Obama And The Political Dept of Justice

While perusing PEBO’s website, I was excited to see another ‘position’  that Barack Obama and I agree on, getting political motivations out of the Dept of Justice. Frankly, it was encouraging to me that he admits to seeing it. Especially now with U.S. Attorney Patrick (Scooter Libby) Fitzgerald as Special Prosecutor  investigating llinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich, detailed in this post on Dec. 10.

Q: “What will you do as President to restore the Constitutional protections that have been subverted by the Bush Administration and how will you ensure that our system of checks and balances is renewed?” Kari, Seattle

A: President-elect Obama is deeply committed to restoring the rule of law and respecting constitutional checks and balances.That is why he has pledged to review Bush Administration executive orders. President-elect Obama will also end the abuse of signing statements, and put an end to the politicization that has taken place within the Department of Justice and return that agency to its historic and apolitical mission of fair and impartial administration of justice.

(emphasis added)

Does this mean we can expect to see Barack Obama take it to Fitzgerald? Oh well, maybe I’m not on the same page with Barack on this.

related links: change.gov: Open for Questions:Response | Patrick Fitzgerald, Still The Prosecutor’s Prosecutor?

Card Check, Intimidation?

Here’s an interesting take, and proposal on ‘Card Check,’ the quid pro quo of Democrats for labor unions.

Let the unions have their “card check” provision–allowing them to substitute publicly-collected, signed cards saying “we want a union” for a secret ballot vote. If the union gets 51% of the employees to sign the cards, it gets recognized. But let the employer also collect cards from employees who don’t want a union. If the employer gets 51% the union has to go away for five years. You’d hear soon enough about how collecting cards in public is unfair, opening the door to pressure tactics, intimidation, etc.. …

links: Kausfiles | Employee Free Choice Act Is Democrats’ Quid Pro Quo

Merry Kwanzaa, A Little History

Is it just me, or does Kwanzaa seem to come earlier and earlier each year?

This year, I believe my triumph over this synthetic holiday is nearly complete. The only mentions of Kwanzaa I’ve seen are humorous ones. Most important, for the first time in eight years, President George Bush appears not to have issued “Kwanzaa greetings” to honor this phony non-Christian holiday that is younger than I am.

It is a fact that Kwanzaa was invented in 1966 by a black radical FBI stooge, Ron Karenga, aka Dr. Maulana Karenga. Karenga was a founder of United Slaves, a violent nationalist rival to the Black Panthers and a dupe of the FBI.

In what was probably ultimately a foolish gamble, during the madness of the ’60s the FBI encouraged the most extreme black nationalist organizations in order to discredit and split the left. The more preposterous the organization, the better. Using that criterion, Karenga’s United Slaves was perfect. In the annals of the American ’60s, Karenga was the Father Gapon, stooge of the czarist police.

Despite modern perceptions that blend all the black activists of the ’60s, the Black Panthers did not hate whites. They did not seek armed revolution. Those were the precepts of Karenga’s United Slaves. United Slaves were proto-fascists, walking around in dashikis, gunning down Black Panthers and adopting invented “African” names. (That was a big help to the black community: How many boys named “Jamal” currently sit on death row?)

Whether Karenga was a willing dupe, or just a dupe, remains unclear. Curiously, in a 1995 interview with Ethnic NewsWatch, Karenga matter-of-factly explained that the forces out to get O.J. Simpson for the “framed” murder of two whites included: “the FBI, the CIA, the State Department, Interpol, the Chicago Police Department” and so on. Karenga should know about FBI infiltration. (He further noted that the evidence against O.J. “was not strong enough to prohibit or eliminate unreasonable doubt” — an interesting standard of proof.)

In the category of the-gentleman-doth-protest-too-much, back in the ’70s, Karenga was quick to criticize rumors that black radicals were government-supported. When Nigerian newspapers claimed that some American black radicals were CIA operatives, Karenga publicly denounced the idea, saying, “Africans must stop generalizing about the loyalties and motives of Afro-Americans, including the widespread suspicion of black Americans being CIA agents.”

