"The Lid"

New Poll: Gosnell Trial Shifted Public Opinion Toward Pro-Life

2013-05-17T21:07:00.002-04:00

The good news is that those who saw media reports of the Gosnell trial lean more pro-life than before, the bad news is that thanks to media bias not many people saw a media report.

According to an Investors Business Daily/TIPP poll only 24% of total adults saw news coverage of the trial of Kermit Gosnell but 42% of those who saw news stories regarding the trial of the Abortionist say they now lean more toward pro-life views than pro-choice views.

"The media's downplaying of this story was clearly reflected in the poll results," according to Raghavan Mayur, president of TechnoMetrica Market Intelligence, which conducted the survey.

Those who did see or read media reports of the trial were far likelier to be affected in the pro-life direction. Only 14% said that because of the trial, they now lean more toward pro-choice views.

Those whose view was not changed one way or the other by the Gosnell trial totaled a sizable 41% — almost as many as those affected in the pro-life direction.

Interestingly the poll showed very little difference between Men (43%) and Women (40%) shifting toward pro life.

A majority of those with some college — 57% — lean more toward pro-life because of the trial, while 33% of those holding a degree swerved in that direction.

Perhaps some of the future investigations will will receive more coverage, for example Houston abortionist Douglas Karpen

Houston doctor Douglas Karpen is accused by four former employees of delivering live fetuses during third-trimester abortions and killing them by either snipping their spinal cord, stabbing a surgical instrument into their heads or 'twisting their heads off their necks with his own bare hands'.

Other times the fetus was so big he would have to pull it out of the womb in pieces, Karpen's ex-assistant, Deborah Edge, said in an Operation Rescue video, which has prompted a criminal investigation into the doctor.

'Sometimes he couldn't get the fetus out... he would yank pieces – piece by piece – when they were oversize,' Edge explained.

Karpen and others like him are being investigated. Sadly there are many more Like Karpen and Gosnell to help sway public opinion.

Ways and Means IRS Hearing: Miller Tap-Dances Around Truth - IG Says More Scandal Reports Coming

2013-05-17T13:08:00.000-04:00

Both Democrats and Republicans showed frustration in their questioning during today's House Ways and Means Committee hearings. Acting commissioner Miller (who is still employed by the IRS)tapped danced around the scandal, while Inspector General Russell George furnished all he could about the report.

The first real surprise was when Russel George indicated there were similar investigations being made so there may be much more coming.

The most fun surprise was the revelation that last week's question to Lois Lerner which made the scandal public was staged.

Rep Nunes “Was her question to Ms. Lerner about targeting certain groups planned in advance?”

Miller replied, “I believe we talked about that, yes.”

As for the "real" investigation-- Miller kept claiming there was no Politics involved in the targeting of conservative groups:

"I think that what happened here was that foolish mistakes were made by people who were trying to be more efficient in their workload selection," Miller said, calling the practices described in the inspector general's report as "intolerable" and a "mistake," but "not an act of partisanship."

He apologized for what he later called "horrible customer service," but he also stubbornly rejected any accusation that it amounted to politicizing the work of the IRS.

Miller objected to the term "targeted", he said the phase targeting conservatives was pejorative--Congressmen of both parties objected. They asked how could there not be targeting when it was only conservative groups who were abused.

“When you talk about targeting, it’s a pejorative term,” Miller said. “There was a lot of discussion within the system about these” [new 501c4 organizations].

Miller said former IRS commissioner Douglas Shulman's testimony failing to disclose the activity when asked specific question by the same committee --was "incorrect," but not misleading. HUH?

Miller also claimed -- over and over -- that he was being honest with Congress during a hearing last year--with those claims he was walking on a very fine line:

"You did not share the information you knew," Rep. Reichert charged.

"I answered all questions truthfully," Miller replied.

This claim was met with deep skepticism Friday. Miller acknowledged he learned of the practice during a May 3, 2012, briefing. Yet when he was asked about it at a July 25 hearing that year, he said only that some applications fell into a particular category -- and that those organizations were grouped for "consistency" and "quality."

When he was asked if his answer was incomplete--Miller would only say his answers were "Truthful."

Miller claimed he did not know who was responsible for the targeting of conservative groups by IRS agents.

“Who is responsible for targeting the conservative organizations?” Rep Brady Asked pressing for names. “I don’t have names for you?, Mr. Brady,”Miller said.

Sounds like he could take over Eric Holder's Job, as Holder also knows nothing.

”I don’t have that name, sir,” he told GOP congressman Dave Reichert in today’s House Ways and Means Committee hearing on the scandal, which came to light last Friday.
Reichert persisted, “Did you ask anybody?”
“Yes,” Miller responded — he asked the senior technical adviser, Nancy Marks.
“And what did Nancy tell you, who’s responsible?” Reichert asked.
“That I don’t remember, to be honest with you,” Miller said.

Not remembering is just as believable as his claim that there was no political reason for the targeting.

Who knew when? George said he alerted Miller’s predecessor, Shulman, in May 2012. He alerted the Treasury counsel on June 4, 2012, and subsequently told Deputy Treasury Secretary Neal Wolin. The IG told new Treasury Secretary Jack Lew after his appointment that he was working on investigating the claims.

Rep. Mike Kelly, R-Pa., was the star of the show as he described the ways its agents are capable of ruining lives.

"You can put anybody out of business that you want. ... When the IRS comes in there, you're not allowed to be shoddy," he said, suggesting the agency's leadership was being held to a different standard now that it is coming under scrutiny.

"This is absolutely an overreach, and this is an outrage for all Americans," he said.

When he finished, the committee room erupted in cheers and applause that lasted several seconds.

It was pointed out that IG George's document was not an investigation it was an audit. Mr George was asked if he is conducting a full investigation. George answered that he couldn't answer that question--a clear indication that there is much more to come...so buy that BIG Bag of popcorn (but don't record it on your 1040 as a deduction).

Plenty of questions remain unanswered about why IRS agents in Cincinnati started using search terms like “tea party” and “patriots” to filter groups applying for tax-exempt status, under who's direction was it started, what the top IRS management did when they found out about it and why the Cincinnati office resumed similar searches months after officials in Washington told them not to. Some of those questions might come out next week when Rep. Issa's House Oversight panel takes its turn with a different set of witnesses.

Obama Caught Abusing Power: Non-Recess, "Recess" NLRB Appointments Struck Down Again

2013-05-17T06:52:00.000-04:00

Every since the President decided to make recess appointments when the Senate was still in session his actions have been challenged in federal court. Back in January a federal appeals court ruled this the "recess appointments" President Obama made to the National Labor Relations Board were an abuse of power, that he acted when the Senate was not actually in a recess and and the board has not had quorum to operate and yesterday a second federal court, the Third Circuit Court of Appeals ruled the Obama appointments to the NLRB were invalid.

The January ruling covered appointments of of Richard Griffin (2012-present) and Sharon Block (2012-present), yesterday's ruling invalidated the earlier appointment of Craig Becker who served from 2010-2012.

Yesterday's ruling by the Philadelphia District court agreed with the one made by the DC District court back in January, saying that recess appointments could only be made between congressional sessions, not when congress is on a break/holiday.

Mark Mix, President of the National Right to Work Foundation, issued the following statement in light of the court's decision:

"Today, another federal appeals court has invalidated one of President Barack Obama's so-called 'recess appointments' to the National Labor Relations Board. As National Right to Work Foundation attorneys have argued in several courts, the Obama 'recess appointments' have clearly violated the U.S. Constitution.

"As a result, the Board has lacked a quorum since at least August 2011, and under a U.S. Supreme Court precedent established in New Process Steel, L. P. v. NLRB (2010), the Board's biased and decidedly pro-Big Labor rulings since then are therefore invalidated. Over 1,500 NLRB decisions may be invalid as a result. This underscores the constitutional chaos this President has created by gaming the system for union bosses.

"Today's decision is a victory for independent-minded workers who have received unjust treatment at the hands of the pro-forced unionism NLRB over the last few years."

The January ruling said recess appointments made by all recent presidents have been unconstitutional. arguing that the president's recess appointment powers don't apply to "intrasession" appointments (such as when they close for a holiday) only after Congress has adjourned a session permanently, which usually means only at the end of a year.

If President's have been making these unconstitutional appointments for decades why is the court first ruling against them now? The honest truth is no one had ever asked (challenged them) before.

Obama's "recess" appointments had created a NLRB that was very biased toward labor. However based on the two court decisions many of those unfair pro-labor decisions are invalid(see below).

Open publication - Free publishing

The DOJ/Associated Press Investigation Was Political Retribution

2013-05-16T19:53:00.002-04:00

In response to a question about the Department of Justice/Associated Press "scandal" today the President said “Leaks related to national security can put people at risk,” the president noted. “They can put some of our intelligence officers, who are in various dangerous situations that are easily compromised, at risk.”

But there was no one at risk! As the Associated Press reported on Tuesday,

We held that story until the government assured us that the national security concerns had passed. Indeed, the White House was preparing to publicly announce that the bomb plot had been foiled.

The White House had said there was no credible threat to the American people in May of 2012. The AP story suggested otherwise, and we felt that was important information and the public deserved to know it.

