Soros Care

By: Ben Johnson

A rising chorus of discontent – more a citizens uprising – shows Middle America’s deep suspicion of President Obama’s health care reform proposal. Average citizens have voiced their disapproval at townhall meetings hosted by Sen. Arlen Specter and HHS Director Kathleen Sebelius, Rep. Lloyd Doggett, Rep. Tim Bishop, and staffers of Sen. Claire McCaskill. In a burst of passion-envy, Chris Matthews asked on Monday night’s Hardball, “Where the Hell are the people who want health care, the poor people out there…the union people? Where are they? I haven’t seen one placard, let alone one protest demonstration, for health care.”

In fact, tens of thousands of people have rallied in the nation’s capital supporting the president’s health care reform plan, including the controversial public option. However, national momentum is not with them, because they are, to use Nancy Pelosi’s phrase, “Astroturf.” These demonstrations were organized by Health Care for America Now! (HCAN), a new “national grassroots campaign of more than 1,000 organizations in 46 states representing 30 million people dedicated to winning quality, affordable health care.” Most of its component organizations have two things in common: they have no experience or expertise in health care, and virtually all received large, tax-exempt grants from far-Left billionaires like George Soros and Teresa Heinz Kerry. Like the “grassroots” movement for campaign finance reform a decade ago, the public demonstrations for health care reform are largely a Soros-financed operation.

Former Governor Howard Dean announced HCAN’s mission on the first night of the annual “America’s Future Now!” conference (formerly the “Take Back America” conference), hosted by the Campaign for America's Future in June. Dean pledged to spend up to $82 million to advance socialized medicine. HCAN rallied 15,000 people in D.C. in April, 10,000 more in June, and with state affiliates like the Maine People’s Alliance, hundreds more in state capitals in July. A searchable database of upcoming spontaneous demonstrations can be found here.

However, a closer look at its members shows it is less a “grassroots” organization than a series of interconnected left-wing pressure groups united by a collectivist ideology and, for most, a common donor.

Among the 21 members of its steering committee are ACORN, MoveOn.org, and the Center for American Progress. CAP, headed by former Clinton chief of staff John Podesta, was created with Soros’ money as a counterweight to the Heritage Foundation. In 2007 alone, Soros’ charity, the Open Society Institute (OSI), gave CAP $1.75 million in 2007 and approved additional grants totaling $1.25 million. Soros personally gave millions to MoveOn.org before the 2004 elections, and he has funded ACORN, the most notorious practitioner of election fraud in the nation.

Dean announced HCAN’s mobilization before the Campaign for America's Future, another institution that has received funding from George Soros and the Rockefeller Family Fund. CAF, an HCAN steering committee member, pushes for national health care as one means to transform the United States into a European social welfare state. Co-founder Robert Borosage previously served as director of the overtly Marxist Institute for Policy Studies, while co-founder Roger Hickey also co-founded the Economic Policy Institute. Other CAF co-founders include socialist columnist Harold Meyerson, Sixties radical Tom Hayden, socialist feminist Barbara Ehrenreich, Service Employees International Union president Andrew Stern, AFL-CIO president John J. Sweeney, Jesse Jackson, and Julian Bond. CAF is best known for hosting its annual “Take Back America” conferences, a gathering of D.C. “progressives” and far-Left community organizers. Code Pink activists famously booed Hillary Clinton after a tour-de-force leftist speech in 2006. An up-and-comer named Barack Obama also spoke at the ’06 event.

Advancing the welfare state by ruse is old hat to the Children's Defense Fund (CDF). The CDF Action Council is a member of the HCAN steering committee. CDF founder Marian Wright Edelman once admitted she got nowhere pushing a left-wing message until “I got the idea that children might be a very effective way to broaden the base for change.” Hiding behind “the children,” her undisguised Sixties radicalism still shines through. In her 1987 book Families in Peril, she wrote, “We must curb the fanatical military weasel.” At the time, the CDF was chaired by one Hillary Rodham Clinton. In addition to Hillary’s patronage, the CDF received a grant of more than $700,000 from the Carnegie Corporation of New York while Teresa Heinz Kerry sat on its board of trustees, and Edelman received the Heinz Award for the “Human Condition” in 1995.

Labor unions are heavily represented on the HCAN steering committee. Members include the SEIU, AFL-CIO, AFSCME, Change to Win (James Hoffa’s breakaway group of seven powerful unions, which includes the SEIU’s Andrew Stern), UAW, the National Education Association, the American Federation of Teachers, Communication Workers of America, and the United Food and Commercial Workers union. Even with the power of compulsory union dues, SEIU received $75,000 from the Open Society Institute in 2007, and AFT was approved for a $150,000 OSI grant.

Other members, such as USAction, are more overtly radical. Its profile on DiscoverTheNetworks.org notes, “The President of USAction is longtime radical activist William McNary, who has written for and supported the official newspaper of the Communist Party USA (CPUSA), the People's Weekly World.” McNary spoke at the June 25^th HCAN rally. USAction receives also funding from Soros’ Open Society Institute.

