‘Reopen Sesame sex suit’

Oh, oh.  It looks as if $125,000 was not enough to buy the silence of Sheldon Stephens who recanted his recantation of teen-age sexual abuse by the voice of Elmo, Kevin Clash.

The man who accused Elmo’s puppeteer of sexual misconduct reportedly wants to recant his recantation.

Sheldon Stephens, 24, last week withdrew sensational claims that, as an underage teen, he had a wild fling with Kevin Clash, the voice behind the beloved Muppet Elmo.

Now Stephens is interviewing lawyers in hopes of ripping up the $125,000 deal he reached with Clash, 52, to deny there was any illegal sex, according to TMZ.

Stephens’ Pennsylvania lawyers last week released a statement on his behalf, absolving Clash of any wrongdoing: “He [Stephens] wants it to be known that his sexual relationship with Mr. Clash was an adult consensual relationship.”

However, Stephens now wants to return to his previous position, claiming Clash had sex with him when he was just 16, TMZ reports.

I suspect he got a better offer.

AP reporter clashes with State Dep’t spokesman over Turkey calling Israel a terrorist state

This can't be an Associated Press reporter.  He actually demands answers, not a fog of words.

Via the Blaze, I don’t think I’ve ever seen a reporter take a tone with a government functionary at a press conference quite like this. And it’s not the first time he’s done it, either. How does this guy not have his own cable news show already? Or better yet, an assignment as a White House beat reporter? “Yeah, first question. How much longer are we going to have to sit through your party’s crap about taxing our way out of this deficit mess?”

What's with the ski masks?

Why does every Jihadi wear one of these ridiculous ski masks?  Is isn't cold.  Head coverings like this  make it harder to see and breathe;  to aim and fire accurately.

Are they hiding their identity?  If so, who are they hiding it from? 

It's not as if the leaders are not well known. 

If these people have any kind of dress code, this affectation is the most common item of that uniform.

Confessions of a Racist

OK leftists. You got me. I am a racist. I can’t fool you. I’m a conservative, and it’s a well-known, indisputable fact that conservatives are racists. So I’m a racist.

When those “New Black Panthers” stood outside polling places during the 2008 and 2012 elections, holding those batons and threatening people if they did not vote for Obama, that wouldn’t have bothered me if only those Panthers had been white.

I would have stood up and cheered when Obama decided to eliminate the DC Schools initiative that gave opportunities for a superior education to underprivileged children (and vastly improved the future of each child who went through it) if only Obama had lighter skin.

I would absolutely support increasing taxes and fees on small business owners, and weighing them down with mind-numbingly punitive regulations, forcing many to close, some (who could) to move their companies overseas, and many to lay off workers. If only Obama was white.

I would be right there encouraging pregnant women to abort their babies, especially late in their term, and most especially if the abortion failed, refusing to help save those babies who survive. Killing babies would be no problem for me, if only Obama was caucasian.

Read the rest.

Krugman calls for return of the 91% tax rate

Let's go for more taxes!

Let's discuss raising us some revenue without hurting the little people.

With the re-election of Barack Obama, I feel compelled – in the spirit of coming together for the common good – to get on the tax raising bandwagon. Here’s my proposal.

· Let’s raise taxes to 50% on people making more than $1 million dollars a year. How much will that raise? Warren Buffer says that the top 400 earners in the US made $90 billion, so that means $45 billion to the treasury. Plus it will satisfy Chuck Schumer.

· Let’s have a 100% sales tax on the sale of movie tickets, CDs, videos and all other entertainment. These are purely luxury items and will not affect the ability of the poor to live. Movies tickets, CD rentals and DVD sales alone should raise $30 billion.

· Let’s have a 100% sales tax on newspapers and magazines. Circulation revenue for newspapers is $10 billion, let’s assume the same for magazines. That’s $20 billion in new revenue for the government. Reporters and editors have been calling for higher taxes and surely they would not mind doing their fair share.

· Let’s have a 100% sales tax on advertising in all media. Advertising is not only irritating but it is the way in which evil corporations get us to spend our money on frivolous and unnecessary goods and services. We should get about $100 billion just from the major networks and that isn’t counting newspaper and magazine advertising which could double that number to $200 billion.

