The Hemingway Report

Obamaism

noreply@blogger.com (Merchant of Venom) — Thu, 23 May 2013 12:03:00 +0000

Is Carney told what to say?

Or does he just ad-lib as he goes along.

Barry and his thugs have created a government in which there is now no reality. Nobody is in charge of anything and senior people don't manage anyone. Nobody remembers anything. Nobody is accountable for anything. Nobody talks to anybody. Somebody unnamed somewhere is responsible for a plethora of scandals but nobody knows who they are. In short, the federal government, according to them, has no clue as to what is going on. A country governed so corruptly cannot possibly last. This is nothing but lie piled upon lie piled upon lie. We are now the government of North Korea on a larger scale. To avoid their corruption being outed, these crooks plead the "Idiot's Defense." We have no idea what the hell we are doing. We are poorly managed and therefore cannot possibly get a handle on anything. Nobody here has seen or heard anything. We wait to hear about what we have actually done throughout the work day when it is reported on the nightly news.

The arrogance of these bastards is truly astounding. I checked Wikipedia. Ken Starr is still sucking air. Better get him off the bench. BTW...Anyone see the backlash if this happened under Bush?

Thomas Jefferson words ring more true today then when he first spoke them almost 200 years ago.

When the people fear the government, there is tyranny. When the government fears the people, there is liberty.

FBI spied on Fox News reporter, accused him of crime

noreply@blogger.com (Merchant of Venom) — Tue, 21 May 2013 11:11:00 +0000

What is this? The Gestapo? I guess the despicable Joe Soptic ads and watching Paul Ryan pushing grandma off a cliff in her wheelchair were just the tip of the iceberg. Now we are getting a better feel for the depth of their... shall we say "improprieties". This administration is inundated with corruption from top to bottom and is lying through its teeth? In the manner of testimony they're all in concert. When asked a question the go to response is..."I don't know".

Solyndra, Fast and Furious, Voter intimidation, MF Global, Benghazi, IRS, AP Wiretapping, etc.

How many additional scandals must occur before Congress appoints a Special Prosecutor?

BTW...they ought to try "Stedman" for terrorism. He's gotten more people killed then Dzhokhar Tsarnaev.

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WASHINGTON — The FBI obtained a sealed search warrant to read a Fox News reporter's personal emails from two days in 2010 after arguing there was probable cause he had violated espionage laws by soliciting classified information from a government official, court papers show.

In an affidavit, an FBI agent told a federal magistrate that the reporter had committed a crime when he asked a State Department security contractor, Stephen Jin-Woo Kim, to share secret material about North Korea in June 2009.

The affidavit did not name the reporter, but Fox News identified him as its chief Washington correspondent, James Rosen. He was not charged, but Kim was indicted on espionage charges in August 2010 and is awaiting trial. He has denied leaking classified information.

The case marks the first time the government has gone to court to portray news gathering as espionage, and Fox News officials and 1st Amendment advocates reacted angrily Monday after the secret warrant was reported by the Washington Post.

"We are outraged to learn today that James Rosen was named a criminal co-conspirator for simply doing his job as a reporter," said Michael Clemente, Fox News executive vice president of news. "In fact, it is downright chilling. We will unequivocally defend his right to operate as a member of what up until now has always been a free press."

The development emerged days after the Justice Department notified the Associated Press that the agency used a subpoena last year to obtain phone company records for 20 telephone lines used by more than 100 reporters and editors in three cities. The subpoena was pursuant to a grand jury investigation of an alleged leak of classified information about an Al Qaeda plot to bomb a U.S. aircraft.

Neither Fox News nor the Associated Press was told in advance about the government actions or had a chance to challenge them in court, the usual practice. The government ordered Google not to disclose that it had given the FBI access to Rosen's Gmail account, and Chief Judge Royce Lamberth of the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia confirmed in a September 2010 ruling that the government did not have to notify Rosen.

A federal statute, the Privacy Protection Act, normally bars the government from using a search warrant to seize a reporter's notes or communications as part of a broader criminal investigation. But the law allows an exception if the reporter is specifically accused of committing a crime.

"There is probable cause to believe that the reporter has committed or is committing a violation of [the Espionage Act] as an aider and abettor and/or co-conspirator," FBI Agent Reginald B. Reyes wrote in a May 28, 2010, application for a search warrant. "Because of the reporter's own potential criminal liability in this matter, we believe that requesting the voluntary production of the materials from reporter would be futile and would pose a substantial threat to the integrity of the investigation and of the evidence we seek to obtain by the warrant."

Alan Kay, the magistrate judge in Washington who signed the search warrant, was not available for comment, his office said Monday. The warrant and application were unsealed in November 2011, but they escaped public notice until now.

"It's hardly clear cut that it violates the 1st Amendment," said Geoffrey R. Stone, professor at the University of Chicago Law School and a 1st Amendment expert. "If in private discourse you try to persuade someone to commit a crime, you can be punished for doing so. The question here is whether the motive for doing it changes things."

No reporter has ever been charged under the Espionage Act, a 1917 law that criminalizes unauthorized disclosure of "national defense information" with intent or reason to believe the information "is to be used to the injury of the United States."

Rosen's role stems from his Fox News story on June 11, 2009, that "U.S. intelligence officials have warned President Obama and other senior American officials that North Korea intends to respond to the passage of a U.N. Security Council resolution this week — condemning the communist country for its recent nuclear and ballistic missile tests — with another nuclear test."

The story said the CIA had learned the information "through sources inside North Korea."

FBI agents subsequently determined that 95 people had authorized access to the highly classified intelligence that Rosen had cited. The FBI alleged that phone records, emails and other records showed Kim was in direct contact with Rosen.

"From the beginning of their relationship, the reporter asked, solicited and encouraged Mr. Kim to disclose sensitive United States internal documents and intelligence information … by employing flattery and playing to Mr. Kim's vanity and ego," Reyes wrote in his affidavit.

He said the reporter "instructed Mr. Kim on a covert communications plan ... to facilitate communication." The affidavit said they used nicknames in subsequent emails and asterisks as signals if Kim wanted to talk by phone.

"What makes this alarming is that 'soliciting' and 'encouraging' the disclosure of classified information are routine, daily activities in national security reporting," researcher Steven Aftergood wrote Monday on his Secrecy News blog. "The use of pseudonyms and discreet forms of communication are also commonplace. But for today's FBI, these everyday reporting techniques are taken as evidence of criminal activity and grounds for search and seizure of confidential email."

When the order to "stand down" SHOULD have be given

noreply@blogger.com (Merchant of Venom) — Sun, 19 May 2013 16:41:00 +0000

What self respecting man would allow another to hold an umbrella over his head?

☟

Guess I answered my own question.

New scientific study says people have grown dumber

noreply@blogger.com (Merchant of Venom) — Sun, 19 May 2013 16:30:00 +0000

One further piece of evidence is Obama is POTUS.

The average intelligence level of a Victorian-era person was higher than a modern-era person, a European research team posits in a report published last week in the journal Intelligence.

The research flies in the face of current assumptions of the Flynn Effect, which states that basic intelligence levels — measured through IQ tests — have risen since the 1930s.

IQ tests have been criticized, however, for reflecting bias toward certain cultures and education levels, while reaction times to stimuli might reflect "true intelligence" — the shorter the reaction time, the smarter the person.

European researchers Michael Woodley, Jan te Nijenhuis and Raegan Murphy compared reaction times to stimuli between people in the Victorian-era and modern-era people between 1884 to 2004.

The Victorian-era is a period of British history between the beginning of Queen Victoria's reign in 1837 until her death in 1901.

In their study, the researchers found that reaction times have slowly increased over time.

"For men, the increase was found to be 183ms to 253ms; for women the increase was from 188ms to 261ms," Phys.org reported.

"The researchers claim this proves that people have grown 'less clever' over time," wrote the publication, noting that a possible explanation for the decline is that smart people reproduce less than less intelligent people.

'We could lose everything': Tea Party groups prepare to sue IRS

noreply@blogger.com (Merchant of Venom) — Sat, 18 May 2013 12:17:00 +0000

Prelude to the article below

Forget about resignations, people need to go to jail over this!

I have to plead ignorant about the existence of the American Center for Law and Justice (ACLJ). But it did turn my attention to the ACLU.

