What’s interesting in the news today?
1. The bi-partisan Senate report on Benghazi is out.
From HotAir “The bombshell here isn’t the blame — it’s that the blame is bipartisan. Normally in these circumstances, a Congressional committee looking into the activities of a current administration will split into partisan conclusions, especially if it’s critical at all. Not this time:
A long-delayed Senate intelligence committee report released on Wednesday spreads blame among the State Department and intelligence agencies for not preventing attacks on two outposts in Libya that killed four Americans, including U.S. Ambassador J. Christopher Stevens.
The bipartisan report lays out more than a dozen findings regarding the assaults on Sept. 11 and 12, 2012 on the diplomatic compound and a CIA annex in the Libyan city of Benghazi. It says the State Department failed to increase security at the sites despite warnings, and faults intelligence agencies for not sharing information about the existence of the CIA outpost with the U.S. military.
The committee determined that the U.S. military command in Africa didn’t know about the CIA annex and didn’t have the resources to defend the diplomatic compound in an emergency.”
They conclude it was preventable. And Hillary doesn’t escape blame either.
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2. ObamaCare is having some unintended consequences for Democrats too. Kay Hagan can ignore the president now, but folks know what she did, and it’s costing her. She now trails all possible Republican challengers.
Also From HotAir “It wasn’t so very long ago — as in, last September — that Democratic senator and enthusiastic ObamaCare cheerleader Kay Hagan was posting fairly comfortable margins leading all of the Republican challengers to her reelection bid this year. Cue the ObamaCare initiation sequence, however, and that all started to change pretty quickly. These past few months have been whittling away at her erstwhile lead, and even as the Republican primary race is starting to solidify, Public Policy Polling‘s latest update indicates that all of her potential opponents are seriously gaining on her:
For the first time in our polling of the North Carolina Senate race, presumptive frontrunner Thom Tillis has opened a little bit of space between himself and the rest of his opponents in the Republican primary. Tillis now leads the field with 19% to 11% for Greg Brannon and Heather Grant, 8% for Mark Harris, and 7% for Bill Flynn. …
39% of voters in the state say they approve of the job Hagan is doing to 49% who disapprove. She has 1 or 2 point deficits against each of her potential GOP foes.
And if these ads are any indication, she’s in for a looong summer.
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3. And it’s not just North Carolina. Democrats own this, and folks are being reminded of that fact.
From TheNYTimes “Democrats are increasingly anxious about an onslaught of television ads hitting vulnerable Senate and House candidates for their support of the new health law, since many lack the resources to fight back in the early stages of the midterm campaign.
Since September, Americans for Prosperity, a group financed in part by the billionaire Koch brothers, has spent an estimated $20 million on television advertising that calls out House and Senate Democrats by name for their support of the Affordable Care Act.
The unusually aggressive early run of television ads, which has been supplemented by other conservative initiatives, has gone largely unanswered, and strategists in both parties agree it is taking a toll on its targets.”
Looks like it’s time for the IRS to go after the Koch brothers again. 🙂
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4. This is ridiculous. They can search you and your personal belongings near the border in the name of national security, but they won’t enforce the borders in the name of national security. 🙄
From FoxNews “A federal judge who endorsed “suspicion-less” searches of laptops, cameras and cell phones at the border has set up a possible Supreme Court showdown challenging what critics call “Constitution-free zones” and the Obama administration’s dragnet approach to national security.
A decision by Judge Edward Korman upholding the federal government’s right to search travelers’ electronic devices at or near the border conflicts with a similar ruling in California. That ruling requires a “reasonable suspicion” of criminal activity before agents can confiscate and examine personal photos, laptops and files. Korman’s ruling does not.
“I think Americans are justifiably becoming increasingly surprised and even outraged by the extent to which the national security state seems to be monitoring and collecting information about us all,” said ACLU Attorney Catherine Crump. “We think that having a purely suspicion-less policy is wrong, because it leaves border agents with no standards at all to follow. That opens the door that people will be [targeted] for inappropriate reasons.”
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Wandering Views 
If not for Kay Hagen, we wouldn’t have Obamacare.
We need to bring Hagen back to NC. At least get her out of Washington.
