“Rep. Won’t Say Why She Opposes 5-Month Abortion Ban Even If It ‘Saves One Life’”

Via Protein Wisdom

That would by Diana DeGette, a woman now infamous for not understanding that the magazines she was pushing to ban on firearms weren’t disposable.

These are the kinds of “leaders” we pick, the kinds of people who we have given power of us as a de facto ruling class.

But that’s all gravy. What’s nice here is that someone finally put the question to a Democratic politician who has, during the gun control debates, run with the party talking that even if bans, registries, etc., save but one life, they are worth the loss of liberty that is required to implement them. Which, if that’s the case, how can not a 5-month abortion ban be something she’s literally creaming over?

From the comments: 

My friends and I started using the term “choiced” when referring to late term abortions. ex: “Those Gosnell babies got choiced!”

New you can use: "Here's Why You Never Talk to the FBI"

Via Vanderleun:

Protect Yourself from FBI Manipulation (w/attorney Harvey Silverglate). Good advice in the age of total surveillance.

NPR's Has Chefs on Staff ... a wellness center, a fitness center, and a cafe.

NPR recently moved from Chinatown into its new 400,000 square-foot home on North Capitol, and they’re excited about it. Eager to show off the new facility, the organization offered a tour to members of the media Tuesday morning, starting with breakfast from their in-house chefs, along with some talking points from CEO Gary Knell, who outlined some impressive features of the space.

Ever wonder why the Washington DC area is never felt the "great recession?"

Oh, and it has other great facilities that you unemployed "Country Class" don't have.

The tour continued through the wellness center, which is capable of simple medical procedures, the fitness center, which is staffed by a trainer, and the cafe, which utilizes the same catering company as Google. The cafe was named by a contest in which employees submitted more than 200 ideas. The winning name, Sound Bites, was entered by Stamberg, further marking her legacy at NPR and the new facility.

From the comments:

Given that these folks are all sucking on the public teat, they should have named that cafe "Free Lunch".

or

Gobbells Gormet eatery.

Keep in mind that the government subsidizes this propaganda organ to the tune of $400 million a year.

Fascism, French Style

From the UK Telegraph.

 

Marine Le Pen to face prosecution for comparing Muslims to Nazis

How long will it be before the Left in the US tells us that we need to follow the lead of Europe and imprison those with whose speech we disagree. If we can sic the IRS on them, it's just a small step to putting them in jail.

Living in Fear: Welcome to Fascist America

Roger Simon makes the point that life in the US is starting to resemble the old Soviet Union.
Living in Fear: Welcome to Fascist America

Back in the ’80s when, on a couple of occasions, I visited the Soviet Union, I always wondered what was it really like to live in that godforsaken place. But it didn’t much matter. For all the creepy spying that was going on, I realized I’d be out of there in a week or two.

Now I know what it was like. It’s come home.

I live in fear.

I don’t want to admit it, but it’s true. Every phone call I make, every email I send, every text I message, every article I write including this one, I imagine being bugged or recorded.

1984 is here and it’s not pretty.

It infects everything we do.

For example, I want to criticize the IRS with every breath I take, but in the back of my head I worry — what if they come after me? What if I’m audited and have to spend the next few years and untold dollars on accountants and attorneys? Is this fair to my family? Is this how I want to spend my life?

Life goes on even in the middle of the most horrible events. And that’s what allows the press to turn their backs and pretend that tyranny is not taking over; that people are not watching what they say because, like residents of the Soviet Union, they could get the attention of the government agents that can make your life a living hell.

I know. I have heard my family tell about life in occupied Holland during World War 2. There was hunger, even starvation, danger from bombers; searches for contraband like bicycle tires, deportations to labor in Germany. And that’s for those who were not Jews; we know what happened to them.  Yet people lived their lives, had kids, and made do.  It has not gotten to that stage here. The tyranny of the ObamaState is of a softer kind: one or more of the alphabet agencies will descend on you to ruin your life. Or perhaps they can get a cooperative woman to claim you raped her.

