Please note that you can leave a comment on any of our posts at our Facebook page.  Subscribers can also comment at length at our Angel's Corner Forum.

APRIL 25,  2014

SHORT TAKES ON THE DRIFTING WRECKAGE – AT 11:45 P.M. ET: 

ALL SOCIAL PROBLEMS SOLVED! – This just in from the Minneapolis Star-Tribune:  "The second Monday in October will now be referred to as 'Indigenous People's Day,' rather than Columbus Day, on all official city communications in Minneapolis following a unanimous City Council vote on Friday morning.
The resolution brought hundreds of people to City Hall to commemorate the vote, which Native American activists have been seeking for many years.  'It’s been a long time coming,' said Clyde Bellecourt, a civil rights organizer. 'For me, it’s been almost 50 years that we’ve been talking about this pirate.'  The language of the resolution notes that the federal government, state government and city government still recognize Columbus Day 'in accordance with the federal holiday established in 1937.'   City attorney Susan Segal said some ordinances and collective bargaining agreements -- not to mention a few parking meters -- still mention Columbus Day.  But the new holiday will be reflected on city messaging, said city clerk Casey Carl. That includes the official calendar of the City Council and committee meetings."  Do you feel the change?  Do you feel the social improvement?  I'm rushing out right now to buy my first Indigenous People's Day gift.

GETTING TOUGH WITH MOSCOW – From Fox:  "A top Russian official sanctioned by President Obama in the wake of the Ukraine crisis is playing a key role in the Pentagon's space program, and thereby continuing to benefit from a lucrative no-bid contract that the Department of Defense awarded earlier this year, Fox News has confirmed.  Dmitry Rogozin, deputy prime minister of the Russian Federation, was among the senior Kremlin officials targeted by the White House's sanctions announcement of March 17. Included in Rogozin's broad portfolio of duties, by virtue of a special order from Russian President Vladimir Putin issued two years ago, is oversight of the Russian space sector, in which capacity Rogozin supplies sophisticated hardware used in the Pentagon's launches of satellites into space."  Brilliant thinking on our part.  Next we'll allow Russian officials under sanction to educate our children. 

OUR SOCIETY – From the Fayetteville (North Carolina) Observer:  "A teenage girl is in jail after authorities said she poisoned her grandmother's food on Easter Sunday.  Tyt'ana Lisa-Nicole Johnson, 17, of Harrison Street, poured insecticide and termiticide into a cooking pot of collard greens while Gaylon Moody, 51, her grandmother, was at an Easter church service, according to arrest warrants.  In a phone interview Thursday night, Moody said the incident happened because she took away Johnson's cellphone.  'She was on punishment. I had taken her cellphone from her. She got mad because I took her cellphone from her, and she poisoned my food,' Moody said. 'I'll tell you one thing: It ain't good to feel.'  Johnson admitted to Fayetteville Police investigators that she poisoned the collard greens, according to arrest warrants. She was charged with two counts of attempted first-degree murder."  I think we should try to understand this young girl, who obviously was a victim of Bush and Cheney, and Fox News.

GOVERNMENT NEWS – From The Wall Street Journal:  "Elevated housing costs helped to make the District of Columbia more expensive to live in than any state in 2012 , according to data released Thursday by the Commerce Department."  Of course.  Government is expanding.  Jobs are plentiful.  And they pay better than the private sector.  For those who get in, government is a very good deal.  Not so good for us.

April 25, 204       Permalink 

NOW WE KNOW – AT 11:01 A.M. ET:  It's so important to clear things up, and enhance our level of education.  From AP:   

MOSCOW — President Vladimir Putin on Thursday called the Internet a CIA project and made comments about Russia’s biggest search engine Yandex, sending the company’s shares plummeting.

The Kremlin has been anxious to exert greater control over the Internet, which opposition activists — barred from national television — have used to promote their ideas and organize protests.

Russia’s parliament this week passed a law requiring social media websites to keep their servers in Russia and save all information about their users for at least half a year. Also, businessmen close to Putin now control Russia’s leading social media network, VKontakte.

Speaking Thursday at a media forum in St. Petersburg, Putin said that the Internet originally was a “CIA project” and “is still developing as such.”

To resist that influence, Putin said, Russia needs to “fight for its interests” online.

COMMENT:  Well, Vladimir isn't that far off.  The internet actually began, at least in part, as a Defense Department project called ARPANET.  ARPA stands for Advanced Research Projects Agency, which was renamed Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) in 1972.  It did important early work to establish what we now call the internet.

