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WiliLeaks dump could be worse
The Pentagon says it believes the next document dump by WikiLeaks will
be even more damaging to national security and the war effort than the
organization's initial release of some 76,000 war files.
Pentagon press secretary Geoff Morrell said Thursday that the military
believes it has identified the additional 15,000 classified documents
that WikiLeaks has vowed to release.
Iran's
nuclear plant to start next week
Russia's nuclear agency said Friday that it will load fuel into Iran's
first nuclear power plant next week, defying U.S. calls to hold off the
start of the launch.
Rosatom spokesman Sergei Novikov said Friday that uranium fuel shipped
by Russia will be loaded into the Bushehr reactor on Aug. 21, beginning
the startup process.
"From that moment the Bushehr plant will be officially considered a
nuclear-energy installation," he told The Associated Press.
Pelosi
stumps for Dems
The big political bull's-eye on House Speaker Nancy Pelosi's back isn't
keeping her from campaigning for Democratic candidates in several
states, even if she avoids some of the most conservative regions.
Pelosi will attend fundraisers this month in Houston and Dallas, plus
make a joint appearance Aug. 16 with President Barack Obama in Los
Angeles. She recently headlined a fundraiser in Santa Fe for New
Mexico's three House Democrats, two of whom face tough Republican
challengers who criticize their ties to the speaker.
Chinese
admiral says U.S. drill courts confrontation
A senior Chinese military strategist called planned U.S. naval
exercises in the region a provocation and accused the Obama
administration of seeking to encircle China and pursuing a "chaotic"
approach toward Beijing.
The commentary in the top paper of the People's Liberation Army (PLA)
was China's latest verbal broadside against Washington, which Beijing
has accused of stirring tension in the region with a series of military
drills near its borders.
'Professional
left' not ready to back an Obama primary challenger in '12?
As angry as it might be, the professional left isn't ready to back a
primary challenger to President Obama just yet.
Two high-profile liberals on Thursday said they are not interested in
running against the president in 2012, and liberal bloggers say any
challenge to Obama would be fraught with difficulty.
“I haven't heard of a credible name that has been floated that would
challenge President Obama,” said David Sirota, a prominent liberal
blogger. “I haven't heard of that. I think it would be very difficult
to do.”
Rep.
Maxine Waters Refutes Ethics Charges
Congresswoman Defends Her
Actions in Assisting Minority Banks, Including One With Ties to Husband
Rep. Maxine Waters, D-Calif., today adamantly refuted charges brought
against her by the House Ethics Committee.
"I have not violated any House rules," she said at a press conference
on Capitol Hill.
Waters was charged by the Ethics panel with violating House rules in
2008. The charges stem from a meeting that Waters requested at the
onset of the financial crisis in September 2008 with then-Treasury
Secretary Hank Paulson. Waters and Paulson did not attend the meeting,
but Treasury officials and members of the National Bankers Association
(NBA), a trade organization representing over 100 minority-owned firms,
did.
Obama
signs border security bill, with no commment
President Obama signed a new border security bill today, but didn't
comment on it or the prospects of more immigration legislation down the
line.
Only photographers were allowed into the Oval Office ceremony. No
reporters.
The Southwest Border Security Bill provides $60 million "to enhance
technology at the border, share information and support with state,
local, and tribal law enforcement, and increase (federal) presence and
law enforcement activities at the border," the White House said in a
statement.
Federal
Judge Clears Way for Gay Marriage to Resume in California
A federal judge put gay marriages on hold for at least another six days
in California, disappointing dozens of gay couples who lined up outside
City Hall hoping to tie the knot Thursday.
Judge Vaughn Walker gave opponents of same-sex weddings until Aug. 18
at 5 p.m. to get a ruling from the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals on
whether gay marriage should resume. Gay marriages could happen at that
point or be put off indefinitely depending on how the court rules.
Walker struck down the state's voter-approved gay marriage ban last
week in a case many believe is destined for the Supreme Court.
Petraeus
Hedges on July 2011 Afghan Pullback Goal
The new U.S. commander in Afghanistan says the goal of starting an
American pullback by July 2011 will depend on conditions at the time.
In an interview taped for NBC's "Meet the Press" this weekend, Gen.
David Petraeus hedged a bit when asked by interviewer David Gregory if
the summer deadline next year was non-negotiable.
CNN
Poll: 2010 Looking Like 1994 for GOP
A new poll from CNN/Opinions Dynamics out Thursday suggests that the
GOP could be looking at an electoral landslide and shift similar to
1994, when Newt Gingrich ushered in a Republican-controlled Congress
with his “Contract With America” movement.
It was the first time in 40 years that Republicans took back control of
Congress. Now a similar movement, spurred by the tea party, may be
underway.
The latest numbers give Republicans a three-point edge on the generic
ballot question, which is just about the same advantage the party
enjoyed heading into the heart of the '94 campaign season, The Hill
reports.
Justice
delayed for military voters
Department ignores
states' likely refusal to comply with ballot rules
When Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr. installed Thomas E. Perez as
assistant attorney general for the Civil Rights Division, he emphasized
the importance of being ready to confront 21st-century issues and doing
so in a timely manner. He warned his new assistant, "The quest for
justice must be an impatient thing - for we all know what happens when
justice is delayed. So I am an impatient attorney general."
