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Regulated to Death – the stealth jobs killer

Sat, 19 May 2012 17:56:00 GMT

"But, in the world nothing can be said to be certain except death and taxes."

Ben Franklin

If Ben Franklin were around today, he would likely amend the above statement to include the certainty of government regulation. A new report by the Heritage Foundation says that in today's America, regulation costs are a far greater burden than taxes. If the current trend of rapidly increasing regulatory burden by the Obama Administration continues, it will hasten the death of the once great American free-market economy.

According to a newly released Heritage Foundation analysis, the annual cost of federal regulations ($1.752 trillion) is 83% greater than the entire revenue expected to be collected from federal individual income taxes for 2011 ($956 billion).

There is broad agreement that the U.S. Corporate tax rate – the highest of developed nations in the world – is an inhibitor to badly needed job creation and economic growth. Even Barack Obama has given lip-service to lowering the excessively high 35% business tax rate. However, the cost of regulation is 8.8 times greater than the total corporate tax revenue ($198 billion) collected in 2011.

Obama has made a habit of demonizing the "huge profits" of corporations, particularly energy companies. But, consider this: Annual regulatory costs exceeded the total combined pre-tax profits of American corporations by more than $400 billion in 2009, the pit of this recession. With profitability returning somewhat in recent months, analyst's current projections suggest regulation cost and pre-tax profit are currently roughly equal.

Compared to the cost and impact of taxes, regulation gets relatively little attention, but it is like a cancer to the economy – a stealth killer – that grows and grows, dragging down the body until it just can't take anymore and finally succumbs. Instead of attacking the regulatory cancerous tumor and shrinking it, under the Obama Administration new regulations have exploded, and he is forever calling for more.

At a time when more than 20 million Americans are out of work or underemployed and the U.S. economy is stuck in neutral, Barack Obama has paradoxically ramped up regulation rather than provide relief. The federal register now exceeds 80,000 pages of government commandments we all must follow. Already bloated regulatory agency budgets exploded by 16% in 2010 and hiring increased by 13%. Hundreds of new regulations have been promulgated and 4200 more are "in the pipeline," and that doesn't count the vast majority of ObamaCare, Dodd-Frank, and much more of Obama's "transformational agenda" that is in the works. Predictably for this President, the morning headlines say yet again that he is calling for – you guessed it – more regulation. As always, he says government must save us from our evil selves. It will help us "keep moving forward," he believes.

The only direction Barack Obama has America moving is toward a cliff. Our great nation desperately needs a course correction, and we pray it comes on November 6, 2012 with the election of Mitt Romney.

Is uncertainty responsible for high unemployment?

Thu, 17 May 2012 19:30:00 GMT

In speaking with various business owners the word that I hear most often to explain why the economy remains so stagnant is "uncertainty." Dr. Sanjai Bhagat, Provost Finance Professor at the University of Colorado and Contributing Editor for A Line of Sight.com, has extensively studied this this issue. He presented his findings last week in Washington, DC at a special event sponsored by the American Enterprise Institute. Following is a video link to the entire presentation and an brief post-event summary by AEI. Also provided is a link to his research document.

"What is causing continued slow economic growth and high unemployment in America? On Friday at AEI, Sanjai Bhagat of the University of Colorado at Boulder discussed his research exploring the correlation between job losses and persistent unemployment. Bhagat began with a presentation of the paper he co-wrote with Iulian Obreja. Noting historically high cash flows and recent capital injections from the U.S. Federal Reserve, Bhagat suggested that capital shortfall cannot explain America's currently weak economic recovery. Instead, Bhagat asserted that high business uncertainty results in a significant reduction in job creation and investment."

Employment Uncertainty Policy Paper, Bhagat-Obreja, pdf

Disarming U.S. as Wolves in Wait

Wed, 16 May 2012 12:40:00 GMT

By Peter Brookes, Contributing Editor

"Prediction is very difficult, especially about the future." - Niels Bohr

In the unknown future of US national-security challenges, safe still beats sorry - especially when those challenges already appear daunting.

Which is why the current defense-spending debate - especially the matter of another $500 billion in cuts, beyond the half-trillion dollars' worth already being lopped off - may be as consequential as any budget decision in recent history.

That's right: The choices we make about the defense budget, including future weapon systems and troop levels, are fateful; the results will be with us for decades.

Pentagon officials have warned of elevated risks, worried that we'll no longer be the global power we are today if another $500 billion is slashed from the defense budget, as is planned for year's end.

Yet some Americans seem to be living in a blissful bubble, oblivious to a world rife with trouble and threats to US security. In some corners, American leadership is not only out of fashion, it's frowned upon.

But such naivete won't deal with current problems or prevent crises in the coming years.

Take the Middle East/North Africa. The Iranian threat is hardly diminishing. Few would dispute that Tehran will not only have nukes in a few years, but an intercontinental-ballistic missile to carry them.

Lawless, ungoverned spaces in Yemen and Somalia support the aspirations and activities of terror groups such as al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula and al Shabab. Al Qaeda in Iraq is active again and maybe aiding and abetting terror in Syria.

Syria itself? The Assad regime's survival will certainly find Damascus committed to revenge - and even more wedded to its drive for the bomb.

The promise of an "Arab Spring" has become the reality of an "Arab Winter," with Egypt, Tunisia and Libya of continuing concern (thanks, especially, to reports of thousands of handheld, surface-to-air missiles missing from Libyan arsenals).

Elsewhere, stability in Afghanistan after our 2014 departure is an open question. A likely security vacuum could leave it vulnerable to the re-rise of the Taliban, al Qaeda and their allies. Instability in (nuclear) Pakistan is good reason for insomnia.

Meanwhile, Team Obama's strategic shift to Asia will be more of a dainty pirouette than a muscular pivot, absent the forces needed to project US power across the Pacific.

With the military might it's amassing, Beijing is developing the raw power to challenge Washington for pre-eminence in East Asia - and, perhaps, beyond.

Then there's North Korea. Not good. Defense Secretary Leon Panetta says, "We're within an inch of war everyday in that part of the world."

There's more. You have to wonder, for example, whether perceptions of US decline made the Russian chief of the general staff think it was OK recently to threaten to pre-emptively strike American missile defenses in Europe.

A world without a strong America is deeply disquieting, one where US interests will be under assault from a number of different directions, including cyberspace.

Fact is, as Sen. Jon Kyl (R-Ariz.) noted last week at The Heritage Foundation, "We don't always have the luxury of deciding where and when we will have to confront evil in the world." The 3 a.m. phone call is a come-as-you-are affair; we better be ready.

Thankfully, some in Congress such as Kyl and Rep. Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) are working to stem America's slide to second-rate-power status by finding ways to trim the federal budget that shift the heavy reliance away from defense-spending cuts.

This is no time to give short shrift to American security. We need a hard-nosed foreign policy backed up by a strong defense. The past shows the painful consequences of being weak and ill-prepared.

Threats will develop irrespective of our ability to defend ourselves. Wishful thinking about a future no one can accurately predict is no foundation for a national-security policy.

Peter Brookes is a Heritage Foundation senior fellow and a former deputy assistant secretary of defense.

***Peter Brookes, a Heritage Foundation senior fellow, is a former deputy assistant secretary of defense and Contributing Editor for A Line of Sight. This article also published May 16, 2012 in the New York Post.

Tip-of-the-Hat: Romney pushes back on the Media

Tue, 15 May 2012 15:29:00 GMT

Mitt Romney stopped off in Colorado last week to talk about getting the economy going again and the importance of affordable domestic energy production in his plans to make that happen. He made himself available to some members of the media, providing local reporters with an increasingly rare opportunity to spend a moment with the man who may well be the next President of the United States.

Shaun Boyd is a usually capable and pleasant reporter for Channel 4 News, the CBS affiliate in Denver. She was assigned to the Romney event, and in the lead up promotion of the coverage, News4 invited viewers to send in questions. That idea may have boosted viewership, but it didn't make for good journalism.

Boyd got about 4 ½ minutes with Gov. Romney and as you'll see in the video below, she spent the majority of the precious moments asking Romney about gay marriage, civil unions, in-state tuition for illegal immigrants, and medical marijuana. At 2:17 of the interview, Romney pushed back:

"Aren't there issues of significance that you'd like to talk about? The economy…the economy…the economy? The growth of jobs, the need to put people back to work, the challenges of Iran…we've got enormous issues that we face, but you want to talk about marijuana?"

He didn't exactly go Chris Christie on Shaun Boyd, but it was pretty refreshing. Romney was his always polite, composed self, but he was also firm. America is facing what many believe is the most critical presidential election in our lifetimes. It is totally appropriate for the campaign to be framed on the macro-issues of the day rather than irrelevant and second tier questions.

In 2008, the media was all too willing to let Obama get by without explaining who he is, what he wants to accomplish, and how he intends to make it happen. In 2012, the White House is understandably averse to discussing the President's dismal record of performance during his first term. The White House is continually diverting attention to ancillary issues like gay marriage or interest on student loans rather than talk about the economy or national security, and the majority of the complicit media is all too willing to follow the trail of bread crumbs laid for them by Team Obama.

Candidates for public office need to be vetted and the media has an import role in assisting the general public who will likely never get the opportunity to directly question them, particularly a candidate for president. But, the media also has an obligation to focus on what really matters. The issues Boyd was addressing are important to some small percentage of the population, for sure, but they really are state's rights issues. She needed to be reminded that Romney was a candidate for President, not the state legislature or governor, and Romney did just that.

The Europization of America

Sun, 13 May 2012 21:27:00 GMT

As millions of citizens become ever more desperate, they do what they must to survive. That's understandable, and the depth and prolonged nature of the current economic mess has pushed millions of Americans onto government assistance that previously would have never considered even asking for help. Some of the trends are startling. They raise questions both about the proper role of government and fiscal limitations, but they also raise the issue of whether there has been a change in the character of the once staunchly self-reliant, independent, personally responsible American citizen.

More than 46 million Americans – about 1 out of every 7 people - now rely on food stamps – a 32% increase in the number of recipients just since the recession supposedly ended in June 2009. (See chart below) However, because of mandated increases in benefits that were part of Obama's Stimulus, higher food costs, and more recipients, total federal spending on the food stamp program has more than doubled in four years; from $39 billion in 2008 to $81 billion this year.

Source: Trivisonno.com

Increasingly, as unemployment benefits are exhausted, Americans are applying for Social Security Disability Insurance, SSDI. Ever since Congress relaxed the eligibility rules for Disability Benefits in 1984 there has been a growing number of recipients. However, as the following chart demonstrates, a virtual explosion has suddenly occurred over the last four years, and it shows no sign of easing. In just the first four months of 2012, 539,000 joined the disability rolls and more than 725,000 applications were submitted. Note that for every one job created (2.3 million) since the recession officially ended in June 2009, more than two people went on disability (4.7 million).

Source: Investor's Business Daily, April 20, 2012

More than 5 million people have been unemployed for more than 27 weeks; nearly twice the previous high for long term unemployment during a recession. "We see a lot of people applying for disability once their unemployment insurance expires," said Boston College economist Matthew Rutledge. Unfortunately, few people that ever qualify for SSDI benefits ever return to the workforce, which even the White House admits can result "in a loss to society of the economic contribution those workers could have made."

Like all other entitlement programs, SSDI is facing a financial crisis. The trust fund is scheduled to go bankrupt in 2018. SSDI recipients, regardless of age, are automatically eligible for Medicare benefits after two years, as well, which accounts for 15% of Medicare's total budget. Medicare will be insolvent in 2020 according House Budget Committee Chairman Paul Ryan.

After decades of gorging at the socialist, big government trough much of Europe is facing a financial crisis. The variety of overly generous entitlements and welfare programs combined with lackluster economic performance threatens to bankrupt the continent. Intoxicated by the nanny state's benevolence and unwilling to take the cure for their addiction, the Europeans seem to be rejecting austerity measures that might at least prolong – if not preserve– their continued existence. The similarities between the European experience and America are all too obvious, and a day of reckoning is rapidly approaching for the U.S. What kind of people are we really? And, what kind of nation will we leave the next generation – if a nation at all? The questions are real, profound, and unavoidable. And, they are really what the 2012 election is all about.

George Will on the ObamaCare Medical Device Tax

Thu, 10 May 2012 13:13:00 GMT

Among the plethora of new taxes, penalties and fees buried inside the ObamaCare legislation is a 2.3 percent surtax on "gross revenue" – not net profit, but gross revenue – of medical device manufacturers. George Will in his regular column in the Washington Post does an excellent job of explaining why this is a jobs killing and entrepreneur limiting tax. Worse, offers real examples of how the pending tax is already limiting production of medical equipment.

Following is a brief excerpt and link to the entire column which we highly recommend:

"An axiom of scarcity is understood by people not warped by working for the federal government, which can print money when it wearies of borrowing it. The axiom is: A unit of something — time, energy, money — spent on this cannot be spent on that. So the 2.3 percent tax, unless repealed, will mean not only fewer jobs but also fewer pain-reducing and life-extending inventions — stents, implantable defibrillators, etc. — which have reduced health-care costs." Read more.

Felon gives Obama run-for-the-money in West Virginia Primary

Wed, 09 May 2012 14:10:00 GMT

A large portion of the mainstream liberal media would have us believe that Barack Obama's re-election is on solid ground, but Democrats in West Virginia aren't so sure. Keith Russell Judd, (pictured) a convicted felon serving a 210 month sentence in Texas, qualified for the West Virginia primary ballot and captured 40% of the vote and actually beat Obama in several counties. Full story here.

Truth is stranger than fiction.

Obama gets a Keystone Mulligan

Wed, 09 May 2012 13:45:00 GMT

Barack Obama is going to get another shot at getting the decision of the Keystone XL Pipeline right. The Canadian company, TransCanada, seeking to build the massive delivery system that would transport 800,000 barrels of oil from the Canadian tar sands to Texas refineries announced it is resubmitting an application for permitting approval.

Obama killed the jobs creating, energy supplying proposal in January to appease his radical environmental constituency that opposes anything connected with the hydrocarbon industry. Criticism of his blatantly political decision came from all corners of the spectrum including the President's usually loyal labor unions who coveted the employment opportunities the pipeline would generate.

Less than three weeks after Obama rejected the pipeline project from our next door neighbor and ally, Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper met with Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao on plans "to export oil and other resources to China, an effort that has intensified following the Obama administration's decision to reject…[the] Keystone XL pipeline," according to the Wall Street Journal.

The rejection of the Keystone pipeline quickly became a 2012 presidential campaign issue and the poster-child for Obama's opponents who charge he has the "most anti-oil-and-gas record in U.S. history." Mitt Romney has pledged "I will build that pipeline if I have to myself!"

The following excerpt is from the announcement by TransCanada with a link to the full article:

"The Canadian company seeking to build the massive Canada-to-Texas Keystone XL pipeline through the U.S. reapplied for a permit on Friday, pushing the politically sensitive issue back onto President Obama’s plate six months before the election."

"TransCanada announced it has asked for permits to build the pipeline into Nebraska, and will eventually submit a new route skirting environmentally sensitive lands in Nebraska — the sticking point that caused the Obama administration to reject its previous application."

"In a statement, TransCanada President Russ Girling made it clear he was appealing to Mr. Obama’s own stated goals of boosting American energy supplies. He also said the thousands of pages of environmental reviews already completed for the earlier application should convince the president to speed this new permit along." Read more

"Forward" – Where do you think they got that idea?

Wed, 02 May 2012 02:48:00 GMT

The Obama re-election campaign has moved on from the 2008 campaign slogan, "Change we can believe in." Yesterday Team Obama introduced the 2012 version – "Forward" – complete with a seven minute video. But, it immediately raised some eyebrows among the politically astute.

Victor Morton at the Washington Times recognized that Forward is "a word with a long and rich association with European Marxism."

Gee, I wonder why anybody closely connected to Barack Obama would come up with that idea?

The following is an excerpt and a link to Morton's article:

Many Communist and radical publications and entities throughout the 19th and 20th centuries had the name "Forward!" or its foreign cognates. Wikipedia has an entire section called "Forward (generic name of socialist publications)."

"The name Forward carries a special meaning in socialist political terminology. It has been frequently used as a name for socialist, communist and other left-wing newspapers and publications," the online encyclopedia explains.

The slogan "Forward!" reflected the conviction of European Marxists and radicals that their movements reflected the march of history, which would move forward past capitalism and into socialism and communism. Read more.

Spiking the Ball

Tue, 01 May 2012 14:04:00 GMT

Lesson #1 for spiking the football: make sure it doesn't bounce straight up and pop you in the nose.

Barack Obama's bragging about taking out Osama bin Laden has blown up in his face. The recently released campaign video that includes a lengthy adulation of the President by Bill Clinton for choosing "the harder and more honorable path" – and suggesting Mitt Romney wouldn't have made the call - has drawn heavy criticism even from die-hard liberals.

Arianna Huffington told CBS the "campaign ad is one of the most despicable things you can do."

Dan Turner, editorial writer for the Los Angeles Times called it "a low blow."

But, the harshest criticism has come from current and former Navy SEALs. It was SEAL Team Six that pulled off the mission in Pakistan one year ago.

Defying the normal silent deference regarding the Commander-in-Chief, the Daily Mail published a lengthy feature on Monday, April 30 quoting numerous former as well as current SEALs who are not at all happy with the President's "spiking the ball" for campaign benefits. Following are some excerpts:

A serving SEAL Team member said: ‘Obama wasn’t in the field, at risk, carrying a gun. As president, at every turn he should be thanking the guys who put their lives on the line to do this. He does so in his official speeches because he speechwriters are smart.

‘But the more he tries to take the credit for it, the more the ground operators are saying, “Come on, man!” It really didn’t matter who was president. At the end of the day, they were going to go.’…

Chris Kyle, a former SEAL sniper with 160 confirmed and another 95 unconfirmed kills to his credit, said: ‘The operation itself was great and the nation felt immense pride. It was great that we did it.

‘But bin Laden was just a figurehead. The war on terror continues. Taking him out didn’t really change anything as far as the war on terror is concerned and using it as a political attack is a cheap shot."

‘In years to come there is going to be information that will come out that Obama was not the man who made the call. He can say he did and the people who really know what happened are inside the Pentagon, are in the military and the military isn’t allowed to speak out against the commander- in-chief so his secret is safe.’

Senior military figures have said that Admiral William McRaven, a former SEAL who was then head of Joint Special Operations Command (JSOC) made the decision to take bin Laden out. Tactical decisions were delegated even further down the chain of command….

A former intelligence official who was serving in the US government when bin Laden was killed said that the Obama administration knew about the al-Qaeda leader’s whereabouts in October 2010 but delayed taking action and risked letting him escape….

Brandon Webb, a former SEAL who spent 13 years on active duty and served in Iraq and Afghanistan said…that many SEALs were dismayed about the amount of publicity the Obama administration had generated about SEAL Team Six, the very existence of which is highly classified.

‘The majority of the SEALs I know are really proud of the operation but it does become “OK, enough is enough – we’re ready to get back to work and step out of the limelight.” They don’t want to be continuously paraded around a global audience like a show dog.

There is much more. Read entire feature story here.

EPA Official is Gone, but does the "crucify them" culture remain?

Mon, 30 Apr 2012 23:01:00 GMT

The head of the EPA in the oil and gas rich Texas-Oklahoma-Louisiana region, Al Armendariz, has resigned after a public uproar over disclosure that he explained the "general philosophy" of the agency was to single out an energy company and "crucify them" to intimidate the rest of the industry.

"The Romans used to conquer little villages in the Mediterranean. They'd go into a little Turkish town somewhere, they'd find the first five guys they saw, and they would crucify them. And then you know that town was really easy to manage for the next few years," Armendariz explained to a group of public officials with considerable bravado. "And so you make examples out of people who are in this case not compliant with the law. Find people who are not compliant with the law, and you hit them as hard as you can and you make examples out of them, and there is a deterrent effect there.” (Video clip here.)

Although the White House brushed off the outrage over Armendariz's comments late last week and said he would keep his job, in his resignation letter today he acknowledge his "crucify them" characterization had become a "distraction" for the EPA.

Armendariz may be gone, but what of the culture within the regulatory agency that he described so brutally candid?

Senator James Inhofe (R-OK), who exposed the Armendariz video presentation from 2010 said, "His choice of words revealed the truth about the war that EPA has been waging on American energy producers under President Obama," Inhofe said in a statement. “It is not just Armendariz. There are a lot of other Armendarizes around,” Inhofe said in an interview with The Daily Caller.

Armendariz took the fall, but he alone was hardly the extent of the problem. For that a change also needs to be made in the Oval Office.

Obama's Energy Shell Game

Mon, 30 Apr 2012 13:45:00 GMT

Note: The following was published as an op-ed in the Pueblo Chieftain April 29, 2012.

Remember the shell game? The magician keeps up a steady stream of patter and diversions to make it difficult or even impossible to know where the pea is hiding. Our national energy policy today is much like the shell game.

In his patter President Obama says we need an “all of the above” approach—we heard it in his State of the Union address to Congress, meaning the country will benefit most by developing its vast oil, natural gas and coal resources along with hydro and nuclear power, while pursuing the development of renewable technologies.

But the President’s actions, as reflected by his budget proposal and his Administration’s various regulatory initiatives, reveal a strong bias against “all of the above” and a big tilt toward energy forms that are not able to compete in the marketplace. There is no level playing field.

Take two recent examples. In mid-April Obama ordered creation of a “task force” to “coordinate” the efforts of ten federal agencies seeking regulatory authority over hydraulic fracturing, the decades-old technology that is unlocking vast amounts of oil and gas from shale rock deep in the ground. Does anyone believe that a larger federal bureaucracy and more federal regulations piled atop state regulations is going to expedite responsible development of domestic oil and natural gas?

In another display of magical misdirection intended to shift focus from high gasoline and diesel prices, Obama asked Congress for $52 million to expand the federal bureaucracy to fight “oil speculators” and “market manipulation” and “illegal activity.” Oil companies are among his targets, but as The Washington Post pointed out, “a senior administration official deflected questions about whether regulators have detected any hint of manipulation and would not give an example of the sort of rigging the president suspected regulators might find with more resources.”

The problem isn’t speculators. The problem is we need more supply and this Administration throws up more roadblocks.

These roadblocks can’t alter chemistry. The energy sources that provide the most bang for the buck are oil and natural gas. And there is more domestic oil and gas available than experts previously thought. In fact, there’s an energy revolution underway in the United States, sparked by the application of hydraulic fracturing to reserves of oil and natural gas once thought to be uneconomical. It’s happening in Pennsylvania, Ohio, West Virginia, Texas, North Dakota, and right here in Colorado.

The oil and gas industry is now producing enough U.S. natural gas to meet our needs for 100 years. Domestic oil production has grown by almost 20 percent in the last four years. These resources called “unconventional” or “tight oil” and “tight gas” are a factor in reducing energy imports from unfriendly and unstable countries. Their development is creating hundreds of thousands of American jobs. Increased supplies of natural gas have driven down the price to below $2 per thousand cubic feet, saving consumers hundreds of millions of dollars in heating, cooling and manufacturing costs.

The White House website prominently features a graphic under the title of The Obama Energy Agenda that suggests the record production of natural gas and ramp up in domestic oil output somehow are a result of his Administration’s policies, though nothing could be farther from the truth. Production on federal lands and offshore is actually down. Gains have come from private lands in spite of Obama’s policies, not because of them. Obama has cancelled scores of existing leases, implemented moratoriums in the gulf, made millions of acres off limits to energy development, and blanketed the industry with regulations.

The oil and gas industry contributes nearly half a trillion dollars a year to the economy in wages, taxes, royalty payments, fees, and dividends. Yet in the president’s proposed budget, there are at least eight provisions that would punish this one targeted essential industry with increased taxes or costly regulation. At the same time, his budget includes generous doles to the “green energy” sector that the White House says will be the future of America’s competitiveness – that’s what he said about Solyndra, too.

Obama promised an energy policy based on science and transparency, but it has proven to be all about politics. While establishing the “most anti-oil and gas record in U.S. history” according to Steve Forbes, Obama has thrown away billions of borrowed dollars to reward and pacify his green constituency.

The United States does need an “all of the above” approach to assuring steady supplies of affordable energy. But, that likely won’t happen if the Administration more committed to playing an energy policy shell game than doing what’s right.

White House Shrugs off "Crucify Them" Comments

Sat, 28 Apr 2012 14:34:00 GMT

The outrage continues to grow over the revelation by EPA Region VI Administrator Al Armendariz that the "general philosophy" of the EPA regarding regulations of oil and gas producers is to "crucify them." Armendariz says the EPA believes in singling out an individual oil company, punish it "as hard as you can," and make an example of it to scare others into submission. It's an intimidation tactic the he borrowed from the ancient Romans:

The White House shrugged off the "crucify them" characterization by the regulator noting he would keep his job. The harshest thing his boss EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson had to say is that Armendariz comments were "disappointing." But, no one has said Armendariz misrepresented the "general philosophy" in practice by the Administration.

Oklahoma Senator James Inhofe (R-OK) first exposed the damning video of Armendariz's comments, and has been leading an investigation into EPA's tactics and war on energy. Inhofe is the Ranking Member of the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee.

The Obama Administration is dismissive of Armendariz's revelation, but others see it as exposing the real agenda. Congressman John Fleming of Louisiana, where thousands of jobs have been lost due to the heavy handed moratorium imposed in the gulf by the Obama Administration, nailed it. "The use of threats and intimidation to force energy companies to submit to an extremist agenda may be fitting under a totalitarian regime, but it is never acceptable in the United States," Fleming said.

Inhofe cites some hard evidence of the EPA's regulatory hard ball. Despite a natural gas boom on private land, the Energy Information Agency (EIA) reports natural gas sales of production from federal lands are down 17% since 2008, Inhofe said in a recent Senate floor speech.

Investor's Business Daily connected the dots correctly in a scathing – and accurate - editorial, "the only conclusion is that Armendariz is doing exactly what the White House wants. He just made the error of saying it." We agree.

Our National Cancer is Growing

Thu, 26 Apr 2012 23:49:00 GMT

By Rob Douglas, Contributing Editor

While discussing our nation’s economic health before Congress on March 8, 2011, Erskine Bowles, Co-Chair of President Obama’s National Commission on Fiscal Responsibility and Reform, stated: “This debt and these deficits that we are incurring on an annual basis are like a cancer. And, they are truly going to destroy this country from within unless we have the common sense to do something about it.”

Thirteen months later and our national cancer is still growing.

While there are many factors contributing to the rapidly declining economic health of our country, the largest contributors are our burgeoning federal retirement and health care entitlement programs.

Last Monday, the Social Security and Medicare Boards of Trustees released their annual reports for 2012. The reports paint a picture of an impending fiscal collapse when it comes to three of the major welfare programs Americans increasingly rely upon – Social Security, Medicare and Disability.

According to the reports: The Disability Insurance Trust Fund will be exhausted in 2016; the Medicare Trust Fund (specifically, Medicare Part A which covers hospital stays) will be exhausted in 2024; and, the Social Security Trust Fund will be exhausted in 2033.

