What’s news today folks?
Obama has picked up 3 much sought after endorsements.
Oh wait, maybe not.
From the WashingtonTimes
“The latest [dictator] to publicly announce his support for the commander-in-chief’s reelection bid was Venezuela’s Hugo Chavez, who this week assured he’d vote for Obama if he were from the United States. The America-bashing strongman made the announcement on state-owned television, saying “Obama is a good guy” and that if Obama was from Caracas, he’d surely return the favor by voting for Chavez.”
Read more here
Chavez joins Raul Castro and Putin as Obama backers. He’s pretty popular with dictators right now. And isn’t it nice that they too can contribute to his campaign, what with his intentionally lax security measures?
From the NYPost
“The Obama re-election campaign has accepted at least one foreign donation in violation of the law — and does nothing to check on the provenance of millions of dollars in other contributions, a watchdog group alleges.
Chris Walker, a British citizen who lives outside London, told The Post he was able to make two $5 donations to President Obama’s campaign this month through its Web site while a similar attempt to give Mitt Romney cash was rejected. It is illegal to knowingly solicit or accept money from foreign citizens.”
Read more here
And more from the DailyCaller here
“A soon to be released report from the conservative Government Accountability Institute shows that President Barack Obama’s re-election campaign has increasingly collected more electronic donations from non-existent ZIP codes throughout the 2012 campaign cycle.
From February through June this year the GAI findings reported that the Obama campaign collected $175,816.26 in electronic donations from non-existent ZIP codes. One month later, the campaign raised $411,369.55 through such donations and $197,464.59 in August.
By the end of September, the Obama campaign raked in $2,199,204.38 – thanks to donations from non-existent ZIP codes.”
And while we’re on the subject of fraud…….
From the HeritageFoundation
“It is no secret that President Obama’s and green-energy supporters’ (from both parties) foray into venture capitalism has not gone well. But the extent of its failure has been largely ignored by the press. Sure, single instances garner attention as they happen, but they ignore past failures in order to make it seem like a rare case.”
“So far, 36 companies that were offered federal support from taxpayers are faltering — either having gone bankrupt or laying off workers or heading for bankruptcy. This list includes only those companies that received federal money from the Obama Administration’s Department of Energy and other agencies. The amount of money indicated does not reflect how much was actually received or spent but how much was offered. The amount also does not include other state, local, and federal tax credits and subsidies, which push the amount of money these companies have received from taxpayers even higher.”
Read more here
But hey, what’s 8 Billion outta 80 Billion to pay off donors? Nothing to get excited about. Move along.
🙄
Oh, and one last thing, about those UN election monitors who will be “just watching”.
From the DailyCaller
“The United Nations-affiliated Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe will deploy election monitors around the United States on Election Day in an effort to monitor conservative groups for voter suppression or intimidation at polling places.
Led by Ambassador Daan Everts, the election monitors will include a total of 57 international experts and observers — 13 placed in Washington, D.C. and 44 placed at polling places on other cities.
The monitors, from Europe and central Asia, will not limit their observation to noting possible violations of U.S. and sate election law. They will also “assess these elections for compliance with international obligations and standards for democratic election” and “conduct comprehensive monitoring of the media,” according to a press release.”
Read more here
Seems like a lot more than the usual watching to me. And when the NAACP and ACLU are involved, it’s doubly suspect.
Wandering Views 
Chavez’s endorsement came a couple of days late for me. I’ve already voted.
They just can’t seem to get it together, can they?
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I got this in an e-mail, so it must be so.
Subject: New golf rules
President B.H.O. Has recently appointed a Golf Czar.
Major rule changes in the game of golf will become effective October 1, 2012.
This is only a preview as the complete rule book (expect 2716 pages) is being rewritten as we speak.
Here are a few of the changes:
Golfers with handicaps:
– Below 10 will have their green fees increased by 35%.
– Between 11 and 18 will see no increase in green fees.
– Above 18 will get a $20 check each time they play.
The term “gimmie” will be changed to “entitlement” and will be used as follows:
– Handicaps below 10, no entitlements.
– Handicaps from 11 to 17, entitlements for putter length putts.
– Handicaps above 18, if your ball is on green, no need to putt, just pick it up.
These entitlements are intended to bring about fairness and, most importantly, equality in scoring.
In addition, a Player will be limited to a maximum of one birdie or six pars in any given 18-hole round.
Any excess must be given to those fellow players who have not yet scored a birdie or par.
Only after all players have received a birdie or par from the player actually making the birdie or par, can that player begin to count his pars and birdies again .
The current USGA handicap system will be used for the above purposes, but the term “net score” will be available only for scoring those players with handicaps of 18 and above.
This is intended to “re-distribute” the success of winning by making sure that in all competitions every Player above an 18 handicap will post only “net score” against every other player’s “gross score”.
These new Rules are intended to CHANGE the game of golf.
Golf must be about Fairness. It should have nothing to do with ability, hard work, practice, and responsibility.
This is the “Right thing to do.”
So, please remember; if you shot a round of golf under par, you didn’t shoot it yourself. Someone else built that course, and someone else cut the grass so that you could play on it. Someone else built the clubs and the cart. Your part was relatively minor in the big scheme of things.
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On the OSCE (which is not part of the UN but is recognized as a regional organization by the UN) For the last couple of elections the right wing has had a similar reaction to the OSCE election monitors sounding more like apparatchiks than small d democrats. It’s not a big deal guys.
