FACT CHECK: Palin’s book goes rogue on some facts

By Calvin Woodward, Associated Press Writer

WASHINGTON – Sarah Palin’s new book reprises familiar claims from the 2008 presidential campaign that haven’t become any truer over time.

Ignoring substantial parts of her record if not the facts, she depicts herself as a frugal traveler on the taxpayer’s dime, a reformer without ties to powerful interests and a politician roguishly indifferent to high ambition.

Palin goes adrift, at times, on more contemporary issues, too. She criticizes President Barack Obama for pushing through a bailout package that actually was achieved by his Republican predecessor George W. Bush — a package she seemed to support at the time.

A look at some of her statements in "Going Rogue," obtained by The Associated Press in advance of its release Tuesday…

PALIN: Rails against taxpayer-financed bailouts, which she attributes to Obama. She recounts telling daughter Bristol that to succeed in business, "you’ll have to be brave enough to fail."

THE FACTS: Palin is blurring the lines between Obama’s stimulus plan — a $787 billion package of tax cuts, state aid, social programs and government contracts — and the federal bailout that Republican presidential candidate John McCain voted for and President George W. Bush signed…

PALIN: Says Ronald Reagan faced an even worse recession than the one that appears to be ending now, and "showed us how to get out of one. If you want real job growth, cut capital gains taxes and slay the death tax once and for all."

THE FACTS: The estate tax, which some call the death tax, was not repealed under Reagan and capital gains taxes are lower now than when Reagan was president.

Economists overwhelmingly say the current recession is far worse. The recession Reagan faced lasted for 16 months; this one is in its 23rd month. The recession of the early 1980s did not have a financial meltdown. Unemployment peaked at 10.8 percent, worse than the October 2009 high of 10.2 percent, but the jobless rate is still expected to climb…

We could not bring ourselves to post the full list of particulars. But these are all too representative.

THE FACTS: Palin is blurring the lines between Obama’s stimulus plan — a $787 billion package of tax cuts, state aid, social programs and government contracts — and the federal bailout that Republican presidential candidate John McCain voted for and President George W. Bush signed.

A) Mr. Bush added sums to the TARP bailout at the specific request of Mr. Obama. Mr. Bush also included bailing out GM and Chrysler at the specific request of Mr. Obama and the Democrats. And, of course, Mr. Obama voted for all the bailouts.

B) Mr. Obama’s stimulus plan includes no real tax cuts. And yet the AP lists that item first.

THE FACTS: … Economists overwhelmingly say the current recession is far worse. The recession Reagan faced lasted for 16 months; this one is in its 23rd month.

This is simply a lie that the AP has been repeating to try to place the recession at the feet of President Bush.

As we have often noted, a recession is two consecutive quarters with a negative gross domestic product. And no amount of repetition will change that definition.

But how typical it is of our watchdog media to ‘factcheck’ with blatant lies.

 

[Also from the Associated Press: On, the left:] This book cover released by OR Books shows ‘Going Rouge-Sarah Palin An American Nightmare’. [On the right:] This illustration released by TBTM Media shows the cover of ‘Going Rouge: The Sarah Palin Rogue Coloring & Activity Book,’ written by Michael Stinson and Julie Sigwart, with illustrations by Sigwart.

But just look at the ‘book covers’ that the Associated Press considers newsworthy if you have any doubt about how much they fear Ms. Palin.

(Thanks to Eagle334th for the heads up.)

From YouTube:

Charlie Bit Me!

We suspect that some Obama voters are starting to feel a little the older brother. But what did they expect?

As always, if you see any gently humorous clips that would make good candidates for future threads, please send them along using the contact form.

(Thanks to Helena for the heads up.)

U.S. President Barack Obama bows as he is greeted by Japanese Emperor Akihito and Empress Michiko as he arrives at the Imperial Palace in Tokyo, Saturday, Nov. 14, 2009.

Of course his shameless minions, like ‘Baghdad Bob’ Gibbs will simply deny this ever happened.

Just like before.

To make the articles as readable as possible, please use the format described here.

