Props to progressive liberal Prof. Michael Shermer, who got (figuratively) his butt kicked in debates with Dinesh D’Souza and well knew it. Shermer was well humored about it and was a real good sport. Most liberals would have simply snapped.
Tag Archives: current-events
Editor’s Response to Obama’s Orwellian Inauguration Speech
It was amazing.
How so?
Even though I have made it my specialty to study liars and the propaganda that is used to market evil to those who are not vigilant, it amazes me when I watch President Obama because, unlike most politicians who lie to get themselves out of trouble or do it off the cuff in the heat of the moment, this new crew of Saul Alinsky inspired Democrats use lies and the most advanced propaganda and deception techniques as a tool for calculated aggression. This writer has no doubt that Obama’s staff has “think tank” sessions where they come up with such lies, distortions, and dishonest associations and even take the time to focus group the lies so as to tweak them for believability.
What I found most offensive was when he perverted the message of America’s Founders as an affirmation of Marxist collectivist propaganda:
… fidelity to our founding principles requires new responses to new challenges; that preserving our individual freedoms ultimately requires collective action. For the American people can no more meet the demands of today s world by acting alone than American soldiers could have met the forces of fascism or communism with muskets and militias. No single person can train all the math and science teachers we ll need to equip our children for the future, or build the roads and networks and research labs that will bring new jobs and businesses to our shores. Now, more than ever, we must do these things together, as one nation, and one people [government must do it]
Individualism of course does not mean always acting alone. Did George Washington with the revolution by himself? Can people not cooperate to make things as complex as a pencil do so without government controlling it all? By using false definitions and associative propaganda techniques this line is designed to undermine and twist the idea of rugged individualism and the idea that in our form of government is the citizen that is the sovereign, not the state.
What we saw in Obama’s speech are the kinds of self serving twists, distortions, and straw-man arguments that tyrants have used for centuries. What makes this different is that , it is being used by an American president, and the quality of such lies is the best I have ever seen since Goebbels.
I was in the process of going through the entire speech so I could deconstruct the lies, but Mytheos Holt at The Blaze has done a nice job of doing this that.
The Blaze:
Unfortunately, another characteristic was also in evidence in Obama’s speech: namely, his tendency to argue against positions that nobody holds (and by extension, to mischaracterize his opponents’ views so as to make them easier to argue against). In logic, this unfortunate tendency is referred to as a “straw man fallacy” and it was well-worn in President Obama’s speech today – so well-worn that at times, he seemed to cough up a new straw man fallacy with every sentence. How many of these arguments in bad faith did the President use? Read on as we list each one and explain their fallacious nature.
Straw Man #1:
“For the American people can no more meet the demands of today’s world by acting alone than American soldiers could have met the forces of fascism or communism with muskets and militias.”
The President’s line about muskets and militias is a rhetorical flourish more than an argument, but the first part of this line is an obvious straw man. No one in the current political climate is arguing for a complete dissolution of government power such that only the American people as a collective would be responsible for defending the country or performing any other task. Rather, the question is how much responsibility should be left to private citizens. Saying “private citizens cannot handle all responsibilities” is not the same as saying “private citizens cannot handle any responsibility at all.”
Straw Man #2:
“No single person can train all the math and science teachers we’ll need to equip our children for the future, or build the roads and networks and research labs that will bring new jobs and businesses to our shores.”
Like the first straw man, this one argues against something which is obviously false, and which no one believes. A single, individual person obviously cannot do all of this alone, but again, that does not imply that if someone cannot do something alone, the government must step in and do it for them. For instance, an architect cannot build a skyscraper alone. He needs laborers, engineers, and other people. But saying he can’t do this alone is not the same thing as saying that private citizens cannot cooperatively agree to do this without help from the government.
Straw Man #3:
“We reject the belief that America must choose between caring for the generation that built this country and investing in the generation that will build its future. For we remember the lessons of our past, when twilight years were spent in poverty and parents of a child with a disability had nowhere to turn.”
No one is proposing completely giving up caring for older generations, nor is anyone proposing completely ignoring young people’s needs. The question is how much government can afford to spend on each. More to the point, no one on either side is proposing complete abolition of programs that help the elderly or the disabled.
Straw Man #4:
“We do not believe that in this country freedom is reserved for the lucky, or happiness for the few.”
This particular straw man presumably is meant to apply to income inequality. At least, that’s the only public policy issue that this author can see it relating to. However, as with the others, it is a misreading of people who argue against greater income equality. For one thing, freedom and happiness are not necessarily the same as money, and luck is not the only thing that makes a person wealthy. Moreover, people who argue that income inequality is not necessarily a problem are not defending the idea that only a few can be wealthy, which is a question of income mobility, not equality.
Straw Man #5:
“Some may still deny the overwhelming judgment of science, but none can avoid the devastating impact of raging fires and crippling drought and more powerful storms.”
This straw man, which deals with global warming, is actually two fallacies in one. It is a straw man because no one believes they can avoid the impact of natural disasters completely, and it also begs the question by assuming that solving global warming will solve the problem of fires, drought and storms, while simultaneously trying to prove that by solving global warming, natural disasters will be lessened.
Straw Man #6:
“We, the people, still believe that enduring security and lasting peace do not require perpetual war.”
The President’s critics on national security do not believe in perpetual war. They may believe in seeing some wars through to their conclusion, or starting other wars out of necessity, but none of them believes in perpetual war for its own sake.
Straw Man #7:
“For our journey is not complete until our wives, our mothers and daughters can earn a living equal to their efforts.”
People arguing against bills such as the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act, which claim to be devoted to ensuring equal pay for women, often do so because they are concerned that these laws give trial lawyers too much of an excuse to sue, not because they believe women should be underpaid.
Straw Man #8:
“Our journey is not complete until our gay brothers and sisters are treated like anyone else under the law, for if we are truly created equal, then surely the love we commit to one another must be equal as well.”
Again, there are no mainstream political figures who believe that gays should be unequal before the law. In fact, gays enjoy all the same constitutional protections as straight people. The question of whether the right to marriage is one of those constitutional protections, however, is an unresolved question, though the Supreme Court may resolve it later this year. This straw man also assumes that the only function of marriage is to facilitate love. That is certainly one view, but it is not one that all critics of gay marriage subscribe to, and thus assuming that they oppose gay marriage out of opposition to love is a straw man.
Straw Man #9:
“Our journey is not complete until we find a better way to welcome the striving, hopeful immigrants who still see America as a land of opportunity.”
Shutting off immigration completely is not a policy proposal being offered. What is being argued about is the question of what to do with people who immigrated to the US in contradiction to its laws.
Straw Man #10:
“Being true to our founding documents does not require us to agree on every contour of life. It does not mean we all define liberty in exactly the same way or follow the same precise path to happiness.”
This is obviously true, but is also a straw man because no one believes that following a blueprint for governance requires the people following that blueprint to make all the same lifestyle choices. This is not even an argument that constitutional originalists on the Supreme Court advance. The President is arguing against a position that is not held by his critics.
Editor’s Thought of the Day (2)
So let me get this straight. When a police officer pulls over a car with possible illegal aliens in it he cannot ask certain questions because liberals say it’s racism. But liberals want gun owners to be registered, fingerprinted and data-based up and down, as well as having our names and addresses printed in the paper.
Who is preferred and who is treated as the non-citizen?
Mark Levin with Megyn Kelly: Obama thinks the Constitution is just another statute to play with (video)
Megyn Kelly and Mark Levin are both lawyers. Mark Levin is a former justice department staffer for the Reagan Administration and has argued in front of the Supreme Court multiple times. Levin is also the author of the best selling book on the Supreme Court in history.