I have not seen any credible evidence to suggest that the internet is a CIA project. 

Al Gore once claimed that he invented the internet.  That is not correct.  He invented snow.

The Russian government is becoming increasingly like the old Soviet regime, which Putin served.  We ignore the trend at our peril, but we will ignore the trend. 

April 25, 204       Permalink 

AND NOW HILLARY NOTICES – AT 9:46 A.M. ET:  Her poll numbers declining, Hillary Clinton appears to be making her first move in noticing that Benghazi is important to her past...and her future.  From Fox:   

Former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has called the Benghazi terrorist attack -- which killed Ambassador Chris Stevens, foreign service officer Sean Smith, and CIA contractors Ty Woods and Glenn Doherty -- the most significant failure on her watch.

In a question and answer session at Simmons College Wednesday night, Clinton listed the terrorist assault on the diplomatic compound in eastern Libya as her “biggest regret.”

"It would certainly be the attack on our facility in Benghazi, and the loss of, uh, two State Department personnel and two CIA contractors from the terrorist attack and the terrible consequences of that," she said.

"It's very, very painful and it was certainly the biggest regret that I had as Secretary of State."

While Benghazi's impact on a possible presidential run is unknown, Clinton focused on the emotional toll.

"They weren't the only people that we lost, but we lost them in such a terrible, senseless, terrorist action that, you know, it's just deeply sorrowful and it went on for hours, because the CIA annex was attacked after the State Department facility was attacked," she said of the Sep. 11, 2012 assault.

Her comments stand in sharp contrast to her defiant congressional testimony in January 2013, when she appeared before the Senate Foreign Affairs Committee.

"The fact is we had four dead Americans, was it because of a protest or was it because of guys out for a walk one night who decided that they'd they go kill some Americans? What difference at this point does it make?" she asked.

Those who have followed Benghazi from the day of the attack, including national security correspondent Eli Lake of the Daily Beast, said it was a significant change in tone.

"At the beginning of 2013 when then Secretary of State Hillary Clinton appears before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, she's feeling beaten up. This has become a major issue, it seems like the Republicans are not going to let it go, and she was combative," Lake said, adding the contrite statement may be highly effective.

"It almost says, listen I acknowledge it's a mistake, you can go back to this, you don't have to hound me on this point, we regret and I think that, you know, speaks volumes for her."

COMMENT:  I don't know how effective this new contrition will actually be.  She's messed up the issue so badly already, and she's been so defiant about it, that the damage to her image my be too strong to reverse.  But at least she's acknowledging, if only for cynical reasons, her actual role.

April 25, 204       Permalink

QUOTE OF THE DAY – AT 8:54 A.M. ET:  Related to the post just below, from superb defense reporter Bill Gertz, at Commentary:

For the past five and a half years, the United States military has suffered the devastating effects of hundreds of billions of dollars in budget cuts. At the same time, China’s armed forces—both conventional and nuclear—have made dramatic gains. The People’s Liberation Army was derided a decade ago by some China-watchers as a “junkyard army” incapable of coming close to matching the military prowess of the U.S. Army. Today, the PLA boasts new strategic capabilities that validate Secretary of Defense Chuck Hagel’s words about the new era of declining American military dominance.

The new Chinese military is armed with highly sophisticated weaponry. They include cyber-warfare forces capable of crippling American electrical and financial infrastructures from computer keyboards in Shanghai as well as precision-guided anti-satellite missiles that can quickly enfeeble the U.S. military’s unparalleled ability to combine long-distance war-fighting with precision attack.

The new power balance—a weakening American military facing a rising Chinese power—has dire implications for global peace and stability. Furthermore, the sharp decline in funds for U.S. military operations and modernization, coupled with China’s rapid buildup of forces, has rendered President Obama’s premier foreign-policy initiative, to strategically shift toward the Asia Pacific and away from conflicts in the Middle East and Southwest Asia, all but impossible to achieve.

COMMENT:  That is the plain, unvarnished truth.  It is terrible...unless you're a member of the Democratic Party's leftist establishment.  To them, this is what victory looks like.

April 25, 204       Permalink

NOW THEY NOTICE – AT 8:32 A.M. ET:  When even The New York Times questions him, a leftist president is in deep trouble.   From The New York Times:

SEOUL, South Korea — Almost everything American intelligence agencies and North Korea-watchers thought they understood two years ago about Kim Jong-un, the North’s young leader, turns out to have been wrong.

