The pursuit of Constitutionally grounded governance, freedom
and individual liberty
"There is but
one straight course, and that is to seek truth and pursue it steadily." --George Washington
______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
Feds plan to give Egypt armed-to-the-teeth shipsHarpoon
missile among weapons aboard patrol vessels
by Steve
Peacock
The U.S. Senate has
rejected an effort to crack down on U.S. taxpayer monies being forwarded to the
violence-ridden nation of Egypt, and now the Obama administration is preparing
to send more heavily armed, missile-equipped naval patrol ships to the interim
government there. For that purpose, Washington is hiring private
contractors to make the transoceanic delivery on its behalf.
This shipment of Fast Missile Craft, or FMC, comes
at a time when congressional interest in suspending U.S. military aid to Egypt
had heated up – to the point there was a Senate proposal to cut it off. That aid, according to federal law, must be
suspended in response to military coups. But the White House refuses to designate the military
overthrow of deposed President Mohamed Morsi as a coup, and therefore has
expressed no more than a commitment to review U.S.-Egyptian aid. The U.S. Senate this week shot down, 86-13,
Sen. Rand Paul’s proposed amendment to the transportation spending bill that
would have redirected “certain foreign assistance to the government of Egypt as
a result of the July 3, 2013, military coup d’état.”Paul specifically sought to
shift some of those funds to critical domestic bridge projects.
~~~~~~
DeMint: Al-Qaeda Bigger Threat Than Pre-9/11
On Fox News Sunday, Heritage Foundation President
and former South Carolina Republican Senator Jim DeMint said Al Qaeda “may be more of a threat to us than
they were before 9/11″ because they perceive President Barack Obama to be a
weak president. While agreeing with the Obama administration’s decision
to close embassies throughout the Muslim world on Sunday due credible threats,
DeMint said America’s enemies have been emboldened. “Our attempt to placate
parts of the world… is clearly not working,” DeMint said. “The perception of weakness in the
administration is encouraging this type of behavior.”
~~~~~~
What Obama Must Learn:
He has to be present to lead! Not
Partying While Advisors Meet on Terror Threat
As his top national
security advisors gathered for an urgent Saturday meeting to discuss the
terrorist threat that has forced the United States to close embassies overseas,
President Obama was at Camp David celebrating his birthday with friends. Sounds like the hours after the Benghazi
bombing/attack! Sixteen
senior officials participated in the unusual gathering, according to the White
House. Among them were National Security Advisor Susan Rice, who chaired the
session, Secretary of State John Kerry, Secretary of Defense Chuck Hagel,
Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Martin Dempsey, White House Chief of
Staff Denis McDonough, and Assistant to the President for Homeland Security and
Counterterrorism Lisa Monaco, and Secretary of Homeland Security Janet
Napolitano. Obama was briefed after the session by Rice and Monaco, according
to the White House. The White House
said Obama has “received frequent briefings over the last week” on the threat.
~~~~~~
CIA Smuggling Arms in Benghazi -- No, Really? by Tad Cronn
News flashes from the
mainstream media, followed by the reaction of knowledgeable people (i.e., those
who don't wait for the mainstream media to find out what's going on): The CIA
had personnel on the ground when the U.S. mission in Benghazi, Libya, was
attacked last year, leaving four Americans, including an ambassador, dead.
Duh.
The CIA operatives were
smuggling guns through Benghazi on their way to illicitly arm
"rebels" in Syria.
Duh-huh.
The Obama Administration
has been hiding witnesses from Congress.
I'll see your "duh-huh" and raise you a
"doy!"
The CIA has been
changing witnesses' names to conceal their identities.
Wha-a-a-a-a-a?
The Obama Administration
may be covering up what really happened.
Bort!
There is no sound effect
disdainful enough to convey the absolute, irresponsible stupidity of the MSM.
CNN supposedly dropped this "bombshell" about the CIA running guns,
hiding witnesses and trying to cover their tracks this week, but it's going to
add up to nothing. UPI, AP and other news sources that have been
working overtime to ignore the Benghazi scandal are now suddenly so in the know
that they can (rightly) dismiss the CNN story about gun-running as old news,
which it is, though you wouldn't know it from listening to the MSM. The Wall
Street Journal and even CNN had briefly reported on this months ago before
forgetting it ever happened. What's
going on is that the media, probably abetted by the White House, are dribbling
out little bits of the story every once in a while without the overall context.
That numbs the Obama zombies who never piece things together, and it enables
other elements of the MSM to dismiss any new elements as "old news" that
you should not worry about. In this case, the new element seems to be that
witnesses are having their names changed and being monitored by the CIA to
prevent leaks. But tie it to the story about gun-running, which is
available in the MSM archives if you dig, then "oh, it's just old
news," yet CNN can still collect a journalism award for its
"bombshell" reporting. Everybody
wins, except the families of four dead Americans and anyone who cares about the
truth.
~~~~~~
50% See U.S. Involvement in Middle East as Bad for U.S.
An unprecedented 19 U.S. embassies and consulates
remain closed today throughout the Middle East and North Africa in response to
a terrorist threat from al Qaeda.
While the Middle East has been a major focus of U.S. policy for decades,
pluralities of U.S. voters say the
country’s involvement in Middle East politics has had a negative effect on both
sides. In addition, more
voters than ever believe most Muslims view the United States as an enemy. Thirty-seven
percent (37%) of Likely U.S. Voters believe that U.S. involvement in Middle
Eastern politics hurts stability in that region, according to a new Rasmussen
Reports national telephone survey. Just 25% believe it helps stability.
Nineteen percent (19%) believe U.S. involvement has had no impact on that
region, while just as many (19%) aren’t sure.
~~~~~~
Health Care Law
Voters remain closely divided over whether their
state should have its own health care exchange, but roughly half still want their governor to oppose implementation
of President Obama’s national health care law. The latest Rasmussen
Reports national telephone survey finds that 40% of Likely U.S. Voters now want
their governor to support implementation of the health care law in their state,
but 48% want their governor to oppose
implementation instead. Twelve percent (12%) are not sure.
~~~~~~
From the Left - Pelosi: Obamacare Will Put ‘Money Back in
the Pockets of Consumers’ By Alissa
Tabirian
Touting what she called the financial benefits of
the Affordable Care Act, House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) told
reporters that working families will be better off when the law begins to be
implemented in October. “With this
landmark law in place, we will be holding insurance companies accountable, we
will be enhancing patients’ rights, putting money back in the pockets of
consumers with the medical loss ratio, and reducing the cost and strengthening
the economic and financial and health security of working families,”
Pelosi said at her weekly news briefing on Capitol Hill Friday.
“Because of the law, in the coming months Americans
will have expanded choices and more affordable care,” Pelosi continued, also
confirming that “members of Congress will be in the exchanges.”
CNSNews previously reported on a speech
President Obama gave in July in which he highlighted the rebates that will be
sent to individuals by insurance companies that don’t meet federal requirements
to “spend at least 80 percent of every dollar paid in premiums on health care.” “Another
$8.5 [million] rebates are being sent out this summer, averaging around 100
bucks each,” Obama said. However, the financial benefits of these rebates will
be negated by rising health care premiums, according to an analysis by the
Kaiser Family Foundation. A Kaiser press release notes that a typical
family’s health care premiums rose $1,975 on average since 2010, when Obamacare
was signed into law.
“This year’s premium increase is moderate by
historical standards, but outpaced the growth in workers’ wages (1.7 percent)
and general inflation (2.3 percent). Since 2002, premiums have increased 97
percent, three times as fast as wages (33 percent) and inflation (28 percent),”
the press release stated. The foundation
also noted that “workers at lower-wage firms on average pay $1,000 more each
year out of their paychecks for family coverage than workers at higher-wage
firms ($4,977 and $3,968, respectively).”
~~~~~~
Rep. Paul Ryan: Federal government shutdown a bad idea - UPI
Republicans shouldn't shut down Washington if
President Obama's healthcare law is included in the new budget, House Budget
Committee Chairman Paul Ryan says. That political tactic, advocated by some Tea
Party-endorsed Republicans, is "sort of swinging for the fences" and won't
even hurt the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, the Wisconsin
Republican told CBS' "Face the Nation." "There are more
effective ways of achieving that goal," such as delaying parts of it, he
said. "Look, we all, Republicans,
want to repeal and replace Obamacare," said Ryan, the Republican vice
presidential nominee last year and a potential 2016 presidential hopeful. "So
it's not a matter of whether or not we want to get rid of Obamacare, we
do," he said.
"We're having a
debate about the best course of achieving that goal, the best strategy. And
with the government shutdown, so to speak, we're talking about discretionary
spending, just government agency budgets, but it doesn't affect entitlements. "Obamacare
is an entitlement, like Medicare and Social Security is, and so the entitlement
carries on, even under a government-shutdown scenario," Ryan said. "I
think there's going to be a better strategy to actually achieve our goal of ...
ultimately replacing Obamacare," he said. GOP congressional leadership is
divided over calls from Tea Party-backed Republicans, including Sens. Ted Cruz
of Texas, Marco Rubio of Florida and Rand Paul of Kentucky, to oppose Obama's
2013 fiscal budget because it will include Affordable Care Act funding. Opposing
it could hold up budget approval, causing Congress to miss the deadline before
the new fiscal year begins Oct. 1. Missing
the deadline would shut down all but "essential" government services.
The exact details of which government functions would stop during a shutdown
would be determined by the Office of Management and Budget. Among the services
shut down in the past were U.S. national parks and passport offices. A shutdown
would also cause a large number of civilian federal employees to be furloughed.
Military personnel would not furloughed, but would likely not be paid as
scheduled.
~~~~~~~
Obama, GOP make no sense on taxes and spending By PETER MORICI, UPI Outside View Commentator
(UPI) -- Republicans
are from Venus and U.S. President Barack Obama is from Mars. Nothing better
demonstrates this than their stances on taxes, spending and jobs.
Obama wants to reform
corporate taxes -- shut loopholes, impose a mandatory levy on profits earned
abroad and lower rates overall -- but to also raise additional revenue to fund
his jobs initiatives.
The corporate tax code
is too complex and encourages tax avoidance more than sound investments.
However, rates are much higher than in competing countries and the United
States taxes profits earned outside its territory whereas other governments do
not. All this encourages U.S. multinationals to invest and create jobs abroad
and keep profits parked there, where they can't foster American growth and
jobs. Firms such as Eaton and Sara Lee have even moved corporate headquarters
to low-tax jurisdictions. By collecting
more taxes on U.S. and foreign operations, Obama would encourage more factories
and firms to leave the country, save their marketing activities.
Obama wants to spend the revenue bonanza on much
needed but poorly conceived infrastructure projects -- federally supported projects import too many materials from China and
require Davis-Bacon union jobs -- education and jobs training. The
purpose of stimulus money isn't to boost employment in the Middle Kingdom, and after the Detroit and GM bankruptcies,
no sane person would advocate strengthening unions. U.S. schools and
universities suffer not from too little money. The real problems are regulations and school cultures that handicap
teachers from intelligently addressing a diverse student population; politically
conservative parents who place too much emphasis on sports, liberal parents who
value too much community service and neither valuing enough academic
excellence; and schools and universities run by incompetent bureaucrats. The federal government already has
too many jobs training programs that don't train much of anyone for a job.
For its part, the GOP
House of Representatives wants to extract spending cuts to reduce the budget
deficit but won't accept measures really needed to accomplish political success
-- higher payroll taxes and more prudent healthcare regulations. Americans
are living longer and can work longer, the Social Security retirement age
should be raised to 70; however, the federal pension system needs to address
other challenges.
Americans working in the
private sector can no longer count on employers to provide decent pensions and
individual retirement accounts and other tax-deferred savings schemes aren't
making up the difference -- for reasons including Americans' inability to save,
the paucity of tax incentives and lower interest rates and stock market
returns. Demographics
require raising the retirement age and politics will mandate bigger benefits
once people get old enough. Republicans don't even want to talk about the
latter but in the end, old people vote, and they will vote for Democrats who
propose an expanded system once Obama exits the scene -- he won't even
recognize the need to raise the retirement age.
On healthcare, the country spends too much -- 50
percent more than the private German and Dutch systems, which better regulate
prices and get better results. Obamacare
isn't the answer -- subsidizing a broken system won't help -- but neither is
the market system we had before it. If the Republicans are serious
about replacing Obamacare -- and slicing the Medicare and Medicaid spending --
they must embrace price regulations but that has as much chance of happening as
I do playing shortstop for the New York Yankees. This fall when the great America drama reprises -- negotiations between
the president and Congress over the raising the debt ceiling -- Netflix could
provide a great public service distributing gratis an appropriate classic. Ship
of Fools!
~~~~~~
"It should be
your care, therefore, and mine, to elevate the minds of our children and exalt
their courage; to accelerate and animate their industry and activity; to excite
in them an habitual contempt of meanness, abhorrence of injustice and
inhumanity, and an ambition to excel in every capacity, faculty, and virtue. If
we suffer their minds to grovel and creep in infancy, they will grovel all
their lives." --John Adams, Dissertation on the Canon
and Feudal Law, 1756
~~~~~~~
No comments:
Post a Comment