Notre Dame Prof: Silent Minority Aids America’s Destruction
And she is right. With the leadership of the GOP seeming to be all over the place, and an RNC that isn’t leading a rhetorical, philosophical, or policy battle; traditionalists, conservatives and those simply wanting some fiscal and regulatory sanity feel like people without a party, and for some they feel like aliens on their own country, but in reality such people are the majority.
[Note: The staff of Political Arena resides in South Bend, Indiana, the home of the University of Notre Dame, although we have no affiliation with the university.]
Ryan Lovelace at The College Fix:
When Laura Hollis, a Notre Dame University business and law professor, looks at America’s path forward, she cannot help but see a dead end.
“Many people say to me, ‘If it gets worse than this, I’m not sure we can survive it,’ and I’m inclined to agree with them,” Hollis said in an interview with The College Fix. “It’s never been as bad as it is now.”
Hollis, who in addition to her professorship is a popular conservative columnist and political commentator, is the author of a post-election column titled “Post Mortem” that went viral across America. It was reposted on many websites, spread like wildfire across social media sites, and emailed far and wide, landing in mom-and-pop inboxes across the nation.
In fact, just as recently as Dec. 28, the popular left-leaning political blog Daily Kos posted an “open letter to Laura Hollis” denouncing her piece.
This ongoing whirlwind of a world wide web debate was prompted by Hollis’ Nov. 8 column, which analyzed the state of the union the day after President Barack Obama was re-elected.
It argued, among other things, that: conservatives are outnumbered; they’re losing the culture war; too many Americans are immature, seeking only self-gratification; and the so-called Republican War on Women played a role in the election outcome.
“America is on a horrific bender; has been for some time now,” Hollis wrote. “The warning signs of our fiscal profligacy and culture of lack of personal responsibility are everywhere – too many to mention. We need only look at other countries which have gone the route we are walking now to see what is in store. … I see the country I love headed toward its own ‘rock bottom,’ and I cannot seem to reach those who are taking it there.”
In an interview this week with The College Fix, Hollis said feedback she’s received from that piece has led her to believe millions of Americans feel as if they have no voice. But the answer, she argued, is not to cower in the corner and give up.
“Speak up,” Hollis said. “Because being polite does not mean being silent.”
First and foremost, the culture war must to be addressed, she said. It’s time to stop worrying about stepping on people’s toes or hurting people’s feelings, she said.
Some Republican and conservative commentators argued after the election the solution to regain the White House, Congress and the country is to become more moderate, acquiesce to the social norms promulgated by the Left.
Bad idea, Hollis said.
“We have to decide we need to change the tone and tenor of culture in the country,” Hollis said. “In order to change the culture, you have to be a part of the culture.”
Take, for example, the alleged War on Women. During the presidential campaign, women’s rights discussions served as a façade for something more sinister, she said. What appeared to be a discourse about access to birth control was really about expanding abortion services and physician-assisted suicide, Hollis said.
“I’m pro-better choice—all choices are not equal,” Hollis said. “If my father is suffering from advanced dementia, I don’t have the right to smother him with a pillow.”
Hollis said advances in science have provided new and startling information about life from conception through natural death that every American should learn. This is one example of the kinds of things that could help turn the culture war tide in conservatives’ favor.
Hollis said “the left” has become politically adept at demonizing people, but it is important for all Americans to understand everyone wants to make things better, she said.
While Hollis’ first point in her “Post-Mortem” work declared Americans who champion free enterprise are outnumbered by those who want free stuff, she said that did not mean throw in the towel.
“No matter where you are, that can be ground-zero for changing things,” Hollis said.
Bill Clinton is Father of the Year? Why the left infiltrates non-profits.
As we lectured about Why Republicans Lost in the last election, conservatives need to engage the culture war to reinforce the ideals the country was founded upon. There are so many “low information voters” who vote on the basis of who looks the best on TV, who tells the best joke or “who looks cooler” that giving up on the culture war is to never win another election again. The left will do anything to make traditionalists and conservatives look like jerks while portraying leftists with the morals of an ally cat such as Bill Clinton and John Edwards as the paragons of virtue.
For those of you who look at the title and have a knee jerk reaction “this is just conspiracy stuff” we assure you that we are the farthest thing from the Alex Jones types. With that said we would remind readers that people are prosecuted in court for conspiracy to do all sorts of illegal things every day, and in the case of white collar corruption working together with politicians the conspiracies to avoid paying taxes or enrich donors with taxpayer dollars are elaborate and often go on for years before being discovered.
Former KGB Agent Yuri Bezmenov participated in a documentary on how the Soviets targeted Hollywood, non-profits and education to undermine American culture. Civil rights groups such as the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education and the Alliance Defense Fund are inundated with cases of universities and public schools that have progressive secular leftists administrators who actively seek out to persecute and fire or remove from school teachers and students who refuse to tote the far left ideological line. This very writer survived multiple attempts at persecution when attending Indiana University.
If you have even the slightest doubt as to just how big this problem is we encourage you to follow this link on our Academic Misconduct category and look through at least a couple of pages listing just a few of these incidents to get the idea of what you have been missing.
Here is a link to the editor’s old college blog with eight short videos documenting how the campus administrations actively conspired to grossly violate the civil rights of both students and teachers. In the video below at the Missouri State University a far left teacher ordered a Christian student to have a homosexual experience and write about it – and the persecution didn’t stop there – the academic department and the university administration actively persecuted her and dug in their heals defending their action until it went to federal court.
So what does all this have to do with the Father of the Year?
Bill Clinton was chosen by the Fathers Day Council to be the Father of the Year. Hmm what would poor Monica Lewinsky’s father think about that, or Juanita Broaddricks, or Elizabeth ward Gracen’s, Dolly Kyle Browning’s, Paul Jones’s, Kathleen Willey’s, and the rest of the fathers of the women Bill Clinton abused, assaulted and sexually harassed?
Smelling a rat I pulled up the list of who has won this Father of the Year award, for which they issue several per year, and you guessed it, for the most part it is a who’s who of leftist luminaries and members of Democrat presidential administrations.
The list includes, in 2007 Senator John Edwards, who as the time was fathering a love child with his mistress while his sweet wife Elizabeth was dying of cancer.
Other far left luminaries include NBC’s activist leftist Sunday morning talk host David Gregory, ABC’s version of the same in George Stephanopoulos, far left former Congressman Ron Klein, former Treasury Secretary Paul O’Neill after he wrote a largely discredited Bush bashing book, Mark Shriver of the Kennedy clan, Hulk Hogan (who just made a sex tape with his best friend’s wife – way to go Dad! But I am sure he made a big donation). CNN’s Larry King, Mayor Bloomberg, Frank Rich (friend of Bill Clinton and the largest tax cheat in history who was pardoned by Clinton), Wolf Blitzer, Bobby Kennedy, NBC’s Brian Williams, former Democrat Senator Chuck Robb (who was having an affair with Tai Collins) and… well I think you are starting to get the picture.
The last two conservatives to get on of these awards were Donald Trump in 2005 (who was working for NBC and wasn’t politically active before Obama) and General Norman Schwarzkopf in 1991 who had just won the Gulf War and wasn’t politically active until the following year.
The last conservative political figures who were handed the award who weren’t otherwise mega-celebs outside of politics were conservative political writer Fred Barnes in 1994 (they had to pick someone because of the Republican revolution in 94) and Dan Quayle in 1989.
George Zimmerman Sues NBC News: Edited 911 Tape to Make Him Look Racist
NBC did this and there is little doubt that it absolutely was malicious.
