with an urgent problem: how to maintain intensity over the scandals without any congressional machinery to do so. [snip]
But it’s questionable how far any of these narratives can go without Issa’s hearings acting as their engine. As Politico notes, with some despair, the IRS story appears to have run its course. “Congress has hauled virtually every conceivable witness before several committees to testify on their role in the debacle,” Politico wrote, and while everybody got film of themselves beating up on IRS agents for future campaign spots, no link to the White House was established. [snip]
But as the tap of new information increasingly runs dry, the villains of the scandals may start to look less like the officials called before Darrell Issa, and more like Darrell Issa himself.”
Barack Obama today attempted to demonstrate he is in command and that the skies are sunny. Obama went to the Jersey shore, playground of Snookie. But it rained.
Barack Obama on the beach reminded us not so much of a cheerful watery outing but of the apocalyptic novel/film “On The Beach” whose players await slow moving yet inescapable nuclear doom and death even as all appears pleasant and unending.
On the beach, Barack Obama and his Big Media protectors might rejoice. After all, they effusively write, the Obama scandals thus far have not hurt Obama in the polls. Big Media will acknowledge that the Obama scandals eat time and distract from Obama’s goals. Some in Big Media even advise patience because it takes time for the soup and the scandals to come to a boil. Wait About Two Months, Then Check the President’s Approval Rating.
Obama on the beach thought this week, with congress in recess, the scandal tide would ebb. But it is a rip tide dragging down Obama. Today on what was supposed to be the end of scandals, Darrell Issa issued subpoenas in the Benghazi scandal. Benghazi is not going away.
“Congressional staffers continue to work on the Internal Revenue Service scandal by preparing documents and related materials for lawmakers to be ready when they return from the Memorial Day recess in June.
The Memorial Day recess gives aides time to go through hundreds of pages of documents requested by Congress from the IRS and the Treasury inspector general, as well as gather more materials, The Hill reports.
There are also several IRS staffers that lawmakers want to interview, focusing on the Cincinnati office where the targeting of conservative groups seeking tax-exempt status began.
“Right now, we’re entering this document-collection phase, interview phase,” Republican Rep. Charles Boustany of Louisiana, chairman of the House Ways and Means Oversight subcommittee, told reporters Thursday. “And then there will be more hearings in June when we get back.“
“Congressional Republicans head into next week’s Memorial Day recess armed with a strategy designed to keep the controversies that have consumed Washington in the news back home.
Both House and Senate Republicans will focus on the Internal Revenue Service targeting conservative groups for extra scrutiny as well as the still-open questions about Benghazi. And more and more, they’ll try to tie them together into a made-for-2014 narrative of an unaccountable and out-of-control government.
In interviews on local television and radio programs and with newspapers, Senate Republicans plan to talk about the Obama administration’s “credibility gap.” They’ll throw into the mix Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius’s request that health industry officials help fund “Obamacare,” a move Republicans call a “shakedown” of the companies she regulates, according to a Senate GOP leadership aide.
Lawmakers will argue that a “lack of details, stonewalling,” and what they call an “ever-changing White House narrative” on both Benghazi and the IRS have led to a trust deficit with the public, a sentiment reflected in recent polls, the aide said.”
“Part of the aim is to get voters to question how they can trust the administration, and the IRS more specifically, to enforce key provisions of Obama’s health care law after improperly targeting Americans.
This fits into Republicans’ emerging scandal-riding midterm election strategy—one that the GOP’s congressional campaign committees think can blend easily into their anti-Obamacare message to help the party take the Senate in 2014. [snip]
“We’re focused on getting to the bottom of this. What we saw over the last week demonstrates that we need to look further. That we need answers on the who, what, where, when, and why,” the aide said.
House Republicans are working to keep a tight lid on their talking points, emphasizing the known facts and staying out of the White House’s way as it continues to trip over its explanation of what happened at the IRS and who knew what, when.
“The message is IRS overreach,” a senior House GOP leadership aide said. “This is a problem about government inserting itself into your life.”
And right now, no matter what the inquiry finds, Republicans come out ahead. The best case scenario is that the IRS was simply “out of control.” The worst case is that someone in power was intentionally targeting conservatives, the aide said.
And don’t forget the national press. House Republicans seem sure that the other controversy—the Justice Department’s seizure of phone records from reporters and editors at the Associated Press—has as much staying power as the IRS and Benghazi issues.
It’s a “double-barreled attack on the First Amendment,” the aide said, noting that the press, always game to write about itself, is sure to keep both IRS and DOJ in the news for weeks, with little help from the GOP.”
