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News/Politics 1-7-15

What’s interesting in the news today?

1. Boehner endures the biggest revolt in over 120 years.

From TheWashingtonPost  “Republicans took full control of Congress on Tuesday, but — even on a day of happy ceremony — GOP leaders were reminded of the limits of their power, first by a veto threat from the president and then by a historic rebellion by conservatives in the House.”

“When a clerk called the roll, 24 Republicans voted for a candidate other than the incumbent speaker, John A. Boehner (Ohio). The plotters couldn’t agree on their own candidate: They voted for one another, and for two sitting senators.

In the end, their rebellion was not enough to unseat Boehner: The speaker won on the first round with 216 votes, 11 more than he needed. But it was far larger than a similar coup attempt against Boehner in 2013. In fact, it was the largest rebellion by a party against its incumbent speaker since the Civil War.”

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2. Boehner celebrated by taking revenge on those who voted against him. Too bad he’s not so tough when it comes to battles with the White House. If he was, he would’ve never had this problem.

From Politico  “After he secured his third term as speaker Tuesday afternoon, losing 25 votes on the House floor to some relative-unknown members of the Republican Conference, Boehner moved swiftly to boot two of the insurgents from the influential Rules Committee. That could be just the start of payback for the speaker’s betrayers, who might see subcommittee chairmanships and other perks fall away in the coming months.

Boehner’s allies have thirsted for this kind of action from the speaker, saying he’s let people walk all over him for too long and is too nice to people who are eager to stab him in the back. The removal of Florida Reps. Daniel Webster and Rich Nugent from Rules was meant as a clear demonstration that what Boehner and other party leaders accepted during the last Congress is no longer acceptable, not with the House’s biggest GOP majority in decades.”

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3. Former Va. governor McDonnell is going to jail. Eventually.

From USAToday  “Former Virginia governor Bob McDonnell, who asked a judge Tuesday for mercy for his wife and himself, was sentenced to two years in federal prison for public corruption.

McDonnell was convicted Sept. 4 of trading access to the power of the governor’s office for more than $165,000 in loans and high-end gifts. Prosecutors had wanted him to spend more than 10 years in prison, but early in the four-hour hearing Judge James Spencer said federal officials misinterpreted the guidelines, contending the range was more like 78 to 97 months — 6½ to a little more than 8 years.

Then Spencer discarded the recommendations entirely but rejected the 6,000 hours of intensive community service that McDonnell’s lawyers had suggested.

“It breaks my heart, but I have a duty I can’t avoid,” Spencer said in handing down the punishment. “Mrs. McDonnell may have allowed the serpent into the mansion, (but) the governor knowingly let him into his personal and business affairs.””

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4. We don’ need no stinkin’ warrants…..

From HotAir  “In a private briefing to committee members, the FBI apparently indicated that they do not believe they need warrants in order to secure data from cell technology using decoy towers known as “stingrays.”

“The Judiciary Committee needs a broader understanding of the full range of law enforcement agencies that use this technology, the policies in place to protect the privacy interests of those whose information might be collected using these devices, and the legal process that DOJ and DHS entities seek prior to using them,” the letter read.

For example, we understand that the FBI’s new policy requires FBI agents to obtain a search warrant whenever a cell-site simulator is used as part of a FBI investigation or operation, unless one of several exceptions apply, including (among others): (1) cases that pose an imminent danger to public safety, (2) cases that involve a fugitive, or (3) cases in which the technology is used in public places or other locations at which the FBI deems there is no reasonable expectation of privacy.

We have concerns about the scope of the exceptions. Specifically, we are concerned about whether the FBI and other law enforcement agencies have adequately considered the privacy interests of other individuals who are not the targets of the interception, but whose information is nevertheless being collected when these devices are being used. We understand that the FBI believes that it can address these interests by maintaining that information for a short period of time and purging the information after it has been collected. But there is a question as to whether this sufficiently safeguards privacy interests.