As if these dates are not imminent enough, the trustees warned the projections are overly optimistic because they are based upon unrealistic expectations of congressional action. And, lest the fast-approaching dates of insolvency are not enough of a siren, the trustees quantified the size of the cancer in dollars.

Social Security and Medicare currently have a combined unfunded liability (benefits promised minus payroll taxes and premiums collected) of more than $63 Trillion. And, once again, the trustees warned that this unimaginable dollar figure is probably low because the calculation is based upon the “highly uncertain” enactment of provisions within the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act - commonly known as ObamaCare.

A more realistic figure for the unfunded liability is an incomprehensible $100 Trillion.

At the heart of this erupting volcano of debt is an inescapable demographic reality. We are a graying nation. Today, and every day for the next 20 years, 10,000 Americans will reach the age of eligibility for Social Security and Medicare.

There’s the rub.

Combine 10,000 additional retirees per day with historic low birth rates and historic high life expectancy and you have a nation that can no longer expect to fund entitlement programs for an exploding population of seniors by shifting the costs to a dwindling population of working age citizens.

So, how do we stop this economic crisis?

As a conservative libertarian, I believe the costs of health care and retirement should be borne by the individual coupled with charities for those truly incapable of providing for themselves. As a realist, I know that our current welfare state will not return to a nation of individual responsibility overnight.

However, that should not stop us from beginning immediately to make changes that can save us from certain ruin.

And, the most important change must begin with each of us as individuals.

As much as we all like to blame our elected representatives in Washington for the current dismal economic state of affairs, the reality is we have trained our representatives that they get rewarded – meaning reelected – by satisfying our every desire, want and whim. And, yes, we all want ‘something’ from Washington.

We must as a nation change that paradigm.

We must stop demanding that the President and Congress increase the size and burden of government and start demanding that they expeditiously and dramatically reduce the size of the federal government by returning the well-being of our lives to the states, our local communities and us as individuals.

Bottom line: When it comes to Medicare, Social Security and Disability, we are quickly running out of time to correct a looming disaster. It is long past time that we as individuals take responsibility and demand less of our federal government and thereby avert what has rightly been called by Erskine Bowles and others, “the most predictable economic crisis in history?”

EPA's energy policy: "Crucify them"

Thu, 26 Apr 2012 21:19:00 GMT

Long ago most of us came to the conclusion that the Obama Administration was waging a war on the fossil fuel industry. Although the President denies this, of course, the evidence is overwhelming. As Steve Forbes said, this Administration "has the most anti-oil-and-gas record in U.S. history."

Need more proof? Watch the video clip below in which Al Armendariz, the Region VI Administrator for the EPA brags that the agency's "general philosophy" regarding enforcement of energy regulation is to "crucify" and "make examples" of oil and gas companies.

By the way, EPA Region VI includes the energy rich states of Texas, Oklahoma, Louisiana, Arkansas, and New Mexico.

Remember this the next time you put $4.00 gas in your car - and, when you vote in November.

"The War on Terror is over" – State Department Official

Tue, 15 May 2012 13:52:00 GMT

An official for the State Department made it official, "The War on Terror is over." It would seem that Barack Obama would have wanted to make the rather significant announcement himself, but instead the proclamation was made by an unnamed State Department official to Michael Hirsch of the National Journal.

Whew! That's good news for sure. I wonder if the Obama Administration also sent a memo to the 50 Foreign Terrorist Organizations identified by the State Department that the clock has run out – the game is over – take your suicide bomber vest and go home? We've all come to know their names: Al Qaeda, Hezbollah, Hamas, Islamic Jihad, Al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigade, Palestinian Islamic Jihad, Al-Shabaab, etc.

Now that the War on Terror has come to an end, look for an announcement that the Department of Homeland Security will be eliminated. DHS should no longer be necessary since fighting the War on Terror was the stated reason for creating the new agency in the first place. In defining the Mission for DHS, Sec. 101 of the Homeland Security Act of 2002 says "The primary mission of the Department is to…prevent terrorist attacks within the United States." The short mission statement uses the word "terrorist" or "terrorism" six times. (See below)

No more War on Terror, no more DHS, no more Janet Napolitano…would that also mean we could go back to the good old days of airport security when we could keep most of our clothes on before boarding a plane? One can hope, but don't hold your breath.

As reported on these pages yesterday, DHS has moved on to a new mission – Environmental Justice – no kidding! That is yet another fascinating pivot in the land of Hope-and-Change from protecting Americans from terrorists who want to kill us, to protecting ferns, mice, and insects from….well, us.

Homeland Security Act of 2002

SEC. 101. EXECUTIVE DEPARTMENT; MISSION.

(a) ESTABLISHMENT.—There is established a Department of Homeland Security, as an executive department of the United States within the meaning of title 5, United States Code.
(b) MISSION.—

(1) IN GENERAL.—The primary mission of the Department is to—
(A) prevent terrorist attacks within the United States;

(B) reduce the vulnerability of the United States to terrorism;
(C) minimize the damage, and assist in the recovery, from terrorist attacks that do occur within the United States;

(D) carry out all functions of entities transferred to the Department, including by acting as a focal point regarding natural and manmade crises and emergency planning;

(E) ensure that the functions of the agencies and sub- divisions within the Department that are not related directly to securing the homeland are not diminished or neglected except by a specific explicit Act of Congress;

(F) ensure that the overall economic security of the United States is not diminished by efforts, activities, and programs aimed at securing the homeland; and

(G) monitor connections between illegal drug trafficking and terrorism, coordinate efforts to sever such connections, and otherwise contribute to efforts to interdict illegal drug trafficking.

(2) RESPONSIBILITY FOR INVESTIGATING AND PROSECUTING TERRORISM.—Except as specifically provided by law with respect to entities transferred to the Department under this Act, pri- mary responsibility for investigating and prosecuting acts of terrorism shall be vested not in the Department, but rather in Federal, State, and local law enforcement agencies with jurisdiction over the acts in question.

Turning Homeland Security into the Green Police

Tue, 24 Apr 2012 12:25:00 GMT

By Rob Douglas, Contributing Editor

Just when you thought the federal government’s “greening” of America couldn’t get any more ridiculous, along comes the U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) with its first-ever Environmental Justice Strategy. (link here)

Yes, that’s right. When determining how best to secure our nation against al-Qaeda, Iran, North Korea, China and other assorted threats, DHS must determine if its actions place “disproportionately high and adverse effects on the human health and environment of minority or low-income populations.”

Starting this year, DHS will prepare an Annual Implementation Progress Report to address the department’s efforts concerning: “(1) implementation of the National Environmental Policy Act; (2) implementation of Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, as amended; (3) impacts from climate change; and (4) impacts from commercial transportation and supporting infrastructure (“goods movement”).”

In order to comply with the new strategy, senior leadership at DHS must ensure that “environmental justice is appropriately integrated into their specific mission: maritime safety, security, and stewardship; federal assistance authority; emergency management programs; border security; transportation security; immigration services; law enforcement training; science and technology research; and mission support and asset management.”

Further, “[a]s the Department’s capacities and mission areas evolve in response to improved understanding of emerging threats to safety and security, the concepts of this strategy will be extended to match the commitment to environmental justice in those new areas.”

There now, don’t you feel safer?

CBO: Obama Budget will "hurt" economy

Mon, 23 Apr 2012 14:00:00 GMT

Harry Reid and the Senate Democrats don't even bother with a budget – even though they are in the fourth year of trillion dollar plus deficits. Apparently, they've already decided that after you've jumped off the cliff, it is a little late to think about a place to land.

President Obama has submitted a budget to Congress as required by law each year, but even Democrats won't support him. The House defeated the 2013 White House budget 414-0 last month. Harry Reid says he has no plans to even bother scheduling a vote on the 2013 budget in the Senate. Last year, the Senate unanimously defeated Obama's 2012 budget 97-0. Obama says he knows how to fix things, and is making his case for a second term, but apparently not even one Democrat on Capitol Hill trusts him enough to support his budget.

Already rejected by even his own elected Democrats, last week the non-partisan Congressional Budget Office piled on with their own criticism. The CBO says that economic plan outlined by the Obama Budget would "hurt the economy in the long term." The following is reported by The Hill:

"The nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office said Friday that President Obama’s 2013 budget will hurt the economy in the long term, arguing the larger deficits it would produce would reduce the amount of capital available to businesses."

"After five years, the CBO says, the Obama proposals would reduce economic output by between 0.5 percent and 2.2 percent. "

Congress was right to reject yet another White House budget that would do even more damage. And, it didn't take the CBO to confirm that Obama economic policies would hurt the economy – we have 3 ½ years of evidence.

The House Republicans approved a budget presented by Rep. Paul Ryan, Chairman of the Budget Committee, but Reid has stalled letting the Senate vote on it, too. So, America finds herself flying blindly through the worst financial storm since the great depression.

Look for someone to ask in the first Presidential debate, "Mr. President, restoring the economy is the number one issue facing America. Why then did you draft a budget that would 'hurt' the economy even more?" That question should be on the mind of every voter.

Government Costs more than Basic Living Expense

Fri, 20 Apr 2012 13:47:00 GMT

President Obama is betting his re-election chances on convincing enough people that Americans are not taxed enough. His designated villain is millionaires - a class that virtually everybody would like to be in.

On the week that we all have the IRS and taxes on our mind, however, it is instructive to look at the bigger picture. The Tax Foundation and the Republican Study Committee offer us the following graph that shows Americans spend more on government at the federal, state, and local level that to provide the essentials of food, shelter and clothing. Yikes!

Tip-of-the-Hat:Joe Lanier: World War II Veteran, Patriot, Great American

Tue, 17 Apr 2012 03:39:00 GMT

In his foxhole on Iwo Jima, he was considered just another worthless black man in a lily-white Navy.

Joseph LaNier, II wore a United States Navy uniform, but as he was in his native rural Columbus, Mississippi, he was segregated. Even in war.

In 1945, Joe became a Navy Seabee in one of the first black Seabee units in U.S. history. He joined the service to help his family out of poverty.

dHis grandfather was a slave. Joe's niece was a member of the Little Rock Nine. He watched the injustice in front of him; his friends were beaten because of their color.

Joe was told in boot camp: "There are two kinds of niggers. A good nigger, and a dead nigger. We don't want no dead ones."

Yet today, he does not hate.

He didn't know the earth was round; had never seen the ocean; didn't swim and had never heard of Hawaii or this place called Iwo Jima. Joe lived two months in a foxhole; he saw death and smelled it; he contributed to the Pacific Theatre war effort despite segregation. After Iwo, he was shipped to Okinawa where he remained through the end of 1945.

He returned to the states in late December of that year and came through Colorado for the first time in January, 1946. A Denver ice cream cone altered the course of his life and he vowed to return someday.
Back in Mississippi and on the G.I. Bill, Joe finished high school (he returned to find himself in the ninth grade and 20 years old.) He went on to enroll at Xavier University in New Orleans, where he later secured his degree in pharmacy.
In Colorado, he became the first-ever black director of pharmacy at National Jewish Hospital, where he met the love of his life, Eula - a white woman from Oklahoma. Defying the odds and social scrutiny, their mixed-race marriage is still strong today, five-plus decades later.
I met Joe, now 86, as he was getting ready to make his return to Iwo Jima for the first time since 1945. He made it to Guam, but the trip was canceled due to the Japanese quake and tsunami the same day he arrived.

He shared his amazing story with me on my morning show, Colorado's Morning News on 850 KOA in Denver, and became the most talked about and requested interview in my news career.

Joe and I made it back to Iwo Jima in March, 2012 and he has become one of my best friends.

Joe has given me the privilege of telling the story of his incredible life in a book scheduled to be released early next year. In conjunction with the book, Joe and I have traveled to eight states and two countries compiling a stellar video documentary on his incredible life.

Joe: A Real Story takes a look at an amazing life of a black man in a white world – a world at war on more than one level. To learn more and support Joe and the project, click here.

On behalf of Joe and myself, thank you so much for your interest and support of this project.

--
Steffan Tubbs is a former ABC News correspondent, now co-host of Colorado's Morning News on 850 KOA-AM in Denver; chairman of "The Greatest Generations Foundation." Four-time Edward R. Murrow award winner. Embedded in Iraq in 2006 & 2010 with US Army 4th ID. Coverage resume includes: 9/11; Columbine; OKC bombing & trials & Hurricane Katrina aftermath. Former Fox 5 anchor/reporter in NYC; KABC-TV in Los Angeles; KMPH-TV Fresno. California Polytechnic State University, San Luis Obispo grad, 1992. San Diego native.

Obama Appointed Medicare Trustee Exposes True Cost of ObamaCare

Thu, 12 Apr 2012 15:09:00 GMT

A public trustee appointed by President Obama to oversee Medicare and Social Security has issued an extensive research report finding that ObamaCare will increase government spending by far more than a trillion dollars while adding hundreds of billions of new debt. The report by Charles Blahous completely refutes the claim by Obama and the Democrats that the legislation would magically increase access and quality of care for millions of Americans while reducing the size of the deficit. The opening paragraph of the report is damning:

"The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (ACA) signed into law by President Obama in 2010 will significantly worsen the federal government’s fiscal position relative to previous law. Supporters argued that this comprehensive health care reform would deliver a much-needed correction to the government’s unsustainable fiscal outlook and would benefit the country’s overall fiscal situation. However, between now and 2021, the ACA is expected to add as much as $530 billion to federal deficits while increasing spending by more than $1.15 trillion. Despite the fondest hopes from its supporters, the passage of the ACA unambiguously darkens a dim fiscal picture." Full report here

Charles Blahous, Ph.D., a senior research fellow at the Mercatus Center at George Mason Institute (full bio). He also currently serves as one of the two public trustees for Social Security and Medicare Programs, appointed to the board by Barack Obama in 2009. Blahous previously served as deputy director of the National Economic Council for President George W. Bush. For more than a decade, Dr. Blahous has specialized in federal entitlement program policy and has published two books on the need for social security reform. Prior to serving in both the Obama and Bush Administrations, Blahous was on the staff of Senators Judd Gregg (R-NH) and Alan Simpson (R-WY).

Blahous's report exposes – yet again – the shell game accounting and erroneous assumptions that the Democrats employed to cook the books prior to passage of the legislation in March, 2010 including the double counting of proposed Medicare "savings" and dubious accounting assumptions. Blahous sounds the alarm on the health care exchanges forced on the various states by the legislation. The CBO estimates the exchange subsidies and related spending will total $777 billion from 2012-2021. But, Blahous warns that far more subsidy-eligible workers will be dumped into the exchanges than originally estimated as businesses drop health care benefits for their workforce. Further, the Medicare Trustee worries that Congress will gradually increase the level of subsidized benefits as politicians have been prone to do with all other entitlement programs. These two big variables could explode the already huge costs of ObamaCare far beyond the already staggering amounts.

Blahous's findings are added to an already lengthy list of similar reports that have exposed the true cost of ObamaCare and the legislation's infringement of individual freedom of both patient and doctor. So, it is not at all surprising that public disdain for ObamaCare continues to grow. According to a new ABC News/Washington Post public opinion poll more than 2/3 of Americans believe the Supreme Court should toss out the entire law (38%) or at least the mandate clause (29%). Support for the overall legislation is at the lowest point since ABC/WaPo began tracking public opinion in August 2009.

The "Fairness President": Obama's Female Employees Earn 18 Percent Less than Men

Thu, 12 Apr 2012 14:36:00 GMT

In recent days, if he hasn't been pitching "fairness" and adoption of higher taxes with his so-called Buffet Rule, President Obama has been pandering to women voters. On April 6, he paraded a group of ladies in front of cameras at a blatant campaign event – funded by taxpayers and hosted at the White House - thinly disguised as an economic forum. The White House said the purpose was to "highlight ways the administration has helped create ECONOMIC SECURITY for women." (emphasis added)

But, so far as we know, the President failed to explain to the visiting ladies why women on his own staff earn 18 percent less than men.

According to a review of the 2011 annual report to Congress of the salaries for the White House staff, female employees earned a median annual salary of $60,000. Male employees median salary, however, was $71,000 – an 18.3 percent differential. Apparently, that "economic security" Obama says he has created for women is a lot less costly than it is for men.

As it is said, "Those who live in glass houses shouldn't throw stones." Maybe the President should take a break from obsessing about "fairness" for everybody else in America, and take a few minutes to look a little closer to home.

Voting Fraud Investigation Compromises Eric Holder's Identity

Wed, 11 Apr 2012 16:13:00 GMT

James O'Keefe is back, this time exposing the ease of voter fraud in the nation's capital. On primary election day April 3, O'Keefe was offered the ballot for U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder after simply stating his name and address. O'Keefe even volunteered to show identification, to which the poll worker says, "You don't need it. It's all right. As long as you're in here, you're on our list, and that's who you say you are, you're okay" – which, by the way, is in compliance with Washington, DC voting regulation.

Last month, James O'Keefe exposed how shockingly easy it was to register NFL celebrity quarterbacks Tom Brady and Tim Tebow to vote in Minnesota without any form of personal identification. O'Keefe was actually handed handfuls of voter registration forms to complete – no ID required. (Click here) Now he has exposed the ease of voter fraud right under the Attorney General's nose.

Holder has consistently been a defender of lax voting regulation and oversight maintaining that there "is no proof that our elections are marred by in-person voter fraud." The AG dismisses efforts to strengthen voting identification requirements claiming voter fraud is a "problem that doesn't exist."

O'Keefe's Project Veritas is a non-partisan national effort to expose the ease of voter fraud and the possible corruption of American elections. FYI – in Roman mythology, Veritas was the goddess of truth.

The Coming Chaos from Korea

Mon, 09 Apr 2012 14:02:00 GMT

By Peter Brookes, Contributing Editor

Seoul: Later this week, North Korea is expected to launch a long-range missile with a satellite on board; it's likely to be just the first in a series of provocations by Pyongyang this year - including another earth-shaking nuclear test.

We've had plenty of warning. Besides crowning Kim Jong Un as the newest king of the "Kim-dom," the regime's prodigious propagandists are busy painting 2012 as the year North Korea will emerge as a "strong and prosperous" nation.

The launch of the Kwangmyongsong (Bright Star) satellite to commemorate the 100th birthday of North Korea's founder Kim Il Sung sometime between April 12 and April 16 is supposed to provide some proof of Pyongyang's new polished-up persona.

Some analysts believe North Korea shares its nuclear work with Iran - and that Tehran, which put up its own satellite in 2009, has aided Pyongyang's satellite-launch program. If so, this attempt is more likely to succeed.

If the launch does orbit Pyongyang's first satellite (after two previous failures), it may help distract the North's hungry hordes with a tasty meal of nationalistic pride. It'll also best rival South Korea, which has failed twice to put up its own satellite.

Shamefully, the launch's estimated $1 billion price tag is believed to be enough to feed the famished North for as long as a year, according to some analysis.

For America, the big issue is that a successful space launch means Pyongyang is closer to deploying an ICBM capable of more accurately reaching more US territory. (Right now, analysts think it can hit the US West Coast with questionable accuracy.)

But there's more. North Korea followed each of its last two long-range missile launches (in 2006 and 2009) with nuclear tests; if the pattern holds, we'll get more atomic activity sometime this year.

And while Kim Jong Un has yet to assume his father's title of chairman of the National Defense Commission, what better way to mark the end of the Kim family's dynastic power transition than with a big bang?

There may be technical reasons for a nuke test, too: to assess progress on a warhead to - tahdah! - mate to a long-range rocket like the one being used for this week's satellite launch.

Or Pyongyang may want to test the fruits of its long-secret, uranium-based nuke program. (Current bombs are made of plutonium.) Experts predict a highly-enriched uranium test will come in the next year or two.

Oh, and a pro-North Korea newspaper in Japan hinted at another reason Pyongyang might go radioactive: to show pique over Team Obama's decision to suspend food aid it promised in a Feb. 29 deal in exchange for a moratorium on long- range missile and nuclear tests.

But Pyongyang's provocations probably won't be limited to missiles and nukes. Some North Korean cognoscenti believe that, with both South Korea and the United States holding presidential elections this year, Pyongyang may do something to shake up the political landscape.

In the last couple of years, the North has sunk a South Korean warship (using a mini-sub torpedo), shelled an island and hatched a (failed) plot to assassinate the South's defense minister.

Nice folks, those North Koreans.

Beyond this sort of "routine" North Korean mayhem-making, cyber attacks are possible. According to US Forces Korea, in the cyber crosshairs are US and South Korean "military, governmental, educational and commercial" targets.

All this is to say that, while there had been reason for cautious optimism based on North Korea's generational leadership change, this is starting to look like the year Pyongyang ensures that hope - once again - doesn't triumph over experience.

*** Peter Brookes, a Heritage Foundation senior fellow, is a former deputy assistant secretary of defense and Contributing Editor for A Line of Sight. This article published April 9, 2007 in the New York Post where Brookes provides a regular column.

Gas Prices Sour March Jobs Report

Sat, 07 Apr 2012 12:27:00 GMT

High gas prices may be hitting the economy right in the gut. For the month of March, the pace of new job creation was cut by more than half compared to the last several encouraging monthly reports.

According to the Labor Department just 120,000 new jobs were created in March. Over the previous three months an average of 246,000 new jobs were added. Analysts generally believe at least 200,000 new monthly jobs are necessary for the economy to expand.

Stuart Varney, business analyst at Fox News and Fox Business Network, says these disappointing numbers "suggest the recovery has stalled."

A little deeper look at the numbers reveals further troubling news – a great many Americans walked away from the workforce. The number of America's employed or looking for a job (157.7 million) declined by 164,000 in March even though the total age eligible workforce population (242.6 million) increased by 169,000 people– a net shift in the wrong direction of 333,000 people. The effect of the shrinking size of the workforce was decline in the Labor Force Participation Rate to 63.8%, and a slight drop of the unemployment rate to 8.2%.

The skunk at the modest economic recovery party that seemed to have begun can be found at your nearest gas station. The national average price of gas has increased 18% (59 cents per gallon) in just the last 90 days. That kind of shock to the family budget and to the cost of producing and transporting goods is like putting a noose around the neck of an already choking economy. Worse, the full impact of the rapid rise in the cost of gas is just beginning to be manifested in the economic numbers, and the peak driving season and historically associated price increases is still a month away.

Solyndra "Rushed" according to Inspector General

Thu, 05 Apr 2012 14:35:00 GMT

New information about the approval process for the $535 million Department of Energy loan to the failed California solar energy company Solyndra contrasts sharply with the sworn testimony of Energy Secretary Stephen Chu last November to Congress. Chu told a House Committee, "I want to be clear: Over the course of Solyndra's loan guarantee, I did not make any decision based on political decisions." According to a Politico.com story published overnight, White House politics was at the center of a "rushed" one day approval of the loan.

"The Treasury Department's review of Solyndra's $535 million federal loan guarantee was 'rushed' through in about one day in March 2009, 'based on an expedited review request from DOE so that a press release could be issued,' according to a Treasury inspector general report that gives further evidence of the early Obama administration's eagerness to announce progress in funding clean energy."

"The report, issued Tuesday, also quotes internal Treasury documents that portray the Energy Department as being under pressure to get the loan agreement out the door."

"'DOE says that their hands are tied on this issue,' the audit quotes one Treasury email as saying, discussing one detail of the financing terms. 'They are under pressure to complete a deal.'"

Read entire Polico.com report here.

Mr. President, Do You Really Want to Talk About an "Unelected" Court, Look at the Senate that Passed ObamaCare

Thu, 05 Apr 2012 13:58:00 GMT

By Chris Jaarda, Contributing Editor

Earlier this week, the President took an unnecessary and overtly political swipe at the Supreme Court of the United States. (This is not the first case of the President taking such action, recall his comments during his State of the Union about the Citizens United case and Justice Alito's reaction to the President's comments).

Here is what the President said:

"Ultimately, I am confident that the Supreme Court will not take what would be an unprecedented, extraordinary step of overturning a law that was passed by a strong majority of a democratically-elected Congress. I'd just remind conservative commentators that for years what we have heard is the biggest problem on the bench was judicial activism or a lack of judicial restraint. That an unelected group of people would somehow overturn a duly-constituted and passed law. Well, this is a good example and I am pretty confident that this court will recognize that and not take that step." [Emphasis added].

Ignoring the fact that I take issue with the President's characterization of how conservatives would view or define judicial activism (it is creating "rights" by judicial decree, using a judges personal opinion to expand government's power over the citizenry, using the judge's views as a substitute for that of the legislature while simultaneously ignoring the plain reading of the Constitution or statute, and looking to foreign law instead of American law as a basis for ruling on a case), I strongly disagree with the President's characterization of the make-up of the Congress that passed ObamaCare. The President is misleading the American people on this issue - and he knows it.

The President wants to talk about the "unelected" - let's talk! Before passing the United States Senate, the ObamaCare bill had to clear a "cloture vote" which means 60 Senators would have to vote to "cut off debate" and end the amendment process. On December 23, 2009, the Senate held that vote and, by the absolute slimmest of margins, cloture was invoked. (See Roll Call Vote 395). ObamaCare passed the Senate only after 60 Senators voted to invoke cloture but of those 60 Senators who voted for cloture, FIVE, yes five, were unelected Democratic Senators.

WHO WERE THE FIVE UNELECTED SENATORS THAT PASSED OBAMACARE?

Sen. Roland Burris (D-Illinois). Burris was appointed by now-convicted former Governor Rod Blagojevich (D) to fill the Senate seat vacated by Barack Obama after he was elected President. Certainly President Obama knew yesterday that his unelected successor was one of five deciding votes that passed ObamaCare. Burris would retire at the end of the 111th Congress and never face voters for his vote for ObamaCare. This U.S. Senate seat is now held by Republican Mark Kirk who was elected by the people in 2010.
Sen. Ted Kaufman (D-Delaware). Kaufman was appointed to fill the Senate seat vacated by Vice-President Joe Biden after the 2008 election. Like Burris, Kaufman would retire at the end of the Congress without ever having to face the voters for his vote for ObamaCare.
Sen. Michael Bennet (D-Colorado). Bennet was appointed to fill the vacancy created when Ken Salazar resigned to become Obama's Secretary of the Interior. He was elected in his own right to the Senate in 2010.
Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand (D-New York). Gillibrand was appointed to fill the vacancy created when Hillary Clinton resigned to become Obama's Secretary of State. Ironically, the man who appointed Gillibrand to the Senate, Gov. David Paterson (D), was himself never elected Governor (he became governor after Elliot Spitzer resigned from office in disgrace). Gillibrand was elected in her own right to the Senate in 2010.
Sen. Paul Kirk (D-Massachusetts). Kirk was elected to fill the vacancy created by the death of Sen. Ted Kennedy (D). Like Burris and Kaufman, Kirk would retire at the end of the Congress without ever having to face the voters for his vote for ObamaCare. This Senate seat is now held by Republican Scott Brown who won a special election running against ObamaCare.
Honorable Mention: Sen. Arlen Spector (D-Pennsylvania). Specter was elected to the Senate five times as a Republican. Having never been elected as a Democrat, he switched parties and became a Democrat on April 30, 2009 and switched his positions on a number of health care issues, ultimately voting for ObamaCare. Ironically, Spector gave a lengthy floor speech in 2001 following Senator Jim Jeffords (VT) party switch in which he praised the idea that a Senator should resign if he intends to switch parties and stated he would propose a rules change related to party switches. Specter lost the 2010 Democratic primary and his seat is now held by Republican Pat Toomey who won the 2010 Senate election for the Senate seat.

