Tag Archives: Obama

Calling President Obama’s Bluff

Posted on by

The American Thinker posted an article today about President Obama’s latest assurances that NATO would protect the Baltic states. The President has a habit of drawing red lines and then stepping over them. Unfortunately, we have passed the point where the rest of the world takes him seriously.

The article reminds us that as soon as President Obama drew his red line in Syria, Putin made a move that left Russia as the dominant player in Syria. Now Putin is reacting to President Obama’s statement that NATO would protect the Baltic republics.

On September 5, the Wall Street Journal reported:

The apparent abduction and detention of an Estonian security officer raised tensions between Estonia and Russia just two days after President Barack Obama came to the country and vowed to defend it as a NATO member.

Estonia’s Internal Security Service, known as KAPO, said its officer Eston Kohver was “illegally detained” at gunpoint early Friday while on duty in southeastern Estonia. It said his abductors had come from Russia and had jammed radio communications and used a smoke grenade in the incident.

“It is unacceptable that people who have crossed the Estonian border kidnap an Estonian citizen from Estonian territory,” President Toomas Hendrik Ilves tweeted on Friday. “I expect the case to be solved quickly.”

The article at America Thinker concludes:

We are in very dangerous territory now. Russia will be encouraged to escalate its provocations, having seen that Obama’s threats are empty. Putin as already mentioned that Russia is a nuclear power, a not so veiled threat to start World War Three should his future aggression meet a response. The risk is that having shown he can be bullied, Obama will respond too late and too strongly, thereby setting off Armageddon.

Weakness is provocative. Obama believes the opposite, and he is as wrong as Neville Chamberlain was.

Playing Politics With Immigration

Posted on by

The Hill posted an article today about President Obama’s decision to delay any executive order regarding immigration. First of all, it is not President Obama’s job to write an executive order regarding immigration–that responsibility belongs to Congress.

The article reports:

Latino groups on Saturday promised they would “not soon forget” President Obama’s move to delay any executive action on the border crisis until after the midterm elections.

A White House official said Obama decided to postpone acting on immigration until after November because of the tremulous political season and “Republican’s extreme politicization of the issue.”

Loosely translated this means that if the President unilaterally passed amnesty for illegal immigrants, the Democrats would seriously lose the midterm elections.

The article further reports:

While a number of Democrats facing reelection pressured Obama to delay action after he vowed on Friday to move on immigration “soon,” a leading Democrat, Rep. Luis Gutierrez (Ill.) has urged the president to “lean in” on reform.

Gutierrez scolded his colleagues earlier this week, telling them to “stand aside” and let Obama take action.

Gutierrez is scheduled to hold a press conference in Chicago on Monday with immigrant families that will be impacted by the administration’s decisions on immigration and deportations, an advisory states.

Our immigration system needs reform, but more than that, our borders need to be secure. Anyone can enter America through our porous borders. (In August I posted a picture at rightwinggranny of James O’Keefe crossing our southern border dressed as Osama Bin Laden.) What kind of a terrorist attack do we have to have in America before we pay attention to border security?

 

 

The President Has Discovered A New RIght

Posted on by

Yesterday John Hinderaker at Power Line posted a story about a recent speech by President Obama.

The article reports President Obama’s comments in a Labor Day speech:

Cynicism is a bad choice. Hope is the better choice. Hope is what gives us courage. Hope is what gave soldiers courage to storm a beach. Hope is what gives young people the strength to march for women’s rights, and worker’s rights, and civil rights, and voting rights, and gay rights, and immigration rights.

What are immigration rights? Is it the right to immigrate to the United States legally? If so, I support those rights. If it is the right to immigrate to the United States illegally, I would like to know where that right comes from. It certainly is not listed in the Constitution. It has been understood throughout history that a country has a right to police its borders. There is nothing hostile about enforcing borders. Not enforcing our borders increases the burden on our schools, communities, and government services. It is time to enforce our current immigration laws. If the voters decide they would like those laws changed, they can vote for representatives who will change them. It is reckless not to enforce our current laws. We are leaving ourselves vulnerable to disease, terrorism, and crime. There is a reason the border is there.

How To Ruin The Last Weekend Of Summer

Posted on by

Today’s New York Post is reporting on President Obama’s plans for Labor Day Weekend. The President will be working hard while people in the northeast who were hoping to take advantage of the last weekend of the summer will be challenged to get to their destinations.

The article reports:

President Obama’s plan to schmooze Wall Street honchos at a Westchester fund-raiser Friday is grounding wealthy weekenders who planned to fly to the Hamptons or Nantucket for the Labor Day holiday.

The FAA has issued a no-fly warning that extends for most of Friday and all day Saturday through Sunday, grounding seaplanes to East Hampton, Montauk, Martha’s Vineyard and Nantucket.

On Friday, Obama will be feted at the home of one of his top bundlers, 32 Advisors’ Robert Wolf, in the aptly-named Purchase, NY, with 250 high-rollers paying up to $32,000 each to bend Obama’s ear.

To quote a previous article at rightwinggranny.com, “Only in America…could politicians talk about the greedy rich at a $35,000 per plate campaign fund-raising event.”