· Let’s tax all foundations with assets over $100 million with a 10% tax of their assets each year. Some of the biggest foundations have been funding programs that increase taxes on the little people. Since they are in the business of philanthropy, they should welcome doing their fair share. And while we’re doing that, let’s limit the highest paid person working for the foundation to a salary of $75,000 annually. If they refuse to comply we’ll revoke their tax exemption. The hundred largest foundations have assets over $236 billion dollars, and that only includes those with assets over $600 million. Total foundation assets are about $500 billion. A 10% tax would produce nearly $50 billion per year.

· Let’s also tax endowments with assets over $100 million with a 10% tax on their assets each year. They, along with foundations, should welcome doing their fair share. The Yale endowment alone is worth over $16 billion dollars and what do they do with that? Not much that I can see. Does Yale need that money more than the people of the US? No! And while we’re doing that, let’s limit the highest paid person working for the foundation to a salary of $75,000 annually. If they refuse to comply we’ll revoke their tax exemption. Endowments total $250 billion; a 10% tax could raise $25 billion to help our government balance its budget.

· We should investigate the accounting practices of the movie industry. There is something seriously wrong with an industry that claims that Forrest Gump never made a profit. We don’t know how badly this industry has cheated the IRS, but let’s assume that $30 billion is a lowball number.

In keeping with President Obama’s position that we will do no “dynamic scoring,” we have already identified $400 billion in new revenue to help close the deficit gap while only raising taxes on 400 people! We have simply put in some much needed sales taxes and are asking those who have been most vocal about the need for everyone to do their fair share to come to the table. Surely no one could deny the reasonableness of these proposals.

Now, if anyone wants to tax the income of people like Bill Gates, Warren Buffett or the buffoon who suckered thousands of people to fill his pockets by taking Facebook public, people who already have all the money they could possibly spend in their lifetimes at, say 100%, you would hear no objection from me.

WHEN REPORTING IS LYING IS JOURNALISM

“The Times leaves out the story’s single most relevant piece of information: Four senior Islamic Jihad terrorists were using the media building as a hideout. They were killed in the Israeli strike.”

Homeland Security promotes welfare to new immigrants in government ‘welcome’ materials

 

 

When I immigrated our family needed a sponsor who guaranteed that we would not become a burden on the taxpayer.  The concept that you could move here and apply for food stamps, social security, medicaid, medicare, and other government provided benfits did not exist.  Today the Obama administration is encouraging immigrants to become burdens on the taxpayer.  The Left thinks it's the right thing to do. 

 

Well, to pay for these benefits, we're going to need more taxes.  So here are a few ideas.

 

· Let’s raise taxes to 50% on people making more than $1 million dollars a year. How much will that raise? Warren Buffer says that the top 400 earners in the US made $90 billion, so that means $45 billion to the treasury. Plus it will satisfy Chuck Schumer.

· Let’s have a 100% sales tax on the sale of movie tickets, CDs, videos and all other entertainment. These are purely luxury items and will not affect the ability of the poor to live. Movies tickets, CD rentals and DVD sales alone should raise $30 billion.

· Let’s have a 100% sales tax on newspapers and magazines. Circulation revenue for newspapers is $10 billion, let’s assume the same for magazines. That’s $20 billion in new revenue for the government. Reporters and editors have been calling for higher taxes and surely they would not mind doing their fair share.

· Let’s have a 100% sales tax on advertising in all media. Advertising is not only irritating but it is the way in which evil corporations get us to spend our money on frivolous and unnecessary goods and services. We should get about $100 billion just from the major networks and that isn’t counting newspaper and magazine advertising which could double that number to $200 billion.

· Let’s tax all foundations with assets over $100 million with a 10% tax of their assets each year. Some of the biggest foundations have been funding programs that increase taxes on the little people. Since they are in the business of philanthropy, they should welcome doing their fair share. And while we’re doing that, let’s limit the highest paid person working for the foundation to a salary of $75,000 annually. If they refuse to comply we’ll revoke their tax exemption. The hundred largest foundations have assets over $236 billion dollars, and that only includes those with assets over $600 million. Total foundation assets are about $500 billion. A 10% tax would produce nearly $50 billion per year.

· Let’s also tax endowments with assets over $100 million with a 10% tax on their assets each year. They, along with foundations, should welcome doing their fair share. The Yale endowment alone is worth over $16 billion dollars and what do they do with that? Not much that I can see. Does Yale need that money more than the people of the US? No! And while we’re doing that, let’s limit the highest paid person working for the foundation to a salary of $75,000 annually. If they refuse to comply we’ll revoke their tax exemption. Endowments total $250 billion; a 10% tax could raise $25 billion to help our government balance its budget.