It took five unelected Senators to invoke cloture on the ObamaCare bill. It took five unelected Senators - who had never been chosen by the American people - to pass ObamaCare. Three of those Senators never faced the voters to stand for election after their votes and another (Specter) lost his seat in an election.

When the President claims that ObamaCare was passed by a democratically elected Congress, it is up to opponents of ObamaCare to point out that the bill never would have passed Congress but for the votes of five unelected Democratic Senators.

UPDATE: On Tuesday of this week, a judge for the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals, Judge Jerry Smith, asked the Department of Justice to provide a letter to the court stating whether Attorney General Holder believes the court does in fact have the power to strike down a federal law. Judge Smith specifically referenced the President's comments when requesting the letter from DOJ. Read more on this developing issue here and here.

***This article previously published by the American Healthcare Education Coalition.

Who is America's Banker?

Wed, 04 Apr 2012 15:03:00 GMT

During his campaign for re-election, don't expect Barack Obama to bring up the national debt. By the time Americans are voting, Obama will have added more than $5.5 trillion of red ink during his first term in office – an increase of more than 50% beyond the total debt accumulated by the previous 43 presidents in over 200 years.

Rather than alarmed by the debt, Obama's budget would put America on a glide path to accumulate an additional $10 trillion of debt over just the next decade, and that is undoubtedly a grossly underestimated prediction.

In addition to the amount of the debt – which now exceeds our nation's GDP – many analysts are increasingly concerned about who holds all that credit; specifically foreign governments have about a third of the total. A lot of Americans are generally aware that China is the largest foreign creditor with over a trillion dollars of US Treasury IOUs. But, China is far from alone. The following chart, courtesy of the House Republican Study Committee, demonstrates the distribution of debt to other nations and notably many would fall in the same category as China as "less than friendly" to America's best interests.

This Land is …. the Government's!

Mon, 02 Apr 2012 16:59:00 GMT

Most people understand that the federal government controls a lot of land, but few know just how vast the holdings really are. The map above is courtesy of Investor's Business Daily. It indicates the vast amounts of land, particularly in the natural resources rich western states, held by the federal government.

According to the USDA, Economic Research Service, of the 2,264,000,000 acres that comprise the United States of America, the federal government owns 635,000,000 of them, or more than 28%. In addition, state and local governments own 195,000,000 acres and another 56,000,000 acres is the sovereign territory of the various Indian Tribes.

Thus, nearly 4 of every 10 acres of land in the U.S. – 39.13% - is owned by a government entity rather than private citizens; easily the largest asset controlled by the collectivist state. And, even the land that is privately held has volumes of regulations controlling what citizens can do on and with it.

Nothing represents the American Dream more than ownership of a piece of land. While significant areas of the country are legitimate public treasures, it seems yet another great paradox that in a nation of supposedly free people committed to private property rights and individual liberty, vast amount of this country is deeded to the government's Central Planners instead of to individual citizens.

There may be a small bit of encouraging news, however. As IBD explained in a companion article to the above map, there is a bit of a "sagebrush rebellion" going on in various western states that are pressing the federal government to hand over control of tens of millions of acres. One clear outcome of this effort might be expanded energy production allowed by the states instead of the obstructionist policies imposed particularly by the Obama Department of Interior that led to an 11% decrease in oil production from federal lands in 2011. State governments are at least one giant step closer to the people than Washington, DC. And who knows, maybe one day as states struggle to balance budgets, they just might find it desirous to have tax revenue generating private land within their borders instead of revenue draining public lands.

Another Stab in Israel’s Back

Sat, 31 Mar 2012 16:10:00 GMT

“The United States will always have Israel's back when it comes to Israel's security.”

Barack Obama, March 5, 2012

The Israeli back that Barack Obama likes to talk about must be getting pretty sore from all the times the President has stabbed it rather than protect it.

The latest undercutting of Israel’s national security interests came this week with the Obama Administration leaking classified intelligence that Israel had “gained access to airbases in Azerbaijan,” the Muslim nation on Iran’s northern border. The extremely sensitive and strategically critical information was reported in Foreign Policy magazine as confirmed by “four senior diplomats and intelligence officials.”

This leak was no accident.

While the Obama Administration fecklessly watches as Iran continues its quest for a nuclear weapon, Israel must wrestle alone with the existential threat they face. Last month, Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta threw Israel under the Obama Administration’s bus by disclosing to the Washington Post that “there is a strong likelihood that Israel will strike Iran in April, May, or June.”

The open-mic disaster in Seoul, South Korea between Obama and Russian President Dmitry Medvedev had to add to the anxiety of the already exacerbated Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. With a paternalistic pat on the knee, Obama told the Russian that after his “last election” next November he’d have “more flexibility” on missile defense. Exactly why Barack Obama feels compelled to cut side deals with Vladimir Putin who reclaimed the Russian Presidency in a corrupt election that was marked by an extremely anti-American campaign agenda is yet another of the Obama paradoxes.

The Russians have become Iran’s greatest defender and ally and are arming Bashar Assad’s relentless assault on his own people in Syria – Israel’s other arch-enemy. Syria has been listed as a state sponsor of terrorism by the U.S. since 1979 and “knowingly harbors and gives financial aid, political support, artillery and military training to terrorist organizations, including Hamas, Palestinian Islamic Jihad, the Al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades, and Hezbollah and other extremist groups,” according to the Middle East experts at The Israel Project.

Obama obviously no longer believes in the clear delineation of the post-9/11 Bush Doctrine that “either you are with us, or you are with the terrorists.”

The great Charles Krauthammer offered the following summation of Obama’s obsession with placating Putin and “resetting” U.S. relations with Russia. Doubtlessly, Netanyahu must be having a similar level of frustration with the American Commander-in-Chief:

“In addition to canceling the Polish/Czech missile-defense system, Obama gave the Russians accession to the World Trade Organization, a START treaty that they need and we don’t (their weapons are obsolete and deteriorating rapidly), and a scandalously blind eye to their violations of human rights and dismantling of democracy. Obama even gave Putin a congratulatory call for winning his phony election.”

“In return? Russia consistently watered down or obstructed sanctions on Iran, completed Iran’s nuclear reactor at Bushehr, provides to this day Bashar Assad with huge arms shipments used to massacre his own people (while rebuilding the Soviet-era naval base in the Syrian port of Tartus), conducted a virulently anti-American presidential campaign on behalf of Putin, pressured Eastern Europe, and threatened Georgia.”

“On which of ‘all these issues’ — Syria, Iran, Eastern Europe, Georgia, human rights — is Obama ready to offer Putin yet more flexibility as soon as he gets past his last election? Where else will he show U.S. adversaries more flexibility? Yet more aid to North Korea? More weakening of tough Senate sanctions against Iran?”

Krauthammer asks rhetorically, “Can you imagine the kind of pressure a re-elected Obama will put on Israel?”

Working side deals with the Russians and hanging Israel – America’s great friend - out to dry is what qualifies as enlightened foreign policy for Barack Obama. With friends like that…..?

We’re Number One – but, don’t expect a trophy

Sat, 31 Mar 2012 13:53:00 GMT

If only it was a very bad April Fool’s Day joke, but it’s not. As of April 1, the U.S. will have sole possession of the highest corporate tax rate in the developed world. When the average tax that states add to the 35% federal corporate tax is included, American businesses are tagged at a 39.2% rate. Japan is the latest nation to lower the tax rate on business and in so doing will relinquish the dubious top tax rate distinction to the USA.

Over the last two decades OECD nations (The Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development) have been lowering corporate tax rates. For anyone concerned about America’s ability to compete internationally, see to following chart.

Republicans and Democrats, including Barack Obama, have talked about lowering the business tax rate, but so far, talk is all that has happened. The President’s plan is really a kind of shell game that would raise other taxes in exchange for a lower tax on profit.

The global lowering of corporate rates "is part of a world-wide recognition that high corporate taxes create economic distortions. Most obviously they encourage businesses to locate operations in other countries," according to the editors at the Wall Street Journal. "American liberals argue that most U.S. companies don't pay the top federal statutory rate of 35% because of various loopholes and credits, but the high rate encourages multinationals to keep their profits overseas to invest there rather than in the U.S." concludes the WSJ.

If the President and Congress were truly serious about creating jobs, stimulating the economy and recovering from the deepest, longest recession since the Great Depression then lowering the corporate tax rate to a globally competitive level should be a no-brainer. But, even that doesn't get done in the toxic environment of Washington.

Chu: Not the brightest bulb in the Administration’s Lamp

Fri, 30 Mar 2012 15:26:00 GMT

During a recent committee hearing on Capitol Hill, Senator John Barrasso (R-WY) asked Energy Secretary Stephen Chu if he thought a $50 light bulb was “affordable” for American families.

“No, of course not,” Chu answered.

Then why did Chu award $10 million to a company for winning a contest to design an “affordable” alternative to the ubiquitous 60 watt incandescent light bulb that would cost $50?

The Energy Departments “L-Prize” was the carrot offered to encourage manufacturers to come up with an “affordable” LED alternative to Thomas Edison’s incandescent bulb. There was only one entrant, Phillips Lighting. The bulb they came up with retails for $50.

Just for the record, at Home Depot you can buy a 4-pack of Phillips standard 60 watt bulbs for $1.47 – less than 37 cents per bulb. For $50 you could get 136 regular 60 watt bulbs; enough to light up a neighborhood.

Why Chu believes light bulb manufacturers needed some incentive to make a product already mandated by the government is another question. But, then this is the same Secretary and the same Energy Department that squandered half a billion on Solyndra, and thought that was a good idea, too.

Chu might have a Nobel Prize in physics, but he obviously knows nothing about the family budget or the market place.

Now there’s an idea – create jobs with affordable, plentiful energy

Wed, 28 Mar 2012 14:00:00 GMT

You’ve heard the stories about the millions of dollars squandered by the Obama Administration on green energy projects supposedly to create vast numbers of new jobs in a revolutionary “green energy economy.” But, all too often all that remains is a bankrupt empty building, or at best a handful of jobs – and, a heap of new federal debt.

If Obama was really committed to creating jobs, there was another time tested way to get it done – by assuring plentiful supplies of affordable, reliable traditional sources of energy. Instead, the “transformational” President went to war against the hydrocarbon industry. Thankfully, he didn’t win.

While the administration has done everything in their power to discourage fossil fuel production on federal land, there has been a revival happening on private land where oil and natural gas output has increased. When supply increases, prices come down, and natural gas is particularly affordable.

As a result, jobs connected to and dependent upon natural gas are exploding. A USA Today feature report documents the hundreds of thousands of new jobs resulting from affordable supplies of gas. Here’s an excerpt:

“Royal Dutch Shell announced this month that it chose a site near Pittsburgh for a facility to convert ethane from locally produced natural gas into ethylene and polyethylene. They're used to make plastics that go into packaging, pipes and other products. The planned ethane cracker would employ a few hundred workers.”

“It's among nearly 30 chemical plants proposed in the U.S. in the next five years, according to the American Chemistry Council. The projects would expand U.S. petrochemical capacity by 27% and employ 200,000 workers at the factories and related suppliers, says Council President Cal Dooley, a major turnaround. As U.S. natural gas prices soared in the late 1990s, chemical makers moved overseas, laying off 140,000 employees, Dooley says. But the U.S. has seen a natural gas boom in recent years, with producers using new drilling techniques to extract fuel from shale formations in Texas, Pennsylvania and other regions. U.S. natural gas prices, at slightly more than $2 per million British thermal units, are about 75% below Western Europe rates.”

“PricewaterhouseCoopers' partner Robert Mc-Cutcheon estimates inexpensive natural gas could help U.S. manufacturers save $11.6 billion a year and create more than 500,000 jobs by 2025.”

Instead of doing the obvious, Obama did exactly the reverse. The Administration implemented policies that would, in the President’s words, cause energy prices to “necessarily skyrocket.” Instead of insuring the U.S. remained competitive, his own Energy Secretary was committed to policies that would “boost the price of gasoline to the levels in Europe.” Every American is experiencing the pain at the pump as gasoline is up more than $2 per gallon since the President took office. And, three and a half years into the recession, millions of Americans are still searching for a job.

Open Mic, Open Mouth

Tue, 27 Mar 2012 13:44:00 GMT

Mistakenly believing the microphone was off, Barack Obama confided to outgoing Russian President Dmitry Medvedev that he needed a little “space” to get through “his last election” and then he’d have “more flexibility” to free-wheel with Vladimir Putin on the critical issue of missile defense. By some chance if you haven’t seen this rare look at the real Obama below is a video link to the conversation, and click here for more on the entire exchange.

video platform video management video solutions video player

If the Medvedev embarrassment doesn’t make you sufficiently nauseous, check out the link below from Danish news media to see what a laughing stock our President has become on the global stage.

Dems Still Attack More Energy Jobs

Sun, 25 Mar 2012 12:43:00 GMT

Sitting atop approximately one trillion barrels of oil and roughly 10 percent of the nation’s total reserve of shale gas, Colorado is poised to become a significant energy producer. But not if certain regulation-loving Democrats and their environmental cohorts have their way.

Recently Colorado Democrats Diana DeGette and Jared Polis, along with New York Democrat Maurice Henchey, tried to resuscitate a 2009 bid for further government intrusion into state sovereignty. The three sent a letter to President Obama urging support of their FRAC Act, a red-tape-lover’s dream that would essentially cede to the Environmental Protection Agency control of the natural-gas-extraction method of hydraulic fracturing.

Apropos of the renewed push, DeGette said, “With hydraulic fracturing expanding across the country, it is more important than ever we ensure the economic benefits of natural gas do not come at the expense of the health and safety of our families.” Apparently the Congresswoman is unaware that hydraulic fracturing has been in commercial use for more than six decades and in that time, according to 2011 testimony from EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson, there has not been a single, proven instance of it contaminating groundwater.

What is proven is the positive economic effect on U.S. communities of natural gas exploration and production. In Colorado alone the natural gas industry directly employs some 30,000 people, and indirectly supports more than 137,000 jobs. That means $18.4 billion in annual, gross output.

But the small matter of jobs and family survival has never been a big concern of the anti-conventional-energy contingent. Perhaps that’s how 13 environmentalist groups were able to demand in all seriousness in recent weeks that Gov. John Hickenlooper pull from the air a 30-second public service announcement of the Colorado Oil and Gas Association.

Hickenlooper, a former geologist who worked in the oil-and-gas industry for five years and has studied hydraulic fracturing extensively, features in the ad, in which he says that since 2008 there have been no known cases in the state of hydraulic fracturing contaminating groundwater. A joint letter from the organizations gallingly and falsely contends the COGA ad “ignor[es] the high incidence of groundwater contamination from spills and releases of toxic chemicals at or near drilling sites."

Not surprisingly, the letter also calls for more – you guessed it – regulation of fracking, saying COGA should “adopt new and stronger protections for Colorado's water resources and communities." But Colorado already has the most stringent fracking regulations in the nation; last December, in an agreement brokered by Hickenlooper himself, the Colorado Oil and Gas Conservation Commission adopted new rules that require drillers to disclose the chemicals used in every hydraulic fracturing operation in Colorado and file them with both the COGC and landowners. The rules go into effect next month, at which point anyone will be able to go online and look up the chemicals used in the fracking of virtually any well in the state. And Colorado’s not alone in willingly adopting these rules; so far 11 states have or are working toward adopting their own regulations on fracking-fluid disclosure.

But instead of supporting the reliable, abundant resources within our own state borders, DeGette, Polis and environmental groups like to tout the many imagined benefits of so-called “clean energy.” A page on DeGette’s own House website discusses how “wind, solar, hydro, and other sustainable energy sources [are] critical to our energy platform.” But the belief that wind farms and solar panels will some day take the place of oil and gas is a fiction, and a costly one at that. Despite the Obama administration’s funneling of more than $90 billion of 2009 economic stimulus money to “clean” energy (including wind power), the American Wind Energy Association reported a drop in 2010 U.S. wind manufacturing jobs. More government waste right down the proverbial rat hole.

Coloradoans must ask what sort of energy future their elected representatives envision for the United States. At a time when so many are out of work and struggling to make ends meet, shale gas could provide significant relief. We need to make sure we have legislators willing to let our resources work for us.

***This article published March 23, 2012 by Townhall Finance.com.

Politico asked about the "messaging" of ObamaCare

Fri, 23 Mar 2012 12:57:00 GMT

Politico.com asked me the following question for their on-line feature, The Arena.

Question: With the Supreme Court set to hear challenges next week to the Obama health care law, POLITICO's Carrie Budoff Brown reports on the public's enduring skepticism about it. "The law is as unpopular today as it was two months after passing in March 2010, when 41 percent of Americans held a favorable opinion of the overhaul and 44 percent viewed it unfavorably, according to the Kaiser Family Foundation Health Tracking Poll." http://politi.co/GS5BvM

Was this a case of weak messaging by the Obama White House, congressional Democrats and liberal allies? Or was it an unpopular proposal from the start that was unlikely to ever catch on with the public?

My Answer: The messaging for ObamaCare was part of the problem in that Obama & Co. was trying to sell something that was blatantly false and unwanted.

No objective person believed their claim that premiums would decline, that it would reduce the deficit, that you'd really be able to keep your insurance and your doctor, or that you somehow were going to get more for less. It was seen as a massive intrusion on personal liberty and freedom of one of the most personal decisions for every person and every family.

The two years since the legislation's signing into law have exposed what many of us critics said at the outset; this was never about health care - it was the largest, most unprecedented power grab by the federal government in our nation's history. Even Obama can't fool all of the people all of the time. And, since "the message" behind selling ObamaCare was built on fantasies and falsehoods - well, that's why a majority of people continue to oppose it.

Shameless in Cushing

Thu, 22 Mar 2012 17:09:00 GMT

President Barack Obama waves as he arrives at the TransCanada Stillwater Pipe Yard in Cushing, Okla., Thursday, March, 22, 2012.

(Credit: AP Photo/Pablo Martinez Monsivais)

Barack Obama showed up in Oklahoma today to announce that he approved the construction of an energy pipeline that would connect the oil depots in Cushing with the refineries in the Gulf Coast. In a side conversation he also offered his approval of Peyton Manning going to the Denver Broncos, the arrival of the first day of spring, and the sun coming up yet again this morning.

Obama’s photo op exceeds the normal self-ingratiating antics of politicians in full re-election mode. Even for the most anti-oil and gas President in U.S. history, this is just plain shameless.

N. Korea welshes on food aid deal: Satellite launch tests long-range missile

Thu, 22 Mar 2012 12:42:00 GMT

By Peter Brookes

What's most significant about the news that North Korea is planning a civilian satellite launch next month isn't the glaring snub of Obama diplomacy, it's that Pyongyang is still honing its long-range missile program - aimed at us.

Of course, you can imagine how disappointed American diplomats must have been on hearing late last week that the deal they'd just struck with the hard-nosed North Koreans had fallen apart after just a few days.

The pact traded a North Korean moratorium on nuclear tests and work at the Yongbyon plant, long-range missile launches and the return of International Atomic Energy Agency nuclear inspectors for 240,000 tons of U.S. "nutritional assistance" (food aid) and other possible benefits.

Some wondered whether this was a good deal for Washington considering Pyongyang's proclivity for perfidy and already-existing United Nations resolutions banning, or condemning, these North Korean activities.

Nevertheless, the State Department cautiously touted it as a "first modest step in the right direction," which makes sense since Pyongyang had been unwilling to seriously engage with Washington since President Barack Obama took office.

In fairness, you can almost empathize with the administration's enthusiasm for the pact. Perhaps engaging the newly-installed North Korean leader, Kim Jong Un, would orchestrate an opening to the outside world?

Or, maybe, down an unquestionably bumpy road, talks with the latest king of the communist "Kim-dom" would end years of hostility toward South Korea and the United States, finally reuniting the long-divided Korean peninsula?

Without question, it's fair for the Obama administration to test the diplomatic intentions of Kim Jong Un, exploring to see if the leadership change after the death of his father, Kim Jong Il, would lead to other sorts of changes, especially of the positive kind.

Unfortunately, it seems the acorns don't fall far from the tree in North Korea.

But the cold dish of embarrassment Pyongyang served up to Washington with the breaking of the agreement is the least of the problems that we'll face from North Korea's planned "peaceful" satellite launch, set for around April 15.

While the shooting of a satellite into orbit to commemorate the 100th anniversary of the birth of Kim Jong Un's grandfather and North Korea founder, Kim Il Sung, seems pretty harmless, it's anything but peaceful to American security.

The dirty little secret is that there is essentially no difference between being able to launch a civilian satellite into orbit and launching an ICBM at a target somewhere across the globe - like, say, from North Korea to the United States.

No surprise then that Washington sees the satellite launch as a deal-breaker - no matter whose birthday it is.

While it's believed North Korea probably has an ICBM capable of reaching the Western part of the United States, there are lingering questions based on its three previous, shaky operational tests, going back to 1998.

In the now-scuttled deal, Washington wanted to limit progress on Pyongyang's nuclear and ballistic missile programs, especially the development of an ICBM, capable of more accurately targeting an increasingly larger swath of U.S. territory.

Curtailing North Korean work on missiles and nukes would not only benefit American security (and that of our Asian allies), it might also undermine Pyongyang's profitable proliferation practices to places like Iran and Syria.

Now, it's unlikely Pyongyang will cancel the satellite launch despite protestations from Washington. But if its fourth attempt in getting a satellite into space is a charm, it'll be anything but a stroke of luck for us.

*** Peter Brookes, a Heritage Foundation senior fellow, is a former deputy assistant secretary of defense and Contributing Editor for A Line of Sight. This article published March 22, 2012 in The Boston Herald.

Tip-of-the Hat: Tom Tillapaugh, the StreetSchool Network

Tue, 20 Mar 2012 03:25:00 GMT

It is a common cliché; "You changed my life." But, how many people really do?

Tom Tillapaugh not only changes lives; he literally saves them. Lots of them.

In 1985 Tom was led by his faith to begin and education ministry in Denver for the most seriously at risk, often forgotten, kids in society. He launched the Denver StreetSchool on East Colfax with the financial help of a business man and three kids in desperate need of help.

His model is built on four principles:
1. Small schools – typically only 50-60 kids
2. Small Classes – limit of 10
3. Strong interlocking relationships – adults willing to be "extremely inconvenienced"
4. A Christian School – Jesus "gives hope and purpose to even want to try."

Tom says the schools are run like an intensive care ward in a hospital. We need "adults who will pour themselves into these kids," he says. Saving and changing lives requires "sacrificial intervention into the lives of these kids by loving, caring adults to the point of extreme inconvenience."

What's that mean? "Doing something during the work day is not sacrificial, that's your job – what are you doing with the kid at 10:00 at night?" Tom asks. And, he walks the talk. Tom had to identify the body of a murdered student because he was considered next-of-kin. He held another as she died with AIDS. Tom and his wife routinely open their home to needy kids. As many as seven students – and their babies – have lived with Tom and his wife at one time.

These are kids that have already had too much trouble with the law, with drugs and gangs, and the public schools have given up on many of them. Personal relationships in their lives have typically been destructive. They will tell you that the StreetSchool saved their life – and they are not exaggerating.

Instead of going to jail – or a morgue – 85% of Street School students are graduating from high school. And, 83% are going on to a post-secondary education or a military career. Many have returned as StreetSchool teachers.

Tom's remarkable results quickly caught the attention of other committed education reformers across the nation. Today there are at least 40 StreetSchools in 24 states. The Bill Gates Foundation was sufficiently impressed with the performance of the StreetSchools that they made a rare grant to the faith based school. The Bush Administration invited Tom to participate on multiple occasions with First Lady Laura Bush's "Helping America's Youth Initiative."

Far beyond three kids in a vacant building on East Colfax in Denver, Tom now heads up a national association, the StreetSchool Network, http://streetschoolnetwork.org/. Below is a link to a 13 minute presentation Tom made for a Heritage Foundation sponsored event hosted by the Centennial Institute at Colorado Christian University in Lakewood, Colorado. See the website to learn more, contact them, visit a school, donate and pray for Tom and the StreetSchool Network and especially for the kids. Be sure to also check out the guest feature Tom authored for this April issue of A Line of Sight, "A History of Islamic Expansion."

Click here for Tillapaugh's Heritage Foundation/Centennial Institute Presentation

Good News: Hellfire and Brimstone Straight From the Pulpit

Mon, 19 Mar 2012 18:56:00 GMT

I've long lamented the careful tip-toeing by religious clergy around anything that leftist politicians might construe as "crossing the line." Organizations like the Freedom From Religion Foundation have been quick to pounce with lawsuits threatening revocation of a church's non-profit status. Timidity from religious leaders has invited an erosion of religious freedom and an increasingly secular society controlled more by an ever more powerful central government than by "the Laws of Nature and Nature's God."

However, the announcement in January by the Obama Administration that as part of ObamaCare all employer provided healthcare insurance policies – even those of religious organizations – would have to provide contraception, sterilization, and even abortifacient drugs awoke a fervor among people of faith, particularly Catholic clerics, that had been virtually silent for at least two generations.

While the Obama Administration with the cooperation of a largely complicit media tried to make the ensuing fight about "women's health care," church leaders including the Catholic Bishops of America rightly saw it as a direct assault on Religious Liberty and the Constitution. Encouraged by the outspoken leadership of men like Cardinal Timothy Dolan and Archbishop Charles Chaput whom we highlighted last month on these pages, parish priests throughout America delivered homilies the likes of which most people in the pews hadn't heard in their lifetime.

One of the best we've heard was delivered February 5, 2012 by Fr. Sammie Maletta, Jr., Pastor at St. John the Evangelist Parish, St. John, Indiana. The pulpit seems like the perfect place from which the real Good News should flow. While Fr. Maletta's sermon might not be a favorite around the current White House, it is one to make the Founding Fathers proud. And, from the response of his parishioners that you'll hear as you play the link below, they sure approved, as well. Click play below, and enjoy the Good News.

Click here for Fr. Maletta's Religious Freedom Homily

Regulation Chicanery

Mon, 19 Mar 2012 16:12:00 GMT

A 180 degree difference from what they say and what they do has become standard-operating-procedure at the Obama White House. Take government regulation, for example. In the middle of the deepest and longest sustained economic downturn since the Great Depression, the Obama Administration cranked out new regulation faster than Oscar Meyer makes hot dogs.

Not surprisingly, there was push-back, to which the ever populist politician President responded with great fanfare that he was opening a government wide hunting season for excessive regulations; a “retrospective review.” It should have been pretty easy hunting given that the Federal Register is more than 80,000 pages of rules covering every nook and cranny of Americans lives. In a Wall Street Journal op-ed in January 2011, Obama said that “rules have gotten out of balance, placing unreasonable burdens on business – burdens that have stifled innovation and have had a chilling effect on growth and jobs.” Sounding very much like he’d gotten the message about over regulation, Obama said the goal of this review would be to “remove outdated regulations that stifle job creation and make our economy less competitive.”

