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News/Politics 5-10-13

What’s interesting out there today?

Another day, another whistleblower. And like all Obama admin whistleblowers, they’re attempting to silence him. At least they didn’t imply he was crazy like they did the last IG to cross them. At least not yet. From HotAir

“In yesterdays hearings on Benghazi, Gregory Hicks told the House Oversight Committee that the State Department warned him about cooperating with investigators and retaliated against him for challenging the bogus talking points about a “spontaneous demonstration.” Mark Thompson further testified to being cut out of the loop after he insisted that FEST should be activated, and Eric Nordstrom dismissed the supposedly independent ARB effort as a whitewash aimed at protecting senior officials in the State Department.

Those aren’t the only complaints coming from career professionals within the Obama administration.  Politico reports that the Inspector General for the reconstruction of Afghanistan is now claiming that “bureaucrats” are trying to silence him to keep the reports of corruption in the Karzai government from doing any more damage.”

“The watchdog who tracks the billions of taxpayer dollars spent to rebuild Afghanistan says government officials have tried to silence him because they think he’s embarrassing the White House and Afghan President Hamid Karzai by pointing out the waste and fraud.”

“John Sopko, the special inspector general for Afghanistan reconstruction, used a speech at the New America Foundation on Wednesday to blast government “bureaucrats”’ who have told him to stop publicizing damning audits that detail case after case of waste, corruption and mismanagement of rebuilding efforts in Afghanistan. Some government officials have even complained that they aren’t allowed to pre-screen or edit his reports, he said. …”

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The Benghazi Patsy, from Politico

“Nakoula Basseley Nakoula deserves a place in American history. He is the first person in this country jailed for violating Islamic anti-blasphemy  laws.

You won’t find that anywhere in the charges against him, of course. As a practical matter, though, everyone knows that Nakoula wouldn’t be in jail today if he hadn’t produced a video crudely lampooning the prophet Muhammad.”

“After Benghazi, the administration was evidently filled with a fierce resolve — to bring Nakoula Basseley Nakoula to justice. Charles Woods, the father of a Navy SEAL killed in Benghazi, said Secretary of State Hillary Clinton told him  when his son’s body returned to Andrews Air Force Base: “We will make sure that  the person who made that film is arrested and prosecuted.”

Lo and behold, Nakoula was brought in for questioning by five Los Angeles County sheriff’s deputies at midnight, eventually arrested and held without bond, and finally thrown into jail for a year. He sits in La Tuna Federal Correctional Institution in Texas right now, even as the deceptive spin that blamed his video for the Benghazi attack looks more egregious by the day.”

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More ObamaCare fraud and waste. From Reuters

“The Obama administration said on Thursday it is making $150 million available to community health centers to enroll uninsured Americans in healthcare coverage under President Barack Obama’s reform law.

The new funds would help about 1,200 health centers hire and train staff, conduct community outreach efforts and assist consumers in applying for benefits under the law, which provides coverage through subsidized insurance markets and an expansion of the Medicaid program for the poor, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services said.”

Community organizers with lot’s of cash. Or as I like to call it, ACORN Reborn.  Again, Politico

“President Obama will speak Friday about the Affordable Care Act’s effects “on the health, lives and pocketbooks of women and their families,” the White House said in his schedule.

Timed to coincide with Mother’s Day, which is on Sunday, the event comes also comes as House Republicans plan to vote next week on a bill to repeal the health care law.

The audience for the 2:40 p.m. event will include representatives from women’s groups, including Planned Parenthood.”

Sure, ‘cuz everybody thinks of PP whenever Mother’s Day is mentioned. 🙄

Maybe they want to be the Grinches of Mother’s Day. Like these folks. From TIME

“It’s the time of year when we celebrate mothers and — about a month later — fathers. But the way we view each holiday reveals a lot about the growing gap between cultural gender stereotypes and the reality of most families’ day-to-day lives.”

“Other messages in Mother’s Day and Father’s Day cards also reinforce sex stereotypes. Moms are thanked for the hugs, for drying the tears, for “always being there.” Dads, though, tend to be thanked as role models and individuals to look up to. A typical Hallmark Father’s Day card reads, “Integrity. Respect. Honor. I learned these things from you.”

Of course, there is not a thing wrong with children saying thank you for all those cuddles and comfort, or for expressing gratitude for models of strength and responsibility. These are all lovely sentiments. The question is: why in 2013, are we still dividing all these traits by gender? It’s insulting to both women and men and it has less and less to do with contemporary American families. Dads can be nurturers. Moms can be role models. Many, of course, already are.”

Why are leftists so miserable that they want to ruin everything that people might enjoy? Sad.

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Domestic Terrorist Teaching at Colleges?

Uh….,  yeah. And here’s a list, from TheOtherMcCain

“Controversy ensued when the news broke that Kathy Boudin, former member of the Weather Underground who was convicted in 1984 of felony murder, received the position of adjunct professor at Columbia University.  While it may be ironic that Boudin received a teaching position at a university she was plotted to bomb, she is not the only former domestic terrorist to receive such a position.