The fact is the Associated Press sat on the story for five days. Then, according to the Washington Post report, during a Monday morning meeting, the journalists were asked by agency officials to hold off on publishing the story for just one more day so the Administration could announcement.

The AP held the story for national security but published it when the only reason to hold it was for the Administration to get some glory.

The Associated Press published the story on Monday, and Tuesday John Brennan, now the CIA director appeared on Good Morning America the following day to . He said that because of the work of U.S. intelligence, the plot did not pose an active threat to the American public.

So if the plot no longer posed a threat, and the only reason the AP was asked to delay was so the administration could make the announcement first, why did the DOJ subpena the Associated Press records. There is only one logical answer, political retribution---the Obama administration was punishing the Associated Press for its blowing the big announcement.

As Benghazi Scandal Builds, Libya Falls Apart

2013-05-16T16:36:00.002-04:00

By Barry Rubin

A forgotten element in the Benghazi scandal is this one: If Obama had said it was a terrorist attack back in September 2012 he would have to have done something about it.

Now, not just on that one day of September 11, 2012 but for seven months thereafter (!) the U.S. government has done zero about the murder of four American officials.

Consider the Benghazi scandal from the standpoint of Benghazi--where the militia that murdered the Americans is one of the most powerful forces in the city--and Libya itself. Suppose that from the beginning on September 11, 2012, the U.S. government announced that the U.S. facility was under attack by a militia group linked to al-Qaida. It would have had to explain why it had hired members of that militia group to guard the facility, a scandal in itself. We know 100 percent that this is true but it hasn't become an issue.

Next, there might have been a rescue attempt and a fire fight between American forces and that militia group in which casualties would have occurred on both sides. Note that as far as we know the militia took no killed or wounded, meaning that in its own eyes it achieved a total victory at no cost. At any rate, the United States would then have been in a military conflict with that militia. It would have to demand that the Libyan government take action and cooperate with U.S. efforts to punish it. On one hand, that would have been a headache for the Libyan government; on the other hand, it might have brought welcome aid to suppress a troublesome militia and help in getting control of the anarchy in the country (see below).

Congress would have given full bipartisan support to punishing those found responsible--by a quick and conclusive FBI investigation, including putting forces on the ground in Benghazi.

In practice, U.S. policy is still acting as if it believed the attack was due to a video and not a terrorist attack!

Note--and this is very important--that the scandal is not restricted to what happened on September 11, 2012, and the Washington cover-up that followed.

As a result of the cover-up there has been no effort made to punish those who we know now to have murdered four Americans.

Think of that point. You cannot punish the terrorists if you haven't officially deemed them responsible for the attack, when an Egyptian-American provocateur, who is supposedly the real guilty party, is in prison already.

Meanwhile, Libya is suffering serious problems that are undoing whatever good the Obama Administration's intervention to overthrow the old regime achieved.

As a result, the terrorists who murdered four Americans are going free; the group that carried out the attack is still enjoying popularity and even playing a role in running Benghazi. Libya itself was the biggest donor to the Muslim Brotherhood-led, U.S. handpicked Syrian opposition and a source of a massive outflow of arms to terrorists.

In other words, as a result of the policy failure and cover-up, Libya faces a much greater threat of a revolutionary Islamist takeover, anarchy, and even becoming an al-Qaida base. (Imagine, for comparison, the situation if the U.S. government had denied al-Qaida involvement in earlier terrorist attacks.)

Meanwhile, Libya is suffering serious problems that are undoing whatever good the Obama Administration's intervention to overthrow the old regime achieved. Even as the Benghazi scandal is growing in the United States, the situation in Libya is deteriorating further.

Ignoring the actual threat of revolutionary Islamist militias—and attributing problems to a video last September plus the botching of the investigation of the attack due to the cover-up also led to mishandling post-attack U.S. Libya policy.

Here are some of the current developments in Libya where, a recent article in the Egyptian newspaper, al-Ahram, explains, “militias at the command of various ideological camps and rival interest groups” increasingly dominate the country’s politics.attack, when an Egyptian-American provocateur, who is supposedly the real guilty party, is in prison already.

In other words, as a result of the policy failure and cover-up, Libya faces a much greater threat of a revolutionary Islamist takeover, anarchy, and even becoming an al-Qaida base. (Imagine, for comparison, the situation if the U.S. government had denied al-Qaida involvement in earlier terrorist attacks.)

Here are some of the current developments in Libya where, a recent article in the Egyptian newspaper, al-Ahram, explains, “militias at the command of various ideological camps and rival interest groups” increasingly dominate the country’s politics.

--“Since last week, the ministries of foreign affairs, justice and the interior in Libya have been under siege by armed militias demanding [passage of a] law that would ban all associates of the former regime from positions in government….”

--There was a recent terrorist attack on the French embassy in Tripoli.

--“As though the situation were not fraught enough, more than 100 policemen stormed the Ministry of Interior headquarters…where they began an open-ended sit-in to press previously voiced demands for adequate protection for the police in the course of the performance of their duties, health insurance, better job and pay conditions, and the restoration of the prestige and full rights of policemen.”

--“The following day…other militia bands stormed the Ministry of Finance located in downtown Tripoli and began to assault the guards. These quickly withdrew in order to avoid a confrontation with their attackers.”

--A band of armed men attacked a Ministry of Justice police vehicle that was transporting prisoners and three escort vehicles.” One prisoner was killed and several others were severely injured during the attack.

--On May 13 a car bomb exploded near Benghazi's main hospital killing at least 13 people.

--Prime Minister Ali Zeidan warned that “if the violence and security breakdown continue, the international community may be compelled to intervene.”

--Despite Zeidan’s threats the militias are not scared.

--The Birka Police Station in downtown Benghazi was struck by a massive explosion that destroyed the building.

--In southern Libya, Chadian forces advanced 100 kilometers into Libyan territory without even encountering the Libyan armed forces. As al-Ahram remarks:

“The incursion further throws into relief Libya’s weak security at a time when neither the army nor the militias are capable of controlling the country’s far-flung borders….

“Yet, it appears that the militias nevertheless have the upper hand. They are better armed than the government forces and they are also said to possess sophisticated eavesdropping equipment which they use to spy on government officials.”

--As a result of the violence the German embassy has suspended operations. British Petroleum has evacuated non-essential personnel.

What does this mean that NATO will return to shore up the regime it put into power? The UN resolution permitting intervention in Libya is still operative. But one additional element of the Benghazi cover-up is that it allowed the U.S. government to ignore the serious state of Libyan security. Remember that the Libyan operation was another of President Obama’s supposed successes that must be made to seem triumphant during the 2012 election.

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-------------------- Barry Rubin is director of the Global Research in International Affairs (GLORIA) Center and editor of the Middle East Review of International Affairs (MERIA) Journal. His next book, Nazis, Islamists and the Making of the Modern Middle East, written with Wolfgang G. Schwanitz, will be published by Yale University Press in January 2014. His latest book is Israel: An Introduction, also published by Yale. Thirteen of his books can be read and downloaded for free at the website of the GLORIA Center including The Arab States and the Palestine Conflict, The Long War for Freedom: The Arab Struggle for Democracy in the Middle East and The Truth About Syria. His blog is Rubin Reports. His original articles are published at PJMedia.

Nancy Pelosi Over the Edge? Says, "GOP Attacks Obama Because He is Such A Great President

2013-05-16T15:45:00.001-04:00

Nancy Pelosi has said some very outrageous things in her time such as we need to pass Obamacare so people will find out what's in it, or that she objected to waterboarding but didn't complain becauseit was not her place to complain because she was no longer the top Democrat on the House intelligence committee. Today's quote is up there with the former speaker's most outrageous.

Pelosi said today that Republicans are using scandals coming out of the White House to undermine President Barack Obama out of "fear," because he is “such a great president.”

No really-- that's what she said:

“They make so much of these issues, because this president is such a great president,” Pelosi said during a press conference on Capitol Hill, ending a week filled with new revelations about scandals involving the terrorist attack in Benghazi, Libya, the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) targeting conservative groups, and the Justice Department seizing phone records of reporters at the Associated Press.

“He’s a visionary—you’ve heard me say this so many times,” Pelosi said of Obama. “This is a great president. He’s a visionary. He has a knowledge of our country, concerns of the American people that give him judgment as to what plan we should have to go forward to strengthen the middle class.

“And he has an eloquence to convey that message,” she said. “They fear that, and so any issue that comes up, they will try to exploit.”

“And some of them are legitimate issues, but they should not dominate everything,” she said. “And so what I think is that they have used talking points on Benghazi. They will use the IRS. They will use the AP. They will use these as, again, subterfuges, evasions of what the American people want us to do here.”

“They want us to create jobs,” she said. “Now if you’re a party in Congress, and you have no intention of creating jobs, you want to change the subject.

“So I think this is as much about enforcing their anti-government ideology, of not a public role in the creation of jobs, as well as undermining the president of the United States,” Pelosi said.

Holy Cow! I didn't think anyone could be THAT partisan! Four people died in Benghazi and the American People were lied to, The IRS went after people based on their political affiliations, and the Department of Justice broke its own rules to get the telephone records of AP reporters...but the ONLY reason the GOP is investigating these "scandal" is to get back at a GREAT President? And yes that description of Obama is as crazy as Pelosi's conspiracy theory about the GOP.

