THE TALK SHOW AMERICAN

The Proper Way To Dispose Of A Damaged Koran ? Burn It !

2012-02-26T13:36:00.000-05:00

The recent outrage over the US Military "accidentally" burning Korans in Afghanistan is all Talibum generated propaganda. According to the gentleman featured in the is PBS Video, the proper and respectful way of disposing of the Koran is to BURN IT !

So one has to ask why the outrage when the Koran's that were used by captured enemy combatants as a way to send coded messages to each other by writing on the pages of the Koran thereby altering the original text and meaning, are burned. That is of course, if one has to ask at all.

It appears that the Talibums are successfully running a propaganda program using the burned Koran's as a catalyst to generate hatred toward America. Unfortunately it has cost the lives of soldiers fighting there as a result and our Appeaser in Chief is apologizing to these people ! For What !

Watch Qur'an Disposal on PBS. See more from Religion & Ethics NewsWeekly.

Gallup: Unemployment Climbs to 9% in February

2012-02-22T15:09:00.000-05:00

Unemployment in the U.S. rose to nine percent in mid-February, up from 8.3 percent a month earlier, according to a new Gallup survey.

The polling company said this suggests that it is “premature” to assume the economy will not feature prominently in the 2012 election season.

“Further, it suggests that it is premature to assume the condition of the economy will not remain a major issue for Americans both financially and politically in 2012.”

Gallup figures typically provide an indication of what the government will report at the end of the month.

“The U.S. unemployment rate, as measured by Gallup without seasonal adjustment, is 9.0% in mid-February,” Gallup said in its mid-month unemployment survey, released on February 17. “The mid-month reading normally reflects what the U.S. government reports for the entire month, and is up from 8.3% in mid-January.”

The survey also found that “underemployment” – those unemployed and those working part-time because full-time jobs are unavailable – rose to 19 percent, up from the 18.7 percent Gallup found in January.

Gallup said its report reflected a continuing trend of weakness in U.S. labor markets, marking a “sharp deterioration” in job market conditions.

“Regardless of what the government reports, Gallup’s unemployment and underemployment measures show a sharp deterioration in job market conditions since mid-January.”

Gallup said the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) would likely report a rise in the official unemployment rate in early March, when it publishes its February figures.

Read More Here

18 Statistics That Prove The Economy Has Not Improved Under Obama

2012-02-22T09:06:00.001-05:00

Has the economy improved since Barack Obama became the president of the United States? Of course not. Despite what you may be hearing in the mainstream media, the truth is that when you compare the U.S. economy on the day that Barack Obama was inaugurated to the U.S. economy today, there is really no comparison. The unemployment crisis is worse than it was then, home values have fallen, the cost of health insurance is up, the cost of gas is way up, the number of Americans living in poverty has soared and the size of our national debt has absolutely exploded.

The following are 18 statistics that prove that the economy has not improved since Barack Obama became the president of the United States....

#1 Today there are 88 million working age Americans that are not employed and that are not looking for employment. That is an all-time record high.

#2 When Barack Obama was elected, the percentage of unemployed Americans that had been out of work for more than 52 weeks was less than 15%. Today, it is above 30%.

#3 There are 1.2 million fewer jobs in America today than there were when Barack Obama was inaugurated.

#4 When Barack Obama first took office, the number of "long-term unemployed workers" in the United States was approximately 2.6 million. Today, that number is sitting at 5.6 million.

#5 The average duration of unemployment in the United States is hovering close to an all-time record high.

#6 During the Obama administration, worker health insurance costs have risen by 23 percent.

#7 Since Barack Obama has been president, the average price of a gallon of gasoline in the United States has increased by 90 percent.

#8 Since Barack Obama has been president, home values in the United States have declined by another 13 percent.

#9 Under Barack Obama, new home sales in the U.S. set a brand new all-time record low in 2009, they set a brand new all-time record low again in 2010, and they set a brand new all-time record low once again during 2011.

#10 Since Barack Obama took office, the number of Americans living in poverty has risen by more than 6 million.

#11 Since Barack Obama entered the White House, the number of Americans on food stamps has increased from 32 million to 46 million.

#12 The amount of money that the federal government gives directly to Americans has increased by 32 percent since Barack Obama entered the White House.

#13 According to the U.S. Census Bureau, the percentage of Americans living in "extreme poverty" is now sitting at an all-time high.

#14 When Barack Obama first took office, an ounce of gold was going for about $850. Today an ounce of gold costs more than $1700 an ounce.

#15 Since Barack Obama became president, the size of the U.S. national debt has increased by 44 percent.

#16 During Barack Obama's first two years in office, the U.S. government added more to the U.S. national debt than the first 100 U.S. Congresses combined.

#17 During the Obama administration, the U.S. government has accumulated more debt than it did from the time that George Washington took office to the time that Bill Clinton took office.

#18 The U.S. national debt has been increasing by an average of more than 4 billion dollars per day since the beginning of the Obama administration.

Read More Here

The True Unemployment Rate is 36%

2012-02-22T08:39:00.000-05:00

How would you define “unemployment?”