The briefings given to President Obama after Mr. Kim inherited leadership said it was almost certain he would be kept in check by his more experienced uncle, Jang Song-thaek. Instead, Mr. Kim had his uncle and dozens of others executed.

The early betting was also that Mr. Kim, who was briefly educated in Switzerland, would emphasize economic overhaul over expanding the nuclear and missile arsenals that were his father’s and grandfather’s legacy. Instead, the nuclear program has surged forward, and recent missile tests are demonstrating that after years of spectacular failures, the North’s engineers are finally improving their aim. Their next big challenge is proving that an intercontinental missile they have shown only in mock-ups can reach America’s shores.

As a result, when Mr. Obama lands here on Friday on the second stop of his Asia tour, he will be confronting the question of whether his strategy of “strategic patience” with the North has been overtaken by reality: an unpredictable, though calculating, ruler in Mr. Kim, who has proved to be more ruthless, aggressive and tactically skilled than anyone expected.

“We have failed,” said Evans J. R. Revere, who spent his State Department career trying various diplomatic strategies to stop the North. “For two decades our policy has been to keep the North Koreans from developing nuclear weapons. It’s now clear there is no way they will give them up, no matter what sanctions we impose, no matter what we offer. So now what?”

It is an assessment some of Mr. Obama’s aides say they privately share...

COMMENT:  Very sharp reporting by The Times.  The question is whether the only vote that counts – Barack Obama's – agrees.  I'm not so sure our sainted leader actually cares.  He seems to show less than minimal enthusiasm for the national-security interests of the United States, and he's cutting defense at precisely the wrong time.

North Korea will prove that even a small, impoverished country can challenge the United States if it is equipped with nuclear weapons and the means to deliver them.  Iran is noticing.

April 25,  2014     Permalink

APRIL 24,  2014

SHORT TAKES ON THE DRIFTING WRECKAGE – AT 10:39 P.M. ET: 

OREGON – THE SURRENDER – From The Hill:  "Oregon is set to become the first state to drop its ObamaCare exchange and transition into the system managed by the federal government.  The decision follows months of severe technical issues that have made Oregon's marketplace one of the worst in the country.  About $130 million has been spent on Cover Oregon, but it is the only ObamaCare enrollment system that won't let registrants buy coverage and qualify for tax credits in one sitting.   It had not enrolled a single person online as of early March, and remains mired in glitches almost seven months after a rocky launch.  Alex Pettit, the state's chief information officer, recommended to an advisory board Thursday that the state hand the reins to the federal government.  Members of the panel appeared to agree, The Oregonian newspaper reported. The board will meet again on Friday morning to further discuss the issue, and perhaps hold a vote."  Why is it that liberals can't run health systems or educational systems?

I WOULD HOPE SO – From The Hill:  "The National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) announced Thursday it will reconsider whether Northwestern University's football players can organize the first union for college athletes.  One day before the Northwestern football players vote on whether to form a union, the NLRB said it would grant the school's request to review the decision, which was issued by a regional official last month.   The decision means the football players will still vote on Friday on whether to unionize. However, their ballots will be impounded until the NLRB issues a final decision on whether student athletes should be considered employees.  Northwestern had argued that the football players should not be considered employees because they are students first, athletes second. But NLRB regional director Peter Sung Ohr sided with the players.  'Eligible to vote are all football players receiving football grant-in-aid scholarship and not having exhausted their playing eligibility' Ohr said in his ruling."  The world gets sillier and sillier.  I want to see a championship team picket the Rose Bowl.  "No contract, no kickoff!"

ANOTHER TEMPEST – From AP:   "TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) -- Michelle Obama is rearranging plans for a speech before graduating high school seniors in Kansas in the face of protests that her appearance at a combined graduation ceremony for five schools would limit seating for families and friends.  She had accepted the Topeka public school district's invitation to speak May 17 at the combined ceremony to mark that day's 60th anniversary of the U.S. Supreme Court ruling in Brown v. Board of Education, outlawing school segregation. The case originated in Topeka.  But a furor over what the district considered an honor erupted after plans for Mrs. Obama's address were announced.  Under a new plan worked out by the district, the first lady will speak on May 16 at a 'senior recognition day' ceremony at the same 8,000-seat arena where the combined ceremony was to be held. The combined ceremony is being scrapped, and the five schools will hold separate graduation exercises instead."  Whether one agrees or disagrees with Michelle Obama, her presence would have been an honor at that graduation.  She's been treated with disrespect by self-centered, self-oriented "graduates" and their families.  Not much of a lesson for young people.