Who is to say if I have the IRS audit me it’s because I wrote things that are critical of the regime? Would the press care? Hell, they don’t like what I write and would get a kick out of watching me get audited, investigated or even accused of crime. Regimes always have the support of the press. That part of the press that may oppose it usually gets intimidated or has its own problems with the powers that be.

 

The ones who are the easiest to intimidate are the ones with the most to lose, firmly middle class or modestly upper class like Simon. I recall Solzhenitsyn saying that he felt most free once he was in the Gulag, because there he had nothing more to lose; there was nothing more they could take away from him.

If you think these are paranoid ramblings, watch the Congressional hearings. Congress is supposed to be the watchdog to keep the administrative state in check. Note that the Administration’s minions are thumbing their noses are congressional deadlines. They are blatantly, openly lying to congressional committees with no fear that they will be prosecuted.  And why should they worry?  The police powers are firmly in the hands of the regime.

To paraphrase Stalin: “how many divisions has Darrell Issa?”

The Elephant in the Room

Chicago Teachers Union President

“When are we going to address the elephant in the room?  she asks.

 

Glenn Reynolds asks:  WHY ARE THESE PEOPLE ALWAYS GROSSLY OBESE, LIKE THOMAS NAST’S PLUTOCRATS? 

Chris Matthews: "The Sun Is Racist"

Well, Chis didn't exactly say that, but he meant to say it.  You know about dog whistles don't you?

Rand Paul: James Clapper was lying

President Barack Obama's director of national intelligence was flat-out lying when he told lawmakers in March the government wasn't collecting data on millions of Americans, Sen. Rand Paul asserted Tuesday.

The core of the Benghzi scandal; breaking faith with the people who put their lives in the line.

 

There are many things about the attack on the US Benghazi compound on 9/11/2012 that can be called a scandal. The Obama administration lying to the American people for political purposes seems to be the focus of a lot of the anger. But the real scandal is breaking faith with the men who fought for hours to repel the attack and failing to go their aid.

Kevin Norton, a former U.S. Army infantry officer who served in Iraq and Afghanistan, recounts how he and his men put themselves in danger to retrieve the body of an Afghan interpreter killed during an ambush. He puts it this way:

In Benghazi, the U.S. government simply did not do all it could to protect its agents in the field. Leon Panetta, defense secretary at the time of the attack, later told Congress that U.S. forces were not deployed because "you don't deploy forces into harm's way without knowing what's going on."

This was a stunning abdication of responsibility. Mr. Panetta and President Obama knew that Americans were under attack that night. Thousands of U.S. military personnel have given their lives to save their fellow Americans—civilians and soldiers alike—under similar circumstances.

[snip]

Amid the many recent scandals that have come out of Washington, there is a danger that the disastrous Benghazi episode will be put aside before it has been adequately explored—before Americans know exactly who did and did not perform capably and honorably during those terrible hours and their aftermath.

We do already know one essential truth about Benghazi: The sacred bond between the government and those who serve it was broken, and the message was delivered to Americans serving around the world. That's a scandal.

The President’s men are busy hiding where Obama was and what he did while the men in Benghazi were fighting and dying. The suspicion is thick that Obama was busy creating his cover story so that he would not be blamed while people under his command were being killed.  Because it's Obama the press doesn't care.

Selling ObamaPhones for heroin and handbags

Carlos Slim, the Mexican billionaire and part owner of the New York Times has received over a billion dollars via the ObamaPhone program. Just as an aside, this article was printed in a British newspaper, not an American one. It seems that the Daily Mail provides more information on the Obama scandals that the American press, referred to by Rush Limbaugh as the "state run media." And he's right.

In an outdoor tent erected by Stand Up Wireless in the City of Brotherly Love, an O'Keefe plant probed a sales rep on May 21.

'Once it's my phone, I don't need to, like, bring it back or anything?' he asked, while the female worker shook her head in the negative. 'It's my phone, right?'

'Mm-hm,' she responded.