The congressional investigation was prompted in part by a report published in The Wall Street Journal in November in which the existence of these secret mock cell towers as well as Cessna aircraft that randomly surveil America’s urban centers was revealed.”

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News/Politics 1-6-15

What’s interesting in the news today?

1. The new Congress is in session.

From TheWeeklyStandard  “The office of House speaker John Boehner announces it’s kicking off the new Congress with a series of jobs bills.”

“Hire More Heroes Act:  The president’s health care law “is prompting many” small businesses “to hold off on hiring and even to shed jobs in some cases,” CNBCreports.  The Hire More Heroes Act will help by exempting veterans who are “already enrolled in healthcare plans through the Department of Defense or the VA from being counted toward the employee limit under the health care law,” the bill’s sponsor, Rep. Rodney Davis (R-IL), explained in this week’s Republican Address.  “So not only are we providing small businesses – and our economy – with much-needed relief, but we’re also helping more of our veterans find work.”

Save American Workers Act: Thousands of workers have seen their hours and wages slashed thanks to ObamaCare’s employer mandate that forces businesses to hold hours down to 30 per week or face a penalty.  Women and low-income workers are particularly hard hit by the mandate, according to an analysis by the Hoover Institution, which found that the 30-hour rule puts 2.6 million Americans earning less than $30,000 a year – 63% of whom are women – at risk of having their hours and their wages cut.  The Save American Workers Act restores the traditional 40-hour work week to protect these workers and help our economy grow.

Approving the Keystone Pipeline: President Obama has stood in the way of the widely-popular Keystone pipeline for more than six years, putting his own political interests ahead of thousands of jobs and increased energy security for the American people.  The House will once again act where the president has not and approve the Keystone pipeline, keeping the pressure on the White House to finally move forward with what one labor union calls a “lifeline” for American workers.”

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2. But Republicans are still split on who will lead the House.

From TheDailyCaller  “The supposedly routine reelection of House Speaker John Boehner is becoming a dramatic repeat of the GOP’s December split over immigration, where the party’s populist base was jammed by the business-backed leadership.

By mid-Monday, at least 10 defectors said they will vote against Boehner for speaker. A new poll was released showing overwhelming opposition to GOP leaders funding President Barack Obama’s executive amnesty. And the House switchboard was jammed by Republicans who are urging their members to vote against Boehner.

 The Daily Caller was on hold for 25 minutes, but the switchboard operator did not answer the phone.

Boehner needs to win 218 votes in the Tuesday ballot, which is scheduled for midday.”

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3. It should be a required course, but those in charge of public education seem to have other priorities.

From TheNYPost  “When people from other parts of the world become US citizens, they have to pass a test that includes questions about how our system of government works. Why shouldn’t native-born Americans have to know the same?

Many Americans grew up with civics classes. But today, civics instruction has largely been abandoned — former Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O’Connor calls this “the quiet crisis in education.”

The good news is that a dozen states are trying to make civics a requirement for high-school seniors.”

“We’re not talking about obscure historical trivia or constitutional arguments. The questions involve basic knowledge of how the US government works. For example, students would be asked to name America’s economic system or to identify one of the three branches of government.

This last is apparently more difficult than it might appear: A recent survey by the Annenberg Public Policy Center of the University of Pennsylvania found that 35 percent of the 1,416 adults questioned couldn’t do it.”

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4. I found this interesting.

From MSN/WaPo  “It started 15 years ago with plans to expand the Tower of David Museum. But the story took a strange turn when archaeologists started peeling away layers under the floor in an old abandoned building adjacent to the museum in Jerusalem’s Old City.

They knew it had been used as a prison when the Ottoman Turks and then the British ruled these parts. But, as they carefully dug down, they eventually uncovered something extraordinary: the suspected remains of the palace where one of the more famous scenes of the New Testament may have taken place — the trial of Jesus.

Now, after years of excavation and a further delay caused by wars and a lack of funds, the archaeologists’ precious find is being shown to the public through tours organized by the museum.

The prison “is a great part of the ancient puzzle of Jerusalem and shows the history of this city in a very unique and clear way,” said Amit Re’em, the Jerusalem district archaeologist, who headed the excavation team more than a decade ago.”