Though it might feel like a hundred years ago, it was only last April when the media joined Barack Obama’s cynical crusade to gin up his base in Florida through the artificial inflaming of racial tensions. And there was no question NBC News was the worst of these co-conspirators after the network was busted editing a 9-1-1 call to make Trayvon Martin’s suspected shooter, George Zimmerman, look like a racist. Today, Zimmerman filed suit against the Peacock Network.
Zimmerman accuses NBC of creating a “false and defamatory misimpression using the oldest form of yellow journalism: manipulating Zimmerman’s own words, splicing together disparate parts of the recording to create the illusion of statements that Zimmerman never actually made.”
He’s suing for defamation and intentional infliction of emotional distress, demanding unspecified damages.
I’m no lawyer, but there’s absolutely no question here that NBC News is at least morally liable for one of the most despicable acts of defamation I’ve ever come across. Here’s the maliciously edited version of the 9-1-1 tape NBC’s storied “Today Show” broadcast before the entire world:
ZIMMERMAN: This guy looks like he’s up to no good … he looks black.
Here’s how the call really went:
ZIMMERMAN: This guy looks like he’s up to no good. Or he’s on drugs or something. It’s raining and he’s just walking around, looking about.
OFFICER: Okay, and this guy — is he black, white or Hispanic?
ZIMMERMAN: He looks black.
All of this, of course, falls on the man in charge of NBC News since 2005, Steve Capus, who apparently encourages this kind of behavior, at the very least, by allowing it to occur again and again without there being any kind of consequence. Because something else Zimmerman might have on his side is the fact that NBC has been caught a handful of times using the exact same kind of malicious edits to aid and abet the left, specifically Barack Obama.
In 2009, NBC’s Contessa Brewer edited video “so that that MSNBC viewers wouldn’t know that the man carrying firearms to a Tea Party was a black man. This allowed Brewer to then host a segment about how racist the Tea Party is towards President Obama and how this racism might just lead to the unthinkable–the assassination of our President.”
In 2011, NBC’s Ed Schultz edited Texas Governor and GOP presidential candidate, Rick Perry, to look racist.
Back in June, Andrea Mitchell was caught editing up a gaffe for Mitt Romney.
Youth Unemployment Highest Since WWII
Barack Obama has made quite a hubbub over the course of his presidency about education for young students, and jobs for young workers. Unfortunately, it seems he’s failed on both counts. According to a recent study produced by the Annie E. Casey Foundation and Children Now, there are now 6.5 million “disconnected” young people in America – “disconnected” being defined as neither in school nor employed, and “young people” being defined as 16-24 years of age. Young people now have the lowest employment rate since World War II.
In California alone, there are nearly a million young people who are “disconnected”: 850,000. Since 2000, that number has jumped a staggering 35 percent. Meanwhile, California’s overall employment rate for people aged 16-19 clocks in at just 18 percent; its high school graduation rate is a paltry 76 percent.
Judge: Indiana Election Fraud Lawsuit Can Continue
Via Judicial Watch President Tom Fitton:
Judicial Watch achieved a significant legal victory last week – and it may lead to cleaner elections. On December 10, 2012, the United States District Court for the Southern District of Indiana, Indianapolis Division, denied Indiana’s motion to dismiss our historic election integrity lawsuit (Judicial Watch, et al. v. King, et al. (No. 1:12-cv-00800)). We allege that the state of Indiana failed to maintain clean voter registration lists as required by the National Voter Registration Act (NVRA), and now we will have our day in court. Make no mistake, this is a HUGE victory for election integrity. True the Vote, the grassroots clean elections watchdog, is both our client and co-plaintiff in this important lawsuit.
The State of Indiana had feebly offered the argument that Judicial Watch did not have standing to bring the lawsuit and, therefore, could not sue Indiana Secretary of State Connie Lawson and Indiana Election Division Directors J. Bradley Kind and Trent Deckard in their official capacity. But Judge Lawrence was having none of it, and ruled that the lawsuit can proceed in its entirety.
By way of review, this case began on February 6, 2012, when Judicial Watch notified Indiana election officials by letter that the state was in violation of the NVRA, having failed to clean its voter records to the extent that “the number of persons registered to vote exceeded the total voting population in twelve Indiana counties.”
The Judicial Watch letter also requested that the State of Indiana make available for public inspection all records concerning “the implementation of programs and activities conducted for the purpose of ensuring the accuracy and currency” of official lists of eligible voters, per Section 8 of the NVRA.
And what was the state’s reply? Indiana election officials summarily dismissed these concerns about the rolls and flatly refused to produce documents about this issue. And so, on June 11, 2012, Judicial Watch filed suit, leading to our recent court victory.
In its denial of the motion to dismiss, the District Court first ruled that the Judicial Watch and True the Vote had sufficiently fulfilled NVRA notification requirements, stating, “[T]he Court finds that the Letter satisfied the pre-suit notice requirement, inasmuch as the Letter, when read as a whole, makes it clear that Judicial Watch is asserting a violation of the NVRA and plans to initiate litigation if its concerns are not addressed in a timely fashion.”
In denying the defendants’ allegation that Judicial Watch and True the Vote did not have standing to sue, the court ruled that Judicial Watch “has satisfied this burden by alleging that its members who are registered to vote in Indiana are injured by Indiana’s failure to comply with the NVRA list maintenance requirements.” True the Vote, the court ruled, “has suffered injuries because of the Defendants alleged failure to comply with the NVRA and therefore has standing to bring its List Maintenance Claim.”
Needless to say, this is a major victory for the people of Indiana and everyone who values the integrity of the ballot box nationwide. Indiana’s election officials who shirked their responsibility to maintain clean voter registration lists have been put on notice that their lackadaisical attitude is no longer acceptable. This victory should put other states on notice that they need to take reasonable and responsible steps to remove dead and ineligible voters from the rolls. The Obama Justice Department has been AWOL on this issue so we will stand in the gap for election integrity. Actually, it’s worse than that. (The Department of Justice has, at times, behaved more like an enemy combatant against election integrity.)
How do people this foolish land jobs in our public schools?
The elite media does a lousy job reporting the civil rights violations that happen almost every day in our public schools. Civil rights organizations such as the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education, the Alliance Defense Fund, the Rutherford Institute, the Student Press Law Center, and more have so many complaints of abuse that they have have no hope of acting upon them all.
We report on a few of the most outrageous cases here, and we spend a lot of time on this issue, but in truth we barely scratch the surface of the problem, as the problem is just that that big.
Bureaucrats, and unfortunately that includes some school administrators seem to have the ability to make the most outrageous behavior sound reasonable. Even now the school principal insists that the school was within its rights (to stick their hands in a boys underwear, not tell the parents, and take the 4th Amendment and toss it out the window) to conduct the strip search. I suspect that the courts are going to give the school a rude awakening. But even so, the administrators won’t be punished, the tax payer will just have to pay the damages and the administrators will just go on violating students.
Notice what national news outlet is reporting this story?
The UK Daily Mail:
Parents’ outrage as school strip searches a 10-year-old boy to find a ‘stolen’ $20 bill that was actually in the cafeteria
North Carolina parents are outraged after an assistant principal strip-searched a 10-year-old boy to find a $20 bill the student didn’t even have.
Union Elementary School assistant principal Teresa Holmes is named in a complaint filed against the school, alleging that she made a young boy strip down to his underwear.
She suspected fifth-grader Justin Cox of having the missing $20 and when he didn’t turn it over she demanded he remove his socks, shoes, pants, and shirt so that a manual search could be done.
Holmes defended herself, saying that other students and faculty had said that the money was missing and that Cox had dived under a table for it.
Holmes told Cox he ‘he left her no choice and that she had to search him,’ according to court records.
She then told him she was ‘within her legal rights to do so.’