The radicalism and overlapping nature of the “coalition” is perhaps best illustrated by the Center for Community Change (CCC), an organization founded in 1968 to advance Saul Alinsky-style confrontational politics. The CCC board includes a founder of Students for a Democratic Society; former Congressman and current mayor of Oakland, California, Ron Dellums, an admirer of Fidel Castro; Marian Wright Edelman’s husband, Peter Edelman; La Raza Vice President Cecelia Munoz; and Heather Booth, who founded the Midwest Academy, where the SEIU’s Andrew Stern learned about union organizing. The CCC is financed in part by George Soros’ Open Society Institute, with OSI awarding the group $2.9 million in grants in 2007 alone. Other funding sources include the Carnegie Corporation of New York, the Fannie Mae Foundation, the Ford Foundation, and the Rockefeller Foundation.

Other members of the HCAN “grassroots” include: ....

National Guard asked to explain 'internment' jobs Campaign recruiting for workers at 'civilian resettlement facility'

By Bob Unruh

An ad campaign

featured on a U.S. Army website seeking those who would be interested in being an "Internment/Resettlement" specialist is raising alarms across the country, generating concerns that there is some truth in those theories about domestic detention camps, a roundup of dissidents and a crackdown on "threatening" conservatives.

The ads, at the GoArmy.com website as well as others including Monster.com, cite the need for:

"Internment/Resettlement (I/R) Specialists in the Army are primarily responsible for day-to-day operations in a military confinement/correctional facility or detention/internment facility. I/R Specialists provide rehabilitative, health

, welfare, and security to U.S. military prisoners within a confinement or correctional facility; conduct inspections; prepare written reports; and coordinate activities of prisoners/internees and staff personnel.

The campaign follows by only weeks a report from the U.S. Department of Homeland Security warning about "right-wing extremists" who could pose a danger to the country – including those who support third-party political candidates, oppose abortion and would prefer to have the U.S. immigration laws already on the books enforced. ....

THIS AIN'T NO TEA PARTY Home front getting ugly for recessed Congress Protests, arrests, shouts, tempers … is there a doctor in the house?

By Drew Zahn

At town halls around the country, many flooded by more protesters than event organizers anticipated, lawmakers returning from Washington are finding constituents don't want to listen; they want to be heard.

"Why won't you let the people speak?" shouted one protester in Tampa, Fla., at a public forum where Rep. Cathy Castor, D-Fla., attempted to pitch Obama's health care reform plan to her constituency.

The Tampa protest made national headlines afterward, as dozens of protesters were pushed out the door in a scuffle, some claiming to have received injuries, and the doors were locked to bar their chanting protest: "You work for us!"

Sign the WND petition challenging the Obama administration to stop its attacks on free speech and the nation's health care system.

But even inside the locked doors, many in the crowd didn't want to listen to their legislator's reasons for advocating a federal health care plan.

When Castor tried to tell the crowd that those who currently pay for their own health insurance, either privately or through their employer, would benefit the most from legislation being considered in Washington, she was drowned out by disbelieving citizens.

"Bull----!" shouted protesters inside the room. "No we're not!"

Video of the eruption can be seen below, though the clip does contain flagrant and repeated profanity:

Rep. Steve Kagen, D-Wis., got a raucous earful as well, when hundreds of people inside and outside the Green Bay town hall demanded their representative read thoroughly the health care reform bill, which many people believe is being pushed too quickly through Congress.

On the Fox News Channel, a Wisconsin man who attended the town hall meeting explained he wanted to express the message, "We don't feel that Washington is listening to us."

He told host Bill Hemmer, "The way the Congress has been acting in general lately is in my mind totally unconstitutional. They want to take one of the most important issues in my life, which is health care, they want to say that they are going to reform it but they haven't even read the bill."

"I will continue to exercise my First Amendment rights until this government exhibits some form of willingness to communicate with the people," the guest explained. ....

Democrats: 'Angry mobs' out to 'destroy Obama' Nancy Pelosi rips health care protesters for 'carrying swastikas'

By Chelsea Schilling

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., has accused attendees at health care town hall meetings of carrying swastikas – and the Democratic National Committee is now featuring photos of protesters with swastikas in its new video, claiming "angry mobs" are "seeking to destroy Obama."

In a short clip posted by Fox News' "The O'Reilly Factor," a reporter asked Pelosi, "Do you think there's legitimate grass roots opposition going on here?"

She responded, "I think they are Astroturf … you be the judge," Pelosi answered. "They're carrying swastikas and symbols like that to a town meeting on health care."

Pelosi did not provide specific examples of unruly citizens carrying swastikas to town hall meetings.

However, the Washington Times suggested Pelosi may have been referring to this photo taken

outside the Fort Collins office of Rep. Betsy Markey, D-Colo, last week:

Protester carries sign featuring swastika with a line through it

A woman protesting President Obama's health care "reform" carried a sign featuring a swastika that was circled with red line through it, suggesting her opposition to Nazi-style policies. It also featured a question mark with Obama's name underneath it.

