The PJ Tatler
New Photo Caption Contest: Huffington Post and PJM Both Agree That Holder Should Resign
There must be millions of Americans who were both shocked and delighted after seeing the “front page” of yesterday’s Huffington Post.
Now, after years of countless reports by PJ Media detailing the illegal actions, cover-ups and wrongdoings of Attorney General Eric Holder, this screenshot has earned a place of honor as the subject of our latest Tatler Photo Caption Contest.
What finally swayed this influential member of the left-leaning media to call for Holder’s resignation?
The front page post appeared after it was revealed by NBC News that Holder had signed off on a controversial and intrusive search warrant that identified Fox News reporter James Rosen as a “possible co-conspirator” violating the Espionage Act.
My guess is the day had finally arrived when the potential for the circumstances written about by Martin Niemoller in his famous WWII-era poem could not longer be ignored by the Huffington Post.
Let’s recall the poem’s first and last verses:
First they came for the Socialists, and I did not speak out– Because I was not a Socialist….
Then they came for me–and there was no one left to speak for me.
Or, was it because President Obama stated in a major speech, just hours before NBC broke the Holder news, that Holder was going to review Justice Department guidelines governing investigations involving journalists?
Perhaps it was the one-two punch of these two news events that finally caused the Huffington Post to agree with PJ Media that Holder is damaged goods and must resign.
So now it is time for PJ Media readers to submit captions for this Huffington Post screen shot from May 23, 2013. I know it will be difficult to stay within the contest rules of “be nice and stay classy because the media is watching.” (And here again are the winners from our last contest who did that rather well.)
However, at this time it is not about the media, but rather self-preservation and potential IRS audits. Who the heck cares what “the media” thinks anymore, anyway?
Have fun with this caption contest over Memorial Day weekend and remember that freedom is never free, especially for those who paid the highest price.
2008 Campaign Flashback: Obama is the ‘Biggest Celebrity In The World, But Is He Ready To Lead?’
Do you remember this controversial John McCain presidential campaign television spot targeted against then-Senator Barack Obama in the middle of the heated 2008 election?
Here’s the script:
Announcer: He’s the biggest celebrity in the world.
But, is he ready to lead?
With gas prices soaring, Barack Obama says no to offshore drilling.
And, says he’ll raise taxes on electricity.
Higher taxes, more foreign oil, that’s the real Obama.
This ad caused the mainstream media (MSM) who were in the midst of their “slobbering love affair” with Senator Obama to pause briefly for self-examination.
The gravity of the ad’s message forced the MSM to acknowledge that they built the alter upon which the “biggest celebrity in the world” was now standing — while continuing to lead the world’s worship of him.
Here is a sentence from the New York Times report on the TV spot dated July 30, 2008:
This ad’s imagery highlights the McCain view that Mr. Obama offers more sizzle than substance, a theme that the Republican candidate has been trying to underscore on the campaign trail.
“More sizzle than substance.” That nicely summed up Senator Obama in July of 2008. But of course the NYT piece did not delve into the possibility that the statement was true. Nor did the MSM investigate or honestly ask themselves the question posed in the ad, “But is he ready to lead?”
Now fast forward to 2013.
Our proven to be “more sizzle than substance” president, not only pleads ignorance about the details of the numerous scandals engulfing his administration, but uses ignorance as both a defense and a badge of honor.
It appears that “ignorance” has joined “blame” as the most useful tools in Obama’s leadership kit.
So looking back, how has the “biggest celebrity in the world” handled his celebrity?
The answer appears to be, “like an addiction.”
An addiction might explain President Obama’s non-stop campaigning and the obvious self-worth he garners from appearing before adoring crowds — no matter how poorly he is performing in Washington. His celebrity addition could also explain why Obama consistently surrounds himself with celebrities who worship him, thus causing their fan base to worship them even more. Let’s call this a celebrity circle of love.
As the second term of President Obama continues to unravel, those of us who were never sucked in by “the sizzle” will be watching with fascination how the show finally ends for “the biggest celebrity in the world.”
It might even be a tragic ending now that his once adoring MSM has finally begun to widely criticize his performance.
Photo Caption Contest Winner: Tear-anny at the White House Press Conference?
Image by JIM BOURG / Reuters
Thanks to all who contributed to our latest Photo Caption Contest.
With all the scandals swirling around President Obama, expect even more tears in the next few weeks because Obama knows his legacy is threatened.
And what does our fearless leader do when his legacy is threatened?
“I sure want to do some governing,” is what President Obama told a star- studded crowd at a New York City fundraiser just hours after last Monday’s “tearful” press conference.
Now, as the contest judge, if someone had submitted that statement as a caption contest entry they would have been awarded the Grand Prize.
Therefore, I declare President Obama our honorary Caption Contest winner. (I am sure he will place our trophy next to his Nobel Peace Prize.)
Speaking of “noble” winners, let’s start with our list of Honorable Mentions.
Submitted by Bpseudomalleus:
I’m a better scandal than Nixon and a better crier than Boehner.
Submitted by Rbj:
*Sniff*, why am I finally being held accountable for the first time ever?
Submitted by WWHawkeye:
“Honestly, I have no idea how I got Krazy Glue on my cheek.”
RockThisTown (a Caption King) submitted these two:
“Where’s a Marine to block water off my face when I need one?”
“There’s no ‘there’ there, er, I mean, there’s no tear there.”
Cfbleachers our Caption King Emeritus submitted:
I’m going to miss Chris Matthews tingling leg soooo much.
And the Grand Prize goes to our reigning Caption King, Chris Henderson with:
White House plumbers have been called in to fix the leak in Obama’s tear duct.
Congratulations to King Henderson who continues his serious winning streak!
Just in case some of you are too young to understand the humor in this winning entry, here is the “White House Plumbers” definition from Wiki:
The White House Plumbers, sometimes simply called the Plumbers, were a covert White House Special Investigations Unit established July 24, 1971 during the presidency of Richard Nixon. Its task was to stop the leaking of classified information to the news media. Its members branched into illegal activities working for the Committee to Re-elect the President, including the Watergate break-in and the ensuing Watergate scandal.
But now its 2013.… “gate” scandals are so overplayed and the current White House has no need for plumbers. Instead, they just fix their own problems “in-house” because the law is irrelevant.
See you next time a photo is worthy of a Tatler Photo Caption Contest! (And if you don’t see another contest, it’s because I am busy fending off an IRS audit.)
New Photo Caption Contest: Tear-anny at the White House Press Conference?
Image by JIM BOURG / Reuters
On Monday May 6th the following question was posted on The Blaze, linked to Buzzfeed’s report from Reuters:
Did Obama Cry While Answering Benghazi Questions During Press Conference?
Buzzfeed reported Reuters’ description of the same photo taken by its photographer, Jim Bourg, referencing the moisture on the president’s cheek as a “tear” that came while he answered press questions about Benghazi.
“A tear runs down the face of President Barack Obama as he answers questions about the attack on the U.S. embassy in Benghazi during a joint news conference in the East Room of the White House in Washington,” Reuters’ description read.
So now you know why the above photo is deemed “worthy” of a Tatler Caption Contest along with loyal contest participants specifically asking for this photo be a contest subject.
I am not going to fault President Obama for showing emotion about the Benghazi incident which resulted in the loss of four Americans. But I do have doubts that it was the real reason for the tear Obama shed eight months after the attack while hosting a joint White House press conference with the British Prime Minister.
Since Benghazi “happened a long time ago” (as White House Press Secretary Jay Carney recently stated) than what else could spark such emotion in our normally “kool” president?
The answer is simple, “It’s the legacy stupid!”
President Obama’s teardrop fell the moment he realized he had lost control over the shaping of his legacy. This explanation is possible because it is well known that Obama’s legacy is very important to him.
In fact, he planned on spending his entire second-term passing and implementing such legacy issues as health care, gun control, and immigration reform.
Then on Monday evening after the tearful press conference, Obama flew off to a star-studded New York City fundraiser hosted by Hollywood mogul, Harvey Weinstein. There, Obama made a statement no president has ever felt the need to make. While reflecting on his second term, he said, “I sure want to do some governing.”
But when is there time for “governing” when his schedule is crowded with fundraising, campaigning, travel, parties, golf and vacations?
And with all the scandals currently engulfing him, even less time will be left for “governing.” (Many readers are cheering this.)
Even more damaging is Obama can not escape the dreaded “N” word he is being associated with on a daily basis, even from his former cheerleaders in the media!
Nixon’s legacy was certainly not the one Obama planned on emulating since his Messianic presidency began with all those lofty comparisons to Lincoln, FDR, and even the real Messiah.
But enough of my theories. Now it’s time for PJ Media readers to weigh in by either writing a caption or explaining the teardrop from the “kool guy.”
Please remember our rules, “be nice and stay classy because the media is watching.” (And obeying these rules might keep you from getting audited.)
Here again are the winners from our last contest (and only a few of them have been audited so far.)
Good luck and please note that using the “N” word (Nixon) in your caption means your entry will automatically be singled out for special attention by the IRS and yours truly!
A Historic News Week In Washington From An Eye Witness Perspective — Past, Present and Future
Last week my husband and I were back in our hometown of Washington D.C. where we both had business and events to attend. Normally I do not write about my personal travel adventures but this trip had a rather unique “historical time capsule” element that makes it worth recanting.
My husband, a retired State Department Foreign Service officer is now an executive with Cross International/Cross Catholic Alliance, both an international Christian and Catholic humanitarian organization that improves the lives of the poor in 40 countries around the world.
He also serves on the board of an advocacy group which is comprised of similar Christian faith-based organizations.
Mid-week while attending a conference of the advocacy group, my husband told me they spent an entire afternoon discussing how Christian groups are being increasingly squeezed/harassed by the Obama Administration in matters such as hiring policies, health insurance coverage and IRS audits. (Cue the foreboding music.)
Meanwhile, Thursday on Capitol Hill, I attended a luncheon held by the Republican Women’s Federal Forum, a group in which I am a long time member and where Senator Rand Paul (R-KY) was the speaker.
We all know that Senator Paul is putting out feelers as to whether he should make a run for the 2016 Republican presidential nomination, but first he must increase his name identification, make some headlines and develop his brand image.
On Wednesday, the day before the Rand Paul luncheon the Congressional Benghazi “whistleblower” hearings had occurred, showering the entire town with political fall-out. So naturally, Rand Paul saw fit to weigh in on this hot topic.
Senator Paul in his Thursday lunch speech said that Former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s handling of the terrorist attack in Benghazi should “preclude her from holding higher office.” I immediately turned to a friend sitting next to me and said, “Now that was a headline.” It was obvious that Rand Paul had just fired his first warning shot of the 2016 presidential campaign.