And:

• Only post ‘hard news’ from establishment media outlets.
• Avoid editorials and ‘thought pieces,’ unless they are truly newsworthy.
• Eschew ‘major news’ items that most people will likely have seen elsewhere.
• Articles that fit under the topic of a recent thread should be posted as a comment there.

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Posts of articles that do not follow these guidelines may be edited or deleted.

White House to Begin Push on Immigration Overhaul in 2010

By JULIA PRESTON

November 14, 2009

The Obama administration will insist on measures to give legal status to an estimated 12 million illegal immigrants as it pushes early next year for legislation to overhaul the immigration system, Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano said on Friday.

In an address at the Center for American Progress, a liberal policy group in Washington, Ms. Napolitano sought to dispel any notion that the administration — with health care, energy and other major issues crowding its agenda — might postpone the most contentious piece of an immigration overhaul until after midterm elections next November.

Laying out the administration’s bottom line, she said it will argue for a “three-legged stool” that includes enacting tougher enforcement laws against illegal immigrants and the people who hire them, and streamlining the system for legal immigration, but also what she called a “tough and fair pathway to earned legal status.”

With unemployment surging over 10 percent and Congress wrestling with health care, advocates on all sides of the immigration debate had started to doubt that President Obama would keep to his pledge to take on the divisive issue of illegal immigration in the first months of 2010.

Congress should be ready to move forward on immigration, Ms. Napolitano said, because the administration had made a “fundamental change” in security at the border and in cracking down on employers hiring illegal immigrants. She said that the Border Patrol had increased its forces by more than 20,000 officers, and that more than 600 miles of border fence had been completed, both milestones set by Congress.

“Let me emphasize this,” she said. “We will never have fully effective law enforcement or national security as long as so many millions remain in the shadows.”

Under the administration’s plan, illegal immigrants would have to register, pay fines and all taxes they owe, pass a criminal background check and learn English.

Ms. Napolitano has been leading the administration’s efforts to gather support for the immigration overhaul, meeting in recent weeks with business leaders, faith groups, law-enforcement officials and other groups to gauge their support for the effort.

Among other things, will this not boost the number of people eligible for government subsidized health care?

Has this been factored into the CBO’s cost estimates?

(Of course not.)

From the Los Angeles Times:

Eric Holder pushed for controversial clemency

As deputy attorney general in 1999, Holder — now attorney general nominee — pressed subordinates to drop objections to clemency for 16 members of violent Puerto Rican nationalist organizations.

By Josh Meyer and Tom Hamburger
January 9, 2009

Reporting from Washington — Attorney general nominee Eric H. Holder Jr. repeatedly pushed some of his subordinates at the Clinton Justice Department to drop their opposition to a controversial 1999 grant of clemency to 16 members of two violent Puerto Rican nationalist organizations, according to interviews and documents.

Details of the role played by Holder, who was deputy attorney general at the time, had not been publicly known until now. The new details are of particular interest because Republican senators have vowed to revisit Holder’s role during his confirmation hearings next week…

President Clinton’s decision to commute prison terms caused an uproar at the time. Holder was called before Congress to explain his role but declined to answer numerous questions from angry lawmakers demanding to know why the Justice Department had not sided with the FBI, federal prosecutors and other law enforcement officials, who were vehemently opposed to the grants.

Some religious groups and influential individuals, including President Carter, had endorsed the commutations. But Clinton’s decision outraged law enforcement officials, who had tried to contain a bombing campaign in New York, Chicago and elsewhere in the 1970s and 1980s by groups seeking independence for Puerto Rico from the United States.

New interviews and an examination of previously undisclosed documents indicate that Holder played an active role in changing the position of the Justice Department on the commutations.

Holder instructed his staff at Justice’s Office of the Pardon Attorney to effectively replace the department’s original report recommending against any commutations, which had been sent to the White House in 1996, with one that favored clemency for at least half the prisoners, according to these interviews and documents.

And after Pardon Attorney Roger Adams resisted, Holder’s chief of staff instructed him to draft a neutral "options memo" instead, Adams said.

The options memo allowed Clinton to grant the commutations without appearing to go against the Justice Department’s wishes, Adams and his predecessor, Margaret Colgate Love, said in their first public comments on the case.