I got this from Wikipedia:

The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) is a nonpartisan non-profit organization whose stated mission is "to defend and preserve the individual rights and liberties guaranteed to every person in this country by the Constitution and laws of the United States."

Watergate Era:

The ACLU was the first organization to call for the impeachment of Richard Nixon.

The ACLU supported The New York Times in its 1971 suit against the government, requesting permission to publish the Pentagon papers. The court upheld the Times and ACLU in the New York Times Co. v. United States ruling, which held that the government could not preemptively prohibit the publication of classified information and had to wait until after it was published to take action.

As the Watergate saga unfolded, the ACLU became the first national organization to call for Nixon's impeachment. This, following the resolution opposing the Vietnam war, was a second major decision that caused critics of the ACLU, particularly conservatives, to claim that the ACLU had evolved into a liberal political organization.

Where are they now?

I guess the last sentence sums it up.

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WASHINGTON – Jay Devereaux hadn't paid much attention to the daily drumbeat of partisan politics in D.C. He wasn't a Washington nerd, and didn't know who said what during congressional hearings -- nor did he care.

But when news broke that the government was using taxpayer money to bail out Wall Street banks, he started paying attention and didn't like what he was hearing.

So the Florida father and information technology specialist decided to form a group, Unite in Action, to educate people in his area about the issues, he said. It was originally formed as a corporation before Devereaux decided to apply for tax-exempt status from the IRS.

That was two years ago. It was never approved.

"It's all but killed us," Devereaux told FoxNews.com. "We could lose everything. Today, it's me and my organization, but tomorrow it could be you."

Devereaux is among a group of activists, being represented by the American Center for Law and Justice, who are preparing to sue the federal government for the practice of targeting Tea Party groups. ACLJ Executive Director Jordan Sekulow told FoxNews.com he'll likely file the civil suits next Wednesday or Thursday on behalf of more than a dozen Tea Party groups who say they were singled out by the IRS and had their tax-exempt status severely delayed or denied altogether.

The suits, combined with congressional inquiries and an FBI probe, signal that the heated hearing on Capitol Hill Friday – with the outgoing IRS chief – was just the start of a protracted legal and political battle over the scandal.

Sekulow said the number of plaintiffs in the civil suit are growing as is the list of who his organization wants held accountable. It's still unclear whether the organization will file as a class-action or individually in the 17 different states where the complaints originate.

Litigation could take months or years and for some like Devereaux, time isn't on their side.

While initially waiting for IRS approval, Devereaux dipped into his own bank account, maxed out credit cards and even borrowed money from friends so his group could put on a civic-engagement training session at the Omni Shoreham hotel in Washington. His goal was to eventually set up a steady stream of revenue for a tax-exempt nonprofit.

The next time Devereaux heard from the IRS, they had requested details and credentials on every single speaker and all the educational materials provided in the 78 classes held at the hotel. The IRS also wanted information on all 45 vendors, their credentials and a donor list.

Devereaux refused.

Five rounds of IRS letters later, and United in Action's tax-exempt status is still in limbo.

If they are denied, Devereaux's group would owe the federal government "somewhere in the neighborhood of $70,000 in back taxes," he said, referring to money he would owe the government on donations.

"It's more than we have in our bank account," he said.

He's not alone.

Waco Tea Party President Toby Walker said her group applied for a 501(c)(4) status in July 2010. She'd call the IRS from time to time to check on the progress but was basically told, 'Don't call us, we'll call you,' she said.

Then in February 2012, the IRS finally made contact.

Walker said she was asked questions that went well beyond the purview of the agency's authority. They wanted to know everything about the Waco Tea Party group, their relationships with public officials, lists of volunteers and every single news story the group had ever been mentioned in.

Walker said the request was so lengthy and intrusive that had she complied with the demands, she "would have needed a U-haul truck of about 20 feet."

While Walker's group was finally granted tax-exempt status in March 2013, she said a lot of damage has already been done. She said people were afraid to support her group financially because they had not received the IRS-stamped status.

Others were afraid that they might be targeted by the IRS if they supported Walker's group publicly. Having one of the most powerful government agencies angry at them wasn't a risk many people were willing to take. And so the group suffered, she said.

"We spent thousands of our own dollars fighting this," she said. "If this happens to one organization in America, we should all be outraged."

Allegations that the IRS had been targeting conservative groups that applied for tax-exempt status date back years but a government report released Wednesday backed up the claims. The White House has spent most of the week trying to contain the fallout from the scandal. "Americans are right to be angry about it, and I am angry about it," President Obama said earlier this week.

By Friday, two of the agency's top tax officials had been removed from their posts. One, outgoing acting IRS commissioner Steven Miller, was grilled Friday morning in the House Ways and Means Committee by Republican and Democratic lawmakers who demanded answers on why the unfair practice of targeting conservative groups was allowed to continue on his watch.

Lame duck to sitting duck seemingly overnight

noreply@blogger.com (Merchant of Venom) — Thu, 16 May 2013 19:24:00 +0000

Scandals prompt comparisons between Nixon,

Obama administrations

"The good news is we can fix this," Obama said last night.

Let's start with his impeachment.

Boehner said, "It's not a matter of who is responsible, but who is going to jail." I hope he lives up to his words. So much for the low level employees. Acting (in more ways then one) IRS Commissioner Steven Miller who was leaving in June anyway has resigned but he was appointed in 2012 long after much of the "inappropriate behavior" as Barry likes to call it took place. I like his choice of words. He is the master of misdirection. Another classic in the same vein was workplace violence.

Blaming the video for Benghazi is troubling to say the least. But the real issue for me is the "stand down" order. When you allow 4 Americans to die, in effect their ass hung out to dry, so in won't interfere with his reelection prospects goes to show just how despicable this guy really is. Remember now, he was so overwrought regarding Benghazi the only cure he could find was to go on a fundraiser in Las Vegas the very next day!

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The chorus of comparisons between President Obama and the only president to resign in disgrace is growing by the day, as the administration's scandals appear to pile up.

Whether the comparisons are fair or not, columnist George Will perhaps led the charge -- after citing the Article of Impeachment against President Nixon in an opinion piece this week.

Will recalled the line: "He has, acting personally and through his subordinates and agents, endeavored to cause, in violation of the constitutional rights of citizens, income tax audits or other income tax investigations to be initiated or conducted in a discriminatory manner."

Scores of websites and blogs have since invoked the Nixon comparison, as did Sen. Orrin Hatch, who speaking to reporters about the IRS scandal said Tuesday, "I've never seen anything quite like this, except in the past during the Nixon years."

The Boston Herald's front page on Tuesday was also emblazoned with the headline, "I Know Nothing," with a sub-headline reading: "(coincidentally, that's what Nixon said.)"

The president is dealing with several scandals at once, including the fallout from the Benghazi terror attack, the Justice Department's seizing of phone records from the Associated Press and the IRS' program of singling out Tea Party and other groups for scrutiny.

While Obama has called the IRS targeting of conservatives "outrageous," and late Wednesday announced the resignation of acting IRS Commissioner Steven Miller, investigations are just now getting under way.

There is no evidence, as of yet, that the scandal leads to the Oval Office. But the comparisons to Nixon are inevitable. While the disgraced Nixon did, indeed, use the IRS to target political enemies, he may have been seeking to avenge friends and supporters who, themselves, had been targeted by the IRS in earlier presidencies -- among them Elvis Presley, Billy Graham and John Wayne.

Regardless of the motive, one thing separates today's IRS from that of earlier administrations -- its technological capability.

The IRS's mainframe computer in Martinsburg, W.Va., is among the world's most powerful. As of October 2010, the Internal Revenue Service had the capability to sift through emailing patterns associated with millions of individual Internet addresses.

Sources tell Fox News the IRS continues to collect tax data, but they also are now acquiring huge volumes of personal information on taxpayers' digital activities, from eBay auctions, Facebook posts, and, for the first time ever, credit card and e-payment transaction records.

And unlike in the Nixon administration, the IRS is, under the Obama Administration, set to expand its workforce by 15,000 to collect health information in accordance with provisions of the president's Affordable Care Act by the end of this year.

Jennifer Stefano, a member of Americans for Prosperity -- who gave up her own quest to form a Tea Party group with friends in 2010 after the IRS threatened to examine her emails, Facebook and Twitter accounts -- voiced concern of a scenario that was perhaps more Orwellian than Nixonian.