The article at the New York Post further reports:

Obama will then fly to Newport, R.I. for an event to benefit House Democrats. Melissa Tomkiel, president of seaplane companies, Fly the Whale (which flies from NYC to the Hamptons and Nantucket) and Tailwind (NYC to Boston and DC), told us, “A flight restriction was issued banning operations in the NYC area due to the president’s visit on Friday for practically the whole weekend, causing major business losses and inconvenience for our passengers on the busiest weekend of the year. It is frustrating. We have had to move at least 10 flights and cancel a number of private charters, costing us thousands of dollars. We count on this weekend to get us through the quieter months of the year. This will create a perfect storm on a holiday Friday, creating air space havoc between New York City and Boston.”

President Obama has become the poster child for narcissism. His weekend schedule reflects a total disregard for other Americans attempting to enjoy their last weekend of the summer.

A Subtlety That I Didn’t Understand

Posted on by

Allen West posted an article on his blog today explaining the difference between ISIS and ISIL. The Obama Administration and some news sources have begun to use the word ISIL instead of ISIS to describe the terrorists making their way across Iraq. I really wasn’t paying much attention to the change, but Colonel West explains the difference.

The article explains:

This week I listened to two Obama administration spokesmen, Josh “Not So” Earnest from the White House, and Rear Admiral Kirby from the Pentagon in relation to the Islamic terrorist army freely operating in Iraq and Syria. These two individuals and many other voices out of the Obama administration refer to them as ISIL (Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant). The group has professed the establishment of an Islamic caliphate and refers to itself as IS (Islamic State). The manner in which we should all be referring to this savage and barbaric group is ISIS (Islamic State in Iraq and Syria).

 …First, if you choose to refer to this group as ISIL, you have basically rewritten the map of the Middle East and fallen into the trap of not recognizing the existence of Israel and also Lebanon. If you use ISIL you are then validating the Islamic totalitarian and jihadist claim that the modern day Jewish State of Israel is an occupation state and does not exist.

The Obama Administration has used some strange words in the past when referring to events in the Middle East. At a Ramadan dinner at the White House, Obama counter-terrorism advisor John Brennan referred to Jerusalem as Al Quds–a name that has a significant meaning to Muslim extremists. The name of the city is Jerusalem. It is the capital of Israel. The Arabs do not have the right to rename it. This is also the administration that referred to the shooting at Fort Hood as ‘workplace violence.’

The article reminds us:

Lastly, we need to address this group as ISIS because it is seeking to establish an Islamic state within the borders of two recognized nation-states; Iraq and Syria. ISIS can attempt to break down any borders and not recognize them, but we must. We cannot allow this group to reestablish some 7th century regional caliphate and therefore must fight to reestablish sovereignty.

Now, I would much rather use this crisis as a means to establish something long since needed — a separate country called Kurdistan — but my focus would be on destroying ISIS. There is an opportunity here to truly promote a country where there can be respect and coexistence of Muslims, Christians, and other religious minorities. A place that would thoroughly reject the idea of Islamic jihadism and would continue to be a reliable ally of the United States.

It is a shame that the Obama Administration does not include people with the understanding of the Middle East that Allen West represents. A more qualified group of presidential advisers might have avoided the disaster that President Obama’s foreign policy has become.

The Eternal Campaign Season

Posted on by

Yesterday John Podhoretz posted an article at the New York Post about some recent comments by Hillary Clinton. Hillary has made some very interesting comments about President Obama’s foreign policy–an interesting point of attack since she was Secretary of State for much of his tenure.

Mr. Podhoretz writes that he thinks President Obama miscalculated by not choosing Hillary as his Vice-President. If she were Vice-President, she would still be standing with him–not trashing his foreign policy.

The article points out some of the reasons Hillary may be striking out at President Obama:

What’s more, when she was working for you, you refused to give her the reins of US foreign policy and centralized all the power in the White House.

Fair is fair. You took Michael Corleone’s advice: You sought to keep this enemy close. But you didn’t keep her close enough. And now you shall pay. She has made you start paying already.

Hillary Clinton is the most popular politician in America now — more popular than you, if you haven’t noticed. And she has decided, for all intents and purposes, to go into opposition.

That was the meaning of the extraordinary interview she granted Jeffrey Goldberg of The Atlantic over the weekend. It was the annunciation of her separation from you and your legacy.

Though filled with qualifications and words of praise for Obama here and there, the interview is a rare assault against a sitting president by his former secretary of state.

The key sentence is this: “Great nations need organizing principles,” Hillary told Goldberg, “and ‘Don’t do stupid stuff’ is not an organizing principle.”

The article sums up the character of the Clintons:

Mrs. Clinton’s political judgment is not to be trusted. She allowed Obama to eat her lunch in 2008 in part because she was overconfident and tacked too far to the center too early. She may well be doing it again.

But she has made her choice. If Obama stumbles, she’ll be there — with her ankle turned out, to trip him up still further and then, with a sad smile, claim credit for having known that the obstacle had been there in his path all along.

I believe Hillary will again be challenged from the left for the Democrat nomination for President. I believe that challenge will come from Massachusetts’ own Elizabeth Warren. It may be an interesting primary season.

How Wars End

Posted on by

Yesterday Frank Gaffney posted a short article at the Center for Security Policy website entitled, “How Wars Don’t End.” In his article he reminds us that President Obama once explained to America that unilateral withdrawals from conflicts is “how wars end in the 21st Century.”