"I remember this well, because it was such a big deal to consider clemency for a group of people convicted of such heinous crimes," said Adams, the agency’s top pardon lawyer from 1997 until 2008. He said he told Holder of his "strong opposition to any clemency in several internal memos and a draft report recommending denial" and in at least one face-to-face meeting. But each time Holder wasn’t satisfied, Adams said.

The 16 members of the FALN (the Spanish acronym for Armed Forces of National Liberation) and Los Macheteros had been convicted in Chicago and Hartford variously of bank robbery, possession of explosives and participating in a seditious conspiracy. Overall, the two groups had been linked by the FBI to more than 130 bombings, several armed robberies, six slayings and hundreds of injuries…

After one meeting with advocates of the FALN prisoners, Holder asked Adams to try to obtain statements of repentance from the inmates to include in the revised clemency report and recommendation being prepared for the White House, according to a 1999 Senate Judiciary Committee inquiry. Clinton later justified the commutations in part by citing his consultation with the Justice Department and the statements of repentance provided by the prisoners.

"The Justice Department is supposed to say what we think on the merits," said another Justice Department official opposed to clemency at the time, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the subject. Instead, "we were pushed to tell [Clinton] what he wanted to hear, which was to grant it and to provide political cover."

When Clinton issued the commutations on Aug. 11, 1999, the House and the Senate passed resolutions condemning his decision. Some lawmakers charged that Clinton approved the commutations to bolster Latino support for First Lady Hillary Rodham Clinton, who was building her campaign for senator of New York, and Vice President Al Gore, who was gearing up to run for president.

Holder was called to testify on the case by the Senate Judiciary Committee but, invoking Clinton’s claim of executive privilege, declined to say whether the Justice Department had changed its position on the commutations…

The rest of the Los Angeles Times article has excerpts from the new documents and other salient details.

Of course, as we noted when we posted this originally, Mr. Holder was probably acting under the direct orders of Mrs. Clinton, who wanted to sew up the Puerto Rican vote for her upcoming Senate bid.

Still, he could have opposed the orders and even resigned. But he didn’t.

He doesn’t seem to have ever had any problems treating terrorist with kid gloves.

Key 9/11 Suspect to Be Tried in New York

By CHARLIE SAVAGE

November 14, 2009

WASHINGTON — Khalid Shaikh Mohammed, the self-described mastermind of the Sept. 11 attacks, and four other men accused in the plot will be prosecuted in federal court in New York City, a federal law enforcement official said early on Friday.

But the administration will prosecute Abd al-Rahim al-Nashiri — the detainee accused of planning the 2000 bombing of the U.S.S. Cole in Yemen — and several other detainees before a military commission, the official said.

The decisions to give civilian prosecutors detainees accused of the 2001 terrorist attacks and keep the case of the Cole attack within the military system are expected to be announced at the Department of Justice later on Friday by Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr…

The decisions about how to prosecute Mr. Mohammed and Mr. Nashiri have been particularly difficult because their defense lawyers are expected to argue that they were illegally tortured by the Central Intelligence Agency during their confinement, tainting any evidence gathered from their interrogations.

Documents have shown that the CIA used waterboarding — a controlled drowning technique — against Mr. Mohammed 183 times in March 2003. Mr. Nashiri is one of two other detainees known to have been waterboarded before the Bush administration shut down the program, which high-level officials had approved after the Justice Department wrote legal memorandums arguing that the president, as commander-in-chief, could authorize interrogators to bypass anti-torture laws.

In other cases in which the administration has discussed transferring detainees, local communities have risen up through political leaders to say they did not want the prisoners because their towns could become a target for terrorism.

New York City has been different…

Isn’t it odd?

At this very moment we’re being told that Mr. Hasan can’t get a fair military trial in the Ft. Hood area because there would be just too much prejudice.

And yet New York City is seen as a suitable venue for trying a man who is accused of masterminding the death of 3,000 New Yorkers.

Notice too how the New York Times does not even deign to explicitly mention that Mr. Mohammed and his four accomplices are going to enjoy a civilian trial.

The Times merely notes that they will be tried in “federal court” before they quickly move on to stress that the Cole detainees will be tried before a “military commission.”