The Associated Press and James Rosen DOJ Obama scandals are an attempt to intimidate reporters. The New York Times reports that they too were targets although this appears to be more an attempt to intimidate the whistle-blowers.
This was supposed to be the week that memory of Obama scandals would be wiped clean. Instead today there are new scandals emerging. The latest one is about potential ObamaCare insider trading as reports emerge from WaPo: WH held investor talks on ObamaCare. Today we have new scandals instead of dying scandals.
The Obama scandals were supposed to be forgotten on Memorial Day.
CHILD#1: In regards to Benghazi, what did you know and when did you know it?
CHILD#2: Mitch McConnell says you govern my intimidation. Is that true?
CHILD#3: Isn’t it unconstitutional to secretly obtain phone records of AP reporters?
CHILD#4: Are Eric Holder’s days numbered?
CHILD#5: Who inside hatched the plan to target conservatives?
And Krauthammer sings “Not Fade Away”:
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On television we are watching round the clock coverage of the tornado disaster in Oklahoma. We wish Oklahoma and its wonderful Obama-rejecting citizens well in these hours of post-disaster search and rescue.
We wish Oklahoma well and we do not begrudge the attention provided to the natural, weather induced, disaster. Still, for those of us happy at last to see some scrutiny of the Barack Obama Mud House there is some concern. The concern is that this natural disaster will cover-up the unnatural disaster which is Barack Obama and his tenure in national office.
Some might wonder, “Are the Barack Obama scandals already fading?”
In our previous article we stated that our test for Big Media is how clear Big Media sees and how clearly Big Media communicates to the American public that “All the scandals erupting now have one common theme and that is the reelection of Barack Obama. Every recent crime, “lapse of judgment”, “ethically questionable action” committed has been done to reelect Barack Obama.”
Some reporters such as Lisa Myers have inched perilously close, like a ballerina on a high wire, to passing our test. But that was before the winds of Oklahoma blew away Barack Obama scandal coverage from the front pages of Big Media. What has happened in Big Media since Oklahoma’s disaster? Is it already over? Is flim-flam man Barack Obama once again one step ahead of the sheriff?
Consider the latest column from one of the ugliest and persistent Barack Obama defender priests - Eugene Robinson:
“Obama administration mistakes journalism for espionage
The Obama administration has no business rummaging through journalists’ phone records, perusing their e-mails and tracking their movements in an attempt to keep them from gathering news. This heavy-handed business isn’t chilling, it’s just plain cold.
It also may well be unconstitutional. In my reading, the First Amendment prohibition against “abridging the freedom . . . of the press” should rule out secretly obtaining two months’ worth of the personal and professional phone records of Associated Press reporters and editors, including calls to and from the main AP phone number at the House press gallery in the Capitol. Yet this is what the Justice Department did.
The unwarranted snooping, which was revealed last week, would be troubling enough if it were an isolated incident. But it is part of a pattern that threatens to redefine investigative reporting as criminal behavior.
The Post reported Monday that the Justice Department secretly obtained phone and e-mail records for Fox News reporter James Rosen, and that the FBI even tracked his movements in and out of the main State Department building. Rosen’s only apparent transgression? Doing what reporters are supposed to do, which is to dig out the news.
In both instances, prosecutors were trying to build criminal cases under the 1917 Espionage Act against federal employees suspected of leaking classified information. Before President Obama took office, the Espionage Act had been used to prosecute leakers a grand total of three times, including the 1971 case of Daniel Ellsberg and the Pentagon Papers. Obama’s Justice Department has used the act six times. And counting.”
Obama lovin’ Robinson recognizes that the real aim of these acts is intimidation. “Every investigative reporter, however, has been put on notice.” Eugene Robinson is loathe to write even a teeny-weeney bad word about his darling Barack, but even Eugene is chillin’ on B.O.
“Hey, remember when Steve Miller insisted there’s nothing illegal about the IRS targeting a particular political faction for extra scrutiny? He was wrong, potentially: There are civil-rights laws in play as well as the Hatch Act, plus some of the IRS’s own regulations for employee conduct. Lois Lerner and her lawyer know the score:
“Carney said Ruemmler was informed by the Treasury Department’s General Counsel’s office April 24 that the Inspector General for Tax Administration was completing a report that found that IRS employees improperly scrutinized political organizations seeking tax exempt status by searching their applications for words including “Tea Party” and “patriot.”
The previous week, on April 16, Ruemmler had learned more generally that there were a number of Inspector General reports being finalized and an IRS investigation was among those investigations, Carney said.