'If you're interested in learning -- wanting to know how much the phone's worth,' the woman offered later in the conversation, '[I] recommend you go to any pawn shop. They'll be more than happy to tell you, OK?'

'OK,' the actor replied. 'So I could get the phone and then sell it?'

'Yeah,' she said, 'I don't care what you do with it.'

A TerraCom Wireless salesman performed with similar disregard for federal law.

One young woman, posing as a low-income citizen on May 8 during a Terracom promotional giveaway in Minneapolis, asked plainly if she would be permitted to sell her new phone.

'It's kind of like, the first thing that I do is this here,' the TerraCom rep responded, referring to the required paperwork. 'And unfortunately there are people on drugs. They get this phone, and they go get $40. ... You basically do whatever you want to do with it. That's what I'm trying to tell you.'

'Well, I'm not on drugs,' she replies, 'but there is a really awesome pair of shoes at the store that I want.'

In mere seconds the TerraCom worker is seen breaking into uproarious laughter.

In Stand Up Wireless's tent, a young woman waited her turn in line. 'I already have a phone,' she says in the video footage, 'but I just need money. So, like, am I allowed to do what I want with the phone when I get it? Could I sell it?'

A female employee busily handing out phones replies, 'If you want. Sure!'

Asked if the customer should acknowledge on an application form that she intends to sell her new phone, the worker advises that she should 'probably, like, plead the Fifth on it.

'Obama is being really nice, anybody that's $16,000 [salary] or less' can qualify, he says.

'Anybody. If you might be American, anybody that makes $16,000 or less.'

News reports have documented fraud in the Lifeline program for years.

'Time and time again, I saw people sign up while texting and talking on their own cell phone,' reported Chris Nagus of KMOV-TV in St. Louis.

'I signed up for two already,' one recipient told him. Another admitted to having four.

Jeff Barnd of WBFF-TV in Baltimore talked with one woman in 2012 who had an even larger collection of 'Obama phones.'

'I have six in my purse now,' Monique Crawford told him. 'Each and every one of these phones works. At home I know I have about 30 and all of them are on.'

Which is the greater danger to freedom?

Which do you consider a greater danger to your freedom:

1. The government having a record of all your phone calls?
2. The government recording every Tweet, e-mail, Facebook post or other Internet activity?
3. The government asking you to show a photo ID when you vote to prevent voter fraud?

If you are a Liberal and also write for the Virginian Pilot (and every other member in good standing of the MSM) the answer is number three. You’re OK with numbers one and two because you trust the people who lied about Fast & Furious, Benghazi, the IRS scandals, Pigford, bugging the AP and wiretapping FOX News reporters. In fact, if you are a student, you think they should be bugged more.

One thing I note as I watched this video is that most of the people who signed the petition were women. Draw your own conclusions.

Obama scandals go international

The scandals revealed underf Obama domesstically include

• "Fast & Furious" - running guns to the Mexican drug cartels
• Sending the IRS after the Tea Party
• Sending the IRS after individuals that contriubted to Romney
• Sending the IRS after Christians and patriots
• Abandoning our troops in Benghazi for politcal cover
• Lying about Benghazi for political advantage
• Making a film-maker a politcal prisoner
• Sending the FBI after the AP
• Accusing Fox news reporter James Rosen of being a criminal
• Lying to congress
• Recording all US phone calls
• Probably hacking into the computer of a repoeter who actaully followed the Benghazi and the Fast & Furious gun running scandals.

The rest of the world is now getting a taste of the first Nobel Prize winner who got his prize for not being his predecessor in office.

CHINA TO US: EXPLAIN

Scandalanche; why the President's enablers in the press are desperately trying to change the subject.

Having lunch yesterday, the couple in the next booth were talking about the NSA spying on us. It's replaced a lot of the talk about the Kardashians, or baseball. But the NSA snooping has been going on a long time and the recent revelations should not have been a surprise to anyone. What's giving it importance is the evidence that this administration has crossed the red line that Americans have set up in their own minds. They no longer trust the government to stay within the boundaries required to keep the people of this nation free.