ELIE – Went to a meeting to hear Elie Wiesel today.  He has done so much not only to keep the memory of The Holocaust alive, but to remind us of many other horrors going on today.  He spoke about people who listen, but do not hear, and it struck a responsive chord.  As in the 1930s, so many in the West today listen, but do not hear.  They refuse to understand that there are extremists who threaten our very existence.  Indeed, if we mention those extremists, we're often called bigots.  Or Islamophobes.  We have the capacity to distinguish between members of groups who are moderate and reasonable, and those who will murder us.  We must not only listen, but we must hear.  Now, with the new rise of Russia, we're seeing a new wave of those, in fashionable circles, with their hands over their ears.  We must never yield to their fantasies.

April 24, 2014        Permalink 

BUSH HAS PROBLEMS WITH THE BASE – AT 8:32 A.M. ET:  Some political observers believe that Jeb Bush would be the most electable of the potential Republican candidates for president.  Problem is, Bush does not shine with the GOP base.  He clearly has work to do.  From the Washington Examiner:   

Former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush, considering a 2016 presidential bid, does not have the support of his party's base, with just one in four Republicans eager for him to run and an even worse 18 percent of self-identified conservatives backing his bid.

With the GOP considering a slew of conservative potential candidates, including former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee and Sens. Ted Cruz and Rand Paul, a new Economist/YouGov poll found that among the right, Bush is considered too moderate.

A word bubble produced by the poll showed the hurdles he faces entering the presidential race. The acronym RINO, or “Republican in name only,” is prominent, as is “legacy” and “Bush,” and the polling firm said that the public isn’t keen on having a third Bush presidency.

It is the latest from the polling duo that sizes up the standing of key 2016 candidates. It is a general poll of 1,000 Americans that included about 340 self-identified conservatives and 223 Republicans. While not a huge number, the pollster indicated that it was large enough to size up the candidates among the party faithful.

The key Bush findings:

-- 26 percent of Republicans want Bush to run. That puts him behind Paul, at 36 percent, and New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie at 30 percent. Some 35 percent of Republicans do not want Bush to run.

— 43 percent of conservatives do not want Bush to run, while 18 percent do.

— Republicans are split on his ideology, with 33 percent saying he is a moderate and 32 percent a conservative. Among conservatives, 36 percent said that Bush is moderate, and 28 percent a conservative.

COMMENT:  If Jeb wants to run, he has to take his case directly to the primary voters, who are hungry for a presidential victory.  He has to do a Reagan, and go over the heads of the "experts" and "advisers."  His most effective argument is that he can appeal to the great American middle, where elections are actually won.  For movement conservatives, though, that's also his weakest argument.  They want a true believer. 

The party is split.  But it was split when Reagan ran, and he unified it through pure power of personality and persuasion.  Hard to think of Jeb filling that slot, but you never know...if he feels that fire in the belly.

April 24, 2014       Permalink

WE POINT WITH PRIDE – AT 8:23 A.M. ET:  Will anything save Chicago?  The slaughter continues, and the "authorities" just keep demanding more gun control.  From Breitbart:   

During the first two weeks of nice temperatures in Chicago this year--which included Easter weekend--the city was beset with some 100 shootings with nearly a dozen dead. This intense violence has earned the Windy City a brand new nickname bestowed by its own citizens: "Chiraq."

Over Easter weekend, there were 45 separate shooting victims in Chicago, four of whom died. The previous weekend saw 35 shootings in only 36 hours that resulted in several more deaths. There were even more shootings and deaths during the intervening days between the weekends, as well. All this violence has turned Chicago into a war zone.

Many of those killed were teens and preteens. In one incident, four girls between 11 and 15 years of age and one teen boy were shot by gang members at a city playground.

On top of the ingrained gang violence, a "rapper" war of sorts is also raging. One rapper, Mario "Big Glo" Hess was gunned down a week ago, hit by ten bullets. Big Glo joined two other rappers who were killed by rivals on the streets of the city.

But the "rapper war" is only a minor part of "Chiraq," as gangs continue their warfare as they attempt to take over each other’s drug territories.

Meanwhile, not a single American solider died in either Iraq or Afghanistan in March, and only 13 died in the previous two months. On the other hand, 76 Chicagoans have been murdered thus far in 2014.

COMMENT:  And yet, the excuses flow.  It's all because of unemployment, the gun manufacturers, even BUSH!!!  It's culture, but nobody wants to talk about it.  After all, who are we privileged folk to question someone's culture? 