The complaint against Holmes states that Cox was deprived of his constitutional rights barring unreasonable search and seizure.
According to court documents, Cox had gone under a lunch table after money a passing girl had dropped. Holmes returned the cash to the girl, and afterwards was told that there was still $20 missing.
When confronted, Cox told her he didn’t have it.
Ordered into her office with a custodian to act as a witness, Holmes went so far as to put her fingers inside the waistband of his underwear and run her fingers on his bare torso.
She explained she had the authority to search him ‘because teachers and students thought Justin had the money.’
But another teacher came into the office to announce that the money was ‘miraculously’ found on the cafeteria floor.
Will: Colleges have free speech on the run
Parents, what you are about to read here is commonplace on American universities today. And you may be thinking, “I am in a conservative town so not my local university”…. well you are sadly mistaken.
This very writer is from South Bend, Indiana. Mike Pence is our new governor, Jackie Walorski is our new Member of Congress, and Indiana was the first state to go to Mitt Romney in the election. Yet, I can tell you with absolute certainty that Christians, traditionalists, and conservatives face discrimination and persecution on campus.
This very writer, when faced with persecution on campus, went very high profile on campus and used a strategy of making the left fear me. Having been a radio talk show host and a person with some resources I had that option, but many traditional students don’t.
Pro-life professors at Notre Dame, the largest Catholic University in the world, are persecuted on campus because the radical left has all but taken over the institution since Father Hessburg actively recruited Marxists to work at the university.
Hundreds of thousands of communists didn’t suddenly become libertarians after the East German wall fell. They had to go somewhere and most of them ended up “teaching” our kids. There are plenty of them on almost every campus in America.
At Tufts, a conservative newspaper committed “harassment” by printing accurate quotations from the Koran and a verified fact about the status of women in Saudi Arabia. Lukianoff says that Tufts may have been the first American institution “to find someone guilty of harassment for stating verifiable facts directed at no one in particular.”
He documents how “orientation” programs for freshmen become propaganda to (in the words of one orthodoxy enforcer) “leave a mental footprint on their consciousness.” Faculty, too, can face mandatory consciousness-raising.
In 2007, Donald Hindley, a politics professor at Brandeis, was found guilty of harassment because when teaching Latin American politics he explained the origin of the word “wetbacks,” which refers to immigrants crossing the Rio Grande. Without a hearing, the university provost sent Hindley a letter stating that the university “will not tolerate inappropriate, racial and discriminatory conduct.” The assistant provost was assigned to monitor Hindley’s classes “to ensure that you do not engage in further violations of the nondiscrimination and harassment policy.” Hindley was required to attend “anti-discrimination training.”
Such coercion is a natural augmentation of censorship. Next comes mob rule. Last year, at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, the vice provost for diversity and climate — really; you can’t make this stuff up — encouraged students to disrupt a news conference by a speaker opposed to racial preferences. They did, which the vice provost called “awesome.” This is the climate on an especially liberal campus that celebrates “diversity” in everything but thought.
“What happens on campus,” Lukianoff says, “doesn’t stay on campus” because censorship has “downstream effects.” He quotes a sociologist whose data he says demonstrate that “those with the highest levels of education have the lowest exposure to people with conflicting points of view.” This encourages “the human tendency to live within our own echo chambers.” Parents’ tuition dollars and student indebtedness pay for this. Good grief.
U. Texas Journalism Prof: US Founding Fathers like “Nazi’s”,
Parents, this kind of nuttery on campus is not uncommon. Most universities pay very low wages, barely enough to pay one’s student loans, so universities tend to often attract the least capable of academics who cannot make it in the private sector, or ideologues like Prof. Jensen who are so radical that the private sector is out of their reach.
Forget all that turkey, stuffing and pumpkin pie, today should be a day of fasting and atonement for American “sin.” That’s according to Robert Jensen, a journalism professor at the University of Texas at Austin. Jensen, known for his hard-left politics, also calls Thanksgiving a “white-supremacist holiday.”
Jensen’s opinion piece “No Thanks for Thanksgiving,” appeared on the far-left, Soros-connected website Alternet on Thanksgiving eve. In it, he wrote how Native Americans suffered because of the “European invasion of the Americas.” He went on to compare the Founding Fathers to Nazi Germany. “How does a country deal with the fact that some of its most revered historical figures had certain moral values and political views virtually identical to Nazis?” he asked.
After a month, plenty of Staten Island residents getting no help
….but (according to the exit polls) the elite media has people thinking that FEMA and Obama did such a great job….
Government spends $100,000 to teach young girls “condom negotiation”
We are printing up money and borrowing it from China for this? Can anyone say that Obama and the Democrat leadership is at all serious about getting the spending under control? There is no attempt at fiscal discipline. They literally say one thing and do another.
All of the talk about deficit control is just that, the tax they want to raise targets small domestic businesses to make it hard to compete against the mega-corps that fund the Democratic Party and assuming such a tax increase passes it will only raise enough money to run the government for a few days. Yet Democrats have the audacity to call their tax hike proposals “Deficit Reduction”.
The Democrat Leadership knows the spending and printing and borrowing will blow up the currency and make it collapse, and yet they are doing everything that can to bring it about. The only question left to ask is why.
The [Obama] administration is funding a $100,000 study of pregnant and “at-risk” 14-17-year-old girls on probation in Houston, Texas, to determine ways to help them choose safer lifestyles and avoid pregnancy, including better “condom negotiation” tactics.
The National Institutes of Health, part of the Health and Human Services Department, is providing a University of Houston researcher the money because of the lack of study of female teen juveniles in trouble with the law.
The school said the study, “Choices – Teen: A Bundled Risk Reduction Intervention for Juvenile Justice Females,” will include 30 at-risk girls, ages 14-17, on intensive probation with the Harris County Juvenile Probation Department.
The goal, said the school, is to determine if intervention programs will help the kids make better life decisions.
According to Danielle Parish, the assistant professor at the school’s Graduate College of Social Work who is conducting the NIH-funded effort, one of the big problems young girls need to learn is how to talk their boyfriends into using condoms.
According to the school’s release, “Parrish notes one of the big issues for this population of adolescent girls is condom negotiation. They may have a boyfriend who says it isn’t ‘cool’ to use a condom. To prepare the girls for these types of situations, the counselors and pediatricians will teach them how to negotiate condom use with their partner. The intervention also helps empower and motivate girls to make healthier choices regarding their alcohol use, smoking and prevention of unplanned pregnancy.”
Editor: I debated Dr. Gilarducci just as Mark Levin did
by Chuck Norton
In the video below Mark Levin very gently takes apart Dr. Teresa Gilarducci. She works for George Soros now, but before that she was an econ professor at Notre Dame. She was also on President Clinton’s Social Security task force.
When she was at Notre Dame I debated her when I was an undergrad in front of an audience, as I was the only one between IU and Notre Dame who would take the partial privatization position point of view on Social Security. Her incredible hypocrisy, that Levin exposes so well in the video below, showed itself in true form in my debate with her as well. Her “logic” is entirely political, circular and based largely on denial and misdirection. She is sweet, attractive and charming, and well knows it as she uses that as a weapon in her arsenal.
Dr. Gilarducci thought she was going to be debating a “college republican” undergrad, what she got is a former radio talk show host who passed the state exams and used to sell retirement and insurance products.
I will not outline the entire debate, but in short I did two things.
First: I outlined the Galveston Plan which has worked wonders as a legal exception to Social Security. I also pointed out the government managed, but partially privatized retirement plan that Members of Congress have which has been a great success through thick and thin. Such a plan would serve as a good model to grow at least a small percentage of Social Security to at least attempt to have a growth to pre-fund our retirement benefits.