Well. so much for that.

The article states:

Recent events in Iraq show that – in our time, as throughout history – unless both sides in a war agree to stop fighting, the conflict will continue. Such fighting generally comes at the expense of the interests or security of the party that calls it quits.

The mayhem in Iraq that has flowed from President Obama’s decision to “end the war” there unilaterally has reached the point where he felt compelled yesterday to authorize renewed U.S. airstrikes.

The trouble is that his delusional approach to ending wars is of a piece with his tendency to micromanage, limit and, thereby, make ineffectual the military operations he does approve.

I hope we don’t have to put actual boots on the ground again in Iraq, but it breaks my heart to see the gains we made with the surge thrown away. I truly believe that had we left forces there, there would have been enough pressure on Prime Minister Maliki to create a more inclusive government. Now we are faced with a radical caliphate in the Middle East that will grow to include some of the countries that in the past have supported us. Being an ally of America doesn’t mean much right now, and our abandonment of the Iraqis is an illustration of that. Hopefully air power will be enough to stop the slaughter of the innocent Christians that is currently taking place.

Leadership Comes From The Top

Posted on by

PLEASE SEE THE UPDATE AT THE BOTTOM OF THIS STORY!

The following video is posted on YouTube:

The story behind the video is at infowars.com:

Seeking to file a complaint about the Helmetta Regional Animal Shelter, Steve Wronko visited the Helmetta Police Department to air his grievances about the shelter falling prey to nepotism and corruption as a result of Helmetta Mayor Nancy Martin appointing her son Brandon Metz to head up the facility.

“I’ve made objections about what’s going on at the shelter over there,” Wronko tells the police officer, adding, “My first and fourth amendment rights were violated, my civil rights were violated.”

“Obama just decimated the freakin’ Constitution, so I don’t give a damn. If he doesn’t follow the Constitution, we don’t have to,” responds the cop, brazenly violating the oath he swore to uphold the Constitution.

Leadership, good or bad, comes from the top. President Obama is not directly responsible for the bad behavior of this policeman, but the negative attitude that President Obama and his Department of Justice have taken toward the Constitution does influence the behavior of those sworn to uphold the Constitution. This policeman should be fired for his actions, but he is simply a reflection of the current President and his administration. All of us should take note of this incident–our civil rights are at risk.

UPDATE:

On August 7, MyCentralJersey posted a follow up story to this which included what sounded like an apology.

The story explains:

But on Thursday, Recine, a registered Democrat who serves on the elected Board of Fire Commissioners of District 2 in Piscataway, said he was being “sarcastic.”

“It was just a stupid statement on my part. He got me riled and I said it,” he explained. “I don’t believe that at all. I’m the most patriotic person in the world. I believe in God, the flag, country, the Constitution.”

Recine said he was dispatched to the building because municipal workers were concerned when they saw Wronko taking pictures indoors.

Mr. Recine has resigned from the police force following the incident.

The Death Of Transparency

Posted on by

The information below is from the Inspectors General website:

Welcome to IGnet serving as a portal to the Federal Inspector General Community whose primary responsibilities, to the American public, are to detect and prevent fraud, waste, abuse, and violations of law and to promote economy, efficiency and effectiveness in the operations of the Federal Government.

The Inspector General Act of 1978, as amended, establishes the responsibilities and duties of an IG. The IG Act has been amended to increase the number of agencies with statutory IGs. In 1988 came the establishment of IGs in smaller, independent agencies and there are now 72 statutory IGs.

IGnet also serves as the purveyor of information, to the American public, from The Council of the Inspectors General on Integrity and Efficiency (CIGIE). “The Inspector General Act of 1978 as amended by the IG Reform Act of 2008” created the CIGIE combining what were formerly known as the “PCIE” (President’s Council on Integrity and Efficiency) and the “ECIE” (Executive Council on Integrity and Efficiency). The CIGIE has 7 committees, Audit, Information Technology, Inspection and Evaluation, Investigations, Integrity, Legislation and Professional Development as well as several related organizations.

The job of the IG is to keep our government honest.

Yesterday Fox News reported the following:

Dozens of government watchdogs are sounding the alarm that the Obama administration is stonewalling them, in what is being described as an unprecedented challenge to the agencies they’re supposed to oversee. 

Forty-seven of the government’s 73 independent watchdogs known as inspectors general voiced their complaints in a letter to congressional leaders this week. They accused several major agencies — the Justice Department, the Peace Corps and the chemical safety board — of imposing “serious limitations on access to records.” 

The inspectors general are now appealing to Congress to help them do their jobs uncovering waste, fraud, and mismanagement. 

“Agency actions that limit, condition, or delay access thus have profoundly negative consequences for our work: they make us less effective, encourage other agencies to take similar actions in the future, and erode the morale of the dedicated professionals that make up our staffs,” they wrote. 

The letter to the chairmen and ranking members of relevant oversight committees in the House and Senate claimed agencies are withholding information by calling it “privileged.”

This stonewalling of the work of the IG’s is unprecedented. Unless Congress acts quickly, the actions of this administration will damage our representative republic irreparably.

In three months voters in America will go to the polls. You may love your Congressman, but if he is running interference for a corrupt administration, he needs to be voted out of office. Your freedom depends on it. Please vote carefully.