"What my concern is, is that four years after the IRS has expanded to police the nation's health care law, how many stories of abuse are going to emerge from this and what will be the impact? It will be far greater than sidelining political voices. It will affect their lives and their health. This is wrong," she said.

Looks like Barry got a bad case of Nixonitis

noreply@blogger.com (Merchant of Venom) — Wed, 15 May 2013 11:37:00 +0000

The tip off:

Carney... "Benghazi...that happened a long time ago."

It's funny and simply must be a coincidence, but every time there is a scandal, and there are many, nobody knows anything. Yet it habitually seems once the scandal is committed, the one who stands to gain the most from the potential outcome and be cast in a favorable light is Barry.

Just how concerned was Barry over Benghazi? The very next day the lowlife was at a fundraiser in of all places Las Vegas! Goes to show you where is priorities are. Say what you will about Bush but that never would have happened under his watch and you can take that to the bank.

Having "Stedman" investigate the IRS scandal is like having Al Capone investigate the Saint Valentine's Day Massacre.

Obama engulfed by triple scandal crisis: White House faces fury over Benghazi cover-up, tax probes on right wing groups and spying on reporters' phone calls

Press secretary Jay Carney insists the White House had no knowledge of the IRS's admitted plan to subject right-wing groups to closer scrutiny.

Carney also says the administration was unaware of the Justice Department's seizure of Associated Press phone records until 'yesterday'.

The administration continues to spin Benghazi, telling reporters that 'politicization' and comparisons with Richard Nixon are Republicans' fault.

Asked what action Obama will take on the IRS scandal, Carney responded only, 'We'll see'

One-THIRD of committees in the House of Representatives are now investigating the Obama administration.

Criminal investigation is launched into the AP phone records, with Attorney General Eric Holder recusing himself from the probe.

The White House struggled to deflect a barrage of questions today as it scrambled to contain three growing scandals lapping at Obama's door.

The usually unflappable Obama press secretary Jay Carney faced a torrid grilling in his daily briefing and could only claim the White House was ignorant - or blame Republicans for the deep water the Obama administration has found itself in.

The swell of criticism over the administration's actions following the 2012 terror attack on the U.S. Consulate in Benghazi, Libya has reached a new crescendo.

Tight-lipped: White House Press Secretary Jay Carney tried to deflect tough questions today during a torrid briefing with reporters demanding answers

Under siege: Obama and his administration are under siege on three fronts and struggling to contain the damage

Under siege: Carney faces grilling on IRS and AP scandals

And at that same moment, news has emerged that the Internal Revenue Service targeted conservative non-profit groups for extra scrutiny.

Thirdly, the Justice Department secretly obtained the phone records of Associated Press reporters in an effort to trace a leak of classified information.

'Is there a siege mentality back there in the West Wing?' one reporter asked Tuesday. Carney's reply 'absolutely not' – drawing eye rolls among cameramen and reporters in the White House briefing room.

Carney maintained his line that the Benghazi question is politically motivated and fueled by House Speaker John Boehner, whom he accused of being 'obsessed' with the topic. The episode, he said Tuesday, is little more than a 'clear political circus.'

Carney bristled at a question about whether it was fair to draw comparisons between the administration's responses and those during the Richard Nixon presidency, bemoaning 'the rapid politicization of everything'.

'I can tell you that the people who make those kinds of comparisons need to check their history,' Carney insisted, "because, you know, what we have here with one issue – Benghazi – is so clearly, as we're learning more and more, a political sideshow. A deliberate effort to politicize a tragedy."

'If you look at the facts, and I think Benghazi is instructive on this, the real issue is that four Americans died,' he said.

The comment is reminiscent of then-Secretary of State Hillary Clinton's testimony before a congressional panel that it didn't matter whether the deaths of Ambassador Chris Stevens and three other U.S. personnel were caused by a terror attack or a spontaneous protest.

'What difference, at this point, does it make?' Clinton famously asked.

The DOJ, led by Attorney General Eric Holder, is under immense pressure following revelations that it secretly collected logs of phone calls made to, and by, AP reporters

President Barack Obama has said those responsible for any improper scrutiny of conservative groups' tax status would be held 'fully accountable.' The current and former heads of the IRS were informed last May that tea-party groups had been targeted. Senator Marco Rubio has called for the removal of Acting IRS Commissioner Steven T. Miller, pictured

The Benghazi political melee had its beginnings in the Obama administration's tale, after the bloodbath in Libya, that an unplanned demonstration over an anti-Islam YouTube video had sparked the consulate's destruction.

Both Obama and Clinton referred to the video in public comments during the week following the attack, and UN Ambassador Susan Rice blamed it for the attack five separate times on Sunday talk shows.

The truth, that the attack was a terrorist assault carried out by extremists including those from the al-Qaeda-affiliated Ansar al-Sharia, emerged much later. More recently came evidence that a talking points memo prepared by the CIA for members of Congress went through a dozen edits, including some directed by the State Department, which removed all references to terrorism.

'[W]e do know that Islamic extremists with ties to al-Qa'ida participated in the attack,' the CIA wrote, in a line that was later removed. Despite the CIA's certainty, Jay Carney claimed repeatedly on Friday that the final, sanitized talking points reflected the best knowledge of the intelligence community – 'what the CIA thought it knew.'

But the IRS and AP tempests brought a refrain from Carney, which he cited in some form more than a half-dozen times during his 50-minute press availability, that the White House knew nothing at all and therefore wouldn't comment.

'I cannot, and he [Obama] cannot comment specifically on an ongoing criminal investigation,' he would say repeatedly. 'It would be wholly inappropriate.'

Yet as one journalist pointed out to the chagrined press secretary, Obama made repeated public comments about the shooting of teenager Trayvon Martin, who was shot and killed in 2011 in a case that sparked hostile race-based controversy.

And the president inserted himself into the story of Henry Louis Gates, a Harvard professor who was allegedly targeted by police because of his race, and arrested for attempting to break into his own house.

'The police acted stupidly,' Obama told his global audience, prompting a much-discussed 'beer summit' – brokered by the president and Vice President Joe Biden at the White House – between Gates and the arresting officer.

Holder: 'Very serious leak' prompted AP records case

Cover-up: Carney reiterated Obama's insistence that Republican fury over the deaths in Benghazi is 'politically-motivated' and that there's no merit in claims there was a deliberate attempt to mislead the country in the hours after the attack days before the last election

OBAMA ADMINISTRATION UNDER FIRE ON THREE FRONTS

Benghazi

THE SCANDAL: Documents show that in the midst of a re-election campaign, administration officials in the State Department had a hand in editing a set of CIA talking points about the 2012 terror attack on the U.S. Consulate in Benghazi, Libya. The first draft from the CIA named the al-Qaeda-linked group Ansar al-Sharia as bearing some responsibility, but the final version contained no references to Islamic terrorism.

THE WHITE HOUSE LINE: Jay Carney has said the White House's only role consisted of editing a single word for clarity, and that the 'intelligence community' was solely responsible.

THE KEY QUESTION: Obama must explain how much influence his political appointees had in the editing process. Did the CIA merely hold the pen while his key advisers dictated the edits?

Associated Press phone records

THE SCANDAL: Journalists are upset that the Department of Justice went to a judge to secretly obtain the office, home and mobile phone records of Associated Press journalists in at least three cities. Justice says it was trying to learn who leaked information to the AP about a classified CIA operation in Yemen which foiled a terror plot involving bombing a U.S.-bound jetliner.

THE WHITE HOUSE LINE: The administration insists that the White House was completely out of the loop, even as Attorney General Eric Holder - an Obama appointee - knew what was going on, and that the president himself found out only on Monday. Carney says that while Obama believes reporters should have 'unfettered' access to information, the government has the right to temper their First Amendment protections by protecting classified information. Carney also says that since the leaker may have been an administration official, it's appropriate for the White House to be on the outside looking in.

THE KEY QUESTION: Obama must tell the press how it is that he was outside the circle of people who knew about what the Attorney General is calling one of the most serious criminal cases he has ever seen. Obama receives daily classified intelligence briefings. If he was truly ignorant of the DOJ's investigation, he should explain why that's a good thing.