· We should investigate the accounting practices of the movie industry. There is something seriously wrong with an industry that claims that Forrest Gump never made a profit. We don’t know how badly this industry has cheated the IRS, but let’s assume that $30 billion is a lowball number.

In keeping with President Obama’s position that we will do no “dynamic scoring,” we have already identified $400 billion in new revenue to help close the deficit gap while only raising taxes on 400 people! We have simply put in some much needed sales taxes and are asking those who have been most vocal about the need for everyone to do their fair share to come to the table. Surely no one could deny the reasonableness of these proposals.

Now, if anyone wants to tax the income of people like Bill Gates, Warren Buffett or the buffoon who suckered thousands of people to fill his pockets by taking Facebook public, people who already have all the money they could possibly spend in their lifetimes at, say 100%, you would hear no objection from me.

What would we do without experts in leadership and disaster response

The Associated Press just gave a big, fat, sloppy, tongue down your throat kiss to the three officials that screwed up the rescue effort before and after Superstorm Sandy.

It begins:

Experts in leadership and disaster response interviewed by The Associated Press gave all three chief executives high marks for their performance so far in Superstorm Sandy, a disaster that left more than 100 people dead and presented perhaps the biggest crisis-management test yet for three Northeastern politicians who have all been rumored to hold presidential ambitions.

How do you get to be an “expert in leadership and disaster response” for the Associated Press? To start, you have to be a professor with no personal experience whatever in emergency response. For example Syracuse University political science professor Robert McClure who holds nothing back:

"Throughout the country, what the American people seek is a kind of authenticity in their public leaders, and these three guys have demonstrated that authenticity throughout this crisis,"

Competence? Foresight? Pre-planning? Making sure that emergency power was available for gas stations? Having enough bottled water pre-positioned? Making sure that power lines would not get torn down by falling trees? Apparently according to “expert in leadership and disaster response” Robert McClure what counts is being able to fake sincerity.

Chris Christie was the best, being seen photographed with Obama, hugging kids for the cameras telling them "Don't be scared."   (Good advice from an expert) Taking time out from his busy schedule of press availabilities to appear on "Saturday Night Live."

It’s a wonder that the storm had any effect at all, what with the preparations beforehand.

All three men took firm command before Sandy arrived. Cuomo closed New York City's subways and tunnels hours before there was a threat of flooding and strategically "pre-positioned resources" days before, a move the federal transportation secretary later praised. Christie struck a get-tough note in ordering people to clear out along the coast, barking, "Don't be stupid" on Twitter. Bloomberg calmly ordered an evacuation of the city's low-lying areas.

The AP is in love. Note the adjectives: "firm command,"  Coumo “pre-positions” unspecified resources, the transportation secretary "praises" ("heck of a job Brownie"), Christie “barks” and Bloomberg is “calm.” Central Casting could not have done a better job.

Some of the other lovers of authenticity and “experts in leadership and disaster response” include Douglas Brinkley of Rice University, Doug Muzzio, political science professor at New York City's Baruch College, and Princeton University politics professor Brandice Canes-Wrone. Brinkley summarized it all for these experts

"Here, all three showed stellar leadership."

Meanwhile off campus and away from the Associated Press, a few people who are actual victims of the storm are not feeling the love.

'I have three kids and we have no power, no heat, for 13 days now'...

Sandy a super test for BloombergChristieCuomo...

 
CHRISTIE CLOWNS ON 'SNL' AS RESIDENTS SUFFER

They're just party poopers. 'This Is Our Katrina': Coney Island Reels From Hurricane Sandy's Wrath.

The pre-planning apparently didn't include parking trains in areas that would not flood. 

NJ Transit investigating its preparations for Hurricane Sandy after numerous trains damaged in storm

DERAILED: NJ Transit’s Meadows Maintenance Complex in Kearny is flooded two days after Sandy.

And what about the new and improved FEMA?  FEMA's head defends the agency's post-hurricane response by saying that emergency relief is not its job. 

Really?  After Hurricane Katrina you got the impression that emergency relief IS FEMA's job.  Or maybe that's only when a Republican is president.  Because the AP couldn't bother with this while smooching CuomoChristieBloomberg.

It didn't set up its first relief center until four days after Sandy hit -- only to run out of drinking water on the same day. It couldn't put sufficient boots on the ground to protect Queens residents from roving looters. The Red Cross -- on whom FEMA depends for delivering basic goods -- left Staten Island stranded for nearly a week, prompting borough President Jim Molinaro to fume that America was not a Third World country. But FEMA's most egregious gaffe was that it arranged for 24 million gallons of free gas for Sandy's victims, but most of them couldn't lay their hands on it.