Would you define “unemployment” as measuring “people who want a job, but can’t get one?” This is, broadly speaking, the definition embraced by the Bureau of Labor Statistics. The trick to making those numbers dance lies in measuring “people who want a job.” The widely reported U-3 unemployment metric, currently standing at 8.3 percent, is very aggressive in shaving off people who have not made recent efforts to find work. It is further distorted by massive “seasonal adjustments,” which made over a million people vanish into thin air last month.

This is why the official unemployment rate gets lower when the American workforce contracts. Workforce contraction is a very bad thing. People who simply cannot find work, and languish on unemployment insurance for years, are the last thing a prosperous country needs… but those people don’t count in the official unemployment rate. For example, if everyone under the age of 25 abruptly stopped looking for work, it would be an economic disaster, but the official unemployment rate would go down, because the pool of people looking for work would get smaller.

(That’s not quite as far-fetched an example as it might sound, incidentally. Even the heavily-massaged U-3 unemployment rate currently sits at 23.2 percent for ages 16-19, and 13.3 percent for ages 20-24… and it’s about two percent higher for young men. Policies that increase the cost of labor, such as minimum-wage increases and mandated benefits, have a particularly punishing effect on young entry-level workers, since their labor has less intrinsic value than experienced older employees.)

This is precisely what has been happening under Barack Obama. The workforce is contracting with horrible speed, but it has the beneficial side effect of making the official unemployment rate go down a little, although 8.3 percent is still pathetic. The Administration bounces happily before the cameras and announces its policies are “working,” and job creation is now “on the right track,” even as their best months post job creation only slightly in excess of population growth – and they’ve only had a few such months. Pundits begin wondering if the old political rules that say re-election is impossible with unemployment over 6 or 7 percent might not apply to this President, if he can campaign on a slowly declining unemployment rate.

Since the concept of people who aren’t looking for work is so fluid, and some of those people have clearly been persuaded not to look for work because of job-destroying government policies, it might be more logical to measure unemployment using the standard incorrectly offered by the Bureau of Labor Statistics for the U-3 rate: “total unemployed, as a percent of the civilian labor force.” That’s what the U-3 rate claims to measure, but it doesn’t, not by a long shot.

What is the current percentage of working-age Americans, eligible to participate in the civilian labor force, but not currently working? Answer: 36.3 percent.

That’s the worst labor participation rate in three decades, and it’s part of the worst employment picture we’ve seen since the Great Depression.

Read More Here

'Scientific' model projects Obama victory

2012-02-18T13:02:00.001-05:00

The Signal -- a Yahoo! blog using an engine that "combines powerful scientific algorithms with multiple, real-time and historical data sources to generate predictions" -- says Obama will win 303 electoral votes to the Republican candidate's 235.

"Campaigns and candidates matter, and elections are dynamic events with more variables than could ever reasonably be distilled in an equation," adds The Signal. "But based on a real-time prediction engine that we have created with Yahoo! scientists, the data suggest a likely second-term for the current presidents."

Also note that The Signal projects Obama winning three states with less than 51% of the vote: Virginia, Ohio and New Hampshire. Should those three states -- and their 35 electoral votes -- shift to the GOP, the Republican candidate would win 270-268.

From The Signal:

We have examined the last ten presidential cycles and found that the Yahoo! model would have correctly predicted the winner in 88 percent of the 500 individual state elections, with an margin of error of just under 3 percentage points for our estimated vote share.

(We exclude Washington, D.C. in the model and assume it will definitely go for the Democratic candidate.)

This makes these predictions appreciably more accurate than the next best model for forecasting the Electoral College by the end of the second quarter of the election year. Furthermore, they are more accurate than polls until just after the conventions.

Using the Yahoo! model, given plausible economic and political trends, Barack Obama's reelection likelihood looks good for Democrats.

We assume that the president's approval rating stays the same between now and mid-June, each of the 50 states reports personal income growth that is average for an election year, and certain key indicators of state ideology remain unchanged this year. In this case, our model predicts that Barack Obama will carry 303 electoral votes this fall, 33 more than needed for victory.

To hedge our bets a bit, however, please note that our model predicts probabilities of victory, and that many states in both the Republican and Obama camps are nearly toss-ups.

CBO: 8%-plus unemployment into 2014

2012-02-18T03:41:00.000-05:00

The Congressional Budget Office is projecting unemployment of more than 8% throughout this election year and into 2014.

According to the CBO:

"The rate of unemployment in the United States has exceeded 8 percent since February 2009, making the past three years the longest stretch of high unemployment in this country since the Great Depression."

It added:

"CBO projects that the unemployment rate will remain above 8 percent until 2014. The share of unemployed people who have been looking for work for more than six months -- referred to as the long-term unemployed -- topped 40 percent in December 2009 and has remained above that level ever since."

Republicans are citing the new CBO report as an indictment of Obama's economic policies:

"Today, there's no denying the fact that his stimulus policies not only failed, they made things worse," said House Speaker John Boehner, R-Ohio.