 

It’s Generally Inconvenient When The Chickens Come Home To Roost

Posted on by

Guy Benson posted an article at Townhall.com today about what is happening to health insurance premiums in Florida due to ObamaCare.

The article reminds us of some of the promises made when ObamaCare was passed:

“We will lower your premiums by $2,500 per family, per year.”

“…save a typical family an average of $2,500 on their healthcare costs…”

“Everybody will have lower rates.”

Well, it just hasn’t worked out that way. There will be an average health insurance rate increase of 13.2 percent for Floridians who buy healthcare insurance on the individual market next year.

Those who supported ObamaCare also told us that ObamaCare would bend the ‘cost curve’ of overall health spending downward. That hasn’t happened either. The projected ten-year cost of ObamaCare has nearly doubled from its original estimated cost. It has followed the path of other government programs over the years–cost more, solve fewer problems.

To add to the mess, the Washington Examiner posted a story yesterday about a government healthcare program started in California as part of the economic stimulus package.

The Washington Examiner reported:

“We need to bundle payments so you aren’t paid for every single treatment you offer a patient with a chronic condition like diabetes, but instead paid well for how you treat the overall disease,” Obama told the crowd of physicians.

Obama was articulating what would become one of the key payment reforms in his health care law — a proposal aimed at giving incentives to providers to control costs by rewarding them for providing less expensive care.

But a study published in the journal Health Affairs looked at an ambitious three-year pilot program of bundled payments in California that was funded by a $2.9 million grant from Obama’s 2009 economic stimulus package — and found that the program was such a massive failure, it could hardly get off the ground.

“In spite of a high level of enthusiasm and effort, the pilot did not succeed in its goal to implement bundled payment for orthopedic procedures across multiple payers and hospital-physician partners,” the study reads. “An evaluation of the pilot documented a number of barriers, such as administrative burden, state regulatory uncertainty, and disagreements about bundle definition and assumption of risk. Ultimately, few contracts were signed, which resulted in insufficient volume to test hypotheses about the impact of bundled payment on quality and costs.”

Can we please get the government out of our healthcare and let the people who actually know something about it run it?

 

Why We Need Informed, Educated Voters

Posted on by

David Limbaugh posted an article today at Townhall.com about President Obama’s continuing claim that the Republicans want to impeach him. Speaker of the House John Boehner has clearly stated that he is not interested in impeaching President Obama, so what is this about? A large part of it is about fund raising for the Democrat party.

On July 28, the Washington Post reported the following:

The Democrats’ congressional campaign arm pulled in $2.1 million in online donations over the weekend — the best four-day haul of the current election cycle — largely propelled by fundraising pitches tied to speculation that House Republicans could pursue the impeachment of President Obama.

That’s part of the story. Another part of the story involves the blatant flaunting of unconstitutional actions in an attempt to goad the Republicans into impeachment. Why impeachment? Because it energizes the far left of the Democrat party base.

David Limbaugh concludes:

So he is not only ratcheting up his rhetoric to accuse Republicans of a plot to impeach him, though House Speaker John Boehner has clearly indicated that is not in the cards, but also trying to force their hand into actually impeaching him. To this end, he is planning on upping the ante by issuing a far-reaching unilateral order granting amnesty to millions.

That’s right. The leader of the Free World is trying to provoke Republicans into impeaching him or otherwise stirring a constitutional crisis.

This is stunningly unprecedented. But more and more people are wising up to his serial abuses of power and his partisan agitation.

I don’t have a great track record as a prognosticator of elections, but I am strongly sensing his party, as a direct result of his policies and lawlessness and its shameless refusal to rein him in, is going to get a titanic comeuppance in November.

America is either going to be a representative republic or a banana republic. Voters in November will make that choice.

 

A Reality Check For Israel’s Left

Posted on by

On Tuesday, Caroline Glick posted an article in the Jerusalem Post about the war between Israel and Hamas. She relates the story of a phone call from President Obama to Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu on Sunday night during an Israeli security cabinet meeting.

The article reports:

But then the telephone rang. And Obama told Netanyahu that Israel must lose. He wants an unconditional “humanitarian” cease-fire that will lead to a permanent one.

And he wants it now.

And by the way, the eventual terms of that cease-fire must include opening Hamas-controlled Gaza’s borders with Egypt and Israel and ending Israel’s maritime blockade of the Gaza coast. That is, the cease-fire must allow Hamas to rebuild its arsenal of death and destruction quickly, with US political and financial support.

Until Obama made the call, there was lingering doubt among some Israelis regarding his intentions. Some thought that US Secretary of State John Kerry might have been acting of his own accord last Friday night when he tried to force Israel to accept Hamas’s cease-fire terms.

But then Obama made his phone call. And all doubts were dispelled.

The request from President Obama did not take into account what would happen if that cease-fire went into effect–Israel would again be defending itself against never ending rocket attacks on civilians and a rebuilding of tunnels that were destroyed. A cease-fire without the destruction of Hamas is an invitation to another war a few years down the road.

The article concludes:

Obama is as involved in the Middle East as all of his immediate predecessors were. He is personally leading US policy on every front. Kerry is not an independent actor.