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News/Politics 1-5-15

What’s interesting in the news today?

1. Make it so.

From FoxNews  “Texas Rep. Louie Gohmert said Sunday that he will challenge House Speaker John Boehner for his post when Congress returns this week to Washington.

Gohmert, among the House Republican caucus’ most conservative members, made the announcement on “Fox & Friends,” saying he decided to run after Rep. Ted Yoho, R-Fla., said Saturday that he would challenge Boehner for the chamber’s top post.

“We have heard from a lot of Republicans that said, ‘I would vote for somebody besides speaker Boehner.’ But nobody will put their name out there,” Gohmert said. “That changed yesterday with Ted Yoho.””

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2. Challenging the myth that Republicans are the party of the rich.

From TownHall  “Not only do Democratic billionaires spend more on campaigns then Republicans do, as Katie Pavlich noted yesterday, but Democrats also represent the nation’s richest congressional districts, while Republicans represent the middle class.

According to 2012 U.S. Census data, Democrats represent seven of the nation’s ten richest congressional districts including, California 18 (median household income $100,917), California 17 (median household income $100,652), Virginia 11 (median household income $98,815), New York 3 (median household income $96,626), Virginia 8 (median household income $92,918), California 33 (median household income $92,111), and Maryland 8 (median household income).

Meanwhile, Democrats also represent nine of the nation’s ten poorest congressional districts, including New York 15 (median household income $23,314), Mississippi 2 (median household income $29,981), Michigan 13 (median household income $30,273), Alabama 7 (median household income $31,080), Florida 5 (median household income $31,116), Ohio 11 (median household income $31,331), Arizona 7 (median household income $32,259), North Carolina 1 (median household income $32,488) , and California 34 (median household income $32,714).

And not only is the Democratic Party sharply divided between those that represent rich and poor congressional districts, but income inequality within Democratic congressional districts is far greater than it is within Republican ones. Of the top ten congressional districts with the highest levels of income inequality, Democrats represent nine of them.”

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3. So taxpayers will be helping to foot the bill for 87% of new ObamaCare enrollees.

From TheDailyMail  “About seven out of every eight Obamacare insurance customers who enrolled between November 15 and mid-December are poor enough to qualify for taxpayer-funded subsidies designed to lower their monthly premiums.

The Department of Health and Human Services reported that number Tuesday, saying it’s up from 80 per cent a year ago.

Americans who participate in government-brokered medical insurance can get subsidies from the federal treasury if their households earn less than four times the government’s official ‘poverty’ level.

That situation describes 64 per cent of all U.S. residents, according to the Kaiser Family Foundation. But far more are qualifying, suggesting that the Obamacare subscriber base is dramatically tilted toward low-income earners.

And as poor Americans depend inreasingly on handouts to manage their monthly health insurance bills, the U.S. Supreme Court could be months away from invalidating the entire subsidy system that supports the 34 states that chose not to run their own Obamacare marketplaces.”

Let’s hope so.

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4. The discovery phase should be fun to watch.

From TheWashingtonExaminer  “Investigative reporter Sharyl Attkisson, whose coverage of the Sept. 11, 2012, terrorist attacks in Benghazi, Libya, has earned her both high praise and harsh criticism, has launched a lawsuit against the Department of Justice, demanding access to FBI documents that involve her personally.

The now-senior independent contributor to the Daily Signal, a conservative online news outlet based at the Heritage Foundation, alleges that during her final months as a correspondent for CBS News, her personal and work computers were hacked as she continued to produce often unfavorable reports on the Obama administration.

“I am hoping to get information that sheds light on a number of problems I’ve been dealing with,” Attkisson told the Washington Examiner’s media desk Friday evening. “One of the items the FBI is withholding is information surrounding a case they opened on my computer intrusions, which lists me as the victim.”