She can't be that partisan, she can't really believe that nonsense. If she does the woman truly needs mental help!

BIG BROTHER? IRS and HHS Building Largest Personal Information Database Govt. EVER Attempted

2013-05-16T13:07:00.001-04:00

If this story came from a different source it would immediately be dismissed as a crazy conspiracy theory like birtherism, truthers, or the missing egg salad recipe discussed in Woody Allen's What's Up Tiger Lilly? But this story came from the Wall Street Journal and comes on top of the growing IRS scandal and should raise fear in the hearts of most freedom loving Americans. The Internal Revenue Service is working with the Department of Heath and Human Services to great the largest database of the personal information of American citizens ever created by this Government.

This March the IRS Inspector General reiterated that ObamaCare's 47 major changes to the revenue code "represent the largest set of tax law changes the IRS has had to implement in more than 20 years." Thus the IRS is playing Thelma to the Health and Human Service Department's Louise. The tax agency has requested funding for 1,954 full-time equivalent employees for its Affordable Care Act office in 2014.

Instead of going after tax cheats, these bureaucrats will write and enforce tax regulations for parts of the economy in which they have no core competence. For example, do ski instructors or public school teachers count as seasonal workers? How long is a "full time" work week? Is it 40 hours, or 30?

The IRS will also dispense ObamaCare's insurance subsidies since technically they're "advanceable" tax credits, i.e., transfer payments made prior to filing a tax return. The IRS will also police the individual mandate-tax to buy health insurance, as well as the business penalties for not offering Washington-approved coverage to employees.

To monitor compliance with these rules, the IRS and HHS are now building the largest personal information database the government has ever attempted. Known as the Federal Data Services Hub, the project is taking the IRS's own records (for income and employment status) and centralizing them with information from Social Security (identity), Homeland Security (citizenship), Justice (criminal history), HHS (enrollment in entitlement programs and certain medical claims data) and state governments (residency).

The data hub will be used as the verification system for ObamaCare's complex subsidy formula. All insurers, self-insured businesses and government health programs must submit reports to the IRS about the individuals they cover, which the IRS will cross-check against tax returns.

Even without the IRS news of the past few days this database of personal information was a frightening thought. When you include this IRS scandal, and the long history of politicians of both parties using the IRS to go after their political opponents, it is clear that the Internal Revenue Service has too much power.

The IRS is a legal governmental bully. This government agency is not much different than the loan shark's enforcer going from "client to client" threatening broken limbs (or worse). The Internal Revenue's major method of enforcement is intimidation.

Now with the extra responsibility of enforcing Obamacare, and its new growing database of American's personal information the IRS will grow in power and weapons for intimidation. Their growing power goes against everything for which this country stands. As Jefferson wrote in the Declaration of Independence:

That to secure these rights, governments are instituted among men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed. That whenever any form of government becomes destructive to these ends, it is the right of the people to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their safety and happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shown that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such government, and to provide new guards for their future security

There is no suggestion here that there should be an uprising to overthrow the government of the United States, but perhaps it's time to "overthrow" the Internal Revenue Service for their long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute despotism.

The IRS was formed by an act of congress, it was given awesome powers by acts of congress, it can be tamed by an act of congress. I call for congress to act immediately to enact legislation to cut the power of the IRS making strict rules about what they can and cannot do (under penalty of law). Further more I call on the House of Representatives to stop funding any IRS expansion due to Obamacare. The House has the power of the purse.. so why are they waiting?

White House Release Benghazi Talking Points Emails - Prove Administration Lied About Benghazi (Emails Embedded)

2013-05-15T21:17:00.001-04:00

After two days of haranguing by a rejuvenated press pool the White House finally released approximately 100 pages of emails covering the discussion of the Benghazi talking points leading up to Ambassador Susan Rice's post 9/11 appearance on five talk shows. At those appearances Rice blamed the entire attack on an anti-Muslim video.

On the positive side for the administration there was a passing reference to the possibility of a spontaneous protest based on the video, and the final document was signed off on by the number two guy in the CIA, everything else in these memos show that the "official account" of merely one word changed in the talking points by the administration is a complete lie. They also show the State Department and White House actively participated in editing the talking points to remove any mention of terrorist/al-Qaeda involvement in the attack. In fact they show the White House was more actively involved than previously thought.

The documents also showed the White House, along with several other departments, played a role in editing the so-called "talking points," despite claims from the White House that it was barely involved. And they showed then-CIA Director David Petraeus objected to the watered-down version that would ultimately be used as the basis for U.N. Ambassador Susan Rice's flawed comments on several TV shows the Sunday after the attack.

One email sent the Friday night after the attack from an unknown official said: "The State Department had major reservations with much or most of the document."

Individual emails leading up to that assessment show State officials repeatedly objecting to the intelligence community's early version of events.

The early versions stated that "Islamic extremists with ties to Al Qaeda" participated in the assault and discussed links to militant group Ansar al Sharia -- and referenced prior attacks against western targets in Benghazi, as well as intelligence warnings.

State Department spokeswoman Victoria Nuland complained that she had "serious concerns" about "arming members of Congress" to make assertions the administration was not making. "In same vein, why do we want Hill to be fingering Ansar al Sharia, when we aren't doing that ourselves until we have investigation results ... and the penultimate point could be abused by Members to beat the State Department for not paying attention to Agency warnings so why do we want to feed that either? Concerned ..."

She also wrote that the line saying the administration knows there were extremists among the demonstrators "will come back to us at podium."

In response to her concerns, Assistant Secretary of State David S. Adams voiced agreement. He said the line about prior incidents "will read to members like we had been repeatedly warned."

The emails show Petraeus' deputy Mike Morell involved in circulating revised points. In one email, he too noted the State Department had "deep concerns" about referencing prior "warnings."

A page of hand-written notes showed Morell scratching out mentions of Al Qaeda, the experience of fighters in Libya, Islamic extremists and a warning to the U.S. Embassy in Cairo on the eve of the attacks of calls for a demonstration. Ultimately, all of that was scrubbed from the talking points. The final version said "extremists" participated, without mentioning prior attacks and warnings in the region.

Petraeus specifically complained about the removal of the line about the warning to Cairo. That is when he said he'd rather not use the talking points, but acknowledged it wasn't his call.

Senior administration officials told reporters Wednesday that Morell made the changes to the talking points because of his own concerns that they could prejudge an FBI investigation into who was responsible for the Sept. 11, 2012, attack that killed U.S. Ambassador Chris Stevens and three other Americans.

But based on the emails, it looks as if Morell made the changes because of State Department pressure. John Boehner agrees, his spokesmen said the emails confirmed his earlier charges that

senior State Department officials watered down the talking points. He also said they "contradict" White House claims that it and State only changed one word.

"The seemingly political nature of the State Department's concerns raises questions about the motivations behind these changes and who at the State Department was seeking them," he said, while calling the document dump "long overdue."

Something also long overdue is a special congressional committee to investigate all the questions about this scandal.

The Emails have been embedded below:

White House Benghazi Emails Released May 15 2013 by Jeffrey Dunetz

Since The Media Is Now Paying Attention-Will They Investigate These 20 OTHER OBAMA SCANDALS?

2013-05-15T15:03:00.003-04:00

It warms my heart to see the mainstream media doing its job (well somewhat and only with Benghazi, IRS and the AP). Now its time for them to prove their meddle. Since they are awake, alert and paying attention, perhaps they could investigate the twenty scandals ignored since Obama became President in January 2009.

According to the information about the Justice Dept. investigation of the Associated Press, Holder's troops got the phone information of 100 reporters Hey AP this is a great way to get back at the administration assign each of the stories below to a reporter, you still would have 80 others to cover other news.

What about the other news organizations--I am not asking they investigate all twenty, perhaps they could split them up one or two per liberal media organization.

Here's my twenty--I am sure there are others but with these twenty plus the three new ones the mainstream media has enough--they have five years to catch up on:

Going to war in Libya without first seeking congressional approval.

The administration's screwing of the primary GM investors so he could give the company to his buddies in the UAW.

Offering Joe Sestak a White House job to drop out of the Senate race against Arlen Specter

Offering Andrew Romanoff a White House job to drop out of the Senate Race against Michael Bennett.

Dropping an already won case against the New Black Panthers.

Refusing to prosecute African Americans for Civil Rights violations.

Ignoring a court order to ease up on restrictions against deep water drilling in the Gulf of Mexico, instead issuing tougher restrictions.

Circumventing the Senate by setting up a "shadow cabinet" of Czars.

Obama's Justice Department’s refusal to defend the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA). Ignoring his constitutional responsibility to defend laws passed by Congress.

Firing (and slandering) AmeriCorps inspector general Gerald Walpin after because he was investigating Sacramento Mayor Kevin Johnson a friend of the Obamas.

Practicing crony capitalism and wasting taxpayer money with Green energy loans to Solyndra and other failing companies.

No bid contract given to a company owned by major Obama donor for a small pox vaccine that doesn't work.

Fast and Furious: Giving guns to Mexican drug cartels in an attempt to take away guns from law abiding Americans.

Making recess appointments when congress was not in recess.

Trampling on the Catholic Church's first amendment rights by forcing them to pay for procedures and drugs that their faith bans.