Real Unemployment Is 15 Percent According To CBO

2012-02-18T02:58:00.000-05:00

The Congressional Budget Office released a report Thursday that showed real unemployment in America at 15 percent for the month of January, a figure considerably higher than the White House’s oft-cited 8.3 percent figure that does not include part-time workers seeking full-time work or those who have given up hope of finding a job altogether.

From the CBO:

Many people would like to work but have not searched for a job in the past four weeks, or are working part-time but would prefer full-time work. If those people were counted among the unemployed, the unemployment rate in January 2012 would have been about 15 percent.

Furthermore, the CBO reported:

The United States is experiencing the longest stretch of high unemployment since the Great Depression with no end in sight through 2014.

The CBO reports that the Obama Economy has created an unprecedentedly high rate of long-term unemployment, which the CBO defines as a person who has been seeking work for over 26 months.

Over 40 percent of people who are currently unemployed have been out of work for more than half a year, as compared with about one-quarter during the 1981–1982 recession. The extent of long-term unemployment is much greater than would be expected on the basis of its historical relationship with the overall unemployment rate.

Read More Here

Hating Tim Tebow

2012-01-13T19:54:00.000-05:00

By Matt Barber

I grew up in Denver and am admittedly biased. I’m a Denver Broncos fanatic. In the Mile High City, the Broncos are more than just a football team; they’re an institution.

Everybody loves a comeback. Former Broncos quarterback John Elway — one of the greatest QBs in NFL history — had comebacks in his DNA. Since he retired in 1999 after back-to-back Super Bowl wins, Denver fans have been jonesing for that regular shot of adrenaline Elway provided week in, week out.

Enter Tim Tebow. In the category of, “Holy cow, can he actually do it?” no Broncos QB since Elway has delivered like Tebow has. He feels familiar. This is what Broncos fans expect. We don’t do steady. We prefer up and down, high and low until that improbable rocket launch to victory in the final seconds of the game.

Will Tebow end up an NFL great like John Elway? That remains to be seen. Opinions are all over the place. But what is certain is that Tim Tebow is more than just a sports phenomenon. He’s a cultural phenomenon.

For starters, Tebow’s very existence is somehow controversial. He’s a walking pro-life testimonial. He’s been pulling off comebacks since before he was born. Pam Tebow, Tim’s mother, courageously chose to carry baby Tim to term despite doctors’ recommendations that she abort him.

You may recall that before Tim went pro, the Christian group, Focus on the Family, commissioned an innocuous TV ad that ran during the 2010 Saints-Colts Super Bowl game. It briefly told the story of the Tebows’ pre-natal struggle. The word “abortion” was never even uttered, but a positive portrayal of childbearing was all it took.

And so began the left’s hate affair with Tim Tebow. Radical feminist groups, media-types and liberal pundits alike lost their collective noodle even before the ad ran.

Erin Mattson, vice president of The National Organization for Women (NOW), told ABC News that Tim’s story of survival was “really quite offensive. … This ad is hate masquerading as love!” she barked. Tim wasn’t dismembered alive and scraped in pieces from his mother’s womb, you see.

The New York-based Women’s Media Center launched a failed censorship petition drive to pull the ad, framing it as an “attack on choice.” Get it? Pam Tebow chose alright; she just happened to make the wrong “choice,” and dared to share about it publicly.

But as a Denver Bronco, Tim Tebow’s profile has grown exponentially. So too has the left’s hatred for him.

This is due in large part to his very open Christian faith. After each game, Tim begins by thanking God: “First and foremost, I’d like to thank my Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ.”

And who hasn’t heard of “Tebowing,” wherein one drops to a knee in prayer?

Then there’s Tim’s favorite Bible verse, John 3:16, which he’s known to wear painted in black swaths under each eye. After the Broncos’ recent electrifying playoff win against the Pittsburgh Steelers in overtime, John 3:16 was reportedly the most popular search term on the Internet.

Remarkably, during the game Tebow passed for precisely 316 yards and averaged 31.6 yards per completed pass. The television viewing audience for the last 15 minutes of the game was 31.6 percent. This only added to the mystique.

So big was the story, in fact, that major news outlets like CNN ran the text of John 3:16 in its entirety: “For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life.”

The attention that Tebow’s bold Christian faith has drawn to the Gospel message has secular “progressives” and other God-deniers tied in knots.

American Atheists, a New Jersey-based group that promotes religious cleansing from the public sphere, says that Tebow is “full of cr*p.”

“Tebow takes religion and injects it into the mix and divides the fan base,” complained David Silverman, the group’s president.

“[Religion] injects the divisive force into football,” he continued (because, absent religion, football is just a touchy-feely snuggle fest). “Why in the world are we talking about religion when we are talking about football?” he demanded.

Of course, Tim Tebow is merely doing what Jesus asks of his followers: “Whoever acknowledges me before men, I will also acknowledge him before my Father in heaven.” (Matthew 10:32)

The problem is that secular “progressives” don’t want Christ acknowledged before anyone, period; and they endeavor to shut down or mock anybody who tries.

During the Broncos’ regular season loss to the Buffalo Bills, for instance, “progressive” troglodyte and pseudo-intellectual funnyman Bill Maher tweeted about the game, encapsulating the left’s visceral hatred for Tim Tebow in 140 characters or less: “Wow, Jesus just [expletive deleted] #TimTebow bad! And on Xmas Eve! Somewhere in hell Satan is tebowing, saying to Hitler ‘Hey, Buffalo’s killing them.’”