The photo, provided by a reader who is a Democrat, was first featured in a column at the Huffington Post.

Pelosi's office did not respond to requests for comment, but the Washington Post reported one spokesman from her office told the newspaper, "In addition, at another town hall held in Worcester, Massachusetts, Democratic Congressman Jim McGovern, the Telegram reports, 'was likened by an attendee to Josef Mengele, the Nazi officer who performed experiments

on concentration camp survivors.'" ....

Afghans Pin Hopes on Mining As Taliban Attacks Intensify

By DEVON MAYLIE

Afghanistan's mining ministry, emboldened by its first copper tender and undeterred by escalating violence, is inviting more bids in hopes the industry can eventually drive economic growth and help bring security.

The rising number of attacks by Taliban insurgents around the country is already deterring investors with a high resistance to risk. In the latest in a series of incidents in which civilians were victims, roadside bombings in Southern and Western Afghanistan this week have killed at least 15 people. On Thursday, four U.S. service members were killed by a roadside bomb in the West, and five Afghan policemen were killed in the South. ....

White House Struggles to Gauge Afghan Success

This article is by David E. Sanger, Eric Schmitt and Thom Shanker.

WASHINGTON — As the American military comes to full strength in the Afghan buildup, the Obama administration is struggling to come up with a long-promised plan to measure whether the war is being won.

Those “metrics” of success, demanded by Congress and eagerly awaited by the military, are seen as crucial if the president is to convince Capitol Hill and the country that his revamped strategy is working. Without concrete signs of progress, Mr. Obama may lack the political stock — especially among Democrats and his liberal base — to make the case for continuing the military effort or enlarging the American presence.

That problem will become particularly acute if American commanders in Afghanistan seek even more troops for a mission that many of Mr. Obama’s most ardent supporters say remains ill defined and open-ended.

Senior administration officials said that the president’s national security adviser, Gen. James L. Jones, approved a classified policy document on July 17 setting out nine broad objectives for metrics to guide the administration’s policy on Afghanistan and Pakistan. Another month or two is still needed to flesh out the details, according to officials engaged in the work.

General Jones and other top National Security Council aides, including Lt. Gen. Douglas E. Lute, gave an update to top Congressional leaders over recent days.

But as the Bush administration learned the hard way in Iraq, poorly devised measurements can become misleading indicators — and can create a false sense of progress.

That is especially difficult in a war like the one in Afghanistan, in which eliminating corruption, promoting a working democracy and providing effective aid are as critical as scoring military success against insurgents and terrorists.

For instance, some of the measures now being devised by the Obama administration track the size, strength and self-reliance of the Afghan National Army, which the United States has been struggling to train for seven years. They include the number of operations in which Afghan soldiers are in the lead, or the number of Afghan soldiers who have received basic instruction.

White House officials say they are taking the time to get the measurements right.

In some cases, old measurements are being thrown out. Commanders in Afghanistan say they no longer pay much attention to how many enemy fighters are killed in action. Instead, they are trying to count instances in which local citizens cooperate with Afghan and allied forces.

And in drafting a metric important to senior members of Congress, the administration is considering conducting an opinion poll to determine Afghan public perception of official corruption at national, provincial and district levels. This would give insight into how Afghan citizens view police performance at the neighborhood level all the way up to the quality of national political appointments.

But as the architects of similar metrics in Iraq learned, even the best-constructed measures can miss the larger truth.

In 2005 and 2006, for example, the White House was often citing the “rat rate” in Iraq, a measure of good tips from Iraqis about the location of insurgents or the planting of roadside bombs.

“We thought this was a good measure of how well the public was turning against” Al Qaeda and other insurgents, said Peter D. Feaver, a professor at Duke University who served in the National Security Council at the time. “What we discovered was that the rat rate numbers steadily improved over the course of 2006 — and the violence was rising.”

That experience helps to explain why the Obama administration has taken so much time. But some frustrated lawmakers said the delay might prove costly.

“We have been in Afghanistan now for more than seven and a half years,” said Representative Ike Skelton, a Democrat of Missouri and the chairman of the House Armed Services Committee. “These metrics are required to help make the case for the American people that actual progress is being made, or if we need to change the course to another direction. I think that time is not on our side.”

When President Obama unveiled his new strategy for Afghanistan and Pakistan in March, he emphasized the importance of these measures.

“We will set clear metrics to measure progress and hold ourselves accountable,” Mr. Obama said. “We’ll consistently assess our efforts to train Afghan security forces and our progress in combating insurgents. We will measure the growth of Afghanistan’s economy and its illicit narcotics production. And we will review whether we are using the right tools and tactics to make progress towards accomplishing our goals.”

All that now seems unlikely to be completed before his field commanders finish their proposals for carrying out their marching orders. Their recommendations were originally due at the Pentagon within the next two weeks, but Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates issued expanded instructions for the assessment to the commanders last weekend and gave them until September to complete their report.