The GSA and Secret Service scandals neither of which should be blamed on Obama directly, both of which show his poor management of the federal government.

Receiving foreign donations for his 2012 campaign.

Slashing the pensions of Delphi's non-union employees leaving the UAW employees' pensions alone.

The Administration purchasing bullets to drive up costs/ empty supply.

Prosecuting Thomas Drake, NSA whistle-blower who leaked unclassified information about government waste and fraud.

IRS Rejects KEY Inspector General Recommendations Designed To Prevent Another Scandal

2013-05-15T12:47:00.000-04:00

One of the thousands of "changing the light bulb" jokes asks, "how many psychiatrists does it take to change a light bulb?" the answer is "one--but first it has to want to change." Today we learned that the IRS does not want to change as it rejected key Inspector General recommendations to prevent another scandal like the one that broke Friday.

The inspector general recommended more transparency, that the IRS do a better job documenting the reasons why its agents believe certain applications need special attention, such as when they suspect a group’s political actions may be crossing a line that would disqualify it for tax-exempt status.

The IRS said it would review its procedures and decide if and how much more documentation was needed.

The report also recommended the IRS develop more standardized procedures for agents regarding how to process tax-exemption requests from groups they suspect aren’t be eligible due to political activity. It also suggested the new guidelines be posted to the internet to promote transparency to organizations on the application process.

Instead of the new guidelines the IRS said it will provide more training on how to handle potential political intervention matters.”

In both cases, the IRS suggested it worried the recommendations would further burden a system already fraught with lengthy delays. To make its point, the agency said that between 2008 and 2012 the number of groups seeking 501(c)(4) tax exemptions more than doubled.

The IRS added that much of its workload was dedicated to checking out the “numerous referrals from the public, media, watchdog groups and members of the Congress alluding that specific 501(c)(4) organizations were engaged in political campaign activity to an impermissible extent.”

But the inspector general said neither IRS alternative was good enough, adding that until the agency makes changes to close out all of its outstanding tax-exempt applications, “we do not consider the concerns in this report to be resolved.”

The IRS has always been seen as some big tyrannical organization lurking behind ever aspect of your lives, always ready to spring out with a letter, threat or audit. This scandal demonstrates that just like its reputation, the IRS may be able to away with almost everything. This agency needs to have more established rules and more transparency. If he truly wants to fix this IRS problem, President Obama should force the agency to accept and enact these recommendations in the Inspector General's report.

Newsbusted: NY Allows Minors To Buy Cigarettes (As Long As Plan B ABORTION Pills Purchased Also)

2013-05-15T12:07:00.000-04:00

There are some crazy new laws in the People's Republic of New York. Last week a federal Judge ruled that the Plan B Abortion pills should be open for purchase without age restriction. Governor Cuomo and his gun banning legislature took that as a signal for action. In a new exclusive report by Newsbusted anchor Jodie Miller (see video below) the legislature is promoting the sale of the Plan B Abortion pills with a special gift pack that will combine a box of the pills with a pack of cigarettes. Purchase of the special gift pack will not need parental approval.

Other news items covered in the latest installment of Newsbusted the weekly faux news feature from Newsbusters.org (embedded below) include; mainstream media explains why they did not cover the Gosnell trial, the AP/Justice Dept. "Scandal," the IRS Scandal; and much, much more

Please make sure you watch the video below because something bad always happens to the people who don't. Last week former President Obama forgot to press play and we all know what a crappy week he's had. So if you don't want to have a crappy week, you BETTER press play.

Oh and if you cannot see the video player below please click here

How Low Can Obama Go? Billy Graham??? THE IRS TARGETED BILLY-FREAKING-GRAHAM!

2013-05-14T20:12:00.002-04:00

There is a famous episode of All in the Family where Archie's Attorney Mr. Rabinowitz (selected because he was Jewish) gives his client the most sage advice, "In the court of law," Rabinowitz said "You NEVER argue with a station wagon full of nuns."

Obama's IRS may have violated what must be a corollary of that rule, when targeting conservatives do not go after Billy Graham.

According to Politico

The IRS came after Billy Graham, too, his son charged Tuesday in a letter to President Barack Obama.

Franklin Graham, the president of the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association and the family’s international humanitarian organization Samaritan’s Purse, said that the IRS notified the organizations in September that it was conducting a “review” of their activities for tax year 2010.

With the IRS admitting it gave extra scrutiny to conservative political organizations, Graham says he now believes that the review was part of an Obama administration effort of “targeting and attempting to intimidate us.”

The Billy Graham Evangelistic Association urging of voters to back “candidates who base their decisions on biblical principles and support the nation of Israel” during last year’s presidential race was the reason why IRS agents visited the North Carolina offices of both Graham groups, the letter accuses.

“While these audits not only wasted taxpayer money, they wasted money contributed by donors for ministry purposes as we had to spend precious resources servicing the IRS agents in our offices,” Graham wrote in the letter, which was shared with POLITICO. “I believe that someone in the administration was targeting and attempting to intimidate us. This is morally wrong and unethical – indeed some would call it ‘un-American.”

Graham said that “in light” of the IRS admission that it targeted tea party groups for added scrutiny, “I do not believe that the IRS audit of our two organizations last year is a coincidence – or justifiable.”

HOLY Cow! That's Billy Graham, targeting him is like tossing one's mother on the street, its like messing with baseball or ~~General Motors~~ (too late for that one). Graham is not only a preacher who can fill Yankee stadium but he is an American icon for God's sake! We are talking about a man who has preached personally to every president since Harry Truman (he played golf with many of them also). He even played golf with Bob Hope.

No matter what one's faith is Billy Graham is an American Treasure, by targeting Graham Obama's IRS has sunk lower than ever thought possible--even for this Administration.

Obama's Benghazi Claims Branded As LIES By BOTH Politifact AND WAPO Fact-Checker

2013-05-14T12:59:00.001-04:00

Perhaps the tide is turning maybe the mainstream media is beginning ever so slowly to gravitate toward its traditional role as "truth-tellers." At least two of the medias most popular fact-checkers ventured into that direction today as both Politifact AND WAPO Fact-Checker disputed some of the Obama Administration Claims as falsehoods.

The WAPO Fact-Checker gave Obama's Claim that he branded Benghazi as a terrorist action one day after the attack a Four Pinocchio rating. In other words he said it was a complete lie (are you listening Candy Crowley?).

Glen Kessler the Fact-Checker columnist examined what Obama said the day after the attack and what he said each time he was directly asked if Benghazi was a terrorist attack:

So, given three opportunities to affirmatively agree that the Benghazi attack was a terrorist attack, the president obfuscated or ducked the question.

In fact, as far as we can tell from combing through databases, Monday [yesterday's comments when he said the investigation was a side show] was the first time the president himself referred to Benghazi as an “act of terrorism.”....

... the president’s claim that he said “act of terrorism” is taking revisionist history too far, given that he repeatedly refused to commit to that phrase when asked directly by reporters in the weeks after the attack. He appears to have gone out of his way to avoid saying it was a terrorist attack, so he has little standing to make that claim now.

Indeed, the initial unedited talking points did not call it an act of terrorism. Instead of pretending the right words were uttered, it would be far better to acknowledge that he was echoing what the intelligence community believed at the time--and that the administration’s phrasing could have been clearer and more forthright from the start.

Obama, Candy Crowley and much of the mainstream media earned themselves Four Pinocchios from Mr. Kessler with that claim.

Politifact was much kinder to Jay Carney's claim that Ambassador Rice did not downplay terrorist involvement in Benghazi during her now infamous trip to the Sunday news shows. The press secretary only received a "mostly false" rating.

In the one interview of the five in which she mentioned al-Qaida at all, she urged caution about assuming they were involved. And while she did allow that "extremists" appeared to have been involved in the attack, she made a point of saying in every interview that these extremists got involved only by hijacking an ongoing event that protested the anti-Islam film, a narrative that gives almost a secondary role to the extremists. Meanwhile, in three of the five interviews, Rice specifically rejected the idea that Benghazi amounted to a preplanned terrorist attack.

Carney said that Rice "talked about the possibility that al-Qaida might be involved, or other al-Qaida affiliates might be involved, or non-al-Qaida Libyan extremists (might be involved), which I think demonstrates that there was no effort to play that down."

It’s true that Rice offered those three scenarios, but Carney is wrong to say she didn’t play them down. Rice barely mentioned the potential role of al-Qaida or one of its affiliates, and she urged caution about jumping to conclusions on the one occasion in which she did.

And while she did point to a role for "extremists," Rice made clear that the extremists didn’t pre-plan the attack, but instead hijacked a demonstration that was already under way.

Both decisions played down, to one degree or another, each of the three scenarios she mentioned. We rate Carney’s claim Mostly False.

Based on their track-records I would doubt that either of these fact-checkers would have come up with the same response a week ago before the Issa committee hearings. While each has tried to present facts in their respective columns, the have tended to interpret those facts to suit their own purposes. Today both of these columns were truth tellers, receiving four stars from this news junkie.