A year later, the White House announced the results of their effort highlighting just four regulations they found and targeted for reform. It sounded pretty weak at the time, but a new analysis by James Gattuso and Diane Katz of the Heritage Foundation indicates it was an even bigger sham that first expected.

“The Administration claimed that its reforms would, if implemented, reduce regulatory costs by $10 billion per year. But little or none of this reduction has materialized. Of the four major actions in 2011 that reduced regulatory burdens, none were the product of the regulatory review initiative. Three—involving air cargo screening, family investment advisors, and debit-card price controls—were modifications of recently imposed regulatory burdens. The fourth, the exemption of milk from “oil spill” regulations, was highlighted in the President’s State of the Union speech as an example of the success of the review. In reality, it had been proposed by the EPA in January 2009, and put on hold when the Obama Administration came into office.”

We had a pretty good indication of where this retrospective review was headed already in June 2011. Obama’s regulatory czar Cass Sunstein offered a rebuttal to the growing criticism that the administration was compounding rather than relaxing excessive regulation. In the Washington Post Sunstein wrote that “the annual cost of regulations has not increased during the Obama administration….there has been no increase in rulemaking in this administration.”

That was a whopper, and Sunstein most certainly had to know it. Instead of really hunting down regulations to whack during 2011, the administration was pumping out more like water gushing from a fire hose. Here’s what Gattuso and Katz discovered:

“Despite the weak economy, the Obama Administration continued to increase the regulatory burden on Americans in 2011, adding 32 major regulations that increase regulatory burdens, almost $10 billion in annual costs, and $6.6 billion in one-time implementation costs. From the beginning of the Obama Administration through 2011, a staggering 106 major regulations that increase regulatory burdens have been issued, with costs exceeding $46 billion. While the President has acknowledged the need to rein in regulation, the steps taken to date have been meager.”

“During the three years of the Obama Administration, a total of 106 new major regulations have been imposed at a cost of more than $46 billion annually, and nearly $11 billion in one-time implementation costs. This amount is about five times the cost imposed by the prior Administration of George W. Bush.”

The Heritage report utilized the government’s own analysis to determine financial impact and status as “major” rules and regulations – those in excess of $100 million of additional cost annually to the economy. But, the authors explain that agencies self-evaluations are typically understated and that many of the rules categorized as “non-major” are really quite substantial.

In addition to the enormous onslaught of new regulations in the last three years, Gattuso and Katz found that much more is on the way.

“Dozens more regulations were slated for 2011, but the Administration failed to meet statutory deadlines. According to business consultancy Davis Polk, 225 Dodd–Frank rulemaking deadlines have passed. Of these, 164—more than seven of 10—have been missed. Regulators have not yet even released proposals for 24 of the 164 missed rules.”

“The most recent Unified Agenda (also known as the Semiannual Regulatory Agenda)—a bi-annual compendium of planned regulatory actions as reported by agencies lists 2,576 rules (proposed and final) in the pipeline. The largest proportion—505 rulemakings—is from the Treasury Department, the SEC, and the Commodity Futures Trading Commission—all tasked with issuing hundreds of rules under the massive Dodd–Frank statute. The Environmental Protection Agency is responsible for 174 others, while 133 are from the Department of Health and Human Services, reflecting, in part, the regulatory requirements of Obamacare.”

“Of the 2,576 pending rulemakings in the fall 2011 agenda, 133 are classified as ‘economically significant.’ With each of these expected to cost at least $100 million annually, they represent a total additional burden of at least $13.3 billion every year.”

Shortly before the White House announced the phony four reforms as the result of the supposed year-long government wide exhaustive review, the head Democrat in the Senate, Harry Reid, mocked efforts by Republicans in the House to provide some real regulation relief saying that “there aren’t any” regulations that “do broad economic harms.” For the Democrats in Congress and the Central Planners in the Obama Administration more government is always a good thing – it’s how they “spread the love.” Obama believes that all the rules and regulations “make our economy stronger and more competitive” while satisfying a moral obligation to meet “our fundamental responsibilities to one another.”

If that is true, then at the rate we’re going the economy ought to be really strong very soon, and whatever moral responsibilities we had yet to satisfy to our fellow man should soon be resolved. Because, as Gattuso and Katz documented, the already bloated Federal Register exploded from 68,598 pages in 2009 to 82,415 pages by the end of 2011 – a 20% increase – and, again, a great deal more is on the way.

Read the entire Gattuso-Katz report by clicking here.

Afghanistan is a Charade: Trying to Define Victories for America In the Middle East

Sun, 18 Mar 2012 14:11:00 GMT

By MG Paul E. Vallely, US Army (Ret.), Contributing Editor

A charade is defined in several ways but in this case the definition is an empty act or pretense. A Victory means winning. I have some questions for our civilian and military leadership today regarding a war that is appearing more and more like an empty act that seems to be losing its character and “raison d’etre”. First, the pretense that this war must continue under the current strategy and that we are achieving results when the facts appear each day to refute that. I have not had one serious politician or senior Military leader describe or delineate any victories for America in our quest for nation building and exporting Democracy. We see more casualties each day and the leadership standbys a self-destructive and self-defeating strategy of "counter-insurgency" (COIN) doctrine and nation-building. Please define for me since January 2002 what the victories are for America in Afghanistan?

The COIN principle is not based on winning; it is based on political whims and is not a true tenet of warfare. Warfare is, and always should be, about WINNING or do not go to War. Great Generals and Admirals of battles past had enough acumen and understanding of the tides of battle to change the strategies and tactics to turn the tide on the enemy. I had the opportunity to attend a dinner a few weeks ago with young NFL quarterback Tim Tebow of the Denver Broncos. He remembered in grade school in Florida that some parents and even some coaches would discuss with the young players in football that it was not about “winning” but about other touchy feely experiences in playing the game. Tim found out very soon that it was “about winning” and life is about winning for your cause, your efforts, your values and that no one wants to be a loser or feel like a “loser”. Our troops never want to lose and they are not trained to lose but our government and naïve leaders cannot even say “Victory” today in our battles to secure America.

Winning this specific war against forces impelled by Islamic ideology calls for unconventional measures and not the conventional actions followed by lengthy occupations such as we have seen in Iraq and Afghanistan. Such an unconventional war doctrine heavily leverages the core capability to break enemy states, target and destroy the enemy’s capability to bring harm to America". Why do the United States and its military/political leaders and strategists still languish in failed strategies from World War II to the present?

LTG Tom McInerney and I have stated previously in many interviews and published articles that America needs a 2012 “Forward Strategy” that positions our Armed Forces to protect America, its assets and its borders.

Jihadists with small arms and IEDS in faraway places cannot harm the United States so there is no reason to order massive armies that require large and extensive bases and massive logistical support to fight them on their home turf. But that is the essence of failed “counterinsurgency” (COIN) strategies that has bewitched US military political leaders. We all want to support our senior military leaders but at some point they have to face the realities of this enemy and protect and secure our American troops before we continue sparing the lives of the Taliban and civilians with bizarre, restrictive rules of engagement (ROE). The latest being the order last week for our Marines to disarm during a conference event in Kabul during the visit of Leon Panetta, the SECDEF.

It disturbs me anytime our policy wonks and senior officers talk about withdrawal of Forces. A great General always repositions his forces to prepare for battle for today and tomorrow. I would reposition all of our Armed Forces out of the Middle East into secure lily pad bases. From our secure bases, we can strike and counter any and all threats against America. Strike anywhere, anytime with our Joint Strike Force capability and make sure the enemies firmly understand these….from jihadists to narco-terrorists or cyber-terrorists. Time to face the realities of today’s world.

Yes, we have made great and innovative technological advances in weapons systems in the air, sea, and ground, in communications, in advanced intelligence systems and command and control systems. Yes, we have operational war planners at all levels of command, senior policy and politicos in the White House and Department of Defense, a National Security Team and a multitude of military commands positioned around the globe to guide and lead us in national security. But where are the common sense and rational senior General and Admiral Strategists that we have trained and schooled to be innovative, aggressive and win our nation’s wars quickly and decisively?

I rarely hear any of them talking about the valued Principles of War that successful combat leaders in the past have used to achieve success and victory. They cannot even talk in terms of victory, winning and bringing the troops home. Or maybe, they do not want to for politically correct reasons at home. Unfortunately, American leaders are increasingly trying to transform this force into one optimized for counterinsurgency missions (when, in fact, we are not, in my opinion, fighting insurgencies but rather, Islamic Jihadis and a fomenting global Caliphate) and conventional war followed on by long-term military occupations. Track back if you will to Korea, Vietnam, and now Iraq, and Afghanistan.

It is true that not all political goals are achievable through the use of military power. However, “victory” in war appears lost in the world of political correctness and appeasement. The conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan – often seen as proving the necessity for COIN-capable forces as well as a commitment to nation-building -- demonstrate in reality that the vast majority of goals can be accomplished through quick, decisive joint strike military operations from selected “Lily Pad” friendly bases. Not all political goals are achievable this way, but most are, and those that cannot be achieved through conventional operations likely cannot be achieved by the application of even the most sophisticated counterinsurgency doctrine either.

We cannot seem to be able to discern between the differences in conventional and non-conventional warfare. The war against mainstream Islamic Jihadist forces and a sick ideology has been, and will continue to be, one requiring unconventional solutions. This is a point that the White House and the Pentagon fear to call this war against a pronounced ideology. It is not a war on terror as we first analyzed; it is a war against people subscribing to Jihad and a derived ideology from the Koran that has evil global intentions as much as the Nazis and Third Reich.

Why can we not understand that our military is for national security, defending our country and defeating our enemies before they bring havoc and harm to our citizens? Why can we not understand how important our resources are in terms of our trained Armed Forces and assets of our country and not to drain them across the globe in futile nation building operations but to leverage the military to counter threats to our country? And, as well, to realize and understand in a profound way that you cannot Nation Build in an area of conflict until the enemy is defeated.

A fundamental challenge in devising a strategy for the use of future American military power is that the world has literally never seen anything like our capability. The U.S. today has military capabilities at least equal to the rest of the world combined. There is virtually no spot on the globe that could not be targeted by American forces, and at most a small handful of countries that could thwart a determined U.S. effort at regime change – and some of those only by virtue of their possession of nuclear weapons. This is the driving point; why are we so worried about what others think? Did these so-called allies not have to be bailed out numerous times for their failed thinking? Why do we want to kowtow to the same intellectual vacuity that caused the greatest conflicts on earth?

As a consequence, the U.S. must adopt a national military strategy that heavily leverages the core capability to break enemy states, target and destroy the enemy’s capability to bring harm to America. Such a strategy could defeat and disrupt most potential threats the U.S. faces. I will discuss in detail, in later follow-up articles, where the strategy of joint strike operations and the unheralded “Global Lily Pad” strategy prove to be the best method for success.

While America’s adversaries today may prefer to engage the U.S. using proxies and develop radical Islamist organizations and jihadists, there is no rationale in declaring to the people of the United States that we are in a long war and accept that as a reason to not achieve a quick and decisive victory. It appears we fight more in agreement with the so called United Nations, allies, and the likes of China and Russia than to stand up for own sovereignty. It is time to relegate these so-called allies to the sidelines.

Let them wail and whimper as we achieve the success that is necessary; wiping out and neutralizing radical Islamism and nation states that support it. There must be an ENDGAME. Because our capability is so novel, American strategists lack a clear framework to guide the utilization of this force. They have sought to match capabilities to conceptions of the use of force from a different era, one in which the Cold War made regime change unpalatable due to the risk of escalation and that tended to make localized setbacks appear as loses in a perceived zero-sum competition with the Soviets. Like Reagan, it is time to call their bluff. They know we hold the big cards, so why are we so timid? This only fosters eastern thought that placation is a sign of weakness. A weakness they will turn into an asset and a political card to play to the uneducated masses they control.

Many describe our efforts as helping to recruit more fighters and more ideologues. This is no way to stop all the threat to our homeland. The only true way to stop that threat is to give them what they respect; pure force of arms and will. Otherwise, they sit in their sanctuaries and count up the moral victories they have achieved, and embolden future efforts. However, significant threats to the U.S., ranging from the military capacity of regional powers to weapons of mass destruction development programs to significant terrorist infrastructures, can be targeted and destroyed by conventional and unconventional military capabilities.

Again, we must stop thinking like westerners, and understand the way our enemy thinks. A lily pad is much more preferable because it gives them no moral high ground to propagandize, but at the same time instills sheer terror in their hearts as they guess at what is coming next. Force of will and resolve is required by our leaders that our enemies indeed respect and understand. Only when we understand that one objective of Global Jihad is imposition – by force or by stealth – of Shari’a (Islamic law) and the other is the re-establishment of the Caliphate/Imamate), can we even begin to formulate the enemy threat doctrine and strategic concept to DEFEAT THE ENEMY and WIN. Generals and Admirals - Reposition our Forces NOW!

***Paul E. Vallely - MG, US Army (Ret) is the Chairman of Stand Up America, and a Contributing Editor to A Line of Sight.

The Oil Scarcity Myth

Thu, 15 Mar 2012 22:13:00 GMT

Rapidly rising gas prices at the pump have turned up the heat on Barack Obama. Interestingly, the Administration that just three years ago said it was committed to policies that would cause energy prices to “skyrocket” and get our gas prices “to the levels in Europe,” now says there isn’t much they can do about rising costs to consumers.

One of the many falsehoods that the President and his anti-fossil fuel allies like to perpetuate is that the U.S. is about run out of reserves. “But you and I both know that with only 2% of the world’s oil reserve, we can’t just drill our way to lower gas prices – not when we consume 20% of the world’s oil,” Obama said yet again in his weekly radio address last Saturday. He repeatedly makes this less-than-truthful claim to obsessively press his anti-oil and gas agenda and justify wasting billions on green energy fantasies.

Obama's basis for his 2%-of-the-world's-oil-reserves claim is the narrow definition of “proven reserves” – a measure based on currently producing fields only, rather than identified but undeveloped known reserves which are far more vast. The 22 billion barrels of “proved” reserves, according to the federal government’s Energy Information Administration “are a small subset of recoverable resources.” Obama conveniently forgets to mention that part. That he knowingly repeats the less than truthful claim for the purpose of perpetuating a misconception is shameless.

Various reports from Obama’s own government including the Energy Department, the Congressional Research Service, and the Energy Information Agency as well as a plethora of private analyses tell a dramatically different story. To be sure, technological challenges, cost of extraction, and political barriers will prohibit some part of the oil buried deep beneath the earth from being harvested, but Obama's representation is pure baloney and he knows it. For a detailed summary of a more accurate assessment of our reserves click here for a feature story from today’s Investor’s Business Daily. If you want the condensed version in graphic form, see below. Please take note that Obama would have you believe all we have left is depicted by the tiny red triangle at the top of the pyramid.

Courtesy of Investor's Business Daily

Are you confused?

Thu, 15 Mar 2012 13:06:00 GMT

Whether you agree with a President or not, any administration should at least be consistent and predictable.

Here's how Obama answered criticism of his decision to join in the NATO mission in Libya:

"To brush aside America's responsibility as a leader and -- more profoundly -- our responsibilities to our fellow human beings under such circumstances would have been a betrayal of who we are," Obama said. "Some nations may be able to turn a blind eye to atrocities in other countries. The United States of America is different. And as president, I refused to wait for the images of slaughter and mass graves before taking action."

If that made sense, then what of Syria? Other than Iran, has any regime been more supportive of terror? Been a bigger threat to Israel? Been more brutal to their own people? And, about all Obama does is wring his hands.

True to form, he did support a U.N. resolution “requesting” Syrian tyrant Bashir Assad voluntarily relinquish power. And, Susan Rice, Obama’s ambassador to the U.N., was “disgusted” when Russia and China vetoed that resolution (surprise!).

Back on February 4 the White House "released a statement" that said Assad should "step aside" and offering to the Syria opposition that "we are with you"...whatever that means.

Let me repeat Obama’s reasoning for going into Libya. "Some nations may be able to turn a blind eye to atrocities in other countries. The United States of America is different. And as president, I refused to wait for the images of slaughter and mass graves before taking action." That was his principled reasoning less than a year ago. Thousands have been slaughtered, and countless of his own people have been tortured in the most brutal fashion imaginable including crucifixion.

From the White House yesterday, Obama was asked yet again what he planned to do to end Assad’s assault on his own people. The President suggested more talking – “the window for solving this issue diplomatically is shrinking,” as if Assad has any interest in being diplomatic.

Below is pasted in its entirety a Los Angeles Times report of Amnesty International’s horrific account of torture and “crimes against humanity.” Apparently, now the President that was so willing to act in Libya is more than willing to “turn a blind eye…to images of slaughter.” With this kind of confused foreign policy, is it any wonder that the Israelis are less than comforted when Obama assures them “we’ve got your back” against any aggression from Iran?

Torture in Syria worst seen in 30 years, report says

Los Angeles Times, March 14, 2012

The scale of torture in Syria since an antigovernment uprising began a year ago amounts to crimes against humanity and is the worst the country has experienced in 30 years, says an Amnesty International report released Tuesday.

Syrians calling for the fall of President Bashar Assad have been arrested in droves and have faced harsh and sometimes fatal mistreatment similar to the brutal crackdown on dissent exerted by government forces during the late 1970s and early 1980s, says the report, released a day before the one-year anniversary of the uprising.

In at least 276 cases documented by Amnesty International, prisoners have died as a result of torture. The human rights group has repeatedly called for involvement by the International Criminal Court.

Some victims of torture were younger than 18, Amnesty reported. The torture appears to have been intended to not only punish and coerce confessions from prisoners, but also perhaps as a warning to others, the report says.

Dozens of victims and witnesses, interviewed after they fled into Jordan, described 31 methods of torture that began with severe beatings upon arrest –- termed “reception” -- with fists, sticks, rifle butts, whips and braided cables.

“During one of those night-beating sessions a guy had his ribs broken in front of me. Another had his back broken but they did not take him to hospital,” said an 18-year-old student from Dara province. “A young man from Homs was beaten in one of those sessions with metal pipes. His neck was broken and he died on the spot. I don’t know where they took him.”

“I was beaten with cables, especially on my head, and told to kneel before a picture of Bashar Assad,” said a 40-year-old decorator from Dara city.

The former prisoners also recounted being forced into a tire, arms pinned to their side, and beaten, hung by their wrists from the ceiling for hours at a time and being electrocuted on various parts of their bodies.

“I was crucified naked on the door for three days using metal handcuffs with my toes barely touching the floor,” one reported.

The Times recently wrote about an Aleppo activist’s account of being in detention for more than 90 days, during which he suffered similar treatment.

In the Amnesty report, one prisoner said that during his interrogation at the military intelligence branch in Damascus he was forced to watch another male prisoner being raped.

Though the overwhelming majority of alleged human rights violations have been committed by government forces, there are some reports of abuses committed by rebel fighters , including kidnapping and killing of pro-government individuals or their relatives or those suspected of being members of the government’s armed militia.

A Dangerous US Drawdown

Tue, 13 Mar 2012 13:17:00 GMT

By Peter Brookes, Contributing Editor

With the persistent perception the United States is losing interest in Europe, British Prime Minister David Cameron's visit with President Obama this week provides a good backdrop to talk about possible trouble for transatlantic security ties.

In another chapter on our incredible shrinking military, Team Obama has decided to reduce US forces in Europe by about 15,000 troops (of an estimated 80,000) over the next two years.

Specifically, Pentagon plans call for bringing home an Air Force fighter squadron from Germany and an air-control squadron from Italy. Plus, it will close up two army heavy brigade combat teams and an HQ element in Germany.

Two weeks ago, the head of our European Command, Adm. James Stavridis, testified to Congress that the reductions amounted to a "manageable amount of risk" - a notably less-than-ringing endorsement.

Not surprisingly, some in Congress worry that the drawdown decision is more about budget numbers than national security - and experts suspect (very likely correctly) that it's only the first of several phased withdrawals.

Why shouldn't we bring home all of our brave young men and women, when the chance of a major war in Europe is so (wonderfully) low these days? Turns out there are many reasons for being there in a big way.

To start, these cuts - which, again, seem unlikely to be the last - will undermine our ability to get to fights quickly and project power in such places as the Middle East, Africa and Eurasia. And there's no shortage of problems in those places.

Fewer troops in Europe would also mean fewer training exercises with our NATO allies, helping to prepare them for deployments to such places as Afghanistan, where they work shoulder-to-shoulder with US forces.

Having troops "over there" helps when surprises like the Libya war come up, showing that US and European forces must be capable of operating jointly in short order. (Libya, by the way, exposed many NATO problems that need fixing.)

The drop in the number of US forces - from nearly 400,000 during the Cold War - would reduce our political clout on the continent, because our influence comes not only from our global political and economic sway but also from our military might in NATO.

A further US drawdown in Europe could prompt other NATO members to cut their own defense spending, with more nations relying on the EU-led (and US-absent) Common Security and Defense Policy structure.

All of this risks encouraging Moscow to become an even bigger problem than it is now (e.g., on Iran and Syria), especially in the wake of Vladimir Putin's "re-re-election" as president.

Despite the Obama "reset" efforts, nobody expects the Once and Future President to change his anti-American views. He's already talking of creating a Eurasian Union of former Soviet states and rolling out

the rubles for Russian military modernization.

In fact, Moscow plans a defense buildup to the tune of $700 billion over the next 10 years, reportedly including the addition of more than 400 intercontinental ballistic missiles, 600 combat aircraft and dozens of ships and subs.

Analysts fear a potential rekindling of the 2008 Russia-Georgia war and unrest in such places as Ukraine, Belarus or even Russia, considering the protests surrounding the last election.

In international security, like in politics and Hollywood, if you're not appearing, you're disappearing. Europe, with its Eurasian/Middle Eastern/North African periphery, isn't a region we should be disappearing from - if we're smart.

*** Peter Brookes, a Heritage Foundation senior fellow, is a former deputy assistant secretary of defense and Contributing Editor for A Line of Sight. This article published March 13, 2012 in the New York Post.

Bad Karma

Mon, 12 Mar 2012 14:32:00 GMT

What do you get for $193 million? A dead battery.

Consumer Reports tried to test the Karma, a $100,000 electric car creation of Fisker Automotive, but it died and wouldn’t restart on the test track. Fisker engineers couldn’t even come up with a reason to explain why the car failed to run.

Fisker has drawn $193 million on a $529 million loan from the Obama Administration to develop the plug-in car, but according to tech industry reports, the company finds itself “in turbulent times.” Having your invention die on the test track isn’t likely to help turn that around.

Last month, Fisker changed its CEO and announced it was forced to renegotiate the terms of the DOE loan because the company “missed milestones in getting its first vehicle, the Karma sports car, to market.” The first car was three months late coming out of the manufacturing plant, and buyers haven’t warmed to a $103,000 electric experiment.

In a pattern that has become all too familiar with DOE loan recipients, Fisker was forced to start laying off workers in their California manufacturing plant in February.

A few weeks ago, GM announced it was “halting production” of the Chevy Volt, another electric experiment, because it wasn’t selling. According to published reports only 1,626 Volts have been sold through February. GM had planned to manufacture 60,000 of them and sell 45,000 in the U.S. this year. Energy Secretary Stephen Chu brags that the government has dumped $5 billion into developing electric cars like the Volt. In addition, there is a $7500 direct subsidy for each car sold. Obama’s solution for the anemic sales? Increase the subsidy by 33% to $10,000.

If that doesn’t work, we understand the President is in negotiations with Santa Clause to put a Volt under Christmas trees.

Panetta: We'll seek international approval for military action first – then might tell Congress what we're doing.

Fri, 09 Mar 2012 15:37:00 GMT

If you had any lingering doubts about the Obama Administration’s lack of respect for the Constitution or for the sovereignty of the United States of America just watch this 7 minute exchange between Senator Jeff Sessions (R-AL) and Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta that occurred yesterday before the Senate Armed Services Committee.

$24 Billion in Energy Subsides and Credits in 2011

Fri, 09 Mar 2012 15:08:00 GMT

The Congressional Budget Office says that the government provided $24 billion of tax credits and direct subsidies to the energy industry in 2011. Here’s how it was divided up:

$2.5 billion in various tax credits to the fossil fuel industry
$6 billion to the ethanol industry
$16 billion to renewable energy and energy efficiency programs

So, the industry that receives about 10 cents of each dollar of incentives the government provides produces 85% of all the energy to keep America going. And, yet it is the industry that Barack Obama demonizes and wants to punish with higher taxes.

It is important to understand that the various government incentives do not all come in the same form. The hydrocarbon industry takes advantage of tax credits designed to incentivize more investment in exploration and production. Most of it is identical to the kind of depreciation and expensing credits available to every other business in America. However, much of the support to ethanol and green technology is direct subsidies and grants; the government literally sends them a check.

Not only does the oil and gas industry supply us with the vast majority of the energy we need, it returns an average of 41% of net income back to the government in taxes and fees amounting to $85 million every day of the year. Meanwhile, the media is full of stories about bankrupt and struggling green energy companies that are net “takers” rather than “payers” to the Treasury.

With growing outrage over soaring gasoline prices, instead of approving the Keystone Pipeline and policies that would increase supplies, Barack Obama has renewed his attack on oil and gas calling for Congress to “eliminate this oil industry giveaway right away.” He reportedly wants to take the additional taxes from oil and gas and further subsidize green energy. Higher taxes would of course increase gas prices even more.

Perhaps even more paradoxical is that the impact of rising gas prices is extremely regressive – higher costs disproportionately impact lower income people who are already struggling the most in the lagging economy. Yet, Obama contends it’s the wealthy that he wants to punish with higher taxes and somehow give lower income folks a break. He can say it all he wants, but his policies produce just the opposite result.

How’s that deficit reduction going?

Fri, 09 Mar 2012 15:07:00 GMT

Back in February, 2009 Barack Obama said, “today I’m pledging to cut the deficit we inherited in half by the end of my first term in office.” Not only has he not delivered on his pledge, the deficit is still headed in the wrong direction.

The Congressional Budget Office announced yesterday that the federal government amassed the worst monthly deficit in history in February – an astounding $229 billion dollars of red ink in only a single month. Thus far for just the first five months of fiscal year 2012, the government has accumulated $631 billion of new debt, and is borrowing 42 cents of every dollar it spends. At this rate, the government will set yet another record deficit in 2012.

The government’s fiscal year ends on September 30, so voters will be armed with fresh information when they vote in November. Obama should feel a great deal of the voter’s anger, but so too should the Members of Congress – Democrat and Republican - who have continued to support the madness and failed to even begin to restrain the beast.

Obama’s Energy Policy: The dots don’t connect

Mon, 05 Mar 2012 14:40:00 GMT

An axiom of economics is “if you want more of something, subsidize it; if you want less, tax it.” As near as I can tell, that pretty much sums up Barack Obama’s upside-down energy policy. He wants to punish the hydrocarbon industry that supplies 85% of our energy needs, while throwing billions at green technology ideas like bankrupt Solyndra and the newly unplugged Chevy Volt. But, exactly why he wants to inflict more pain on every single American along the way, particularly at a time when so very many are struggling is beyond me. The dots simply don’t connect.