Skeptical lawmakers have implored Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton, Mr. Gates and Adm. Mike Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, to produce what Mr. Obama promised, and they have made specific recommendations of their own.

“The metrics are critically important to keep everyone’s feet to the fire on this and for the public to know how we’re doing and have some ways to measure it and not have just rhetoric,” said Senator Carl Levin, Democrat of Michigan and chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee.

“We all share the president’s goal of succeeding in Afghanistan,” said Senator John Kerry, Democrat of Massachusetts and chairman of the Foreign Relations Committee. “The challenge here is how we are going to define success in the medium term, given the difficult security environment we face.”

Senior White House officials say their objectives are grouped in three main categories: counterterrorism, Pakistan and Afghanistan.

The counterinsurgency objectives are highly classified and cover a “full range” of efforts to help Pakistan combat the militant threat in its tribal areas.

Others address Pakistan’s ability to maintain and strengthen democratically elected civilian government; the country’s ability to confront and defeat an internal insurgent threat; and international support for Pakistan, including international donors, the United Nations and the World Bank.

In Afghanistan, they would assess suppression of the insurgency; building and strengthening Afghan security forces; shoring up support for the government and reviving the economy; and garnering support from NATO, the European Union, the United Nations and international donors.

U.S. Top Spy's Curious Committee Report

By Jeff Stein

When Steven Aftergood read Adm. Dennis C. Blair's written responses to a Senate Intelligence Committee questionnaire the other day, something looked familiar.

And indeed, it was.

The Director of National Intelligence (ODNI), had given the committee a statement about Russian attacks on American spy satellites that "was simply lifted, almost word for word," from a Moscow newspaper, Aftergood reported Thursday in Secrecy News, the must-read newsletter he's edited for many years.

"The DNI repeated the Nezavisimaya Gazeta item nearly verbatim, presenting it as an established fact, with no attribution at all," Aftergood wrote.

But was it plagiarism?

Blair's spokesman heatedly rejected the allegation.

You be the judge:

Blair - or most certainly an aide -- wrote over his signature:

"In 2003, the Russian military prepared for an exercise that included attacking U.S. satellites to disrupt the NAVSTAR global positioning system, the Keyhole optical-electronic reconnaissance satellites, and the Lacrosse radar reconnaissance system with the intent of 'blinding' the Pentagon and denying it the opportunity to use precision weapons against Russia."

Nezavisimaya Gazeta reported on May 14, 2003, that the Russian military was preparing exercises that would include:

"destroying the US satellite group in order to neutralize the NAVSTAR global navigation system, the Keyhole optoelectronic intelligence satellites, and the Lacross radio-locating intelligence satellites. Under actual conditions of a war this would 'blind" the Pentagon and does not let the US use high-precision weapons against Russian military groups."

But what made Aftergood suspicious about Blair's statement?

"The giveaway," he told me later in an e-mail, "was the use of the (obsolete) terms Keyhole and Lacrosse, which are not normally mentioned in public by intelligence officials. In fact, the term Lacrosse is nominally still classified."

As it turned out, the online Newsmax news service had picked up on the Russian report back in 2003. The DNI did not cite that, either.

Aftergood was even more nonplussed that Blair's office seemed to have lifted the material and presented it to the Senate Intelligence Committee as a fact - without any independent corroboration.

"The Russian story lazily attributed its claim regarding the anti-satellite exercise to 'certain reports,'" Aftergood wrote.

Blair's statement didn't cite any sources whatsoever.

"I wouldn't call it plagiarism exactly, but I wouldn't call it intelligence either!" Aftergood joked in an e-mail.

But he was willing to give Blair's crew a bit of a break.

"A reporter colleague, whom I will leave unnamed," he said, "contacted ODNI for further background on the Russian anti-satellite exercise, and ODNI to its credit dug up the Russian article. So they weren't trying to hide their sources."

"But left unexplained," he added, "is how an anecdotal Russian news account could be presented to Congress as the authoritative view of the U.S. intelligence community."

Blair spokesman Michael G. Birmingham objected to Aftergood's characterization of the similar language.

None of the items Blair provided to the committee cited sources, he said.

As for the Russian anti-satellite exercise, Birmingham maintained that Nezavisimaya Gazeta was not the DNI's only source of information on the issue.

"We're not going to provide classified information in an unclassified document," he said in a brief interview late Thursday night.

Birmingham also said there was ample, additional open-source information about the Russian anti-satellite exercise elsewhere.

The principle source he cited, however, a report by the Nuclear Threat Initiative (NTI) had none of the specificity regarding Russian anti-satellite exercises that Blair used in his committee presentation.

"NTI doesn't mention any satellites by name but it mentions the exercise and the intent of the exercise," Birmingham responded. "And it cites multiple sources."

The relevant paragraph, he said, was this one:

"Russian ships in the Arabian Sea (the group consisted of nine ships from the Pacific and Black Sea Fleets) simulated a search-and-destroy mission vis-à-vis American Los Angeles class SSNs and launched sea-based cruise missiles. Simultaneously, strategic submarines from the Northern and the Pacific fleets conducted SLBM launches while Russian Space Forces simulated disruption of U.S. satellite communications."