Michael A. Walsh

What makes the news scary are the revelations of what else Team Obama’s been up to. Follow the bouncing scandal ball:

* On Benghazi, the administration has simply clammed up, keeping suspicions alive that there’s much more to this story. A handful of intrepid reporters have bucked the tide, but others have stopped asking why no help was sent and where President Obama was that night. Because . . .

* In clear violation of the First Amendment, the administration — allegedly angered about national-security leaks — seized phone records from the AP and Fox News in a what looks like a transparent attempt to put the fear of God into them and keep others incuriously toeing the party line, which mostly amount to: Trust us. But can we? Consider . . .

* The strange goings-on at the Environmental Protection Agency, where recently-departed chief Lisa Jackson was using a fictitious e-mail account in order to communicate privately without all those pesky “transparency” requirements. How widespread is this practice? What to make of word that Health Secretary Kathleen Sebelius was also using “secondary” e-mail accounts?

* Then came the IRS bombshell — something every taxpaying American can relate to. That a supposedly neutral collection agency with powers far beyond what we entrust to law enforcement would cheerfully target Tea Party and other righty groups for special scrutiny is the stuff of Orwellian nightmares. And although the IRS has tried to blame “rogue elements” in its Cincinnati office, whistleblowers are coming out of the woodwork to point the finger directly at the White House.

All this adds up to a perfect storm of mistrust, now exacerbated by the fears of the surveillance state that has mushroomed since the panicky post-9/11 “reforms.” Thus Americans now fear a culture of suspicion among top law-enforcement officials, who treat more than 300 million overwhelmingly law-abiding Americans as potential criminals, subject to snoops and pat-downs.

And when that leviathan falls down on the job — as it did in failing to spot the Tsarnaev brothers — then the trade-off between liberty and security becomes a very bad bargain indeed.

Limbaugh: “The Republican Party is Embarrassed of its Base"

Rush talks about the Ruling Class Republicans.

Luddites at the Virginian Pilot

For those who went to public school a little explanation may be in order. “Luddites” were a movement by people who were afraid of technology. Merriam Webster:

one of a group of early 19th century English workmen destroying laborsaving machinery as a protest; broadly: one who is opposed to especially technological change.

The Left has become increasingly Luddite, fearful of atomic power (the Virginian Pilot has wasted tons of newsprint on this issue), oil and gas exploration and now it goes into an anti-science rant about the dangers of fracking disguised as preservation.

The Left today is nostalgic for the time when they believed they held the moral upper hand. Today we have their incessant squawk about racism and anti-science when they themselves are practicing racism and protesting technologies that make things better and cheaper. They yearn for yesterday.

Remember? ORCA, Mitt Romney’s high-tech get-out-the-vote program, crashed on Election Day

Given what we know about the NSA spying system and the Obama campaign's incestuous relationship with Google and other Silicon Valley Internet giants, the suggestion that Romney's  system was deliberately overwhelmed at a crucial time nags in the back of one's mind.

 

And rememer the Obama Phone lady?    It turns out that Obama was able to contact her and tell her to vote, and vote, and vote.

voters in urban areas where Obama was counting on high voter turnout were more likely to use a mobile phone

And remember Sarah Jessica Parker's ads for Obama?  The result of data mining.

For the general public, there was no way to know that the idea for the Parker contest had come from a data-mining discovery about some supporters: affection for contests, small dinners and celebrity.

Detroit Defaults

The result of decades of total Democrat control. 

A team led by a state-appointed emergency manager said Friday that Detroit is defaulting on about $2.5 billion in unsecured debt and is asking creditors to take about 10 cents on the dollar of what the city owes them.

Fun facts about Detroit:

• 20 percent of Detroit is on food stamps.
• It's violent crime rate is 5 times the national average and it’s rated as America’s Most Dangerous City.
• 40% of Detroit residents want to leave the city.
• Home prices have fallen 54 percent in the last 3 years.
• Detroit has the highest poverty rate in the nation.
• Detroit voted for  Obama by 98 percent, because when you’re already living in a hellhole, your prime motivation is to drag the rest of the country in with you.
• The 40 percent of Detroiters who want to leave have drawn no conclusions about the causes of all their problems.