IRS targeting of tea party groups and other conservative non-profits

THE SCANDAL: The Internal Revenue Service has admitted running a longstanding program that targeted right-wing groups - including those aligned with the politically successful tea party - for extra scrutiny, through delay tactics and intrusive mandatory questionnaires, when the organizations applied for tax-exempt status through the federal government. Some of those inquisitions involved demands for donor lists and the names of groups' volunteers. The Washington Post has reported that senior IRS officials in Washington, D.C. knew about the program. And a draft of portions of a report from the IRS's internal Office of Inspector General lays out a timeline showing who knew what, and when.

THE WHITE HOUSE LINE: Carney says the White House was completely unaware of the program, learned about it less than a month ago, and was taken completely by surprise. Obama has said he was outraged but cautioned that all the facts are not yet known, and that since the report has not been finalized, it's inappropriate for the administration to comment or to assume that anyone in the government has done anything wrong.

THE KEY QUESTION: The president needs to convince the press that senior IRS officials in Washington who were informed about the politically partisan program never told the Treasury Secretary or anyone in the White House, and that they kept it from Obama's political team during his re-election campaign. The administration also must provide an explanation for its inaction, despite the IRS's quick admissions and apology. Senator, Marco Rubio - partially to bolster his credentials among conservatives who don't like his immigration reform proposals - is openly calling for the top tax collectors' heads to roll.

Carney's professed ignorance on Tuesday covered both new administration headaches.

He first insisted that no White House personnel were notified about the IRS's intense focus on challenging the tax-exempt status applications of conservative organizations.

Moments later, he made a similar promise about the Justice Department investigation that prompted subpoenas for reporters' phone records – including the calls made and received on journalists' mobile phones, their home landlines, and at least one line in the House of Representatives press gallery.

The AP reported in May 2012 on the CIA's disruption of an al-Qaeda plot in the Gulf state of Yemen, which aimed to blow up a commercial aircraft bound for the United States. That operation was classified, and the Justice Department sought to determine who provided the information to reporters.

Only weeks before, the Obama administration – in mid-re-election swing – had assured the American public that no such attack had been planned or set into motion.

'I have been a prosecutor since 1976,' Attorney General Eric Holder said Tuesday, 'and I have to say that this is among – if not the most serious, it is among the top two or three most serious leaks that I have ever seen.'

The entire case, Carney said, was 'handled by the Justice Department independently.'

Ignorance: Carney repeatedly said the White House was not aware of either the IRS 'harassment' of the Tea Party and conservatives or the DoJ wiretapping the AP

Playing for time: Carney went on to claim that reporting of the growing 'scandals' was inaccurate, telling journalists to wait for the investigations to finish before making conclusions

'We have no knowledge' of the matter, he told reporters. 'We are not involved in the White House with any decisions made about ongoing investigations.'

'It would be wholly inappropriate for me to have answers to those questions,' he added, 'and I don't have them.'

Obama himself, he said, found out about the Associated Press-related subpoenas yesterday while watching TV.

Carney reminded reporters that the president 'believes that the press, as a rule, needs to have the ability to pursue investigative journalism,' referring to that freedom as 'unfettered.'

But the government, he added, must balance that 'unfettered' access with the need to protect classified information.

'There is a balance that has to be struck here,' Carney said, prompting one journalist to ask him how that balance could be compatible with an 'unfettered' press corps.

'The president understands that a reporter needs to be shielded,' he intoned. But with respect to the DOJ obtaining reporters' phone records, he said: 'I can tell you that I am not aware of anyone here knowing about it.'

'I am certainly not aware of, and am confident that, no one here was involved with this,' Carney continued, referring further questions to the Justice Department in a moment which may soon be interpreted as a shifting of blame.

Politico reported Tuesday that AP reporters themselves were furious.

'People are pretty mad — mad that government has not taken what we do seriously,' one reporter told the inside-the-beltway broadsheet.

'When the news broke yesterday … people were outraged and disgusted. No one was yelling and screaming, but it was like, 'Are you kidding me!?'

Obama surrogate Jay Carney claimed the president doesn't insert himself into active criminal cases like the Justice Department's probe of Associated Press reporters. But he weighed in repeatedly when the self-styled neighborhood watchman George Zimmerman (L) was charged with second-degree murder for killing the unarmed black teenager Trayvon Martin (R) in Florida

The president (R) also inserted himself into the 2009 controversy created when Police Sergeant James Crowley (2nd R) of Cambridge, Massachusetts arrested Harvard Professor Henry Louis Gates Jr. (2nd L), holding a so-called 'beer summit' at the White House that also included Vice President Joe Biden (L). 'The police acted stupidly,' Obama said, after what was presumed to be a racially-motivated arrest of Gates

Politico also reported Tuesday that 'roughly one-third of House committees are engaged in investigating some aspect of the Obama administration.'

Holder, who leads the Justice Department as the nation's highest-ranking law enforcement official, was having his own press conference across town at the same moment Carney held his announcing a criminal probe into the phone-records scandal, and also making clear that it was his deputy who had approved the plan to spy on reporters' phone records.

Similarly, despite the IRS's apparent admissions that it targeted right-wing groups – including some that identified with the once politically powerful Tea Party – for extra scrutiny, Carney crouched behind Obama's hedging on Monday and said the White House was in the dark.

And he, like Obama, suggested that the reporting to date might not be true.

Carney questioned aloud 'if the actions [of the IRS] were inadvertent, or not,' and said that 'at this point, we have to wait for the action of an independent investigator ... before we can jump to conclusions about what happened.'

No shortage of hands raised on Tuesday as White House Press Secretary Jay Carney took questions - mostly from his regular journalist-inquisitors - during his daily news briefing at the White House. Reporters were most persistent on the Justice Department's seizure of two months of phone records from the Associated Press, in pursuit of the source of leaks of classified information

The president 'made it clear,' Carney argued without conceding any facts, 'that if the reports about the activity of IRS personnel proved to be true, he would find them outrageous.'

Even the details the IRS has confirmed, Carney suggested, were not yet settled. Obama, he said, 'had no tolerance for the targeting of specific groups,' and referred to them as 'conservative groups, if the reporting is true about this.'

Carney acknowledged the media reports about 'a deliberate targeting of groups, inappropriately,' but said action from the administration would only be expected 'if it, in fact, took place.'

Citing Obama's public comments about his 'outrage' over the IRS's reported partisan activity, one reporter asked what might be 'the consequences of his outrage.'

'We'll see,' Carney responded.

A full bank of TV cameras focused on Jay Carney as he defended the Obama administration against a hail of media attacks over a trio of scandals

But 'instead of rushing to conclusions or perpetrating consequences,' he insisted, the media must wait for the conclusions of a report from the IRS Office of Inspector General.

While the president, he said, 'is concerned about every report he hears about this,' Carney refused to commit the administration to a change in leadership at the IRS, even if the reports so far are proven true.

He did, however, answer 'yes' to a reporter's request that he state 'categorically' that no one in the White House knew about, or was involved with, targeting Tea Party groups ''We learn everything we know about this from your reports,' Carney insisted.

Yet amid new reporting from the Washington Post that senior IRS officials in Washington knew about the anti-conservative program in 2011, before the president's re-election date, Carney punted a question about whether or not the White House should have been informed.

'Notification is appropriate and routine' only after the IG report is published, he insisted, adding that 'there was no knowledge here' before media outlets broke the story.

Ultimately, Carney gave himself a breather by taking questions from reporters representing news outlets in Pakistan and Turkey, despite reporters' interest in Benghazi, the IRS and the Associated Press.

He had lengthy prepared statements addressing both questions and read aloud from them.

And, perhaps for the first time in the Obama administration's history with the press, audible sighs were heard among reporters in the packed briefing room.

RNC Benghazi Ad That Never Ran

noreply@blogger.com (Merchant of Venom) — Sun, 12 May 2013 10:20:00 +0000

By Ed Kilbane

Another bone headed decision by the RNC. This ad was dead on!

Video 28

http://youtu.be/2glkw1htsPk

Apparently mister nice guy Mitt did not want it aired. Strange when you consider the Joe Soptic ad which portrayed him as a murderer.

What would Nixon do?

noreply@blogger.com (Merchant of Venom) — Sat, 11 May 2013 12:19:00 +0000

Probably the same thing Barry and his cohorts are trying to pull off.