Now we know that the FBI fueled the bloody rivalry between the Panthers and United Slaves. In one barbarous outburst, Karenga’s United Slaves shot to death Black Panthers Al “Bunchy” Carter and Deputy Minister John Huggins on the UCLA campus. Karenga himself served time, a useful stepping-stone for his current position as a black studies professor at California State University at Long Beach.

(Sing to “Jingle Bells”)
Kwanzaa bells, dashikis sell
Whitey has to pay;
Burning, shooting, oh what fun
On this made-up holiday!

Kwanzaa itself is a nutty blend of schmaltzy ’60s rhetoric, black racism and Marxism. Indeed, the seven “principles” of Kwanzaa praise collectivism in every possible arena of life — economics, work, personality, even litter removal. (“Kuumba: Everyone should strive to improve the community and make it more beautiful.”) It takes a village to raise a police snitch.

When Karenga was asked to distinguish Kawaida, the philosophy underlying Kwanzaa, from “classical Marxism,” he essentially explained that under Kawaida, we also hate whites. While taking the “best of early Chinese and Cuban socialism” — which one assumes would exclude the forced abortions, imprisonment of homosexuals and forced labor — Kawaida practitioners believe one’s racial identity “determines life conditions, life chances and self-understanding.” There’s an inclusive philosophy for you.

Coincidentally, the seven principles of Kwanzaa are the very same seven principles of the Symbionese Liberation Army, another charming invention of the Worst Generation. In 1974, Patricia Hearst, kidnap victim-cum-SLA revolutionary, posed next to the banner of her alleged captors, a seven-headed cobra. Each snake head stood for one of the SLA’s revolutionary principles: Umoja, Kujichagulia, Ujima, Ujamaa, Nia, Kuumba and Imani – the exact same seven “principles” of Kwanzaa.

Kwanzaa was the result of a ’60s psychosis grafted onto the black community. Liberals have become so mesmerized by multicultural nonsense that they have forgotten the real history of Kwanzaa and Karenga’s United Slaves — the violence, the Marxism, the insanity. Most absurdly, for leftists anyway, is that they have forgotten the FBI’s tacit encouragement of this murderous black nationalist cult founded by the father of Kwanzaa.

This is a holiday for white liberals — the kind of holiday Bill Ayers and Bernardine Dohrn probably celebrate. Meanwhile, most blacks celebrate Christmas.

Kwanzaa liberates no one; Christianity liberates everyone, proclaiming that we are all equal before God. “There is neither Jew nor Greek, slave nor free, male nor female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus” (Galatians 3:28). Not surprisingly, it was practitioners of that faith who were at the forefront of the abolitionist and civil rights movements.

Next year this time, we’ll find out if our new “Halfrican” president is really black or just another white liberal. If he’s black enough to say the “brothers should pull up their pants,” surely Obama can just say no to Kwanzaa.

Ann Coulter, Dec. 24, 2008

What, surely you didn’t think that was my writing. Well said as only Ann Coulter can.

An Open Letter to the President, the Congress, and the American people

Below is an open letter to the President, the Congress, and the American people concerning reform of the Federal Tax Code from economists and educators in the United States. For those unfamiliar with The Fair Tax, this letter will give you a good overview of it. The letter can also be found at FairTax.org. Please share it with others.

Continue reading An Open Letter to the President, the Congress, and the American people

Putin's Russia Beats Down Freedom

Starting with an AP report of civil unrest and peaceful protests, and Russian riot police reacting by beating and kicking protesters and journalists, and ending with no mention of or comment from either Russia’s President, Dmitry Medvedev, or Russia’s Prime Minister, Vladimir Putin, the story of what looks like Russia’s biggest problem, freedom, is being minimized while Russia’s Navy in the Western hemisphere takes center stage.