Perhaps they are hoping no one will notice.

Still, remember how Harry Reid assured us back in May of 2009 that terrorists would never be held in this country?

Mr. Reid said:

[P]art of what we don’t want is them be put in prisons in the United States. We don’t want them around the United States.

And speaking of lies, isn’t it amazing the amount of mendacity the New York Times can fit into just one paragraph?

Documents have shown that the CIA used waterboarding — a controlled drowning technique — against Mr. Mohammed 183 times in March 2003. Mr. Nashiri is one of two other detainees known to have been waterboarded before the Bush administration shut down the program, which high-level officials had approved after the Justice Department wrote legal memorandums arguing that the president, as commander-in-chief, could authorize interrogators to bypass anti-torture laws.

As we have noted often before, these so-called ‘documents’ are ambiguous at best. And Mr. Mohammed himself has claimed to have been water-boarded a total of five times.

Moreover, not only would it have been preposterous to have waterboarded Mr. Mohammed at least six times a day for a solid month, it would serve as definitive proof that waterboarding is a) not dangerous and, b) ineffective.

As for the legal memorandums, it is simply a bold faced lie to claim they argued that the President could authorize by-passing anti-torture laws. The memos rightly claimed that waterboarding was not torture under any accepted legal definition of the term.

But the New York Times will say anything to protect their terrorist heroes.

Indeed, we expect to see them hawking ‘Free MSM’ t-shirts any day now.

GOP chairman ends abortion insurance for employees

By CHRISTINE SIMMONS (AP)

WASHINGTON — A chagrined GOP Chairman Michael Steele has told Republican National Committee staff to immediately stop providing RNC employees with insurance for elective abortions — an option that Republicans strongly oppose as Democrats try to pass a health care overhaul bill.

"Money from our loyal donors should not be used for this purpose," Steele said in a statement late Thursday after learning of the abortion coverage from a news report. "I don’t know why this policy existed in the past, but it will not exist under my administration. Consider this issue settled."

Steele instructed staff to inform the insurance carrier that the RNC wanted to opt out of elective abortion coverage, RNC spokeswoman Gail Gitcho said. She said the policy has been in effect since 1991.

A memo earlier from RNC Chief of Staff Ken McKay to the organization’s members said Steele was taking the matter very seriously and "has been engaged by phone on this issue."

The GOP platform traditionally includes strong anti-abortion language. All House Republicans, except one, voted for an amendment imposing restrictions of coverage for abortions in the health care bill that passed the House last Saturday. Inclusion of the abortion restrictions prompted an angry backlash from liberal House Democrats, and some are now threatening to vote against a final bill if the curbs stay in.

The memo said the RNC received a phone call from a reporter on Wednesday asking whether the RNC’s health care policy, through Cigna, covered elective abortions for employees. On Thursday, Politico.com published a report citing two sales agents for Cigna who said the RNC’s policy covered elective abortion.

The Cigna employees said the RNC didn’t choose to opt out of abortion coverage when given the opportunity, Politico.com reported.

"Upon learning of this story, at the chairman’s direction, we immediately contacted the Executive Committee," the RNC memo said. "We will be scheduling a call with the Executive Committee in the immediate future to discuss this matter more fully."

The memo said the RNC health insurance policy has been in review for some time.

"Chairman Steele had already called for an official review of our health insurance policy along with a number of other operational items," the memo said.

This is pretty amazingly hypocritical, even for a political party.

But what is still more interesting is that we see that kind of spade work the Politico, the Associated Press and the rest of our media watchdogs are capable of doing.

When it involves getting the goods on those evil Republicans.

The Islamic Education Center, a grade school and mosque in Houston.

Muslims decry move to seize Houston mosque

Houston spiritual center among U.S. buildings federal prosecutors link to Iran

By MOISES MENDOZA, MARY FLOOD and LINDSAY WISE
Nov. 13, 2009

The U.S. government on Thursday moved to seize more than $500 million in assets from a New York-based foundation accused of being a front for the Iranian government, including a building that houses the Islamic Education Center of Houston.

The news provoked confusion and anger among Houston’s Shia Muslims, many of whom worship at the center’s mosque or send their children to an Islamic school that occupies the same large white building at 2313 S. Voss.