“Yet they never told me they opened the case, never interviewed me, and won’t produce material relevant to the case or the case file. The case has to progress through court and, historically, the government drags it out (at taxpayer expense). So it’s unclear when, if ever, we might receive the documents to which we are entitled,” she said.”

Yet another of the Obama admin’s “investigations” that don’t really investigate.

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5. Extortion by another name is still extortion.

From TheNYPost  “Want to influence a casino bid? Polish your corporate image? Not be labeled a racist?

Then you need to pay Al Sharpton.

For more than a decade, corporations have shelled out thousands of dollars in donations and consulting fees to Sharpton’s National Action Network. What they get in return is the reverend’s supposed sway in the black community or, more often, his silence.”

“Al Sharpton has enriched himself and NAN for years by threatening companies with bad publicity if they didn’t come to terms with him. Put simply, Sharpton specializes in shakedowns,” said Ken Boehm, chairman of the National Legal & Policy Center, a Virginia-based watchdog group that has produced a book on Sharpton.”

“Once Sharpton’s on board, he plays the race card all the way through,” said a source who has worked with the Harlem preacher. “He just keeps asking for more and more money.””

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by

News/Politics 12-30-14

What’s interesting in the news today?

1. Anyone notice a pattern from the “most transparent administration ever?”

From NationalReview  “Darrell Issa’s leading role in the IRS investigation may have come to a close — he lost his chairmanship of the House Oversight Committee to term limits — but there is plenty of work left for his successor, Jason Chaffetz of Utah. None of these criminals has been punished; the maddening fact is that Lois Lerner is enjoying a six-figure pension at the expense of the very taxpayers against whom she conducted a corrupt political jihad. And even if that happy day should come when Lerner et al. are given one-way bus tickets to Florence, Colo., or some other suitable destination, Chaffetz and his colleagues still would have a tremendous amount of work to do; if Issa’s time has taught us anything, it is that the federal agencies are in thrall to a culture of criminality, and that the most significant crime in the agencies’ repertoire is the obstruction of federal investigations.

Earlier this year, 47 inspectors general — the officials charged with fighting corruption, waste, and wrongdoing in federal agencies — sent a letter to Issa’s committee complaining that organizations ranging from the EPA to the Justice Department were impeding their investigations by withholding information — despite the fact that federal law specifically forbids withholding that information. These are not a bunch of Republican operatives trying to score a few political points: Those 47 inspectors general comprise more than half of all such officials, and many who signed the letter were appointed by President Barack Obama. Their complaint is that the federal agencies treat them more or less like they do . . . members of Congress: thwarting them, withholding documents, obstruction investigations.

Michael Horowitz, the inspector general for the Justice Department, came to the Oversight Committee practically begging them for a means by which the DOJ – the federal law-enforcement department — might be forced to follow the laws that it is supposed to be enforcing. “It is very clear to me,” he testified, “just as it is to the Inspectors General community, that the Inspector General Act of 1978 entitles inspectors general to access all documents and records within the agency’s possession. Each of us firmly believes that Congress meant what it said in Section 6(a) of the IG Act: that Inspectors General must be given complete, timely, and unfiltered access to agency records.” But under the leadership of Attorney General Eric Holder, the DOJ did no such thing. Horowitz notes that the DOJ specifically tried to withhold information related to the investigation of Operation Fast and Furious.”

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2. Oh goody, because the one we have just isn’t enough. 🙄

From TheDailyCaller  “President Obama’s nonprofit advocacy group Organizing for Action plans to train 10,000 new community organizers in 2015 in a search for the next “organizer-in-chief.”

The OFA Fellows Program set a goal of training 10,000 new organizers to follow in the footsteps of Obama, according to a fundraising email the group sent out Sunday with the subject line “The next Barack Obama.””

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3. Talk about bad optics…..

From TheWashingtonExaminer  “One couple wanted to get married, but President Obama wanted to play golf.

Army captains Natalie Heimel and Edward Mallue Jr. knew Obama was headed to Hawaii for the holidays, so on a whim, they extended him an invite to attend their Dec. 28 wedding — one he politely declined. That same day, they were informed they would have to move their wedding location.