Riot police clubbed, kicked and detained dozens of people who gathered at a holiday celebration in Russia’s Far East Sunday as hundreds protested across the country over a hike in car import tariffs.

Rising unemployment and a sharp slide in the ruble have driven discontent across Russia and the Kremlin fears the deteriorating economic situation could lead to public unrest.

With domestic car production suffering, the government this month announced higher import tariffs on automobiles, prompting several protests. The demonstrations have been most vehement in Vladivostok, Russia’s largest Pacific port, where nearly all private cars are imported from Japan.

Hundreds rallied in the city Saturday for the second weekend in a row and demonstrators hoped to rally again on Sunday.

But authorities refused to authorize the demonstration and hundreds of riot police blocked off the city square where it was planned.

Soon after, some 500 people gathered around a traditional Russian New Year’s tree on Vladivostok’s main square, singing songs and dancing. It was unclear how many were thwarted demonstrators, and there were no placards or signs of political protest, but riot police demanded that people disperse.

Putin’s idea of progress is to return to the 20th century Soviet Union. Raising protectionist tariffs, squelching public dissent, silencing political opponents, and controlling the press, hallmarks of Khrushchev and Gorbachev, is the direction that the ‘new’ Russia is headed.

An Associated Press reporter watched as several people who resisted were beaten with truncheons, thrown to the ground and kicked. Several parents were detained as their children watched.

“Riot police encircled the group … even those just passing by, and they started taking people away without any sort of comment,” said Olga Nikolaevna, a 62-year-old pensioner who witnessed the incident.

An AP reporter saw at least 10 journalists detained by police, who demanded several turn over videotapes and photo memory chips and wrecked a Japanese TV crew’s video camera. Some journalists were beaten and kicked, including an AP photographer. National TV channels, which are state-controlled, ignored the demonstrations.

The Kremlin has sidelined political opponents and put tight controls over civil society and the media, rolling back many post-Soviet freedoms.

For Putin, this is a case of history repeating itself. He seems hell-bent on resisting freedom, like Gorbachev did, instead of embracing it. Boris Yeltsin embraced it, and won.  Putin and his puppet president fear freedom and the power and prosperity that freedom and a free-market economy can deliver to the Russian people. Rather than being a champion of freedom, they are proving to be an enemy of it.

link: ap_logo

Gay Leaders Flexing Their Muscle?

As one would expect, ‘tolerance’ to the gay movement means exactly the opposite of what the dictionary would suggest. Case in point is President-elect Barack Obama’s choice of Rick Warren to deliver the invocation at his inauguration.obama_warren

Upset over the fact that the minister actually believes his religion and lives his life accordingly, some feel that Obama is blowing off the LGBT sector of humanity. For his part, Obama’s choice is seen as a conciliatory gesture toward social conservatives who opposed him in November. You know, reaching out. Isn’t it curious that appealing to mainstream America is seen as reaching out? On the other hand, if Barack is not reaching out, does that mean that he is dissing the LGBT’s, or just acting like any other president-elect would?

Rick Warren, the senior pastor of Saddleback Church in southern California, opposes abortion rights but has taken more liberal stances on the government role in fighting poverty, and backed away from other evangelicals’ staunch support for economic conservatism. But it’s his support for the California constitutional amendment to ban same-sex marriage that drew the most heated criticism from Democrats Wednesday.

“Your invitation to Reverend Rick Warren to deliver the invocation at your inauguration is a genuine blow to LGBT Americans,” the president of Human Rights Campaign, Joe Solomonese, wrote Obama Wednesday. “[W]e feel a deep level of disrespect when one of architects and promoters of an anti-gay agenda is given the prominence and the pulpit of your historic nomination.”