Jesus addressed the Bill Mahers of the world — past, present and future — on more than one occasion. In John 15:18-20, for instance, He reminds His followers: “If the world hates you, keep in mind that it hated me first. If you belonged to the world, it would love you as its own. As it is, you do not belong to the world, but I have chosen you out of the world. That is why the world hates you.”

Those who belong to the world do indeed hate Tim Tebow. He stands for much of what our postmodern popular culture despises: sexual purity within the bonds of natural marriage, the sanctity of human life, selflessness, personal charity, humility and much, much more.

I mean, Tim Tebow has never even been arrested for drug possession or sexual assault, for crying out loud. We simply can’t allow children this kind of role model.

So, does God care about who wins NFL football games? Probably not. Does he care about those who play, watch and love football? Unquestionably.

Win or lose, no matter what happens with the rest of the Denver Broncos football season, one thing is for sure: people will keep talking about Tim Tebow. And when people are talking about Tim Tebow, they can’t help but talk about the profound faith that drives him both on and off the field.

In the meantime: Go Broncos!

(First published at Daily Caller)

Matt Barber (@jmattbarber on Twitter) is an attorney concentrating in constitutional law. He serves as Vice President of Liberty Counsel Action .

SCOTUS delivers knockout to White House

2012-01-12T10:45:00.000-05:00

Wednesday the United States Supreme Court delivered a knockout blow to the White House in the cause of religious liberty.

Chief Justice John Roberts, writing for a unanimous court swatted away the government’s claim that the Lutheran Church did not have the right to fire a “minister of religion” who, after six years of Lutheran religious training had been commissioned as a minister, upon election by her congregation.

The fired minister -- who also taught secular subjects -- claimed discrimination in employment. The Obama administration, always looking for opportunities to undermine the bedrock of First Amendment religious liberty, eagerly agreed.

There was just one big problem standing in the way of the government's plan: the U.S. Constitution. For a long time American courts have recognized the existence of a "ministerial exemption" which keeps government’s hands off the employment relationship between a religious institution and its ministers or clergy.

Here, in this case, the Department of Justice had the nerve to not only challenge the exemption’s application but also its very existence.

But, Chief Justice Roberts pushed back hard, telling the government essentially to butt out:

“Requiring a church to accept or retain an unwanted minister, or punishing a church for failing to do so, intrudes upon more than a mere employment decision. Such action interferes with the internal governance of the church, depriving the church of control over the selection of those who will personify its beliefs. By imposing an unwanted minister, the state infringes the free exercise clause, which protects a religious group’s right to shape its own faith and mission through its appointments. According the state the power to determine which individuals will minister to the faithful also violates the establishment clause, which prohibits government involvement in such ecclesiastical decisions.”

Citing well-known legal precedent dating as far back as Reconstruction, the court made it clear that it is not up to the government to contradict a faith’s determination as to who should -- and should not -- be performing religious functions.

The Supreme Court clearly announced Wednesday that the First Amendment itself gives special recognition to the rights of religious organizations and rejected the government’s view that the Religion Clauses of the Constitution don’t apply to religious organizations’ freedom to select their own ministers, priests, rabbis and imams.

The Court also took aim at Plaintiff’s Cheryl Perich’s claims for back pay finding that such relief would operate as an unconstitutional penalty against a religious institution for terminating an unwanted minister and exercising its constitutional right to make decisions about internal church governance. Unfortunately, the federal government has become expert in imposing penalties for practicing one’s faith.

Read More Here: http://www.foxnews.com/opinion/2012/01/11/supreme-court-delivers-knockout-punch-to-white-house/#ixzz1jDGerJc8

Appeals Court Upholds Order Blocking OK Sharia Law Ban

2012-01-12T10:15:00.000-05:00

The U.S. 10th Circuit Court of Appeals, in a ruling released Tuesday, affirmed an order by a district court judge in 2010 that prevented the voter-approved state constitutional amendment from taking effect. The ruling also allows a Muslim community leader in Oklahoma City to continue his legal challenge of the law’s constitutionality.

The measure, known as State Question 755, was approved with 70% of the vote in 2010. The amendment would bar courts from considering the legal precepts of other nations or cultures.

“Specifically, the courts shall not consider international law or sharia law,” the law reads.

The appellate court opinion pointed out that proponents of the law admitted to not knowing of a single instance in which an Oklahoma court applied sharia law or the legal precepts of other countries

Read More Here: http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-oklahoma-sharia-20120111,0,570388.story

U.S. Debt Now Larger Than Whole Economy

2012-01-11T10:16:00.000-05:00

The amount owed by the federal government to its creditors, combined with IOUs to government retirement and other schemes, now stands at $15.23 trillion. The government estimated the value of goods and services produced by the economy in a year at $15.17 trillion as of September.

According to long-term forecasts, debt will carry on growing faster than the economy, which would need to expand by at least 6 percent per year to keep pace.