Then later on, more 2016 Republican presidential campaign antics were yet to come.
In the early evening, I attended an event called POLITICO’s Playbook Cocktails with MSNBC “Morning Joe” co-hosts Mika Brzezinski and Joe Scarborough.
The event was supposed to be about Mika’s new book called Obsessed, America’s Food Addiction – And My Own, but of course politics soon entered the discussion. Joe Scarborough said something like President Obama should have remained a U.S. Senator in order to have gained more experience, and Senator Marco Rubio was not yet ready to run for president in 2016 and should stay in the Senate. (I strongly agree with both assessments.)
As Joe was talking about the future of the Republican Party, Mika’s cell phone rang and she immediately says, “Hi Chris.” Big surprise! N.J. Governor Chris Christie called in to join the discussion and upstaged everyone on stage. Truly it was an entertaining moment and you can watch as it happened here.
During the call, Christie said his recent secret weight reducing LAP-BAND surgery was a difficult personal decision based on health and family issues, not future political considerations. He was referring to his assumed 2016 presidential run for the GOP nomination.
However, if this surgery is successful Christie will emerge physically smaller but politically larger with an image more suitable for a jog on the national campaign trail. Therefore, Christie feels the need to justify, re-justify and further defend his “tough personal” medical decision.
So my Thursday in DC could be summarized like this: Rand Paul vs. Chris Christie vs. Hillary in 2016.
Then it was Friday and ABC News revealed that there were 12 versions of the Benghazi talking points. I cheered this “breaking” news because finally the mainstream media (MSM) were on to Benghazi, after months of Fox News being ridiculed by the MSM for its non-stop pursuit of this unresolved story. (Kudos to PJM as well, along with Steve Hayes of the Weekly Standard who was the first to report the Obama Administration’s multiple Benghazi talking-points. But as we Conservatives know, news is only real news when the MSM reports it.)
Then over the weekend the Benghazi story had fully evolved to where Republicans want the whole truth while Democrats accuse Republicans of using Benghazi to target Hillary for 2016. Here are two pieces I posted last week in Washington on this exact issue.
My big question is, “Why in Washington D.C. in May of 2013 does every lunch, event and hearing have to be about the 2016 presidential election?” Could it be that Washington is such a forward thinking city? (Try not to laugh.)
While my husband’s conference finished up I had a two free hours and decided to visit the American History Museum which I had not been to in years.
On my way there, news broke that the IRS had just admitted targeting Tea Party groups who were applying for perfectly legal tax-exempt status.
How timely that the group of Christian aid agencies my husband helps represent, just two days ago in their Washington meeting had discussed how their faith-based group members were being targeted for audits by the IRS. (My husband’s organization among them.)
As I entered the American History Museum my thoughts turned to Nixon and Watergate. Remember how Nixon used the IRS to harass his political enemies? In fact, that was one of Nixon’s 1974 impeachable offenses. There are, as of this writing, no direct ties to Obama, but after all, the IRS is part of his administration.
Now the American History Museum was swamped with school kids and at one point the crowd broke into a spontaneous singing of the Star Spangled Banner while unfurling a huge flag in the lobby. This outbreak of patriotism renewed my faith in the American people even as news about the IRS will undoubtedly contribute to the growing distrust Americans have towards their government.
May 10, 2013 at the Smithsonian American History Museum.
With my museum time short, I wandered into the American war exhibits and was shocked to see that WWI and the Korean War were stuffed into very small corners. Certainly these wars deserve more space than currently allotted.
However, WWII was the exact opposite with endless rooms covering all aspects of the war. In the Home Front exhibit there were WWII posters hanging on the side of a battleship. As an owner of a small collection of WWI and WWII posters, I was delighted to see one of my own posters on display.
So now my new definition of growing old (semi-gracefully) is seeing stuff you own hanging in the Smithsonian. And to further add friends to this definition, I spotted the name of a close friend on a movie exhibit. Instantly I sent him an image of the display, exclaiming that he was “Smithsonian” famous, as opposed to just Hollywood famous. He immediately thanked me because he had not known this and was thrilled.
Finally, on Saturday we are at Reagan National heading home and in the terminal we stumble upon a group of WWII veterans arriving as part of an Honor Flight. If you are not familiar with Honor Flights they are an organization that brings WWII veterans to Washington D.C. to visit the WWII memorial.
Greeting them at the gate was a full band and much flag waving. Random passengers like us instantly formed lines in the terminal clapping and cheering as these heroes of the “Greatest Generation” got the welcome they richly deserved.
This spontaneous demonstration of patriotism and respect was a remarkable sight, especially after I had just visited all those Smithsonian exhibits dedicated to their struggles.
After arriving home, I had a good laugh on Sunday as Meet the Press moderator David Gregory, quoted Rand Paul’s controversial remark about Hillary that he repeated again in Iowa over the weekend. It seems 2016 is looming very large.
Then I walked into our guest room and looked lovingly at my Smithsonian WWII poster hanging on the wall. After what I consider a “time capsule” trip to Washington with so much breaking news, the poster’s slogan took on new meaning. Its stirring message is just as applicable today, whether Americans are fighting a foreign enemy or raging against their own government.
My WWII Government Printing Office poster dated 1942 says: Strong in the strength of the Lord we who fight in the people’s cause will never stop until that cause is won.
Perhaps I should send the IRS and the Obama Administration a photo of this poster? But I am sure that the poster would be outlawed today as a violation of church and state and I would be audited for even sending it.
New Photo Caption Contest: Benghazi Flashback – ‘What Difference Does It Make?’
When future historians write about the September 11, 2012 attack on the U.S. consulate in Benghazi, my bet is the most memorable statement will be the one spoken by then-Secretary of State Hillary Clinton. It was back in January of 2013 when Clinton finally testified before a Senate committee and famously yelled, “What difference –at this point, what difference does it make?”
Her statement was referring to a top diplomat who said, “from the beginning” everyone at the consulate thought the attack was an act of terror — as opposed to a spontaneous demonstration stemming from an anti-Islamic You Tube video — the explanation put forth by the Obama Administration.
So today, as the Benghazi hearings took place on Capitol Hill, Drudge Report, at one point, had our contest photo featured front and center with the caption, “What Difference Does It Make?”
Now I am quite sure that PJM readers can write captions much more colorful, so prove me right! However, your only restraint is the rule, “be nice and stay classy because the media is watching.” (Here again are the winners from our last contest who followed that rule and still managed to flourish.)
Perhaps decades from now, Hillary’s statement will rank as high on the “scandal statement scale” as Howard Baker’s, “What did the President know and when did he know it,” from Senate Watergate hearing fame in 1973.
That of course depends on whether voters ask the same question, “What Difference Does It Make” and apply it to Hillary’s 2016 White House plans.
And the answer to that question is still, “to be determined.”
Why Obama and the Liberal Media Need To Take a Good Look at the FBI Most Wanted Terrorist List
This week the FBI announced an addition to its Most Wanted Terrorist List, a female by the name of Joanne Chesimard.
Upon hearing this news I thought it was a good time to check out the list. (You never know what you will find because these days you might even spot that “quiet” neighbor or pot-smoking classmate.)
After reading the list I strongly encourage President Obama to do the same. Perhaps then he might not be so hesitant to utter the phrase, “Islamist Terrorist” when discussing the Boston bombings or the numerous other recent domestic Islamic extremist/terror attacks that were either successful or foiled.
Please feel free to forward this list to the media or elected officials who are resisting the truth about a very small number of people from a certain group who want to do our nation great harm.
From reading this list one would think that political correctness and ethnic sensitivity would take a back seat to the reality of the serious threats we face. But remember, this is 2013 and we are super-respectful of everyone’s feelings, both group and individual.
So now, be sure to keep your feelings in check as you scroll down the FBI’s Most Wanted Terrorist List.
Most Wanted Terrorists
At the bottom of the list are several FBI legal paragraphs and now I would like to add my own:
This list has been posted as a public service by an American who loves and fears for this nation.
New Photo Caption Contest: Our ‘Laid-Back’ President ‘Leans-Back’ in Vanity Fair Magazine
Obama talks with chief of staff Denis McDonough and Miguel Rodriguez, director of legislative affairs, in the Oval Office on February 5, 2013. His jacket hangs on a chair, and his legs rest on the Resolute Desk, which was gifted to President Rutherford B. Hayes by Queen Victoria in 1880.
Vanity Fair is out with their May issue featuring a photographic essay entitled, The Lean-Back President, proving (for those who had any doubt) that President Obama is, in fact, a “laid-back president.” (So glad we finally have conclusive evidence of this revelation, considering all his vacations, golf outings, and glamorous parties at tax-payer expense.)
But apparently Vanity Fair felt the need to answer “critics” who think that President Obama is “too buttoned-up.” Seriously, I am not making this up, for the piece states:
Barack Obama receives ample flak from critics who say that he is too buttoned-up and reserved to thrive in an office that historically has required its fair share of cajoling, socializing, and even arm-twisting. But a thorough examination of the photo archives of White House photographer Pete Souza reveals quite the opposite: Obama can, in fact, be remarkably laid-back. His body language in the Oval Office, the Situation Room, and other top Cabinet-level meetings indicates a man who is ready to let it all hang loose. He’s often in shirtsleeves, with his feet up, and frequently will be the only member of a meeting with a knee on the table. Below, a photographic investigation of the “lean-back” president.
Our contest photo was captioned above by Vanity Fair and now, here is a second contest photo with its Vanity Fair caption.
Obama stretches in the afternoon sun in the Rose Garden on May 20, 2009.
I am sure that PJM readers can write more colorful captions than Vanity Fair, so go ahead and “make my day.”
Of course we have rules that must be obeyed and they are, “be nice and stay classy because the media is watching.” (After all, PJM is a “family” web site.) And, if you need further assistance, read how our last contest winners managed to restrain themselves.
Because of the unusual nature of this contest featuring two photos, please note, photo one or photo two when submitting your entry.
Have fun, but parents please teach your children to keep their feet off the priceless antiques when visiting the White House.
On His Library’s Dedication Day, Bush Derangement Syndrome Takes Center Stage Again
Here’s a little linkfest tour of some of the day’s reactions to the dedication of the George W. Bush Presidential Library from the tolerant Left.
Media Matters took a break from whining about Fox News to weigh in.
The none-too-intelligent Jonathan Chait wants you to know that Bush isn’t a smart man.
Think Progress says W killed the planet.
Without the slightest hint of irony, Salon calls Bush’s tenure a “mess of a presidency“.
More from Salon-the execrable Joan Walsh did double duty, complaining about both W and Jeb.