The wedding was set to be at the 16th tee box at Kaneohe Kipper Golf Course on the Marine Corps Base in Hawaii — a favorite of both Mallue and Obama.

“It was kind of ironic they got the letter from them and then, within hours, they were told they had to be moved due to him,” Jamie McCarthy, Mallue’s sister, told Bloomberg Politics. “It was emotional, especially for her — she’s the bride and in less than 24 hours they had to change everything they had planned.”

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4. And some good news…..

From Breitbart  “Though the Chinese Communist Party is the largest explicitly atheist organization in the world, with 85 million official members, it is now overshadowed by an estimated 100 million Christians in China. It is no wonder Beijing is nervous and authorities are cracking down on Christian groups.

Christianity is growing so fast in China that some predict that it will be the most Christian nation in the world in only another 15 years. By far, the greatest growth is coming outside the official state-sanctioned churches, which are rightly considered subservient to the Communist Party. Numbers are increasing, rather, in unofficial Protestant “house churches” and in the underground Catholic church.

“By my calculations China is destined to become the largest Christian country in the world very soon,” said Fenggang Yang, a professor of sociology at Purdue University and author of Religion in China: Survival and Revival under Communist Rule.”

China is on to this as well and they are persecuting many as a result.

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by

News/Politics 12-29-14

What’s interesting in the news today?

Open Thread. Here’s a few to start things off.

1. The firing of the head of the Phoenix VA where the scandal started has been upheld. Funny thing though it was for receiving inappropriate gifts and not for the actual scandal itself. It seems the govt. didn’t provide enough info to find fault on those charges. Convenient, no?

From StarsAndStripes  ” The government agency charged with making sure federal employees are treated fairly upheld this week the Department of Veterans Affairs decision to “formally remove” Sharon Helman, director of the Phoenix Department of Veterans Affairs’ Health Care System and the leader at the center of the biggest scandal in the agency’s history.

But the ruling by the Merit Systems Protection Board could not substantiate that Helman knew or should have known that employees at her hospital lied about health-care wait times for former troops seeking treatment for everything from cancer to post-traumatic stress disorder.”

“In the ruling, Chief Administrative Judge Stephen Mish rejected the VA’s other charges, which said that Helman failed to see that veterans were waiting months or even years to get health care. But the judge said the VA failed to demonstrate any actions or inactions on the part of Helman that caused it.

“To phrase it more colloquially, an agency must connect the dots of fault from the identified failure by the subordinates back up the line to the manager,” the judge wrote. “The agency did not attempt to do so here. Accordingly, this specification is not sustained.”

Similarly, the VA said Helman failed to process 2,500 new claims that were found, which led hundreds of veterans to be without health care for more than a year. But the judge again said the VA did not provide enough information to the board.

The ruling also points out that linking Helman’s removal to the wait-times issue is complex. The report notes that the VA’s office of the inspector general did not interview Helman about wait times during their investigation into the issue.”

So it’s like the IRS scandal, where no one talks to the witnesses, victims, or the accused before deciding the case.

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2. They did it again. But this time it was cops from all over the country.

FromTheWashingtonPost  “The streets of this working-class neighborhood in Queens overflowed on Saturday with thousands of blue-uniformed police officers, state troopers, corrections officers and firefighters from across the country.”

“The outpouring — some estimates were of more than 20,000 officers — was about more than brotherhood and the New York Police Department’s long history of showing support to honor slain officers. This time, the solemn memorial turned into a kind of counter-protest.”

“Hundreds of officers watching the services outside Christ Tabernacle Church turned their backs on the screens when Mayor Bill de Blasio spoke. The mayor has been heavily criticized by New York police union officials, accused of causing a mood of mistrust that they say contributed to the killings of Ramos and Liu. Tensions between the mayor and police had already grown in recent months after de Blasio said he was worried about how police might treat his son, who is biracial.”

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3. Despite the reporter’s attempts to provide cover for Obama, Rudy raises some good points.

More here from NationalReview

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