Lieberman Urges Holder Against Investigating Interrogation Techniques

By Emily Pierce

Sen. Joe Lieberman (ID-Conn.) on Wednesday discouraged Attorney General Eric Holder from initiating any investigation of how suspected terrorists were treated at the hands of American intelligence agents and contractors. ....

Obama: A modern day Roman plebeian tyrant

(American Thinker) Barack Obama: Plebeian politician to senator to dictator wannabe. The USA – republic, to democratic dictatorship, then despotism. It not only can happen, but will, unless ...

Fear or Loathing: Democrats Raise Specter of Swastikas to Cancel Town Halls

Democrats and the White House say the rowdy health care protests in the country are largely orchestrated from afar by insurers, lobbyists, Republican Party activists and others -- but Republicans deny any role in organizing them.....

SEIU’s new attack video on “Teabaggers”

By Michelle Malkin

Forced union dues at work: SEIU has just posted a new video attacking “Teabaggers” and — snort — decrying violence:

You know the truth.

Obama’s SEIU “brothers and sisters” can’t handle the truth.

***

The St. Louis Tea Party will hold a protest at the local SEIU headquarters on 8/8. More info here.

Watch Missouri Rep. Russ Carnahan squirm when confronted by talk show host Jamie Allman about the SEIU thuggery.

Voice of Taliban on VOA probed

Complaints that the U.S. government's Voice of America (VOA) interviewed a top Pakistani Taliban leader have sparked an investigation into VOA's Pashto language service to determine if it has allowed itself to become a platform for terrorist propaganda.

In a letter obtained by The Washington Times, the State Department's acting inspector general, Harold Geisel, said his office will conduct a review "to determine the effectiveness of their broadcast and editorial practices and policies." The service broadcasts into the Afghanistan-Pakistan border region that serves as a refuge for al Qaeda and the Taliban. ....

Blueprint for New World Order

(Compiler's note: Click on the title above for the full and troubling analysis discussed below. Click here for the full Foreign Policy Magazine.)

If you want to know what the globalist elite really have in mind for us, you should keep your eye on Foreign Policy Magazine, as I do.

The May-June issue is nothing short of a blueprint for where the powers that be plan to take us – and it ain't pretty. ....

White House 'dialogue' site scrubbed of eligibility posts Many Obama birth certificate queries yanked from 'transparency' debate

With more than 200 individual threads and thousands of comments on the eligibility issue alone, moderators of the White House website on "open government dialogue" have been working tirelessly to edit the dialogue about Barack Obama's elusive "long-form" birth certificate. ....

The Emergence of President Obama's Muslim Roots

ABC News' Jake Tapper and Sunlen Miller report: The other day we heard a comment from a White House aide that never would have been uttered during the primaries or general election campaign.

During a conference call in preparation for President Obama's trip to Cairo, Egypt, where he will address the Muslim world, deputy National Security Adviser for Strategic Communications Denis McDonough said "the President himself experienced Islam on three continents before he was able to -- or before he's been able to visit, really, the heart of the Islamic world -- you know, growing up in Indonesia, having a Muslim father -- obviously Muslim Americans (are) a key part of Illinois and Chicago." ....

FBI Eyes Charity Linked To Rep. Murtha

CBS News has learned the FBI is investigating a little-known not-for-profit organization called Commonwealth Research Institute. It's located, like a lot of Rep. John Murtha's, D-Penn., pet projects, in his hometown, Johnstown, Penn.

Commonwealth gets the same benefits as the Salvation Army or any other charity: It doesn't have to pay taxes. But its line of work may be surprising. It's a defense contractor. ....

For the biggest hint as to what Commonwealth is all about, it may help to know something about its parent company, Concurrent Technologies (Corporation - CTC). Concurrent is another defense contractor in Johnstown, also registered as a charity at the same address. And, with the help of Murtha and The PMA Group, a lobby firm that's also under FBI investigation, Concurrent has gotten a billion dollars-plus in defense contracts and earmarks.

Concurrent employees have also given Murtha’s campaign over $95,000 in donations since 2002.

....At last week's annual defense trade show in Johnstown, Pennsylvania, an Associated Press reporter asked Murtha about another local defense contractor also under investigation, Kuchera Industries. Kuchera was just suspended from getting any new contracts with the U.S. Navy. A Navy spokesperson cited the reason for the suspension as "alleged fraud." CBS News affiliate WTAJ in Altoona captured the exchange.

The Geography of Recession

(Compiler's note: A fascinating analysis -- I recommend reading the entire article. Please click on the title of this article.)

By Peter Zeihan

The global recession is the biggest development in the global system in the year to date. In the United States, it has become almost dogma that the recession is the worst since the Great Depression. But this is only one of a wealth of misperceptions about whom the downturn is hurting most, and why.

Let’s begin with some simple numbers.