Worry not, tomorrow they will all be busy pretending that there is no Islamic connection to Islamic terrorism.
Donna Brazile Praises Bush’s Katrina Efforts, Dems Become Apoplectic
George W. Bush was good as his word. He visited the Gulf states 17 times; went 13 times to New Orleans. Laura Bush made 24 trips. Bush saw that $126 billion in aid was sent to the Gulf’s residents, as some members of his own party in Congress balked.
Bush put a special emphasis on rebuilding schools and universities. He didn’t forget African-Americans: Bush provided $400 million to the historically black colleges, now integrated, that remain a pride, and magnet for African-American students. Laura Bush, a librarian, saw to it that thousands of books ruined by the floods were replaced. To this day, there are many local libraries with tributes devoted to her efforts.
It was a team effort. I’m glad to report the commission I served on went out-of-business in 2010. I’m also grateful and proud to report that President Bush was one of the leaders, and a very important member, of that team. Our recovery can be credited to the civility and tireless efforts of President Bush and other Americans, who united and worked together to help rebuild the Gulf and the place of my birth, New Orleans.
Breaking from the Hive Mind narrative is always met with revulsion among the Democrats, but countering the Bush-Cheney Weather Machine Katrina fairy tale is a mortal sin. And Bush Derangement Syndrome is still a brain rotting disease for which no cure, or even treatment for the symptoms, has been found. Check out this post and the ensuing comments from Democratic Underground.
Resistance is futile…
Salon Clown David Sirota: Yeah, We Totally Deserve Terrorist Attacks
Bonus — he starts with a quote from Jeremiah Wright!
Remember, this is the same intellectual powerhouse who last week was fervently hoping the Boston bombing would turn out to have been done by a white guy.
This is a wearisome line we’ve been hearing from the Left and Ron Paul fans for some time, but little Davey thinks this nonsense has all kinds of credibility now because Tom Brokaw subscribes to it.
This is the news from Tom Brokaw’s appearance on “Meet the Press” last Sunday. Discussing revelations that the bombing suspects may be connected to Muslim fundamentalism, he said:
“We have got to look at the roots of all of this because it exists across the whole (Asian) subcontinent and the Islamic world around the world. I think we also have to examine (America’s) use of drones (because) there are a lot of civilians who are innocently killed in a drone attack in Pakistan, in Afghanistan and in Iraq. And I can tell you having spent a lot of time over there, young people will come up to me on the streets and say, ‘We love America, but if you harm one hair on the head of my sister, I will fight you forever.’ And there is this enormous rage against what they see in that part of the world as a presumptuousness of the United States.”
As one of the establishment’s most venerated voices, Brokaw is not prone to radical statements. But in a nation that often avoids acknowledging its own role in intensifying cycles of violence, it is unfortunately considered radical to do what the NBC News veteran did and mention that our violent attacks abroad increase the chance of retributive attacks at home.
Sirota lives on a planet where MSM journalists like Brokaw are venerated. Sane people do not. Sane people read and understand history. Radical Islamic violence against the West, and the United States in particular, has been relentless since the late 1970s. Sane people know that there were no drone strikes going on then. But this country is currently polluted with people who are so desperate to be politically correct that they are forever engaged in a fantasy game called “Anything But Islam.”
And that’s what’s getting people killed.
Also read:
Donna Brazile Praises Bush’s Katrina Efforts, Dems Become Apoplectic
New Photo Caption Contest: What Is Bush Thinking While Obama Is Speaking at His Library Opening?
A gathering of former presidents always makes me misty-eyed for several reasons. First, it is a reminder of how members of this exclusive club clawed each other’s eyes out during their respective presidential campaigns and then later bonded together to do good things.
Second, is reminds us that our nation’s orderly transition of presidential power sets such a wonderful example for the rest of the world.
Now, with all the presidential and first lady group photos to choose from as a result of the Bush Library dedication, why did I chose the one above for our caption contest? The answer is rather simple. After decades of observing presidential politics, I do not recall that there has ever been a president who has used his predecessor as an excuse for his own failings as often and as long as Obama has used George W. Bush.
So now that you know the reason why this photo was chosen, it is your turn to write the perfect caption. Of course while doing so, you must obey our contest rules which are “be nice and stay classy because the media is watching.” Just follow the example of our last contest winners and you will do fine.
Finally, with all the good feelings and nostalgia that were generated today towards President George W. Bush at his library opening — coupled with Bush’s rising post-presidency approval rating — I can not help but call attention to a piece that I co-authored in 2010 titled “Will Bush Be The Next Truman?” Fifty years after Truman left office, historians revisited his unpopular presidency and, as a result, Truman garnered new respect and soaring post-presidential approval ratings. This was after Truman left office with a lower approval rating than George W. Bush had! Now it actually appears that Bush has the potential for a similar Truman trajectory of approval and respect.
Now it’s time to start writing contest captions about our 43rd president listening to our current president, who would not have been elected or reelected if it hadn’t been for that deadly media disease known as Bush Derangement Syndrome.
Miraculously, even though Obama has continued many of Bush’s policies, this disease has been completely eradicated!
LA Times: Obama Magic To Run Out In 2014
Earlier this month, President Obama visited San Francisco and was joined by Democratic House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi for a fundraising event. In the course of the evening, Obama told the donors that he expected that after the 2014 election, Pelosi would resume her place as speaker, which she relinquished after the 2010 election.
It’s easy to see why the president would want that to be so. If the Democrats were to win the 218 House seats needed for the majority and put Pelosi back in the speaker’s chair, it would allow Obama to spend his final two years in office doing more than marking time as a lame duck.
But even if Obama were to inject himself massively into the campaigns of congressional Democrats, it’s unlikely he could guarantee a Democratic victory.
A gain of congressional seats by a president’s party in his sixth year in office may not be quite as elusive as the Higgs boson or Fermat’s Last Theorem, but it’s nearly the equivalent in the political world. Only once in the last 80 years has a president’s party managed to gain seats in his second midterm election. That feat was pulled off in 1998 by Bill Clinton, when Democrats gained eight seats on the GOP. In general, however, losses by presidents in midterm elections are as predictable as anything in politics.
This is all very true. However, recent history was also against a first term senator (or any senator, actually) with no real accomplishments in government or the private sector running away with an election and becoming president. It was also nigh on impossible for a president who was in office while the economy was getting swallowed by quicksand to get reelected.
What may factor into the unlikelihood of the Democrats regaining a majority in the House more than history will be the reality of this president’s singular achievement. Great pains were taken to have as little of Obamacare implemented before the 2012 election because even those most ardently supportive of it know that its promise and reality are unlikely to bear any resemblance to one another. Premiums will go up, people won’t be able to keep their doctors and the sobering difference between access to health insurance and availability of health care will become apparent. The victory parties from election night hadn’t even been cleaned up yet when Obamacare related layoffs began.
This is all, of course, rather obvious but the MSM has to begin the excuse-making now to protect their deity.
If You Really Want to Celebrate Earth Day the Authentic Way…
…well, hopefully, you won’t.
On September 9, 1977, Ira Einhorn, one of Earth Day’s co-founders, lured his ex (the ‘ex’ portion occurring pre-brutal murder) girlfriend, Holly Maddux, to his apartment and killed her in a heartbroken rage. Though, he did choose to dispose of the body by composting her. So at least he’s consistent.
It took seven months for the police to discover what had happened, and just days before his murder trial was set to begin, Einhorn—or as he preferred to be called, the Unicorn—fled to Europe, where he enjoyed a 17-year holiday from the law, avoiding extradition and marrying a Swede along the way. He was at last sent back to face the consequences on July 2001, and is currently serving a life term in prison without the possibility of parole.
The Unicorn?
‘Poor Dear, There’s Nothing Between His Ears’
I have to do it in short spurts, I’m only human after all, but I monitor some of the left-wing extremist web sites. You may have seen some of your liberal friends buying into a serious revision of history in the wake of the death of the great Margaret Thatcher. Many from the “Occupy Wall Street” crowd are pointing to a quote, allegedly from Thatcher, insulting former President Ronald Reagan.
The “alleged” quote comes from the “alleged” journalist Peter Jenkins, who quoted Thatcher as saying of Reagan, ”Poor dear, there’s nothing between his ears.” My first reaction was to demand context. The left wing sites don’t offer that. My second thought was, “That’s all the extreme left wing has, a 2nd hand alleged quote?” So instead of relying on hearsay, I thought I’d quote the late Prime Minister directly to gauge her feelings for our 40th president. In a 1997 speech at the Heritage Foundation in Washington, D.C., Thatcher said, “As soon as I met Governor Reagan, I knew that we were of like mind, and manifestly so did he. We shared a rather unusual philosophy and we shared something else rather unusual as well: We were in politics because we wanted to put our philosophy into practice.” At Reagan’s funeral in 2004 Thatcher said, “We have lost a great president, a great American and a great man. And I have lost a dear friend.” And as if predicting the left wing extremists attempt to revise history upon her death, Thatcher said, “After all, so many people have been proved wrong by Ronald Reagan that they simply daren’t acknowledge his achievement. Forests have already been pulped to print the revisionist analyses of the ’80s.” Committed left-wingers are funny when they try to re-write history. They are funny because their assertions demonstrate they in fact have “nothing between the ears.” Feel free to share this with the liberals on your Facebook page.
Legalize Polygamy!
Some of us have warned about the slippery slope presented by changing the definition of marriage. We have mostly been ignored. So I’ll just leave this right here.
While the Supreme Court and the rest of us are all focused on the human right of marriage equality, let’s not forget that the fight doesn’t end with same-sex marriage.
But if you’ve pointed this out lately as an argument against changing the definition of marriage, you’ve been dismissed, ignored or called a bigot, or you’ve been told that you’re just not in touch with younger voters. What if the younger voters just haven’t thought things through?
Now that the first battle appears won, the concern over further changing the definition of marriage has been validated over at Slate by Jillian Keenan.
We need to legalize polygamy, too. Legalized polygamy in the United States is the constitutional, feminist, and sex-positive choice. More importantly, it would actually help protect, empower, and strengthen women, children, and families.
Evidence presented to back that argument? None. The rest of the article boils down to “Well, who are you to judge?”
One response to this will be, to just get government out of marriage altogether. How we do that, and more importantly whether that’s wise or not, is never really addressed. Marriages deal with child birth and upbringing, property and asset ownership, money — all things that end up demanding government involvement in one way or another as disagreements arise. As we have watered down the meaning of marriage and divorce over the past few decades, has government become more or less involved in marriage? Through court cases and decisions, undoubtedly government has become more involved, not less. Are we better off as families and a society, or worse off? We could look at segments of society where out-of-wedlock births are highest and marriage rates are lowest to find our answer. Sen. Daniel Patrick Moynihan wrote about that once upon a time, but no one really cares about history anymore.