Read More Here: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2084353/Size-U-S-debt-entire-economy--15-23-TRILLION.html

Poll: Obama's Re-election Is Americas’ Top Fear

2012-01-10T13:40:00.000-05:00

According to a new Washington Whispers poll, many voters aren’t forgetting what they dislike about Obama and want him out office.

In the New Year’s poll, when asked what news event they fear most about 2012, Americans by a margin of two-to-one said Obama’s reelection. Only 16 percent said they fear the Democrat won’t win a second term, while 33 percent said they fear four more years.

In results backed up by other polls, older Americans and those earning $75,000 or more are especially worried about the president getting a second term, according to the poll done by Synovate eNation.

The poll of younger Americans, 18-24, said just 28 percent of those voters said they feared Obama winning in November.

Read More Here: http://www.usnews.com/news/blogs/washington-whispers/2012/01/09/poll-americans-2-1-fear-obamas-reelection?s_cid=rss:washington-whispers:poll-americans-2-1-fear-obamas-reelection

List of Gitmo Detainees Obama Plans to Release in Deal with Talibums

2012-01-10T13:13:00.002-05:00

According to Washington Post writer Marc A. Theissen President Obama is reportedly planning to release Taliban leaders from Guantanamo Bay detention center.

The Obama administration is allegedly considering the release of these senior Taliban leaders as part of a deal to bring the militant Islamist group to engage in peace talks.

According to Theissen, if Obama does in fact proceed with the release, he will do “tremendous harm” to U.S. national security “and to his prospects for reelection this fall.”

Theissen writes:

To understand why, consider the individuals White House is considering setting free. Last year WikiLeaks released a trove of documents it dubbed the “Gitmo Files” with assessments of hundreds of Guantanamo detainees — including the five Taliban leaders reportedly under consideration for release.

U.S. Most Armed Country (with 90 guns per 100 people)

2011-12-21T15:43:00.000-05:00

Reuters is reporting that U.S. citizens own 270 million of the world's 875 million known firearms, according to the Small Arms Survey 2007 by the Geneva-based Graduate Institute of International Studies.

About 4.5 million of the 8 million new guns manufactured worldwide each year are purchased in the United States, it said.

"There is roughly one firearm for every seven people worldwide. Without the United States, though, this drops to about one firearm per 10 people," it said.

India had the world's second-largest civilian gun arsenal, with an estimated 46 million firearms outside law enforcement and the military, though this represented just four guns per 100 people there. China, ranked third with 40 million privately held guns, had 3 firearms per 100 people.

Germany, France, Pakistan, Mexico, Brazil and Russia were next in the ranking of country's overall civilian gun arsenals.

On a per-capita basis, Yemen had the second most heavily armed citizenry behind the United States, with 61 guns per 100 people, followed by Finland with 56, Switzerland with 46, Iraq with 39 and Serbia with 38.

France, Canada, Sweden, Austria and Germany were next, each with about 30 guns per 100 people, while many poorer countries often associated with violence ranked much lower. Nigeria, for instance, had just one gun per 100 people.

"Firearms are very unevenly distributed around the world. The image we have of certain regions such as Africa or Latin America being awash with weapons -- these images are certainly misleading," Small Arms Survey director Keith Krause said.

"Weapons ownership may be correlated with rising levels of wealth, and that means we need to think about future demand in parts of the world where economic growth is giving people larger disposable income," he told a Geneva news conference.

Read More Here: http://www.reuters.com/article/2007/08/28/us-world-firearms-idUSL2834893820070828

"Civilian holdings of weapons worldwide are much larger than we previously believed," Krause said, attributing the increase largely to better research and more data on weapon distribution networks.

White House:TEA Party To Blame for Potential Tax Hike

2011-12-21T14:39:00.001-05:00

White House Communications Director Dan Pfeiffer:

“You can’t get 89 votes in this day and age for apple pie, yet they all supported this. They did it with the understanding that the House would approve this two-month extension and Speaker Boehner got on the phone with his caucus, tried to sell it. He had a Tea Party revolt. He reversed his position and he’s now putting danger, a tax increase…”

Poll: Obama Virtually tied with Romney, Gingrich

2011-12-21T14:28:00.000-05:00

A new USA TODAY/Gallup Poll shows President Obama basically tied with top Republican contenders Mitt Romney and Newt Gingrich.

In both cases, 50% of registered voters surveyed said they would support Obama, while 48% would back either Romney or Gingrich.

A main reason for the tight results, Gallup says: Negative votes against Obama.

"Most registered voters who back Obama indicate that their vote decision represents a vote for Obama rather than a vote against the Republican candidate," Gallup reports.

"By contrast," the survey adds, "voters supporting the Republican in each trial heat say their choice primarily represents a vote against Obama rather than for either Gingrich or Romney."

Read More Here: http://content.usatoday.com/communities/theoval/post/2011/12/poll-obama-basically-tied-with-romney-gingrich/1?csp=34news

Sen Coburn Releases 'Wastebook' Detailing 6.5 Billion Plus in "Unneccesary" Spending

2011-12-21T14:03:00.000-05:00

Oklahoma Sen. Tom Coburn on Tuesday released his annual "Wastebook" highlighting what he's labeled some of the government's most wasteful spending items, including $113,000 for a video game preservation center and $765,000 to subsidize "pancakes for yuppies" in Washington.