Military voters know what happens when justice is delayed.
Notwithstanding overwhelming evidence in 2008 that military voters
needed at least 45 days to receive and return their absentee ballots,
the Voting Section of the Civil Rights Division stood by as more than
20 states failed to provide military voters with sufficient time to
vote. This failure alone cost thousands of military members the right
to vote.
Obama's
economic tragedy
U.S. fiscal gap makes
Greece look responsible
America appears to be in worse long-term financial health than Greece,
Europe's poster child for govermental mismanagement. According to a
report issued last month by the International Monetary Fund (IMF), the
United States has built up so much debt and so many financial
obligations that the difference between all future expenditures and
revenues, the so-called "fiscal gap," will equal 14 percent of the
gross domestic product (GDP) for as far as economists can project - in
Greece, that figure is an unsustainable 11.5 percent.
So that means our federal expenditures will exceed revenue by 14
percent of GDP every year, forever. Consider the following example of
how deep a hole we're in. Congress will spend about 25.4 percent of GDP
this year, and the only way to balance the budget would be to slash
spending levels to 11.4 percent of GDP or double the existing tax
burden, which is now 14.9 percent of GDP. Neither doubling the tax bite
nor cutting overall spending by more than half appears to be a
politically viable option.
Disorder
By Geoff
Metcalf
"In
its
narrowest
acceptation,
order
means obedience. A government is said
to preserve order if it succeeds in getting itself obeyed."
--
John
Stuart
Mill
I have tried and failed to give our young hope and change President the
chance to demonstrate by action that those of us who had been critical
of his lack of experience, hypocrisy and duplicity might have been
wrong. The republic needs help and what is right and wrong should
overshadow who is right or wrong.
However, this president seems intent on establishing new standards for
incompetence, failure and even the barest minimal capacity to judge the
climate, strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats his actions
(and inaction) precipitate.
Conventional wisdom would suggest that statistically, the
administration might be right more based on pure chance
probability?
Not even! Even the liberal punditry class is wishing Hillary had
prevailed.
Nobel laureate Isidor Issac Rabi once observed, "Most new insights come
only after a superabundant accumulation of facts have removed the
blindness which prevented us from seeing what later comes to be
regarded as obvious." Hell-o?!?!?
Barack Obama is failing epically. Even the brayed about Obamacare
victory (?) has supporters seeking cover. Woodrow Wilson was a
flop as
president largely because he allowed the oligarchy to do what they
wanted to do. And look what it got us…the Federal Reserve Act of 1913,
the 16th Amendment and systemic Big Brotherism.
Jimmy Carter failed without help from the CFR magus…his monumental
failures were largely his own. LBJ failed…but at least was slick enough
to craft his own exit strategy. Richard Nixon was Richard Nixon
and
although he has become a stereotype for all things venial and wrong, he
still gets kudos for statesmanlike props because of China (which yet
may come back to bite us in the bottom).
Barack Obama however, is a horse in another garage…a new standard to
overshadow all previous failures. The Obama failures are not isolated
or focused…no; they are routine, ubiquitous, and the new standards.
The President's job performance has been not just bad but way bad:
foreign policy, domestic initiatives, (no one could have forcast our
first Black president's awful ham handedness in turning minor racial
issues into such a monumental SNAFU) and most importantly, in forging
connections with the American people (for whom he appears to show open
distain)
.
Cicero noted, “A nation can survive its fools, and even the ambitious.
But it cannot survive treason from within. An enemy at the gates is
less formidable, for he is known and carries his banner openly. But the
traitor moves amongst those within the gate freely, his sly whispers
rustling through the alleys, heard in the very halls of government
itself. For the traitor appears not a traitor, he speaks in
accents
familiar to his victims, and he wears their face and their arguments,
he appeals to the baseness that lies deep in the hearts of all
men. He
rots the soul of a nation, he works secretly and unknown in the night
to undermine the pillars of the city, he infects the body politics so
that it can no longer resist. A murder is less to fear. The
traitor
is the plague.”
The Wall Street Journal said Obama is failing because "he has no
understanding of the American people". Some say he just flat out
doesn’t like the American people he is supposed to serve.
Fred Barnes of the Weekly Standard says Obama is failing because he has
"lost control of his message", and is overexposed. However, the
systemic problem from the jump was the message was form without
substance…it was a catch phrase without a plot. Beyond winning the
election, Obama really had no strategy and no tactics.
Clarice Feldman of American Thinker dared to say what needed to be
said...not just that the emperor has no clothes but, “Obama is failing
because fundamentally he is neither smart nor articulate; his
intellectual dishonesty is conspicuous by its audacity and lack of
shame.”
The real villain in the contemporary American tragedy is not really
Barack Obama, or even his liberal socialist masters. Justice Hugo
Black once wrote, "The Press was protected so that it could bare the
secrets the government and inform the people. Only a free and
unrestrained press can effectively expose deception in government. And
paramount among the responsibilities of a free press is the duty to
prevent any part of the government from deceiving the people."
However, we now have a press that has epically failed in its
responsibilities “to prevent any part of government from deceiving the
people.”
The main stream media has become a willing and hyper-active
co-conspirator enabling an incompetent dysfunctional administration
that has done (and continues to do) irreparable harm to the republic.