Now let’s add polygamy to the scene. It probably won’t happen through a vote, but through court action. The Supreme Court is looking at changing the definition of marriage right now, and if they’re not careful, they could change it a whole lot whether they intend to or not. Who wants to bet that the same court that found the ObamaCare mandate a tax when it wasn’t written into the legislation as such will be careful? That the same court that opened Pandora’s Box with Dred Scott and Roe v Wade will be careful? History doesn’t back up that faith, but then again, who bothers to learn from history?
The argument for polygamy rests on the lack of any sort of fundamental values. One cannot build a house without a foundation, but we’re attempting to build a society without one.
The definition of marriage is plastic. Just like heterosexual marriage is no better or worse than homosexual marriage, marriage between two consenting adults is not inherently more or less “correct” than marriage among three (or four, or six) consenting adults. Though polygamists are a minority—a tiny minority, in fact—freedom has no value unless it extends to even the smallest and most marginalized groups among us.
That’s teenage level thinking. The fact is, in many instances rights compete against each other. Rights are often invented in order to oppress, not liberate. The “right” to health care, for instance, can end up commanding someone to surrender what they have earned to pay for someone else’s doctor bills. The “right” to free birth control results in commanding others to give up their right of conscience, on penalty of losing their livelihoods. Sandra Fluke is in competition with the owners of Hobby Lobby on this point right now.
So let’s fight for marriage equality until it extends to every same-sex couple in the United States—and then let’s keep fighting. We’re not done yet.
That’s what some of us have been warning about all along.
America’s Cuba Policy Now a Battle of Pitbull vs Jay-Z
Jay-Z and wife Beyonce visited Cuba earlier in April, despite the fact that ordinary tourist travel to the communist island remains illegal. Not to worry, though — the pair got the US Treasury Department’s authorization for the trip, under the rubric of “educational exchange.”
No press reported the pair engaging in any seminars, teaching any school classes or doing anything that appeared to be educational in any way. They celebrated their fifth wedding anniversary in a nation that is stuck in a time warp and jails and tortures dissidents.
Rapper Pitbull fired at Jay-Z and Beyonce Sunday, tweeting that he was “born politically incorrect.”
I’m cuban american i was born politically incorrect here is my open letter daleee sovo.co/77a1cfa19a
— Pitbull (@Pitbull) April 14, 2013
The link goes to a new Pitbull track that schools listeners on Cuba’s history and politics. It discusses the Cuban Missile Crisis, Elian Gonzalez (which upset many in the Cuban-American community during the Clinton years), the Bay of Pigs and gets patriotic when Pitbull says “Let’s break down ‘us.’ That’s right, that’s U-S, God bless.”
Pitbull also raps for Cuba libre:
It’s the freedom that we ride for/ It’s the freedom that we die for/ C-U-B-A/ Hope to see you free one day
The rap’s freedom refrain may get overshadowed by its silly play of the race card.
“Question of the night, would they have messed with Mr. Carter if he was white?” Pitbull rapped, using Jay-Z’s real last name in a reference to critics of the trip.
Answer of the day: Of course. Many of Jay-Z’s critics also criticize Michael Moore, Oliver Stone and Sean Penn for praising the Castros and Hugo Chavez’s of the world. Race has nothing to do with criticizing trips to Cuba. It’s not the race, it’s the kowtowing to communism that upsets people.
Overall, Pitbull’s rap may be a sign that he’s coming back to the Republican fold after voting for Obama.
9/11 Families Outraged Over Museum Plan to Charge Visitors
The 9/11 Memorial Foundation, charged with running the memorial museum, promised America that access to the museum would be free.
They have now gone back on that promise and have outraged families of the victims who believe it a travesty that anyone should have to pay to honor their loved ones.
The 9/11 Memorial foundation, funded to the tune of $830 million, has begun nickel-and-diming visitors for ticket reservations.
Even though the nonprofit has long vowed admission to the sacred site would be free, it is now demanding $2 per ticket for all advance reservations made online or by phone.
Officials quietly rolled out the fee on March 1 — but it did not escape the notice of some outraged families of Sept. 11 victims.
“I don’t want the American public to have to pay a dime to pay respects to my son,” said Sally Regenhard, whose firefighter son, Christian, died in the World Trade Center attacks.
“They made . . . a vow that no one would ever be charged for going to the memorial, but money is the bottom line here,” she fumed.
“They’re making money off the people that died. It’s disgusting,” said Jim Riches, a retired FDNY deputy chief who lost his firefighter son, Jimmy, on 9/11.
“The memorial should be free for everybody to pay their respects. You wouldn’t charge money to get into a cemetery.”
According to the memorial’s Web site, the booking fees are necessary to “safely manage visitor capacity” while surrounding construction projects are completed.
The nonprofit claims on its Web site that it “does not receive city, state or federal funding for its operations.”
But from 2006 to 2011, it pulled in about $295 million in taxpayer-funded grants for construction.
It also reaped more than $430 million in private donations after the tragedy, including pennies raised by millions of patriotic American schoolchildren.
“Like other similar institutions, in order to help support the operational needs of the 9/11 Memorial, we have implemented a service fee, solely for advance reservations,” foundation CEO Joe Daniels told The Post.
The memorial compares it to the American Museum of Natural History’s $2 charge and the Washington Monument’s $1.50 reservation fee.
But critics are calling it a two-bit money grab by fat cats hemorrhaging funds. Construction costs are now pegged at $700 million for the museum and memorial — more than it took to build the Empire State Building.
The incredibly bloated salaries of the directors is an outrage:
The foundation, chaired by Mayor Bloomberg, says the memorial and museum will cost $60 million a year to operate once complete. Security will cost $12 million a year, and another $5 million will go to operating the waterfall tributes.
Add that to the nonprofit’s swanky salaries: Ten of the 12 directors raked in more than $200,000 in 2011. Daniels pulled down $336,224 in salary and benefits, and Museum Director Alice Greenwald made $351,171, tax filings show.
Since tomorrow is tax deadline day, how about having the National Park Service shell out $20 million a year of your tax dollars? Forget about cutting some of those gargantuan salaries down to size. The foundation is talking about reviving a Senate bill that would do just that.
The museum opened in 2011, but construction was shut down by the Port Authority due to $300 million in cost overruns. Perhaps someone will explain to me how the directors are making such monumental salaries while demonstrating an incompetence rarely seen outside of government.
Museums were free when I was a kid. Now, admission at many of them costs as much as box seats at the ballgame. Not only are the poor shut out of experiencing what the museum has to offer, but even Middle Class families end up paying a significant part of their disposable income to enjoy what the museum experience has to offer.
The 9/11 museum wasn’t supposed to be like that. But mismanagement and misplaced priorities may make the 9/11 memorial just another urban luxury that only the well off can truly afford.
NY Teacher Put on Leave for ‘Think Like a Nazi’ Assignment
A New York teacher who gave her students a writing assignment to research Nazi propaganda and then write a letter trying to convince an official of the Third Reich “that Jews are evil and the source of our problems” has been placed on leave.
A high school English teacher who had students pretend to be Jew-hating Nazis in a writing assignment has been placed on leave.
The teacher at Albany High School caused a storm of criticism after having students practice the art of persuasive writing by penning a letter to a fictitious Nazi government official arguing that “Jews are evil.”
District Superintendent Marguerite Vanden Wyngaard held a news conference Friday to apologize for the assignment.
The Times Union newspaper reported ( http://bit.ly/ZTc4PU ) on Saturday that the teacher was not in class on Friday and had been placed on leave by the school district.
The writing assignment was done before a planned class reading of the memoir “Night,” by Holocaust survivor Elie Wiesel.
For the assignment, the teacher asked students to research Nazi propaganda, then write a letter trying to convince an official of the Third Reich “that Jews are evil and the source of our problems.”
“Review in your notebooks the definitions for logos, ethos, and pathos,” the teacher’s assignment said. “Choose which argument style will be most effective in making your point. Please remember, your life (here in Nazi Germany in the 30′s) may depend on it!”
Wyngaard said she didn’t think the assignment was malicious but “it displayed a level of insensitivity that we absolutely will not tolerate.”
One of the most enjoyable aspects of reading, writing, and thinking about history for me is how the subject matter has the ability to transport me back in time and set me down as a stranger in a strange land. Reading about the Revolutionary War? Square your conservative beliefs with being on the side of the rebels. Where would you have stood as a southerner during the Civil War? How about as a northerner? Superficially, there are easy answers. But in order to truly understand the subject, you must know yourself. Writing does that. It makes one “an exact man,” as Francis Bacon noted.
It appears to me that the unnamed teacher approached this assignment in the correct manner. She told students to research Nazi propaganda and argue that propaganda from a particular point of view using accepted styles of argument. The exercise expanded their minds, made them think, took them out of their comfort zone, and forced them to think like an entirely different person.
What kind of person would you have been in Nazi Germany circa 1936? Think about it. A particularly virulent and nauseating form of anti-Semitism gripped the entire continent of Europe in the period between the wars. It was normal. It was natural to harbor evil thoughts about the Jews. Everyone you knew hated the Jews. Your parents hated the Jews. Your friends and neighbors hated the Jews.
Forget about the “good Germans” who opposed Hitler. There were damn few of them and they were weak-willed and weak-minded. For the most part, the good German people approved of and applauded Hitler’s oppression.
Is it a valuable lesson to force students into that world, that mindset, and have them act out what they would have been thinking by having them write about it? I think it is an extremely valuable exercise. It won’t change anyone’s mind about the Nazis or the Jews. But it will help the students know themselves better. What could possibly be wrong with that?
More on the next page.
Liberal Ad Links McConnell Gun Control Stance to Al-Qaeda
An ad released by Americans United for Change compares Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell’s stand on gun control with the beliefs of al-Qaeda.
A liberal political organization is slamming Mitch McConnell’s stance on gun control by linking his beliefs to those of a member of Al Qaeda.
The group, Americans United for Change, released a TV ad Friday quoting statistics that showed that a majority of Kentuckians were for universal background checks while McConnell was against it.
“So who does agree with Mitch?” the narrator in the ad asks. The video then shows an Al Qaeda recruitment video that encourages its audience to go to gun shows to purchase weapons since they probably would not have to go through a background check or show identification.
“These rabid partisan extremists have no interest in promoting what’s right for Kentucky and they’ll stop at nothing to attack its biggest advocate,” McConnell’s campaign manager Jesse Benton told Fox News. “The political Left has proven they’ll stop at nothing to target people who disagree with them. Racist attacks on Mitch’s family, illegal bugging, and connecting him with terrorists won’t stop him from fighting for the Second Amendment rights of law abiding Kentuckians.”