Apologies for the post explaining the OSCE on this point on yesterday’s news and politics — my smart phone kept having issues, having to press letters 3 times and I see I missed several as I was posting while also watching the Pats and Jets … sigh.
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…because Republican’s have such a long history of intimidating voters?
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Chas, I love the new golf rules!
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Apparently so do a lot of US Citizens.
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I get so freaked out about the new golf rules that it makes my stomach hurt! It is incomprehensible to me that so many people seem to want the new rules.
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Where were the monitors when the Black Panthers were at the Philadelphia polls?
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Inbut, they were there, but didn’t care.
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The osce as been observin US elections since 1993. At the last presidential, they went to Fla, NC, Va, Md, Oh, NH, NM, Colo. You can read more about the osce at osce.org.
Once again, this is not a big deal.
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Whatever. They should concentrate on some other country’s elections… for instance, those under the thumbs of dictators like Putin, Chavez, and Castro…
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CB…would it be a big deal if their stated purpose was to monitor liberal groups for election violations?
Why is the irrelevant UN sending an irrelevant European oversight group to monitor conservatives? Smacks of an attempt to influence elections…
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In,
It isn’t the monitoring mission’s stated purpose but rather brietbart’s spin. So the premise of your question is misinformed.
MiM
OSCE does electoral observation in Russia but not Venezuela – Vz is not an osce member state.
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Maybe the monitors will decide we really should have at least some voter ID requirements in place. 😉
What a concept.
I think we’re now about the only western country that doesn’t have a voter ID in place?
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Oh…good. That wasn’t their purpose…
Then maybe they will notice the Black Panthers, multiple voters, buses full of questionable voters, etc. THIS time…
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Under the radar flying by the Obama Administration
From Human Events
By: Audrey Hudson
10/19/2012 05:20 AM
The Obama administration is creating an advisory committee on climate change to advise the federal government on future operations.
The Interior Department announced the new bureaucracy in a recent federal registry notice along with a call for nominations by Nov. 19 to seat the 25-member board.
http://www.humanevents.com/2012/10/19/hudson-interior-dept-creates-climate-change-committee/
This committee will be in position to do lots of damage.
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Chas
This committee is s under the radar that it was publicly announced and per FACA requirements will have public meetings. Wow those Obama people are tricksie allright what with so much transparency…
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Donna
Most of the rest of the west hhas mandatory registration and natinal id’s.
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Chas, 3:35, hard to imagine how they could add on any more federal regulatory bureaucracy than we already have, isn’t it? 🙂 But where there’s a will, there’s a way.
It’s what government does. It tends to just keep reproducing itself, layer upon layer, once it reaches a certain threshold.
I’m not anti-regulation, by any means. And I’m far from being a libertarian.
But I also think regulations can quickly spiral out of control to the point where doing/building/changing just about anything becomes nearly impossible and simply is one more added (and costly) burden.
… especially when regulations become based on what is, in part, a future “climate” forecast that includes at least some measure of speculation and guess work?
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The purpose of any government entity is to grow. There used to be a US Dept of Health, Education and Welfare. They became their own departments. This “advisory committee” will grow into a Climate Change Department if we let it.
Everything you do will affect the climate.
They will control everything you do.
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Chas and Donna,
In order for an executive department to consider and adopt ideas from ngos or businesses, it is required to set up an advisory committee (congress passed this requirement many years ago). The committee must have public meetings with public minutes. Maybe that seems outrageous …
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🙂 Ooh, love advisory committees. 🙂
I’m sorry, I’ve covered government on a local level for too long, I suppose (as in long enough that my eyes now simply glaze over at the mention of yet another committee being appointed that will produce yet another report …. )
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Jaded. I know.
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I still remember when an urban development consulting panel came to our area several years ago to spend a few weeks on an assessment of what could be done differently/better to improve the community & make it more appealing for both residents and tourists.
In their wrap-up comments, one of the panel members — who had a pronounced southern accent, I think she may have been in real estate, each panel member had a different expertise — recommended significantly cutting down the many “committees” and various community groups that were discussing (too often) the same things and just overlapping one another.
“Frankly,” she said, referring to all the committees that met so often, “I don’t know how you all do it.”
The suggestion to streamline fell on deaf ears, of course.
After the panel left town, the community decided it needed to create yet another committee — to discuss the panel’s findings. 😦 😦
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Lol. Yes, an advisory committee will absolutely get things done .. heh. I’m extremely cynical about these kinds of committees.
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Twelve minutes into the “debate” and neither of them is saying anything.
Schaffer asks a question and each of them goes into a prepared speech on the subject, whether it addresses the question or not.
I’ll hang on a while longer to see if it develops.
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Advisory committees and public comment scenarios can be useful. I know of one (and only one.) Arizona Game and Fish uses theirs and listens. Part of the reason is that, like most similar state wildlife departments, most of their funding comes from hunting licenses and fees so must function somewhat like a business. Would that more aspects of government were funded by voluntary contributions.
AG&F is very good at striking a balance between different interests in wildlife and providing for all types of wildlife uses.
Then again I am reminded of the public comment meetings by the Tucson School District when they were going to ram down their sex education program. Noone from the School Board attended the meetings and they ignored everything that was said in them. Arrogant government officials are very destructive. Their attitude helped solidify my wife and my decision to home school our children.
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