Faheem Kazimi, chairman of the board of directors, said IEC leases its building from the Alavi Foundation but no other connection exists.

“The Islamic Education Center is a nonprofit, independent organization, not affiliated with any other organization,” Kazimi said…

The 97-page civil forfeiture lawsuit filed by federal prosecutors in Manhattan alleges that the Alavi Foundation, which files federal taxes as a charitable foundation, is illegally funneling money to the government of Iran…

The foundation released a written statement through an attorney, saying the group was disappointed with the government’s legal move.

“The Foundation has been cooperating fully with the Government since the investigation began,” the statement read. “The Foundation intends to litigate the Government’s claims and expects to prevail when the litigation is over.”

Citing U.S. policy under several presidents and the International Emergency Economic Power Act, the civil suit alleges that the foundation’s property, which includes the Islamic Education Center, is forfeitable as proceeds of violations of laws including money laundering.

The indictment alleges how the Alavi Foundation has been providing services to Iran and the government-owned Bank Melli. The suit also alleges how shell corporations were used to dodge taxes and how a foundation official was arrested for allegedly destroying documents being sought in a grand jury investigation.

The U.S. Treasury has accused Bank Melli of providing support for Iran’s nuclear and ballistic missile programs.

The civil suit seeks forfeiture of a 36-story New York City office tower along with other property in New York, California, Virginia, Maryland and several bank accounts. This lawsuit replaces one prosecutors filed in 2008 seeking forfeiture of only a portion of the New York City office tower.

The Houston property, near Westheimer, is mentioned only briefly in the government’s lawsuit. It states the property was purchased in 1988 for $1.1 million and that $285,000 worth of improvements were made on the land between 1997 and 2004…

Hussein Abdi said he moved to the U.S. from Iran more than 30 years ago and he’s been worshipping at IEC for two decades. He came Thursday to pray.

“It makes me furious,” Abdi said. “We’re under attack.”

IEC serves as a place of worship, celebration, community programs and study, according to the center’s Web site. Its premises are occupied by one of Houston’s largest Shia mosques and the Al Hadi School of Accelerative Learning, a full-time private Islamic school for kindergarten through 12th grade.

“Among the primary goals of IEC is to inform and educate non-Muslims and Muslims about Islam, and to provide information about Islam on varying levels of inquiry, from the casual passer-by to a believing and practicing Muslim who wishes to extend his or her knowledge and level of piety,” the Web site states.

More background on the Alavi Foundation, from Discover The Networks:

Alavi Foundation

A not-for-profit organization formed in New York State in 1973, the Alavi Foundation was originally set up by the former Shah of Iran’s government to promote Iranian language and culture in the United States. With the fall of the Shah, the multi-million-dollar building where the Alavi Foundation has its offices became the property of the Mostazafan Foundation, a non-profit which was established by the Ayatollah Khomeini’s revolutionary Islamic government in Iran…

The Alavi Foundation owns numerous properties in the United States, including a 36-story New York City office complex worth an estimated $135 million; 20 acres of prime development land in Catharpin, Virginia; and four "Islamic Education Centers" in Potomac (Maryland), Queens (New York), Houston (Texas), and Carmichael (California).

The Potomac location serves some 1,500 Muslim families and was directed for 14 years by Islamic cleric Mohammad Asi, who called the 9/11 attacks "a grand strike against New York and Washington" launched by "Israeli Zionist Jews" who had advised the 5,000 Jews employed at the World Trade Center to skip work on that fateful day. Asi has also praised and supported the activities of Hezbollah, which is an arm of Iran’s Revolutionary Guards.

Former FBI official Oliver Revell has stated that the Alavi Foundation is "a front organization for the Iranian regime that is engaged in covert intelligence activity on the part of a hostile foreign government." That intelligence consists, in part, of monitoring Iranian dissidents in the U.S. by means of technological espionage.

David Cohen of the New York Police Department intelligence division says the Alavi Foundation is "totally controlled by the government of Iran" and "funds a variety of anti-American causes" including the Potomac Center and other mosques.