The AP Can't Complain Because Obama's Hubris Was Suckled at the Teat of the Mainstream Media

2013-05-14T08:05:00.001-04:00

Six months into his second administration Barack Obama's Presidency has become overrun with scandal. The events of the past seven days; the Benghazi hearings, the news about twelve revisions of the Benghazi talking points, the IRS scandal and yesterday's Justice Dept. attack on freedom of the Press via the AP phone records, is a lot of “distractions” during course of a four-year-term, however this is only one week. Presidents tend to have problems their second term--but Obama's second term problems seemed jacked up on steroids.

The Obama administration may be buckling under the weight of its own hubris, but they had help. Obama’s hubris suckled at the teat of the mainstream media.

In Benghazi, the administration told a tale of events which suited their own purposes--reelection. And just to make their story look good they ran advertising in the Muslim world apologizing for a YouTube video we now know had nothing to do with the attack. They also threw the video's creator in jail, where he still sits t as a political prisoner of an administration who does not believe in the First Amendment. The cover-up of Benghazi was undertaken because the administration believed they could get away with it--they had always gotten away with it before.

When criticism of the Administration's story line began to arise, those critics were told to back off, the President said they should back off here was nothing to see it’s all a political ploy. The mainstream media refused to look into the charges because Obama said it wasn’t so- for eight months they backed him up.

It didn't start with Benghazi; it began at the very beginning of his administration. Eric Holder dropped the charges against the New Black Panthers because his department felt that only Caucasians could commit voter intimidation, whistle blowers came out to say this justice department treated whites different than blacks. The media saw it as a non-story and Obama’s belief that he could get away with anything grew.

When other scandals began to break, Solyndra, Fast and Furious; when the $800 billion dollar stimulus was spent on useless pork, when the Obama Administration told lies about Obamacare, when the President made recess appointments even though the Senate was in session, when he sent our heroes to Libya without congressional approval or an exit plan--- every situation where a free press would investigate a government the press neglected its duty and instead echoed the "move on, nothing to see here" coming out of the White House. And Obama’s hubris grew.

When Mitt Romney who, whether you agree with his politics or not, is a decent man, was attacked personally with lies from Obama's campaign; that he hated women, he wanted people to drink dirty water, that he didn't pay taxes, or he caused the cancer death of a steelworkers wife, the press gave them a free ride. And still Obama’s hubris grew.

When grass roots Americans rose up to complain about the attack on personal freedoms and excessive government spending, the press joined with the administration ridiculing the people and their attacks on those Americans as racists. Obama knew the press would protect him.

Something seemed to change last Wednesday when a 20+-year civil servant (and a life-long Democrat) testified before the Issa committee telling the country the truth about Benghazi, what it felt like to live through that horror. He told a story much different than the "official" media/administration tale that he was ordered to stay silent even to a member of Congress. He told us how he tried to correct the Administration's lies and for that was demoted, ridiculed, and had any real authority taken away from him. The Administration still tries to tell us to move on, but this time it isn’t working.

On Friday we learned the IRS had been targeting this President's political opponents. Though his opponents have made these charges on and off for the past three years, the press had ridiculed those who had been wronged---conspiracy theorists they were called. But this time instead of feeding this President's hubris, they investigated and found that even Friday's story was a lie, it wasn't junior people in Cincinnati but a scandal that reached senior people in the IRS (and maybe higher).

Yesterday's story of the Justice Department secretly obtaining the phone records of the Associated Press was poetic justice. There was nothing illegal about it because the DOJ obtained a warrant from a Judge but it was a frightening attack on the first amendment right of freedom of speech; just as the Obamacare regulations about mandatory insurance for birth control and "day after pills", etc., were an attack on the first amendment right of freedom of religion. Why did the DOJ attack the freedom of the Press? Because they could! After all throughout all of the other scandals, throughout the attacks on our constitution, the press fed this administration’s hubris by ignoring the wrong, the scandal, the abuse of power.

But this time the Obama administration attacked a major press organization. Immediately the National Press Club complained about this affront to freedom of the press. The liberal media is complaining about this overreach of power.

In truth they have no right to. They created this “monster” whose hubris taught him he could get away with anything. Every single time they had an opportunity to explore Obama's actions, they shied away, thus feeding his sense of invulnerability. Why are they surprised when, like the monster created by Victor Frankenstein, their creation which lives on arrogance and entitlement-- attacks its creator the mainstream media.

Will the media’s desire for self-preservation force it to execute its responsibilities and thus seek the truth? Or after a few days of whining will it once again allow this President to build his arrogance, his hubris on the teat of the mainstream media?

Only time will tell.

CRAZY!! IRAN Will Be Chairing the UN Conference on Disarmament

2013-05-13T21:47:00.003-04:00

With each passing day, the United Nations becomes more irrelevant to anyone outside the progressive movement and/or the Obama Administration. The latest example of the failure of this institution is the news tha Iran will chair the United Nations’ most important disarmament negotiating forum during the panel’s May session, which opened today, sparking calls by an independent monitoring group for the U.S., the EU, and UN chief Ban Ki-moon to protest.

“This is like putting Jack the Ripper in charge of a women’s shelter,” said Hillel Neuer, executive director of UN Watch, the Geneva based non-governmental organization, which announced it will hold protest events outside the UN hall featuring Iranian dissidents.

“Iran is an international outlaw state that illegally supplies rockets to Syria, Hezbollah, and Hamas, aiding and abetting mass murder and terrorism. To make this rogue regime head of world arms control is simply an outrage. Abusers of international norms should not be the public face of the UN.”

U.N. officials say Iran’s post is merely the result of an automatic rotation.

But UN Watch rejected attempts to downplay what it described as “a fundamental conflict of interests” and “an act certain to be exploited by Iranian propaganda to legitimize the mullahs’ cruel regime.”

“UN Watch calls on U.S. Ambassador Susan Rice, EU High Commissioner Catherine Ashton, and UN chief Ban Ki-moon to make clear that when the United Nations imposes four rounds of sanctions on Iran for illicit nuclear activities, condemns it for illegally arming the murderous Syrian regime, and denounces Tehran’s massive abuse of human rights, this kind of appointment just defies common sense and harms the UN’s credibility,” said Neuer.

“Any member state that is the subject of UN Security Council sanctions for proliferation—and found guilty of massive human rights violations—should be ineligible to hold a leadership position in a UN body. The U.S. and Canada have asserted this principle in the past, and should do so again,” said Neuer.

UN Watch can complain all it wants the UN doesn't care. To this world body of peace, Iran is a member in good standing--they are all rainbows and unicorns despite the fact they are building nukes and threatening to use them against Israel and the US. It is "rogue nations" such the United States and Israel who will never be rotated into the chairmanship of this conference.

DOJ Associated Press/Scandal UPDATE National Press Club To Obama "WE WANT A PUBLIC EXPLANATION"

2013-05-13T17:01:00.002-04:00

This has not been a great couple of days for the Obama administration. In fact if one didn't know better they would think Obama was trying to destroy himself.

On top of Benghazi and the IRS Scandals, now there is breaking news that the Eric Holder's department of Justice obtained secretly procured two months of telephone records of reporters and editors for The Associated Press in what the news cooperative's top executive called a "massive and unprecedented intrusion" into how news organizations gather the news.

The records obtained by the Justice Department listed incoming and outgoing calls, and the duration of each call, for the work and personal phone numbers of individual reporters, general AP office numbers in New York, Washington and Hartford, Conn., and the main number for AP reporters in the House of Representatives press gallery, according to attorneys for the AP.

In all, the government seized those records for more than 20 separate telephone lines assigned to AP and its journalists in April and May of 2012. The exact number of journalists who used the phone lines during that period is unknown but more than 100 journalists work in the offices whose phone records were targeted on a wide array of stories about government and other matters.

In a letter of protest sent to Attorney General Eric Holder on Monday, AP President and Chief Executive Officer Gary Pruitt said the government sought and obtained information far beyond anything that could be justified by any specific investigation. He demanded the return of the phone records and destruction of all copies.

Why is the Justice department checking out the Associated Press, especially since they are pro Obama?

The government would not say why it sought the records. U.S. officials have previously said in public testimony that the U.S. attorney in Washington is conducting a criminal investigation into who may have leaked information contained in a May 7, 2012, AP story about a foiled terror plot. The story disclosed details of a CIA operation in Yemen that stopped an al-Qaida plot in the spring of 2012 to detonate a bomb on an airplane bound for the United States.

There is no justification for the action of the Department of Justice, that is not supposed to be the way the country works. Especially when you consider something called the First Amendment.

This scandal is going to alienate the media. In the end the general horror surrounding the IRS scandal and now this intrusion into the freedom of the press will definitely erode the Mainstream Media's overwhelming loyalty to this administration while they ignore the truth.

UPDATE: The National Press Club Wants a Public Explanation

In the wake of reports today that the Justice Department secretly obtained phone records of several of AP's reporters and four of its offices, the National Press Club requests that the Obama administration publicly explain the reasons behind the action.

The Justice Department disclosed to AP in a May 10 letter that the government had obtained last year two months of personal and professional phone records for individual AP reporters and from AP offices in the House press gallery and from AP bureaus in DC, New York and Hartford, Conn. The letter did not provide a reason why, AP said, but the targets of the government seizures and the timing suggested that it might be related to a probe of who leaked information to AP for a story the news organization broke last year about a bombing plot that had been organized by an Al Qaeda affiliate in Yemen.