Gas prices at the pump are more than twice what they were three years ago when Obama came into office. And, if history is a guide, prices will soar another 20-25 percent by the time the heavy driving season arrives in about 60 days. Given that reality – and the laws of simple economics – it defies common-sense why the President would be suggesting further disincentives for more production of badly needed gasoline supplies, but that’s his plan.

On several occasions just this past week he unleashed his fury at the energy industry. “I am asking Congress to eliminate this oil industry giveaway right away,” Obama said in New Hampshire. “You can either stand up for the oil companies, or you can stand up for the American people,” he said. The same animus was in full force in a Miami speech.

Complete revision of the tax code is a legitimate debate to have, but that’s not what he’s suggesting. The majority of tax credits and incentives that are available to the energy industry are the same ones available to just about every other American industry. But, the President aims his punishment only at the one industry that he should want to increase production to benefit all those Americans the President says he is standing up for – at least, if one understands that increased supply of any commodity is the quickest and surest way to reduce consumer prices.

The President’s paradoxical recommendation is not only refuted by backyard common-sense. The non-partisan Congressional Research Service issued a report just last year that said ending the existing tax breaks would result in even higher gas prices in the short term. “On what would likely be a small scale, the proposals also would make oil and natural gas more expensive for U.S. consumers and likely increase foreign dependence,” the CRS determined.

Various reports suggest Obama’s punitive policies would end between $2 billion to $4 billion in tax credits for the hydrocarbon energy companies. Further confounding any semblance of good judgment, Obama wants to direct the “found revenue” to even more subsidies of green energy companies like Solyndra – nascent technologies that already got $80 billion from his Stimulus, already enjoy massive tax credits as well as direct subsidies, will have negligible short-term impact for consumers, and have an most uncertain future to substantially contribute to America’s total energy demands.

For the record, as we have previously documented, the hydrocarbon energy industry pays an average of 41.1% of net income in taxes compared to 26.5% for all other S&P industrials. Every single day of the year, the oil and gas industry pays $85 million in taxes and fees to the U.S. Treasury. In 2008, the year before Obama came into office, annual payments for royalties, rents and leases to the federal government from oil and gas companies added $23.3 billion to the treasury. With the dramatic decrease in permitting, cancelling of leases, and moratoriums imposed by this Administration, those payments declined to just $8.6 billion in 2010. The industry also directly employs over 9 million people and invests about $300 billion each year in capital projects that benefit local communities and the national economy.

While production on private lands is up, output from federal lands directly controlled by the government is down 11% and permitting of new wells is happening at barely one-third the rate pre-Obama.

Obama’s perverted economic policies continually want to punish success while simultaneously squandering billions on dreams. That would be a sure-fired plan for quick failure in the real world; a place that Barack Obama has never experienced. I’m all for Obama being free to follow whatever misguided personal strategy he chooses for himself, but I don’t want him to take the rest of us along with him. November can’t come soon enough.

O'Keefe Exposes Ease Of Voter Fraud

Sun, 04 Mar 2012 19:40:00 GMT

Still in his twenties, James O’Keefe is already a very well established investigative journalist having blown apart ACORN and embarrassed Planned Parenthood and NPR. Recently O’Keefe’s 501c3 organization, Project Veritas, released an alarming video exposing the ease of creating massive voter fraud. While the investigation is focused on Minnesota, I should shock citizens coast-to-coast as states rush to adopt ever more liberal voting regulations. Watch the short video below, and see how easy it was for him to register NFL quarterbacks Tim Tebow and Tom Brady to vote – without any form of identification or appearing in person. Please visit ProjectVeritas.com for more information.

James Edwards: Alice in Wonderland-style Truck “Safety” Regs

Mon, 05 Mar 2012 14:47:00 GMT

By James R. Edwards Jr., Contributing Editor

The so-called Compliance Safety Accountability program out of the U.S. Department of Transportation makes Alice’s experiences in Wonderland look reasonable. CSA amounts to a bureaucratic end run around the legally required rulemaking requirements, an arbitrary and subjective way to re-regulate a deregulated industry, and a disruption to the supply chain in ways that will have substantial effects on consumers and the shipping public.

A little background: CSA uses roadside inspection data to rank commercial motor carriers in seven “BASIC” safety categories. BASICs include things like “vehicle maintenance,” “driver fitness,” and “unsafe driving.” A creation of the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration, CSA ranks the truck companies against each other in each of the BASICs (five of which are publicized on the Internet).

CSA’s Safety Measurement System assigns scores in each BASIC to a carrier. Rated carriers are then compared against their “peers” within each BASIC. A percentile ranking in a category supposedly shows where a carrier stacks up against other motor carriers. But it’s an ever-changing set of peers.

FMCSA sets an arbitrary percentile level for each BASIC that some refer to as “limbo bars.” Carriers whose BASIC score crosses the limbo bar gets branded on the CSA website with an “alert” — a golden triangle with an exclamation mark.

The agency created CSA to replace its precursor, SafeStat. No doubt SafeStat wasn’t perfect. But SafeStat scores remained unpublicized. They gave agency officers an internal tool for determining what interventions were appropriate for certain carriers that might have some challenging safety area.

If CSA were only a newer, internal tool for the agency to do its job, that would be tolerable. But the FMCSA has put CSA scores out there in public. The agency has even been pushing shippers and brokers to rely on CSA scores in choosing freight haulers.

But CSA has real problems. And it’s causing turmoil in the industry. Perfectly safe carriers are losing business with established clients because of CSA-spurred fears. How CSA got here reveals a lot about this imperfect system and its harmful consequences.

First, CSA was rolled out never having followed legal requirements designed to protect against rogue rulemaking. FMCSA developed CSA itself, without any clear statutory authority from Congress to do so. The agency claims it can do this under its general authority. CSA was field-tested in a handful of states, where indications were that it improved upon SafeStat, but had problems.

The University of Michigan produced a study at FMCSA’s request assessing CSA. The study apparently never underwent any kind of peer review and was never published in any reputable academic journal. Instead, FMCSA kept the UM study secret until just a few months ago — releasing it only after CSA had been made public and in use. The study essentially concluded that CSA was better than SafeStat.

In December 2010, FMCSA moved forward with what was then called Comprehensive Safety Analysis 2010, putting CSA ratings on the Internet and promoting them as new and improved and ready for the shipping public’s usage.

FMCSA never afforded industry or the public the due process required by the Administrative Procedure Act. In order to make such a substantial change in regulation, the APA lays out requirements, such as giving notice of proposed rulemaking, seeking public comment, etc.

Federal laws, including the Paperwork Reduction Act and the Regulatory Flexibility Act, require agencies to take into account the regulatory impact of its proposed rules on private industry, especially small businesses (which make up most of the trucking sector). The Data Quality Act requires peer review, which CSA lacks.

In FMCSA’s case, the agency is constrained to follow the National Transportation Policy, which is set in law. NTP requires the agencies of DOT to ensure that every rule and regulation balances safety, efficiency and competition. In CSA’s case, none of this ever occurred.

Second, CSA’s arbitrary nature and foundation of sand really appear when you look into the facts. The agency only has enough roadside inspection data to rate 92,000 of the 770,000 federally regulated motor carriers in even one BASIC. More than half of the 12 percent of the industry that’s rated is over the agency’s arbitrary trigger level that saddles a carrier with an “alert” in at least one CSA BASIC.

In many instances, what data CSA uses has little, if anything, to do with actual safety. For example, the “driver fitness” BASIC only rates 3.5 percent of the industry. Most points in this category are assigned for drivers not having their medical cards on them at an inspection, not for driving with some disqualifying medical condition. One carrier crossed the limbo bar because of a driver operating his vehicle with a suspended driver’s license. His license was suspended for failure to pay child support.

In the “vehicle maintenance” BASIC, more than half of the CSA points come from trailer lights burning out, brake adjustments and tire tread depth. None of these factors has a proven correlation with safe vehicle operation. In the “unsafe driver” BASIC, most CSA points accrue from truck drivers getting speed warnings and tickets.

Geographic bias tilts the playing field, though, because about half of such speed-related citations are issued in just five Midwestern states. Their “probable cause” state laws mean police there must issue some citation in order to conduct roadside inspections. Thus, Indiana wrote more than 53 percent of all the speed warnings truckers received in 2011 for allegedly driving 1-5 miles per hour over the speed limit.

Much of what comprises the “fatigued driver” BASIC is really logbook, paperwork violations — “form and manner” errors — where drivers didn’t strictly comply with the hours-of-service diktats that only a bureaucrat could love.

And consider that when inspectors find nothing to mark down a driver or truck for, most inspectors refuse to issue a clean report. Thus, the data that constitute CSA scores are virtually always negative with little positive data to give balance.

Further, because CSA ratings use subjective, faulty methods and incomplete, biased data, carriers that pass FMCSA’s safety fitness audits, which are objective, with flying colors may well have BASICs in which they are under “alert.”

And the subjective nature of the system makes it where carrier BASIC scores can swing wildly. One carrier reportedly saw its “unsafe driving” BASIC whipsaw from 47 percent to 89 percent the same day. Also, even if a carrier fires a driver who’s a safety risk, such actions won’t reflect in its CSA scores for many months.

In other words, fit and safe carriers don’t control their own destiny under CSA. They can watch their BASICs flitter all over the place but have no effective or fair recourse to get their scores settled in the safe zone.

That’s because CSA grades carrier safety like Dancing With the Stars grades dancers. No matter how well everyone may dance, at the end of the night, somebody’s going home. Only in the case of misbranded motor carriers, it means the arbitrary destruction of businesses, jobs, and freight capacity.

Salt in the wounds that CSA is inflicting comes from reality checks that the FMCSA ignores. On the objective criteria of accidents per million miles and accidents per power unit (tractor that pulls the trailer), Wells Fargo scrutinized CSA. This objective assessor found little or no connection between a carrier’s CSA BASICs for “unsafe driving,” “fatigued driving” or “driver fitness” and accidents per million miles driven or accidents per power unit. Wells Fargo concluded that CSA scores are “misleading.”

More salt-grinding comes from the absolute fact that accidents and deaths involving commercial motor vehicles keep falling to historic lows. DOT’s own data show that, objectively looking at safety, the number of accidents and fatalities per million miles driven have steadily dipped to record levels.

Also, FMCSA’s advisory committee found fault with CSA. Its members couldn’t say with any confidence that CSA scores relate to carrier crash probability. This group determined that the agency needs more data to make sure SMS methodology employs science instead of intuition or experts’ opinions.

Third, CSA is hurting the industry. Trucking companies are getting tarred by an unproven, subjective system at a time the industry has achieved some of the safest records ever.

Ultimately, what hurts trucking and shipping hurts consumers, because so much of our economy relies on the distribution system of shippers, brokers, carriers, logistics partners, expediters, and truckers. Trucks play a central role in getting groceries to your local grocery shelves, medicine to your pharmacy, furniture to your department store, etc.

A survey of shippers by Morgan Stanley found 55 percent of shippers saying they won’t use a carrier with even one CSA “alert.” The FMCSA website now states that carriers not rated or with an “alert” might be considered a safety risk. This despite the fact the agency is well aware of CSA’s shortcomings and the concerns industry has raised.

The Department of Defense has begun relying on CSA, and long-time, safe carriers are losing business hauling goods for DOD. As a number of shippers and brokers, including large retailers, factor CSA into their carrier selection, they are opening themselves up to legal liability. Shippers and brokers that use CSA as part of their own, ad hoc selection criteria now face vicarious liability and negligent selection lawsuits.

In other words, rather than keeping the onus on the agency to be the sole determiner of carrier fitness, the shipping public exposes itself to liability lawsuits under state law. It should be enough for the shipping public to compete carriers on rates, routes and services. Safety should not become a competitive matter in this picture. It becoming such subjects the shipping public to liability.

This scenario with CSA is much like consumers being forced to do their own inspections of jet airplanes, pilots and air carriers to determine if they are safe enough to fly on, rather than have confidence in the Federal Aviation Administration’s determination that an airline is a fit air carrier.

In conclusion, as CSA blackballs perfectly safe and fit motor carriers, thousands of companies, especially small businesses, lose business from a frightened shipping public. This risks loss of jobs at trucking companies and brokerages. The loss of capacity will lead to higher freight rates. Competition suffers.

All this pushes consumer prices higher. It could force a tenth of all truck drivers out of the driver pool, at a time when the trucking industry is hiring. Meanwhile, plaintiffs’ lawyers smell blood and launch new rounds of liability suits.

This isn’t a situation that ends pretty.

While Congress looks at transportation reauthorization, it should block FMCSA from publicizing CSA scores. It should require FMCSA to fulfill its legal requirements of putting CSA through the complete rulemaking process.

Further, Congress should require the agency to use only objective measures to assess carrier safety, making absolutely demonstrable correlation of any safety measurement with carrier accidents and fatalities per million miles driven the only acceptable standard. It should force FMCSA to own up to its responsibility as the sole determiner of carrier safety fitness.

And Congress should give federal preemption to protect anyone in the industry who relies on the agency’s carrier fitness determination for carrier selection.

That would save jobs, promote the economy and restore certainty to the shipping and trucking community.

The President’s Energy Two-Step

Fri, 02 Mar 2012 19:44:00 GMT

Editor's Note: The Minority Report requested an energy op-ed from us. This was published March 2, 2012.

Starting with his State of the Union address last month and carrying into his University of Miami speech, the President has been raising eyebrows and hopes with his seemingly pro-energy stances. From unconventional-gas exploration to adoption of the “all of the above” moniker Republicans have used to describe their approach to energy development, Barack Obama sounded downright, well, Republican. However, actions still speak louder than words, and despite the President’s rhetoric about turning over a new leaf, his administration is still playing the same old tune. Read entire op-ed here.

Peter Brookes: Tehran's Ticking Nuclear Time Bomb

Fri, 02 Mar 2012 13:57:00 GMT

By Peter Brookes, Contributing Editor

March 2, 2012--With President Obama addressing AIPAC on Sunday and meeting with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu at the White House on Monday, now is the time for him to unveil a more hardline policy on Iran.

Until now, Team Obama's Iran policy has been a hodge-podge of well-intentioned but ineffective diplomatic and economic initiatives aimed at getting Tehran to alter course on its burgeoning nuclear program.

While Tehran proposes another set of time-killing talks, and the administration preaches patience in hopes that economic sanctions will make the ayatollah cry uncle, the bad news on Iran's nuclear program keeps rolling in.

For instance, Iran is reportedly fielding a new generation of uranium-enriching centrifuges. It's also increasing the production of 20-percent-enriched uranium - which is beyond that needed for power reactor fuel, and closer to the 90 percent used in a bomb.

In addition, mounting evidence of a "military dimension" to Tehran's purportedly peaceful nuclear plans should increase already-well-deserved suspicions of Iranian atomic intentions.

Accounts from the IAEA and others note evidence of nuclear-weapon design, high-explosives work, military procurement of nuclear-related material, nuke facilities located on military bases, and intercontinental-ballistic-missile (ICBM) development.

But despite the existence of all the trappings of a nuclear-weapons program, and Iran's lack of transparency about its atomic activities, the administration seems convinced that Tehran hasn't yet settled on building a bomb.

Considering all that Iran has done so far on the nuclear front - not to mention the grief it has gotten for defying the international community on these matters - such a conclusion seems a bit odd.

It walks like a duck, quacks like a duck, but it's not a duck - yet.

Equally troubling are public comments from senior Pentagon officials that seem more intent on dissuading an Israeli attack on Iran's nuclear facilities than on dissuading the ayatollah's atomic ambitions.

The chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, General Martin Dempsey, counseled about the "prudence" of an Israeli military strike and Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta even speculated on when Israel might conduct a raid.

Israel wasn't pleased, to say the least. Thus, for fear of an American leak that would alert Tehran to an inbound Israeli strike, it's highly unlikely they'll give us a heads-up should they decide to "visit" Iran.

There's a sense that the administration doesn't see the United States and Israel in the same boat on the Iranian nuclear matter. This couldn't be further from the truth, considering we're both in Tehran's crosshairs - nuclear or not.

Of course, the Iranian nuclear wolves are circling closer to the Israeli cabin at the moment, but with the possibility of an Iranian ICBM by 2015, these same wolves will soon be baying at our door.

As such, in addition to patching up strained relations with Netanyahu, Obama should publicly express a strong sense of solidarity with Israel on Iran, beyond the usual political platitudes (which no one buys anyway).

Iran understands strength, especially the military kind - and it only benefits from the bickering that we've seen again and again in recent years between Israel and the United States on a number of matters.

The president should also lean forward on the military option, beyond the tired old phrase that "it's still on the table." While Obama must be careful not to make threats he isn't willing to keep, he should define red lines that are not to be crossed.

Iran will surely blame us for any Israeli strike, whether we're involved from the get-go or not. As such, the president should ready U.S. forces for a possible Persian punch directed at us in the aftermath of an Israeli attack on Iran.

Assuming Israel doesn't give us advanced warning, any Iranian hostility toward us or our interests should feel the searing heat of U.S. air and naval assets, not only targeting Iran's nuclear program, but its conventional and paramilitary forces, too.

Obama understandably doesn't want a crisis with Iran right now, but the consequences of an Iranian nuclear breakout apply to far more than just this year's election; they're about the future of America's national security.

Chu says high gas prices are proof economy is coming back; won’t retract envy of European price at pump

Fri, 02 Mar 2012 00:17:00 GMT

In December, 2008 Steven Chu, the man who was to very shortly become Barack Obama’s Secretary of Energy, told the Wall Street Journal that, “Somehow we have to figure out how to boost the price of gasoline to the levels in Europe.” Now the average price at the pump is twice what it was when Chu made the outrageous statement, and every American is feeling the pinch. It is particularly foreboding that gas prices are typically relatively subdued at this time of year, and spike with the peak driving season beginning in about 60 days.

Today, Chu appeared before the House Committee on Science, Space, and Technology and was grilled about gas prices. Rep. James Sensenbrenner invited Chu to retract his earlier statement about chasing European gas prices; Chu refused. Further, he actually suggested the doubling of gas prices, and particularly the recent rapid price increases, were somehow good news and evidence that the economy was coming back. A visibly exasperated Sensenbrenner pointed out that unemployment is still higher than it was when Chu made his statement, but gas prices were double – and getting worse. See the video of the verbal exchange below.

http://sensenbrenner.house.gov/News/DocumentSingle.aspx?DocumentID=282773

Obama Backed Solar Company Slashes 70 Percent of Workforce

Thu, 01 Mar 2012 15:14:00 GMT

See if this sounds familiar. A solar energy company with a principal investor who is a huge supporter Barack Obama and Democrat causes got a Department of Energy loan for hundreds of millions of dollars. The President publicly claims the company will “create whole new industries and hundreds of thousands of new jobs in America.” However, fourteen months later the company is bleeding financially, laying off hundreds of workers, shutting down production to retool, and complaining that it is all China’s fault.

No, it is not Solyndra. The company is Abound Solar; winner of a $400 million DOE loan in December, 2010. Abound was to make solar panels at its Longmont, Colorado facility and build a second plant in Indiana. Obama used part of a regular weekly radio address in 2010 to praise Abound who he said would “create 2000 construction jobs and 1500 permanent jobs.” Barely a year later, Abound Solar is a skeleton of Obama’s fertile imagination. The workforce is being slashed by 70%, 280 workers. The anticipated Indiana plant is nowhere to be found.

Company executives say competition from Chinese low-cost manufacturers has negatively impacted business forcing them to sell their solar panels below the cost of production. Was China not in the solar panel market 14 months ago? Did nobody notice?

So, how did Abound convince the Obama Administration to approve a $400 million loan? Just as Solyndra and other companies that received millions and billions for green projects were connected to campaign contributors and administration officials, one of the main investors in Abound – Pat Stryker - is a big Democrat financier. The following is courtesy of Joel Gehrke and the Washington Examiner. What Gehrke failed to mention is that billionaire Stryker is also a founding member of the "Gang of Four" who invested millions in what became known as the Colorado Model, a largely covert political strategy that reversed the political power in Colorado and became embraced by the Democrat Party.

“Pat Stryker, founder of Bohemian Companies (an Abound Solar investor, as theSunlight Foundation first observed), donated $50,000 to support President Obama's 2009 inauguration and bundled another $87,500 for the event, Stryker also gave $35,500 to the Obama Victory Fund 2012, according to FEC reports, and another $5000 to the Democratic White House Victory Fund in 2008.”

“In addition to supporting Democratic candidates, Stryker also provides significant financial backing to third-party groups that support Democratic candidates.”

“For instance, FEC reports show Stryker donated $145,000 in 2010 to America's Families First Action Fund (AFFAF) and $75,000 to ‘Women Vote’ operation organized by the pro-choice group, Emily's List. the Washington Post reported in October 2010 that AFFAF had spent almost $6 million during that cycle on behalf of Democratic candidates only. ‘Women Vote’ is a similarly partisan effort by Emily's List to ‘turn out women voters for our pro-choice Democratic women candidates and every Democrat on the ticket.’ “

Barack Obama played Investor-in-Chief with $80 billion borrowed dollars as part of his Economic Stimulus boondoggle. Pretending he was the smartest guy in every room, Obama and his administration rejected warnings of industry analysts, sound business practices, and common sense, blindly throwing huge amounts of money at anything remotely “green” to satisfy his personal obsessions and placate contributors and friends. As I wrote earlier this week, with the Obama Administration, Green has become the color of rotten corruption.

In the real world, an investment banker with such consistently flawed – even corrupt - judgment would be fired – and investigated. That should be the case in politics, too. November can’t come soon enough.

More Fuel for the Fire

Tue, 28 Feb 2012 22:57:00 GMT

President Obama says he is for an "all of the above" energy policy, and likes to take credit for domestic production being up. But, as Steve Forbes says, the Obama Administration has "the most anti-oil and gas record in U.S. history." Whatever production increases there are have happened in spite of Obama's policies, not because of them. And, it sure isn't coming from federal lands or offshore reserves.

Gas prices are soaring - up for the 21st consecutive day in a row - and we are still more than two months away from the start of the peak driving season. If by chance your weren't already fired up enough, the next time you stop to fill-'er-up and you stare in disbelief as the meter spins wildly cha-ching - you might want to reflect on the following information courtesy of the fact-finders at the House Republican Study Committee.

Green – the Color of Rotten Corruption

Sun, 26 Feb 2012 23:19:00 GMT

As if it were his private stash of fun-money, Barack Obama set aside $80 billion of the Stimulus boondoggle to artificially pump up the green-energy industry through a DOE administered program of grants and loans. When three of the companies that received funding, Solyndra, Beacon Power, and Ener1, each declared bankruptcy in rapid succession, a rotten stench started to waft from the DOE and the White House.

It quickly became apparent that there were numerous close connections between many of these heavily government funded businesses and Obama campaign supporters and operatives. While the cronyism and corruption appeared extensive, until recently no one had quantified the total extent of the cronyism and corruption that existed.

Thanks to some extensive research by the Washington Post, the magnitude of the scandal is now better defined. Here’s what the WaPo found:

$3.9 billion in federal grants and financing flowed to 21 companies backed by firms with connections to five Obama Administration staffers and advisers.
Sanjay Wagle, a venture capitalist and Barack Obama fundraiser in 2008, went to work at the DOE in 2009, and guided $2.4 billion to companies in which his former firm, Vantage Point Venture, had invested.
David Danielson, formerly of General Catalyst, joined a DOE mission to fund breakthrough technologies and directed $105 million to three General Catalyst portfolio firms.
David Sandalow was a highly compensated consultant in 2008 for Good Energies, a venture capital firm, before becoming an Assistant Secretary at DOE in 2009. SolarReserve, a Good Energies investment, received a $737 million DOE loan.
Steven Spinner, got a job as an “adviser” at DOE after having been a campaign fundraising bundler for Obama. Spinner’s wife worked for the global law firm, Wilson Sonsini Goodrich & Rosati that specializes in clean technology companies. WSG&R clients garnered $2.75 billion in DOE loans, including the now infamous $535 million for Solyndra.
Steve Westly – an Obama campaign fundraising bundler in 2008 and 2012 – was the founder of the venture capital firm, the Westly Group, and an adviser to DOE Secretary Steven Chu. Westly Group portfolio companies received $600 million in funding through the green-loan program.
David Prend is Managing General Partner at the Boston based venture capital firm, Rockport Capital Partners. Prend also chaired a solar technologies advisory panel for the DOE, and had close ties with Energy Czar, Carol Browner. The DOE pumped $550 million into various Rockport Partners supported firms, not including Solyndra in which Rockport Partners was a 7.5% stakeholder. The DOE also funded electric-car battery company, Ener1 – a partner with Rockport portfolio car company Think - with a $118 million loan.

Within weeks of Obama’s inaugural in 2009 and with the $800 billion Stimulus already passed, the green-energy community was euphoric that the new administration would soon be passing out billions like candy at a Fourth of July parade. Wagle participated in a seminar in San Francisco in February to coach and encourage green businesses to line up at the federal trough. In spite of the economic woes already in full swing, Wagle explained that, “The recession has actually accelerated green policies” by creating an excuse for the Stimulus – the Mother Lode for funding virtually anything that was some shade of green. Wagle invoked Rahm Emanuel’s dictum that “a crisis is a horrible thing to waste,” and explained that Obama was going to take full advantage of the economic pain engulfing the nation to fund green technologies.

Holly Kaufman, CEO of San Francisco based Environment and Enterprise Strategies, also participated in the Green-Biz conference with Wagle. Reminding the attendees that George W. Bush was gone and with green-loving Democrats now in control of Congress and the White House, Kaufman said they should now “get used to success” – a quote she attributed to her good friend Nancy Pelosi. After what green-enthusiasts believe were eight years of famine, the money spigot was about to be opened full throttle according to Kaufman.

The White House pretends that it is merely coincidental that many of their political appointees were closely connected to companies that were the beneficiaries of millions and billions. These are “all professionals with expertise in clean-energy science, finance or both – but none of them play a decisional role in DOE awards and none of them are in positions of regulating the industry,” according to White House spokesman Eric Schultz.

But a former employee at the Office of Management and Budget, David Gold, told the Washington Post that explanation doesn’t hold up. “To believe those quiet conversations don’t happen in the hallways…is naïve,” Gold said. “When you’re putting this kind of pressure on an organization to make decisions on very big dollars, there’s increased likelihood that political connections will influence things.”

The one hour presentation that included Wagle and Kaufman at the 2009 San Francisco Green-Biz conference was rich with jokes and jabs over the departure of the Bush Administration. Kaufman was elated that unlike Bush, the Obama Administration was “committed to science and transparency.” That might be what it’s called in San Francisco or in Obama’s hometown of Chicago. But, in most of the rest of the country – after three years of this stuff – we recognize it for what it is….old fashioned greed, cronyism and corruption.

Our hope is that the various congressional committees and government agencies investigating the DOE green loan scandal will doggedly do their job. After the waste of billions, the taxpayers at least deserve to know the truth of just how corrupt our government has become.

Peter Brookes: Obama’s Nutty Nuclear Notion

Thu, 23 Feb 2012 14:39:00 GMT

By Peter Brookes, Contributing Editor

Reports last week have Team Obama considering cuts in our strategic nuclear forces - by as much as 80 percent. Not good.