New York lowered its murder rate by 80% under Rudy and Mike.  What is the problem in Chicago?  It's that Rudy and Mike didn't take their orders from local "leaders," whose only concern was getting a slice of the pie, and Rudy and Mike didn't worship at the altar of "multiculturalism."  They got the job done, and the greatest beneficiaries were minorities, but their leaders would never admit it.  Nothing in it for Al Sharpton.

April 24, 2014       Permalink

ANOTHER KEYSTONE, WITH THE USUAL SUSPECTS? – AT 8:14 A.M. ET:  There's a new environmental controversy brewing, and we can't wait for the "activists" to fly in by private jet.  From Fox:   

A liquefied natural gas facility in southern Maryland is generating intense criticism from environmental groups, in a fight that echoes the protracted battle over the proposed Keystone XL pipeline.

Energy company Dominion Resources is hoping to invest up to $3.8 billion to upgrade the Cove Point LNG facility as an export terminal.

If successful, it could become the East Coast's chief LNG export facility, sending billions of cubic feet of natural gas to Japan, India, and elsewhere.

Growing the economy?  Creating jobs?  Who needs it?

Dominion stresses that the project would have a huge economic impact close to home as well.

"The local area of Calvert County gets a huge benefit: $40 million dollars in additional taxes, property taxes, and the whole area of Maryland gets a benefit as well ... not to mention the U.S., from an export perspective," Mike Frederick, Dominion's VP of liquefied natural gas operations, told Fox News in an interview.

The Department of Energy has given Dominion conditional permission to export gas. The company is awaiting an environmental assessment from the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC), due May 15.

As with the proposed Canada-to-Texas Keystone oil pipeline, organized labor is on board with the LNG project, wanting the roughly 3,000 jobs it is projected to create during construction.

The left has no use for organized labor.  Maybe organized labor should find out.

But some environmental groups are fighting it, complaining it's being oversold.

"Everybody in the U.S. economy will suffer from gas exports according to the U.S. Department of Energy, except for one industry -- and that's the gas industry, which will make lots and lots of money," Chesapeake Climate Action Network's Mike Tidwell told Fox News in an interview.

He was referring to concerns that, if the U.S. starts exporting natural gas, prices could increase domestically.

And...

But Maryland Democratic Rep. Steny Hoyer, whose district includes Cove Point, is a supporter, noting the project would bring new, well-paying jobs to the community.

COMMENT:  Hoyer is the Dem whip in the House, a heavy hitter.  Like Keystone, this is kind of a no brainer, unless you're a president beholden to wealthy environmental fanatics.  Then the brain stops working.

April 24, 2014        Permalink

OUR TAX DOLLARS AT WORK – AT 8:05 A.M. ET:  It is hard to believe that this is the real world, and that our government is part of it.  From UN Watch via Canada Free Press: 

GENEVA, - The United Nations today elected the Islamic Republic of Iran and more than a dozen other repressive regimes to top committees charged with protecting women’s rights and with overseeing the work of human rights organizations, according to an exclusive report by UN Watch, a non-governmental Geneva-based human rights group.

Human rights activists are expressing outrage.

“Today is a black day for human rights,” said Hillel Neuer, executive director of UN Watch. “By empowering the perpetrators over the victims, the UN harms the cause of human rights, betrays its founding principles, and undermines its own credibility.”

“Civil society loses as repressive states win election,” said the International Service for Human Rights (ISHR).

Despite the sharp condemnation of Iran’s human rights record by UN chief Ban Ki-moon—who recently reported how women in Iran are “subject to discrimination, entrenched both in law and in practice” and how “women’s rights activists continue to face arrest and persecution”— the UN Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC) in New York today elected Iran to a four-year term on its 45-nation Commission on the Status of Women, the principal intergovernmental body dedicated to protecting women’s rights. Equitorial Guinea was among other dictatorships also named to the global gender equality panel.

COMMENT:  The corruption at the UN is hopeless.  It reflects the corruption in individual governments.  And yet, the Obama administration takes the UN seriously, and has made it a centerpiece of its foreign policy.  That's like making the Edsel the centerpiece of auto racing. 

I have long favored the establishment of a league of democracies, made up only of countries that clearly meet certain criteria.  Not a chance, though.  Too many power centers around the world have a vested interest in dictatorships, and the ugly fact is that a disturbing number of "intellectual leaders," including those who teach your children, have no great problem with them.

April 24,  2014     Permalink