AP President and CEO Gary Pruitt called the incident "a massive and unprecedented intrusion" into newsgathering and said the records could reveal how AP reporters and editors gather news and what they're working on.

"This appears to be a gross violation of press freedom," said National Press Club President Angela Greiling Keane, a Bloomberg News reporter. "If there's a good explanation for this, the public has a right to hear it promptly."

The National Press Club is the world's leading professional organization for journalists and is an ardent advocate of press freedom and open government.

I get the feeling Obama's friends in the mainstream media are NOT too Happy

BREAKING: Mass Murderer Kermit Gosnell Found Guilty of Three First-Degree Murder Charges

2013-05-13T15:27:00.000-04:00

Mass-Murderer Kermit Gosnell accused of killing four babies and a patient at a 'House of Horrors' clinic has been found guilty of three out of four first-degree murder charges.

Gosnell, 72, was cleared in the death of a fourth baby, who prosecutors say let out a soft whimper before he snipped its neck.

Gosnell also was accused in the death of Karnamaya Mongar, 41, who died of an anesthetic overdose during a second-trimester abortion at his West Philadelphia clinic. In that case, the jury found him guilty of involuntary manslaughter.

Gosnell was also found guilty of 21 counts of abortion of the unborn, 24 weeks or older. In Pennsylvania, abortions past 24 weeks are illegal unless the health of the mother is at stake.

Dr. Kermit Gosnell, 72, who ran the now-shuttered Women's Medical Society Clinic, could face the death penalty after the Common Pleas Court jury convicted him of severing babies' spines.

The verdict was reached just hours after the seven-woman, five-man jury, which has been deliberating for 10 days, sent out a handwritten note on Monday to say it was hung on two counts.

The Jury comes back next Tuesday to decide whether or not Gosnell should get the death penalty.

Jack McMahon, Gosnell's attorney, described the doctor as "disappointed" and "upset" over the verdict but said the defense team respected the jury's ruling.

"They obviously took their job seriously," McMahon said of the jury. "The verdict should be respected based on their effort."

More To Come

Obama To America-YOU DON'T DESERVE THE TRUTH!

2013-05-13T13:00:00.001-04:00

Understand very clearly what President Obama said today. During his Presser with British Prime Minister Davide Cameron, he called the controversy over Benghazi a "sideshow:

“The whole issue of talking points, frankly, throughout this process has been a sideshow,” Obama said, adding: “Suddenly, three days ago, this gets spun up as if there’s something new to the story. There’s no there there.”

Obama again said Republican are playing politics with something that shouldn’t be political. He noted that Republicans have used the issue for fundraising, as the Post first reported Friday.

Obama noted that the e-mails published Friday had been released by the White House months ago and scoffed at the notion that there was any kind of cover-up.

“The whole thing defies logic, and the fact that this thing keeps getting churned out quite frankly has a lot to do with political motivations,” Obama said.

He said diplomats shouldn’t be the subject of political gamesmanship.

“We dishonor them when we turn things like this into a political circus,” he said.

Despite the fact that there were brand new revelations during the committee hearings on Wednesday and ABC and the Weekly Standard on Friday, this President is trying to work the Progressive version of the Jedi mind trick on American voters. "These aren't the scandals you are looking for." It's already been proven that voters were lied to...Americans aren't that stupid. But with his comments today Barack Obama is calling Americans idiots...there is nothing here--the problem is we already found something there. The American people deserve the truth, but your President does not believe it so.

Posted Last July-Now More Relevant: DIRTY TRICKS--Major Romney Donor Target of TWO Federal Audits

2013-05-13T11:50:00.001-04:00

This post originally appeared on this site ten months ago. At the time I was called a conspiracy theorist. With all the latest news about the IRS targeting conservatives...this story is much more relevant and we can throw the conspiracy theorist bunk out the window... so I am re-posting below:

Do you believe in coincidences? On April 20th, Idaho businessman Frank VanderSloot found out he was on the Obama campaign "enemies list." Specifically he found himself listed on an Obama campaign website accusing him of being among eight wealthy individuals with less than reputable records.

VanderSloot, CEO of Melaleuca, an Idaho-based health and househould products company, has a rags-to-riches story that is a prototypical example of the American Dream. But he has a "dark side," at least according to the campaign to reelect the president (CREEP). He serves as co-chair on Mitt Romney’s national finance committee and is among the GOP nominee’s top donors, including $1 million contribution to the pro-Romney super-PAC, Restore Our Future.

When originally singled out, VanderSloot fought back, he spoke publicly about how such a list went against the grain of the freedom of expression outlined by the Constitution. Yesterday we learned that he is being punished by the Obama administration (unless you believe in coincidences). VanderSloot is now the target of two federal audits, one by the IRS the other by the Department of Labor.

One of the charges made against VanderSloot was that he is anti-Gay, to which he responds.

"I have many gay friends whom I love and respect. And I believe they love and respect me. I am very close to some of these very good people. Our company has thousands of gay customers, independent marketing executives, and employees. I believe they feel welcome and valued. I believe that people deserve freedom, respect, and privacy in their own lives. I believe that gay people should have the same freedoms and rights as any other individual.

Among other false rumors, the idea that Melaleuca outed Peter Zuckerman is absolutely false. I believe if someone were gay and did not want to disclose that, they should absolutely have the right to their own privacy. If anyone were to "out" a gay person against his or her will, I think that would be an extremely hurtful and wrong action. But, in the case of Peter Zuckerman, that is hardly what happened. For whatever reason, Peter had erred in his articles about the Boy Scouts by unfairly inferring that several innocent people were responsible for unknowingly aiding and abetting a pedophile. The people who knew the facts knew that the articles were inaccurate and sensationalized. (See what Melaleuca really said about Peter Zuckerman.)

In an interview with FoxNews.com on Tuesday the Idaho businessman , said he received the initial audit notice from the IRS last month. Two weeks later the Labor Department sent a notice saying the agency would be looking into records related to foreign employees working at his Idaho Falls cattle ranch.

Was this double whammy because of his business practices or because he gave money to super PAC “Restore of Future,” and stood up to CREEP when they put him and seven other successful individuals on their list.

“It seems coincidental, but who knows,” VanderSloot told FoxNews.com Tuesday. “The problem is the president made the list, and 61 days later I get the first letter. One has to ask: Is the fact I’m being shot at the result of having a target on my back? … Was the list made with that intent?”

VanderSloot expected some scrutiny, considering he is a co-chairman on the Romney campaign, and years of contributing to state and national races had already exposed him to the rough-and-tumble world of politics.

“I had never heard anybody say that,” said VanderSloot, who speculated the anti-gay claim is largely the result of him about 13 years ago opposing the film “It’s Elementary -- Talking about Gay Issues in School” airing on public TV because it was not suitable for viewing by young children.

“Ninety percent of my gay friends agreed,” he said.

Ironically back in May when the businessman appeared on "The Factor," he joked.

“Am I going to get a call from the FDA … or the IRS?” he said Tuesday, echoing his comments from the show.

VanderSloot doesn’t think President Obama directly ordered the audits, saying that with the publication of the so-called "enemy list" he became a target.

“I doubt he said, ‘Let’s get these guys,’ ” VanderSloot said.

VanderSloot also said the scrutiny has only strengthened his commitment to stay engaged in the political system.“I am not going to stay away,” he said. “This has given me even more resolve that we need a new president.”

Forty years ago a president was brought down precisely because of actions like this. His reelection campaign started with enemies lists and audits, then graduated to breaking and entering, and obstruction of Justice.

While it is entirely possible that the actions against VanderSloot are totally coincidental to his objections to the enemies list back in April, it smells to high heaven. This is president/administration that has shown it would do anything to get reelected; lie, share state secrets of our allies---anything. If they will share military intelligence, what makes on think that they wont try and intimidate a big Romney donor via audits.

While nothing can be proven, this seems like another example of just how low this President and his CREEP will go (and how much America needs a change at the top).

PIGS FLY! Snowballs in Hell! Obama Administration Bashed Twice on Morning Joe!!

2013-05-13T08:49:00.002-04:00

Maybe there is some hope left for the Mainstream Media. This morning Joe Scarborough had Tom Brokaw as a guest on Morning Joe, the 6-9am liberal news program on MSNBC. They began do discuss some of the Democratic positions on Benghazi and:

JOE SCARBOROUGH: [...] To play off what Senator Feinstein said, that it was evident from the very beginning this was a terror attack and yet Susan Rice is sent out five days later with talking points that have been changed from the CIA 12 times in 24 hours. The White House just not being straightforward about it from the very beginning. The Susan — Susan Rice calling [the attack a demonstration] five days after, is mind boggling.

TOM BROKAW: That is the part still inexplicable to me, the debate that is going on prior to her appearance, that is what is going on now about whether there could have been an appropriate military response, whether they were aware of what was going on. You cannot explain away Susan Rice’s performance on those Sunday talk shows in which she said it was not a terrorist attack and grew out of a domestic demonstration of some kind, she completely underplayed it and rewrote the script and I think we deserve to who it is. That is what the American public finally tuned into that was first public response and we have not had an adequate notice from the White House or anybody in the administration as to why she was allowed to say what she did. Did flags go off in her own mind? I mean she’s a sophisticated diplomat. Did she go down and say, wait a minute? But nonetheless she went on all of those shows in a very emphatic way and said it was not a terrorist attack and this grew out of a demonstration that it was spontaneous and that turned out to be not so true whatsoever.