As one can see in the chart, the U.S. recession at this point is only the worst since 1982, not the 1930s, and it pales in comparison to what is occurring in the rest of the world. (Figures for China have not been included, in part because of the unreliability of Chinese statistics, but also because the country’s financial system is so radically different from the rest of the world as to make such comparisons misleading. For more, read the China section below.)

But didn’t the recession begin in the United States? That it did, but the American system is far more stable, durable and flexible than most of the other global economies, in large part thanks to the country’s geography. To understand how place shapes economics, we need to take a giant step back from the gloom and doom of the current moment and examine the long-term picture of why different regions follow different economic paths. ....

How The Obama DOJ Decision In Georgia Will Aid ACORN And Fraudulent Elections

(Compiler's note: My fear is that this will be just the first of many such incidents. Absolutely must read this full article by clicking on the title above. This leaves no doubt that we are under attack -- and this one is coming from those within our own borders from those who do not respect our U.S. Constitution.)

by Ms Placed Democrat

Obama DOJ Decision Will Allow Non-Citizens to Register to Vote in Georgia…aiding ACORN in their efforts to register fraudulent voters. ACORN will now be allowed to bus illegal aliens to register to vote in the state of Georgia. ....

Decision Bars Georgia From Continuing Voter Verification Process

Georgia Secretary of State Karen Handel issued the following statement following the U.S. Department of Justice’s denial of preclearance of Georgia’s voter verification process

Atlanta - “The decision by the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) to deny preclearance of Georgia’s already implemented citizenship verification process shows a shocking disregard for the integrity of our elections. With this decision, DOJ has now barred Georgia from continuing the citizenship verification program that DOJ lawyers helped to craft. DOJ’s decision also nullifies the orders of two federal courts directing Georgia to implement the procedure for the 2008 general election. The decision comes seven months after Georgia requested an expedited review of the preclearance submission.

“DOJ has thrown open the door for activist organizations such as ACORN to register non-citizens to vote in Georgia’s elections, and the state has no ability to verify an applicant’s citizenship status or whether the individual even exists. DOJ completely disregarded Georgia’s obvious and direct interest in preventing non-citizens from voting, instead siding with the ACLU and MALDEF. Clearly, politics took priority over common sense and good public policy.

“This process is critical to protecting the integrity of our elections. We have evidence that non-citizens have voted in past Georgia elections and that more than 2,100 individuals have attempted to register, yet still have questions regarding their citizenship. Further, the Inspector General’s office is investigating more than 30 cases of non-citizens casting ballots in Georgia elections, including the case of a Henry County non-citizen who registered to vote and cast ballots in 2004 and 2006. ....

AIR FRANCE 447 ANALYSIS

(Compiler's note: For those looking for the Air France 447 writeup it can be found by clicking on the title above. A most interesting analysis of what had to have been an extremely terrifying event for those aboard the downed aircraft.)

by Tim Vasquez

.... The satellite imagery indicates that numerous cumulonimbus towers were rising to at least 51,000 ft, and were embedded in extensive stratiform anvils with tops of 35,000 to 45,000 ft. This kind of configuration is actually quite normal for equatorial storms due to the higher tropopause height, but it emphasizes that the aircraft was certainly within the bulk of an extensive cumulonimbus cloud field for a significant amount of time and that storms could indeed have been a contributing factor to the crash. ....

.... Overall what we know for sure is weather was a factor and the flight definitely crossed through a thunderstorm complex. There is a definite correlation of weather with the crash. However the analysis indicates that the weather is not anything particularly exceptional in terms of instability or storm structure. It's my opinion that tropical storm complexes identical to this one have probably been crossed hundreds of times over the years by other flights without serious incident.

Still, in the main MCS alone, the A330 would have been flying through significant turbulence and thunderstorm activity for about 75 miles (125 km), lasting about 12 minutes of flight time. Of course anything so far is speculation until more evidence comes in, and for all we know the cause of the downing could have been anything from turbulence to coincidental problems like a cargo fire.

My own opinion of the crash cause, as of Monday night, based on the complete lack of a HF radio call and consideration of all of the above, suggests severe turbulence (see the BOAC 911 and BNF 250 tragedies) combining in some unlikely way with CRM/design/maintenance/procedural/other deficiencies to trigger a failure cascade. We can almost certainly count on some unexpected surprises once the CVR is recovered. Until then, all we can do is await the investigation and hope that the world's flight operations stay safe until AFR447's lessons are revealed.

Justice Denies the Uighurs … For Now The Supreme Court cannot release them here, but what about the president?

(Compiler's note: It is a long, but must read article. So click on the title above and read the original article. We are going to hear more of this.)

By Andrew C. McCarthy

Courts ought to butt out of how the administration disposes of detainees at Guantanamo Bay. They are not defendants; they are held “as enemies under the laws of war.” And besides, as the Supreme Court held after World War II, it “is inherent in the executive power to control the foreign affairs of the nation.”