At least a dozen former members of domestic terrorist organizations are now college professors. Members of the Weather Underground make up half of this list; some are well known, like Bill Ayers and his wife Bernadine Dohrn, Ayers is now retired from the University of Illinois, while Dohrn is still teaching at Northwestern Law.

Other lesser-known members of the group include Howard Machtinger, who was charged with conspiring to bomb the Detroit Police Officers Association Building and was on the run from the law for five years from 1973 to 1978. Machtinger now works for the School of Education at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.”

And many more as well.

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10 thoughts on “News/Politics 5-10-13”

  2. What are you making of the Bangladesh garment building horror? Has it made anyone think twice about the real cost of cheap clothing? Is this another reason to buy American?

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  5. Donna,

    More on that here,

    http://www.nationaljournal.com/politics/scrubbing-the-truth-from-benghazi-20130510

    “These changes don’t resolve all of my issues or those of my building’s leadership.” With that sentence, one in a series of emails and draft “talking points” leaked to Jonathan Karl of ABC News, the Obama administration was caught playing politics with Benghazi.

    Summaries of White House and State Department emails — some of which were first published by Stephen F. Hayes of the Weekly Standard — also contradict the White House version of events that led to U.N. Ambassador Susan Rice misleading the public about the cause of the Sept. 11, 2012, attack on the U.S. installation in Libya.

    Where does this all lead?”

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  6. Michelle, it has brought yet another light on the ills of the industry. I was already pondering how the manufacture of ultra-cheap clothing in a developing country, was beginning have detrimental effects on the cottage industry of a third-world country. Here, the traditional clothing industry looks something like this: bolts of cloth are sold in the local marketplace by merchants who travel from marketplace to marketplace to sell their wares. The buyer haggles with the seller, working out a price between them. The buyer then takes that cloth to a local tailor, who sew it on his treadle machine, making a unique and attractive garment to the taste of the buyer and then the price of labour is hammered out between buyer and tailor. As used and factory excess manufactured clothing comes in the country, it endangers the livelihood, not of the merchants, who simply switch their wares, but of the tailors, who are completely cut out of the process – as they have been in the West for nearly a century.

    Personally, I buy as little cheap manufactured clothing as possible. Part of that is because the clothing itself is not worth it. The material is badly woven, the colours run and even the machine stitching is done with cheap thread. I make most of my clothes, buying quality material (where and how that material is woven is another good question) and thread and choosing classic styles for my patterns. It means a smaller wardrobe, but my skirts and shirts last for years. Some of the horror of this tragedy for me is that those people died stitching together clothes that I, in my poverty, wouldn’t look twice at when they hang for sale in my local superstore (I am familiar with at least one of the lines that this factory produced). I couldn’t afford to spend 10 dollars on a shirt that would tear in three months. Why did they have to waste their lives in such an aimless pursuit?

    It could be said that they did it to have money for food on the table, and that is true in the immediate sense. But why weren’t they rather growing their own food in their own garden plot instead of being crowded in tenements, where they had to go and pay for food at a store or market, around this illegal factory? Someone here will suggest that it is because Bangladesh does not have enough land for all its inhabitants to have gardens, as the heaviest populated country (in terms of persons per land area) in the world. I doubt that is the case in fact, as gardens do not require large areas if properly managed, but those with the overpopulation axe to grind will suggest it.

    No, it is more to do with the marketing of manufacturers and suppliers, who seduce not only their buyers with promises of cheap clothing but also their workers with the idea of a job that pays regularly, good times or bad. When people live off the land and the fruit of their hands, as they do here, it is a precarious existence. A drought year or a severe storm at harvest time means famine. To have even a meaningless job, picking up the same shapes of thin cloth and pushing them through the machine in the same direction all day, that pays regular wages seems to promise security to those accustomed to a knife-edged existence. What a hollow promise it turned out to be for those 1000 and more people, mangled and crushed by their place of work.

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  8. Michelle,

    Buying American is a good idea, but it’s getting harder to do. In many industries, it’s nearly impossible. The company my wife works for is one of the largest men’s clothing companies in the world. You’d know just about all of the brands they produce and sell. Just about everything is now made over seas. There is not an American company out there that could provide the materials, workers, or factories and facilities necessary to produce their products. That stinks, but it is the reality of the clothing market today. They go out of their way to avoid slave labor companies and ones with horrible conditions in their factories. Yet to meet the demand they sometimes have to go to countries that don’t oversee their factories at all. In places like Bangladesh there is no OSHA or like minded groups looking out for workers. The govt doesn’t care. So what is a company to do? They need product, or they’ll have no business. American made would be great, but it’s not possible. 😦

    And you wouldn’t believe the hoops they have to jump thru to import products. When you add in tariffs and import fees, it adds up to quite a bit of the cost. Not to mention customs checks at ports, goods held because customs is behind, and any other delays and expenses that arise from importing. They’d love to do it here and avoid all that. But due to the loss of clothing production companies and facilities, not to mention the union costs involved, it’s no longer even an option. It’s sad, but reality often is. 😦

    And yes, many companies are all too happy to do things this way. They could care less about the workers producing their goods. Unfortunately, they make the whole industry look bad. Even those that try to do it right.

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