Carney’s comments today are at odds with what he told reporters last week, when he said the White House counsel “only found out about the review being conducted and coming to conclusion by the inspector general.”
“The White House on Monday once again added to the list of people who knew about the IRS investigation into its targeting of conservative groups — saying White House chief of staff Denis McDonough had been informed about a month ago.
Press secretary Jay Carney said again that no one had told President Barack Obama ahead of the first news reports: not his top aide McDonough, nor his chief counsel Kathy Ruemmler, nor anyone from the Treasury Department.
Monday’s revelation amounts to the fifth iteration of the Obama administration’s account of events, after initially saying that the White House had first learned of the controversy from the press.
Republicans said they were on the lookout for the next installment in the White House’s ever-shifting narrative.“
“It’s been only a week since the president told the world that he had learned about the “outrageous” actions of the IRS’ Cincinnati office from “news reports” on May 10. We now know that those reports stemmed from a disclosure the administration had planned and that, in fact, “senior officials” in the White House knew the essence of a damning inspector general’s report on the matter as early as April 24. [snip]
Last Tuesday, I asked White House press secretary Jay Carney about a passing reference he had made the day before in his briefing: that the White House Counsel’s Office had been informed about the impending report “several weeks ago.”
How did that square, I wanted to know, with the president’s own statement that he hadn’t learned about the matter until May 10? And what did the counsel’s office learn in April? Weren’t those explosive matters worth being passed on to higher-ups? [snip]
With two winning presidential campaigns built on successful grassroots fundraising, with a former White House counsel (in 2010-11) who is one of the Democrats’ leading experts on campaign law (Bob Bauer), with former top campaign officials having been ensconced as staffers in the White House (David Axelrod, who left for the reelection campaign in early 2011, and Dan Pfeiffer among others), it’s hard to imagine that the Obama inner circle was oblivious to the issue of what the IRS was doing in Cincinnati.
That may well be true. Maybe they didn’t care one whit what the IG was going to say. But they sure haven’t been behaving that way in the last week.“
“You know, a White House that just got exposed for spying on journalists probably should be doing some bridge-rebuilding, especially for an administration who needs a friendly media as much as this one does. What’s the worst possible way to get back in the media’s good graces? Accusing them of being conspiracy nuts for asking about Kathleen Sebelius’ fundraising for ObamaCare, starting with CBS’ Major Garrett, who just got done fronting the Benghazi e-mail defense demolished by Glenn Kessler today.”
Yeah, that’s the ticket. That’s how not to draw attention from the Oklahoma disaster.
It’s a Senate hearing, not a Republican House hearing, which will be chaired by Max Baucus. Read the letter sent by the Finance Committee to the IRS (pdf format) and you will see what amounts to an proctologist’s exam:
“1. Provide a copy of any and all questions, questionnaires and information requests used by the IRS to attempt to elicit additional information from 501(c)(3)-(6) applicants from February 1, 2010 to the present regarding their donor lists, volunteer lists, financial support for, and relationships with, political candidates, and any and all other similar information. [snip]
4. How many applications for each tax-exempt status, 501(c) (3)-(6), were filed and processed each year from FY 2005 through the present? In addition, provide the number of people in the Determinations Unit tasked with handling these applications during each fiscal year. [snip]
29. Provide copies of all documents, between any IRS employee and anyone else, including, but not limited to, individuals outside of the IRS, that were generated as a consequence of, or relate to, the letters sent by members of the Congress to the IRS since 2012 regarding the issue of inappropriately targeting organizations seeking 501 (c) (4) status for heightened scrutiny. [snip]
39. Provide documents relating to communications between any and all IRS employees and any and all White House employees including, but not limited to, the President, regarding the targeting of organizations seeking 501 (c)(3), (4), (5), or (6) tax-exempt status for full development or heightened scrutiny based on the existence of certain words or phrases in their applications, from February 2010 to the present. This includes any documents relating to communications received by any IRS employee from the White House or Treasury, whether or not the IRS employee was simply the recipient of such a communication from either the White House or Treasury.”
“The story itself would be huge — making a connection earlier than the IG report’s first leak, which came from Lois Lerner herself at the IRS. Don’t forget that Obama yesterday parsed his response very carefully when it came to knowing about the targeting at the IRS. He would only say that he first became aware of the IG report last Friday; he left open the question of when he first knew about the targeting.