This was followed with a discussion about the IRS scandal and both Brokaw and Chuck Todd bashed the President for his silence.

If you haven't done so yet...make sure to purchase a lottery ticket today. Because if Liberal's Tom Brokaw and Chuck Todd both criticize the administration on the same day--both on the Morning Joe Show---well who knows what other miracles are possible.

Anybody see flying pigs?

Does Jay Carney Believe His Own Bull Sh*t?

2013-05-13T06:52:00.001-04:00

Friday was another tour de force for White House Press Secretary Jay Carney. He tap danced around the brand spanking new IRS scandal by pointing out the head of the agency was a Bush appointee (true) and that the IRS was an independent agency (false, its part of the Treasury Dept.).

"I.R.S. is an independent enforcement agency," said Carney. "The -- which I believe, as I understand it, contains only two political appointees within it. The individual who is running the I.R.S. at the time was actually an appointee from the previous administration."

Backed against a wall because of the Jonathan Karl revelation about 12 versions of the Benghazi talking points, at the same press update he blamed the scandal on Mitt Romney and John McCain for making it political. Carney has long passed the line where he was "spinning" for the president and now operates out of some mythical area where fantasy become reality.

Typical Jay Carney, but it makes one wonder...does he really believe his own Bull Sh*t? Most of the time he looks as if he really believes the lies he is spewing in the name of the President, even when he is giving spin so ridiculous that one expects him to break out laughing and announce "April Fools!."

The guy was an award winning journalist. Carney was Time's Washington Bureau Deputy Chief from 2003 to 2005, and Chief from September 2005 until December 2008. He was assigned to the magazine’s Washington Bureau in that tenure while also being able to write about politics and national affairs. Carney has also worked for CNN as a special correspondent--we are talking strong MSM credentials.

Does Carney go home at nigh upset that he has sold his soul for a chance to be near the seat of power? Is the guy upset that he has to repeat the same lies over and over again--without making it seem like a joke? Do you wonder if he wants to say "Hey guys you ever hear the one about the Benghazi talking points?" before he repeated the same story long proven to be false:

“Those talking points originated from the intelligence community. They reflect the IC’s best assessments of what they thought had happened,” Carney told reporters at the White House press briefing on November 28, 2012. “The White House and the State Department have made clear that the single adjustment that was made to those talking points by either of those two institutions were changing the word ‘consulate’ to ‘diplomatic facility’ because ‘consulate’ was inaccurate.”

Did Jay Carney mean it when he got a bit cranky because of a series of pointed questions asking if the president should be traveling less/scheduling fewer golf trips rather than taking away the American People's access to their White House? After all some of those same reporters might remember that Reporter Jay Carney criticized George Bush for taking vacations. Did he believe it when he said that the New Egyptian President believed in religious tolerance? Or when he said that Bush did not believe that Jerusalem was Israel's Capital even though that was not true?

I wonder if Carney believes himself when he blames things on Bush, The CIA, The Secret Service, everyone but his boss--the man in charge.

In 2016 the Obama administration will be done with...and Jay Carney will have to find a new job. Does he believe his own Bull Sh*t enough to try to get a job working with the people he's lied to for 4+years? After all when a reporter sells his soul, the only thing a journalist has--his honesty to be close to the seat of power, eventually he will have to pay up. Pretty soon Carney will have to stop lying and start paying the price for his own "Bull Sh*t" whether he believes it or not, because the rest of us do not believe it in the least.

IRS Targeting of Conservative Groups Started in 2010-Ended in 2012

2013-05-12T20:37:00.002-04:00

One of the things we were told by Lois Lerner on Friday was as soon as the targeting of conservative groups was discovered it was stopped. However today's news shows the IRS employee who admitted she was bad at math is also lousy at calendars. The targeting of certain types of groups had fits and starts but lasted well after it was first discovered. And the IRS wasn't only singling out groups by their names but also by their political philosophy.

"From February through August 2010, no official criteria [for the heightened review] existed, but specialists had been asked to be on the lookout for Tea Party applications, and the IRS Determinations Unit had begun searching its database for applications with 'Tea Party,' 'Patriots,' or '9/12' in the organization's name as well as other 'political sounding' names," according to the detailed Treasury inspector general findings.

By June 2011, some IRS specialists were probing applications using the following criteria to identify tea-party cases, according to the Treasury inspector general findings: "'Tea Party,' 'Patriots' or '9/12 Project' is referenced in the case file; issues include government spending, government debt or taxes; education of the public by advocacy/lobbying to 'make America a better place to live'; statements in the case file criticize how the country is being run."

This information comes from documents in an audit conducted by the agency’s inspector general.

At the end of June 2011:

RS staffers held a briefing with senior agency official Lois G. Lerner in which they described giving special attention to instances where “statements in the case file criticize how the country is being run.” Lerner, who oversees tax-exempt groups for the agency, raised objections and the agency revised its criteria a week later.

But six months later, the IRS applied a new political test to groups that applied for tax-exempt status as “social welfare” groups, the document says. On Jan. 15, 2012 the agency decided to target “political action type organizations involved in limiting/expanding Government, educating on the Constitution and Bill of Rights, social economic reform movement.,” according to the appendix in the IG report, which was requested by the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee and has yet to be released.

According to the Inspector Generals report, the IRS did not adopt a more neutral test for social welfare groups until May 17, 2012 almost a year after Lerner learned was first informed about the problem.

At that point, the IRS again updated its criteria to focus on “organizations with indicators of significant amounts of political campaign intervention (raising questions as to exempt purpose and/or excess private benefit.)”

And we also know its wasn't just right-wing groups, but the pro-Israel group Z-street has been suing the IRS since 2010 because their application was for tax-exempt status was delayed (according to the IRS) the organization was “connected to Israel,” and needed additional scrutiny.

Its yet to be seen where the IRS got its "marching orders" to target conservative and Israel-related groups. I am sure any investigation by Congress will be called by the Democrats "politically motivated.

Why Benghazi Is So Incredibly Important

2013-05-12T12:52:00.004-04:00

By Barry Rubin

There is something terribly and tragically and importantly symbolic about the Benghazi attack that may be lost in the tidal wave of details about what happened on September 11, 2012, in an incident where four American officials were murdered in a terrorist attack. This point stands at the heart of everything that has happened in American society and intellectual life during the last decade.

And that point is this:

America was attacked once again on that September 11, attacked by al-Qaida in an attempt to destroy the United States—as ridiculous as that goal might seem. Yet the U.S. government blamed the attack on America itself.

Other reasons can be adduced for the official position that what happened that day was due to a video insulting Islam rather than to a terrorist attack, but this is the factor of overwhelming importance. It transformed the situation in the following ways:

Muslims were the victims of American misbehavior, a point emerging from the administration’s wider worldview of U.S. aggression and Third World suffering, as in the lectures of all those left-wing anti-American academics and the sermons of Jeremiah Wright.

“Hate speech” and racism (as “Islamophobia” is often reconfigured) was the cause of troubles.

While freedom of speech and such liberties should be defended they must be limited in some ways to prevent further trouble.

America’s proper posture should be one of apology, as in the advertisements that Secretary of State Hilary Clinton made for the Pakistani and other media.

The misblaming, to coin a word, on the video showed terrorist groups that not only can they attack Americans but they can do so without fear of punishment or even of blame! As the House of Representatives' hearings show, the misattribution of responsibility also delayed the FBI's investigation, perhaps conclusively so.

The exercise of American power has been the cause of America’s problems and not an excess of appeasement. The chickens—in Wright’s phrase—are merely coming home to roost. Yet once the video—which nobody in the Middle East was aware of—there were in fact further anti-American riots in different countries, now over the video which Clinton and others made known, and in which dozens of people died. This showed that appeasement and apology caused worse problems.

The solution to these Middle East conflicts required a change in U.S. policies in order to avoid further offense. This meant distancing from Israel and even historic Arab allies, showing respect and encouragement even for “moderate” Islamist movements, and other measures.

In short, this is the stance of blaming America and exonerating its enemies that has seized hold of the national consciousness.

Of course, parallel responses met the Boston bombing as the mass media and academics scrambled to give alternative explanations to the terrorists’ motives.

The truth is, however, extremely simple: The United States faces a revolutionary Islamist movement that will neither go away nor moderate itself. To understand this movement and its ideology, how it is and is not rooted in Islam, its weaknesses and divisions, the forces willing to help combat it, and ways to devise strategies to battle it is the prime international need for the moment.

It is as necessary to do these things for revolutionary Islamism today as it was to do the same things regarding Nazism in the 1930s and 1940s; and for Communism in the 1940s and 1950s.

Yet the U.S. armed forces and other institutions are forbidden from holding this inquiry.

There are, of course, additional issues raised, though many of them also have far deeper significance:

The failure of the Obama Administration to defend and rescue Americans in Benghazi is equivalent to its failures to defend American interests around the world.

The fear of using American power in Libya that day parallels the overall retreat from the traditional bipartisan policies of credibility, deterrence, and all the other things in a great power’s lexicon.