What about the Geneva Conventions, you say? Forget it: They don’t create any enforceable rights for these detainees, and federal judges have no business entertaining claims based on them — including claims rooted in the Conventions’ Common Article 3, which has no bearing on this situation. And don’t tell us about how U.S. statutory law might help the detainees. Gitmo is part of Cuba; it’s not sovereign U.S. territory. The judicial power to enforce U.S. law “does not have extraterritorial application and therefore does not apply to petitioners at Guantanamo Bay.” There is, moreover, nothing in the U.S. Constitution that entitles these aliens to relief — on that, a conservative-leaning panel of the D.C. Circuit had it just right when it reversed that bleeding-heart, Clinton-appointed district judge.

Sound familiar? You must figure I’ve dusted off a copy of Dick Cheney Does the Imperial Presidency — or maybe that I’m reading from some relic those Constitution-shredders in the Bush Justice Department left behind.

I am actually reading from the brief submitted to the Supreme Court last week by Pres. Barack Obama’s Justice Department. As the DOJ announced, in what’s becoming its weekly contribution to the Friday Night Embarrassing News Dump, the brief sets forth the administration’s opposition to the Uighurs, Chinese nationals held at Gitmo who are claiming a right to be released in the United States. .....

.... Justice does not make a single reference to Section 1182(a)(3). That’s the provision in which Congress bars from admission any alien who has been affiliated with a terrorist organization or has had terrorist paramilitary training. In this litigation, that would be checkmate, so why not invoke it? Very simply: Because while Section 1182(f) is a limitation on the power of the court, Section 1182(a)(3) is a limitation on the power of Obama. The administration does not want to acknowledge any such limitations — doubtless because, as the brief asserts, “the Executive” is still “encouraging other countries to participate in resettlement efforts.”

Neither the Supreme Court nor Congress is going to like this game. The administration is telling the justices that Congress has rendered them powerless to order the Uighurs’ release in the United States, yet DOJ refuses to acknowledge that Congress has also rendered the president powerless to release them here. Obviously, the administration is engaging in this sleight of hand because President Obama still intends to resettle at least some of these trained terrorists in the United States. Inspiring other countries to be reciprocally suicidal is Obama’s only real chance to honor his reckless commitment to close Gitmo by January.

Somebody on Capitol Hill should ask Attorney General Holder why his department held back from making its best argument to the Supreme Court.

Reporter To Gibbs: How Much Was The President's Tax-Funded Date Night?

Islam and Muslims: History of Oppression, Violence, and Fanaticism

Dr. Sami Alrabaa

Have you ever pondered what has been the contribution of Islam and Muslims to the world civilization until now? The answer is very evident and straightforward: oppression, violence, discrimination, and fanaticism. These negative immoral values have been an essential part of Islam since its inception.

Here is the evidence. Muhammad, the leader of Muslims claimed that he was a “prophet,” and in the name Allah, he ordered his followers to kill the “infidels,” non-Muslims; in particular, Jews and Christians.

While Judaism and Christianity were spread peacefully under sacrifices by followers of Moses and Jesus

, Islam was spread under the threat of the sword: “Submit to Islam, otherwise you’ll be killed.” Islam considers non-Muslims the enemies of Allah. For more details, check out Understanding Muhammad by Ali Sina.

Also in the name of Allah, Muhammad urged his followers to conquer the world and force its people to convert into Muslims. Muslims call all this “Futuhat” (opening). The Muslim conquest was bloodier much worse than “colonialism.” The British and French colonialists never forced people to renounce their local faiths. For further details, check out Islamic Jihad by M.A. Khan.

After Muhammad’s death, four of his staunchly contemporary followers took over, called the Caliphs, or “Al Khulafa’ Al Rashidun” (the rightly guided successors) as Muslims prefer to call them. Abu Bakr, Omar, Othman, and Ali, all of them were murdered by fellow Muslims in bitter fights for the leadership of the rising Muslim empire. ....

North Korea's Kim moves to anoint youngest son as heir

SEOUL - North Korean leader Kim Jong-il has told top officials to pledge loyalty to his youngest son, signaling his anointment as heir to the family dynasty that has ruled since the state's founding, a lawmaker and South Korean media said on Tuesday.

Romney to Obama: Stop Apologizing to America's Critics

WASHINGTON -- Republican Mitt Romney, seen as a likely contender for the White House in 2012, scolded President Obama on Monday for apologizing to America's critics in the global arena. ....

U.S. census sparks feud over the counting of illegal immigrants

In a high-stakes battle that could affect California's share of federal funding and political representation, immigrant activists are vowing to combat efforts by a national Latino clergy group to persuade 1 million illegal immigrants to boycott the 2010 U.S. census. ....

Chinese students laugh at Geithner

.... "Chinese assets are very safe," Geithner said in response to a question after a speech at Peking University, where he studied Chinese as a student in the 1980s.

His answer drew loud laughter from his student audience, reflecting scepticism in China about the wisdom of a developing country accumulating a vast stockpile of foreign reserves instead of spending the money to raise living standards at home. .....