If Ruemmler knew about it earlier than that, it becomes a much bigger problem for Obama. First, just as with the IRS chief counsel’s briefing on the matter in August 2011, it’s almost impossible to believe that the lawyers wouldn’t immediately tell their bosses what was going on, unless they had good reason to believe their bosses already knew about it. If Obama found out a few weeks before the IG report came out, why didn’t he act then to clean house at the IRS? And it then also prompts the Watergate-ish question: What did the President know, and when did he know it?“
“I’ve been told today by several reporters that President Obama’s White House counsel, Kathryn Ruemmler, knew for several days — perhaps weeks —that some Internal Revenue Service officials were engaging in political targeting of conservative groups, and that she did not tell the president as soon as she knew even partial reports about the story.
With all due respect to someone who has impeccable legal credentials, if she did have such foreknowledge and didn’t inform the president immediately, I respectfully suggest Ms. Ruemmler is in the wrong job and that she should resign. [snip]
If Ms. Ruemmler did know about this IRS story and didn’t inform the president immediately, then, respectfully, that must mean she didn’t appreciate fully the mammoth legal and political implications for the U.S. government as well as the American people of a story involving IRS officials abusing power and possibly violating criminal laws.
It is also hard to understand why some people in the media who apparently knew about this foreknowledge by the White House counsel and her failure to tell the president missed this story and its significance.“
Lanny Davis is lighting the path, with blazing torches, for investigators – right into the Oval Office. Lanny knows exactly what he is doing. No one believes that a White House counsel would know about criminal activity in the IRS and not tell the president. As to Big Media knowing about criminal activity and keeping quiet in order to protect Barack Obama?
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Update II: Would you eat from a kitchen run by Jeffrey Dahmer? Think about ObamaCare run by the woman who targeted Tea Party groups – will you willingly provide her with information as to your health so that information can be used against you to suppress your free speech rights or even economic rights? For her malevolent efforts to target “Tea Party, evangelical and pro-Israel groups for harassment” this tainted bureaucrat received over $100,000 in bonuses from 2009 through 2012.” That Barack Obama bonus was for a job well done – it got Obama reelected and neutralized the Tea Party.
Today is step one in cleansing the IRS from the clutches of Barack Obama. Today is step one in breaking the dirty hands of the IRS from control of the health care of Americans. Today there are public live hearings by the prestigious House Ways and Means Committee. The eyes of Americans who respect the rule of law will be on the House Ways and Means Committee today. Open thread: IRS hearings open on Capitol Hill – with Acting IRS Commissioner Steve Miller (the guy Obama supposedly forced to resign but then it turns out his job was ending anyway – score another Obama lie) and a “hero” in our constitutional drama, the Treasury Department’s Inspector General for Tax Administration, Russell George.
The Big Test today will not be about the IRS however. Today the test will be on Obama Dimocrats and whether they continue to distract and distort as they have been doing at any and all hearings that seek to get at the truth of Barack Obama’s time in the White House. As we write below – All the recent government scandals have been in the service of Barack Obama’s reelection.
Chairman Camp started the hearings on the right foot by taking the unusual step of putting the witnesses under oath. We are still going to need special prosecutors and select committees to wash the Mud House clean again and return it to a beautiful White House.
“IRS Official in Charge During Tea Party Targeting Now Runs Health Care Office
The Internal Revenue Service official in charge of the tax-exempt organizations at the time when the unit targeted tea party groups now runs the IRS office responsible for the health care legislation.
Sarah Hall Ingram served as commissioner of the office responsible for tax-exempt organizations between 2009 and 2012. But Ingram has since left that part of the IRS and is now the director of the IRS’ Affordable Care Act office, the IRS confirmed to ABC News today.
Her successor, Joseph Grant, is taking the fall for misdeeds at the scandal-plagued unit between 2010 and 2012. During at least part of that time, Grant served as deputy commissioner of the tax-exempt unit.”
The questions will be about the growing cancer on the presidency. The questions will be what Barack Obama knows and when did he know it. For us that won’t be enough.
From here on out we will have one standard to determine whether Big Media is holding Barack Obama to account. There is one question, one “theory of the case” for us which Big Media must publicly recognize if we are to hold Barack Obama to account.
What Big Media must ask, the dots that need to be connected, are clear to those that want to see and are not willfully blind. All the scandals erupting now have one common theme and that is the reelection of Barack Obama. Every recent crime, “lapse of judgment”, “ethically questionable action” committed has been done to reelect Barack Obama.
Richard Nixon did not need to use dirty tricks or White House Horrors to destroy his political opponents but he could not help himself. It was in his nature. The boy that signed letters to his mother as “your faithful dog” had Richard III type insecurity humps which led to his downfall. Likewise Obama. We’ve discussed the Obama sperm donor dad that rejected little Barry and the trampy mother that wandered the world and dumped little Barry in Hawaii with what Barack describes as a “racist” grandmother although it is clear that she was a loving woman and Barack smeared her under a bus to get elected in 2008. Little Barry learned to get along by becoming a flim-flam man. His career was born in filth, smearing opponents.