The problem is that in every war, in every conflict and in every contest of wills that has occurred in the Middle East since Obama took office, he has sided with Iran and the Muslim Brotherhood, against America’s allies.

Under Obama, America has switched sides.

It will be amazing if we have any allies left by the end of the Obama Administration.

 

 

 

Reading Between The Lines

Posted on by

One of the recent ideas to come out of the White House is that Republicans want to impeach President Obama. Admittedly, Sarah Palin has made that statement, but the silence from other Republicans is deafening. There’s a reason for that.

Yesterday John Hinderaker at Power Line posted an article with a picture that tells us everything we want to know about impeaching President Obama.

This is the picture:

ImpeachmentEmail06

Impeachment talk makes great fundraising. It also distracts people from the domestic and foreign failures of President Obama. The biggest mistake the Republicans could make right now would be to attempt to impeach President Obama. Impeachment is probably the only way the Democrat party can be competitive in the mid-term elections.

A Dangerous Executive Order

Posted on by

The Daily Signal posted an article today about President Obama’s latest Executive Order. The President claims that the order will bar federal contractors from practicing “discrimination” on the basis of sexual orientation and gender identity. That sounds good, but there are some problems with it.

The article reports:

Today’s executive order does not contain any religious liberty protections—though it does retain an older federal regulation that permits religious organizations that favor employment of co-religionists to continue such practices. But there is no protection for organizations that hire based on mission—not on affiliation—to continue to do so. This in effect excludes taxpayers who hold conscientious beliefs about sexuality that run counter to Obama’s from being eligible for federal contracts funded with their own tax dollars.

The article also explains the solution for this Executive Order:

In response to this executive order, Congress has an opportunity to protect religious liberty and the rights of conscience. Policy should prohibit the government from discriminating against any individual or group, whether nonprofit or for-profit, based on their beliefs that marriage is the union of a man and woman or that sexual relations are reserved for marriage. The government should be prohibited from discriminating against such groups or individuals in tax policy, employment, licensing, accreditation, or contracting.

The Marriage and Religious Freedom Act—sponsored by Rep. Raul Labrador, R-Idaho, in the House (H.R. 3133) with more than 100 co-sponsors of both parties and sponsored by Sen. Mike Lee, R – Utah, in the Senate (S. 1808) with 17 co-sponsors—would prevent the federal government from taking such adverse actions. Protecting religious liberty and the rights of conscience fosters a more diverse civil sphere. Indeed, tolerance is essential to promoting peaceful coexistence even amid disagreement.

We have always had transgendered people with us. They should be treated with respect. However, people with religious convictions should also be treated with respect. The right of conscience has always been a part of American law–from abortion law to gender issues. The Executive Order President Obama signed today is an affront to the freedom of all Americans–it does not respect their First Amendment right to practice and live according to their religious beliefs. Someone needs to read the U.S. Constitution to all of the people in Washington .

Another Significant ObamaCare Court Case

Posted on by

Yesterday National Review Online posted an article about a current court case that represents a significant threat to ObamaCare. Halbig v. Sebelius (since renamed Halbig v. Burwell, for the current HHS secretary) was argued before a three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit Court in March. The case involves the government subsidies paid by the exchanges included in ObamaCare.

The article states:

If the Supreme Court ultimately finds that the Obama administration violated the law in doling out those subsidies, it could force a wholesale revision of Obamacare. In January, The Hill quoted a key Obamacare supporter as saying that Halbig was “probably the most significant existential threat to the Affordable Care Act.” Jonathan Turley, a noted liberal constitutional-law expert at George Washington Law School, recently agreed, writing in the Los Angeles Times that Halbig “could leave Obamacare on life support.”

…The Halbig plaintiffs — individuals and small businesses in six states that didn’t establish state exchanges — argue that the Obama administration is breaking the law by offering those tax subsidies in all 50 states. The plaintiffs argue that if the subsidies hadn’t been offered in their states, they would have been exempted from the individual-mandate penalties of Obamacare because they couldn’t have afforded to pay for health coverage.

I have no idea how this case will be decided. The writer of the article believes that if the case is decided against ObamaCare it will force Congress and the President to make positive changes in the law (particularly if a Republican Congress is elected).

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit is expected to rule on this case within the next week.

 

When Congress Doesn’t Follow Its Own Laws

Posted on by

Townhall.com posted an article today about the crisis America is experiencing on our southern border.

The article reminds us:

Wouldn’t $3.7 Billion better be used to build a concrete wall across the border of the United States? The fence that the American people were promised when President George W. Bush signed the Secure Fence Act of 2006 saying “This bill will help protect the American people. This bill will make our borders more secure. It is an important step toward immigration reform.”

The Fence Act passed the Senate 80-19 and approved $1.2 billion to be used to build a physical barrier more then 700 miles along the Mexico-United States border.

Theoretically Congress solved the southern border problem in 2006, promising to build a fence that would stop the flood of illegals. Somehow Congress never actually got around to acting on the law it passed.

The article further reports:

In a press conference on Wednesday night, President Obama refused to acknowledge the fact that his “Dream Act,” as well as his 2012 Executive Order of Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals, is what motivated this surge of illegal children. The President continued his normal pass the blame policy, putting the blame on the Republican lead House of Representatives for the problem because they have not passed a comprehensive immigration reform bill.