It was all about the "despicable video" according to Hillary. Rice couldn't blame the video enough on the Sunday talk shows. Now not one word about it. It has become what Kryptonite is to superman. The guy in jail who shot the video is being held on what charge? If we're going to take this approach why is the guy who made Lost In Translation not in jail?

The catalyst?

My money is on this guy.

I surprised they didn't call it work place violence. After all, Chris Stevens was working at the Benghazi embassy.

The sad truth about this whole episode was getting Barry reelected and damage control for Hillary's 2016 run. But it just may blow up in their face.

Benghazi e-mails show clash between State Department, CIA

New details from administration e-mails about last year's attacks on the U.S. compound in Benghazi, Libya, demonstrate that an intense bureaucratic clash took place between the State Department and the CIA over which agency would get to tell the story of how the tragedy unfolded.

That clash played out in the development of administration talking points that have been at the center of the controversy over the handling of the incident, according to the e-mails that came to light Friday.

Over the five days between the attacks and the now-infamous Sunday show appearance by U.N. Ambassador Susan E. Rice, senior officials from the Central Intelligence Agency and the State Department argued over how much information to disclose about the assault in which four Americans, including Ambassador J. Christopher Stevens, were killed.

That internal debate and the changes it produced in the Obama administration's immediate account of the attack have revived Benghazi as a political issue in Washington six months after the presidential election in which it played a prominent role. Friday's revelations — ABC News published 12 versions of the talking points — produced the latest round of Benghazi post-mortems in the eight months since the attacks. Senior administration officials said in a briefing for reporters that none of Obama's political advisers were involved in discussions around the original talking points, only national security staff officials.

According to various drafts of the talking points, shaped before the final editing by the White House and other agencies, State Department officials raised concerns that the CIA-drafted version could be used by members of Congress to criticize diplomatic security preparedness in Benghazi.

One U.S. intelligence official familiar with the talking points' drafting said: "The changes don't reflect a turf battle. They were attempts to find the appropriate level of detail for unclassified, preliminary talking points that could be used by members of Congress to address a fluid situation."

One version of the talking points, drafted by the CIA, noted that unknown gunmen had carried out at least five recent attacks in and around Benghazi against "foreign interests." The final version, however, did not include those warnings after Victoria Nuland, the State Department's chief spokesperson at the time, protested in e-mails to White House national security staff and other agencies involved in editing the talking points.

CIA officials said in the weeks after the Benghazi attack that Ansar al-Sharia, a group affiliated with al-Qaeda, was not mentioned in the final talking points because the information was classified — even though the early versions made public this week showed that the agency initially intended to name the group.

During the 2012 presidential campaign, Republican nominee Mitt Romney accused thwe White House of downplaying the attackers' links to Ansar al-Sharia for political reasons given Obama's campaign argument that he had severely weakened the terrorist group.

Reports about the e-mails surfaced two days after three State Department officials appeared before Congress on Wednesday and criticized administration actions before, during and after the September assaults.

The most memorable testimony came from Gregory B. Hicks, who was deputy ambassador at the U.S. Embassy in Tripoli at the time of the attack. Hicks and the others questioned why the Benghazi facility had not been made more secure before the attack and why the Pentagon did not send air or ground support once the attack began. Hicks also testified that he was criticized for raising the questions and was effectively demoted as a result — allegations that the State Department denied.

On Thursday, House Speaker John A. Boehner (R-Ohio) called on the White House to make public e-mails and other information about the talking points that are among tens of thousands of pages of documents the administration turned over to lawmakers months ago. White House officials continue to assert that they have provided all the information congressional leaders have asked for.

White House officials have said previously they made only one change to the CIA-drafted talking points, changing U.S. "consulate" to "diplomatic post" in the final version.

But White House officials were directly involved in developing the talking points through discussions with the CIA, the State Department, the FBI, the Justice Department, and elements of the Pentagon.

Behind the scenes, as a then-close presidential campaign entered its final stretch, State Department officials found themselves at a disadvantage in debating the CIA, whose deputy director, Mike Morrell, took charge of organizing days of internal agency discussions into a coherent set of talking points for members of Congress.

For one, State Department officials could not disclose that one of the two U.S. sites attacked in Benghazi was run by the CIA because of its secret designation.

CIA operations in the area included disarming militias, including ones affiliated with Islamist extremist groups, several months after the U.S. military role in toppling Libyan leader Moammar Gaddafi. Virtually every U.S. official assigned to Benghazi was based in the CIA annex — where the agency, not the State Department, was in charge of security.

The State Department was also chiefly responsible, along with the White House, for describing the events surrounding the deadly attacks publicly.

In addition to the State Department, the FBI and the Justice Department also objected to the CIA's inclusion of Ansar al-Sharia in the talking points because it could have harmed the nascent investigation, senior administration officials said Friday.

In a statement, Jen Psaki, the State Department's chief spokesperson, said Friday that the department first reviewed the talking points on the evening of Sept. 14, two days before Rice delivered them on a series of talk shows. She said Nuland raised two concerns. "First that the points went further in assigning responsibility than preliminary assessments suggested and there was concern about preserving the integrity of the investigation," Psaki said. "Second, that the points were inconsistent with the public language the administration had used to date — meaning members of Congress would be providing more guidance to the public than the administration."

In November, both Director of National Intelligence James R. Clapper Jr. and former CIA director David H. Petraeus briefed the intelligence committees about the talking points. After that testimony, DNI spokesman Shawn Turner told reporters that the intelligence community was solely responsible for "substantive" changes in the talking points.

A bipartisan report on Benghazi released by the Senate homeland security committee in December said that a senior CIA analyst had advocated including the al-Qaeda reference.

But Clapper, CIA, FBI and State Department counterterrorism officials told the committee that "changes characterizing the attacks as 'demonstrations' and removing references to al-Qaeda or its affiliates were made within the CIA and the" intelligence community.

"They also testified," the Senate report said, "that no changes were made for political reasons, that there was no attempt to mislead the American people about what happened in Benghazi and that the only change made by the White House was to change a reference of 'consulate' to 'mission.' "

Secretary of State John F. Kerry, who has been traveling outside the country this week, said Friday that Benghazi was a "tragedy. But I hate to see it turned into a pure, prolonged, political process that really doesn't tell us anything new about the facts."

Priorities At The Top

noreply@blogger.com (Merchant of Venom) — Fri, 10 May 2013 10:49:00 +0000

On a tip from Ed Kilbane

When an Army soldier, or Marine is killed in the line of duty, his family eventually gets a flag and a note conveying sympathy and respect from the United States Government. When a Black pro basketball player announces he is a queer, he immediately gets a personal phone call from the President congratulating him for his courage.

Am I missing something?

America was founded by geniuses but over 200 years later is now loaded with idiots.

noreply@blogger.com (Merchant of Venom) — Thu, 09 May 2013 19:04:00 +0000

1. If you can get arrested for hunting or fishing without a license, but not for being in the country illegally… you might live in a country founded by geniuses but run by idiots.

2. If you have to get your parents permission to go on a field trip or take an aspirin in school, but not to get an abortion… you might live in a country founded by geniuses but run by idiots.

3. If you have to show identification to board an airplane, cash a check or check out a library book, but not to vote… you might live in a country founded by geniuses but run by idiots.

4. If the government wants to ban stable, law-abiding citizens from owning gun magazines with more than ten rounds, but gives 20 F-16 fighter jets to the crazy new leaders in Egypt... you might live in a country founded by geniuses but run by idiots.

5. If in our largest city, you can buy "two" 16-ounce sodas, but not a 24-ounce soda because 24-ounces of a sugary drink might make you fat… you might live in a country founded by geniuses but run by idiots.

6. If an 80-year-old woman and 3 yr old child can be stripped searched by the TSA, but a woman in a hijab is only subject to having her neck and head searched… you might live in a country founded by geniuses but run by idiots.

7. If your government believes that the best way to eradicate trillions of dollars of debt is to spend trillions more… you might live in a country founded by geniuses but run by idiots.

8. If a seven year old boy can be thrown out of school for saying his teacher is cute, but hosting a sexual exploration or diversity class in grade school is perfectly acceptable… you might live in a country founded by geniuses but run by idiots.

9. If children are forcibly removed from parents who discipline them with spankings while children of addicts are left in filth and drug infested homes… you might live in a country founded by geniuses but run by idiots.