U.S. intelligence officials characterize Alavi as a vehicle through which the Iranian regime "keeps tabs on Iranians [in the United States], obtains data about U.S. technology, promotes Tehran’s views on world affairs, provides gathering places for pro-Iran activists, and channels money to U.S. academics to gain a friendly reading on Iran."

The Alavi Foundation has been operating in our country for three decades.

Why has it taken so long for anyone to do anything about it?

Gates Condemns Leaks on U.S. Afghan Policy and Ft. Hood

By ELISABETH BUMILLER

November 13, 2009

OSHKOSH, Wis. — Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates is normally a mild-mannered man, at least in public, but he unleashed a torrent on Thursday about leaks during the investigation of the Foot Hood shootings and during President Obama’s deliberations on sending more American troops to Afghanistan.

First, on the president’s meetings on Afghanistan: “I have been appalled by the amount of leaking that has been going on in this process,” Mr. Gates told reporters on his plane en route to a Wisconsin factory that is churning out thousands of armored trucks for use by American troops in Afghanistan. He added that he thought “a lot of different places are leaking” and that he was “confident that the Department of Defense is one of them.”

Then he made a threat: “And frankly if I found out with high confidence anybody who was leaking in the Department of Defense, who that was, that would probably be a career ender.”

The defense secretary moved on to the investigation of Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan, who was charged in the deaths of 13 people on Nov. 5 at Fort Hood, Tex., and what Mr. Gates called “unconscionable” leaks from “everybody out there with their own little piece of the action.”

Then he concluded, “Everybody ought to just shut up.” …

It is simply outrageous after all of the leaks we have had of matters truly vital to our national security, that Gates would pick this time and these two issues to speak out against leaking.

We shouldn’t be allowed to know that our President is dithering for months while are troops are waiting desperately for reinforcements?

We shouldn’t be allowed to hear the details behind the worst terrorist attack on US soil since 9/11? And how the military’s wrong-headed policies facilitated that attack?

Mr. Gates wants to cover up these things? (As if the press isn’t already doing its best to cover them up, anyway.)

In a better world this would be a “career ender” — for Mr. Gates.

In this photograph taken in October, 2009, Indian eunuchs show their voter identification cards at a polling station in Mumbai.

Indian eunuchs given separate IDs

November 13, 2009

India’s Election Commission has given eunuchs an independent identity by letting them choose their gender as "other" on ballot forms.

The commission said it had received representation from various individuals and interest groups on the subject.

So far, eunuchs were forced to put down their gender as either male or female.

There are about 500,000 eunuchs in India. Known as hijras, they comprise the hermaphrodite, transvestite and transsexual communities.

Eunuchs are feared and reviled in many parts of India, where some believe they have supernatural powers.

The BBC’s Geeta Pandey in Delhi says the election commission’s recognition of eunuchs as an independent group is a first step towards an official recognition of the community which has so far remained on the margins of society.

"The commission has duly considered the request and has decided to allow eunuchs and transsexuals to indicate their sex as ‘Other’ where they do not want to be described as male or female," the Election Commission said in a press release.

"Necessary instructions have been issued to all electoral registration officers through the chief electoral officers of all states and union territories (areas directly administered by the central government in Delhi) to give effect to the above decision of the commission."

The commission said it had received several representations from individuals and groups to include eunuchs in the electoral rolls with a separate identity.

"When the representations came, we readily agreed," Times of India newspaper quoted Election Commissioner SY Qureishi as saying.

"Why should a section of the population be left out? The decision will help in mainstreaming a section of the population," he said.

Most eunuchs earn a living by collecting cash gifts from people during marriages and child births.

But in recent times, with the decline in their traditional roles, many have been forced to work as commercial sex workers.

However some have contested elections and entered the public arena.

But correspondents say these success stories are rare.

This might be a handy solution for the problems in the Republican party.

Instead of conservatives leaving the GOP, maybe the ‘moderates’ could start their own ‘Other’ party. They certainly could pass the physical.

But, alas, just like in India, their success stories will undoubtedly be rare.