America is quite capable of closing the southern border. However, there is one thing about this current crisis that I don’t understand. Mexico has very strict laws about who they let into their country. Mexico does not have illegal aliens–they put them in jail or send them home. How is it that all these unaccompanied children are getting into and through Mexico?

Losing The Concept Of Law

Posted on by

One of the problems with the Obama Administration is that the President seems to think he has the right to follow some laws and ignore others. Unfortunately, this idea seems to be working its way through the country.

Yesterday the Washington Times reported that a federal appeals court has ruled that Arizona must issue driver’s licenses to ‘dreamers.’ Dreamers are the young illegal immigrants that President Obama has given tentative permission to be in the country. The ‘dreamers’ are in a difficult position–they were brought here as young children and have lived their lives in America–but they are still illegal immigrants–and we are giving them driver’s licenses. This really sets a bad precedent.

We need to remember that illegal immigrants are not American citizens–they are not entitled to the protections of the U.S. Constitution granted to American citizens. I would not have a problem with setting up a reasonable process to allow dreamers to become citizens, but issuing driver’s licenses to illegals is a really bad idea.

The article reports:

The ruling could bolster Mr. Obama’s desire later this summer to claim executive powers to carve out even more illegal immigrants from the danger of deportation.

The judges said Congress has given the executive branch “broad discretion” to decide whether illegal immigrants are able to live and work in the U.S., and the judges said Arizona was interfering with that ability.

The ruling once again puts Arizona in the center of the immigration debate — a role that the state had played for years but which it seemed to be shedding in recent months as Texas rose to the front — overwhelmed by a new wave of illegal immigrant families and unaccompanied children from Central America.

The Tenth Amendment states:

The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.

The federal appeals court is taking away the right of Arizona to decide to follow the law and not issue driver’s licenses to people who are here illegally.  Not only is that is a state matter–not a federal matter–it is in conflict with existing federal law.

 

Funding The Left Through Saving The Planet

Posted on by

Yesterday John Hinderaker at Power Line posted an article about President Obama’s commitment to clean up the environment.

The article includes two charts that show why the President’s environment policies will not have an impact on CO2 emissions worldwide:

clip_image002_thumb1

clip_image009_thumb

So why is the environment such a high priority for President Obama? As usual, follow the money.

The article explains:

First, the Left has made an enormous investment in promoting misinformation about global warming. You can’t get through elementary school in the U.S. without being hectored about your family’s carbon footprint. (“I will never live in a house bigger than John Edwards’,” my then-third-grade daughter wrote in response to a question about what she, personally, intended to do to change the Earth’s climate.) Those millions of misinformed people are now voters, and Obama is secure in the knowledge that the newspapers and television networks haven’t done anything to educate them.

Second, to the Obama administration, the fact that “green” energy cannot survive without government subsidies and mandates isn’t a bug, it’s a feature. It allows the Democrats to slide billions of dollars to their cronies, like Tom Steyer, the left-wing billionaire who is now the number one financial supporter of the Democratic Party. Steyer made his first fortune by developing coal projects, and is making his second fortune as a Democratic Party crony, developing uneconomic but heavily subsidized “green” energy projects. So the war on coal and other sources of CO2, while it can’t have any impact at all on the climate, has turned into a funding mechanism for the Democratic Party.

Next time someone produces a dictionary and is looking for a definition of the word “cynic,” all he needs is a picture of Barack Obama.

It really isn’t about the environment.

It’s Not A Matter Of Intelligence

Posted on by

On Wednesday, the Center for Security Policy posted an article about the recent offensive in Iraq by State of Iraq and al-Sham (ISIS) terrorists.

The article states:

Some former intelligence officers are blaming this failure on a lack of human intelligence sources in Iraq and an over-reliance on technical intelligence collection.

Congressman Mike Rogers, R-Mich., the chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, disagrees. He says the Iraq crisis is a policy and not an intelligence failure.

Rogers says the signs were there about the ISIS threat and the deteriorating situation in Iraq but Obama officials ignored them. He contends that “It was very clear to me years ago that ISIS was pooling up in a dangerous way — building training camps, drawing in jihadists from around the world. We saw all of that happening.”

 What happened in Iraq was to a large extent the result of the failure of America to leave troops there after we declared the war in Iraq. The troops would not have been as much of a military force as a limiting force against the retribution of the Shiite government against the Sunnis who had previously been in power.

The author of the article, Fred Fleitz writes:

 I believe the crisis in Iraq is a major U.S. policy failure due to the Obama administration’s failure to leave a small troop presence behind after the 2011 troop withdrawal and the repeated tendency by Obama officials to discount and downplay the continuing threat from radical Islamist groups. We saw this in September 2012 when Obama officials claimed the attacks on the U.S. consulate in Benghazi was the result of an anti-Muslim video and not an attack by radical Islamists.

The intelligence oversight committees should review classified analysis on Iraq, Syria, and ISIS produced over the last year to determine whether intelligence agencies failed to provide adequate warning of the ISIS threat. I believe such an inquiry will find that U.S. intelligence analysts provided the Obama administration with excellent analysis about ISIS and the deteriorating situation in Iraq but Obama officials ignored it.

 President Obama’s Middle East policy has been a failure. It is time for him to either listen to the people giving him good advice or find people who will give him good advice.