10. If hard work and success are met with higher taxes and more government intrusion, while not working is rewarded with EBT cards, WIC checks, Medicaid, subsidized housing, and free cell phones… you might live in a country founded by geniuses but run by idiots.

11. If you pay your mortgage faithfully, denying yourself the newest big screen TV while your neighbor buys iPhones, TVs and new cars, and the government forgives his debt when he defaults on his mortgage… you might live in a country founded by geniuses but run by idiots.

12. If being stripped of the ability to defend yourself makes you more safe according to the government… you might live in a country founded by geniuses but run by idiots.

Now she'll find out what difference it makes

noreply@blogger.com (Merchant of Venom) — Mon, 06 May 2013 19:02:00 +0000

Thesaurus:
Liars

deceivers, fibbers, perjurers, false witnesses, fabricators, equivocators, the Clintons

The video was a deception. Susan Rice was the sacrificial lamb.

Hillary Clinton is the filet mignon.

Compare:

The dogged hunt for the Boston Marathon bombers to the hunt for the Libyan attackers. Four dead Americans... and no one has lifted a finger to find the perpetrators, in fact the only guy in jail is the one who shot the video.

On a side note...
They can 't find a cemetery who will bury Tamerlan Tsarnaev. Maybe they should bury him in Bill Ayers' backyard.

Clinton sought end-run around counterterrorism bureau on night of Benghazi attack, witness will say

On the night of Sept. 11, as the Obama administration scrambled to respond to the Benghazi terror attacks, then-Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and a key aide effectively tried to cut the department's own counterterrorism bureau out of the chain of reporting and decision-making, according to a "whistle-blower" witness from that bureau who will soon testify to the charge before Congress, Fox News has learned.

That witness is Mark I. Thompson, a former Marine and now the deputy coordinator for operations in the agency's counterterrorism bureau. Sources tell Fox News Thompson will level the allegation against Clinton during testimony on Wednesday before the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, chaired by Rep. Darrell Issa, R-Calif.

Fox News has also learned that another official from the counterterrorism bureau -- independently of Thompson -- voiced the same complaint about Clinton and Under Secretary for Management Patrick Kennedy to trusted national security colleagues back in October.

Extremists linked to Al Qaeda stormed the U.S. Consulate and a nearby annex on Sept. 11, in a heavily armed and well-coordinated eight-hour assault that killed the U.S. ambassador to Libya, Chris Stevens, and three other Americans.

Thompson considers himself a whistle-blower whose account was suppressed by the official investigative panel that Clinton convened to review the episode, the Accountability Review Board (ARB). Thompson's lawyer, Joseph diGenova, a former U.S. attorney, has further alleged that his client has been subjected to threats and intimidation by as-yet-unnamed superiors at State, in advance of his cooperation with Congress.

Sources close to the congressional investigation who have been briefed on what Thompson will testify tell Fox News the veteran counterterrorism official concluded on Sept. 11 that Clinton and Kennedy tried to cut the counterterrorism bureau out of the loop as they and other Obama administration officials weighed how to respond to -- and characterize -- the Benghazi attacks.

"You should have seen what (Clinton) tried to do to us that night," the second official in State's counterterrorism bureau told colleagues back in October. Those comments would appear to be corroborated by Thompson's forthcoming testimony.

State Department spokeswoman Jen Psaki called the counterterrorism officials' allegation "100 percent false." A spokesman for Clinton said tersely that the charge is not true.

Daniel Benjamin, who ran the department's Counterterrorism Bureau at the time, also put out a statement Monday morning strongly denying the charges.

"I ran the bureau then, and I can say now with certainty, as the former Coordinator for Counterterrorism, that this charge is simply untrue," he said. "Though I was out of the country on official travel at the time of the attack, I was in frequent contact with the Department. At no time did I feel that the Bureau was in any way being left out of deliberations that it should have been part of."

He went on to call his bureau a "central participant in the interagency discussion about the longer-term response to Benghazi." He said "at no time was the Bureau sidelined or otherwise kept from carrying out its tasks."

Thompson's attorney, diGenova, would not comment for this article.

Documents from the State Department, the Central Intelligence Agency and the National Security Council, first published in the May 13 edition of "The Weekly Standard," showed that senior officials from those agencies decided within days of the attacks to delete all references to Al Qaeda's known involvement in them from "talking points" being prepared for those administration officers being sent out to discuss the attacks publicly.

Those talking points -- and indeed, the statements of all senior Obama administration officials who commented publicly on Benghazi during the early days after the attacks -- sought instead to depict the Americans' deaths as the result of a spontaneous protest that went awry. The administration later acknowledged that there had been no such protest, as evidence mounted that Al Qaeda-linked terrorists had participated in the attacks. The latter conclusion had figured prominently in the earliest CIA drafts of the talking points, but was stricken by an ad hoc group of senior officials controlling the drafting process. Among those involved in prodding the deletions, the documents published by "The Weekly Standard" show, was State Department spokeswoman Victoria Nuland, who wrote at one point that the revisions were not sufficient to satisfy "my building's leadership."

The allegations of the two counterterrorism officials stand to return the former secretary of state to the center of the Benghazi story. Widely regarded as a leading potential candidate for the Democratic presidential nomination in 2016, Clinton has insisted she was not privy to decisions made by underlings about the inadequate security for the U.S. installations in Benghazi that were made in the run-up to the attacks. And she has portrayed her role -- once the attacks became known in Washington -- as that of a determined fact-finder who worked with colleagues to fashion the best possible response to the crisis.

Clinton testified about Benghazi for the first and only time in January of this year, shortly before leaving office. She had long delayed her testimony, at first because she cited the need for the ARB to complete its report, and then because she suffered a series of untimely health problems that included a stomach virus, a concussion sustained during a fall at home, and a blood clot near her brain, from which she has since recovered. However, Clinton was never interviewed by the ARB she convened.

Fox News disclosed last week that the conduct of the ARB is itself now under review by the State Department's Office of Inspector General. A department spokesman said the OIG probe is examining all prior ARBs, not just the one established after Benghazi.

The two U.S. officials -- former Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Mike Mullen and former Ambassador Tom Pickering -- who oversaw the internal review of the attacks defended their report.

"From the beginning of the ARB process, we had unfettered access to everyone and everything including all the documentation we needed. Our marching orders were to get to the bottom of what happened, and that's what we did," they said in a statement Monday.

The counterterrorism officials, however, concluded that Clinton and Kennedy were immediately wary of the attacks being portrayed as acts of terrorism, and accordingly worked to prevent the counterterrorism bureau from having a role in the department's early decision-making relating to them.

Also appearing before the oversight committee on Wednesday will be Gregory N. Hicks, the deputy chief of mission at the U.S. Embassy in Libya at the time of the Benghazi terrorist attacks. Like Thompson, Hicks is a career State Department official who considers himself a Benghazi whistle-blower. His attorney, Victoria Toensing, a former chief counsel to the Senate Intelligence Committee, has charged that Hicks, too, has faced threats of reprisal from unnamed superiors at State. (Toensing and diGenova, who are representing their respective clients pro bono, are married.)

Portions of the forthcoming testimony of Hicks -- who was one of the last people to speak to Stevens, and who upon the ambassador's death became the senior U.S. diplomat in Libya -- were made public by Rep. Issa during an appearance on the CBS News program "Face the Nation" on Sunday.

Hicks told the committee that he and his colleagues on the ground in Libya that night knew instantly that Benghazi was a terrorist attack, and that he was astonished that no one drafting the administration's talking points consulted with him before finalizing them, or before U.N. Ambassador Susan Rice delivered them on the Sunday talk shows of Sept. 16.

Hicks was interviewed by the ARB but Thompson was not, sources close to the committee's investigation tell Fox News.

Headlines From The Year: 2059

noreply@blogger.com (Merchant of Venom) — Mon, 06 May 2013 10:24:00 +0000

Ozone created by electric cars now killing millions in the seventh largest country in the world, Mexifornia, formerly known as California .

White minorities still trying to have English recognized as Mexifornia's third language.

Spotted Owl plague threatens northwestern United States crops and livestock.

Baby conceived naturally! Scientists stumped.

Couple petitions court to reinstate heterosexual marriage.