All she would say about these partially privatized plans is that the retirees wouldn’t get the money and even though retired Members of Congress and some in Galveston were already getting great benefits now she insisted that soon that money would vanish because only government transfer payments can be trusted. She kept saying again and again, “Until you go to get your money at retirement and it’s not there.”
Ironically in the video below, the type of plan she insisted could never work because the “greedsters” in the private sector would steal it all, is the exact same plan that she has for herself for her own retirement by her own admission.
Second: Dr. Gilarducci had written some good papers on 401K reform. She argued that too much of the 401K investment is in the employers own stock, so if the employer goes under said employee looses a lot of their retirement. As a fix she proposed that 401K laws be changed to require diversity of investment to more reliably pre-fund such retirement plans. Social Security has much the same problem as all of the eggs are in one basket, there is no diversity of investment and people’s retirement’s are not pre-funded.
So I used her own words and arguments on how to have a reliable and secure 401k, but replaced the term “401k” with “Social Security”. I used those near verbatim arguments to make most of my case.
All through the debate she insisted that (what she didn’t realize were her own arguments in her own published work) were just bad arguments from a young undergrad who just didn’t know better and that is how she treated me……until the end when I dropped the bomb that many of the arguments she so cutely poo-poohed were actually her own published work. She was floored.
Mark Levin:
During my last few shows, including as recently as yesterday, I have alerted you to Obama’s desire to nationalize your 401-k plan and eliminate your mortgage interest deduction.
Some background on the former. Back in October 2008, I got word that Professor Teresa Ghilarducci of the New School had testified before Rep. George Miller’s committee in support of a plan to nationalize private pension plans — in particular, 401-k plans. I not only spoke about it on my show back then, but we tracked down the professor and I conducted the first interview on talk radio. I will discuss this at more length on my program this evening, but I thought you might want to be among the first to listen to that interview again. Please pass it along to as many people as you can. See below.
Some political strategists do get it…
Jay Heine is one that has always “gotten it”.
Political Strategist Jay Heine:
You want to know why we lost ground in 2006, 2008 and 2012? We elect/select candidates that tell us what we want to hear, who are “electable”, but not trustworthy. They get into office and they follow the crowd. The most successful office holders are those that stand on principle and are unwavering. It doesn’t matter whether they are conservative or liberal, it matters whether they do what they say they are going to do. If they don’t they alienate the electorate. And all the Republicans who are about to sell us out on the fiscal cliff are making the same error.
Klavan: Give the entire Middle East to the Jews (video)
The one state solution:
Entertainment Exec: Congratulations to the GOP for losing the easiest election of our lifetime
Mr. entertainment CEO makes a good point. Romney did not do any of the late night shows such as Jay Leno nor did he appear on John Stewart. Romney did not do talk radio, which is bigger than any music format, or Fox News which beats the other news networks combined.
Richard Mgrdechian is doing something about it. He manages Madison Rising which features traditional messages in it’s music. Here is their YouTube channel.
Richard Mgrdechian:
Congratulations to the GOP for losing the easiest election of our lifetimes. Over the past four years, Obama has been exposed as a liar, a fraud, a charlatan and a scam. We’ve seen his policies of racism, divisiveness and class warfare tear at the fabric of our society on a daily basis. We’ve seen the national debt go up by $5 trillion during his watch. We’ve seen the value of the dollar go down dramatically over that same time. We’ve seen ambassadors killed overseas while he sits around and laughs it up with daytime talk show hosts. On top of it all, we’ve seen an endless amount of buyer’s remorse from people who voted for him the first time around and swore they would never do it again. Yet, even with all of this – and an economy in complete shambles – we still lost. The obvious question would have to be how is that possible? Well forget voter fraud, the Electoral College, how much we spent or anything else; at the end of the day the answer is clear and simple – we lost because, no matter how many times they talk about it, Republicans once again missed the boat on popular culture.
Keep reading, because I can tell you right now that this won’t be just another abstract article about what “needs” to be done by someone who has no clue, concept or desire to actually do anything about it, but needs to fill space in a weekly column or has to come up with something to talk about on the radio for a segment or two. No, this is an article about what is being done, what the hurdles have been – mostly from within our own party, by the way – and specific ideas on what we can do to make sure we’re ready next time around.
First of all, we need to understand that popular culture trumps politics every time. Why? Simple: logic and rational arguments are not cool, they’re not fun, they’re not easy and they’re not inspirational. Pop culture on the other hand, is – by definition – all of these things. Pop culture is what we do every day. Pop culture influences what we say, what we think, what we watch, how we dress, what we eat, what we buy and how we act. Ultimately, pop culture is what defines us both as people and as Americans.
Right now, as pathetic as it may be, our front line in the culture war is the Tea Party movement. Unfortunately, these organizations and their events are about as far from “parties” as humanly possible. In fact, the whole thing is more like a tea funeral, actually. Sure, they were effective for a year or so as a way of galvanizing support and aggregating people who felt frustrated and alone, but in reality these groups – especially given they way they are currently run – are completely unsustainable. After all, there are only so many times you can stand there and watch the same twenty people screaming at a podium about the same twenty things for four or five hours at a time. Yes, they truly are funerals in every sense of the word – boring, dreary, draining, unappealing, exhausting and most of all – they are killing the conservative movement.
The same thing seems to be true of the RNC itself, as well as the vast array of non-profits organizations that are supposed to be helping us educate voters, grow our base and win elections. From what I’ve seen, they’ve failed miserably at all three. Not only have they failed, they’ve absolutely refused to do anything innovative, to change their thinking in any manner whatsoever or to make any attempt at all to leverage the power of popular culture.
Latino voters are culturally no different than the population at large, believe Democrat’s false narratives
There is some very wrongheaded thinking in part of the establishment GOP. They believe that in order to get in power Republicans should pander, and move to the left.
Those who hold such a view actually seem to believe that the Democrats will then stop calling Republicans racist and every dirty word in the book.
Look at what the Democrats do to black and Hispanic Republicans, they release their credit history to the public illegally like they did to Michael Steele, they release their social security number publicly like they did to Allen West, and they use every racial attack they can think of.
Democrats sent agitators to Michael Steele events to literally throw Oreo’s at him. They accused Allen West of being a part of a motorcycle drug gang, they trashed his military service, they trashed his family and even went after his children. They they engaged on what is now well reported outrageous vote fraud to unseat him, and replace him with a rich white guy.
Then the Democrats said it was Republican’s fault that Congress is richer and whiter.
Democrats on the Senate Judiciary Committee trashed Miquel Estrada when he was nominated to the DC Court of Appeals saying in their own committee memo’s that they must stop him “because he is Latino”.
Democrats trotted out campaign ringers to call South Carolina Governor Nikki Haley, who is Indian-American, a slut.
AEI:
I’ll start with the General Social Survey (GSS), the most widely used database for monitoring social trends. All the results that follow are based on the biennial GSS surveys conducted from 2000 to 2010.
Latinos aren’t married more than everyone else. Among Latinos ages 30–49, 52 percent are married. Everyone else: 54 percent.
Latinos aren’t more religious than everyone else. Among Latinos, 29 percent attend worship services regularly (nearly once a week or more). Everyone else: 31 percent. Among Latinos, 18 percent not only attend regularly but also say they have a strong affiliation with their religion. Everyone else: 24 percent.
Latinos aren’t more opposed to gay marriage than everyone else. Among Latinos, 44 percent disagree or strongly disagree with the statement that “homosexuals should have the right do marry.” Everyone else: 50 percent.
Latinos are a little more opposed to abortion than everyone else, but not by a landslide. Among Latinos, 12 percent are opposed to abortion under all circumstances. Everyone else: 9 percent. Among Latinos, 21 percent are opposed to all abortion unless the mother’s health is seriously endangered. Everyone else: 14 percent.