White House Aims to Cut Deficit With TARP Cash

By DEBORAH SOLOMON and JONATHAN WEISMAN

NOVEMBER 12, 2009

WASHINGTON — The Obama administration, under pressure to show it is serious about tackling the budget deficit, is seizing on an unusual target to showcase fiscal responsibility: the $700 billion financial rescue.

The administration wants to keep some of the unspent funds available for emergencies, but is considering setting aside a chunk for debt reduction, according to people familiar with the matter. It is also expected to lower the projected long-term cost of the program — the amount it expects to lose — to as little as $200 billion from $341 billion estimated in August.

A $210 billion surplus in TARP funding could be used to reduced the U.S.’s towering national deficit. WSJ’s Deborah Solomon says the move follows criticism of the Obama administration’s approach to debt.

The idea is still a matter of debate within the administration and it is unclear how much impact it would have on the nation’s mounting deficit levels. Still, the potential move illustrates how the Obama administration is trying to find any way it can to bring down the deficit, which is turning into a political as well as an economic liability…

On the $700 billion Troubled Asset Relief Program, the administration is considering a change that may appear to improve the fiscal situation. Agreeing not to spend a certain amount of TARP money will enable the White House, in its budget projections, to assume less money out the door and, therefore, less debt issued. The move would also reduce the deficit by an unknown amount since a certain level of spending and borrowing is already factored into estimated future deficits.

The Treasury Department said about $210 billion in TARP funds remains unspent, including about $70 billion returned from financial institutions. A further $50 billion is expected to be repaid in the next 12 to 18 months.
Journal Community

Budget experts said committing some TARP funds toward debt reduction could help calm concerns about the size and intent of the program. "I don’t necessarily want them to pull back in a huge way, because there’s a lot of uncertainty, but right now what we’ve got could turn into a $700 billion slush fund" for Congress, said Douglas Elliott, a fellow with the Brookings Institution, a liberal think tank…

Why stop with using the unspent TARP money to pay down the deficit?

Why doesn’t Mr. Obama just write a check for the total $1.5 trillion and get it over with?

Acorn Sues Over Funding Vote in House

By KAREEM FAHIM

November 13, 2009

Saying a resolution by the House of Representatives that barred Acorn from receiving federal aid violated the Constitution by singling the antipoverty group out for punishment, lawyers for Acorn filed a lawsuit on Thursday that seeks to restore the financing.

The lawsuit, filed in United States District Court in Brooklyn, says that the Congressional resolution constitutes a “bill of attainder,” or a legislative determination of guilt without a trial. In the suit, Acorn, which came under fire especially from conservative critics after a series of embarrassing scandals, said it was penalized by Congress “without an investigation” and has been forced to cut programs that counsel struggling homeowners, and to lay off workers.

For example, it said, because of budget cutbacks, a first time homebuyer class in New York that enrolled 100 people in September enrolled only seven people in October, after the Congressional action.

“It’s a classic trial by the Legislature,” said Jules Lobel, a lawyer with the Center for Constitutional Rights, which brought the suit. “They have essentially determined the guilt of the organization and any organization affiliated or allied with it.”

The suit represents the first legal response by Acorn to the Congressional action in September, when the House of Representatives added the financing prohibition to a bill on college lending.

Before the vote, the organization had come under heavy criticism by conservative groups amid allegations of voter registration fraud; critics intensified their attacks after Acorn counselors were videotaped giving mortgage advice to activists posing as a pimp and a prostitute interested in setting up a brothel. The counselors were fired.

The Obama administration has also distanced itself from Acorn, which is short for Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now.

Since 1994, the group has received about $53 million in federal aid.

At the time of the House vote, Acorn said the action would have little impact, since the group receives most of its income from members and other supporters. But in the suit, the group said that many of those supporters had cut off their relationships with Acorn, for fear of being tainted.

In an affidavit attached to the lawsuit, Bertha Lewis, the chief executive of Acorn, said she “underestimated” the effect of the resolution. “It gave the green light for others to terminate our funds as well,” she said. “All of our state and local grants were frozen, as were most of our private foundation funds.”

And several applications made by Acorn for contracts with federal agencies have also been rejected, the suit said, including a $780,000 grant for outreach to poor communities about asthma, and an application to set up public computer centers in five different cities.