But if you think FEMA's inability to provide rapid relief subverts the core reason for its existence, think again. A few days after the Times' valentine, FEMA head W. Craig Fugate told the newspaper that the agency's rapid response role is really a fallacy. "The general public assumes we are part of the response team that will be there the first couple of days," he said. But it is really designed to deal with disasters several days after the fact.

How does FEMA do that? By indiscriminately writing checks -- a task at which it evidently excels.

Experts in leadership and disaster response were not asked to respond.

In 37 Chicago Precincts, Romney Received No Votes

OUTPERFORMING ENVER HOXHA.  Results like this are typically found  on Communist dictatorships, although in those places they usually give a few tenths of a percent to the "opposition" to make it look as if there is an opposition. 

In critical swing states like Pennsylvania, Ohio, and Illinois there are a lot of precincts in Philadelphia, Cleveland, and Chicago which reported 100% of their votes cast for Obama. These add up to many 10's of thousands of votes for Obama and 0 for Romney. I repeat, 0 for Romney. I have read a number of articles about this and people knowlegable in Political Science and Statistics are starting to take notice of this.Statistically, even if among 10's of thousands of voters all wanted to vote for Obama, it would not be possible to receive 100% of the vote because at least a few would make a mistake and vote incorrectly for Romney. Not to mention the fact that a least a few of those 10's of thousands might actually disagree with Obama. These types of election returns are only seen in countries run by dictators.

 

It appears that the Obama machine in Philadelphia actually beat the Chicago machine in rigging the election.  Philadelphia had 59 precincts that voted 100% for Obama, Chicago only 37. 

Let’s raise us some taxes.

Let's discuss raising us some revenue without hurting the little people. 

With the re-election of Barack Obama, I feel compelled – in the spirit of coming together for the common good – to get on the tax raising bandwagon.  Here’s my proposal.

·         Let’s raise taxes to 50% on people making more than $1 million dollars a year.  How much will that raise?  Warren Buffer says that the top 400 earners in the US made $90 billion, so that means $45 billion to the treasury.  Plus it will satisfy Chuck Schumer.

·         Let’s have a 100% sales tax on the sale of movie tickets, CDs, videos and all other entertainment.  These are purely luxury items and will not affect the ability of the poor to live.  Movies tickets, CD rentals and DVD sales alone should raise $30 billion.

·         Let’s have a 100% sales tax on newspapers and magazines.  Circulation revenue for newspapers is $10 billion, let’s assume the same for magazines.  That’s $20 billion in new revenue for the government.  Reporters and editors have been calling for higher taxes and surely they would not mind doing their fair share.

·         Let’s have a 100% sales tax on advertising in all media.  Advertising is not only irritating but it is the way in which evil corporations get us to spend our money on frivolous and unnecessary goods and services.  We should get about $100 billion just from the major networks and that isn’t counting newspaper and magazine advertising which could double that number to $200 billion.

·         Let’s tax all foundations with assets over $100 million with a 10% tax of their assets each year.  Some of the biggest foundations have been funding programs that increase taxes on the little people.  Since they are in the business of philanthropy, they should welcome doing their fair share.  And while we’re doing that, let’s limit the highest paid person working for the foundation to a salary of $75,000 annually.  If they refuse to comply we’ll revoke their tax exemption.  The hundred largest foundations have assets over $236 billion dollars, and that only includes those with assets over $600 million.  Total foundation assets are about $500 billion.  A 10% tax would produce nearly $50 billion per year.

·         Let’s also tax endowments with assets over $100 million with a 10% tax on their assets each year.  They, along with foundations, should welcome doing their fair share.  The Yale endowment alone is worth over $16 billion dollars and what do they do with that?  Not much that I can see.  Does Yale need that money more than the people of the US?  No!  And while we’re doing that, let’s limit the highest paid person working for the foundation to a salary of $75,000 annually.  If they refuse to comply we’ll revoke their tax exemption.  Endowments total $250 billion; a 10% tax could raise $25 billion to help our government balance its budget.

·         We should investigate the accounting practices of the movie industry.  There is something seriously wrong with an industry that claims that Forrest Gump never made a profit.  We don’t know how badly this industry has cheated the IRS, but let’s assume that $30 billion is a lowball number.