Americans United, however, isn’t backing down. Shortly after the group released its own statement saying that McConnell did not defend his position at all, mainly because it was “indefensible”
“To be very clear: nothing in the ad says Sen. McConnell pals around with terrorists – but we are saying the reckless policy he espouses benefits criminals and terrorists looking to get their hands on guns in America no questions asked, a point made straight from the horse’s mouth in that Al Qaeda recruitment video,” said the group’s communications director Jeremy Funk in the statement. “It is hard to imagine a more frightening example why the gun show loophole needs to be closed than that video.”
This is ridiculous — even amusing. Background checks are going to stop terrorists from getting guns? The level of stupidity it takes to make a statement like that with a straight face is breathtaking. I don’t know what’s funnier; the fact that they believe that background checks will stop terrorists from getting a gun or using an al-Qaeda video as justification for their position.
I don’t think it’s apt to use what we now know are fake Hitler quotes on gun control or link an American politician to anything having to do with terrorists in this debate. It doesn’t prove anything about the other side but says a lot about you for using rancid analogies. Even if Hitler favored gun control or al-Qaeda tells its members to shop at gun shows for their weapons because there’s no background check, what exactly does it prove about protecting the Second Amendment or regulating guns? Absolutely nothing. It is a political attack — no more, no less.
And anyone who uses the tactic should be called out for it.
The Strange Jujitsu of the Liberal Mind
A week ago, former comedian Jim Carrey publicly advocated for restricting the law-abiding citizen’s access to firearms. He was militating against a right plainly spelled out in the Constitution.
This week, Jim Carrey has put his name to a letter advocating relaxing drug laws and clemency for drug offenders. The letter also hints at restoring voting rights to felons at the federal level, which up to now has been a state issue. These same people fight against voter ID, which protects the voting rights of Americans who have broken no laws.
Whatever you may think of the drug war, and I question the growing militarization of ordinary police forces, Carrey’s two positions are common on the left: Against the law-abiding citizen’s right to bear arms, simultaneously for the law breaker whose actions make the law-abiding citizen’s self-defense necessary. “Free Mumia” goes with universities hiring domestic terrorists goes with “gun free zones” that help killers plan massacres.
Carrey and other liberals do not see the contradiction here. Your right to bear arms, written into the Constitution, does not count. Yet they will find shadows and penumbras to create rights that are not written there.
On issues of life, liberals tend to favor the most radical policies on abortion, while they oppose the death penalty for our worst criminals. In court this week they won a victory allowing people of any age to purchase a powerful abortifacient drug, meaning children will end up buying, using, and probably being harmed by this drug. When a girl is harmed and sues the manufacturer, the same liberals will stand up and denounce “Big Pharma.” Liberals are literally turning a blind eye now to the ongoing trial in Pennsylvania, in which the details of an abortion mill/charnel house are being laid bare. Kermit Gosnell’s trial is among the most grisly in American history. But the lives of those children he and his employees callously snuffed and snipped out do not matter to liberals, at all. Their silence says all that needs to be said. Liberals who favor the death of the thousands of children killed at Gosnell’s slaughter house will oppose meting out the death penalty to the doctor who systematically killed them.
On the other hand, President Obama, Hillary Clinton and other liberals incessantly claim that their policies are — sing along if you’d like — “for the children.” MSNBC’s Melissa Harris-Perry advocates for the collective against the family in an ad, yet pushes against any collective disgust or restrictions when it comes to abortion. She says children matter to all of us, yet if a child is born while a doctor is trying to kill her, that child does not matter at all. Gosnell is free to keep her feet in a jar, as he did with many of his victims.
Liberals also claim to be be voices for the powerless against the powerful. If they really cared about the children, and were really advocates of the powerless against the powerful, would they not see in the Gosnell trial a chance to side with both? Likewise, they claim to be women’s advocates, yet women were victims at Gosnell’s horror lab. He employed a person with no medical education at all to anesthetize patients. Women were injured and died due to his unsafe and unsanitary practices, practices government ignored for years.
Liberals have nothing at all to say about any of this. Nothing.
And they apparently see no contradiction between their rhetoric and their true policies. If liberals have a conscience, even the alleged crimes of Kermit Gosnell does not sear it.
The mental jujitsu that it takes to be a modern liberal doesn’t stop there. If you’re a law-abiding Christian church leader in America, the Obama administration wants to dictate to you, tell you whom to hire and what products you will pay for through insurance. But if you’re a drug cartel operative in Mexico with designs on expanding your business in the US, liberals want to make sure your path across the border is smooth. Liberals create “free speech zones” on university campuses that explicitly restrict free speech that liberals don’t like. Liberals claim to be for education, yet always side with unions that oppose firing incompetent teachers. Liberals claim to be racially tolerant, yet routinely launch racist attacks against minorities who disagree with them, as Clarence Thomas, Ted Cruz and our own Allen West can testify. Liberals claim to be pro-woman, yet demonize women leaders like Margaret Thatcher, Sarah Palin and Condoleezza Rice. Liberals claim to be pro-science, yet ignore the science on the beginning of life and on climate and everything else that contradicts their political point of view. They claim to be lovers of reason, yet get into a discussion with one and if it doesn’t go their way, liberals tend to become the most hysterical shriekers on earth. Despite their claims to be open-minded and free-thinkers, the America that liberals are trying to create has no room at all for anyone who disagrees with them, on anything. Their America would consist of endless purges as political correctness evolves and metastasizes, a movie we’ve seen before in France and Cambodia. Liberals claim to stand for freedom, yet consistently expand the power of a less and less accountable bureaucratic state. They’re for due process for foreign terrorists, against due process for the American farmer on whose land an endangered species resides. They’re pro-choice, as long as you choose what they want you to choose. Choose to go to church, listen to Rush Limbaugh, hunt, or vote Republican and watch how tolerant and pro-choice they really are.
Take it all in, and it leaves little room for the existence of a well-meaning liberal. There must be some, but the vast majority must be either dupes who do not really understand the effects of their beliefs, they have succumbed to bullying or are liberals just to be seen as cool, or they know exactly what they’re doing, why they’re doing it, and who stands in their way and must therefore be destroyed.
Will Obama Be Partying at White House During North Korea’s Missile Launch?
Here is something veddy interesting to consider as you go about your average day.
It looks like North Korea is set to launch a mid-range missile on Wednesday, April 10th. This could be a bluff but maybe not. The missile could be nuclear but hopefully not. The Express UK reports:
North Korea to ‘launch missile TOMORROW’ after warning foreigners to evacuate South
NORTH Korea has completed preparations for a mid-range missile launch tomorrow from its east coast, officials in Seoul have revealed – just hours after foreigners living in South Korea were warned to quit the country.
Now consider that North Korea is 14 hours ahead of Washington D.C., and tonight at 7:30 p.m. President Obama is hosting a lavish party/concert celebrating Memphis Soul music with Justin Timberlake headlining an all-star cast. As the Weekly Standard reports:
On Barack and Michelle Obama’s schedule for today, this event is listed:
7:30PM THE PRESIDENT and THE FIRST LADY host a concert celebrating Memphis Soul music as part of their “In Performance at the White House” series; THE PRESIDENT delivers remarks
As the White House has previously announced, Justin Timberlake (who will be making his White House debut), Al Green, Ben Harper, Queen Latifah, Cyndi Lauper, Joshua Ledet, Sam Moore, Charlie Musselwhite, Mavis Staples, and others will be performing at the exclusive event.
So just when the White House party begins it will be 9:30 a.m. in North Korea. This conceivably means that President Obama could be dancing and singing while North Korea’s leader Kim Jong Il is launching.
Just think, Obama could be the first president to preside over a nuclear dance party. Or to state this in a more familiar historical context: “Obama fiddles while South Korea burns.”
New Wikileaks Doc Dump
Wikileaks has proudly announced their next treasure trove of US secrets they are dumping on the world. More than 1.7 million cables and reports from the period 1973-1976 will be available to peruse to your anti-American heart’s content.
If these hackers are so all-powerful, why don’t they try hacking the diplomatic archives of the old Soviet Union? We couldn’t have that — that would show a balanced view of the historical landscape. This is something Wikileaks is desperate to avoid at all costs. The goal here is to undermine American leadership. Confusing people by showing how there were times that America was responding to moves made by the Soviet Union would ruin the narrative of America as bully, America as sinner — not sinned against.
Julian Assange said WikiLeaks had been working for the past year to analyse and assess a vast amount of data held at the US national archives before releasing it in a searchable form.
WikiLeaks has called the collection the Public Library of US Diplomacy (PlusD), describing it as the world’s largest searchable collection of US confidential, or formerly confidential, diplomatic communications.
Assange told Press Association the information showed the vast range and scope of US diplomatic and intelligence activity around the world.
Henry Kissinger was US secretary of state and national security adviser during the period covered by the collection, and many of the reports were written by him or were sent to him. Thousands of the documents are marked NODIS (no distribution) or Eyes Only, as well as cables originally classed as secret or confidential.
Assange said WikiLeaks had undertaken a detailed analysis of the communications, adding that the information eclipsed Cablegate, a set of more than 250,000 US diplomatic cables published by WikiLeaks from November 2010 and over the following year. He said WikiLeaks had developed sophisticated technical systems to deal with complex and voluminous data.
Top secret documents were not available, while some others were lost or irreversibly corrupted for periods including December 1975 and March and June 1976, said Assange.
For some historians, the document dump is a godsend. Most of these cables wouldn’t have been available for 30 years or more and they certainly flesh out the bare bones of knowledge we have about US actions during this period.
I just wonder how much history you can write looking at only one side of the equation.
Jihad Erupts on Egypt’s Christians, Again
Over the weekend, Muslims launched yet another all-out jihad, replete with cries of “Allahu Akbar,” on Egypt’s Coptic Christian minority—also known as the original, indigenous inhabitants of Egypt, before Muslims invaded in the 7th century. Different reports are citing different sources as prompting this latest Islamic assault: some say Muslim children drew swastikas on a mosque, which prompted the imam and others to scapegoat and attack Christians; some say the source of the conflict is a feud between a Christian family and a Muslim family (over the latter’s sexual harassment of Christian girls).
- Smoke rises near St. Mark Cathedral from Molotov cocktail attack
Whatever the source or pretense of this latest jihad on Egypt’s Christians, the hate has led to the deaths of several Christians—including one Copt intentionally set on fire—and the wounding of hundreds. The next day, after the funeral of the slain Christians, Muslims again attacked and opened fire on Christians, this time in the St. Mark Cathedral, one of the most sacred spots for Copts.