Iran still closed off; physicists estimate it will take at least 10 more years before radioactivity decreases to safe levels.

France pleads for global help after being taken over by Jamaica . No other country comes forward to help the beleaguered nation!

Castro finally dies at age 112; Cuban cigars can now be imported legally, but President Chelsea Clinton has banned all smoking.

George Z. Bush says he will run for President in 2060.

Postal Service raises price of first class stamp to $17.89 and reduces mail delivery to Wednesdays only.

85-year $75.8 billion study: Diet and exercise is the key to weight loss.

Average weight of Americans drops to 250 lbs.

Global cooling blamed for citrus crop failure for third consecutive year in Mexifornia and Floruba.

Japanese scientists have created a camera with such a fast shutter speed they now can photograph a woman with her mouth shut.

Abortion clinics now available in every High School in United States .

Senate still blocking drilling in ANWR even though gas is selling for 4532 Pesos per liter and gas stations are only open on Tuesdays and Fridays.

Massachusetts executes last remaining conservative.

Supreme Court rules punishment of criminals violates their civil rights.

A Couple Finally Had Sexual Harmony...

They Had simultaneous Headaches.

Average height of NBA players is now nine feet seven inches with

only 3 illegitimate children.

New federal law requires that all nail clippers, screwdrivers, fly swatters and rolled-up newspapers must be registered by January 2060.

IRS sets lowest tax rate at 75 percent.

Floruba voters still having trouble with voting machines.

Islam... in all its glory

noreply@blogger.com (Merchant of Venom) — Sat, 27 Apr 2013 11:34:00 +0000

Video 27

http://youtu.be/GCXHPKhRCVg

I never thought I would ever agree with Bob Beckle (the Fox news ultra liberal) but I do when he says it's time for a suspension of all students visas and immigration from countries that do not publicly condemn acts of Islamic terrorism. Even our illustrious president can't bring himself to say the words Islamic terrorism. He has referred to the Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood as "a non secular religious party". He still refers to the Ft. Hood shooting as a case of "workplace violence".

Caution:

Not the censored version you watch on TV.

Just to understand the hatred, viciousness, and callousness of the Jihadists. Indiscriminate killing of innocent people including women and children all in the name of some twisted religious ideology.

When you here terms like the:

Shoe Bomber

Underwear Bomber

Time Square Bomber

and now the Boston Marathon Bombers

The common denominator is they're all Muslims. And believe me... this is just the tip of the iceberg.

Taxpayer-Funded Jihad

noreply@blogger.com (Merchant of Venom) — Thu, 25 Apr 2013 11:05:00 +0000

Talk about adding insult to injury.

Video 26

http://youtu.be/GhYnHisjkwo

I agree with Gutfield. America now sponsors terrorism.

Business as usual

noreply@blogger.com (Merchant of Venom) — Tue, 23 Apr 2013 12:30:00 +0000

Muslim reaction to the Boston bombing.

What's next... background checks for pressure cookers?

noreply@blogger.com (Merchant of Venom) — Mon, 22 Apr 2013 11:14:00 +0000

I'm sure the two terrorist's in the recent Boston bombing followed the gun control laws to the letter.

BTW...

With the blessing of liberals, how long do you think it will be before some Imam wants a mosque built at the Boston Marathon finish line?

Gratitude

noreply@blogger.com (Merchant of Venom) — Sat, 20 Apr 2013 13:28:00 +0000

What kind of religion believes setting off bombs injuring almost two hundred, killing three, one an 8 year old little boy, endears one closer to God?

According to what I have heard and read these radicalized dogs were refugees from Chechenia and granted asylum here. One was given a $2,500 scholarship the other was supposedly trying out for the Olympic boxing team. Their mother (again supposedly) is on welfare and recently was arrested for shoplifting $1,600 of merchandise at the very store Lords and Taylor that captured her sons terror plot on a surveillance camera.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2311653/Boston-bombings-Mother-Boston-bombing-suspects-arrested-year-stealing-1-600-worth-clothes-Lord--Taylor.html

I don't know what kind of BS story Dzhokhar Tsarnaev is going to come up with, but I do know this is how he and his family expresses their gratitude to a country that welcomed them with open arms.

I hope this terrorist attack will decisively open our eyes to allowing vermin from Islamic countries to enter the United States. That said. I doubt it.

I mean...what else has to happen before we wake up?

http://hemingwayreport.blogspot.com/2010/02/profiling-multiple-choice-test.html

Before and after.

His brother did not fare so well.

What you sow so shall you reap.

Really proud of the spectacular work law enforcement has done in this case!

Breaking News

noreply@blogger.com (Merchant of Venom) — Mon, 15 Apr 2013 20:09:00 +0000

Common Sense...No it's not Thomas Paine

noreply@blogger.com (Merchant of Venom) — Thu, 04 Apr 2013 15:10:00 +0000

In 15 years of law enforcement Dan Bongino never arrested anyone for a gun crime who owned the gun legally. More often then not, I bet across the country this is the case.

Video 25

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R8WLXhahw_A&feature=player_detailpage

A criminal is not going to submit themselves to a background check. They're not going to register their gun or buy insurance and as sure as hell they're not going to follow any laws restricting magazine capacities.

That's why they're called criminals.

The proposed gun legislation serves only to go after the law abiding citizen which makes as much sense as a drunk driver blaming the road for his condition.

Personally, I would like to see some sort of data bank be inclusive in a background check with the emphasis on the mental stability of the applicant.

I think Graham is on to something here.

http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2013/03/17/graham-keeps-up-fight-to-ban-mentally-ill-from-guns-as-dems-focus-on-assault/

What common trait do they all possess?

I was going to say "share" but I'll let the pictures do the talking...

Karma

noreply@blogger.com (Merchant of Venom) — Thu, 04 Apr 2013 00:01:00 +0000

KOBE BRYANT...

Magic's Support of Gay Son

IS AWESOME!

Of course, if Johnson's son wasn't gay and Bush were president having "evolved" endorsing gay marriage, these two, along with the Black community as a whole, would have readily gone along with it just like they did with Barry.

Kobe Bryant is awestruck by a former Lakers star who rivals him -- Magic Johnson ... telling TMZ Magic's support of his gay son is a lesson everyone, including pro athletes, should learn.

TMZ broke the story ... Magic and Cookie are 100% behind their son, EJ, who is openly gay. Kobe tells us ... "Of course Magic is supportive of and loves his son. Why should anyone be surprised?"

Kobe says, "What I can't tolerate is a lack of tolerance."

The Shortest Books of All Time

noreply@blogger.com (Merchant of Venom) — Tue, 02 Apr 2013 11:36:00 +0000

On a tip from Phil McCafferty

MY BLACK GIRLFRIENDS

By Tiger Woods

THINGS I LOVE ABOUT MY COUNTRY

By Jane Fonda and Cindy Sheehan

Illustrated by Michael Moore

Foreword by George Soros and Michelle Obama

MY CHRISTIAN ACCOMPLISHMENTS AND HOW I HELPED AFTER KATRINA

By Rev Jesse Jackson & Rev Al Sharpton

THINGS I CANNOT AFFORD

By Bill Gates

THINGS I WOULD NOT DO FOR MONEY

By Dennis Rodman

THINGS WE KNOW TO BE TRUE

By Al Gore and John Kerry

GUIDE TO THE PACIFIC

By Amelia Earhart

HOW TO LIVE LIFE TO THE FULLEST

By Dr. Jack Kevorkian

TO ALL THE MEN WE HAVE LOVED BEFORE

By Ellen de Generes and Rosie O'Donnell

GUIDE TO DATING ETIQUETTE

By Mike Tyson

THE AMISH PHONE DIRECTORY

MY PLAN TO FIND THE REAL KILLERS

By O. J. Simpson

HOW TO DRINK AND DRIVE SAFELY

By Ted Kennedy

MY BOOK OF MORALS

By Bill Clinton

With introduction by The Rev. Jesse Jackson

MY COMPLETE KNOWLEDGE OF MILITARY STRATEGY

By Nancy Pelosi

THINGS I DID TO DESERVE THE NOBEL PEACE PRIZE

By Barack Obama

World class PC or BS?

noreply@blogger.com (Merchant of Venom) — Mon, 01 Apr 2013 11:50:00 +0000

I say both.