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Good post by Matt Walsh on “…why we need a minimum wage hike.” I laughed out loud at the “Asteroid of Fairness from the Kumbaya Galaxy” line. 🙂
http://themattwalshblog.com/
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My daughter turned 26 this month and so went off of my health insurance. In preparation for the change, she went on Healthcare.gov in December to enroll in a policy. After going through the application process, she was told that Medicaid was her only option.
Now the State is telling her that she may not qualify, and that if she does her coverage may not begin for quite some time.
Prior to Obamacare I knew how to help her with things like this. Now the government has sabotaged what was working, and replaced it with something that is not. Please stop helping me. I was doing better on my own.
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HI Didymus. I haven’t seen you for a while.
Your daughter’s experience is just another step on the stairway to single payer.
Which was the objective all the time.
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1. Sounds like a typical lack of communication between different agencies. Pretty hard to trace that sort of thing to the top. You would need a smoking gun such as a memo addressed to Clinton that an attack was planned …..
3. Democracy is at risk when money is used to dominate the conversation.
4. As a Canadian who’s crossed the border many times I can attest that US border guards (and the DEA) are not to be messed with ….. there’s no constitution when you are anywhere near the border. This is nothing new. Admittedly it became even tighter after 9/11. After traveling back and forth to Europe where a white middle aged Canadian gets nothing more than a nod, crossing into the US isn’t as pleasant.
AJ — any comment on corporate malfeasance in West Virginia?
Chas — I doubt it was Obama’s plan to introduce single payer. When the Democratic Montana governor mentioned it in a speech, Obama quickly shot it down (prior to the introduction to the ACA). From what I’ve read, single payer advocates were firmly told to be quiet.
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the left responds
http://thedailybanter.com/2013/05/13-benghazis-that-occurred-on-bushs-watch-without-a-peep-from-fox-news/
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When Obamacare was enacted the US was spending 18% of GDP on healthcare. That was 50% more than any other country. Two thirds of that spending was from the government. Most of this was Medicare, Medicaid or federally-mandated local spending at county hospitals. Put another way, the US government was spending as much on healthcare as any other country before taking into account healthcare paid for by insurance companies and the drop in the bucket paid for by individuals. Obamacare is certain to make healthcare spending as a percentage of GDP go up. The Democrats can always take a bad situation and make it worse.
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I believe we should create a federal Department of Homosexuality to promote perversion. This department would be patterned after the US Department of Energy. We would be entirely heterosexual within twenty years. I have that much faith in our government.
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Ricky – That’s funny!
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HRW,
Ahhh yes, the “Well he did it first!” defense, the last refuge of scoundrels. Lol. 😆
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I think their argument is not “he did it first” but rather Republicans didn’t investigate the 13 embassy attacks under Bush so why the one under Obama — it must be politics.
Ricky — American medical expenses are high since the gov’t avoids using cost control measures other nations routinely use because they see it as market intervention or more likely Congress has been bought and paid for by the health insurance, pharmaceuticals, etc. Here’s one example. The Ontario gov’t is the second largest purchaser of drugs in North America and uses this to negotiate a sharpely discounted rate. Meanwhile, the largest purchaser of drugs — the US government — has legislated itself so its not allowed to negotiate lower prices.
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HRW, American medical expenses began to skyrocket in 1965 – the year Medicare and Medicaid were adopted. Ronald Reagan correctly opposed both as “socialized medicine”. Everything that has happened since then has been anti-climatic.
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HRW, I will grant you this. Your socialists are smarter than ours.
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I will grant you one other point. Crony capitalism, aka fascism, doesn’t exist solely in the fake-green energy industry. It has been a huge part of American healthcare since… Here we go again – 1965!
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It seems I’m a prophet. We already have a Department of Homosexuality.
http://www.lifenews.com/2014/01/15/planned-parenthood-denies-lawmakers-request-to-see-its-graphic-sex-ed-curriculum/
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HRW, he shot down single-payer like he shot down same-sex marriage. There’s a certain “finger-in-the-wind” aspect to this presidency. Yes, it was what they wanted all along. But only when enough folks were on board (in this case, intended or not, it’ll be when Obamacare creates enough of a nightmare to leave people screaming for a fix).
Once it’s deemed publicly “safe,” it’s full speed ahead.
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I don’t recall hearing a US ambassador was killed during the Bush administration.
That’s the difference for me.
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HRW
I’m convinced, if I want to live in America and be a socialist, I will move back to Canada, my maternal Grandfather’s birth place.
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