The standpoint that it is better to let Americans die than to risk offending certain groups. That might seem harsh but when it was decided not to send a rescue mission that was precisely what was happening.

A lack of competence by a president who didn't know his duty and by high-ranking subordinates who would not remind him of that duty.

The perfect symbolism of the president of the United States going to sleep in the face of a crisis, the living embodiment of a 2008 election ad by his opponent about whether he would deal with a crisis that erupted at 3 AM

The perfect symbolism of the secretary of state being the one who did that ad and who said, "What difference does it make" regarding the attackers' motives.

The fact that the cover-up seems to be involved with the administration's need to declare victory over al-Qaida. Not only is that claim untrue but the idea that if al-Qaida is defeated there is no more threat from revolutionary Islamism is the central bad theme of Administration Middle East policy.

The issue of why the ambassador was in Benghazi that day. Remember that President Obama stood before the United Nations General Assembly and said that he was there to plan a new school and hospital wing. Was he telling an outright lie?

Was the ambassador there in:

An attempt to retrieve advanced weapons previously provided to Libyan Islamist groups in the war against the Qadhafi dictatorship because they could be turned against America? Well, such weapons were turned against America that day. If so, the situation showed the bankruptcy of the pro-Islamist policy.

An effort to funnel weapons to the Syrian rebels, in a policy likely to repeat the problems in Libya? If so, the situation showed the bankruptcy of the pro-Islamist policy.

A policy of negotiating some kind of deals with extreme and anti-American Islamist terrorists? If so, the situation showed the bankruptcy of the pro-Islamist policy.

And finally what could be more symbolic than the hiring of Islamist terrorists to guard the consulate, men who deserted or even turned their guns against the Americans there? It is truly symbolic because the Obama Administration has turned to Islamists—in Egypt, Tunisia, Turkey, Syria, and elsewhere--in the belief that they are best suited to guard U.S. interests in the Middle East.

In discussing the Benghazi affair none of these broader issues should be forgotten. It was not merely an order for the American rescue forces to “stand down” but for the United States to bow down.

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-------------------- Barry Rubin is director of the Global Research in International Affairs (GLORIA) Center and editor of the Middle East Review of International Affairs (MERIA) Journal. His next book, Nazis, Islamists and the Making of the Modern Middle East, written with Wolfgang G. Schwanitz, will be published by Yale University Press in January 2014. His latest book is Israel: An Introduction, also published by Yale. Thirteen of his books can be read and downloaded for free at the website of the GLORIA Center including The Arab States and the Palestine Conflict, The Long War for Freedom: The Arab Struggle for Democracy in the Middle East and The Truth About Syria. His blog is Rubin Reports. His original articles are published at PJMedia.

Protesting The Koch Brothers--Good To Hear The Left Also Wastes Their Own Money

2013-05-10T14:12:00.001-04:00

Boy oh boy those progressives sure like to throw away money, but sometimes its really nice to see them wasting their money instead of the tax payers hard earned cash. Specifically two progressive groups (Courage Campaign Institute and Forecast the Facts) will be running ads on the Web sites of the Los Angeles Times and The New York Times (for readers in the LA area) to protest the possibility of the Koch brothers purchasing the LA Times.

The ad shows the Koch brothers, Charles and David, alongside Tribune chairman Bruce Karsh and Oaktree Capital chairman Howard Marks, manipulating the LAT on puppet strings, with the headline “Save the Newspaper!”

The ad encourages readers to sign an online pledge to stop reading and subscribing to the newspaper if Tribune sells it to the Koch brothers.

Courage Campaign Institute is a LBGT advocacy group and Forecast the Facts is a proponent of the Global Warming Hoax. The groups saythey oppose the Koch brothers’ bid because they fear the Koch brothers will use the LAT as a platform for their conservative agenda.

CCI founder and chair Rick Jacobs stated: “The Koch brothers want to buy the biggest paper in California and the fourth largest in the nation so they can set the debate, not cover it.”

Previously, the same groups delivered a petition signed by 250,000 people opposing the potential sale to the Koch brothers to the LAT headquarters.

However, these protests -- along with demands that Advance sell the newspaper to another publisher that would commit to continuing daily publication -- were rebuffed.

The Koch brothers are large donors to conservative causes and think tanks, and they may very well change the LAT from a paper that advocates the progressive agenda to one that advocates a right of center agenda (a right of center newspaper would be a novel experience for this country as most of the mainstream media tilts toward the left).

But let these folks raise more money for more ads--they won't work but every dollar they spend on this effort is one less dollar spend on something they may be able to influence.

IRS VS.Conservatives UPDATE: IRS Has a Disastrous Presser (PLUS It's Bush's Fault)

2013-05-10T11:21:00.003-04:00

Scroll down for Update

There is that old line about paranoia..sometimes they really are after you.

Such is the case with the IRS who in a just released story by the Associated Press admits to targeting conservative organizations' tax exempt status during the 2012 Presidential election period.

Lois Lerner, who heads the IRS unit that oversees tax-exempt groups, said organizations that included the words "tea party" or "patriot" in their applications for tax-exempt status were singled out for additional reviews.

Lerner said the practice, initiated by low-level workers in Cincinnati, was wrong and she apologized while speaking at a conference in Washington.

Many conservative groups complained during the election that they were being harassed by the IRS. They said the agency asked them an inordinate number of questions to justify their tax-exempt status.

In some cases, groups were asked for their list of donors, which violates IRS policy in most cases, she said.

“That was wrong. That was absolutely incorrect, it was insensitive and it was inappropriate. That’s not how we go about selecting cases for further review,” Lerner said at a conference sponsored by the American Bar Association.

“The IRS would like to apologize for that,” she added.

About 75 groups were inappropriately targeted. None had their tax-exempt status revoked, Lerner said.

...And they are sorry...does that make YOU feel better? (me neither).

This is no surprise, back in March, Michelle Malkin talked about Mark Levin's Landmark Legal foundation suing the IRS for just that reason:

…inquiries about personal associations and political viewpoints are not only inappropriate, but impinge upon constitutionally-protected freedoms of speech and association.

Although the Internal Revenue Code has limited the tax exemption subsidy ofSOI(c)(3) organizations to groups that do not participate in political activity, the Service must still tread lightly when dealing with fundamental constitutional rights. Inquiring about the positions a prospective organization adopts on various policy issues serves no valid purpose if the organization does not engage in political activity. Such inquiries appear to be designed only to intimidate the applicants. As it has been upheld repeatedly by the Supreme Court, the government cannot regulate political speech with laws that chill permissible speech. Finally, reports that Tea Party-related organizations are being singled out for the IRS’s intrusive inquires raises serious questions about the propriety of the personnel involved in the evaluation of tax
exemption applications.

Landmark Legal Foundation respectfully requests an immediate and thorough investigation to determine whether IRS employees are acting improperly in the evaluation of exempt status applications. This investigation also must determine whether the relevant IRS employees are acting at the direction of politically motivated superiors.

Gee Whiz and I thought we only had to worry about the press targeting conservatives. It certainly makes one even more paranoid about the fact the IRS is also going to be enforcing Obamacare.

...More to come

UPDATE: This is quickly becoming another disaster for the Obama Administration:

Lois Lerner held a press conference with reporters trying to track down more facts about the story of the IRS targeting conservative groups. At one point during the call Ms Learner said something one shouldn't hear from someone who works at the IRS

“I’m not good at math,” she confessed as she tried to summon a statistic.

Not only was the Press Conference a disaster for Ms. Lerner, but during his briefing Jay Carney blamed the misuse of the IRS as the fault of the previous administration.

WAPO reports why the presser may have done the IRS more harm than good:

IRS officials claimed that there was no political bias behind the targeting of these conservative groups, but they failed to produce any examples of similar targeting of groups with non-conservative-sounding names. Initially, they suggested that other non-conservative-sounding names might have been targeted. By the end of the call, though, Lerner acknowledged: “I only said that because I never like to say ‘absolutely not.’ I don’t have any information on that.”

Lerner wouldn’t say whether anyone is being disciplined, then appeared to say there was no disciplinary action, then went back to saying she wouldn’t comment. Federal personnel rules appear to prohibit Lerner from discussing discipline, so she has some justification for not commenting. But that justification was never explained, and instead she was pressed repeatedly on why she wouldn’t discuss discipline.

Lerner said she disclosed the information because someone asked her about it Friday morning — indicating that she had no plans to release the information publicly, despite the confirmed wrongdoing.

When asked how they found out about the wrongdoing, Lerner said the investigation stemmed from media reports about conservative groups claiming that they were targeted, not from any internal review.

Lerner and her staff tried to get off the phone call after less than half an hour of questioning, but Columbia Journalism Review reporter (and Pulitzer Prize winner) David Cay Johnston informed them that they had better stay and answer everyone’s questions. They stayed on the call for another 20 minutes. By the end, they said Lerner had to get to some appointments and cited the “repetitive” line of questioning. Johnston informed them that it was because they weren’t answering the questions.

Yikes But then for Comic Relief there is always Jay Carney who said:

"I.R.S. is an independent enforcement agency," said Carney. "The -- which I believe, as I understand it, contains only two political appointees within it. The individual who is running the I.R.S. at the time was actually an appointee from the previous administration."

The Blame Bush video is below: