Category Archives: 2012 Primary

2012 Primary, Communications Theory, Editorial, Mitt Romney, True Talking Points

Ann Coulter Blasts Romney Campaign and Andrea Saul. Is Romney Serious About Repealing Obamacare? – UPDATED!

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UPDATE – Even CNN dismantles this add showing how it is just not true: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PMkmxJ3P9Tw

UPDATE II – Obama lied about his campaign not linking Romney to “murder” – LINK  –  LINK.

 

Coulter is right. This is an embarrassment. Andrea Saul did not even seem to have the best facts straight before responding on behalf of the Romney Campaign. The question is, why does a presidential campaign have a twenty-something hottie for a campaign spokesman?

In case you missed it, here is Andrea Saul responding to an Obama ad accusing Mitt Romney of costing a man his job and health care for his family. His wife didn’t want to report she was sick and died of stage four cancer. The accusation is silly on its face. We will give the answer she should have given in a moment, but first watch this spectacle:

SAUL: To that point, you know, if people had been in Massachusetts under Governor Romney’s health care plan, they would have had health care. There are a lot of people losing their jobs and their health care in President Obama’s economy.

The text comment by the YouTube uploader is correct in that answers like this make people doubt that the campaign is serious about repealing ObamaCare. This is now the third Romney Campaign luminary who has indicated this in one form or another. This is compounded by the fact that Romney was for the national insurance mandate before he was against it.

The ad is a preposterous lie for several reasons:

1 –  Mitt Romney left Bain for the Olympics before the decision was made to close the plant and an Obama Campaign bundler was actually running Bain at the time.

2 – The company was dying and Bain tried to rescue GST Steel. The man in the video has Bain Capital to thank because without them GST Steel would have died three years earlier.

3 – The woman who died had insurance when her husband left GST Steel.

4 – And she didn’t get very ill until 2006!

5 – The Obama campaign says that the ad was done by a 527 group and that it has no control over what they do, but what they don’t say is that Obama Cabinet members are the ones funding the 527.

6 – Obama is directly responsible for almost 100,000 energy jobs lost and those are top jobs with insurance. Obama is also responsible for retirees at Delphi losing many of their benefits. Only FDR beats Obama when it comes to sustained job losses over time.

UPDATE – Soptic was offered a buyout from Bain when he worked for the company and CHOSE NOT TO TAKE THE INSURANCE – LINK.

That is why this ad is such an outrage. So it is not as if Andrea Saul did not have plenty of legit ammo to use in her response. You can be sure that some conservative voters will stay home on election day simply because they saw Andrea Saul’s remarks.

Ann Coulter:

I am going to get in trouble for what I am about to say here but it must be said. There is a problem in insider American politics that people should be aware of.

Let me preface my remarks by saying that candidates for Congress ask me for advice often as well as communications pros from around the country. While we are not nearly as popular as Hotair.com or Gateway Pundit this web site has a big enough impact that many in political journalism are very aware of us (and at the risk of being immodest have been aware of yours truly for several years). I spent some time in DC. When looking for work I learned that my competition for most any position included at least a dozen ladies who all are wielding serious cleavage, sparkling hair, a come hither smile, and a Masters Degree. I know through experience that countless women like this come to DC to get their Congressional and Executive Branch knee pads. If anyone thinks that “Monica Lewinsky’s” are uncommon they have not spent time in DC. Sex appeal is a weapon in politics and anyone who tells you otherwise is lying to you or hasn’t actually spent time in the district.

With that said does this mean that we are accusing Andrea Saul of sleeping her way to the top? No we are not. But what we will say is that she has been around for a few years, we are aware of her, and while she is certainly a hottie, her skills as a crisis communications pundit have never seemed particularly impressive [Editor’s Note – we take no pleasure in saying this and we understand that Miss Saul is a real person with real feelings. With that said this is a presidential camnpaign and the stakes are just too high to have this kind of a problem. We wish Miss Saul all the best in her future endeavors].

2012 Primary, Budget, Econ, Energy Policy, Jobs, Obama, True Talking Points

Obama’s EPA crushing coal-fired power plants, electricity bills rise…

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RELATED:

Candidate Joe Kennedy III Calls for End To “Cheap Oil” – LINK

Gas Prices Under President Obama – LINK

EPA Official on Video: We Are “Crucifying” Oil And Gas Companies – LINK

Under Obama, Price of Gas Has Jumped 83 Percent, Ground Beef 24 Percent, Bacon 22 Percent – LINK

Obama Green Energy Program Cost $9.8 million Per Job – LINK

15th Green Energy Company Funded by Obama Goes Under – LINK

On Oil Obama Says One Thing & Does Another – LINK

GAO: Recoverable American oil in a single location equal to the entire world oil reserves – LINK

 

 

Phil Kerpen:

With the country focused on this week’s high drama at the Supreme Court, President Obama’s EPA quietly released long-delayed regulations to apply global warming rules never authorized by Congress to new coal-fired power plants.

That Obama’s EPA would release a rule to destroy coal-fired electricity while the president gives stump speeches about an “all of the above” energy policy is an insult to the American people.

This rule will effectively block any new coal-fired power plants from being built in America, and a second round of related rules – expected after the election, of course – will shut down existing coal-fired power plants.

The result will be steeply higher electricity prices, lost jobs, and lower standards of living. Remarkably, this is all done in the name of global warming, but even EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson admits it will have no discernible impact on global temperatures. Obama’s EPA is crippling the U.S. economy not to accomplish anything, but just to enjoy a nice, warm, green feeling of self-satisfaction.

Four years ago, then-candidate Barack Obama explained his anti-coal energy policy in an editorial board meeting with the San Francisco Chronicle. Obama said: “Under my plan of a cap-and-trade system, electricity rates would necessarily skyrocket. Even regardless of what I say about whether coal is good or bad.” He went on to explain: “So, if somebody wants to build a coal plant, they can — it’s just that it will bankrupt them.”

Indeed Obama attempted to make good on his campaign promise to bankrupt the coal industry and make electricity prices skyrocket the legitimate way – by proposing cap-and-trade legislation in Congress. It was jammed through the House but crashed and burned in the Senate, where many Democrats understood such an energy rationing plan to be political suicide.

They were right.

The American people decisively rejected energy taxes and rationing in the 2010 election, with dozens of Democrats losing because of their support for cap-and-trade. West Virginia Democrat Joe Manchin survived and won his Senate seat by literally shooting a bullet through in the bill in a television ad.

But the day after the 2010 election President Obama said: “Cap-and-trade was just one way of skinning the cat; it was not the only way. It was a means, not an end. And I’m going to be looking for other means to address this problem.”

With Tuesday’s EPA action to bankrupt coal, he found his “other means” to address the “problem” of affordable electricity.

As I demonstrated in my book “Democracy Denied”, under Article I, Section 1 of the U.S. Constitution, the power to make these decisions resides in Congress, not the EPA.

The House has already acted to fix the structural problem that allows bureaucrats to implement economy-changing rules without congressional approval when they passed the REINS Act last year, a bill that would require prior-approval from Congress for major new regulations.

The Senate has refused to act on the legislation.

Fortunately, Senator Jim Inhofe (R-Okla.) has already promised to introduce a resolution of disapproval that will put every senator on the record on this global warming power grab. Because the resolution is privileged under the Congressional Review Act, Harry Reid cannot prevent it from coming to the floor and it cannot be filibustered.

Whatever the result of that Senate vote is, it will ultimately be up to the American people to hold Congress and the president accountable for the actions taken by rogue EPA bureaucrats this week.

Nothing less than America’s economic future is at stake.

Phil Kerpen is vice president for policy at Americans for Prosperity and the author of “Democracy Denied: How Obama is Ignoring You and Bypassing Congress to Radically Transform America – and How to Stop Him.”

 

2012 Primary, Dirty Tricks, Health Law, Obama, True Talking Points

Rationing Begins: 16 States Limit Drug Prescriptions for Medicaid Patients

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Sarah Palin told you so….

CNS News:

Sixteen states have set a limit on the number of prescription drugs they will cover for Medicaid patients, according to Kaiser Health News.

Seven of those states, according to Kaiser Health News, have enacted or tightened those limits in just the last two years.

Medicaid is a federal program that is carried out in partnership with state governments. It forms an important element of President Barack Obama’s health-care plan because under the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act–AKA Obamcare–a larger number of people will be covered by Medicaid, as the income cap is raised for the program.

With both the expanded Medicaid program and the federal subsidy for health-care premiums that will be available to people earning up to 400 percent of the poverty level, a larger percentage of the population will be wholly or partially dependent on the government for their health care under Obamacare than are now.

In Alabama, Medicaid patients are now limited to one brand-name drug, and HIV and psychiatric drugs are excluded.

Illinois has limited Medicaid patients to just four prescription drugs as a cost-cutting move, and patients who need more than four must get permission from the state.

Speaking on C-SPAN’s Washington Journal on Monday, Phil Galewitz, staff writer for Kaiser Health News, said the move “only hurts a limited number of patients.”

“Drugs make up a fair amount of costs for Medicaid. A lot of states have said a lot of drugs are available in generics where they cost less, so they see this sort of another move to push patients to take generics instead of brand,” Galewitz said.

“It only hurts a limited number of patients, ‘cause obviously it hurts patients who are taking multiple brand name drugs in the case of Alabama, Illinois. Some of the states are putting the limits on all drugs. It’s another place to cut. It doesn’t hurt everybody, but it could hurt some,” he added.

Galewitz said the move also puts doctors and patients in a “difficult position.”

“Some doctors I talked to would work with patients with asthma and diabetes, and sometimes it’s tricky to get the right drugs and the right dosage to figure out how to control some of this disease, and just when they get it right, now the state is telling them that, ‘Hey, you’re not going to get all this coverage. You may have to switch to a generic or find another way,’” he said.

Arkansas, California, Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Maine, Mississippi, North Carolina, Oklahoma, South Carolina, Tennessee, Texas, Utah and West Virginia have all placed caps on the number of prescription drugs Medicaid patients can get.

2012 Primary, Dirty Tricks, Obama, Pay to Play, Treason, True Talking Points, Unions

GM Bailout: Obama Administration ordered the termination of retiree benefits for 20,000 non-union workers while topping off union benefits (video)

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Welcome to Chicago….err I mean Detroit…..err I mean Washington; where if you don’t want to be punished you had better pay “the man”. This is unspeakable cruelty and where was the elite media?

UPDATE – Michelle Malkin tells the story:

UPDATE II – Retired Delphi Employees Spaek Out! http://www.whymrpresidentwhy.com/

UPDATE III – New ad tells story of how Obama screwed non-union GM employees:

Matt Boyle at The Daily Caller:

Emails obtained by The Daily Caller show that the U.S. Treasury Department, led by Timothy Geithner, was the driving force behind terminating the pensions of 20,000 salaried retirees at the Delphi auto parts manufacturing company.

The move, made in 2009 while the Obama administration implemented its auto bailout plan, appears to have been made solely because those retirees were not members of labor unions.

The internal government emails contradict sworn testimony, in federal court and before Congress, given by several Obama administration figures. They also indicate that the administration misled lawmakers and the courts about the sequence of events surrounding the termination of those non-union pensions, and that administration figures violated federal law.

Delphi, a 13-year old company that is independent of General Motors, is one of the world’s largest automotive parts manufacturers. Twenty thousand of its workers lost nearly their entire pensions when the government bailed out GM. At the same time, Delphi employees who were members of the United Auto Workers union saw their pensions topped off and made whole.

The White House and Treasury Department have consistently maintained that the Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation (PBGC) independently made the decision to terminate the 20,000 non-union Delphi workers’ pension plan. The PBGC is a federal government agency that handles private-sector pension benefits issues. Its charter calls for independent representation of pension beneficiaries’ interests.

Former Treasury official Matthew Feldman and former White House auto czar Ron Bloom, both key members of the Presidential Task Force on the Auto Industry during the GM bailout, have testified under oath that the PBGC, not the administration, led the effort to terminate the non-union Delphi workers’ pension plan.

“As a result of the Delphi Corporation bankruptcy, for example, Delphi and the Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation were forced to terminate Delphi’s pension plans, which means there are Delphi retirees who unfortunately will collect less than their full pension benefits,” Feldman testified on July 11, 2012.

The emails TheDC has obtained show that the Treasury Department, not the independent PBGC, was running the show.

Under 29 U.S.C. §1342, the PBGC is the only government entity that is legally empowered to initiate termination of a pension or make any official movements toward doing so.

NOTE – READ THE EMAILS HERE – LINK.

UPDATE IV – ‘Highly confidential’ internal Treasury documents show Obama admin’s involvement in Delphi pension scandal  – LINK

2012 Primary, Econ, Obama, Stuck on Stupid, True Talking Points

Detroit becomes dumping ground for the dead

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Detroit has been run by Democrats for decades. Their wealth destroying policies oversaw Detroit’s decline from the highest per capita income in the country to next to 67th.

Related:

Progressivism Unrestrained: 1 in 3 residences abandoned in Detroit.

Profiles in Unrestrained Progressivism: Detroit

Detroit Public Schools Graduation Rate 26%

Democrat Conyers Pleads Guilty to Feds for Taking Bribes.

Progressivism Unrestrained: Detroit building “train to nowhere”

Democrats Loot Detroit for Half a Billion, Elite Media Doesn’t Care…


Palm Beach Post:

From the street, the two decomposing bodies were nearly invisible, concealed in an overgrown lot alongside worn-out car tires and a moldy sofa. The teenagers had been shot, stripped to their underwear and left on a deserted block.

They were just the latest victims of foul play whose remains went undiscovered for days after being hidden deep inside Detroit’s vast urban wilderness — a crumbling wasteland rarely visited by outsiders and infrequently patrolled by police.

Abandoned and neglected parts of the city are quickly becoming dumping grounds for the dead — at least a dozen bodies in 12 months’ time. And authorities acknowledge there’s little they can do.

“You can shoot a person, dump a body and it may just go unsolved” because of the time it may take for the corpse to be found, officer John Garner said.

The bodies have been purposely hidden or discarded in alleys, fields, vacant houses, abandoned garages and even a canal. Seven of the victims are believed to have been slain outside Detroit and then dumped within the city.

It’s a pattern made possible by more than four decades of urban decay and suburban flight. White residents started moving to burgeoning suburbs in the 1950s, then stepped up their exodus after a deadly 1967 race riot. Detroit’s black middle class followed over the next two decades, leaving block after block of empty homes.

Over time, tens of thousands of houses deteriorated. Some collapsed, others were demolished. Empty lots gave way to block-long fields.

Jacob Kudla and Jourdan Bobbish were found July 27 in a field off Lyford Street, a lonely road that borders an industrial area and a small municipal airport. The teens from suburban Westland, 18 and 17, respectively, had been visiting Kudla’s uncle in Detroit when they disappeared July 22.

Their corpses were found by someone walking along the desolate block. The closest house, about 100 yards (91.4 meters) away, belongs to 74-year-old Ella Dunn.

Over the last 24 years, she has watched nearly all her neighbors move out. Now she constantly hears people dumping tires, furniture and trash.

“They drive down and push stuff out,” she said.

A nearby parking lot resembles a small landfill for junk — a coloring book based on Bible characters, a yellow toilet, furniture, shoes and five boats.

“Detroit is a dumping ground for a lot of stuff,” said Margaret Dewar, professor of urban and regional planning at the University of Michigan. “There is no one to watch. There is no capacity to enforce laws about dumping. There is a perception you can dump and no one will report it.”

 

 

 

 

2012 Primary, Culture War, Dirty Tricks, Treason, True Talking Points, Unhinged

Liberal Extremists Send Death Threats to Olympic Shooter

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And in case the attacks from the left on Gold Medalist Gabby Douglas didn’t turn your stomach in the case of Corey Cogdell the left has upped the ante.

UPDATE – The New York Times totally trashed American track record holder Lolo Jones because she is a Christian who is saving herself for the right man (and no I am not even linking it. We will not be referring hits to their trashy hit piece).

Team USA Corey Codgell
Team USA Corey Codgell

Via Michelle Malkin:

Threats to Corey Codgell 2Threats to Corey Codgell 1

2012 Primary, Sarah, True Talking Points

KINGMAKER: All Candidates Endorsed by Palin Win Contested Primaries

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It isn’t just PoliticalArena saying it. It is no secret that we like Governor Palin. We do so for two very important reasons, (1) her legislative accomplishments as governor are only equaled by famed governors such as Mitch Daniels, Bobby Jindal and Scott Walker, and (2) Palin took on one of the most powerful corrupt political machines in the country and was able to tear most of it down even though much of it was in her own party. Call her all of the names you want, but any male governor with similar accomplishments would be whispered about for a VP pick.

Quite frankly, we do not care what the conventional wisdom is or what the elite media says, we look at the record, what got done and what didn’t and that is how we make our judgments. In politics, words are usually hollow so fruits are the only real substance.

Washington Post:

Each of five candidates she has endorsed this year who have faced primaries or other campaigns have won, including former Texas solicitor general Ted Cruz, who Tuesday beat the state’s well-connected lieutenant governor for the Republican nomination for the U.S. Senate. …

She has endorsed just nine Republicans this year — five of them women, according to the Web site of SarahPAC, her political committee. In an interview on Fox News on Wednesday, Palin said that she is making down-ticket races, not the presidential campaign, a focus of her efforts this year. She called Senate and House races “so instrumental in reforming government, shrinking it, allowing the private sector to grow and thrive.”

Ed Morrissey:

This might be easy to dismiss if Palin made a habit of endorsing front-runners, but that’s not been the case.  Ted Cruz started off at a large disadvantage to Lt. Governor David Dewhurst in practically every metric imaginable.  Dewhurst had Rick Perry’s endorsement, a high profile office, tons of his own money to use in the primary fight, and at one time a huge lead in the polls.  In the first round of the primary in May, Cruz only narrowly forced a runoff, at 30% and Dewhurst just a shade under 48%.  The Tea Party engagement that Palin helped facilitate took Cruz from 18 points down in May to a 13-point victory this week — a remarkable 31-point turnaround in just two months.

Similarly, Palin backed Tea Party upstart Richard Mourdock against longtime incumbent Dick Lugar in Indiana’s GOP primary.  Palin endorsed Mourdock late in the cycle, just a couple of weeks before the primary.  Lugar had been up as much as 25 points in the polls in early 2012, but two weeks prior to her endorsement, Mourdock’s internal poll had him even with Lugar.  One week after Palin endorsed Mourdock, he was 10 points up on Lugar in what the local newspaper called “a dramatic slide” for the incumbent.  By the time the election rolled around one week later, Mourdock ended up with a 22-point victory over the entrenched incumbent.

2012 Primary, Academic Misconduct, Culture War, Dirty Tricks, Education, School Indoctrination, True Talking Points

Survey: Liberal profs admit they’d discriminate against conservatives in hiring, advancement…

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The “statistically impossible lack of diversity” on campus demonstrates ideological discrimination.

It is not surprising how willing leftist academics were willing to admit that they engage in such persecution and discrimination. This is how entrenched the far left is on campus. This problem is so bad that groups such as FIRE, the ACLJ and the Alliance Defense Fund routinely take action against universities whose faculty and administrators actively conspire to engage in such persecution.

If you doubt it I will just provide a few of the thousands of examples we could list here LINK – LINK :

Missouri State University orders Christian student to engage in homosexual sex act, abandon Christian beliefs, engage in far left political advocacy…or else:

In 2007, the University of Delaware’s Office of Residence Life used mandatory activities to coerce students to change their thoughts, values, attitudes, beliefs, and habits to conform to a highly specified social, environmental, and political agenda:

Teacher Michele Kerr describes how Stanford University’s Teacher Education Program (STEP) tried to oust her for her for not being a leftist:

Washington Times:

It’s not every day that left-leaning academics admit that they would discriminate against a minority.

But that was what they did in a peer-reviewed study of political diversity in the field of social psychology, which will be published in the September edition of the journal Perspectives on Psychological Science.

Psychologists Yoel Inbar and Joris Lammers, based at Tilburg University in the Netherlands, surveyed a roughly representative sample of academics and scholars in social psychology and found that “In decisions ranging from paper reviews to hiring, many social and personality psychologists admit that they would discriminate against openly conservative colleagues.”

This finding surprised the researchers. The survey questions “were so blatant that I thought we’d get a much lower rate of agreement,” Mr. Inbar said. “Usually you have to be pretty tricky to get people to say they’d discriminate against minorities.”

One question, according to the researchers, “asked whether, in choosing between two equally qualified job candidates for one job opening, they would be inclined to vote for the more liberal candidate (i.e., over the conservative).”

More than a third of the respondents said they would discriminate against the conservative candidate. One respondent wrote in that if department members “could figure out who was a conservative, they would be sure not to hire them.”

More:

But Harvey Mansfield, a conservative professor of government at Harvard University, argues that the anti-conservative bias is real and pronounced. He says conservatism is “just not a respectable position to hold” in the academy, where Republicans are caricatured as Fox News enthusiasts who listen to Rush Limbaugh.

Beyond that, conservatives represent a distinct minority on college and university campuses. A 2007 report by sociologists Neil Gross and Solon Simmons found that 80 percent of psychology professors at elite and non-elite universities are Democrats. Other studies reveal that 5 percent to 7 percent of faculty openly identify as Republicans. By contrast, about 20 percent of the general population are liberal and 40 percent are conservative.

Mr. Inbar and Mr. Lammers found that conservatives fear that revealing their political identity will have negative consequences. This is why New York University-based psychologist Jonathan Haidt, a self-described centrist, has compared the experience of being a conservative graduate student to being a closeted gay student in the 1980s.

In 2011, Mr. Haidt addressed this very issue at a meeting of the Society for Personality and Social Psychology — the same group that Mr. Inbar and Mr. Lammer surveyed. Mr. Haidt’s talk, “The Bright Future of Post-Partisan Social Psychology,” caused a stir. The professor, whose new book “The Righteous Mind” examines the moral roots of our political positions, asked the nearly 1,000 academics and students in the room to raise their hands if they were liberals. Nearly 80 percent of the hands went up. When he asked whether there were any conservatives in the house, just three hands — 0.3 percent — went up.

This is “a statistically impossible lack of diversity,” Mr. Haidt said.

2012 Primary, Health Law, Obama, Pay to Play, Taxes, Thugs, True Talking Points

AFL/CIO Gives $206.7 Million to Obama, Gets 40% of All ObamaCare Waivers

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This is is AFL/CIO Union President Richard Trumka. He said that government should take over all private business, who speaks in front of communist revolutionary groups, and has a long history of violence. Trumka brags that he talks to the White House every day and visits twice a week (video). Trumka also says that the best way to create jobs is to raise taxes. Keep in mind that each ObamaCare waiver results in a massive tax cut.

AFL/CIO Union Leader Rich Trumka
AFL/CIO Union Leader Rich Trumka

Forbes:

Waivers for Favors

When President Obama was campaigning in 2008, he spoke often of his desire to limit the influence of lobbyists in Washington. There’s only one problem: the more government involves itself in the private sector, the more private businesses needs to hire lobbyists to make sure that new laws and regulations don’t put them out of business. Inevitably, the next step involves campaign contributions to key lawmakers, protection money that ensures that the law favors those with the right political connections.

In the case of Obamacare, this phenomenon shows up in manifold ways. Roy Poses highlights the story of how Dr. Elias Zerhouni, former head of the National Institutes of Health, had leveraged his position into lucrative corporate packages. Timothy Carney of the Washington Examiner has been tracking a long list of Washington officials and staffers who are taking advantage of “The Great Health-Care Cashout.”

Then came the news last week the Department of Health and Human Services has granted over 700 waivers [Note – this number is up to 1,200 last we checked – Political Arena Editor] to Obamacare’s obtuse rule that businesses drop “mini-med” plans in favor of more expensive, comprehensive coverage. Many businesses, such as McDonald’s, were faced with dropping their health coverage entirely, rather than face the prohibitive expense of complying with the new law. So rather than repealing the regulation, HHS has taken it upon itself to grant waivers arbitrarily to those whom it deems fit.

The Casablanca-style shocker is that, of the more than 2 million workers who will benefit from the HHS waivers, 40 percent belong to labor unions [as of 2011] “Waivers for Favors,” as Michelle Malkin memorably put it:

The Teamsters Union, which hailed Obama last March for “enacting historic health care reform, providing health insurance to millions of Americans who don’t have it and controlling costs for millions more who do,” obtained waivers for 17 different locals.

The United Food and Commercial Workers International Union (UFCW), which celebrated the passage of Obamacare as “an achievement that will rank among the highest in our national experience,” secured waivers for 28 different affiliates.

The International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers — which exulted after the health-care law’s passage that “finally, affordable and comprehensive health care coverage will be available for millions of working Americans” — saw eight of its affiliates win shelter from the Obamacare wrecking ball.

The Communications Workers of America, which sent its workers to lobby for Obamacare on Capitol Hill as part of the Health Care for America Now front group funded by left-wing billionaire George Soros, snagged a waiver that will spare a hefty 19,000 of its members from the onerous federal mandate.

And the Service Employees International Union, which poured $60 million into Democratic/Obama coffers in 2008 and millions more into the campaign for the federal health-care takeover, added four new affiliates to the waiver list: SEIU Local 2000 Health and Welfare Fund, representing 161 enrollees; SEIU 32BJ North Health Benefit Fund, representing 7,020 enrollees; SEIU Local 300, Civil Service Forum Employees Welfare Fund, representing 2,000 enrollees; and SEIU Health & Welfare Fund, representing 1,620 enrollees.

That’s in addition to three other previous SEIU waiver winners: Local 25 SEIU in Chicago with 31,000 enrollees; Local 1199 SEIU Greater New York Benefit Fund with 4,544 enrollees; and SEIU Local 1 Cleveland Welfare Fund with 520 enrollees. This brings the total number of Obamacare-promoting SEIU Obamacare refugees to an estimated 45,000 workers represented by seven SEIU locals.

According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, labor unions represent less than 7 percent of the private sector workforce, compared to 40 percent of HHS’ waivers. Does anyone seriously believe that HHS is handing these waivers out based on merit and need, rather than political self-interest?

2012 Primary, Budget, Econ, Europe, Obama, Sweden, Taxes, True Talking Points

Sweden’s Conservative Economic Recovery Continues

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Related: Sweden turns to Reagan’s economic reforms and it’s working – LINK

Matt Kibbe at Forbes:

Sweden Finance Minister Anders Borg
Sweden’s Finance Minister Anders Borg

With Most Of Europe Still On Its Back, Sweden Tries Policies That Actually Work.

While the rest of Europe and the United States have gone on massive spending sprees fueled by government borrowing and tax hikes, Sweden took a different approach. In the Spring 2012 Economic and Budget Policy Guidelines, the Swedish Government and its Finance Minister, Anders Borg, have laid out a plan that is focused on lowering taxes. Their rationale? “When individuals and families get to keep more their income, their independence and their opportunities to shape their own lives also increase.”

Borg also wants to lower the corporate tax rate as a way of meeting the government’s goal of “full employment”. The government has already cut property taxes and other luxury taxes on the rich to lure investors and entrepreneurs back to Sweden. The government has also slashed spending across the board, including on the welfare programs that used to be Sweden’s claim to fame. They’ve also installed caps on annual government expenditures: real and enforceable limits that the Swedes believe are pivotal to economic stability. They explain in their Policy Guidelines that “the expenditure ceiling is the Government’s most important tool for meeting the surplus.” Imagine that, a government that stays within its limits. So why didn’t Sweden hop on the stimulus bandwagon like the U.S. and much of Europe?

Anders Borg explains, “Look at Spain, Portugal or the UK, whose governments were arguing for large temporary stimulus… Well, we can see that very little of the stimulus went to the economy. But they are stuck with the debt.” We have now seen that attempts at austerity within the Eurozone have met a similar fate: none of it was serious. As spending increases have been squandered, spending cuts have been a charade, failing to target the big government programs at the core of the debt crisis. So Anders Borg and the Swedish Government have undertaken an economic and budget plan that slashes taxes and (actually) caps government spending. If you told Paul Krugman and the rest of the Keynesians back at the onset of the financial crisis that Sweden’s finance minister was planning such action, they would have surely laughed in your face and cynically predicted doom and gloom for the Scandinavian nation. However, in reality, a place Keynesians seem to be unfamiliar with, it’s become clear that what Sweden is doing is working. And it’s working better than even Minister Borg expected.

Despite slow projected growth for 2012, Sweden is expecting annual GDP growth of over 3 percent starting next year, projected out through 2016 by which time their unemployment is expected to slide down to just about 5 percent. During this time the Swedish gross debt is expected to drop from 37.7 percent/GDP to 22.5 percent/GDP as a result of government surpluses. For comparison, US gross debt to GDP is well over 100 percent and climbing. All this success must be on the backs of the working class right? Wrong. Wages are slated to rise in Sweden by nearly 4 percent annually through 2016.

2012 Primary, Dirty Tricks, Obama, Treason, True Talking Points

Obama Administration Sues To Stop Military From Voting (video)

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The Obama Administration is suing to make it harder for the military to vote in the key swing state of Ohio. This is not a surprise. Al Gore in 2000 sued Florida to get military ballots thrown out. Another trick is that counties ran by Democrats will deliberately mail out requested absentee ballots for military personnel late so that they cannot make it back on time. They always say “oops we made a mistake”. It is a mistake they make every election year.

Military ballots mailed late… – LINK

Dearborn Overseas Primary Ballots Coming in Despite Late Sendout: Dearborn is one of 70 municipalities included in a federal lawsuit for sending absentee ballots out past the June 23 deadline – LINK.

California counties miss deadline to send ballots to overseas, military voters – LINK.

Election clerks once again miss federal absentee ballot deadline: More than three dozen local election clerks appear to have missed a federally mandated deadline for sending out absentee ballots to military voters – LINK.

2012 Primary, CFA, Culture War, Dirty Tricks, Elite Media, True Talking Points

Far left and some elite media already attacking Gold Medalist Gabby Douglas

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UPDATE – Unhinged Liberal Extremists Send Death Threats to Olympic Shooter – LINK.  And the New York Times totally trashed American track record holder  Lolo Jones because she is a Christian who is saving herself for the right man (and no I am not even linking it. We will not be referring hits to their trashy hit piece).

Gabby Douglas Glory to God
Gabby Douglas

When Gabby Douglas gave “All Glory to God” for her magnificent Olympic victory when the elite media already had the long knives out going after Chick-Fil-A (LINK – LINK) for being closed on Sunday and supporting traditional marriage the attacks on her were reflexive. The left had already noticed that Mitt Romney’s legacy in helping the Olympics was reflected in the attitudes of many Olympians. On top of that Olympic mega-stars Michelle Kwan and Christie Yamaguchi had announced that they were working to support conservative causes and are supporting Mitt Romney. It was just too much for the left to take and now they have just snapped. The liberal magazine Salon found Gabby’s Christianity “unnerving“.

Of course, the only ones pushing back to defend Gabby are commentators on Fox News, talk radio and internet bloggers. Fox News commentator and former House GOP leadership aide Cheri Jacobus (Hat Tip RSC):

“Has the Left gone too far in fostering a culture of resentment against Americans who are very, very successful? Superstar U.S. gymnast Gabby Douglas may have seemingly become a star overnight, but she worked at it her entire life. She is being criticized for signing a lucrative deal to appear on a Wheaties box, for espousing her religious views, and even for her hair. And she’s only a teenager.

“Gabby deserves the accolades, the contracts, the fame and the glory for her hard work, success and making her country proud. The rest just sounds like jealousy and resentment. “I suppose the liberals will now claim Gabby didn’t do this on her own because the rest of us paid to build the roads she used to get to gymnastics practice.”
Gabby Douglas Corn Flakes
Gabby Douglas

NBC News (sister network of MSNBC) went so far as to play a clip of a monkey doing gymnastics immediately after playing a clip of Gabby Douglas. What if Fox News had done this? What would the left be saying? The racism charges would be flying. Where is the NAACP and the leftist groups that claim to speak for all black people? This will make your stomach turn. NBC was forced to apologize after a hailstorm of criticism from those who actually have a sense of decency.

2012 Primary, Civility, Dirty Tricks, Jobs, Obama, Stuck on Stupid, True Talking Points

Labor Dept. Waives 60-Day Jobs Notice To Help Obama Get Good Press…

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That’s right…. SCREW THOSE DEFENSE WORKERS! They probably voted for McCain anyways…..

This is cruel.

Investors Business Daily:

Politics: An administration that doesn’t want layoff notices required by law going out days before the November election is telling defense contractors they don’t have to send them for the cuts required by sequestration.

As the heads of major defense contractors Lockheed Martin, EADS North America, Pratt & Whitney and Williams-Pyro testified recently before the House Armed Services Committee, they are bound by law to give employees 60 days’ notice if their jobs are going to be terminated as a result of sequestration cuts scheduled for Jan. 2.

Federal law under the WARN (Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notice) Act required employers to give workers a minimum of 60 days notice before potential mass layoffs.

That means layoff warning notices could go out to hundreds of thousands of workers just days before the presidential election, a prospect President Obama and his administration do not relish.

Some $500 billion in defense-spending reductions are scheduled to kick in beginning Jan. 2.

These cuts come on top of $487 billion in Defense Department cuts recently approved and threaten to not only to put our national security in jeopardy but also gut the skilled workforce in the aerospace industry.

Robert Stevens, chairman and CEO of Lockheed Martin, told lawmakers that his company alone is looking at laying off roughly 10,000 employees from its 120,000 workforce.

The layoffs would be the result of cuts to its largest programs, including the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter and the Littoral Combat Ship.

To avoid the electoral consequences of these cuts, the Department of Labor (DOL) is informing defense contractors that since sequestration hasn’t actually happened yet, and some in Congress are trying to find ways around it, it might be nice if they didn’t obey federal law and send out the pink slips just this once.

Otherwise, outraged voters might give President Obama a pink slip a few days later.

2012 Primary, Treason, True Talking Points

Congress votes to ignore checks and balances on political appointees…

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We do not often post pieces from New American, but no matter what you think of them, this particular piece is spot on. I don’t know about you, but amending the Constitution by legislative fiat creeps me out. Aside from the fact that the law is royally unconstitutional, is LESS Congressional oversight of the Executive what we really need right now? There are some on the GOP who still just don’t get it and the Democrat leadership is off in Saul Alinsky land.

New American:

By a vote of 261-116, the House of Representatives passed a bill rewriting Article II of the Constitution and divesting the Senate of the power to accept or reject the appointment of many presidential nominees.

Last year, the Senate passed the measure by a vote of 79-20, so it now goes to the desk of President Obama for his signature.

“Important positions will be filled faster, government agencies will be more capable of offering valuable services to their constituents, and the overall confirmation process will be more efficient,” said Senator Joseph Lieberman (I-Conn.), chairman of the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee.

Dozens of key management positions in the Departments of Agriculture, Defense, Commerce, and Homeland Security (including the treasurer of the United States, the deputy administrator of the Federal Aviation Administration, the director of the Office for Domestic Preparedness, and the assistant administrator of FEMA) will now be filled by presidential edict, without the need of the “advice and consent” of the Senate, a phrase specifically removed from the process in the text of the bill.

Although the House vote occurred on Tuesday, the Senate voted to surrender its constitutional check on the executive over a year ago on June 29, 2011.

Despite a last-minute attempt by some House leaders to put the measure to a voice vote, thus allowing members to vote in favor of the legislation without being listed on the record, a roll call vote was taken, and the name of every congressman who voted to unconstitutionally neuter the legislative branch is listed.

The process began last March when Senator Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) and 15 cosponsors, including Republicans Lamar Alexander (Tenn.); Scott Brown (Mass.); and Mitch McConnell (Ky.), introduced S. 679, the “Presidential Appointment Efficiency and Streamlining Act.” The measure struck from many current laws the “advice and consent” requirement for many executive branch appointments, giving the president unchecked power to fill key administration positions.

In a memo sent to Capitol Hill in advance of Tuesday’s vote in the House, Thomas McClusky of the Family Research Council reminded lawmakers, “The United States Constitution does not bestow kingly powers on the President to appoint the senior officers of the government with no process.”

Although McClusky’s reading of the Constitution is accurate, as of Tuesday it is no longer the law of the land. According to proponents of the measure, the bill benefitted from such strong bipartisan support (95 Republicans joined 166 Democrats voting in favor of passage) because its sole purpose is to relieve the backlog of unconfirmed appointees by eliminating the confirmation requirement for about 200 offices.

The process by which heads of executive branch departments are appointed and confirmed is set forth by Article II, Section 2 of the U.S. Constitution. The “Appointments Clause” provides that the president:

shall nominate, and by and with the Advice and Consent of the Senate, shall appoint Ambassadors, other public Ministers and Consuls, Judges of the supreme Court, and all other Officers of the United States, whose Appointments are not herein otherwise provided for, and which shall be established by Law: but the Congress may by Law vest the Appointment of such inferior Officers, as they think proper, in the President alone, in the Courts of Law, or in the Heads of Departments.

Now, as soon as President Obama adds his signature to the bill, the checks and balances established by our Founding Fathers as a protection against tyranny will be eliminated, as well as the concept of enumerated powers.

2012 Primary, Dirty Tricks, Elite Media, Mitt Romney, Obama, Sarah, Stuck on Stupid, True Talking Points

86% of Romney Elite Media Coverage Negative; Obama Coverage “Gushing” With Approval…

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Their coverage of McCain/Palin was not even this negative.

Lets talk about Sarah Palin for just a moment. People now realize that Sarah Palin has been correct on issue after issue. She was right about ObamaCare, she was right about how radical the Obama Administration would be, she was also right when she predicted the rise of food prices very early on. Even the Wall Street Journal trashed Palin for the food prediction, but time after time she has been shown correct. The result is that more and more people doubt the elite media and truly understand just how vicious a partisan attack machine it has become.

Washington Times:

Media bias has gone from bad to ridiculous.

During Mitt Romney’s overseas visit earlier this week, 86 percent of the coverage on ABC, CBS and NBC “emphasized Romney’s perceived gaffes,” according to a content analysis of 21 major news stories by the Media Research Center, which also compared Mr. Romney’s trip to a similar excursion made by President Obama in 2008.

The results: The broadcast networks committed 53 minutes of almost entirely negative coverage to Mr. Romney, and 92 minutes of “gushing” to Mr. Obama.

“The near unanimous negativity of their coverage is as outrageous as it is transparent,” observes the center’s founder Brent Bozell. “It’s impossible to look at the fawning coverage of Obama’s trip in 2008 compared to the sliming Romney has taken in 2012 and not see a clear agenda on the part of the liberal media.”

mmm

2012 Primary, Health Law, Obama, True Talking Points

ObamaCare already increasing insurance premiums and eliminating insurance carriers.

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We have been covering the ObamaCare law in detail here at Political Arena. If you want to get down to the details and the nitty-gritty of how ObamaCare is designed to price both insurance and care out of the hands of most private individuals a good place to start is at the Health Insurance Tips Blog. Please see their post HERE.

2012 Primary, Dirty Tricks, Energy Policy, Gangsta Govt, Obama, True Talking Points

Emails Show Rahm Emanuel Lied About Solyndra Scandal

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Related: 16th Green Energy Company Funded by Obama Goes Under – LINK

See our other green energy scam coverage HERE.

Via the Washington Free Beacon:

BY:
August 2, 2012 5:07 pm

Chicago mayor and former White House chief of staff Rahm Emanuel repeatedly claimed he had no memory of the Obama administration’s controversial $535 million loan to failed solar company Solyndra, but White House emails released Thursday say it was Emanuel’s idea for the administration to tout the doomed firm.

In a batch of White House emails released in a report on Solyndra by the House Energy and Commerce Committee Thursday, White House aide Aditya Kumar wrote to Jacob Levine of the Office of Energy and Climate Change: “Feels like Rahm wants this too (barring any concerns) — POTUS involvement was Rahm’s idea.”

However, speaking to Chicago radio station WLS 890AM at a news conference in September, 2011, Emanuel said he did not remember anything about the failed investment loan by the Department of Energy, which critics say was fast-tracked to fit the White House’s political agenda.

“Ya know, I’m focusing on a major announcement today for the City Of Chicago,” Emanuel said. “I don’t actually remember that or know about it.”

Four weeks later, Emanuel again claimed he did not remember anything about the Solyndra loan.

Earlier emails revealed by the House Energy and Commerce Committee hinted at Emanuel’s involvement.

An assistant to Emanuel wrote on Aug. 31, 2009, to the Office of Management and Budget about the administration’s upcoming Solyndra announcement, and asked whether “there is anything we can help speed along on OMB side.”

The director of the OMB at the time was Jack Lew, now White House Chief of Staff. The Washington Post reported Thursday that Lew allowed the Solyndra loan to be restructured despite warnings from his staff.

2012 Primary, CFA, Communications Theory, Culture War, Editorial, Education, Gangsta Govt, Obama, True Talking Points

Editorial: I Was at Chick-Fil-A Appreciation Day!

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Let me be CLEAR! This issue is not about gays, it is about freedom. The “gay” issue is just the crutch being used today to disguise an attack on capitalism and freedom. Next time it will be some other crutch, but the attack will be the same. The gay people on my friends list support capitalism and freedom as well as anyone can and in that cause they have my support!

No matter the charge when the left cries wolf:

GAYS! (insert leftist cause here – this time it is let politicians punish freedom of religion)…

RIGHTS FOR WOMEN! (government forces the church and all private enterprises to pay for your birth control)…

RACE! (let government regulate all sorts of things that violate property rights)…

DISABLED VETS! (let government micromanage all sorts of aspects to private business including how high your mirrors are and how the steps to your door are built) …

ENVIRONMENT! (allow government to regulate all forms of production and virtually take over the energy industry picking winners and losers)…

DRUG GANGS! (Efforts to take away guns specifically from the law abiding – LINK)….

GLOBAL COOLING! (Solution is centralized control of the economy, the expansion of the state and abandoning of limited government and capitalism)…

GLOBAL WARMING! (Solution is centralized control of the economy, the expansion of the state and abandoning of limited government and capitalism)…

The waving left hand is the wedge issue, the right hand is doing what they want to accomplish. This is the modus operandi of the far left. The headline from the Huffington Post below is merely an example of this truth”

An association of black church leaders has come out against the attempt to redefine marriage and has spoken out against the Democrat Party leadership. You will notice that the so called “gay groups” have nothing to say about it. Why? Because the leadership of groups such as GLAAD could give a rip about gays and are functioning as a leftist radical group of pure ideology, much like the NAACP whose leadership constantly acts against the interests of inner city black families to support teachers unions and a far left political agenda. If this is about principle why aren’t these same “gay advocacy groups” doing “kiss off” protests at black inner city churches? [Answer – because it could chase away votes from Democrats].

Please enjoy this slideshow from Chick-Fil-A at South Bend and Mishawaka, Indiana

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Radicalized homosexual groups problem is not that they are homosexual, that is just the wedge issue they are using as a distraction, the problem with them is that they are radicalized leftist groups that use the claim that they speak for homosexuals as just another vehicle to attack capitalism and their pro-capitalist political enemies which is their true objective.

The case of MN Forward is another example of this truth – “radicalized homosexual activists” called MN Forward a hate group using all the same rhetoric. MN Forward is a group that supports business in Minnesota, their “crime” is that they gave a small donation to a Republican candidate who supports small business and happens to support traditional marriage. MN Forward is a small group that few had heard of that has no stake in the culture war, but they are effective at lobbying state government in Minnesota in preserving an free economic environment that is favorable for creating wealth and jobs. The average voter didn’t know that MN Forward even existed.

When people act on principle they have no need to lie and in fact have a vested interest in telling the truth to support their cause. GLAAD had this to say about actor Kirk Cameron:

“Saying that gay people are ‘detrimental to civilization’ might be ‘loving’ in Kirk Cameron’s mind, but it’s gay youth and victims of bullying who truly suffer from adults like Cameron who espouse these ideas. Cameron used his platform to attack gay Americans and is now attempting to play victim in an effort to sell his upcoming movie. That Cameron would risk the health and safety of young people in order to do so speaks for itself.

There is one problem, Cameron did not say that. Actually there are two problems, GLAAD changed what Cameron said, and then used the false accusation to paint him as an accessory to violence. GLAAD is making a bogus case that Cameron engaged in some kind of crime, or at least what should be considered a crime. By tying Cameron to violence falsely they are inciting others to do violence to him.

Here is the video of what Kirk Cameron really said – http://piersmorgan.blogs.cnn.com/2012/03/02/kirk-cameron-on-homosexuality-its-detrimental-and-ultimately-destructive/.

Radicalized leftist groups such as GLAAD falsely accuse the political enemies of the left of being tied to violence, and are, in turn trying to incite others to do violence against them, in this case Christians. It is the worst form of bigotry imaginable. The leadership of GLAAD does this because Christians are more likely to vote for free market Republican candidates and as we pointed out above, you won’t see GLAAD attacking associations of black churches who oppose gay marriage. Why? Because they tend to vote for Democrats who oppose free markets and favor government control of the economy.  Such leftist groups are not even the slightest bit interested in protecting the freedom of religion, conscience, speech and association of those with whom they disagree.

2012 Primary, Culture War, Jihad, True Talking Points

Saudi Islamic Cleric: Equal Rights for Women Sends Shivers Down My Spine (video)

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The Blaze comments:

Islam, as many a liberal thinker will happily inform you, is a religion of peace, and anyone who disagrees, or questions what else it might teach, is racist [Note, in spite of the fact that Islam is not a race – PoliticalArena Editor]. If this is so, one wonders how such people would defend the following clip, apparently of a sermon by Saudi cleric Sa’d Al-Qa’ud, decrying the U.N. Convention on the Elimination of all forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW), a law which the cleric in the video decries as an attack on “Allah and his Shari’a.”

2012 Primary, Gangsta Govt, Obama, Thugs, Treason, True Talking Points

NAACP leader sent to prison for 10 counts of vote fraud

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This is why Eric Holder, the Obama Administration, oppose voter ID laws.

Daily Caller:

While NAACP President Benjamin Jealous lashed out at new state laws requiring photo ID for voting, an NAACP executive sits in prison, sentenced for carrying out a massive voter fraud scheme.

In a story ignored by the national media, in April a Tunica County, Miss., jury convicted NAACP official Lessadolla Sowers on 10 counts of fraudulently casting absentee ballots. Sowers is identified on an NAACP website as a member of the Tunica County NAACP Executive Committee.

Sowers received a five-year prison term for each of the 10 counts, but Circuit Court Judge Charles Webster permitted Sowers to serve those terms concurrently, according to the Tunica Times, the only media outlet to cover the sentencing.

“This crime cuts against the fabric of our free society,” Judge Webster said.

Sowers was found guilty of voting in the names of Carrie Collins, Walter Howard, Sheena Shelton, Alberta Pickett, Draper Cotton and Eddie Davis. She was also convicted of voting in the names of four dead persons: James L. Young, Dora Price, Dorothy Harris, and David Ross.

 

2012 Primary, Dirty Tricks, Health Law, Obama, Pay to Play, Treason, True Talking Points

Obama Gives AARP $52 Million – And It Wasn’t Because He Loves Seniors….

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AARP, whose board of directors has been hijacked by liberal political activists threw seniors under the bus when they supported ObamaCare with its bureaucrats that can deny seniors access to care (after Obamacare is fully implemented) and its half a TRILLION dollars in Medicare cuts. President Obama of course sought to enrich those who run AARP with some giveaways [from my old college blog – yes we were paying attention even then]:

AARP Making Mega-Millions on Corrupt ObamaCare “Easter Egg” – LINK

Corrupt AARP Health Care Deal Puts Seniors at Risk – LINK

AARP and Many Others Hiking Premiums or Dumping Coverage Because of ObamaCare – LINK

 

Now this. Big Government:

Today, the Department of Labor proudly announced that it had given away some $260 million in grants to various organizations through its Senior Community Service Employment Program (SCSEP). SCSEP is “a community service and work-based training program for older workers – providing subsidized, part-time, community service training for unemployed, low-income persons 55 or older who have poor employment prospects.”

Sounds great. Except the biggest recipients of SCSEP cash are Democratic political surrogates.

The largest single recipient of general SCSEP funds was – you guessed it – the American Association of Retired Persons Foundation, which pulled down almost $52 million. The AARP Foundation is a wing of the AARP, which stands to make some $1 billion over the next decade thanks to Obamacare and spends hundreds of millions of dollars to push liberal policies. The head of the AARP contributed some $8,900 to Obama’s campaign committees in 2008.

Coincidentally, the DOL is handing $6.6 million to the National Urban League – and it just so happens that President Obama spoke at the NUL this week in an attempt to reinvigorate his black support base.

The goodies keep on coming for President Obama’s friends. And that’s his entire campaign strategy: buy off specific constituency with taxpayer cash, and then let them push him to victory.