Latinos aren’t more conservative than everyone else. Among Latinos, 14 percent describe themselves as “conservative” or “extremely conservative.” Everyone else: 20 percent.
What about the Latino work ethic? For indicators on that, I turn from the GSS to the Current Population Survey (CPS). I restrict the results to the surveys from 2000–2008, before the financial meltdown—that is, we’re looking at work behavior in years in the normal range of unemployment.
Latino men are only fractionally more likely to be in the labor force than everyone else, and those with jobs work slightly fewer hours. Among Latino men ages 30–49, 92 percent were in the labor force. All other men ages 30–49: 91 percent. Among men ages 30–49 who had jobs, Latinos worked an average of 42 hours in the preceding week. All other men ages 30–49: 44 hours.
Latino women are substantially less likely to be in the labor force than everyone else. Among Latino women ages 30–49, 68 percent were in the labor force. All other women ages 30–49: 78 percent. Among those with jobs, hours-worked in the preceding week were virtually identical: 37.3 for Latino women, 37.5 for everyone else.
I can understand why people think Latinos are natural conservatives. Just about every Latino with whom I come in contact is hard-working and competent. I don’t get into discussions with them about their families and religion, but they sure look like go-getting, family-values Americans to me. But note the caveat: “with whom I come in contact.” There’s a huge selection artifact embedded in that caveat—I always come in contact with Latinos because they are on a work crew that’s doing something at my house or office, or at my neighbors’ houses. That’s the way that almost all Anglos in the political chattering class come in contact with Latinos. Of course they look like model Americans.
The data I used for the numbers above come from the most trustworthy, carefully conducted surveys available. They paint a portrait that gives no reason to think that Republicans have an untapped pool of social conservatives to help them win elections.
Heather MacDonald:
A March 2011 poll by Moore Information found that Republican economic policies were a stronger turn-off for Hispanic voters in California than Republican positions on illegal immigration. Twenty-nine percent of Hispanic voters were suspicious of the Republican party on class-warfare grounds — “it favors only the rich”; “Republicans are selfish and out for themselves”; “Republicans don’t represent the average person”– compared with 7 percent who objected to Republican immigration stances.
[In other words Republicans have allowed themselves to be maldefined, have been timid in the battle of the narratives, and not aggressive enough to show why capitalism and freedom work when given the chance. Conservatives have also not been active in pop-culture and public education. – Political Arena Editor]
And a strong reason for that support for big government is that so many Hispanics use government programs. U.S.-born Hispanic households in California use welfare programs at twice the rate of native-born non-Hispanic households. And that is because nearly one-quarter of all Hispanics are poor in California, compared to a little over one-tenth of non-Hispanics. Nearly seven in ten poor children in the state are Hispanic, and one in three Hispanic children is poor, compared to less than one in six non-Hispanic children. One can see that disparity in classrooms across the state, which are chock full of social workers and teachers’ aides trying to boost Hispanic educational performance.
More incidents of union thugs busted stealing Romney signs….
There are several reports like this one from the Toledo Blade around the country.
Perrysburg police today issued misdemeanor citations to four men for allegedly being in possession of stolen political signs.
Those charged with receiving stolen property included John Russell, 39, of Toledo, and Chris Monaghan 41, of Rossford, who are both listed on the Sheet Metal Workers Local 33 Web site as business agents for the union’s Toledo district.
The men were in a pickup truck registered to Local 33 in Parma, Ohio, police said.
Also cited were Corey J. Beaubien, 37, and Sean Bresler, 33, both of Toledo.
A Tea Party Web site reported Friday the truck was loaded with the campaign signs of GOP Presidential nominee Mitt Romney and running mate Paul Ryan. Perrysburg police did not confirm that, but a police incident report said that the summonses were issued about 12:30 a.m. in the 11100 block of Fremont Pike “after several reports were taken of political signs being stolen in the city of Perrysburg.”
Still no federal assistance on Staten Island. Mayor Bloomberg turns away national guard help. Obama not leading….
This is a disaster and this is not partisanship, it is a cold reality.
The federal response in New York and parts of New Jersey is not going well. After 72 hours FEMA and the military should be engaged full speed ahead. It isn’t. Main roads still have boats sitting on them.
Mayor Bloomberg is keeping out the National Guard because they have guns… no kidding. Obama should assert FEMA emergency powers since this is a multi-state disaster and over rule the Mayor. Bush did the same thing after Louisiana Governor Blanco refused to cooperate during Katrina. Bloomberg may know how to make money, but that is all he knows how to do. His failure as mayor is truly epic.
There is a shortage of water. So what you do is call in the Navy as the ships have large desalination machines to make fresh water which could be sent inland.
After Katrina Bush sent in the Navy, the Coast Guard and Army General Honore into New Orleans and the General got it under control and had choppers and trucks moving debris just after 72 hours. Bush also parked the US Navy a hospital ship just off the coast. By the way, federal guidelines say that FEMA’s and the federal response time should be 48-72 hours.
Honestly I was expecting the disaster response for this hurricane to go well like it did in Mississippi for Katrina. Mississippi Governor Haley Barbour had asked for the military and national guard to come in before Katrina even hit. The damage to the Mississippi Gulf Coast was FAR worse than the damage in New Orleans, but they got things going in a hurry, got relief delivered well. This is what happens when Governors and local authorities cooperate with and coordinate with FEMA like they are supposed to. The reason the press didn’t tell you this was because what news is there report when the news is good?
Via Jim Hoft:
Staten Island resident John Tabacco told Neil Cavuto this morning that Staten Island is still alone.
** There is no federal help.
** The feds just drive by with their clipboards.
** We just found three more dead people in the pile this morning.
Beck blasts Obama & FEMA for directing elderly without power to the internet for help (video)
So we have the biggest storms to hit New York and New Jersey in decades, there are mass power outages and granny is going to whip out her Samsung Galaxy and pull up FEMA.gov to find out what to do?
Local TV stations didn’t even broadcast emergency phone numbers before the storm hit. So what is the FCC/FEMA emergency broadcast system good for again?
UPDATE – Hey buddy you ain’t in da union! I don’t care if those people are stranded and starving YOU ain’t helpin’!
Non-Union Alabama Utility Workers Denied Entry into New Jersey – Told to Stand Down (Video)
Green Corruption: Over 80% of “Green Jobs” money went to Obama donors, 50 “green” companies going under…
In a nutshell: 150 more Obama Administration emails released showing how green energy money was steered to Obama cronies with sham junk bond companies. The list of green jobs companies gone or going under grows to 50. That is your money folks.
With so many of these green energy boondoggles it looks like this: Obama gives big taxpayer money to a fund raiser who is an owner in a “green energy company”. Said owners pay themselves in a big way, give big money to Democrats and go out of business.
While the administration claims that this was all science and no politics, a slew of leaked emails show the corruption and influence peddling.
Our friends Christine Lakatos at Green Corruption and Marita Noon at Townhall have been tracking the list of green jobs boondoggles that are going out of business after paying themselves lavishly with your money. That list went from 15, to 16, to 36 and now 50 green jobs enterprises paid for with your money that either have shut down or are about to. See that list here:
http://greencorruption.blogspot.com/2012/10/green-alert-tracking-president-obamas.html
Via the research from Lakatos and Noon, the Daily Caller is now running with this story, as is former Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich:
Newt comments on the erupting “green corruption”story after he discusses the emails showing that the order to let or embassy staff die was from the White House.
Erupting indeed. Emails showing the influence peddling and corruption keep coming out.