 In keeping with President Obama’s position that we will do no “dynamic scoring,” we have already identified $400 billion in new revenue to help close the deficit gap while only raising taxes on 400 people!  We have simply put in some much needed sales taxes and are asking those who have been most vocal about the need for everyone to do their fair share to come to the table.  Surely no one could deny the reasonableness of these proposals.   

 

Now, if anyone wants to tax the income of people like Bill Gates, Warren Buffett or the buffoon who suckered thousands of people to fill his pockets by taking Facebook public, people who already have all the money they could possibly spend in their lifetimes at, say 100%, you would hear no objection from me. 

Trees in Autumn

West wins request for recount of some ballots

Rep. Allen West won a full recount of early voting in St. Lucie County when the county’s canvassing board voted late Friday to grant his request.
Local news accounts said the decision came in a 2-1 vote.

We’ve got a president Klink who knows nothing, hears nothings, and sees nothing.

Isn't it amazing that no one tells Obama anything?

Attacks on Israel from Egypt could lead to all-out war.

News that rockets were fired at southern Israel from the Sinai — from Egypt in other words — raised the possibility that an IDF operation directed against Gaza might lead to further incidents with Cairo.

Egyptian newspaper Al-Shorouk reported Friday that an Egyptian militant group in Sinai Peninsula has claimed responsibility for the launching of the rockets.

“The rockets were launched from the northern part of Sinai,” the newspaper said.

It added that the group also released a video clip showing “that the rockets were fired from 107-millimeter rocket launchers.”

Although the attacks will be attributed to rebel elements acting independently of Cairo, the unanswered question posed by simultaneous attacks on American diplomatic missions in Tunisia, Libya and Egypt on September 11, 2012 are to what extent Jihadi groups are intermingled with ‘government’ agencies in those countries.

 

Richard Fernandez

For once a crisis is brewing which no amount of bribery — offers of arms to Israel or food and money to Egypt — can long forestall. The true bill for the lies at Benghazi and the entire ‘Arab Spring’ enterprise may no longer be avoided. At long last some answers must be provided. How deep is the administration’s partnership with the Muslim Brotherhood? Just what did the assault on US consulates throughout the region truly portend? Is there substantial opposition to the policy of dealing with the Muslim Brotherhood from within American intelligence agencies or the military?

And if so, why has it not been discussed till now? Why are the papers bannering Paula Broadwell or any number of the tabloid talking points the media trots out to protect Obama? Those tactics have allowed the administration to avoid building a broad, bipartisan and national consensus for whatever it is doing in the Middle East by laying down a wall of smoke. Operating behind a compliant screen of media apologists and vilifying any critics in its path, the administration has pursued an unaccountable course in the region, saying one thing to the public and doing God knows what in private.

 

All the lies, the smokescreens, the sex scandals and the boot-kissing media can come unravelled  if there is a real Arab-Ireal war in the Middle East.  But Israel faces a problem. Demographic and political attitudes have changed in the US (witness the last election) and they have changed even more in Europe. Today it is Israel who is viewed by the “Obama Constituency,” - the Left, the press, academia, European elite opinion - as the aggressor. I believe that the current Israeli leadership understands this and realizes that time is not on their side. That increases the possibility that Israel will strike, and strike soon. Obama may have precipitated the coming war.

Claims that FBI protocol kept the White House from being informed about the Petraeus affair are demonstrably false.

... And are incredible on their face.

Would you not tell the President that his CIA Director is under investigation and could be blackmailed? What kind of a dim bulb believes this? The answer is people who want to believe, who need to believe because to do otherwise brings their belief in Obama into question. He's their messiah and you don't give up your faith easily.

Obviously, the president relies on the CIA director for security assessments and briefings on a weekly and sometimes daily basis. Can the attorney general and the White House seriously argue that the fact that Petraeus had an extramarital affair that made him subject to blackmail, and that he might have disclosed classified information to his paramour, was not important for the president to know when carrying out his duties to protect the country from national security threats as commander-in-chief?

One of the reasons for the FBI protocols and the DOJ guidance is preventing interference with criminal investigations of third parties who may have political connections with the White House or Congress. That rationale does not apply to the investigation of a high-level government official who is a direct subordinate of the president. Both the president and the National Security Council should have been immediately informed about this investigation when the security issues arose.

In fact, a long-time acquaintance who worked in the Office of the Attorney General in a prior administration told me it was inconceivable that an attorney general would not inform the White House counsel or the president that the president’s CIA director was being investigated.
 