"Wastebook 2011" details the "most egregious ways your taxpayer dollars were wasted" -- items he claims total more than $6.5 billion in "unnecessary" spending.

"Video games, robot dragons, Christmas trees, and magic museums. This is not a Christmas wish list, these are just some of the ways the federal government spent your tax dollars," Coburn said in a statement.

"Instead of cutting wasteful spending, nearly $2.5 billion was added each day in 2011 to our national debt, which now exceeds $15 trillion," Coburn said.

Read more: http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2011/12/20/coburn-releases-wastebook-detailing-more-than-65-billion-in-unnecessary/#ixzz1hCEuxSqK

Democrat Party Whoppers of 2011

2011-12-21T13:22:00.000-05:00

FactCheck.org has released a list of political whoppers for 2011. I have listed the Democratic Party whoppers here but to be fair FactCheck lists Republican Party whoppers as well, however you'll have to go to FactCheck.org to read those Democrats, I'm not doing your work for you.

Republicans Would ‘End Medicare’

First the truth: The budget plan that Republicans pushed through the House in 2011 would have radically changed Medicare in the future — for workers now under age 55. Starting in the year 2022, the GOP plan called for new Medicare beneficiaries to purchase private insurance with the help of federal subsidies.

But the plan would have continued the present Medicare system indefinitely for those now getting benefits, and also for all those who reach age 65 during the next decade.

But the truth didn’t stop Democrats from misrepresenting the proposal shamelessly to scare senior citizens and win election votes. They tested this tactic in a May 26 special House election in New York state, running ads accusing the Republican candidate of endorsing a plan that would “essentially end Medicare” and amount to “cutting benefits for seniors,” claims that were far from the truth.

The truth is that not all Democrats think that changing Medicare in the way Republicans proposed is tantamount to murdering grannie. In fact, Democratic Sen. Ron Wyden of Oregon joined Republican Rep. Paul Ryan of Wisconsin on Dec. 14 to offer a bipartisan plan that is a modified version of the GOP plan Ryan authored earlier. And the New York Times noted Nov. 28 that there is growing support among some Democrats for reining in Medicare costs through a “premium support” system similar to the GOP plan if accompanied by enough safeguards.

Obama’s Dying Mother

We also discovered in 2011 that one of President Barack Obama’s favorite personal anecdotes — which he had told any number of times to sell his health-care legislation to the public — was not true.

The president told the story often during the 2008 presidential campaign and the many months before he signed the health care law. He said his mother, as she was dying, nearly was denied health insurance coverage due to the fact that her ovarian cancer was considered a preexisting condition. But in 2011, author Janny Scott published a biography, “A Singular Woman: The Untold Story of Barack Obama’s Mother.” And in it she wrote that Stanley Ann Dunham’s health insurance provider did, in fact, cover most of the medical expenses.

The author had access to Dunham’s letters to her insurance company and reported that her fight was over disability coverage (which is not affected by the new health care law) and not over medical insurance. The White House did not dispute the account.

This is not the first time Obama has been caught using an embellished anecdote to sell the massive new health care law. In 2009 — in a televised health care address to Congress and the nation, no less — he claimed an insurance company delayed covering an Illinois man’s chemotherapy and “he died because of it.” But as reporters later pointed out, the man’s coverage was reinstated. His treatment resumed, and however badly he was treated, he nevertheless survived another four years. In that case, Obama’s speechwriters relied on a mistaken news account and never bothered to check the facts, which had been aired in public hearings before Congress.

Teachers Pay Higher Tax Rates Than Obama

President Obama went overboard arguing for higher tax rates on high earnings, claiming that he pays a lower tax rate than a teacher making $50,000 a year. That’s not true.

A single taxpayer with $50,000 of income would have paid less than half the effective rate paid by the Obamas in 2008, 2009 or 2010. And if the $50,000-a-year teacher was supporting a spouse and two children — like Obama — he or she would have paid no federal income taxes at all.

Other Assorted Absurdities

Vice President Joe Biden’s multiple whoppers about rapes in Flint, Mich., following police layoffs. He claimed variously that they went up 152 percent, tripled and even “quadrupled.” But FBI data show the number of rapes in Flint went down by 11 percent over two years. Michigan State Police figures, which include male victims, show a 9.8 percent reduction. The city supplied rape statistics to both the state and federal agencies.

An exaggerated Democratic National Committee Web video accusing ex-Gov. Mitt Romney of far more flip-flopping than he really committed. It’s a preview of what the general election campaign will see should Romney win the GOP nomination.

Democratic National Committee Chairwoman Debbie Wasserman Schultz wrongly claimed that the U.S. has begun to add “millions of jobs in manufacturing.”

Read More Here: http://factcheck.org/2011/12/the-whoppers-of-2011/

Newt Wins Tea Party Straw Poll

2011-12-21T12:49:00.002-05:00

Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich scored a huge victory Monday, winning a key straw poll of Tea Party supporters.