A Rather Weak Resume´

Posted on by

Victor Davis Hanson posted an article at National Review today which sums up the presidency of Barack Obama. The article is simply entitled, “ Don’t Mess with Messiahs.  Whenever things go wrong, it’s the fault of those obstructionists in Congress.”

The article describes the President’s latest whine:

In Obama’s most recent — and embarrassing — public whine, he lashed out at the once-obsequious press. In his now customary first-person I/me/my/mine lament (e.g., “They don’t do anything, except block me and call me names. . . . If they were more interested in growing the economy for you and the issues that you are talking about instead of trying to mess with me, we would be doing a lot better. . . . The critics, the cynics in Washington, they’ve written me off more times than I can count.”), he lambasted the partisan culture of Washington. He lashed out at the Tea Party, the House Republicans, his opponents in general, and all those who would unreasonably oppose his blanket amnesties, his climate-change taxes and regulations, the shutdown of the Keystone-pipeline project, Obamacare, and $9 trillion in new debt.

Mr. Hanson points out that President Obama acts as though he was not in charge when the VA scandal occurred, the IRS scandal occurred, Benghazi was overrun, and the Middle East imploded. Who, then, is running the show?

As it becomes more obvious that President Obama’s economic policies are not working, he seems inclined to continue them.

The article points out:

…Yet the administration’s reaction seems to be more deficit spending, more zero interest rates, more regulations, more restrictions on new energy development, and more class-warfare rhetoric.

Again, the message seems to be something like, “One way or another we are going to grow government, broaden the progressive base, increase the number of Americans on entitlements, raise taxes, cheapen the value of money, run up deficits, pile up regulations — and let you nitpickers worry about the high unemployment, sinking GDP, and declining household income.” The point is not to find the best way to help ordinary Americans, but to find a way to ram through a progressive economic agenda without much concern over whether it works or makes things worse.

Hang on to your hats–this President does not seem to learn from his mistakes.

The Practical Side Of Economic Policy

Posted on by

I hate to admit this, but I think economics is boring. I understand the basics, but after that I get lost. Yet economics and economic policy have a lot to do with how successful all of us are and how successful the country is. Right now America is not in good economic shape, and economic policies have a lot to do with that fact.

Fox News posted an article on Friday by Peter Morici entitled, “Why I can’t be both an economist and a liberal.” Mr. Morici goes into detail about the effects of some of the economic policies coming out of the Obama Administration.

The article cites an example of the consequences of one Administration policy:

The Congressional Budget Office estimates raising the federal minimum wage to $10.10 an hour, as President Obama proposes, would eliminate 500,000 to 1,000,000 jobs. Businesses will be forced to raise prices, lose customers and lay off employees. Fast food restaurants will begin to use more machines and we’ll see something similar to automated checkout devices at drug stores and supermarkets.

Past increases in the federal minimum wage did not have large impacts on employment, because those were in line with inflation, and businesses adopted strategies expecting such periodic adjustments. The minimum wage was last reset in 2009 and we knew that raising it one dollar to $8.25 to preserve purchasing power would not cost many jobs.

Jumping it up to $10.10 an hour, however, would fundamentally redefine the tradeoffs businesses face regarding unskilled labor and automation. The workers left standing would have more spending power but overall, increasing unemployment by at least 500,000 would take a bite out of GDP and growth from an already anemic economic recovery.

Meanwhile, the Democrats criticize the Republicans for not being willing to raise the minimum raise. Common sense and cause and effect are not mentioned.

The article also mentions the idea that if America would cut its CO2 emissions to curb global warming, China would follow suit.

The article points out:

Liberals argue that by setting a good example the United States can bring China along.

Nonsense! American diplomats have not been able to get Beijing to respond on its undervalued currency or protectionism generally, abandon the use of force to settle territorial disputes in the China seas, or anything else the Chinese Communist Party sees as impairing economic growth or its quest to wrest leadership from the United States on global economic and security issues.

It’s time for those in leadership in America to begin putting the good of the country above the good of their political party or worse, the desire to stay in power. We have created a political class–something never intended by the founders of this country. It is time to limit terms of Senators and Representatives and return to government by the people. A Congressional term should not be a ticket to lifelong wealth.

Protecting Your State From Federal Government Overreach

Posted on by

This week the Supreme Court ruled on President Obama’s recess appointments. This was the first slap on the wrist the President has received when he has overreached his power. There is also a lawsuit coming from Congress regarding his changes to ObamaCare, which were clearly unconstitutional. However, there has generally not been a lot of pushback to President Obama’s power grabs. States that have refused to blindly follow the President on ObamaCare changes to Medicaid or on Common Core have found themselves treated poorly by the Obama White House. It has become obvious to some citizens that states need to protect themselves from unconstitutional actions by the federal government. Now more than ever, we need to follow the Tenth Amendment of the U.S. Constitution.