Soldiers shot by Muslim convert

(KATV-TV, Little Rock) At a briefing this afternoon, Little Rock police chief Stuart Thomas identified the suspect as Abdul Hakim Mujahid Muhammad, 24, of Little Rock ....

Don't mess with Savage! U.K. home secretary quits

(WorldNetDaily.com) In the wake of scandal over personal use of taxpayer funds and her controversial ban of talk-radio host Michael Savage, British Home Secretary Jacqui Smith will resign ...

Arpaio Goes Head-to-Head with Feds

by Fox News

The Feds are investigating Sheriff Joe Arpaio for possible civil rights violations, and Monday, the Sheriff announced he's going to put the Obama administration under the microscope.

Sheriff Joe Arpaio is asking the Justice Department to investigate the Obama administration -- specifically the Department of Homeland Security, which is led by former Arizona governor, Janet Napolitano.

Arpaio believes he's being unfairly targeted. The sheriff's attorney delivered an 8-page letter to the head of the Justice department, saying the investigation into his department's practices stems from a political agenda and lawyers acting improperly.

The letter details the events surrounding a routine March audit by Homeland Security with senior MCSO officials. No lawyers were present -- and the sheriff says that auditors then shared their information with Civil Rights Division attorneys.

"We are defending ourselves. I'm defending our office, my constitutional authority to enforce all the laws," said Arpaio.

The sheriff called the interaction between the Department of Justice and Homeland Security an orchestrated scheme to acquire documents and testimony. ....

Poll: Most Oppose Closing Gitmo

by USAToday

Americans are overwhelmingly opposed to closing the detention center for suspected terrorists at Guantanamo Bay and moving some of the detainees to prisons on US soil, a USA TODAY/Gallup Poll finds.

By more than 2-1, those surveyed say Guantanamo shouldn't be closed. By more than 3-1, they oppose moving some of the accused terrorists housed there to prisons in their own states.

The findings underscore the difficult task President Obama faces in convincing those at home that he should follow through on his campaign promise to close the prison in Cuba, especially in the absence of a plan of where the prisoners would go.

In many parts of the world, however, Gitmo has become a symbol of US arrogance and abuse, and Obama has cited its closure as a way to lay the foundation for better relations. He is scheduled to deliver a major address aimed at the Muslim world on Thursday from Cairo.

It is one of the few subjects on which most Americans side with the views of the Bush administration over its successor.

"Coming up on eight years after Sept. 11, fear remains, and fear is politically potent," says political scientist Paul Freedman of the University of Virginia, who studies public opinion. "When it comes to the issue of terrorism … people are inclined to err on the side of that fear." ....

Pakistani Cleric Suspected in Deadly Indian Attack Ordered Freed

by LA Times

A court in Lahore, Pakistan, today ordered the release of a firebrand Islamic cleric with alleged links to the deadly attacks in Mumbai, India, last year, sparking an angry rebuke from Indian officials that Pakistan is not committed to meting out justice to militants.

Hafiz Saeed, head of a charity that international organizations have said is tied to the militant group Lashkar-e-Taiba, which Saeed founded, had been held under house arrest, though he had not been publicly charged or indicted.

Lashkar-e-Taiba has been blamed for engineering and carrying out the attacks on Mumbai, India's commercial capital, that killed 166 people last November.

The United Nations regarded Saeed's charity, Jamaat ud-Dawa, as a front for Lashkar-e-Taiba, which was formed 20 years ago to fight Indian rule in the Himalayan region of Kashmir. Many believe that Pakistan's Inter-Services Intelligence agency played a critical role in the group's formation.

The order to free Saeed drew a harsh response from the Indian government.

"We are unhappy that Pakistan has not shown the degree of seriousness and commitment it should have to bring to justice the perpetrators of the Mumbai attacks," Indian Home Minister P. Chidambaram told reporters. ....

Obama says Iran's energy concerns legitimate

LONDON -- President Barack Obama reiterated that Iran may have some right to nuclear energy _ provided it takes steps to prove its aspirations are peaceful.

In a BBC interview broadcast Tuesday, Obama also restated plans to pursue direct diplomacy with Tehran to encourage it to set aside any ambitions for nuclear weapons it might harbor. ....

Arkansas jihad killer went to Yemen seeking to study with jihadist imam

from Jihad Watch

A well-placed source has told me that Abdulhakim Mujahid Muhammad, who shot one soldier and wounded another at an Arkansas military recruiting station yesterday, went to Yemen hoping to study with a jihadist imam, Yahya Hajoori. I haven't yet been able to find out know if he actually studied directly with Hajoori, or with one of his students.

Remember that in August 2008, six Americans were arrested in Yemen. They attended a mosque in Germantown, Pennsylvania that sponsored "students" to go to Yemen to study with the jihadist Sheikh Muqbil -- and after he passed away, with Yahya Hajoori. This was the mosque attended by Howard Cain, the bank robber and killer of Police Officer Stephen Liczbinski.

More exclusive information here.