Barack Obama has a history of dirty tricks and filth flinging to win elections. Richard Nixon had CREEP (Committee to Re-Elect the President) and Barack Obama has his OAFs (now Organizing For Action for which we employ a more accurate anagram). If Big Media wants even a hair’s-width of credibility it is necessary to tie Barack Obama’s most recent scandals to Barack Obama’s reelection.
Since 2007 we have noted that when caught either digging up the sex lives of opponents or assorted dirty tricks Barack Obama blames the staff. Barack, on matters large and small, always blames someone else. Barack’s autobiography was a load of crap and he was called out by those who had worked with him. But Big Media protected Barack. Hazel Johnson never got to tell her story in the Big Media spotlight because her testimony, like that of others, would have written a different story about Barack than the choom hallucinations in Obama’s false history autobiographies.
Born into slavery as one of the youngest of thirteen children of James and Elizabeth in Ulster County, New York, in 1797, Sojourner Truth’s given name was Isabella Baumfree. As almost all of her brothers and sisters had been sold to other slave owners, some of her earliest memories were of her parents’ stories of the cruel loss of their other children. [snip]
In 1843, she changed her name to Sojourner Truth – her name for a traveling preacher, one who speaks the truth – and left New York. She traveled throughout New England, where she met and worked with abolitionists such as William Lloyd Garrison, and Frederick Douglass. Her life story, The Narrative of Sojourner Truth: A Northern Slave, written with the help of friend Olive Gilbert, was published in 1850.
While traveling and speaking in states across the country, Sojourner Truth met many women abolitionists and noticed that although women could be part of the leadership in the abolitionist movement, they could neither vote nor hold public office. It was this realization that led Sojourner to become an outspoken supporter of women’s rights.
In 1851, she addressed the Women’s Rights Convention in Akron, Ohio, delivering her famous speech “Ain’t I a Woman?” The applause she received that day has been described as “deafening.” From that time on, she became known as a leading advocate for the rights of women. She became one of the nineteenth century’s most eloquent voices for the cause of anti-slavery and women’s rights.
Because we want to share our ideas and experiences, our common goals, and nonpartisan solutions to the challenges that we face - and there are no limits to what we can achieve when we do.
And because we want to keep working for a better future for every child, from every family – a world in which no limits is not just our goal, but a reality!
NoLimits.org will "keep you up to date with news about issues on which Hillary took a lead and we know you care so much about," group President Ann Lewis said in an e-mail to as many as 2 million people culled from the Clinton campaign database.
Because No Limits is a registered nonprofit, "it cannot do anything political. It has to be nonpartisan," said Lewis, a longtime senior adviser to Clinton.
In Clinton's job as secretary of state for President Obama, her political dealings are highly restricted.
For example, she shut down her political action committee.
Some, like Democratic consultant and former Bill Clinton aide Chris Lehane, dismiss talk that the group could be a springboard for Clinton to try again for the White House in, say, 2016.
"Sometimes a cigar is just a cigar," Lehane said. "I think this is just [a] group of folks who developed relationships in an intense [electoral] environment and want to stay together."
But the University of Virginia's Larry Sabato countered: "Whenever a group like this says it's not a political organization, you just know it is."
"Maybe [this] is Hillary's answer to Obama's new 'change' group that controls his golden mailing list. Maybe it's a way for Secretary of State Clinton to mobilize backing for her objectives at the State Department," he said. "And maybe [it's] a standby committee of supporters in case Hillary decides to get back into elective politics."
Democratic consultant Hank Sheinkopf said NoLimits.org is "one way to make sure that she - and/or the former President - still have political leverage."
Hillary World-Wide January 26, 2009
Secretary of State Hillary R. Clinton Meets Afghan Women Lawyers. Secretary of State Hillary R. Clinton met today at the State Department with fourteen prominent Afghan women judges, prosecutors, and defense attorneys. These jurists were in Washington to participate in a training program arranged by the Department’s Public-Private Partnership for Justice Reform in Afghanistan. Secretary Clinton told them: "Your American friends greatly admire your bravery and courage. It is your work in the tough environment of Afghanistan for women lawyers that will bring real reform and the rule of law to the Afghan people. As President Obama made clear yesterday in his first foreign policy announcement, we are committed to supporting your efforts to bring security and stability to your country."
