Tag: oppression

“The implication that Mr. Cunningham may have engaged in criminal conduct with respect to Fast and Furious is a major escalation of the Department’s culpability.”

3:06 pm

“The implication that Mr. Cunningham may have engaged in criminal conduct with respect to Fast and Furious is a major escalation of the Department’s culpability.”

Mr. Cunningham is a Department of Justice lawyer. The “Department” is the Department of Justice itself. And “Fast and Furious” was the Obama administration’s project to allow about 2000 guns to be smuggled illegally into Mexico, for reasons that remain inexplicable.

Though Cunningham has the right to take the fifth, it should immediately disqualify him from his job, and the Obama administration should fire him. That they don’t tells us a lot about their own culpability in the Fast and Furious gun smuggling scandal. As Issa wrote in his letter to Eric Holder on Tuesday,

Mr. Cunningham’s broad assertion of his Fifth Amendment privilege raises the specter that the Department has allowed him to continue in his position as Chief of the Criminal Division knowing that he might have criminal culpability himself.

You can read Darrell Issa’s (R-California) full letter to Eric Holder here. [pdf]

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What really happened in the Gingrich ethics case?

12:06 am

What really happened in the Gingrich ethics case?

Given all the attention to the ethics matter, it’s worth asking what actually happened back in 1995, 1996, and 1997. The Gingrich case was extraordinarily complex, intensely partisan, and driven in no small way by a personal vendetta on the part of one of Gingrich’s former political opponents. It received saturation coverage in the press; a database search of major media outlets revealed more than 10,000 references to Gingrich’s ethics problems during the six months leading to his reprimand. It ended with a special counsel hired by the House Ethics Committee holding Gingrich to an astonishingly strict standard of behavior, after which Gingrich in essence pled guilty to two minor offenses. Afterwards, the case was referred to the Internal Revenue Service, which conducted an exhaustive investigation into the matter. And then, after it was all over and Gingrich was out of office, the IRS concluded that Gingrich did nothing wrong. After all the struggle, Gingrich was exonerated.

I vaguely remembered the details of the Gingrich ethics case, and the article above confirms what my memory was telling me: Not only was Gingrich innocent of all charges, the charges themselves were political in nature and downright absurd.

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Former Obama staffer arrested in false ID scheme

4:37 pm

A former Obama staffer has been arrested in false ID scheme aimed at implicating a Republican office-holder in unethical behavior.

“So on its face, Edwards’s identity theft appears to be part of a coordinated effort by the Iowa Democratic Party to bring down the Republican Secretary of State so he can be replaced with a Democrat. We hope that Edwards will get the long jail term that he deserves, but the more important question is, from whom was he taking instructions? Circumstantially, one would guess from his boss, Jeff Link. But if so, who was instructing (and paying?) Link’s firm? The White House? Tom Harkin? Iowa’s Democratic Party?”

Of course, hoards of mainstream journalists are now gathering in Iowa to cover this story.

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The chief of the Criminal Division of the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Arizona has refused to testify to Congress about the Obama administration’s policy of allowing guns to be illegally smuggled to Mexican drug lords.

9:24 am

Taking the fifth: The chief of the Criminal Division of the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Arizona has refused to testify to Congress about the Obama administration’s policy of allowing guns to be illegally smuggled to Mexican drug lords.

As his attorney, Tobin Romero, wrote:

“Department of Justice officials have reported to the Committee that my client relayed inaccurate information to the Department upon which it relied in preparing its initial response to Congress. If, as you claim, Department officials have blamed my client, they have blamed him unfairly,” the letter to Issa says. Romero claims Cunningham did nothing wrong and acted in good faith, but the Department of Justice in Washington is making him the fall guy, claiming he failed to accurately provide the Oversight Committee with information on the execution of Fast and Furious.

In other words, give me immunity and I will fry Eric Holder and the Obama administration.

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Obamacare’s 34 pilot programs designed to save money will have no effect or will increase costs, according to a Congressional Budget Office report yesterday.

9:14 am

Repeal it: Obamacare’s 34 pilot programs, designed to save money, will have no effect or will increase costs, according to a Congressional Budget Office report yesterday.

I guarantee that they will increase costs, and actually hinder the work of doctors. The number one task of the new Congress after 2012 should be to repeal this abomination of a law as fast as possible.

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Occupy Wall Street Thugs Confiscate Man’s Home

9:42 am

Thugs: Occupy Wall Street has stolen a man’s home.

The real property owner is livid because he could be raising his two little girls, Imani, 3, and Kwazha, 10, in the two-story home instead of in a meager, two-bedroom rental in Brownsville while he tries to sort out his mortgage nightmare. … “[OWS] told me not to talk to them [reporters] because they [OWS] had an offer for me,” he said.

At a second meeting after the press conference, however, organizers said they would not pay him for the house. At that point, he told them to leave. Inside the house the walls are knocked down and all of his belongings, including a stove, refrigerator and bedroom furniture, have been moved to the basement.

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A private organization is now taking the White House to court over the president’s decision to install three new members on the National Board Relations board without Senate approval.

8:45 pm

The court suits begin: A private organization is now taking the White House to court over the president’s decision to install three new members on the National Board Relations board without Senate approval.