These accounts say the Pentagon has been ordered to study the possibility of reducing the number of deployed nuclear warheads to several levels - 1,000 to 1,100; 700 to 800; 300 to 400.

This would be on top of the cuts agreed to in 2010 in the New Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty with Russia, which drops our deployed nukes to 1,550 by 2018. (Entering office, President Obama inherited about 2,200 warheads.)

One big question is: Why?

First, money. Absent reform of the big "entitlement" programs that are ballooning our federal budget, defense appears (falsely) as the place to find some cash.

With the White House seeking to downsize conventional forces in the next budget, going after strategic forces down the line might ease the sting of the coming Pentagon cuts, because it would happen over time.

Then, too, chopping US strategic forces is integral to President Obama's national-security "theology," including his dreams of a nuke-free world and of taking America down the mythical road to "nuclear zero."

Obama is rightly concerned about nuclear proliferation. Iran is on the brink of "nukedom"; Syria may still have a program; North Korea helps others gain nuclear knowhow; Pakistan may be bolstering its arsenal; Russia and China are modernizing.

Where the administration gets it wrong is in its belief that if we reduce or eliminate our nuclear holdings - unilaterally, bilaterally or multilaterally through a treaty - others would, too.

It's a great theory, but there's no evidence that it would work in practice.

Instead, were we to shrink our stockpiles enough, such countries as China that now have fewer nukes than we do might move to match or exceed our diminished holdings - creating possibly unfriendly strategic peers. There are other risks, too.

Cutting US forces to 300 deployed warheads - a level that experts say we haven't seen since the early 1950s - might force us to alter our strategic doctrine. Right now, that's a "counterforce" policy - we target opposition-nuclear forces. A smaller force might require us to put "countervalue" targets, that is, large population centers, in the crosshairs.

No shortage of moral issues there.

The nuke cuts would also heighten the danger to our conventional forces. How? Without an iron-clad US nuclear deterrent to backstop our troops, foes would be more tempted to roll the dice and challenge us or allies that rely on our nuclear umbrella.

Yes, Republican presidents have ditched plenty of nukes over the years. But those reductions came with US arms-control wins, the fall of the Berlin Wall, the collapse of the Soviet Union and our indisputable conventional superiority.

The world remains a dangerous place of rising powers, rogue states and much international uncertainty. As always, now's a good time for "peace through strength," involving robust conventional, nuclear and missile-defense forces.

These possible nuclear cuts are just one more bad - in fact, dangerous - national-security notion floating around the White House. It'd be a big mistake for this nuclear nonsense to become a reality.

***Peter Brookes, a Heritage Foundation senior fellow, is a former deputy assistant secretary of defense and Contributing Editor for A Line of Sight. peterbrookes@heritage.org<mailto:peterbrookes@heritage.org> This article also published February 23, 2012 in the New York Post.

Good News of the Month: Cape Verde - Something Good Happening in Africa

Tue, 21 Feb 2012 03:44:00 GMT

Too often it seems that any news coming from the African continent is bad. Famine, disease, tribal warfare, abject poverty, political and economic turmoil, warlords and dictators, – the list of challenges and problems is long and overwhelmingly discouraging. Much of the worst news of late is linked to the influence of radical Islamic sects like the Muslim Brotherhood and the overthrow of Mubarak in Egypt and Gaddafi in Libya. Radical Arab influence is prevalent throughout much of northern Africa and is at the root of much of the extended tragedies in Sudan.

A rare bit of good news was highlighted by Dr. Kelly Victory, A Line of Sight Contributing Editor, in her December 2011 article highlighting the success of President George W. Bush's efforts to fight HIV-AIDS throughout much of the continent. Bush's 2003 President's Emergency Plan for AIDs Relief (PEPFAR) and The Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Malaria and Tuberculosis are credited as already having saved 30 million lives in Kenya, Sudan, Tanzania, Zimbabwe, and Uganda according to Dr. Victory, making it perhaps the most successful foreign aid initiative in history.

Nonetheless, Africa's legacy of hopelessness and despair has become so commonplace and extended that it is often referred to as the "lost" or "forgotten" continent. I've long been perplexed at the lack of progress and desperation that has befallen the millions of Africans. So, the headline "Cape Verde: African good news story" immediately captured my attention.

I have to admit, I didn't immediately know where Cape Verde was in Africa, but then neither did Evan Davis, the reporter assigned to write the article for the BBC before he was sent there. Here's what I learned.

Cape Verde is an island nation of barely half a million people about 300 miles west of Dakar, Senegal off the coast of Sub-Saharan Africa. The combined land mass of the various islands is roughly the size of Rhode Island. Heavily influenced by Europe, the government is a stable democratic republic, complete with multiple political parties exchanging control of the government in regular elections, and respect for the rule-of-law including strong private property rights. The population is primarily Catholic and Protestant according to our state department.

Travel websites display images of a tropical paradise which is appealing enough, but there was much more to the good-news story than white sandy beaches and palm trees. This is a rare place in Africa where democracy actually flourishes. Davis points out that Cape Verde is one of a very small number of nations on the planet that have ever migrated out of the UN's "least developed nation" status to "middle income country" designation. On the 2012 Index of Economic Freedom published by the Heritage Foundation and Wall Street Journal, Cape Verde ranks #66 -- just ahead of France. Education opportunity is expanding rapidly, says Davis, noting that a generation ago there was a shortage of high schools to accommodate the population; but today's youth are attending universities.

In contrast to the impoverished, backward regions of much of Africa, the Cape Verde economy is expanding, most of the population has telephones, Wi-Fi service is prevalent in the main cities, and literacy is "nearly universal" according to Davis (the U.S. State Department says the literacy rate is actually 84%, which would sound pretty good in a lot of American inner-cities today). The economy is expanding at 5.6% per year and inflation is a very manageable 2.1%. Unemployment is 10.3%, which is high by our standards, but makes Cape Verde the envy of most African nations.

Davis points out that there is still much to be done with lingering evidence of poverty in Cape Verde. "Many people live in slums," he found. But, Davis was taken by how far the tiny nation has come in a very short while. "It is a country that had famines killing tens of thousands of people in the first half of the 20th century," he says. Now, the tiny nation's chief economic problem stems from a "property price bubble" created by a rush of primarily British and Irish vacation resort investments that have over supplied the market.

Impressed by the relative good-news in Cape Verde, Davis looked a little further and found that several other mainland African nations have some good economic news to share as well. He found that per capita income over the last decade has increased significantly in Ghana (104%), Mozambique (103%), Rwanda (119%), Sierra Leone (99%), Tanzania (95%), and Uganda (81%). Granted, when you start at a very low level, it is relatively easier to make significant gains, but these are promising signs on a continent too often bereft of any good news.

Good News often comes in small incremental amounts and the need continues to be great for the vast majority of the African people. It is encouraging to see the progress being made in Cape Verde, and we hope other nations and peoples might follow their example -- particularly their democratic system, strong legal foundation, educational and economic opportunities, and notable absence of radical Islamic influence. Cape Verde might be tiny, but like a candle at the end of a long tunnel, it might show the way out of the darkness.

Tip-of-the-Hat: Charles J. Chaput, Archbishop of Philadelphia - and friends

Tue, 21 Feb 2012 03:44:00 GMT

As a life-long Catholic, the often blind loyalty of many in my faith to the Democrat Party has befuddled me for years. Regardless of the promotion of a social agenda at odds with the Doctrinal Principles of the Church, Catholics have continued to overwhelmingly support Democrat candidates. Even Barack Obama -- "the most antilife presidential candidate ever" -- got 54% of the Catholic vote in 2008. That may be about to change.

Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius -- a professed Catholic herself -- announced in late January a new regulation mandate that she would implement as part of the ObamaCare legislation requiring that all employers -- regardless of moral objection -- would be required to provide contraception, sterilization, and the "morning after pill" -- an abortifacient -- to all employees through employer provided health insurance programs.

It was as if a bomb went off.

Catholic Universities, Hospitals, Schools, Daycare Centers, Adoption Agencies, Homeless Shelters, as well as thousands of private employers that similarly have a moral objection to the mandate would be forced under the rule to violate their faith -- a principle protected under the First Amendment of the Constitution.

While the immediate reaction was greatest within the Catholic community, very quickly people of all faiths realized it was not just an issue involving reproductive health care, but one of religious liberty -- a foundational issue of American culture.

I have been pleased that the issue has captivated much of America, and we hope the concern remains top-of-mind. Even the Roe v. Wade decision in 1973 didn't seem to mobilize and energize the Catholic community and people of faith like this arrogant breech of authority by the Obama White House. Regardless of outcome, this arrogant abuse of power should be reason enough to deny Barack Obama a second term in office.

I'll not attempt to re-write the extensive record already created by this controversy. It has dominated news media as well as pulpits and even the halls of Congress for the last month, and likely will for some time to come. We would, however, be remiss if we failed to compliment the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops led by Archbishop (Newly appointed Cardinal) Timothy Dolan for the courageous, outspoken challenge of the mandate. In their latest public letter, the Conference of Bishops said the Administration's mandate amounts to "government coercion of religious people and groups to violate their most deeply held convictions. In a nation dedicated to religious liberty as its first and founding principle, we should not be limited to negotiating within these parameters." The Bishops continue to demand that the mandate be rescinded "to protect the religious liberty and freedom of conscience for all."

Many of the 160 American Bishops have spoken out individually. Bishop W. Francis Malooly of Wilmington, Delaware said emphatically, "We will not comply with this unjust law." The Bishop of Pittsburgh David Zubik used the vernacular of the Steel City to explain the situation; "Kathleen Sebelius and through her, the Obama administration, have said 'To Hell with You' to the Catholic faithful in the United States."

Of all the letters I read by the various clerics, my personal favorite was by Archbishop Charles Chaput of Philadelphia. Until last year Chaput was my Archbishop in the Denver Diocese where he emerged as one of the most outspoken of all the bishops in America. His moral clarity and unwavering courage quickly captivated his new flock in Philadelphia where he has already been labeled the "warrior bishop."

In an op-ed published February 12, 2012 by the Philadelphia Inquirer, Chaput is his normal candid self:

"The current administration prides itself on being measured and deliberate. The current HHS mandate needs to be understood as exactly that. Commentators are using words like 'gaffe,' 'ill conceived,' and 'mistake' to describe the mandate. They're wrong. It's impossible to see this regulation as some happenstance policy. It has been too long in the making."

"Despite all of its public apprehension about "culture warriors" on the political right in the past, the current administration has created an HHS mandate that is the embodiment of culture war. At its heart is a seemingly deep distrust of the formative role religious faith has on personal and social conduct, and a deep distaste for religion's moral influence on public affairs. To say that this view is contrary to the Founders' thinking and the record of American history would be an understatement."
American clergy, including Catholic bishops, have largely avoided public feuds with government officials, particularly Presidents – but, Chaput is going right at President Obama and his administration. He concludes with this:

"But it is this administration - not Catholic ministries, or institutions, or bishops - that chose the timing and nature of the fight. The onus is entirely on the White House, which also has the power to remove the issue from public conflict. Catholics should not be misled into accepting feeble compromises on issues of principle. The HHS mandate is bad law; and not merely bad, but dangerous and insulting. It needs to be withdrawn - now."

I have lamented many times that the leaders of my Church were too silent and accepting of government actions in the name of so-called "social justice" or separation of church-and-state. In Congress, I watched as scores of elected officials professed to be Catholic, but repeatedly voted with apparent impunity against Catholic Doctrine.

Silence -- sometimes even acceptance -- by the faith community only encouraged some in government to be more egregious. Obama may have finally crossed the line. So, to Archbishop Chaput, his fellow Bishops and Priests, Pastors and Rabbis who have joined in the fight, and the millions of rank-and-file citizens who still believe in Religious Freedom in America, I tip-my-hat and vow to stand right with you.

Gallup Small Business Survey: Obama Policies are the Problem, not Solution

Mon, 20 Feb 2012 14:58:00 GMT

Over the past two decades, small businesses have created 65% of all new jobs in America according to the Small Business Administration. Yet, nearly four years into the current recession, 85% of U.S. small business owners still aren’t hiring. That’s according to a survey of 600 small business owners by Gallup that found instead of having America headed in the right direction, Obama’s policies are the problem.

According to the survey results:

Forty-eight percent of respondents who are not hiring said it was due to concerns about possible rising health care costs.
Forty-six percent cited concerns about government regulations as a primary reason for their choice not to hire additional workers.
Twenty-four percent of respondents that were not hiring said they are holding back from hiring because they are worried about no longer being in business in 12 months.
Seventy-one percent of those surveyed said revenues/sales wouldn't justify hiring additional workers.
Sixty-six percent expressed worries about the overall economic situation.

The President and the Democrats promised ObamaCare would lower health care costs – obviously, these business owners concluded that was not true. Senate Democrat Leader Harry Reid recently said that there “aren’t any” regulations that “do broad economic harms” – however, these business owners know differently. And, the President’s new budget which is full of new taxes, more government growth, spending, and debt is more bad news that adds even more worries for these business owners. Uncertainty about the future is the reason most often cited by business owners and consumers alike for the anxiety they feel about the economy and the reason for holding back – and, rather than providing relief, Barack Obama and his policies keep tightening that knot in their belly.

Some Stimulus - Obama Fails on His Own Top Three Presidential Priorities

Sat, 18 Feb 2012 15:11:00 GMT

As mentioned in a feature earlier this week, February 17 marked the third anniversary of President Obama’s signing into law of his infamous economic Stimulus. The ceremony took place in Denver complete with an Air Force One grand entry, a plethora of television cameras and adoring media reporters. While this Denver appearance didn’t include gargantuan Greek or Roman marble columns, he did pick the Museum of Nature and Science to give a timeless perspective to $825 billion of government extravagance he promised would bring “real and lasting change for generations to come.”

Three years later it is obvious that history is more likely to record Obama’s folly as the largest waste of money in the history of the world with the least to show for it – a total failure. Thanks to Investor’s Business Daily for some good statistical research, the following is a summary of the evidence. In full re-election campaign mode, Obama is now doing his best to spread an “all is well” message, but the numbers tell a very different story – a story that caused a more honest White House campaign strategist to admit Obama can’t “run on (his) accomplishments.”

Unemployment Rate: Currently identical to February 2009 at 8.3%, after 36 months well above that level. The month before signing the Stimulus Obama promised it would never go above 8%. The CBO predicts unemployment to remain closer to 9% through 2012.

Long-term Unemployment: The number of workers who have been unable to find a job in 27 months or more is up 83% - now totaling 5.5 million people.

Civilian Labor Force: It has shrunk 126,000. According to IBD, in past recoveries the labor force has expanded by more than 3 million people over comparable time periods.

Labor Force Participation Rate: A measure of the number of age eligible Americans working or looking for a job – the LPR is down 3% to 63.7% - also highly unusual this far into a recovery, and a rate not seen since the early 1980s when fewer women were in the workforce. About four million people have given up on finding a job. A low LPR artificially makes the unemployment rate look better that it really is.

Household Income: Median annual household income is about 7% lower than in February 2009 according to the Sentier Research Household Income Index.

National Debt: Up $4.5 trillion – a staggering 41% - to $15.4 trillion.

Deficits: FY 2009’s deficit was $1.4 trillion. Obama’s new budget projects FY 2012 will be $1.33 trillion. FY 2010 added $1.293 trillion; FY 2011 another $1.299 trillion. He had promised to cut “the deficit he inherited” for 2009 in half by the end of his first term.

Gross Domestic Product: Real GDP has climbed just 6% between Q1 2009 (the bottom of the recession) and Q4 2011 making this the slowest recovery since the Great Depression.

Spending by Consumers and Business: At the Stimulus signing, Obama promised the legislation would “ignite spending by businesses and consumers.” But, consumer spending is up just 10% in three years and businesses are sitting on cash – up 27% since Q1 2009 – instead of investing.

This is the real Obama record on “fixing the economy” – something he said would be his top priority just days before he got elected President. By any objective measure, he has failed.

He said his #2 priority was “promoting energy independence.” The still unraveling scandal of disastrous squandering of billions on green-energy companies like Solyndra, Beacon Power, and Ener1 while establishing what Steve Forbes called “the most anti-oil and gas record in U.S. history” is proof enough that Obama failed on his second priority, as well.

Obama’s self-imposed third priority was “health care reform” – ObamaCare. Now that we have had time enough to “find out what is in it,” we know that premiums will go up not down, we really won’t be able to keep our insurance if we like it, nor will our doctor necessarily even be around to take care of us when we need him. We have seen in recent weeks the violation of Religious Liberty and the First Amendment by rule making fiat from the White House, and the Supreme Court is deliberating whether to toss the entire legislation out as unconstitutional. By a margin of 54-41, Americans favor complete repeal of the legislation. That spells failure on Obama’s third priority, as well. Three strikes and you’re out, Mr. President.

Where are the jobs?

Fri, 17 Feb 2012 16:11:00 GMT

Three years ago today Barack Obama signed his $800 billion Stimulus into law in Denver, Colorado. He said would save or create 4 million jobs and that the unemployment rate would be below 6% by now. He failed.

Obama’s spending didn’t stop with the Stimulus of course. In fact he’s piled up more than $4 trillion of new debt during his first three years with more than a trillion of additional red ink expected this year.

Still the question remains, where are the jobs? Today more than 13 million Americans that want a job can’t find one. Another 4 million Americans have given up even trying to find work. Five million jobs lost in the recession have yet to return. This has already been the deepest and longest lasting recession since the Great Depression. Barack Obama squandered trillions of dollars and American’s still wonder, “Where are the jobs?” he promised.

The following graph is courtesy of the House Republican Study Committee (RSC). It charts the steep decline of the Labor Participation Rate (LPR) from January 2005 to the present. The LPR represents the number of people employed or looking for a job out of the total age-eligible workforce. It is an indication of the confidence level in the state of the economy. It’s not a very encouraging picture, and yet another serious indictment of the failed policies and wasteful spending of this Administration.

Behind the "environmentalist" curtain lurks ... nothing.

Tue, 21 Feb 2012 03:42:00 GMT

Late last month Chesapeake Energy Corp. quietly tested a new method of horizontal hydraulic fracturing, or "fracking," on two well sites in Ohio. The new process uses about 10 percent of the water of typical fracking, relying, instead, primarily on carbon-dioxide foam to crack natural-gas-rich shale rock deep below the earth's surface.

Given that one of the usual environmentalist refrains on hydraulic fracturing is that the process uses too much water, one might imagine Chesapeake's move would have garnered some praise from the "green" contingent. But if one thought as much, one doesn't know environmentalist groups. The response from the Natural Resources Defense Council last week, for example, via Senior Policy Analyst Amy Mall, was to ignore the matter of water entirely. "It could be safer. It could be better. But it doesn't reduce all the risk," Mall said.

Environmentalists have long slammed domestic energy's supposed wanton waste of natural resources, depicting oil and gas companies as insatiable behemoths spitting out the bones of the landscape once they ravage it. Though Chesapeake is remaining largely mum on the pilot testing of the new fracking method, a 90-percent reduction in water use is nothing to sneeze at -- least of all from an environmentalist viewpoint. So why the silence from "greenies"?

Simply put, now that there may be a "fracking" method out there that uses so much less water, it is likely becoming clear to such organizations and their constituents that politically, the water issue may soon become a non-starter. So environmental groups are regrouping -- and, to give credit where credit is due, the Natural Resources Defense Council regrouped fairly quickly, shifting the focus of their anti-fracking campaign entirely to human safety.

But there's no denying these groups have essentially demanded a reduction in hydraulic-fracturing water, and noisily. Last November, in a statement about protecting "Colorado from [f]racking" by calling on the Colorado Oil and Gas Conservation Commission to disclose the amount of water it used in natural-gas extraction, Clean Water Action Program Director Gary Wockner said, "Let's go right to the source and have the drillers and frackers report their water use so that Colorado knows how much additional stress this will place on our rivers and farms which are already being drained and dried up." An April 2011 Pennsylvania Green Party statement on hydraulic fracturing in the Marcellus Shale reads, in part, "[H]ydraulic fracturing squanders our precious water resource." In November, former Sierra Club lobbyist John Smithson wrote in a Charleston Gazette op-ed: "[I]n West Virginia, we are letting gas drillers waste trillions of gallons of fresh water, to harvest what will be only a few decades worth of natural gas. Not only are we wasting trillions of gallons of potable water, we're also depositing millions of gallons of toxic chemicals in underground storage sites. This wastewater is lost forever. It can never again be used for anything."

Conventional energy can make all the strides it dares undertake -- at significant cost and allegedly at environmental groups' behest -- but it will never satisfy its environmentalist critics. The great irony of these mammoth organizations is they apparently exist only to oppose: When their demands are met, their focus shifts to the next perceived calamity. How many great ideas or groundbreaking plans of action has even one of the numerous international environmental organizations envisioned, much less put into action? None. The truth is these organizations lack any real message other than "No." Ironically they depend for continued existence, media coverage and funding on the very people and industries they rail against. Behind the curtain lurks ... nothing.

This article also published February 17, 2012 by Right Side News.

Obama oblivious to world of trouble: Problems won’t stay overseas forever

Thu, 16 Feb 2012 16:03:00 GMT

By Peter Brookes, Contributing Editor

You know what’s so great about the Obama administration’s record in the Middle East and North Africa — or Near East as some call it — after three-plus years in office? Unfortunately, little to nothing.

In fact, from the looks of it, the region is a veritable weather map of nasty storms whose troubling winds and waves are rattling and pounding our interests abroad — and may very well reach our shores.

First, there’s Iran. While the White House touts the punitive economic sanctions on the Iranian regime for its nuclear (weapons) program, the truth is that it’s having little effect on changing Tehran’s atomic aspirations.

Equally troubling, U.S. Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta said that Iran could have the bomb within a year and a delivery vehicle to carry it on one to two years after that. He oddly even speculated publicly on the timing of an Israeli strike.

And speaking of Israel, it claims that Iran will soon enter a “zone of immunity,” where Tehran will have moved its uranium enrichment work inside a mountain near Qom, possibly rendering a military strike ineffective in quashing the nuclear program.

And what of Syria? After nearly a year, the country has steadily moved in the direction of a civil war, where more than 5,000 people have been killed and the regime has detained possibly tens of thousands.

Of course, the administration hasn’t given us a clue as to who — or what — might replace the regime when it tells us that Syrian President Bashar al-Assad’s days are numbered. Beyond rhetoric, we seem to be in the unenviable state of policy paralysis.

Then there’s Iraq, which has been plagued by internal political troubles, Iranian intrigue and sectarian and terrorist violence since U.S. troops left in December. Whether Baghdad will be Washington’s ally in the future is in question.

Another worry is Egypt. The military that took over control of the country a year ago is still in power and may put on trial some 40 democracy-promoting workers for non-governmental organizations (including 19 Americans). Meanwhile, the nation’s already-weak economy is plummeting.

The former staunch U.S. ally now has a parliament where Islamists own some 70 percent of the seats. There’s plenty of chit-chat about ties with the United States and the future of the now perceived hostile Camp David accords with Israel, too.

Of course, there’s also the chaos in Yemen. There will be presidential elections soon, but the ever-dangerous al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula is holding territory in the country’s south, where we remain in their cross-hairs.

Libya remains in turmoil. The National Transitional Council is struggling to govern as well as gain control over maybe hundreds of militias that remain active, leaving concerns about violence and illegal arms flows in the region.

All of this while U.S. defense spending is in free fall and the Obama administration talks about a political, economic and security rebalancing or “pivot” away from the Middle East (meaning Iraq) and toward Asia in the years to come.

While there’s no question about the rising importance of Asia to U.S. national interests, the Near East should also remain a priority, considering American stakes (for example, Israel, terrorism and oil) in a region already rife with instability.

The fact is that our national security shouldn’t — indeed, can’t — be an “either-or” proposition.

The president clearly owes us an explanation of his plan for leadership and action in dealing with the growing problems in the Middle East and North Africa.

***Peter Brookes is a Heritage Foundation senior fellow and a former deputy assistant secretary of defense, and A Line of Sight Contributing Editor. This article published February 16, 2012 in his regular column in the Boston Herald.

Craig, Colorado: A case study in energy regulation gone mad.

Tue, 14 Feb 2012 21:48:00 GMT

When Barack Obama promised that his non-energy energy policies would “bankrupt” anyone foolish enough to try to operate a coal-fired power plant, he talked as if he would only inflict pain on some inanimate structure of concrete and steel . Clever politician that he is, he depersonalized his war on fossil fuels all in the name of saving the planet.

What he didn’t mention, of course, is that real people work at these power plants, and real people have jobs harvesting and transporting coal, natural gas, and oil from deep inside the earth so that many more people may have sustained supplies of affordable energy to maintain a quality of life and productive work places. Furthermore, in energy producing communities any family or small business not directly connected to energy is still dependent on the health and vitality of the energy industry for their survival, too.

Craig is a town of just 10,000 people in the northwestern corner of Colorado. It is home to one of the largest coal-fired power plants in the country. A combination of new federal and state punitive regulations mistakenly aimed at the industry is threatening the very existence of the town and its citizens.

Below is a link to a short video that accurately represents the importance of a vibrant coal industry to everyone in that community. It’s not just brick and mortar that government over regulation will destroy – it’s the lives of real people like these. The impact of these new policies is only just beginning to be felt, but you can already see the severe consequences to the good folks who live here. Worst of all, as the video mentions, most of these new destructive policies are based on falsehoods and phony myths. With today’s clean technology, fossil fuels are not the enemy. Given the chance, people in places like Craig would supply vastly greater amounts of affordable, dependable, domestically produced clean energy all across America.

Click here to watch The Perfect Storm over Craig

Budgeting Fiction and Failings

Tue, 14 Feb 2012 03:25:00 GMT

Barack Obama delivered his new budget proposal to Congress this morning. The document increases yet again the estimate for deficit spending for the current FY 2012 year - $1.33 trillion. If even close to accurate, when this fiscal year ends, Obama will have presided over four consecutive annual deficits in excess of $1 trillion – each one nearly three times larger than any previous annual deficit in U.S. history – and a total of additional debt for the nation of $5.334 trillion during his first term.

By election time this fall, Obama will have nearly completed his first term. The annual deficits on his watch will be as follows:

FY 2009 - $1.412 trillion

FY 2010 - $1.293 trillion

FY 2011 - $1.299 trillion

FY 2012 - $1.33 trillion (OMB estimate)

It seems meaningless to mention that he promised a much different scenario.

It took the first 42 Presidents 212 years for America to amass as much total debt as Obama will pile on future generations in just four years. According to the White House’s Office of Management and Budget (OMB) the total debt held by the public will more than double during Obama’s four years in office – exploding from $5.8 trillion at the end of FY 2008 to nearly $12 trillion by the end of FY 2012 on September 30 of this year.

Yes, Obama inherited an economy in free fall, and he does not deserve blame for all of the deficit spending already in motion when he was sworn into office, although it is only fair to mention that Democrats were in control of both the House and Senate in 2007 and 2008. Other President’s came to office amid great challenges, too, and Obama was the one who promised he knew how to turn things around. He’s the one who said he’d cut in half the deficit he inherited by the end of his first term.