The House Oversight Committee has released a new set of 150 emails that show how your money was steered to cronies in the name of green jobs. More on this story from Marita Noon in today’s Townhall (excerpt):
The 1705 loan guarantee program had 460 applicants, but only 7% were approved—26 projects were funded. Of those 26 projects 22 were junk-bond rated—meaning private investors wouldn’t fund them. So why did we, the taxpayers?
Our research showed that at least 90% of the projects had close ties to the White House and other high ranking Democrats. Despite the obvious connection, President Obama has repeatedly denied any involvement—preferring to blame “career bureaucrats” who could take the fall with no political consequence.
In March, Energy Secretary Steven Chu, testified that, “We looked at the loans on their own merits.” Also, back in November 2011, he said: “I am aware of no communication from White House to Department of Energy saying to make the loan or to restructure.”
Just last week, on October 26, President Obama affirmed Chu’s position when he said: “Decisions made in the loan program office are decisions, by the way, that are made by the Department of Energy, they have nothing to do with politics.”
However, late Wednesday, the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform released a new report of “over 150 emails that contradict statements by the President, Secretary Chu, and White House and DOE officials.” The emails reveal a series of questionable practices, including coercion, cronyism and, cover ups.
Read the rest HERE.
Says Noon, “The Obama green energy program is the largest, most expensive, and deceptive case of crony capitalism in American history”.
See the rest of our green jobs scam and Solyndra coverage HERE.
UPDATE – Even MORE from the House Oversight Committee: Obama Administration lying about the influence peddling; caught again with more of their own emails.
INTERVIEW EXCERPT FROM KUSA Channel 9 News Denver Colorado’s Kyle Clark:
KYLE CLARK: In a national address, you touted the stimulus money going to Abound Solar – a Colorado company connected to one of your billionaire fundraisers. Now, as you may know, Abound Solar is out of business and under criminal investigation. The jobs are gone and taxpayers are out about 60 million dollars. How do you answer critics who see Abound Solar as Colorado’s Solyndra – a politically connected clean energy company that went under and took our money with it?
PRESIDENT OBAMA: (Laughs) Well, Kyle, I think that if you look at our record that these loans that are given out by the Department of Energy for clean energy have created jobs all across the country and only about four percent of these loans were going to some very cutting-edge industries that are going to allow us to figure out how to produce energy in a clean, renewable way in the future and create jobs in Colorado and all around the country. And some of them have failed but the vast majority of them are pushing us forward into a clean energy direction. And that’s good for Colorado and good for the country. And these are decisions, by the way, that are made by the Department of Energy, they have nothing to do with politics.
Investigative Reporter Todd Shepherd: NOT POLITICAL? EMAILS SHOW WHITE HOUSE DROVE FAILED GREEN-LOAN IN COLORADO
CompleteColorado.com has obtained emails that seem to directly contradict Plouffe’s answer, and also challenge the President’s notion that the DOE’s loan decisions were universally autonomous within the agency. The emails also lend even more credence to the theory that the loan to Abound Solar was political payback to Colorado’s wealthy Democratic benefactor and Gang-of-Four member, Pat Stryker.”
In the above email thread, DOE loan executive Jonathan Silver tells DOE credit advisor Jim McCrea, “You better let him know the WH wants to move Abound forward.” It appears to be a mild scolding to a Treasury advisor, Ian Samuels, who is not moving fast enough to schedule calls regarding Abound.
The second page of the email thread makes mention of “…transaction pressure under which we are all now operating…” This entire email thread happened just a few days before President Obama would hail the government-backed loans as a job creator for Colorado.
AWESOME: 13-Year-Old Jenny Gives Report Cards to Obama and Romney (video) – UPDATE: A Liberal Responds (and so does the editor)
I am shocked at how good this is.
A leftist, Mimi Tackaberry, responded, so we included a little fact check of our own. Enjoy.
Dear Jenny,
First let me commend you on your poise and on getting involved in politics at your very young age. If you are like most 13 year olds, your world view and values are formed in the context of your family. If you are intellectually curious your early perspective will likely evolve. A few years ago Jonathan Krohn at age 14 was the darling of Fox News and now 4 years later he’s rethought many of his conservative positions.
[Political Arena Editor Responds:
Indeed John Krohn has moved on some of his positions, but keep in mind that liberal teachers union employees sought out to cram those views at him as well.
With that said, Artur Davis, who spoke for Obama at the 2008 Democrat Convention, spoke at the 2012 convention for Romney. In fact there is a long list of playwrites, Hollywood stars such as Ron Silver, James Woods, Gary Graham, Kelsey Grammer, Stacy Dash and Dennis Miller, and liberal activists such as David Horowitz who have switched to become conservatives]
The recent death of those 4 Americans in Benghazi was horrible indeed. But President Obama has spent almost 4 years fulfilling his campaign promises –to end the war in Iraq and schedule our troops to leave Afghanistan. He’s rallied world support for sanctions against Iran, created good will and all-important cooperation. Most of the civilized world commends his leadership and only Pakistan hopes that Romney wins (I guess they’re still bummed that our President killed Bin Laden right next to their military academy).
[Political Arena Editor Responds:
What nonsense. President Obama watched via our overhead drones in the situation room as our embassy staff was slaughtered and it was Obama that gave the stand down orders to stop CIA and military help. The emails saying so have been leaked by his own intelligence community:
Obama spent four years fulfilling his campaign promises??? Oh really? Here are five pages of broken promises via Factcheck.org:
http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/promises/obameter/rulings/promise-broken/
And here are 13 minutes of broken promises on video:
By the way the Taliban is re-surging in Afghanistan and by advocating leaving you are dooming the women of Afghanistan to a fate worse than death. Also, the Muslim world hates us more now than when Obama took office:
read it.]
Gov. Romney has no foreign policy experience but he’s surrounded himself with many of the same advisers who gave us the Bush war. Not one American life was lost when the people of Libya overthrew the dictator Qaddafi. Over 4000 Americans lost their lives in Bush’s war.
[Political Arena Editor Responds:
Wrong, our embassy staff was slaughtered by the very same people Obama has been arming, namely Al-Qaeda and the Muslim Brotherhood. Qadaffi, Mubarak, Asaad, and The King of Jordan are/were all in favor of keeping the peace agreement with Israel. Obama has been arming people who have vowed to kill us in order to help them overthrow those governments and they are in the process of being replaced with Sharia Supremacist governments via the Muslim Brotherhood. The PUBLIC slaughter of political enemies and subjugation of women has already started where they have taken control.
Yes indeed, lives were lost in Iraq, but while it has problems, at least it is a functioning democratic government and not a Muslim Brotherhood one.]
Jenny I’m afraid Bain is not like your dad’s business where he does well if he takes care of his customers. Bain did start some companies, like Staples, but then Romney moved Bain on to a new business model – called leverage buyouts, which means you buy a company with a low down payment, and then the company is saddled with the debt of the balance of the purchase price. Your question should be “how would being good at leverage buyouts make Romney good at being President of the United States?”
[Political Arena Editor Responds:
FACT: Mitt Romney left Bain Capital to run the Olympics in 1999. When the leverage buy outs and such that the Democrats are putting in TV commercials started happening the man in charge of Bain was and is President Obama’s largest campaign money bundler:
Read it.]
Let’s talk about 5 years from now when your rights as a woman could be vastly curtailed. Do you plan to have a career? Romney does not support the legislation signed by Obama for equal pay for women and he supports the Blunt Amendment giving employers the right to withhold contraception from your (future) health plan – for any reason. So dig a deeper. You have a promising future ahead of you, unless…
[Political Arena Editor Responds:
The legislation that Obama signed does not guarantee equal pay for women, rather the bill is carefully designed to hand the trial lawyers lobby a boatload of money via lawsuits that are almost unprovable.