In his article, notice too the connection Ben Smith draws between the LGBT group and Democrats, known to be tolerant of just about anything. Democrats’ alleged displeasure over California’s approval of a constitutional amendment to ban gay-marriage is misplaced. California is as blue a state as it gets, and they voted for it. The displeasure lies primarily in the LGBT camp. On the whole, I have more confidence than Smith does that democrats are not as intolerant as the gay community is. Am I wrong?

links: Gay leaders furious with Obama

we-told-you-so

Time Magazine 2008 Person Of The Year

Cool. Time magazine’s person of the year for 2008, President-elect Barack obama_youth_04.jpgObama. Try this admission by the Times.

In one of the craziest elections in American history, he overcame a lack of experience, a funny name, two candidates who are political institutions and the racial divide to become the 44th president of the United States.

Time To Save The World

Air America Radio talk show host Mike Papantonio is all about a fossil fuel replacement program, and now a chemical replacement program, because chemicals can be used as a WMD. And, they are produced by big corporations, which by definition makes them almost criminal. So why stop there?

What this country, and the world, needs is a liberal replacement program. Liberal dogma, whether in ‘public’ education, economic principles, and ‘social’ matters, is just as much a weapon of mass destruction as any nuclear bomb and al-Qaeda combined where the United States is concerned.

Bio:Mike Papantonio hosts Ring of Fire, a nationally syndicated radio show on Air America Radio and is the founder of GoLeft.tv. He is a partner in the Levin Papantonio law firm in Pensacola.

link: Chemicals in U.S. might be used as WMD

Even Blogs Are Cutting Back

It is happening every day now. Businesses are taking actions to remain in business, not to mention be competitive in today’s economic climate. You see it happening in Newspapers, broadcast radio, and now GoLeftTV on the Internet.

Obviously, the current state of the economy is not good. But that hasn’t always been the case. These media have had problems generating revenue for years. Adding to that, one could argue that the product these media are delivering is defective to the point that there is not enough support in the free market to keep them in the black, forcing them to find a Sugar Daddy like George Soros to keep them going. Air America Radio seems to have found Big Labor, you know, one of those evil ‘special interest’ groups. Ring of Fire Radio has resorted to Google Ads. And GoLeftTV has apparently given up and moved their site to YouTube, which is free. It is a sign of the times.

related links: Go Left TV Takes On Conservative Media | Newspapers are feeling the economic pinch, too | Could Newspapers Be The Next Bailout?

The Laffer Curve And The Fair Tax

The notion that increasing taxes will increase revenue is bogus. Winston Churchill nails it with this famous quote, “We contend that for a nation to try to tax itself into prosperity is like a man standing in a bucket and trying to lift himself up by the handle.”

There are examples in the United States that demonstrate that revenues increase by lowering taxes, and decrease by raising them. There is an optimum point in the taxes/revenue equation and it has a name. It is called the Laffer Curve.

Since classical economic theory back in the early part of the 20th century economist have always known about money circulation. What is referred to as velocity. The faster money goes through the economy the more money people make and the more taxes are collected. Since then the equations have gotten a lot more complex with partial differentials, regression analysis and other mathematics. The principals are the same. The faster the economic activity the more jobs, income and taxes.

So how do we get a faster economy? There has to be some tax rate that allows maximum tax collections right? Yes there is. Arthur Laffer took a simple business principal studied by millions of business majors the world over. The maximum profit point or maximum revenue point. It the point where the price of your Chevy trucks makes you the most profit. Charge too much and you lose customers. Charge to little and you lose money. It’s not that complex. Disney does it for ticket prices. Walmart does it for their store pricing policies. All business does it. So why when Arthur Laffer does this same thing for government maximum revenues is he ridiculed for “trickle down,” “Voodoo” and other names too discredit his theory?

By understanding the Laffer Curve and the adoption of the Fair Tax, you will easily see how beneficial and growth oriented the Fair Tax would be to the economy.

Please check it out.

Link: Fountainhead Zero: Taxes 101: The Laffer Curve