For the candidate who promised hope-and-change it seems fair to ask, “What have you changed in your first four years, Mr. Obama?” Not much that is good, and certainly not what you promised.

The law requires the President to submit annual budgets to Congress including ten year projections. Simply comparing his own previous budget projections for FY 2012 to this newest version of White House fiction exposes what is either gross fiscal incompetence or a strong propensity to be less than honest. Following are the deficit projections for FY 2012 from Obama’s first four budgets:

FY 2010 Budget Estimated FY 2012 deficit: $.557 trillion

FY 2011 Budget Estimated FY 2012 deficit: $.828 trillion

FY 2012 Budget Estimated FY 2012 deficit: $1.101 trillion

FY 2013 Budget Estimated FY 2013 deficit: $1.33 trillion

In the real world outside Washington’s beltway, any CEO of a major company that missed the mark so badly and always to the financial detriment of the organization would be sent packing. In fact, Obama fired the CEO at General Motors for that very reason. The same standard needs to apply to this President, and November can’t come soon enough to do just that.

Canadian PM courts Chinese after Obama's Keystone Pipeline Rejection

Fri, 10 Feb 2012 15:46:00 GMT

About three weeks ago, Barack Obama nixed the Keystone XL pipeline that would have transported 900,000 barrels of oil per day from the Canadian tar sands to the gulf coast region of the U.S. The pipeline project would also create 20,000 direct jobs and potentially hundreds of thousands of indirect jobs according to economic analysis.

Spurned by Obama's rejection, Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper stated that if Canada's next door neighbor and close ally didn't want Canada's oil, then he'd pursue other markets to "diversify" the market for Canada's natural resources. It didn't take him long.

Harper was in Beijing this week where he "pledged closer trade ties with China" during talks with Premier Wen Jiabao. Finding alternative markets for its natural resources has become a top priority for Canada, which today sells nearly all of its oil to the U.S., but sees environmental regulations from Washington as an increasing impediment to its oil-export ambitions, according to a report about Harper's trip in the Wall Street Journal.

Obama's rejection of the Keystone XL pipeline was dumb on top of stupid. It killed a legitimate job creating, energy providing shot in the arm for the American economy in desperate need of some good news. The rejection also forced a great ally and trading partner to seek favor with America's largest economic and political competitor in the world. The Chinese are more than willing to fill the void created by Obama's mistaken decision, and take advantage of Canadian oil to expand the Chinese economy on a path to overtake the U.S. as the world leader.

Beauprez on Fox News.com: Banning members of Congress from insider trading is a good idea but forcing financial advisers to register as lobbyists is a mistake

Fri, 10 Feb 2012 01:55:00 GMT

Published 2/08/12 on Fox News.com http://www.foxnews.com/opinion/2012/02/08/banning-members-congress-from-insider-trading-is-good-idea-but-forcing/

More often than not Congress needs to be saved from itself. A classic example is the STOCK Act which passed the U.S. Senate last week and comes up for a vote in the House of Representatives later this week.

The sentiment behind the legislation is noble and worthwhile. The full name of the bill -- Stop Trading on Congressional Knowledge Act – underscores the problem the legislation is attempting to solve. Members of Congress have been buying and selling stocks with inside information only they have been privy to. Thus they have had an unfair advantage over the general public when it comes to both money-making opportunities or warnings of a downturn.

The revelation about congressional insider trading practices came with the release of an explosive bestselling book titled Throw Them All Out, authored by Peter Schweizer. The book was launched on a segment of CBS 60 Minutes, and featured a House Press Gallery confrontation between 60 Minutes correspondent Steve Kroft and House Minority Leader (and former Speaker) Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) as he grilled her about a possible conflict of interest.

But with public outcry and momentum behind any initiative taken by Congress often comes an overreach by Members of Congress themselves. In this case, Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-IA) has done a disservice to the public by pushing an amendment to the STOCK Act that actually mocks the original bill itself.

Grassley’s amendment – which is in the Senate bill passed last week – would force information consultants and financial advisers to register as lobbyists, even though they simply gather and share info about potential legislation regarding finances or financial services, as opposed to trying to influence a Member of Congress to vote yea or nay on a particular bill. Grassley’s amendment would create a massive new class of registered lobbyists out of people who don’t even lobby.

This would be a large, unnecessary and very expensive expansion of government regulation that would create a massive bureaucratic nightmare. It would also do nothing to keep Members of Congress, or their staffers, from trading on inside information.

Suppose an information consultant, hired by Wells Fargo or Merrill Lynch, talks to his or her contacts on Capitol Hill and then does a memo about the financial impact of a potential bill. The company, in turn, sends the memo to thousands of financial advisers all across America or hosts them on a conference call to relay the information. Under Grassley’s amendment, all involved would have to register as lobbyists.

Given how many financial services companies regularly gather and share such information, the sheer number of people who would have to register is prodigious. Who is going to register all these people? Who is going to monitor and track their activities? A large government agency would have to be expanded and staffed with more government bureaucrats, or a new agency with its own bureaucrats would have to be created

Not only are there First Amendment issues raised by this amendment but those who don’t register as lobbyists could face civil or criminal penalties, as pointed out by Sen. Joe Lieberman (I-CT) who raised serious questions about enforcing the amendment on the Senate floor in a debate with Grassley.

Should Members of Congress be forbidden to buy and sell stocks based on inside information? Yes. Can Congress police itself without overreaching and creating even more bureaucratic regulations funded by more money we don’t have? Yes. The House should pass the STOCK Act without the Grassley amendment and make sure the final bill, negotiated with the Senate, doesn’t contain it either.

Government Assistance: A Safety Net or a Hammock?

Thu, 09 Feb 2012 17:58:00 GMT

A short while back I wrote of some revealing statistics that invite the question, are we becoming “A Nation of Dependents” on government benefits of one kind or another? Now the Heritage Foundation has published their 2012 Index of Dependence on Government that raises even more questions. According to the newly released report, the average amount of federal benefits received by individuals now exceeds the average disposable personal income level in the nation, suggesting it is more profitable for many to rely on government assistance than to work. One in five Americans – 67.3 million – get some type of federal assistance, while half of the population pays no federal income tax. A summary of the findings follows:

One in five Americans—the highest in the nation’s history—relies on the federal government for everything from housing, health care, and food stamps to college tuition and retirement assistance. That’s more than 67.3 million Americans who receive subsidies from Washington.
Government dependency jumped 8.1 percent in the past year, with the most assistance going toward housing, health and welfare, and retirement.
The federal government spent more taxpayer dollars than ever before in 2011 to subsidize Americans. The average individual who relies on Washington could receive benefits valued at $32,748, more than the nation’s average disposable personal income ($32,446).
At the same time, nearly half of the U.S. population (49.5 percent) does not pay any federal income taxes.
In the next 25 years, more than 77 million baby boomers will retire. They will begin collecting checks from Social Security, drawing benefits from Medicare, and relying on Medicaid for long-term care.
As of now, 70 percent of the federal government’s budget goes to individual assistance programs, up dramatically in just the past few years. However, research shows that private, community, and charitable aid helps individuals rise from their difficulties with better success than federal government handouts. Plus, local and private aid is often more effectively distributed.

In his State of the Union speech, Barack Obama said income inequality was “the defining issue of our time.” During his 2008 campaign, Obama repeatedly said “spreading the wealth” of the nation around a priority of his administration. The Heritage report would suggest he’s being remarkably successful, but what kind of nation – what kind of people – does it make us?

In an op-ed on the subject, Rep. Allen West (R-FL) who grew up in inner-city Atlanta acknowledges that there is a time and place for a government “social safety net” to assist the very poor along with the good work done by churches, charities, private companies, and neighbors. However, “that ‘net’ should never turn into a ‘hammock’ – and that is what this President and his policies are allowing,” West says.

My parents grew up during the Great Depression. Dad only went to school through 8^th grade; Mom through the 9^th. They left school to work on their own family’s farm to help survive the tough times. Their entire married life they worked as farmers and many years it was a struggle to stay afloat. Extended drought years nearly caused them to lose everything a couple of times. When times were the most difficult, they just worked harder, longer, and smarter. I never – ever – remember them with their hand out to government or anyone else.

That “personal responsibility” defined them and the “Greatest Generation” of which they were members. From the beginning of our nation, the same quality has always been part of our soul, seemingly embedded in our DNA to be passed along to successive generations. But, has something changed?

Rather obviously, the continued increase of spending by government on ever more social programs is financially unsustainable. The findings of the new Heritage study and many more similar reports cause Congressman West and many like him to wonder if something dramatic and maybe irreversible is happening as America races down the same path that has created financial havoc in so many European nations. The problem with this socialist kind of government redistribution and dependency is, “Sooner or later, you run out of other people’s money,” as Margaret Thatcher warned.

Is America on the brink? Allen West sounded the alarm. “Our democratic government is at risk when there are more Americans who are wedded to the federal government – either by subsistence or employment check – than federal taxpayers to pay for the rampant spending.”

Who are we as individuals; as a people? Can America survive? Will we change course, or continue down a path of fiscal calamity? Those are real questions; very serious questions, that Americans will have to address in the Presidential election of 2012.

Education Finance Lawsuits: The Judges vs. the Voters

Tue, 07 Feb 2012 23:39:00 GMT

By William Moloney, Contributing Editor

Following Franklin Roosevelt’s landslide re-election victory in 1936 the U.S. Supreme Court’s decisions regarding the President’s New Deal legislation became noticeably friendlier. Noting this trend the great jurist Louis Brandeis famously remarked that “even judges read the newspapers”.

That may be true in other places and times, but not in Colorado of late where the will of the people as democratically expressed in their resounding 2 to 1 defeat of Proposition 103 collided head-on just a month later with the will of a judge as expressed in the recently decided Lobato lawsuit on education finance.

This Colorado conflict has gained wide attention because in almost perfect textbook fashion it illustrates the main issues in the long running national controversy of judicial vs. popular will in the matter of education finance.

Going back almost forty years to landmark cases in New Jersey and California there have been no less than thirty-nine education finance lawsuits in twenty-seven states. Colorado has had two in the last decade.

Though there has been considerable local variation in these cases they have nonetheless been very similar in broad outline. Basically all have involved education interests supporting lawsuits against their state over perceived inadequacies in K-12 funding.

What is dramatically different in recent cases like Lobato is that the sums of money involved have increased exponentially and have the potential of overthrowing the financial structure of entire states.

Colorado’s last K-12 lawsuit- Giordino, 2001 cost taxpayers a “mere” $500 million dollars and a relatively prosperous state with a robust economy was able to absorb this cost.

In Lobato the plaintiffs boldly asserted that K-12 public schools required an increase of two to four billion dollars annually to adequately fund the State’s 178 school districts. The judges’ ruling strongly supported the plaintiff’s case. Though no specific financial remedy was included in the decision the judge declared the state funding system unconstitutional and “unconscionable”, and further stated that “every single” school district in the state was underfunded.

So, what would be the effect of a $2 to $4 billion dollar per year increase in education funding?

Consider the following: Between 1970 and 2008 K-12 education spending in Colorado has already been increased by 96% in inflation adjusted dollars. At present K-12 spending equals 45% of the state’s General Fund. A $ 2 billion dollar per year increase would lift that figure to 66 %. A $4 billion dollar per year increase would give K-12 86% of the General Fund.

Given that these numbers are clearly untenable the alternative scenario is dramatic increases in taxation.

Interestingly the people and organizations who supported the Lobato plaintiffs are the same ones who backed Proposition 103. Yet even if the voters had approved Proposition 103 which required $3 billion dollars in new taxes over five years, those increases would have fallen far short of the amounts sought in Lobato. ($10 to $20 billion over five years)

Democratic Governor John Hickenlooper vigorously supported the state’s defense in the Lobato case because he like Governors all across the country struggling to contain runaway education costs realizes that the long-term trajectory of K-12 spending is simply unsustainable and if left unchecked it can threaten the fiscal integrity of the entire state. He also sees that while Social Security and Medicare may be the eight hundred pound gorillas of the entitlement crisis in Washington, at the state level it is the education entitlement that cries out for the kind of structural reform that can save both our schools and our state.

Such viewpoints are, of course, heresy to those who believe that education reform begins and ends with a dollar sign, and that judicial fiat is a clever way to circumvent recession weary voters grown skeptical about education’s seemingly limitless appetite for more money.

The people deserve better solutions than what is currently offered, and our state’s economic future may depend on our success in finding them.

William Moloney was Colorado’s Education Commissioner from 1997 to 2007.

Ginsberg tells Egypt to look to South African, Canadian Constitutions - not U.S.

Mon, 06 Feb 2012 19:30:00 GMT

"I would not look to the U.S. Constitution if I were drafting a constitution in 2012."

Ruth Bader Ginsberg, January 30, 2012
Egyptian Al-Hayat Television Interview

Even coming from one of the most entrenched liberals on the United States Supreme Court it was a shocker. During an interview aired last week on Egyptian television, Ruth Bader Ginsberg advised the Egyptian's against using the U.S. Constitution as guidance for their new effort at democratic self-governance. The American Constitution she said is too antiquated. Ginsberg instead suggested they look for something more modern like the South African -- "a great piece of work" -- or Canadian Constitutions as better models of perfection.

Like all federal officials, Ginsberg took an oath to "support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic; that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same." Ginsberg's statement to the Egyptian's appears to be inconsistent with her oath to "support…defend….bear true faith and allegiance" the U.S. Constitution. It begs the question why Bill Clinton nominated someone with less than complete reverence for the genius of our founders, and why the Senate confirmed her?

Justice Ginsberg, if you are so dissatisfied with our Constitution, if you see it as so flawed, that you cannot bring yourself to bear true faith and allegiance to it then, please, just resign.

The rest of the jobs story

Sun, 05 Feb 2012 16:01:00 GMT

The recent labor reports certainly have some encouraging news. New jobs in January estimated at 243,000 and a decline in unemployment to 8.3 percent suggests that the economy might be headed in the right direction. But, another key indicator that doesn’t get the attention of the jobs number or the unemployment rate shows that all is definitely not well.

As the following graph courtesy of the Labor Department demonstrates, the Labor Participation Rate (LPR) continues to decline. The LPR measures the number of people employed or looking for work compared to the total of age eligible population. As the graph indicates, the LPR has been on decline since the recession began, and it made another significant move downward to just 63.7 percent in January. That is the lowest since Carter era recession year of 1981.

The declining LPR is a clear indication that more Americans continue to give up on even finding employment as the failed economic policies of Barack Obama infect the market place with anxiety and uncertainty. A higher LPR indicates more people bringing home a paycheck and greater economic output. Until there is a sustained turnaround in the LPR, any talk of “recovery” is premature.

Labor Participation Rate

Source: Bureau of Labor Statistics http://data.bls.gov/timeseries/LNS11300000

Taliban Terrorists to be released from Gitmo as “incentive” to talk

Fri, 03 Feb 2012 17:00:00 GMT

The Obama Administration is reportedly working on a deal to release five Taliban terrorists held at Gitmo as an “incentive” to talk peace in Afghanistan. Taliban leader Mullah Omar reportedly has “demanded” the Gitmo prisoners release as a pre-condition to any talks. The prisoners are among the most dangerous captured since the 9/11/01 attacks. As recently as last May, the White House announced that the 172 detainees still at Gitmo were too dangerous to move.

The release of the prisoners from Gitmo is intended as a “goodwill gesture” by Obama merely for the Taliban’s willingness to establish a political office in Qatar to open “peace talks.”

According to the Israeli News Organization Arutz Sheva, Afghan Taliban Leader Mullah Omar confirmed “peace talks with the United States are on the horizon.” But, in exchange for an implied willingness to talk, “Omar has demanded the release of Afghan prisoners from the Guantanamo Bay detention facility and complete withdrawal of U.S. led forces from Afghanistan.” Included in Mullah Omar’s “demand” to Barack Obama is the release of Mullah Fazl Akhund, the former leader of the army in a war that has claimed the life of 1879 American troops and wounded 15,300 more.

Democrat and Republican Presidents have historically maintained a rigid policy of not negotiating with terrorists. Obama seems to have thrown that policy in the trash.

The British newspaper, the Guardian, confirms the same “demands” by Mullah Omar and further reports that “the U.S. has agreed in principle to release high-ranking Taliban officials” from Gitmo.

Three days ago, the Associated Press reported that “U.S. intelligence officials acknowledged Tuesday that the United States may release several Afghan Taliban prisoners from the military prison at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, as an incentive to bring the Taliban to peace talks.”

Did you catch that? Just as an “incentive” to talk.

In December 2011, Vice-President Joe Biden shocked the nation with one of his notorious gaffes claiming “the Taliban is not our enemy.” Instead of clarifying, the White House stood by Biden’s ridiculous assertion. But, on December 28 the Taliban proved Biden wrong. Three NATO troops were killed by a roadside bomb blast. The next day ten Afghan troops were killed in an ambush of a convoy delivering supplies to US-led NATO troops.

The Obama Administration’s strange fascination with the Taliban baffles even leading Democrats. Last June, Senators Chuck Schumer and Kristen Gillibrand of New York along with Robert Menendez and Frank Lautenberg of New Jersey urged the State Department to formally designate the Taliban a Terrorist organization, but the Administration continued to resist the obvious.

The only three criteria necessary to qualify as a terrorist organization are:

it must be foreign,
it must engage in terrorist activity,
its activity must threaten the security of the U.S. or its citizens.

“It is hard to imagine this agency (the State Department) can see fit to issue a report that doesn’t include the Taliban groups,” Fred Gedrich, a foreign policy analyst and former State Department official said at the time. “They have killed more Americans and conducted more terror attacks on innocent civilians during the past 12 months than any other terror group.”

Nine days after the 9/11 attacks George W. Bush issued the warning “either you’re with us or with the terrorists.” The Taliban harbored and supported Osama bin Laden and his al Qaeda base from which the attacks had been hatched. Within weeks U.S. troops invaded Afghanistan in what was dubbed Operation Enduring Freedom. During the prosecution of the war nearly two thousand Americans have been killed along with a thousand more of our allies. Our forces captured many of the most dangerous Taliban operatives removing them from the battlefield and positions of command. It now appears some of the very worst may be given absolution by Barack Obama – who likes to talk.

Vallely supports Jim Woolsey on Iran

Thu, 02 Feb 2012 22:58:00 GMT

By MG Paul E. Vallely, US Army (Ret.), Contributing Editor Contributing Editor to A Line of Sight, CEO of NEMO Arms Inc. (New Evolution Military Ordnance), and Chairman of Stand Up America.

I support Jim Woolsey’s intelligence analysis and conclusions on how to execute operations to neutralize Iran’s Nuclear Sites, regime targets, and further weaken and depose the IRGC (Iranian Revolutionary Guard).

To date, approximately 75 regime targets have been targeted and strikes must be carried out.

Iran’s continued support of radical Islam and Islamist proxy groups like Hezbollah, is destabilizing not only the Middle East, but also the entire world. Stepped up and accelerated support for Iranian Opposition Forces, as well as Lebanese Christian, and Druze Forces is essential.

The United States must also step up to the plate and mutually support Israeli Defense Forces through well planned Joint Strike Force Operations and the new, advanced US “Lily Pad” Strategy to bring the Islamist ruling mullahs to their knees.

Please read the whole article below:

Begin military plans to thwart Iran nukes

By Oren Kessler, Jerusalem Post, 2/02/2012

Iran is working to obtain a nuclear weapon, a former CIA chief said Wednesday while visiting Israel, and the US should begin military preparations to block the Islamic Republic from reaching that goal. “To believe anything other than that Iran is working to get a nuclear weapon is hopelessly naive,” James Woolsey said in an interview on the sidelines of the Herzliya Conference. “At some point someone is going to have to decide to use force to prevent Iran from getting a nuclear weapon. I’d argue that those who say we can deal adequately with Iran through deterrence are quite naive. “National survival is at issue. In the near term that’s the case for Israel, but in the somewhat longer term it is [the case] for the US, which from Iran’s point of view, is the ‘Great Satan,’” he continued. “This is a world-class problem, not an eastern Mediterranean or Persian Gulf problem. The politics of the world will change if this regime gets the bomb.”

Woolsey, a graduate of Yale Law School, was CIA director under president Bill Clinton from 1993 to 1995. The veteran intelligence official identifies himself as a Democrat, but has held high-level positions in administrations from both major parties, and has long advocated a robust US foreign policy, particularly in the Middle East.

Today, the 70-year-old is chairman of the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, a Washington think tank. Woolsey said commentators who view the Iranian nuclear threat through the prism of Cold War deterrence are misreading history.

“By the 1960s, the Soviets were operating with a nearly dead ideology,” he said. “Though the Soviet leadership had many flaws – and I’m delighted we won the Cold War instead of them – by that time fanaticism was not one of their characteristics, at least for most of them.” Debates over whether the Iranian regime is rational, he said, also miss the point. “People who believe there are only two categories of individual – the rational and the stark-raving mad – are quite untutored in human psychology and human history,” he said. “It’s not only raving lunatics who want to destroy a country, culture or civilization they hate.”

Woolsey said Iran’s theocratic leadership promotes an aggressive, totalitarian ideology akin to Nazi Germany and Fidel Castro’s Cuba. “During the Cuban Missile Crisis, Castro knew Cuba would be destroyed, but he didn’t care. He felt that if the United States were destroyed, he’d be carrying out his life’s mission,” he said. “As for Hitler, he had a two-part plan: Kill the Jews and take over Europe. Iran’s President Ahmadinejad says he’s got a plan as well: Kill the Jews and take over the Middle East.

“There’s no basis for the proposition that if you’re so intemperate as to decide to use a nuclear weapon you are a blithering, incoherent fool. You might be a shrewd, nasty fool.” Containing the Iranian threat, he said, will require a credible show of military force aimed at Iran’s Revolutionary Guards. “They’re at the heart of this regime – they’re the instrument of oppression, and they run the Basij militia. They control the nuclear, space and ballistic- missiles program, as well as the Quds Force,” he said, referring to the Guards branch responsible for overseas operations.

“They’re at the heart of everything repressive internally, or aggressive externally.” Woolsey suggested sending approximately five carrier battle groups – each comprising an aircraft carrier and its escort vessels – to the Indian Ocean, accompanied by bomber support, if possible. “What these [battle groups] are capable of doing – should the trigger be pulled – is taking out everything related to the Revolutionary Guards,” he said. “Not the civilian infrastructure, not the electric grid, not the regular army, not civilian institutions.”

Still, he said, certain questions would need to be answered before forcibly engaging Iran, including: “How fast the nuclear enrichment is going; whether they’re working on a plutonium bomb as well; whether they’re working on a weapon that could be delivered, or something that would simply be detonated in the desert somewhere – like North Korea does to make clear they’re a nuclear power; or whether they’re more ambitious.

“All these could affect the specific tactics, but I don’t think these should affect the vigor of the sanctions, or preparations to take out the Guards.” In such a scenario, he said, ground forces would be unnecessary. “No one is suggesting ground troops or mass bombing of parts of Iran,” said Woolsey. “Instead, it would be an operation similar to what might have been suggested to the Royal Air Force sometime in the mid-1930s to take out the Gestapo, SS and stormtroopers.”

“The US conducted air operations like this twice in the 1990s in Serbia – once on behalf of the Bosnians, and once on behalf of the Kosovars – both Muslim peoples, by the way,” he added. “We didn’t lose a single aircraft or pilot, and now in Kosovo there is a Bill Clinton Avenue and statue.”

Gulf Moratorium Crushing Small Businesses, Jobs

Thu, 02 Feb 2012 05:18:00 GMT

The 'Hidden Victims' of economic destruction by the Obama Administration

When the Deep Horizon well in the Gulf of Mexico exploded in May of 2010, the Obama Administration was quick to climb the rostrum of political opportunity and seize full advantage from public outrage directed at BP, the energy company responsible for the well. “We will keep our boot on their neck until the job gets done,” raged Secretary of Interior Ken Salazar in reference to responsibility for stopping the leak and cleaning up the contamination.

Holding BP responsible was fair enough, and nobody was rushing to defend the company. However, Salazar and his boss, Barack Obama didn’t stop there. Salazar quickly imposed a permitting moratorium that essentially shut down the gulf. Louisiana Governor Bobby Jindal and Democrat Senator Mary Landrieu as well as other elected officials immediately objected saying it would devastate the gulf economy far beyond the already significant impact of the well explosion, particularly to the energy, fishing, and tourism industries.

Eventually, U.S. District Judge Martin Feldman overturned the moratorium and ordered Interior to begin permitting according to existing regulations. Salazar re-instated a second moratorium within days, which caused Feldman to find him in contempt of the previous court order noting that the Administration had shown “determined disregard” for the court. In a separate ruling, the court found that new regulations imposed unilaterally by Salazar also violated his authority and federal law and struck them down, as well.

Obama extorted $20 billion from BP to fund an escrow damage account without constitutional authority or judicial foundation. Columnist George Will was appalled. The use of "raw political power, without recourse to courts that exist for this sort of thing, under laws, with due process, essentially confiscates $20 billion from a publicly held corporation, about half of its shares held by Americans, to be dispensed, again, without judicial supervision, as the political branch sees fit" resembles the action of a tyrant ruling a "Northern Hemisphere Venezuela" rather that the United States of America Will said on the ABC News program, This Week.

Interior has effectively maintained an "informal moratorium" by stalling and delaying permitting. The results have been devastating just as Gov. Jindal warned. A study just completed by Greater New Orleans, Inc., or GNO, an economic development agency, found that the many small and medium size business that are dependent on the energy business in the gulf are shedding workers, exhausting personal savings, and leaving the gulf in an attempt to survive. It’s a tale of economic destruction that was created by excessive over-reach for perceived political gain by Salazar and the Obama White House.

New Orleans Fox 8 News Report

In a survey of 100 business owners or company executives associated with the oil and gas industry in the gulf, GNO found that 50 percent had been forced to lay off workers as a result of Salazar’s moratorium. Thirty-nine percent reported retaining staff but being forced to reduce salaries and cut hours.

Of the 100 companies surveyed, 41percent are not making a profit, 76 percent have drained cash reserves, and 82 percent have been forced to tap into personal savings as a result of the permit slowdown – 13 percent said they had completely exhausted their personal cash.

Forty-six percent of the companies surveyed reported moving some or all of their operations away from the gulf in an attempt to survive.

"Small and mid-sized companies are the hidden victims of the permit moratorium and ensuing slowdown," said Michael Hecht, President and CEO of GNO, Inc. "While global companies can simply shift their assets, these Louisiana companies – through no fault of their own – have endured significant, and now documented, financial hardships."

Although the moratorium is technically lifted, permit issuance is slow at best. According to GNO’s most recent published Gulf Permit Index report for January, 2012 the rate of issuance of deep-water permits are 71% fewer than the historical average. Just two permits per month have been issued over the last 90 days. Barely two-per-month shallow-well permits are being issued, too, which is 84% less than historical levels.

In his recent State of the Union Address, Barack Obama tried to claim credit for increases in oil and gas production in the U.S. Production in some parts of the nation has happened in spite of his Administration, not because of it. Advanced technology and the success of fracking to open more reserves to production from Texas to North Dakota and Pennsylvania to Alaska are responsible. But, in the gulf – where 30 percent of domestic oil and 13 percent of natural gas is produced – Obama’s policies have damaged not only energy production but the economy and lives of countless Americans. That’s a tragedy Barack Obama didn’t mention in his speech and a reality he chooses to ignore.