The poll, taken among 23,000 Tea Party enthusiasts organized by the Tea Party Patriots, one of the nation’s biggest Tea Party organizations, had Gingrich winning with with 31 percent of their vote, registered in a conference call on Sunday night.

Coming in a close second was Rep. Michele Bachmann of Minnesota, with 28 percent. Mitt Romney, the former governor of Massachusetts, pulled 20 percent; former Sen. Rick Santorum, 16 percent; Rep. Ron Paul of Texas, 3 percent; Gov. Rick Perry of Texas, 2 percent, and Jon M. Huntsman Jr., 0.3 percent, The New York Times reported.

Read more on Newsmax.com: Gingrich Wins Tea Party Straw Poll

GOP poll reveals Iowa distrusts Obama

2011-12-21T02:31:00.002-05:00

Buried in the Poll of likely Iowa Republican voters is the stunning conclusion that more than half either don’t believe Barack Obama or aren’t sure he’s telling the truth about his eligibility to be president.

The poll indicated that 31 percent do not believe Obama was born in the United States – an indication of their disbelief about his eligibility to be president.

Another 21 percent were not sure. Some 47 percent said they believe he was born in the United States. Some, however, argue that even that is not sufficient to establish that Obama is a “natural born citizen,” as the Constitution requires for presidents. The poll comes eight months after the White House released his “Certificate of Live Birth” as “proof positive” of his birth in Hawaii and, therefore, his eligibility.

The Atlantic Wire, reporting on the poll, which was conducted by telephone over the weekend, noted the “tidbit” that “52 percent either said he was not or they’re not sure” without referencing the significance of such a finding.

Read More Here: http://www.wnd.com/index.php?fa=PAGE.view&pageId=379233

Condi Rice For V.P. ?

2011-12-21T02:10:00.001-05:00

There is growing speculation that Condolezza Rice is quietly positioning herself to be the top choice of the eventual Republican presidential nominee, ready to deliver bona fide foreign-policy credentials lacking among the candidates. The 56-year-old has recently raised her profile, releasing her memoir in November and embarking on a monthlong book tour.

After 2 1/2 years as a professor at Stanford, Miss Rice is reportedly getting “antsy” to get back into the political game. “She’s ready to go,” said one top source.

Plus, her selection would be a giant chess move to counter the expected replacement of Vice President Joseph R. Biden with Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton. Sure, the White House denies and denies, but that should really make any political watcher more suspicious.

Unlike 2008, when Miss Rice repeatedly played down all suggestions that she might like to join the Republican ticket as the vice presidential candidate, she is actively staying mum, while quietly encouraging speculation that she is ready to run.

The 2012 election is shaping up to be all about the U.S. economy. Everything Mr. Obama has tried has failed, so American voters are looking for someone who can actually fix the problems. But what the Republican presidential hopefuls lack is foreign-policy experience. Cue Miss Rice.

Of course, like any black conservative, she is mostly reviled in the black liberal community.

Imagine the debate, whether it’s against Mr. Biden or Mrs. Clinton: Miss Rice would bring a huge resume - not to mention a real understanding of the world, on which top Democrats seem to clueless and all issues of race would be moot.

Read More Here:
http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2011/dec/18/curl-one-president-please-with-a-side-of-rice/

Democrats outpacing GOP in lobbyist cash

2011-12-21T01:40:00.001-05:00

The national political parties took more cash from lobbyists in the first half of 2011 than in any other six-month period on record. The Democratic Party’s committees have easily outpaced their GOP counterparts despite President Obama’s vilification of special-interest giving.

An analysis by The Washington Times found that the fundraising arms of the Democrats took in 30 percent more in lobbyist donations than Republicans in the first six months of this year, a lead but a significant drop since the heady days of 2008 and 2009 when Democrats dominated with ratios of 2-to-1 and 3-to-1, respectively. The figure is at odds with the grass-roots image that Democratic leaders have cultivated.

Congressional disclosures through June show the Republicans’ fundraising groups - the Republican National Committee, the National Republican Congressional Committee and the National Republican Senatorial Committee - received $1 million from lobbyists compared with $1.3 million taken in by the Democrats’ committees this year.

Lobbyists contributed $1.6 million to Democratic Party committees in the months before the ban and $1.7 million in that period a year later, indicating Mr. Obama’s oft-touted efforts to keep special interests at a distance have done little to curb their giving to Democrats.

“It’s hypocritical,” said Howard Marlowe, president of the American League of Lobbyists. “He’s found someone who’s got a couple percentage points lower [approval] than Congress and he’s going to pound away. … Meanwhile, all these folks absolutely love money from whatever source, as long as it’s legal.”

Read More Here:

http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2011/dec/19/democrats-outpacing-gop-in-lobbyist-cash-race/

FCC official warns: ‘Internet freedom’ threatened

2011-12-21T01:16:00.000-05:00

An international fight is brewing over whether the Internet will remain free from government regulations or fall increasingly under the control of emerging global powers according to FCC commissioner Robert McDowell.