Once again, President Obama’s decision to make these appointments in this unprecedented manner, when it was obvious the appointments would be challenged legally, was a terrible decision that will do no good and a great deal of harm. At minimum, it puts a cloud over anything these appointees do.

Above all, this action is further evidence that this President is an arrogant man with no interest in running the government in a manner that is reasonable or fair.

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Obama asks for more power to consolidate government agencies

10:18 am

President Obama today asked Congress for additional power to consolidate six government agencies.

While this at first sounds like a very good idea, I must admit that it is difficult for me to trust this man with more power, at any time. In addition, how serious can we take his claim of desiring to save money when his administration is on a pace to increase the federal debt by more than $6 trillion, exceeding the debt accumulated by all Presidents from George Washington to Bill Clinton?

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The Obama State Department has rejected the European code of conduct for space

3:21 pm

The Obama State Department made it known today that it has rejected the European code of conduct for space.

“Too restrictive,” Ellen Tauscher, undersecretary of state for arms control and international security, said of the 12-page document that seeks to promote the peaceful, safe and “transparent” use of outer space. Tauscher, speaking to a gathering of Washington, D.C.-based defense reporters on Jan. 12, let slip at the end of her talk that the State Department had rejected the document as it was written. While answering an unrelated question, she mentioned that, “we’re not going to be joining with the Europeans on their [space] treaty.” She did not share any further details as to what parts of the code were “too restrictive.”

Though I applaud the decision of the Obama administration to say no now, the article notes that Tauscher later admitted that the administration is still willing to negotiate this thing.

Why has Western civilization decided in recent decades that the solution to all problems is to lay down restrictions on what people can do? This authoritarianism goes against every ideal and principle that made our culture a success. Worse, it never works. Like gun control, the only people the rules harm are those who follow the rules.

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“the EPA touches on the lives of every single American every single day.”

3:07 pm

Obama today: “The EPA touches on the lives of every single American every single day.”

Truer words were never spoken, but not in the way the President intended. He was speaking to a gathering of EPA employees in Washington, DC, and was praising them for their work. To the rest of the nation, however, the EPA’s effort is increasingly seen as a terrible burden that is squelching both the economy and the freedom of Americans.

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The Supreme Court looks hard at the EPA and doesn’t like what it sees

10:39 pm

The Supreme Court looks hard at the EPA and doesn’t like what it sees.

This case is about the EPA’s ongoing effort to steal property from private landowners.

The Sacketts wanted to build a home on a 0.63-acre lot near Priest Lake in the Idaho panhandle that they bought for $23,000. But after three days of bringing in fill dirt and preparing for construction in 2007, officials from the EPA and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers ordered the activity stopped and said they suspected the land contained wetlands.

Months later, the agency sent the Sacketts a “compliance order” that said the land must be restored as a wetlands before the couple could apply for a building permit. The government acknowledged Monday that fines for failure to comply with the orders could be as much as $75,000 a day.

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The New Authoritarianism

9:51 am

The new authoritarianism.

If Obama does win, 2013 could possibly bring something approaching a constitutional crisis. With the House and perhaps the Senate in Republican hands, Obama’s clerisy may be tempted to use the full range of executive power. The logic for running the country from the executive has been laid out already. Republican control of just the House, argues Chicago congressman Jesse Jackson, Jr., has made America ungovernable. Obama, he said during the fight over the debt limit, needed to bypass the Constitution because, as in 1861, the South (in this case, the Southern Republicans) was “in a state of rebellion” against lawful authority. Beverley Perdue, the Democratic governor of North Carolina, concurred: she wanted to have elections suspended for a stretch. (Perdue’s office later insisted this was a joke, but most jokes aren’t told deadpan or punctuated with “I really hope someone can agree with me on that.” Also: Nobody laughed.)

Read the whole essay. It is a remarkably concise and accurate description of the beliefs and desires of my liberal readers, which was further illustrated by their quick willingness in the comments here, here, and here to excuse an unconstitutional power-grab by Obama. This quote says it all:

Let leaders lead.

Very depressing.

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Homeland Security is monitoring journalists

9:42 pm

Gotta have my KGB: Under an initiative that came out in November, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) has begun monitoring journalists.

Specifically, the DHS announced the NCO and its Office of Operations Coordination and Planning (OPS) can collect personal information from news anchors, journalists, reporters or anyone who may use “traditional and/or social media in real time to keep their audience situationally aware and informed.”

According to the Department of Homeland Security’s own definition of personal identifiable information, or PII, such data could consist of any intellect “that permits the identity of an individual to be directly or indirectly inferred, including any information which is linked or linkable to that individual.” Previously established guidelines within the administration say that data could only be collected under authorization set forth by written code, but the new provisions in the NOC’s write-up means that any reporter, whether someone along the lines of Walter Cronkite or a budding blogger, can be victimized by the agency.

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FAA grants exemption, allowing ultra-light plane to resume whooping crane escort flight

4:52 pm

Gee, isn’t that nice of them: The FAA has granted a one time waiver, allowing an ultra-light plane to resume this year’s whooping crane escort flight.

This infuriates me. What business is it of the FAA whether the ultra-light plane pilots make money on this or not?

This is a perfect example of “mission creep.” The FAA was originally chartered to manage airports, install required landing and navigational equipment, and monitor the designs of aircraft for safety hazards. Somehow, this mission now includes regulating who and what aviation groups are allowed to make money. Disgusting.

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