Worse, various elements of Egypt’s military, police, and security, have not only failed to protect the beleaguered Christians, but, according to numerous sources, have even joined in the attack on the cathedral.
This should be unsurprising, considering the Egyptian military intentionally slaughtered some 23 Coptic Christians—including by intentionally running them over with armored vehicles—during the Maspero Massacre of October 2010, when Copts dared protest against the constant Islamic attacks on their churches.
Similarly, just as the White House issued a statement during the 2010 Maspero Massacre, saying “Now is a time for restraint on all sides”—as if to imply Egypt’s beleaguered and unarmed Christian minority needed to “restrain” itself against the nation’s military—one expects more whitewashing and relativism from the White House. For, just as the Obama administration tried to cover up the fact that the Benghazi attack, where American diplomats were killed by the same jihadi forces that Obama helped empower, so too will it naturally try to dissemble the fact that Egypt’s Christians are being terrorized and killed by the same Islamic forces—in this case, the Muslim Brotherhood and Salafis, who routinely incite Muslims against Christians—it helped empower.
Because there is so much startling and disturbing information concerning this latest attack on Egypt’s Christians in the Arabic-language media—much of which will never make it to the English-language media—over the next few days, I will be combing through the many Arabic reports and videos to bring you the facts and details of this latest atrocity.
‘One Small Step for a Man…’ and then Stick out Your Thumb
As late as 2010, NASA was planning a return to the moon by 2020. But budget cuts led to the cancellation of those plans, while NASA continued to design and build hardware associated with a lunar mission.
The question was always, why are they building hardware for a mission that doesn’t exist? Indeed, the Ares rocket — a heavy lift booster necessary to ferry the crew exploration vehicle, lander, and command module into space — continues to be built at the cost of several billion a year despite not having any purpose. It was hoped that eventually, NASA would come up with some alternate plans for a moon mission.
But those hopes have been dashed by NASA administrator Charles Bolden:
NASA administrator Charles Bolden has dismissed the idea that the space agency will attempt another manned Moon mission. Speaking with contemporaries, Bolden said “NASA will not take the lead on a human lunar mission… probably in my lifetime.” Bolden added that if the next administration reverses NASA’s decision it would set back the manned space program in its entirety. He warned that, should we divert resources towards a manned moon mission in the future, we would probably never “see Americans on the Moon, on Mars, near an asteroid, or anywhere” in our lifetimes, explaining that “we cannot continue to change the course of human exploration.”
The agency will instead focus on a manned research mission to a nearby Asteroid, as it announced three weeks ago. That’s not to say that we won’t see another human on the Moon — there are multiple companies planning commercial space flights, and Golden Spike last December committed to take people to the Moon by 2020.
Bolden’s statements echo the words of President Obama who, while making a speech at the John F. Kennedy Space Center, acknowledged there was a desire among some to return to the Moon before exploring the further reaches of space. “I just have to say pretty bluntly here: we’ve been there before,” said Obama back in 2010, “There’s a lot more of space to explore, and a lot more to learn when we do.”
“We choose to go to the moon not because it is easy, but because it is hard,” said John Kennedy. Apparently, today’s NASA only wants to do the “easy” stuff — and take our own sweet time doing it too. Now we have plans to “lasso” a small asteroid and drag it into orbit around the moon:
The asteroid retrieval mission is based on a scenario set out last year by a study group at the Keck Institute for Space Studies. NASA’s revised scenario would launch a robotic probe toward a 500-ton, 7- to 10-meter-wide (25- to 33-foot-wide) asteroid in 2017 or so. The probe would capture the space rock in a bag in 2019, and then pull it to a stable orbit in the vicinity of the moon, using a next-generation solar electric propulsion system. That would reduce the travel time for asteroid-bound astronauts from a matter of months to just a few days.
The Keck study estimated the total mission cost at $2.6 billion — but the administration official said the price tag could be reduced to $1 billion, or roughly $100 million a year, if the mission took advantage of an already-planned test flight for NASA’s heavy-lift Space Launch System rocket and Orion crew exploration vehicle. That flight would send astronauts around the moon and back in 2021.
“This mission would combine the best of NASA’s asteroid identification, technology development, and human exploration efforts to capture and redirect a small asteroid to just beyond the moon to set up a human mission using existing resources and equipment, including the heavy-lift rocket and deep-space capsule that have been under development for several years,” the official said in an email.
The 2014 budget would set aside $78 million for planning the asteroid retrieval mission, plus $27 million to accelerate NASA’s efforts to detect and characterize potentially hazardous asteroids. The federal government currently spends $20 million annually on asteroid detection.
Some may mourn the loss of a government moon mission, but the reality is we don’t have the money. We may not even have the money for the asteroid mission, given the direction of budget cuts.
But the chances are a private company will get to the moon sooner than NASA ever could. And they won’t go just to plant a flag and gather a few rocks. They will build mining towns and perhaps even construct a space center where missions to the outer solar system will originate, using the 1/5th gravity compared to earth that is found on the moon as a way to save hundreds of millions of dollars.
NASA plans a manned Mars mission by the mid 2030′s. I think by that time, it will be a moot point as private space companies will have preceded them by a decade.
America will maintain a lead in space exploration. But it won’t be government that will be running the show. In the next decade, American private industry (with the assistance of NASA) will be where the action is for manned space flight.
Perhaps NASA will be able to hitch a ride back to the moon with one of them.
Left Celebrates the Death of Rick Warren’s Son
One of the more disturbing aspects of the internet culture — fed largely by the ability to post anonymously — is the rash of mean, hateful comments made following the death of a prominent figure associated with one side or the other.
It’s a disease that afflicts both sides. The death of Ted Kennedy a few years ago brought out the haters on the right to an unprecedented degree. The vitriol and foul language as well as carefully composed comments designed to inflict the maximum amount of pain that were the rule on the right then are mirrored today by comments and tweets on the left regarding the suicide death of prominent Christian pastor Rick Warren’s son.
SooperMexican has some tweets from the compassionate gay left who wish devoutly that Warren’s son was gay:
@BryanJFischer well after all the dead gay kids Rick Warren is responsible for, I guess one of his is a small price to pay. #tcot
If Rick Warren’s kid committed suicide after gay conversion therapy that would just be another body in Rick Warren’s body count.
@RickWarren your son died due to your anti-gay hate toward gay people including your son..
@anotheraka @normaconnors gays commit suicide every day and Rick warren rubs it into the families faces every day! http://Evilbible.com
Here are a few gems from the comments responding to the news on Raw Story:
Well it’s too damn late to convince that egotistical shit Rick Warren to commit suicide first isn’t it? The sins of the father are visited upon the sons. In this case probably late at night when the sons were in grade school.
[...]
Well, one of Rick Warrens gods thought it a good idea to take his son from him. What does your god think of that?
[...]
Why all the fuss? If you were unfortunate enough to have been spawned by Rick Warren, and have to put up with his bulls**t 24/7/365, wouldn’t suicide be high on your bucket list?
CBS: Hey, John the Baptist Attended Jesus’ Crucifixion
Maybe we should start having mandatory Sunday School lessons for mainstream media reporters.
CBS, clearly embarrassed to be No. 2 in Christian faith ignorance, ran a segment on CBS Sunday Morning in which Martha Teichner stated confidently that John THE BAPTIST stood at the foot of the cross with Mary. That should get some kind of honorable mention here.
After getting schooled by its commenters, CBS posted a correction.
EDITOR’S NOTE: An earlier version of this story mis-identified the possible “beloved disciple” as John the Baptist.
Hillary Watch 2016: You COULD Ignore All The Latest News, But That Would Be Foolish
Faster than a speeding bullet! More powerful than a locomotive!
Does this iconic Superman intro also describe the state of Hillary’s non-campaign campaign for 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue in 2016? Perhaps, but with so much news and media slobbering to report, barf bags, “tucked into the seat pocket in front of you,” may be needed to help PJM readers get through it all.
Let’s first start with the “mouth of the south,” that Ragin’ Cajun, James Carville.
He is billed as a “longtime confident of the Clinton family” in today’s Washington Post piece announcing the shocking news that Carville is “supporting the super PAC devoted to luring Hillary Clinton into the 2016 presidential race.”
The operative word here is luring. Gee, just how much luring is this endeavor going to take? Now before you answer that question consider this – Ready for Hillary is the name of the PAC doing the “luring.”
As Carville is getting Hillary “ready” for “luring,” let’s turn our attention to Hillary Watch 2013. Oh, my mistake! What I meant to write was, let’s turn our attention to the 2013 Virginia gubernatorial election taking place November 5th.
This bellwether race features another “longtime confident” (the longtime banker of Clinton-land) Terry McAuliffe.
Look for McAuliffe’s photo in the dictionary next to the definition of political operative, lobbyist extraordinaire, wealthy businessman, power-broker, fundraising king and former Democratic National Committee Chairman. He was also co-chairman of Bill Clinton’s 1996 re-election campaign and chairman of Hillary Clinton’s 2008 presidential campaign.
McAuliffe is taking another shot at becoming Governor of Virginia in 2013 after losing the Democrat primary in 2009. (Virginia has an open gubernatorial race every four years because the governor is limited to only one four-year term.)
For this 2013 race, McAuliffe managed to scare away all the potential primary opposition with his clout and personal Brinks trucks full of cash. Thus becoming the Democratic candidate by default.
As one would expect from Terry McAuliffe, he is using his perch as the Democrat candidate to raise money and support with the theme, “send me money and secure your slot in the 2016 Hillary campaign hierarchy.”
Read how Ken Vogel at Politico reported the situation:
HILLARY CLINTON’S FIRST TEST
Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign begins this year in Virginia.
She hasn’t said anything about 2016, but Terry McAuliffe’s 2013 gubernatorial campaign is serving as a testing ground for Clinton’s clout, operatives and donors In fact, McAuliffe and some of his top allies have suggested to big donors and consultants that supporting his campaign is a way to get in on the ground floor of Hillary 2016, several donors and operatives told POLITICO.
Reaching for that barf bag yet? Hold on, because it only gets worse if you are a Republican who thinks the GOP has any shot of winning the White House in 2016.
On April 25th, Hillary will be giving her first paid speech, guaranteed to garner massive media attention the night before the opening of the George W. Bush Presidential Center at Southern Methodist University in Dallas.
Hillary will be attending the opening along with that guy she is married too. So, do you think there will be any media coverage speculating about whether Hillary is ready to join that exclusive men’s club of presidents gathering for the ribbon cutting?
If you are a follower of Hillary Watch 2016, you know my theory about that great, unstoppable, social/media movement afoot in the mainstream media to elect the first female President of the United States. This movement is akin to the first African-American president social/media movement in 2008 that propelled our current Oval Office occupant into office. (In 2008, that movement was slightly stronger in the media than the female movement.)