“The proponents of Internet freedom and prosperity have been asleep at the switch,” Mr. McDowell, the lone Republican serving at the FCC, told editors and reporters at The Washington Times. “Or maybe I should say asleep at the router.”

The 193-member International Telecommunications Union (ITU), a U.N. agency, will meet in Dubai next December to renegotiate the 24-year-old treaty that deals with international oversight of the Internet. A growing number of countries are pushing greater governmental control and management of the Web’s availability, financial model and infrastructure.

They believe the current model is “dominated” by the U.S., and want to “take that control and power away,” Mr. McDowell said. China and Russia support the effort, but so do non-Western U.S. allies such as Brazil, South Africa and India.

“Thus far, those who are pushing for new intergovernmental powers over the Internet are far more energized and organized than those who favor the Internet freedom and prosperity,” he said.

While growth of the Internet has exploded under a minimal regulatory model over the past two decades, “significant government and civil society support is developing for a different policy outlook,” according to an analysis by lawyers David Gross and M. Ethan Lucarelli on the legal intelligence website www.lexology.com.

“Driven largely by the global financial troubles of recent years, together with persistent concerns about the implications of the growth of the Internet for national economies, social structures and cultures, some governments and others are now actively reconsidering the continuing viability of liberalization and competition-based policies,” they wrote.

A bad treaty - which would need the support of only a bare majority of U.N. members to pass and which the United States could not veto - could bring “a whole parade of problems,”

“They’re very well aware of it,” Mr. McDowell said. “The Obama administration is in the right position. But my concern is that we’re behind the curve.”

The FCC commissioner said he is trying to sound the alarm about the U.N. effort because he believes the Internet has thrived precisely because of the absence of central government control.

Read More Here: http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2011/dec/19/fcc-official-delivers-warning-on-threat-to-interne/

Supreme Court to hear ObamaCare arguments in March

2011-12-20T16:02:00.001-05:00

The Supreme Court announced Monday that it would hear arguments over three days in late March to decide the constitutionality of President Obama's healthcare law.

The 51/2 hours of argument are believed to be the most time devoted to a single case since the 1960s.

The court will decide whether the Constitution gave Congress the power to require all Americans to have health insurance by 2014.

On Monday, March 26, the court will consider an issue that could derail a decision for now. A 19th century law known as the Anti-Injunction Act forbids judges from striking down taxes until the taxpayer has paid the tax and then sought a refund. Under the healthcare law, a citizen who has no health insurance in 2014 would have to pay a "penalty" on his or her tax form that is due in April 2015. If this penalty is deemed a "tax," the Anti-Injunction Act says no judge could rule on it until 2015.

Neither the Obama administration nor the Florida challengers relied on this "tax" argument to delay a decision. The justices appointed outside lawyers to argue the point for one hour.

On March 27, the court will devote two hours of argument to what has been the main issue: Is the mandate that each individual have insurance a valid regulation of the health insurance market, or is it an unconstitutional burden on people who do not want to buy insurance?

On March 28, the court will spend 90 minutes debating a question that arises if the mandate is declared unconstitutional. Must the entire statute fall if this one provision is struck down, or can it be "severed" so the rest of the law can stand?

Also on March 28, the justices will devote an hour of argument to another issue with the law: Did Congress violate states' rights when it expanded the Medicaid program? This healthcare subsidy for low-income and disabled Americans is jointly funded by the federal government and the states, although 90% of the expansion would be paid from Washington.

The justices are expected to decide these issues and hand down their opinions by late June.

Read More Here: http://www.latimes.com/health/la-na-court-healthcare-20111220,0,7552715.story

Poll: Americans dislike what they see in 2012 Election

2011-12-20T13:01:00.000-05:00

A USA TODAY/Gallup Poll finds those surveyed say the election process isn't working and the candidates aren't coming up with good ideas to solve the nation's problems.

Fewer than half of them say there is a candidate running, Republican or Democratic, who would make a good president.

"We're looking at the politics of backlash," says Lawrence Jacobs of the Center for the Study of Politics and Governance at the University of Minnesota. Americans see a political process that is "out of touch and paralyzed in the face of crushing economic conditions and fear about the future. It's as if the country is on the Titanic and it's going down, and you've got Congress and the presidential field playing violins."

Americans by 4-1 margin say it makes "a real difference" to them who is elected president, and 53% strongly agree that the stakes in this election are greater than in previous years. Almost two-thirds of registered voters are concerned about what might happen if their candidate isn't elected.

The findings point to how much the 2012 election is about Obama, not his opposition. That's disquieting news for the president's strategists.

The president, nor anyone else in Washington for that matter, gets high marks for the job done this year.

Only 8% say Obama has done an "excellent" job, a rating given by 3% to congressional Democrats and 2% to congressional Republicans. All three received a "poor" rating by the majority of those surveyed.

Even their own partisans don't rate them highly: A third of Democrats say Obama did a fair or poor job this year. Almost eight in 10 Republicans say congressional Republicans have done a fair or poor job, and six in 10 Democrats say the same thing about congressional Democrats.

Read More Here:
http://www.usatoday.com/news/politics/story/2011-12-19/poll-2012-race-president/52074434/1?csp=hf