Lets talk about women’s rights. Real rights, you know, Like the First Amendment.
What Obama is trying to do is use the government to FORCE churches and church institutions to pay for not just contraception, but abortions and abortion inducing drugs. This is not only a violation of freedom of religion, but it also obliterates any notion of “Separation of Church and State”.
Also, President Obama threw a film maker in jail illegally and without bond for making a film criticizing Islam and its treatment of women among other things. He also is supporting action in the United Nations to make it a crime to criticize Islam. What about free speech? How will women speak out against bad treatment?
Also about birth control, anyone can buy it at the store for between $4 and $9 a month. Do you really want the government to creep in your bedroom either by way of buying your birth control or forcing someone else to pay for it for you?
Does President Obama support equal rights for women? Perhaps one indicator is that he pays women on his campaign and White House Staff less than men. The same goes for Democrats in Congress, they pay women less:
Obama White House Pays Women 18% Less… and His 2008 Campaign Did too….
Female Democrat Senators Pay Female Staffers Less than Men…. Much Less!
And the Democrats assault on women doesn’t end there. The Obamacare IPAB rationing panel has targeted women’s health care screenings for rationing again, while fully admitting that the result will be more dead women from breast and cervical cancer:
https://politicalarena.org/2012/10/03/obamacare-panel-targeting-womens-health-screenings-again/
In fact, here are some examples of how Democrats treat women:
Watch the videos.]
Mocking Obama Ads Taking Toll
Saul Alinsky, the greatest smear artist of the modern age, said that nothing beats ridicule when it comes to political slander, but in truth, informed ridicule is far more effective. When you can ridicule someone and the mockery is based in truths that are at least directionally accurate, it can be enough to turn any brand into a sour note for many people.
Presidential Debate Moderator: Romney-Ryan “is some sort of ticket death wish” (video)
Candy Crowley: Paul Ryan on the ticket is ‘some sort of ticket death wish’..
When are the Republicans going to stop agreeing to these ridiculous moderators?
Not enough for you? Here is MORE.
Star Trek’s Gary Graham Endorses Romney
More and more Hollywood Celebs including “A Listers” like Gary Graham are coming out for Mitt Romney.
Perhaps this is because Hollywood box office receipts are in decline and the reason for it is obvious – movie tickets are bough with discretionary income. A long double dip recession impacts Hollywood in a big way and the numbers speak for themselves.
Barack Obama has governed so far left that even some of my lefty friends in Tinseltown are throwing flags-on-the-play. Gone is the excited buzz from four years ago. Democrats talk only about their disgust and hatred for Romney, or Limbaugh or Hannity … or Bush. But oddly, unless it’s to brag about “their guy got bin Laden” … not a word about the Prez. And if Obama is mentioned at all, it’s in muted tones and short, general references. These days a patina of vague embarrassment colors liberal obstinancy in Hollywood.
I don’t know why they’re surprised – all he’s ever espoused has been neo-socialist rhetoric, anti-imperialism, and Saul-Alinsky-esque diatribes attacking capitalism, traditional American values and supply-side economics. So, nearly four years since taking office, why are so many of them shocked that he actually governed as the ultra-left radical he always swore he was?
As a former lefty myself, I’m familiar with the left’s propensity to court reality with no real intention to marry.
I, for one, believed Obama. That’s why I never supported him. As an ardent student of history, I’ve seen the ravages that socialism has inflicted upon the world. Hundreds of millions of lives lost needlessly and untold human suffering. The arrogance to think that it wasn’t the system to blame … that socialism could work if the right people were in charge, with the right leadership; then the unwieldy, overstuffed, non-aeronautic abomination could actually fly … and that all it took was good intentions, vague dreams of Utopian hopes and dreams to lift it off … and the physics of economics be damned. It’s beyond comprehension.
So, predictably, President Obama’s policies … all of them … have failed completely. On every score, they fail to do as promised. Rather than uplift and unite, they depress and divide. Rather than stimulate the economy, they slide us deeper into debt, stagnant economic growth and development and slip us deeper into recession. Rather than build up our image globally and foster love and appreciation, they alienate our allies and embolden our enemies and make us not only hated, but disrespected.
At the Emmys recently, host Jimmy Kimmel sniped, “Yeah who here is voting for Romney?” Expecting a groan and a laugh … he was mildly shocked to hear the positive response. It sounded like a third of the people present were cheering. Cheering – for a Republican challenger. At a Hollywood event!
Continue reading HERE.
Emails Reveal Justice Department Enlists Media Matters to Attack Reporters Reporting Obama Admin Scandals
Friends, this is absolutely Stalisnist and that is not a term we use lightly. This administration has threatened and targeted reporters again and again and is now using underhanded tactics like this to keep the elite media, who is already mostly in the tank for them, in line.
Internal Department of Justice emails obtained by The Daily Caller show Attorney General Eric Holder’s communications staff has collaborated with the left-wing advocacy group Media Matters for America in an attempt to quell news stories about scandals plaguing Holder and America’s top law enforcement agency.
Dozens of pages of emails between DOJ Office of Public Affairs Director Tracy Schmaler and Media Matters staffers show Schmaler, Holder’s top press defender, working with Media Matters to attack reporters covering DOJ scandals. TheDC obtained the emails through a Freedom of Information Act request. (RELATED: TheDC’s complete coverage of Media Matters)
Emails sent in September and November 2010 show Schmaler working with Media Matters staffer Jeremy Holden on attacking news coverage of the New Black Panther Party voter intimidation scandal.
Holden attacked former DOJ Civil Rights Division attorneys J. Christian Adams and Hans von Spakovsky on Sept. 20, 2010 for what he called an attempt “to reignite the phony New Black Panther Party scandal.”
Before Holden posted his article at 7:52 p.m., Schmaler sent him several emails with information helping him attack both former DOJ oficials.
“Here’s one Wolf letter,” read the subject of one email Schmaler sent Holden that contained no text. The email was likely a reference to Virginia Republican Rep. Frank Wolf, a member of Congress who led the Republican charge on the New Black Panther Party scandal involving alleged voter intimidation at a November 2008 polling place in Philadelphia.
In response, Holden told Schmaler that “The response to interog 38 is particularly helpful. Thanks!”
Interrogatory 38 was a reference to a question from Congress that the Justice Department answered, concerning the role of several senior officials in discussing litigation related to that voter intimidation case.
A follow-up email shows Schmaler sending Holden more information.
“[H]ere’s another one to Smith,” Schmaler wrote. “[I]t’s about perrelli contact with w. WH. helpful in that it makes clear perrelli didn’t have discussions w/ WH on the case (obviously confirming he knew of it) … but also illustrates [REDACTED] they’ve tried to throw up that won’t stick[.]”
Holden responded at 8:34 p.m. — three hours after Schmaler sent her first email at 5:34 — to say, “Post is live, FWIW [for what it’s worth]. Thanks again.”
Nearly two months later, on Nov. 18, 2010, Holden wrote a new blog post he described as an “EXCLUSIVE,” titled “Right-wing commission to vote on flawed New Black Panthers report.”
“The conservative-dominated U.S. Commission on Civil Rights will vote Friday on an interim report that omits critical evidence disproving allegations that the Obama administration refuses to enforce voting-rights laws against racial minorities, according to Media Matters’ analysis of a copy of the report we obtained,” Holden wrote in the Nov. 18 article.
Holden attacked Adams again, and Christopher Coates — another now-former DOJ attorney.
After Holden published that piece, Schmaler sent him an email titled “Great piece…” and continuing in the body of the message, “On USCCR investigation.’” One minute later, Holden responded, writing, “Thanks!”
Continue reading HERE.
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