The law suit names as defendants Timothy F. Geithner, the treasury secretary; Shaun Donovan, the secretary for Housing and Urban development; and Peter R. Orszag, who, as the director of the Office of Management and Budget, enforced the freeze on financing, the suit alleges.

Claims that lawmakers have violated the constitutional prohibition on bills of attainder are difficult to win, because courts have construed the clause as applying to punitive measures, according Michael C. Dorf, a constitutional law professor at Cornell University.

“Even though it’s certainly plausible to infer, given the politics and timing, that there was an aim to punish Acorn,” Professor Dorf said, “the government would undoubtedly defend on the grounds they can choose to fund or not to fund.”

Notice that we have come to such a sense of entitlement that when a group no longer receives government funding they think their rights are being violated and that they are being punished via a bill of attainder.

It’s a shame, but we presume Mr. Obama’s duties will keep him so busy he will not be able to act (once again) as ACORN’s attorney in this matter.

But of course he may be able to help them in other ways.

And speaking of proper legal representation, the Center for Constitutional Rights was founded by unapologetic communists, and they have gone downhill since then.

Stone: Do you think it’s fair to send people to jail who don’t buy health insurance?

Pelosi: … The legislation is very fair in this respect.

Apparently, Ms. Pelosi began to have second thoughts about her admission.

According to the YouTube uploader, who appears to be Mr. Stone himself:

The Office of Speaker Nancy Pelosi released this information in an email to Shomari Stone about an hour after the news conference:

"Reform includes a shared responsibility requirement, for those who don’t already have insurance to either purchase affordable health insurance or pay a fee of 2.5 percent of their income so they are not driving up everyone else’s health costs.

Under the bill, the only people who would face the fee for not purchasing insurance are those who can truly afford to purchase such insurance.

For those who can afford insurance but for some reason do not purchase it, they simply pay the fee a fee designed to cover their costs when they use the health care system. For a small number of people who might refuse to pay the fee, it is important to remember that, in the majority of cases, the IRS which will enforce the insurance requirement uses the CIVIL process to settle delinquent penalties and taxes.

It would only be in extremely rare circumstances that criminal prosecutions of any kind would be pursued. Indeed, in 2008, there were 156 million individual tax returns filed in the United States. Out of all of those 156 million returns, there were only 100 criminal prosecutions for willful failure to pay taxes and only for the most egregious examples of those who willfully defraud the system."

You see, there is nothing to worry about.

Having the IRS after you is no real big deal. (Never mind that, unlike under the rest of our judicial system, with the IRS you are presumed to be guilty until you can prove yourself innocent.)

Besides, the odds of going to jail for this are very low. They just want to put the threat of jail in the law for a lark.

But just try to get that language removed.

TSA nominee questioned over FBI censure

Erroll Southers had background check run on ex-wife’s boyfriend

By Ed O’Keefe
Wednesday, November 11, 2009

Sen. Susan Collins (R-Maine) questioned President Obama’s nominee to lead the nation’s airport security agency Tuesday about a censure he received from the FBI in 1988.

Erroll Southers, who was serving as an FBI special agent at the time of the censure, asked a co-worker’s husband who worked for the San Diego Police Department to run a background check on his ex-wife’s boyfriend.

Under questioning by Collins, Southers said that he has not misused government databases to receive personal information on anyone since the incident and that he would not do so in the future.

Collins did not describe the incident during Tuesday’s hearing, instead referring only to an "issue" that led to the censure.

Southers gave a detailed account in his written responses that were released Tuesday by the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee.

"The boyfriend had moved in with my ex-wife, from whom I had separated only a short time before, and I was concerned for the safety of her and my infant son, who was also living with them," he wrote. "The database search revealed an outstanding warrant for his arrest, about which I informed my ex-wife."

"I recognize that it was a mistake to have used my official connections to investigate the matter," Southers said.

Southers worked as an FBI special agent from 1984 to 1988. He told lawmakers Tuesday that he left the FBI about six months after the censure for unrelated reasons…

Be fair.

It would be pretty hypocritical for Mr. Obama to bounce this nominee for such an infraction after what he did to Joe The Plumber.

Not to mention how he got open divorce records to win his previous elections.