Defense Department says giving Purple Heart to Fort Hood survivors would hurt Hasan trial

This was a "Benghazi like botched case" from the get go.

Fort Hood shooter Nidal Hasan was investigated by the FBI after intelligence agencies intercepted at least 18 e-mails between him and al-Awlaki between December 2008 and June 2009. Even before the contents of the e-mails were revealed, terrorism experts said that Hasan's contacts with al-Awlaki should have raised "huge red flags". FBI agents had identified al-Awlaki as a known, "important senior recruiter for al Qaeda", and a spiritual motivator.

In one of the e-mails, Hasan wrote al-Awlaki: "I can't wait to join you in the afterlife". "It sounds like code words," said Lt. Col. Tony Shaffer, a military analyst at the Center for Advanced Defense Studies. "That he's actually either offering himself up, or that he's already crossed that line in his own mind." Hasan also asked al-Awlaki when jihad is appropriate, and whether it is permissible if innocents are killed in a suicide attack. In the months before the attacks, Hasan increased his contacts with al-Awlaki to discuss how to transfer funds abroad without coming to the attention of law authorities.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anwar_al-Awlaki

Case in point. Anwar al-Awlaki was regarded as a terrorist for years. So much so and subsequent to the Ft Hood massacre, and to my delight, he was hunted down by the CIA and killed by a drone.

Now the Defense Department is trying

to separate the goose from the gander.

This is how Hasan looks now. Last I heard he is still collecting his pay. Hasan has appeared in court sporting a beard. The beard violates Army regulations, but Hasan said it is an expression of his Muslim faith. I was in the army. Times have sure changed. I could see what would have transpired had I said, "Jesus had a beard and it is an expression of my faith." Only in America could a rag-head who killed 13 people get away with this maneuvering and the DOD is only to happy to go along with it for the sake of PC.

There are over 3,000 Muslims in the Army ranks. The Hasan case can't help but make one wonder which way they're going to break when the sh-- hits the fan.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/11/09/us/politics/09casey.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0

The DOD states they don't want to indirectly influence the trail.

Why? Because granting the Purple Heart to the injured would deem Hasan a terrorist, which would jeoprodize their BS "workplace violence" theory. The Purple Heart goes away so Hasan's rights are not indirectly influenced. Sucking up to Muslims, the image the DOD is trying to project, is the real story here and comes across as..well...something this administration is truly adept at.

So if Hasan had been killed would it still be just another case of workplace violence, or a terrorist attack?

After all I have read on this case including shouting Allahu Akbar as Hasan began mowing people down is all the evidence I need.

Ask yourself this. If Hasan was Presbyterian do you think this would have happened? Or do you think he's just another wacko like Holmes, Lanza, and Loughner?

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Legislation that would award the injured from the 2009 Fort Hood shooting the Purple Heart would adversely affect the trial of Maj. Nidal Hasan by labeling the attack terrorism, according to a Defense Department document obtained by Fox News.

The document comes following calls from survivors and their families for the military honor, because they say Fort Hood was turned into a battlefield when Hasan opened fire during the November 2009 attack. Fox News is told that the DOD "position paper" is being circulated specifically in response to the proposed legislation.

The document reads in part:

"Passage of this legislation could directly and indirectly influence potential court-martial panel members, witnesses, or the chain of command, all of whom exercise a critical role under the Uniform Code of Military Justice (UCMJ). Defense counsel will argue that Major Hasan cannot receive a fair trial because a branch of government has indirectly declared that Major Hasan is a terrorist -- that he is criminally culpable."

A source with knowledge of the position paper told Fox News that DOD is putting on a full-court press by sending senior officials, including generals, to meet with lawmakers in an effort to block support.

But Neal Sher, counsel for the Fort Hood families involved in a federal lawsuit against the department, told Fox News that the document -- an "official Army response" to the request for Purple Heart status -- is "an utter outrage" and that it was not surprising given it comes from the same department which labeled the attack "workplace violence."

"This is a cynical travesty. What the government has done by making this statement is guarantee that anything done to help the victims will effectively prevent or impair Hasan's prosecution. There was no reason for the government to put this kind of a statement in writing, even if it were true (which it is not)," Sher said via email.

Sher represents families who are suing the Defense Department over the shooting which killed 13 and injured dozens at the Texas Army base in 2009.

Fox News was the first to report in 2011 that DOD was handling the attack, in which survivors say the shooter shouted "Allahu Akbar" as he opened fire – in the context of workplace violence. Fox News was the first TV network, in June 2012, to interview the survivors.

The Defense Department document says that to expand the Purple Heart criteria to include "domestic criminal acts or domestic terror attacks would be a dramatic departure" from traditional criteria.

"The Army objects to (the proposal) because it would undermine the prosecution of Major Nidal Hasan by materially and directly compromising Major Hasan's ability to receive a fair trial. This provision will be viewed as setting the stage for a formal declaration that Major Hasan is a terrorist, on what is now the eve of trial. Such a situation, prior to trial, would fundamentally compromise the fairness and due process of the pending trial," the document said.

It continues: "Moreover, the effect of such an act by Congress would be to deprive the victims of these crimes the right to see justice done."

But Sher said the Army's legal arguments that such a situation prior to a trial would fundamentally compromise fairness and due process are especially troubling given the Holder Justice Department wanted to prosecute the self-described architect of 9/11 Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and his four co-conspirators in a New York City federal court.

"Seriously? We could try KSM no problem, but helping out Hasan's victims creates due process problems?" Sher said.

Sher said the Fort Hood families he represents in the federal suit find it hurtful that DOD would now claim "such an unprecedented action would thwart the real and lasting measure that will bring closure to the grieving and harmed victims and families -- the trial itself."

While the document claims "the Government has vigilantly tended to the needs of the victims and families since the tragic events of November, 5 2009," Sher said the facts show the Army has failed to live up to its creed that no soldier will be left behind.

Newtown...I was dead wrong

noreply@blogger.com (Merchant of Venom) — Sun, 31 Mar 2013 18:44:00 +0000

I originally posted the assault rifle was never used by Adam Lanza in the Newtown shooting.

I was wrong.

These are the three weapons we were originally told that were used in the Newtown killing spree.

I personally watched this guy on TV (Lt Vance) who conducted the original investigation state when asked by a reporter, "The assault rifle was never taken from the back seat of Lanza's car."

He has since contradicted his earlier statement (cannot find original video) and the new story is 4 weapons were actually involved.

Link to NBC video:

http://www.ijreview.com/2013/01/30208-nbc-admits-no-assault-rifle-used-in-newtown-shooting/

(Wait a few seconds and the video will play)

On 15, Jan 2013

NBC Admitted: No 'Assault Rifle' Used in Newtown Shooting

[Transcript]

This continues to be a very complex investigation and there is a lot of contradictory information out there, but we have some new information this morning (one month ago) from a couple of federal officials and state officials.

They say now that there were actually four handguns inside the school, not just two as we were initially told. Four handguns and apparently only handguns that were taken into the school.

We knew that Adam Lanza, the man said to be the gunman here, also had an 'assault-style' AR-15 -style rifle that he had had taken to the school, it was in the car he drove there, his mother's car, but we have been told by several officials that he had left that in the car.

And I bet Vance was one of those officials.

I went with what Vance said but apparently I also got sucked into the misinformation. Originally they erroneously reported Ryan Lanza, Adam's brother, did the shooting. They also reported Adam Lanza killed his father, which also turned out to be incorrect.

I should have known better.

As it turns out after further investigation it seems I was dead wrong.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sandy_Hook_Elementary_School_shooting

Sorry about that.

Congressional Minuteman---Because it only takes a minute to welcome someone "home"

noreply@blogger.com (Merchant of Venom) — Thu, 28 Mar 2013 14:16:00 +0000

As soon as her feet hit the ground McCain handed her a drivers license and Schumer a welfare application. Free Health Care to follow compliments of Barry.

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Don't believe the latest crap the government is trying to spew with an 11 million illegal figure. The lib's are cooking the numbers so it won't look so bad in a attempt to grant them amnesty. The government itself said over a decade ago it was over 12 million.

The true figure is closer to 17,000,000

illegals living in the U.S.

This is slit your throat time for Republicans. If they don't fight this tooth and nail and amnesty is granted with one stroke of the pen Barry just created 17 million new Democrats.