 We’ve got a president Klink who knows nothing, hears nothings, and sees nothing.

EPA chief’s secret ‘alias’ email account revealed



Meet "Richard Windsor"

The name Richard Windsor may sound innocuous, but it is allegedly one of the secret “alias” email accounts used by Obama EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson.

“That is the name — sorry, one of the alias names — used by Obama’s radical EPA chief to keep her email from those who ask for it,” Chris Horner, senior fellow at the Competitive Enterprise Institute and author of the new book “The Liberal War on on Transparency,” told the Daily Caller News Foundation in an email.

In his book, Horner revealed the existence of “alias” email accounts used by EPA administrators. The first such transparency dodge, he writes, came from Carol Browner, former director of the Obama White House Office of Energy and Climate Change Policy and Bill Clinton’s EPA administrator.

 

Keep in mind that this is the "most transparent administration in history."  If you don't believe them, just ask them.  Use e-mail.

Maine’s striking Hostess workers say company’s collapse a strong message of union resolve

Seems more like" If you don't do what I say, I'll kill myself."

What would we do without experts ... and professors?

The union’s willingness to go down with the sinking ship — and in some cases take credit for sinking it — in the Hostess case may prove to corporate investors that the working class must be reckoned with, said University of Southern Maine economist and labor relations expert Michael Hillard.
 

The union wins (the workers, not so much).

Biddeford Mayor Alan Casavant said, “philosophically, I think the union wins” in the Hostess standoff.

“They’re saying to the world at large, ‘We deserve a working income. We work hard, we deserve a living wage, and we don’t just want to be pawns in a corporate game,’” he said. “There’s a philosophical victory. But in an economic sense, you’re walking a fine line, because all of a sudden you’re cast into a void of not knowing what tomorrow brings… Putting myself in their shoes, I’d be scared, because there’s so much uncertainty in this economy.”

 

Don't worry Al.  There's not a lot of uncertainty.  The economy is either treading water or headed for another recession.  The workers without jobs will now get 99 weeks of unemployment, food stamps, an ObamaPhone and are at the top of the list to vote for the next Democrat.  Win/win.

Lawsuit Alleges “Corruption and Negligence” at Department of Energy

Just another day in ObamaLand.

A lawsuit filed in federal court on Wednesday alleges mass favoritism in the Department of Energy’s decisions to award federal grants to major car companies to develop electric vehicles, according to a legal complaint obtained by Scribe.

The plaintiff, San Francisco-based XP Technology, says in a complaint filed in the U.S. Court of Federal Claims that “corruption and negligence” pervaded DOE’s decision to award loan guarantees to Ford, Nissan, Tesla Motors, and Fisker Automotive for the development of electric vehicle technology.

“Investigations have shown that DOE officials intentionally stalled numerous applicants’ reviews in order to force them out of business and protect favored players,” the complaint claims.

 

Says the US Media: "Nothing to see here, move along."

DRUDGE: Human Waste Continues to Pour into NY Harbor After Sandy...

HEH!

Human Waste Continues to Pour into NY Harbor After Sandy...

Obama reports for more photo ops. Sandy victims continue to suffer.

The press was given another opportunity to tell us how wonderful Obama is.  Democrat politicians told him how wonderful he is.

As for the people affected,

”Help Us Obama Please Now!”  [said a sign held by some poor deluded fool]

 

....the first and only resident we were able to speak with expressed dissatisfaction with some of the help they have received since the storm.

At the tents, a man named Al Bevacqua said “it seems like FEMA can’t do anything without the insurance companies,” which he accused of putting him and other Staten Islanders “on hold.” On Cedar Grove Avenue, just before the president spoke to the group we talked to a woman named Stacy Chifando who said she had suffered serious consequences from the storm and was disappointed with the help she subsequently received from FEMA.

“We just really want to get back on our feet and FEMA’s not doing too much to help us right now,” said Ms. Chifando.

She went on to explain that many of the residents had not received the funds for temporary housing they hoped to obtain from FEMA.

“They tell us we need computers, but there’s no power. We don’t have computers,” she said.

The real purpose of the trip was found at the end:

After the speeches, President Obama parted ways with the local officials.

“Alright guys, hang in there,” he said.

Before departing in his motorcade, the president walked over to another group of locals for a final round of handshakes, photos and hugs.

“Hey everybody. Let me shake hands with some folks,” he said. “How’s it going everybody?”

At that point, we were ushered back into the press vans and were unable to hear their answers.

People are just extras in the never-ending Obama movie.