One concerned citizen has done something about his concern. The following article is posted at the Craven County North Carolina GOP website:

Craven County GOP Leaders visit with Senator Sanderson and Representative Speciale

By Mark Jones on June 23, 2014 in Events

Today, Carl Mischka and I traveled to Raleigh to visit with Senator Norman Sanderson (District 2) and Representative Michael Speciale (District 3). Joining us on the trip were Hal James, Raynor James, Rick Hopkins, and Randy Siler. The group thanked Norm and Michael for their efforts to further the cause of Conservatism in the North Carolina Legislature. We also asked both gentlemen to work hard to pass an effective bill that will end Common Core as we know it in North Carolina. Senate and House Bills about Common Core are currently expected to be debated and possibly combined this very week. It will take efforts in both Chambers of the Legislature to ensure an effective outcome.

We also talked to Senator Sanderson and Representative Speciale about what the Legislature may be able to do to protect North Carolina citizens from unconstitutional Federal executive orders. State Legislatures are the final line of defense between our out-of-control Federal Government and the people. We received commitments from both gentlemen to work with us on this issue between now and the next Legislative Session which begins in January. Let us hope and pray we have until January to do something before more freedoms are lost. More information will be provided on our website as it becomes available.

If anyone wishes to join us in our efforts to defend the Constitution and save America (one county at a time), please contact us for information about how you can help. One person can make a difference.

 

 About Mark Jones

Mark is the current 1st Vice Chairman of the Craven County Republican Party and former Precinct Chair for Epworth. Mark serves as a GOP leader organizing efforts in rural Precincts in western and northern Craven County. Mark believes in personal liberties, personal responsibility, limited Government, and in the U.S. Constitution as the blueprint for everything Government should do.

 

Recess Appointments Can Only Be Made When Congress Is Actually In Recess

Posted on by

USA Today is reporting today that the Supreme Court has ruled that several recess appointments made by President Obama in 2012 were invalid. The ruling against President Obama’s recess appointments was unanimous; however, four of the justices wanted to restrict the President’s power to make recess appointments.

The article reports:

The high court’s ruling means that hundreds of decisions made by the labor board while dominated by Obama’s recess appointees in 2012 and half of 2013 will be called into question. The new five-member board, including four members since approved by the Senate, will have to revisit those cases. Consumer protection chief Richard Cordray has since been confirmed by the Senate, so he can reaffirm his prior actions.

This is the second unanimous Supreme Court decision in two days–yesterday the Court ruled that police required a search warrant to search the information on a suspect’s cell phone.

Manufacturing A Crisis

Posted on by

On Friday I posted a screen capture of an advertisement asking for contractors to transport unaccompanied illegal alien children coming to America (rightwinggranny.com). The humanitarian crisis on our southern border was manufactured by the Obama Administration. Because they manufactured it, the Obama Administration also has the power to stop it. However, as reported in the Daily Caller yesterday, the Obama Administration has given orders to block Border Patrol Agents from doing what is necessary to stem the tide of unaccompanied children coming across the border.

The article reports:

If officials wanted to block the “Dream Deluge” of Central Americans youths, for example, “they would stop releasing them to family members [in the U.S., and] make sure they’re in long-term detention until they could either verify an asylum claim or a claim for persecution,” said Shawn Moran, vice president of the National Border Patrol Council.

Immigration officials could make sure the youths’ parents are legal residents before they transfer the children and youths, and then deport the parents if they’re here illegally, said Moran, whose council serves as a union for border patrol officers.

But Obama’s appointees say “the whole goal of the process is family unification, so we’re not allowed to even ask the legal status of whosoever is picking them up,” he said.

This is another example of President Obama’s philosophy of “the law is whatever I say it is.” That attitude is the mark of a dictatorship–not a republic. Either the press (which isn’t going to) or Congress needs to hold President Obama accountable to his job description–upholding the U.S. Constitution (and the law). This is not a pattern of behavior that can be allowed to continue–our Republic is in danger. President Obama needs to be censured, at least, for his behavior.

I Thought That One Of The Principles Of Our Republic Was The Protection Of Individual Property Rights

Posted on by

As Iraq collapses and President Obama thinks about what to do, his administration has taken action on a truly pressing matter. Today’s Wall Street Journal is reporting that the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office has canceled the trademark of the Washington Redskins.

At the end of last year I moved from Massachusetts to North Carolina. As a result of that move, I became involved with a group of constitutional conservatives. I look at things now in the framework of the U.S. Constitution. Aside from being unconstitutional, this is just tacky.

The Independent Journal Review also posted an article on the subject.

The article in the Independent Journal Review reported:

This is how the Obama administration rolls. Get in a confrontation with the president, and some IRS branch patent office makes trouble for you. That’s how “community organizers” do business. That’s the Chicago Way.

The latest example? After Washington Redskins owner Dan Snyder made it painfully, abundantly clear that he believes their team name is a tribute to their historic legacy and an honorable reflection of the spirit they aim to incorporate, a lowly patent office clerk just went ahead and cancelled their trademarks.

…The timing of this move is pretty convenient for the president and is a classic example of both the distraction politics this administration is good for and the lack of seriousness of his administration.

This is clearly petty revenge served up by a president who has little regard for the law or respect for free speech. Just because you are “offended” by something, doesn’t mean you get to violate other people’s rights. This move is obviously less about the Redskins than it is about the president’s thin skin.

Impeachment will not work because the Senate is controlled by Democrats and there is no political will for it, but I hope enough people realize the damage this administration has done to the rule of law to vote the Democrats out of office and limit the damage that can be done in the next two years.

Do you suppose anyone has the emails to show where this action originated?