Perfect examples of this movement in action are these headlines from Newsweek/Daily Beast:
Better Than Ever…Hillary’s Back!!
And her return should strike fear in the hearts of Republicans everywhere.
She’s back. And it seems like she never left at all.
Be afraid GOP: Hillary is back and she will beat you in 2016.
And this one:
Are Republicans really going to try to damage Hillary Clinton by digging up old non-scandals no one even remembers? They’ll do damage, all right, says Michael Tomasky, but not to Clinton.
In fact, Newsweek/Daily Beast has become the house organ for Hillary in 2016. My reasoning is that Editor-in-Chief Tina Brown, who is British, greatly desires to be Hillary’s Ambassador to Great Britain. (Meow, meow goes the cat.)
Now, just posted today are two more Hillary media happenings worth mentioning.
First, news that Hillary has inked a book deal. Here is my favorite part of this report from AP Newsbreak:
The book has yet to be titled and is tentatively scheduled for June 2014, in time for the summer reading season and for the midterm elections, when a promotional tour could easily blend with Democratic efforts work to recapture the House. The former secretary of state’s itinerary will be closely scrutinized for any signs she may run for president in 2016 — any book tour events in early voting states like Iowa, New Hampshire and South Carolina would receive broad attention.
Just how much broad attention would her June, 2014 “book tour events in early voting states” actually receive? The modern age has yet to invent words that fully describe the phrase, “broad attention.”
Finally in Politico, is a piece chronicling all the clues any sleuth should look for when determining if Hillary is planning a presidential run in 2016.
But here is one CLUE not mentioned in Politico today — Hillary will announce in the library with Colonel Mustard and Professor Plum. So many clues, so much mystery!
This latest Hillary Watch 2016 installment concludes with the same old question I plan on asking from now until 2016:
“How do any of our current crop of 2016 GOP candidates ultimately win 270 electoral votes?”
And, unfortunately as you know by now, I have not a clue.
North Korean War at a Glance
If North Korea makes good on its threats and attacks South Korea and the U.S., the war that ensues is likely to be very bloody but short — as long as China either stays out of it or sticks to sealing its border with North Korea. China’s actions will have a massive impact on the course that any war with Pyongyang is likely to take.
The United States keeps about 28,000 troops in South Korea. They’re there to act as a trip-wire and deterrent against any North Korean attack. Any serious attack on South Korea would trigger a serious U.S. response.
The South Korean military is about 600,000 strong. Through decades of training and equipment buys, it’s modern and very capable. South Korea’s total population is about 49 million.
The North Korean military is about 1.1 million strong, and is one of the largest military forces on earth in terms of manpower. But it is not one of the best trained, and its supplies are not likely to last for very long. A military that cannot eat cannot long fight, and North Korea has not been able to feed itself for decades. Its military is well fed, for now. A war would force it to burn through men and supplies quickly. North Korea’s total population is about 24 million.
The U.S. contributes more than just boots on the ground. It brings the most modern and lethal air force into any conflict, and the clearest view of the battlefield from our fleet of satellites. The B2 and F22 stealth aircraft can be expected to play a very significant role against North Korea’s layered radar and anti-aircraft defenses. Most of North Korea’s gear is Soviet-made and of that era, but it has been upgraded over the years. It will not be able to keep up with U.S. stealth aircraft. The B2 can drop the MOP, the 30,000 pound Massive Ordnance Penetrator, on North Korea’s dug-in bunkers and artillery positions. The B2 can launch from Guam, Japan, or Diego Garcia or even the continental U.S., and therefore can be based well out of range of any North Korean efforts to strike at it. The F22 can outrun and outshoot anything the North Korean air forces can throw at it. Like the B2, it can attack ground targets, and can remain largely invisible to North Korean anti-air.
A war with North Korea is likely to be bloody in the early going because the North has positioned massive numbers of artillery in the mountains just 35 miles from Seoul, and within range of South Korea’s capital. The North could be expected to unleash those guns on the city of 10 million. But the U.S. could be expected to establish air supremacy quickly. The U.S. could strike anywhere in North Korea by air and offshore ballistic missile, launched from submarines and surface ships. As long as the U.S. brought its full naval strength to bear, from Japan, Hawaii, and around the Pacific, the naval side of the conflict would be a quick kill for the allies. North Korea’s navy simply cannot match the U.S. navy. North Korea’s artillery would probably enjoy a short lifespan, until U.S. forces cave in the mountain tunnels from which they fire. American and South Korean conventional air power would devastate North Korea’s air defense net and then rip up Pyongyang’s military infrastructure. South Korean ground forces would probably spend the opening hours of the war repelling a massive ground invasion from the North, but as the air war shifts to the allies’ favor, would push the North Korean ground forces north of the DMZ as they chewed the Kims’ military to pieces. South Korea would suffer massive civilian casualties in the early hours to days of the war, but the North would probably have its military destroyed and then the North Korean state would be dismantled.
History Repeats Itself: Once Again, Big Labor Puts a Bull’s-Eye on Immigration Reform
After Google’s decision to honor the leftist labor leader Cesar Chavez on Easter Sunday instead of Jesus Christ, I began to draw parallels from Chavez’s time to the present. I was talking with Rusty Humphries on his radio program when it hit me. With President Obama’s help, big labor is once again trying to stick it to the America and the immigrant community.
In my last article I set the record straight on Cesar Chavez. I reminded people that he did help improve working conditions on America’s farms for legal and illegal folks. In that regard, he was a decent labor leader. But the white-washers of history have forgotten that Chavez was severely anti-illegal immigrant. He helped end a guest worker program called the Bracero Program. He led a march to the Mexican border, with a Democrat U.S. Senator in tow, calling it the “wet line”. He inspired hit squads to kick the crap out of illegals crossing the border to work. And Chavez dehumanized the illegals by referring to them as “human contraband” in Congressional testimony. Cesar Chavez did all of this because those illegals threatened the power of his union. In the current debate over illegal immigration, big labor is once again plotting to scuttle reform, and this time they have help at the top.
In a recent interview with Univision, President Obama introduced a so-called poisoned pill into the illegal immigration debate. He told Univision that he didn’t want to tie a pathway to citizenship for illegals to border security because the border, “is never going to be 110% perfect.” It’s not the first time he’s done this. Obama was blasted by the GOP and some Democrats for “leaking” his illegal and legal immigration plan, a plan devoid of border security, to the press. It was a move that was seen as unproductive from all concerned. Still, the White House talking points on sabotaging reform are already out. Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano is resisting any meaningful border security measures by refusing to come up with a metric to measure border security. But anyone who’s at all familiar with the reform debate knows that border security is the number one priority of well-meaning conservatives. Most sane Americans are willing to back a path to legalization and perhaps citizenship, once they are assured that we won’t be back in this same spot twenty years from now. Once Americans are assured that illegal immigration is slowed to a trickle, and not the raging river it has been in the past, they’ll buy in. Obama and his allies in Big Labor know this. So, in an effort to protect a key constituency of his base, Obama is willing to torpedo the reform effort by introducing measure he knows will be unacceptable by the GOP and conservatives. This way, he can blame Republicans, knowing the compliant press would be all-to-willing to help. Just one problem with that plan Mr. Obama: Many of us don’t get our news from NBC, and we’re all paying attention.
Just like back in the 60s and 70s, big labor is attacking the immigrant community in an effort to protect its power. The AFL-CIO is solidly against a guest worker program in any reform deal. The unions, in particular public employee unions, get their economic strength from exorbitant wages, gold-plated benefits packages and the dues they rake in from their members. In turn those dues, some of them tax payer funded, go to Democrat candidates. Once again President Obama and his party are solidly in Big Labor’s camp. And once again they’re willing to throw America under the bus by not allowing a fix to the nation’s broken illegal and legal immigration systems. But, I offer a word of caution to our esteemed president and Democrats. The Latino demographic is the fastest growing in the U.S. Thankfully, union influence is at historic lows and continuing to fall. Liberals might want to choose sides carefully. I can assure you, we’re watching.
Easter March Media Madness – The Agony, The Ecstasy and The Absurd
With Easter Sunday in our rear-view mirror, now is the time to reflect on what I am calling Easter March Media Madness — The Agony, The Ecstasy and The Absurd.
Let’s first chronicle the absurd, and in this category are two entries of national and international prominence.
First up is Google with its iconic, “Google Doodle.”
If you are not familiar with the Google Doodle this is Google’s icon that tops their main search page. The Doodle graphically depicts holidays, seasons, events, or just plain fun designs. Daily it is seen globally by hundreds of millions of users as they do that thing they do on Google.
But on Easter Sunday, a holiday celebrated by over a billion people around the world, the Google Doodle had an image of someone I did not recognize, but later discovered it was farm labor leader, Cesar Chavez. As it turned out Easter Sunday would have been his 86th birthday. (He died in 1993.)
However, as Easter morning turned into afternoon, a tsunami of controversy began to swirl across the media universe, even in mainstream media.
On PJ Media alone there were three separate posts, written by Ed Driscoll, David Swindle and Chris Salcedo.
A Google spokesperson told the Washington Post on Easter Sunday:
We enjoy celebrating holidays at Google but, as you may imagine, it’s difficult for us to choose which events to highlight on our site. Sometimes for a given date, we feature an historical event or influential figure that we haven’t in the past.
A friend of mine who works for Google responded this way to a personal outrage email I sent him:
The man (Chavez) was a devout Christian. It is utter nonsense that anyone is upset. Google does Doodles for unique and always different dates of historical significance.
Ultimately, will Google “dissing” Easter turn out to be a “Bing” deal or what? Only time will tell how much backlash Google will receive and drive users to rising competitor Bing, which displayed Easter eggs on its home page.
The absurd category continues with the New York Times and my favorite example of Easter Day “media madness.”
In an Easter piece with the headline, Pope Calls for “Peace in All the World” in First Easter Message the NYT was forced to issue a correction. Bryan Preston, in a PJ Tatler piece asked in his headline, Best NYT Correction Ever? My answer is, “Yes, definitely.”
For if you click on the Pope piece you will see this message at the bottom:
This article has been revised to reflect the following correction:
Correction: April 1, 2013
An earlier version of this article mischaracterized the Christian holiday of Easter. It is the celebration of Jesus’s resurrection from the dead, not his resurrection into heaven.
Those who believe in Christ’s resurrection from the dead, can now rejoice that the NYT has learned the meaning of the “Christian holiday of Easter.” Is this God’s wrath on the New York Times? To make matters even worse, this correction was headlined on the Drudge Report. Wouldn’t you have loved to have been there when this “mischaracterization” first hit the newsroom? No doubt, some editor was throwing chocolate Easter eggs at someone.