Not enough fun facts?

• 50 years ago, Detroit's population was more than two million.
• 700,000 are left
• The number of people who left Detroit in the last decade is nearly twice those who left New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina.
• Detroit’s public schools are among the worst in the nation in spite of spending nearly $16,000 per pupil, 60 percent more than Georgia spends.
• Detroit school graduation rate is 32%.
• Test scores are so bad the superintendent of the city’s schools once said they were no better than if the students had simply guessed at the answers.
• Detroit’s per capita tax burden is several times the average for the Michigan cities.
• Kwame Kilpatrick, Detroit's last mayor was convicted of 24 federal crimes, including racketeering, extortion and bribery and is going to jail for up to 30 years.
• Detroit is so Democrat that it's mayoral elections have two Democrats running against each other.
• As an interesting sidelight, Kwame Kilpatrick was one of the Mayors Against Guns crowd started by Michael Bloomberg.

Finally, serious consideration is given to razing Detroit and turning it into farmland.

"It all started with a third-rate break-in into a reporter's computer..."

Ask yourself the question, who would break in to Sharyl Attkisson's computer?

This is obviously a politically-motivated crime, not a personally- or economically-motivated one. That doesn't mean the government had anything to do with it, but it certainly seems that someone favorably inclined towards the government did.

Attkinson was virtually the only MSM reporter interested in Fast & Furious and Benghazi.

Watergate started with a seemingly minor break-in too.

DOJ has already announced that “to our knowledge,” it has never accessed Ms. Attkisson’s computers

Surveillance never sounded so smooth!

Learning to hate America?

 

 

My previous post linked to a Peggy Noonan column.  The subhead: The surveillance state threatens Americans' love of country.

 

She's right.

 

Noonan is one of those who, along with David Brooks and Christopher Buckley (Bill's son), was smitten with Barack Obama in 2008.  They presented him as sharp, smart, moderate and just the right color to bring racial harmony to America.  Brooks is still smitten but Noonan is backing away.  (We never found out what happened to Bill's son.)

 

Her most recent essay has an interesting insight into something going on in America today.  Keep in mind that Obama represents the counterculture of the 1960s.  The part that hated the culture and the institutions of the country.  They are the ones who spit on Viet Nam vets as they came home, and chanted "Ho, Ho, Ho Chi Min, the Viet Cong are going to win" as they rioted for a communist victory in Viet Nam.

 

They didn't like America.  And they went on a long march through the institutions they own today: academia, the media, the press, the "permanent" government. 

 

Pushing back, the rest of the country became more reflexively more pro-country.  But that is changing thanks to the Obama administration.  Now that the hard core cadres of the Left have captured the Presidency, the patriotism of the Country Class may be turning.

 

Noonan:

I feel that almost everyone who talks about America for a living—politicians and journalists and even historians—is missing a huge and essential story: that too many things are happening that are making a lot of Americans feel a new distance from, a frayed affiliation with, the country they have loved for half a century and more, the country they loved without every having to think about it, so natural was it. This isn't the kind of thing that can be quantified in polls—it's barely the kind of thing people admit to themselves. But talk to older Americans—they feel they barely know this country anymore. In governance its crucial to stay within parameters, it's important not to strain ties, push too far, be extreme. And if you think this does not carry implications for down the road, for our healthy continuance as a nation, you are mistaken. Love keeps great nations going.

But when love is reciprocated with hate, there is a reaction.

 

If this country is really Obama's America; if he and the people who elected him are the future of America, I'm glad I'm old enough to be closer to the end than the beginning.  My admiration for law enforcement, for the military, for teachers, for trust in the basic justice of the government is disappearing.  I may soon end up as part of the NEW American counterculture.  After all, if the country under Obama represent the dominant culture, then those of us who were once patriots will now become what they once were.

UPDATE:  Thanks Glenn, and welcome Instapundit readers.  You may also like Detroit Defaults