Now let’s explore Easter March Media Madness — the ecstasy.
As Google ignored Easter and the NYT learned its meaning, 11.7 million people watched the final two-hour episode of the hit series, The Bible on The History Channel. From Deadline Hollywood:
History’s Mark Burnett-produced The Bible ended on Easter Sunday with 11.7 million viewers. That was up 14% from the 10.3 million who watched last week’s penultimate episode of the 10-part miniseries. However, it is down from the series’ debut, when The Bible premiered with a two-hour episode March 3 with 13.1 million viewers.
The Bible, a five-part, 10-hour miniseries on History Channel has become the biggest cable television hit of the year. Not bad for a show based on a book nearly 2000 years old, with portions even older than that!
The second ecstasy of Easter was the non-stop mainstream media coverage paid to the Shroud of Turin. The Shroud is what millions believe is the burial cloth of Jesus and this new study dates it back to the time of Jesus. Shroud coverage was virtually unavoidable, showering more attention on the tortured and crucified “mysterious man” whose imprint appears on the Shroud.
Finally, here is the agony of Easter.
On Sunday evening, as those 11.7 million people watched Christ being nailed to a wooden cross on The Bible series, there was a real-time agony played out on another piece of wood.
During the NCAA Basketball Tournament, Louisville guard Kevin Ware suffered a horrible lower right leg injury in the game against Duke. The agony displayed by Ware was so heart wrenching to watch that CBS Sports banned replays of the injury. The Boston Herald reports:
The chairman of CBS Sports had no regrets about banning further replays of Louisville basketball player Kevin Ware’s gruesome broken leg and says if anyone wants to watch it on the Internet, that’s fine with him.
There you have it, all nicely rolled into Easter March Media Madness — The Agony, The Ecstasy and The Absurd.
Next Easter, will the Google Doodle commemorate Kevin Ware’s injury with basketballs in the Doodle’s two O’s?
Obama Ally Google Honors Cesar Chavez on Easter Instead of Christ
Be careful Google, your bias to the extreme left is showing. In case you missed it, this last Sunday, on the Holiest day in the Christian calendar, the leftists at Google decided to honor the Socialist leader César Chávez. Instead of honoring the Easter holiday, in the banner atop their search engine page, Google decided to pay homage at the liberal altar, using Chávez as the day’s savior.
I’ll give the man his due. Chávez did improve working conditions on the nation’s farms. But instead of being the Latino Martin Luther King, as many liberals have tried to portray him, this man was a precursor to the “Occupy Wall Street” wing of the Democrat party. He proved this in his actions and in Congressional testimony when he actually dehumanized illegals. Contrast Chávez’s message to that of Jesus Christ, a message of salvation, peace and compassion. After Easter weekend, 2013, we all know where Google’s priorities rest. But it gives me a great opportunity to remind the public about some facts concerning Chávez , facts that liberal leaders have decided to try and erase from history.
Chávez was a great labor leader. The reforms he championed did improve the working conditions at the nation’s farms. However, Chávez was no civil rights leader. During his tenure as head of the United Farm Workers, the union was committed to restricting illegal and legal immigration. César Chávez and Dolores Huerta fought the Bracero Program that existed from 1942 to 1964. The Bracero Program was an early attempt, by our government, to bring in guest workers to the U.S. Chávez opposed the program because it undercut his efforts to extort exorbitant pay and wages from the nation’s farm owners. Unions rely on high wages for their membership so they can assess dues use and use that money to pay-off politicians and shape public policy. Chávez and Huerta were determined to not allow undocumented migrant labor to undermine UFW strike campaigns. In 1969, Chávez and members of the UFW marched through to the border of Mexico to protest growers’ use of undocumented immigrants as strikebreakers. Joining him on the march were both Reverend Ralph Abernathy and U.S. Senator Walter Mondale, a Democrat and future presidential candidate. Chávez and the UFW went so far as to report illegals, who refused to unionize, to the Immigration and Naturalization. A Republican congressman just got into a heap of trouble for referring to illegals as “wet backs”. But the extreme left wasn’t persecuted by liberals in 1973, when the United Farm Workers set up a “wet line” along the United States-Mexico border to prevent Mexican immigrants from entering the United States illegally and potentially undermining the UFW’s unionization efforts. Under the guidance of Chávez’s cousin Manuel, physical attacks were launched against illegal immigrants. But Chávez’s most egregious and revealing act would occur year later.
Before a congressional labor subcommittee in 1979 Caesar Chávez said the following: “. . . when the farm workers strike and their strike is successful, the employers go to Mexico and have unlimited, unrestricted use of illegal alien strikebreakers to break the strike. And, for over 30 years, the Immigration and Naturalization Service has looked the other way and assisted in the strikebreaking. I do not remember one single instance in 30 years where the Immigration Service has removed strikebreakers. . . .The employers use professional smugglers to recruit and transport human contraband across the Mexican border for the specific act of strikebreaking . . .” Most conservatives would simply prefer that illegal immigrants not enter the country without permission. But Chávez, an early champion of the extreme, “Occupy Wall Street” left, dehumanized illegals because they undercut his precious union and his political power. That’s the man that Google chose to honor. Goggle opted to forego Christ’s message on Easter and opted for an extreme leftist’s gospel. Google, one of President Obama’s biggest boosters, chose to deify Chávez on the holiest day of the Christian calendar. There are 1.2 billion Catholics around the world. There are billions more Christians around the globe too, who may now be reevaluating their use of Google products and their search engine as a result.
César Chávez was a labor leader. He was no civil rights leader. As demonstrated through the man’s action, he was a left-wing thug who inspired violence against human beings. He added insult to injury by testifying before Congress, his contempt for those who would dare to undermine his political power. Then there’s Jesus Christ who said, “How happy are the poor in spirit: theirs is the kingdom of heaven. Happy the gentle: they shall have the earth for their heritage. Happy the merciful: they shall have mercy shown them. Happy the pure in heart: they shall see God. Happy the peacemakers: they shall be called children of God. Happy those who are persecuted in the cause of right: theirs is the kingdom of heaven. Happy are you when people abuse you and persecute you and speak all kinds of calumny against you on my account. Rejoice and be glad, for your reward will be great in heaven.” Google made their choice on Easter Sunday 2013. Perhaps Christians the world over can make better choices from this day on. Can you say Bing?
‘Pawn Star’ Rick Harrison Says ‘Leninist’ Federal Government is Keeping Him From Filming New Show
Pawn Stars chief Rick Harrison called into the Mark Levin Show Friday night. He told Levin that he had come up with new reality show about dune buggiers in southern California, and approached federal authorities about getting permission to film, as the dune buggiers do their thing on federal land.
The federal government, Harrison says, denied permission and blamed the sequester. Harrison says the show would not have cost the federal government anything. In fact, it would have employed over 100 people.
The federal government’s actions on this and a broad range of issues remind Harrison of another government that once ruled Russia.
“I am a history buff,” Harrison told Levin. “We have a government that’s down on business, down on business, people with money. I know someone else who did that. His name was Lenin.”
For the benefit of any low-information voters out there who may have heard that or may be reading this, Lenin is not the guy who was with the Beatles. He was the founder of the Soviet Union, which crushed freedom around the world for more than 70 years. Lenin was very, very bad.
“[Lenin] blamed the banks, he blamed the Jews, he blamed the intelligentsia,” Harrison said. “‘Let’s re-educate everybody’ and I just feel like that’s what’s happening to our country.”
Harrison also blasted ObamaCare and said that the Supreme Court justices who voted to uphold it should be impeached. He says that the regulations it imposes on businesses make it all but impossible to start a new business in America.
Harrison’s family obtained their pawn license in Las Vegas in 1987 and established the Gold and Silver Pawn Shop. Pawn Stars has been on the History Channel since July 2009.
Flashback: Obama Votes Against Born Alive Act
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Today, shocking video emerged showing a Planned Parenthood official arguing that even infants born alive, surviving an abortion attempt, have no right to life.
In 2003, then Illinois Sen. Barack Obama was asked his views on abortion. The future president resolutely declared, “I am pro-choice.”
An unidentified reporter follows up. “In all situations, including the late-term thing?”
Obama answers, “I am pro-choice. I believe that women make responsible choices, um, and they know better than anybody the tragedy, uh, of, a, uh, you know, a difficult, um, pregnancy, and, uh, I don’t think that it’s the government’s,uh, role to meddle in that choice.”
As president, Obama sees no problem with government meddling in a woman’s choice to own a firearm, despite the fact that the right to keep and bear arms is expressly protected in the Constitution.
Setting that aside, as a state senator, Obama opposed a partial birth abortion bill that came before the Illinois Senate. He also criticized the Supreme Court decision upholding the partial birth abortion ban.
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In 2008, when ruminating on the possibility of his own grandchildren coming into the world unexpectedly, then US Sen. Barack Obama described those future grandchildren as a “punishment.”
First Lady Michelle Obama is also far out on the edge of extremism on abortion. She signed a letter in 2004, when her husband was still in the Illinois Senate, that supported partial birth abortion.
Executed Convict Missing, Authorities Urge Calm
Breaking news from the capital city suggests that the nation’s most notorious convict has somehow “escaped” — after his death sentence was carried out.
While authorities claim it’s merely a case of fanatic followers stealing the corpse of the condemned, our correspondents in the suburbs and villages bring word of multiple eyewitness encounters with the treasonous extremist in the hours and days since he was beaten, bled, and suffocated to death in a way the government reserves for the worst sorts of criminals.
If true, the government’s attempt to squelch a rebel movement has been turned on its head, and given new life by the very act of putting its leader to death.
There’s no dispute that the convicted felon was executed just before the weekend, since the act was witnessed by crowds of ordinary people, and many law enforcement officers and community leaders.
However, early Sunday authorities met privately with a security detail, which had been tasked with protecting the gravesite, to mull what to say publicly about the missing body. The official word — stolen corpse — rang hollow to those who knew that the grave had been guarded by heavily-armed soldiers whose own lives were in jeopardy if their mission failed.
While public officials refused comment, some local folks recalled that the condemned man, a freelance teacher who many credit with acts of physical healing that defy medical explanation, previously told his students he would be executed, buried and then “rise.” At the time, his remarks seemed mysterious and eccentric.
The “clearly impossible” news gathers credibility as regional social networks hum with stories of sightings, and even physical contact with a man who looks and speaks exactly like the deceased.
Officials are confident that the spurious accounts will fade once the body is located. They urge citizens to remain calm, and not to be taken in by scam artists who say that the dead man is alive, or that, as some claim, he can confer immortality on others.
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