Inspector General finds $500 million wasted training for “green jobs”

Tue, 31 Jan 2012 14:58:00 GMT

Financially troubled companies like Solyndra, Beacon Power, and Ener1 were not the only places Obama was squandering hundreds of millions of dollars in his greening-of-America quest. The Administration earmarked $500 million (about the same as taxpayers lost on Solyndra) for a “green jobs training” program. It looks like that’s been a big failure, too.

The Inspector General at the Department of Labor has informed Congress that after 17 months only 8,035 trained workers had jobs. That’s barely 10 percent of what Obama had estimated would be the results by now. Not surprisingly, the IG’s report contains a recommendation to pull the plug on the training program and recover what might remain of unspent dollars. However, the Administration is defending the program and the results. More here.

Fairness? - CBO finds government workers make 16 percent more than private sector

Tue, 31 Jan 2012 14:07:00 GMT

President Obama has been talking a lot about income equality and fairness lately. In his State of the Union speech he called it “the defining issue of our time.” Thanks to a little investigative work by the Congressional Budget Office, the President doesn’t have to look very far for a place to start.

Yesterday the CBO reported that federal government workers are compensated 16 percent more than comparable private-sector workers on average. In fact, for those with only a high-school degree, the government paid them 21 percent more in wages and 72 percent more in benefits than private sector counterparts.

Obama’s solution: his 2013 budget will reportedly call for another salary increase for federal employees, and he wants to raise taxes to pay for it. Full story here.

More on Ener1 Demise: Funding of far too many manufacturers doomed many to fail.

Tue, 31 Jan 2012 00:13:00 GMT

Here’s a quick footnote to our commentary published yesterday about the bankruptcy announcement by Ener1, another of Obama’s failed green-energy “investments.” Ener1 manufactured lithium-ion batteries to be used in electric vehicles, EVs. Today’s Wall Street Journal provides further reasons to question Obama’s judgment and his irresponsible stewardship of the taxpayer’s dollars.

Ener1 blamed the anemic market for rechargeable battery cars and an overly competitive market place for the company’s financial woes. That is a similar refrain to the one offered by Solyndra, the California solar energy company that went bust last September even after Obama had guaranteed $535 million in loans.

But, flooding an uncertain, limited, nascent market with a plethora of manufacturers did not seem to bother the Obama Administration or cross anyone’s mind at the DOE. “The battery glut was created in substantial part by the Obama Administration, which handed out money to no fewer than 48 different battery technology and electric vehicle projects in 2009,” according to the WSJ.

Ener1 was awarded a $118 million grant by the DOE in 2009. That’s a “grant” – as in “gift” – not a loan like Solyndra or Beacon Power, a Massachusetts green company that also went bankrupt after a $43 million DOE loan guarantee. At least with a government loan there is an assumption, however weak, that the funds will eventually be paid back. Not so with a grant.

It’s far from clear why a taxpayer gift of $118 million seemed justified other than that the Obama Administration was passing out favors to just about anybody that could say “green energy” – better still if they had also contributed to the Obama campaign. It certainly wasn’t based on prior performance.

The company was founded in 2002, but was never able to post a profitable year. Even 2010, the year after the $118 million grant, Ener1 posted a $165 million loss. That was also the year that Vice-President Biden visited the plant and said the company “was leading the way…sparking whole new industries that will ensure our competitiveness for decades to come.”

Give Joe credit for being an eternal optimist, but he certainly isn’t very good at business. Only Joe would claim that a company showing loses of hundreds of millions of dollars and less than a year away from bankruptcy was “leading the way” to anything but the poor house.

Labor Dept. targets Family Farms: Now it is Personal

Mon, 30 Jan 2012 19:15:00 GMT

I was seven when my Dad put me on the seat of an Oliver 77 tractor and sent me to the field to rake hay by myself. My Dad said he was about the same age when his father first assigned him to a pair of horses and a mower to cut hay on his own. My mom was just five when her dad took her to the barn to hand milk cows. When Claudia and I had our own four children, they all helped out on our dairy farm at pretty young ages, too.

To those unfamiliar with life on a farm, this might seem inappropriate, dangerous, or even abusive. It’s not. It is a way of life that has existed for as long as there have been farms and families. In many cases it was necessary to support the survival of the family. That was the case for my parents who were farm kids during the Great Depression. Family work on a farm or ranch is also a way of life that instills values and principles that seem to be increasingly more difficult to pass from one generation to the next in today’s America.

Yes, sometimes the work is dangerous and accidents do happen. They can be serious, even fatal. But, the rewards of the culture of the family farm have long been believed to far outweigh the risks, and government historically left parenting and farm family life alone. That’s about to change.

The Obama Administration is proposing to use the force of federal law to usurp the judgment of farm parents and replace it with government regulations. Led by big labor, union advocate Hilda Solis, Secretary of Labor, the Administration is proposing a sweeping set of new rules that would do the following:

Prohibit children under 16 who are being paid from operating most power-driven equipment, including tractors and combines. Some student-learners would be exempted from the ban on operating tractors and other farm implements, but only if the equipment has rollover protection and seat belts.
Bar those under 18 from working at grain elevators, silos, feedlots and livestock auctions and from transporting raw farm materials.
Prevent youths 15 and younger from cultivating, curing and harvesting tobacco to prevent exposure to green tobacco sickness, which is caused by exposure to wet tobacco plants.
Prohibit youths from using electronic devices such as cellphones while operating power-driven equipment.

Solis believes that some farm work is "too hazardous for children to be engaged in." How she knows this is anyone’s guess since she apparently has never lived or worked on a farm, nor do we find any evidence that she has children of her own.

Solis’s parents were both labor union members and activists. She is a life-long government employee and proponent of “environmental justice.” As Labor Secretary she has been a chief operative enacting Big Labor’s agenda by the Obama Administration.

The Labor Department says the proposed regulations would not apply to children working on farms owned by their parents, but the new regulations would prevent youngsters from doing some jobs for pay at the farms of neighbors and relatives – a tradition as old as our nation. It would also prevent scores of farm kids from getting summer or part-time jobs which historically have aided family incomes and helped a send countless numbers to college.

But, the biggest problem with Solis’s proposal is that she’s sticking government’s nose squarely where it doesn’t belong. And, as is always the case, once government’s nose is under the tent, you can bet that more regulation and control is right around the corner.

America began as a nation of farmers, and throughout our history the family farm has embodied the best of our national culture and family life. There is no big movement in America to adopt these new regulations; there’s been no vote in Congress. The Obama Administration is doing this just because they can; to grab more power for the government; to exert ever more control over our lives. And, they are doing it because as the “enlightened Central Planners” they believe that they are smarter than all the rest of us – including parents of farm children. They are wrong.

Avoiding the Obvious

Mon, 30 Jan 2012 16:43:00 GMT

Imagine you are a Member of Congress deeply troubled by the huge federal deficits. You would likely be fully aware that unless serious reform happens soon, the existing major entitlement programs will eventually consume the entire federal tax revenue.

Now, imagine learning that one simple reform could provide the following results:

Reduce outlays by $380 billion in the first 10 years
Cut public debt by 20% within 25 years, by one-third within 30 years, and maybe as much as 80% with 50 years.
Increase the GDP by 1%, or $150 billion per year, and a cumulative $13 trillion over the next three decades.

You might be thinking that this would be the easiest piece of legislation to sponsor and pass on Capitol Hill – but, you would be wrong.

Yesterday we published A Nation of Dependents focusing on the dramatic increase in both the amount and distribution across the population of various government benefit programs. We also noted that while Americans generally believe that federal deficits need to be brought under control, few are willing to reform major entitlements like Social Security and Medicare to help reduce over spending and balance the federal budget.

The above scenario is outlined in a Washington Times feature based on just one change to Social Security and Medicare: gradually increasing the retirement age from 67 to 70 for Social Security benefits and from 65 to 67 for Medicare. The projections for savings are based on analysis of by the Congressional Budget Office, the Committee for Responsible Budget Reform, and the McKinsey Global Institute.

Life expectancy has increased by about 15 years for both men and women since Social Security was first implemented; by eight years since Medicare was adopted. And there is abundant evidence that Americans want to work longer, be productive citizens, and continue to earn – but, they also don’t want to sacrifice government benefits. Just 24% are willing to consider a cut in Social Security and only 16% for Medicare according to recent public opinion polling.

Politicians know that pledges to “preserve and protect” Social Security and Medicare win them votes as well as campaign contributions. Conversely, even a hint of reforming the entitlement programs is red-meat ammunition for any candidate’s opponent, and sure to bring out the pitchforks with the electorate.

Increasing the eligibility age was also supported by the Simpson-Bowles deficit reduction commission appointed by President Obama. Political leaders from both parties at times have intimated a willingness to support a gradual increase in the eligibility age, but serious proposals never seem to gain legislative traction. As the Washington Times said, “few politicians today will even touch it.”

That analysis is consistent with this former Member of Congress’s personal experience. The arithmetic isn’t that complicated. Democrats and Republicans have known for a long time how to fix the entitlements to make them financially sustainable and reduce the burden of growing debt. But, politicians are in to self-preservation. They like to keep their jobs. So, until the electorate is willing to support entitlement reforms to reduce deficits spending, don’t look for Congress to really get serious about doing it either.

Low Voltage: Obama Failure as Investor-in-Chief

Mon, 30 Jan 2012 00:56:00 GMT

Even before he took the oath of office, Barack Obama embraced the financial crisis of 2008. In the words of his then Chief-of-Staff Rahm Emanuel, “You never want a serious crisis to go to waste,” and Obama saw the recession as an opportunity for him to play investor picking winners and losers with hundreds of billions of borrowed dollars. This was his moment to “transform” the American economy to match his vision for a brave new world.

Lavishing billions on green technology was high on Obama’s list of favorites. In just three years, his Administration has pumped $80 billion into so-called “clean energy” companies. Even that staggering amount is barely half of the $150 billion he said he wanted to spend if given enough time in the White House. At every opportunity Obama championed investment in green technology as “the way to a more prosperous, brighter future.” There was a very personal reason Obama was willing to plunge the nation deeper in debt with high-risk adventures in the middle of a serious economic recession. “I want to make sure the planet is as beautiful for my daughters as it was for me,” he admitted during a debate in Des Moines, Iowa in December, 2007. Most fathers are willing to sacrifice of their own treasure for the benefit of their children. Obama put the treasure of generations of other American’s children yet to be born on the line for a mythical better world for his two daughters.

Obama admitted with his policies “electricity rates would necessarily skyrocket,” and his Energy Secretary volunteered that the Administration would pursue policies to get gas prices at the pump “in line with Europe.”

Thus far, Obama & Co. have been successful in driving energy prices higher. As for saving the planet and other ancillary benefits, the record isn’t very good.

Last week, Ener1, an electric car battery company that received a $118 million grant from Obama’s Energy Department filed for bankruptcy. The White House once forecast that Ener1 would employ 1400 people by 2013. Just before declaring bankruptcy, the company had only 350 workers. Ener1 and the White House had tied the company’s fortunes to the success of the Norwegian carmaker Think, and the Think City plug-in. Ener1 was to supply the batteries. Think suffered their own financial crisis, however, and declared bankruptcy in 2010, the year following the $118 million grant to Ener1.

The financial problems with Ener1’s primary targeted manufacturer didn’t give pause to the White House, however. On January 26, 2011, Joe Biden visited Ener1 in Indiana. That was the day following the State of the Union speech in which Obama touted his prescient investment skills and painted a vision of an America in 2015 as “the first country to have one million electric vehicles on the road.” So certain were Biden and Obama of the wisdom of their investment that Biden said the millions spent on companies like Ener1 were “sparking whole new industries that will ensure our competitiveness for decades to come—industries like electric vehicle manufacturing.”

Ener1’s demise follows the collapse of the California solar energy company, Solyndra, and Beacon Power, a Massachusetts energy storage company that had received $535 million and $43 million DOE loan guarantees. Concerns of crony capitalism, favors for Obama campaign supporters, and fiscal malfeasance have spawned no less than five separate federal investigations of the Solyndra collapse alone. “One bankruptcy may be a fluke, two could be coincidence, but three is a trend,” said Rep. Cliff Stearns (R-FL), Chairman of the House Sub-Committee looking into the growing litany of problems with the DOE green energy loan program.

There’s more.

Part of being a successful investor involves timely investment of capital to coincide with increased market demand. Unfortunately for the taxpayers and scores of left behind workers, Obama’s timing hasn’t been all that good.

Ener1 said the company’s financial woes were accelerated when “demand for litihium-ion batteries slowed due to lower-than-expected adoption for electric passenger vehicles.” That explanation qualifies as an major understatement.

“Rather than electrifying auto buyers, the plug-in revolution is feeling more like a fizzle,” according to a USA Today report just last month. Sales of the Chevy Volt and the Nissan Leaf, the first two plug-in electric cars from major manufacturers to enter the market represent just 0.1% of the 2011 sales in the nation through November. Even the extremely modest market expectations by GM and Nissan proved to be overly optimistic. Instead of a public warming to Obama’s fantasy car, public acceptance is waning. Last July 1% of car buyers said they would at least consider buying a Volt, but by December just 0.6% expressed any interest.

The year just completed was the best since 2008 for an auto industry that was hard hit by the recession, but the encouraging news of 2011 didn’t extend to the plug-ins. In fact, sales for the Volt are so anemic that dealers are saying “no thanks” to GM for new allocations of inventory. For example, in the New York City market, GM had allocated 104 Volts for 14 dealerships in December. But, the dealers took just 31 according to an industry publication. On the opposite coast, GM allocated six new Volts to a dealer who had only sold ten in all of 2011. He didn’t take any of them. Brett Hedrick, the dealer, said for GM to think “we need six more Volts is just crazy. We’ve never sold more than two in a month.”

The anemic sales aren’t because Obama didn’t put a pretty big effort behind his dream; (i.e. gambling with a whole lot of your grandchildren’s money). According to a report in the New York Times, in addition to the $50 billion or so to bailout (seize) General Motors, some portion of the $14 billion Obama loaned GM to “retool” plants was allocable to the Volt. Obama threw in another $240 million in grants specifically designated to develop the Volt. Then there was $150 million to save-and-create jobs for the Volt’s South Korean battery manufacturer (not Ener1 in Indiana). For good measure, Obama tossed in another $1.5 billion in subsidies to buy-down the exorbitant cost of the Volt by $7,500 per vehicle. And, still he can’t sell them. But, oh well, as Obama says, “Some technologies don’t pan out; some companies fail.”

Lost in much of Obama’s green debacle is his other stated objective to save-the-planet for his daughters. It turns out that the mythical environmental benefits of his plug-in fascination were premised on a hoax, too.

A study conducted by the British Government (who is also heavily subsidizing battery technology) and the car industry blows apart the claim that battery cars lower greenhouse emissions. "Electric cars could produce higher emissions over their lifetimes than petrol (gas) equivalents because of the energy consumed in making their batteries," according to the analysis. The study found that a battery car would need to be driven over 80,000 miles just to break even with total emissions produced by a gas powered car. While driving the electric car produces fewer emissions, the problem is that emissions produced in "manufacturing electric cars are at least 50 percent higher because batteries are made from materials such as lithium, copper and refined silicon, which require much energy to be processed." If the need for a second battery replacement is factored into the equation, as well as the disposal of old batteries, total emissions far more than double for a plug-in electric car.

Barack Obama came to the Oval Office with exactly zero experience in the private sector, never having run a business, taken a business investment risk, or even held a private sector job. Worse than no experience, he routinely expresses his disdain for the great American free-market economy. It is little wonder then that rather than respecting the wisdom of the market place, Obama thinks he can dictate and redirect market forces by wasting billions on his whims and fantasies to facilitate a political – not an economic - agenda. If he were failing so miserably with his own money, it would be a tragic personal story of mistaken judgment and failure. But, he’s squandering the resources, opportunities, and careers of countless Americans, some yet to be born, and imperiling the future of the greatest nation in the history of the world. That is unforgivable.

Evidence Mounts Against Justice Kagan For Recusal In ObamaCare Suit

Sun, 29 Jan 2012 20:30:00 GMT

By Ronald Rotunda, posted at FoxNews.com

Editor’s Note: We have written no less than six times on these pages about the reasons why Associate Justice Elena Kagan should recuse herself from hearing the ObamaCare case to be taken up shortly by the United States Supreme Court. While Kagan has been pressured from many corners – including Congress – she has refused to step aside. The following excellent article by Ronald Rotunda offers both a current update of the facts surrounding the issue and raises many of the unanswered questions. Mr. Rotunda has a distinguished legal career and is co-author of Legal Ethics: The Lawyer’s Deskbook on Professional Responsibility (published by the American Bar Association and West Publishing Company) and is the Day and Dee Henley Chair and Distinguished Professor of Jurisprudence at Chapman University.

Last month, Chief Justice Roberts gave his annual year-end report on the federal judiciary, but it was quite different from prior ones. For the first time, it focused on when Supreme Court Justices should disqualify (or “recuse”) themselves from a case because of a conflict of interest. He acknowledged that the Code of Conduct for United States Judges applies to all federal judges except Supreme Court Justices. However, he assured us that the Justices do, in fact, look to this Code for guidance, and follow it, along with the federal statue, federal advisory opinions, and court precedent.

All this comes hard on the heels of those calling on Justice Elena Kagan to disqualify herself in the ObamaCare litigation because of her role, as Solicitor General, in preparing its constitutional defense. These calls have intensified with the release of recent emails. Justice Kagan’s supporters respond that she testified in her confirmation hearings that she had nothing to do with ObamaCare.

First, her phraseology was much more precise. She said she would only recuse herself from any case in which she “officially formally approved something,” or “served as counsel of record” or “played any substantial role.” But the statute requires disqualification if Kagan, as a federal employee (she was the former Solicitor General) “participated” as an “adviser” on a matter, even if she did not give any formal advice. She also must disqualify herself if her impartiality might reasonably be questioned.

In response to a Freedom of Information (FOIA) request, the Obama Administration has turned over some emails but it refuses to turn over many others because, it says, these emails are “protected by the attorney work product doctrine.” That doctrine, the DOJ affidavit explains, covers discussion by “OSG” (Office of Solicitor General) lawyers about “legal issues, arguments, and strategy concerning anticipated” litigation over ObamaCare. So, the DOJ is simultaneously claiming that it completely walled off Kagan from any discussions involving the constitutional defense of ObamaCare, while admitting that Kagan was participating in emails discussing “legal issues, arguments, and strategy concerning” the anticipated ObamaCare litigation. Read more.

A Nation of Dependents

Sun, 29 Jan 2012 20:33:00 GMT

The following graph demonstrates the dramatic growth of dependency on federal government benefits. Given the rapid increase in the established trend, any day now at least one person in more than half of all households in America will be receiving some type of government assistance. The current federal debt of $15.3 trillion is greater than the entire Gross Domestic Product (GDP), and is increasing by more than $1 trillion annually.

From Investor's Business Daily, January 27, 2012

Congress has been warned repeatedly that this pattern of deficit spending is “unsustainable,” but, despite a lot of rhetoric, serious reform continues to elude both parties. With an ever increasing percentage of the population dependent on government programs for sustenance, and nearly half of all Americans already paying none of the federal income tax burden or actually getting a check from the government, is it any wonder why a political solution continues to escape our elected leaders? By our selfish nature, people are usually willing to see someone else's sacred cow put on a diet, but rarely their own.

Entitlements and other government social programs now have such large dependent constituencies that even a hint of changing benefits for future recipients creates an avalanche of criticism; remember the outrage for Paul Ryan’s plan to reform Social Security, not for current recipients but those a generation from now?

Following is a summary of the state of dependency in America as outlined by John Merline in Investor’s Business Daily this past week. Nearly everyone recognizes that this path is unsustainable, but not everyone agrees how to fix it or has the courage to do what is obviously necessary to avoid bankrupting the nation. Actually, most politicians – and particularly the current President – continually call for even more spending and additional programs compounding the problem instead of fixing it.

Direct Payments: As the graph shows, direct payments have increased steadily for four decades. However, under just Obama’s first term they have shot up 32% - almost $600 billion. The White House estimates direct payments will increase another $500 billion by 2016 and consume two-thirds of all federal spending.
People getting benefits: According to the census bureau 49% of households have at least one recipient of a federal benefit check: social security, workers comp, unemployment, subsidized housing, food stamps, etc. That’s up from 44% when Obama took office, and way up from 1983 when less than one-third of households received a government benefit.
Food stamps: More than 46 million Americans – 15% of the total population – get food stamps. That’s 45% higher than when Obama took office, and nearly twice the average of the past 40 years (7.9%). Some of the increase is due to the recession, but Obama’s “stimulus” also expanded the eligibility for the benefit.
Disability: The number of people receiving Social Security Disability payments has steadily increased largely due to relaxed eligibility rules. But, in just the first two years of Obama the numbers increased by 10%. With millions out of work during the recession, when unemployment benefits expire “many people who could otherwise work sign up for disability benefits instead,” according to Merline.
Health care: 45% of all health care spending now comes from the government. That’s up from 32% as recently as 1990. If ObamaCare is implemented, the government’s role will increase dramatically; 16 million people will be added to Medicaid and 24 million more will get government insurance premium subsidies.
Corporate welfare: Often with the best of intentions Congress has provided “incentives” for a variety of industries and perceived desirable business activities. Over time the number of loopholes has become more the rule than the exception. Merline cites a CATO report that found subsidized loans, special tax breaks, bailouts and the like totaled $92 billion before Obama took charge. Through his stimulus and spending on favored industries like green energy ($18 billion in 2009 alone), Obama has greatly expanded corporate welfare.

The dramatic increase in spending on various entitlement programs over the last many decades has hardly been a secret. Nor, has the danger to the nation’s fiscal well-being of a failure to address the problem. Presidents and politicians from both parties have said some of the right things for a long time. Even Barack Obama spoke of the need to “pay down our debt” three separate times in his recent State of the Union address– while using most of the rest of his speech to call for more new programs and spending that would do just the opposite.

It is our nature to like to be spoiled, and politicians seeking favor with the electorate are usually willing to oblige. Everybody prefers to receive rather than to give, particularly if the government is on the other end of the transaction. So, even knowing that America is on a glide path to disaster, when push-comes-to-shove few Americans are really willing to cut back on federal benefits. According to a recent IBD/TIPP poll just 24% would support cutting Social Security and only 16% would back Medicare cuts – by far the most costly of all federal entitlement programs.

Nancy Pelosi promised “no new deficit spending” on the day she was elected Speaker of the House in 2007. She broke her promise.

During the Presidential campaign of 2008, Barack Obama said the $9 trillion of federal debt at the time was "irresponsible. It's unpatriotic." Unfortunately, that rhetoric came 6 trillion dollars of additional debt ago.

Out of control, unsustainable spending is once again a big issue in the 2012 Presidential and Congressional campaigns. But, regardless of who ultimately gets elected, it will take not only a change in the courage of the politicians, but also in the will of the people before any substantial reform is enacted.

The Cost of Obama's Green Appeasement

Tue, 24 Jan 2012 23:37:00 GMT

Editor's Note: The following was published January 24, 2012 by The Blaze.

This weekend’s Boston Globe Magazine will feature a gargantuan, 3600 word homage to rabid environmentalism in the form of a profile on 350.org founder Bill McKibben. The piece and President Obama’s disastrously short-sighted decision Wednesday to reject permitting for Transcanada’s Keystone XL pipeline are both symptomatic of a much larger ailment plaguing liberal politicking in general and the Obama administration in particular: a continual willingness to sacrifice the well-being of the majority for an elite, hypocritical minority.

The Keystone project, a 1,700-mile pipeline that would bring crude from Alberta’s oil sands to U.S. refineries on the Gulf Coast, has the potential to create hundreds of thousands of direct and indirect decent-paying American jobs and reduce our dependency on the oil of despotic, anti-western nations with questionably sane leaders. But radical environmentalists like McKibben – a second generation jailed protestor and disciple of John Kerry – seem either not to know or else don’t care what real poverty looks like. And he is among the leaders of the voting contingent to which our president is pandering – purely for political reasons.

The Harvard-educated McKibben, who was among the 1,252 people arrested during protests against the pipeline outside the White House last year, is on a mission to “end the tyranny of oil” and coal. Along with his worship of the false god of climate change, McGibben like many leftist elitists is committed to “social justice” according to the Globe. What McGibben and his ilk overlook is that real social justice begins with a job, the dignity of work, and the ability to care for and feed one’s own family. McGibben & Company’s quest is anti-jobs and therefore anti true social justice.

According to analysis released just this week by the Brookings Institution, child poverty has risen 4% in the past five years – an addition of 3 million impoverished kids, most of them added in the time Obama has been in office. The state with the highest rate? Mississippi, in the Gulf Coast – the very region in which many of the Keystone XL’s quarter-million jobs would have been created, and where the Obama administration’s six-month deepwater drilling moratorium cost Americans tens of thousands of jobs. T.V. talk show host – and Obama supporter – Tavis Smiley said recently, “Many of the ‘new poor’ are the former middle class.”

Obama claims to be “all in” for domestic energy production and job creation, but when handed a no-brainer like Keystone, he choose to side with a radical minority of his base. Why? As Michael Brune, the head of the Sierra Club said, “it shores up the base, definitely.”

On Capitol Hill there has been almost universal silence from Congressional Democrats who apparently are listening to that same “base.” So, what does that say about what agenda really drives the Democratic Party? Politico.com says that according to a “top Democratic fundraiser” the issues driving the party donors are “Keystone and gay marriage.”

Obama and the Democrats may soon grow to regret the Keystone decision. There are about 25 million Americans unemployed, under employed, or that have given up even trying to find a job. If you’re out of work or struggling to get by, a politician focused on killing jobs and promoting gay marriage probably doesn’t sound like one that has your best interests at heart.

Besides all jobs we now stand to lose out on, we also face a considerable new security challenge in the form of a bolstered China. As Rep. Steve King of Iowa said this week: “If we block [the pipeline] that oil will certainly go to China. It will enrich their economy.” Canadian Prime Minster Stephen Harper has no intention of waiting for the United States to reverse this wrongheaded move; his goal is to see Canada at the forefront of the energy game. Harper will travel to Beijing next month, where he will likely take part in talks on selling his country’s vast oil supplies to the Chinese government. And China is serious about quenching its thirst for oil.

“Chinese firms aren’t just buying stakes, they’re buying whole operations,” reads a piece this month in Canada’s daily Globe and Mail. “It’s a new phase of China’s step-by-step Canada strategy. It will change not just the oil patch but Canada’s foreign policy. And a game of international energy politics is afoot in Canada’s West.”

When Obama finally turns around for a gander at his fellow Washington backers on this latest political choice, he will see he has precious few.

Unemployment

Tue, 24 Jan 2012 17:36:00 GMT

It’s a good bet that Barack Obama will spend considerable time during tonight’s State of the Union address on jobs and the economy – both of which are in a sorry state. In preparation for the smoke-and-mirrors Obama-spin, the following little exercise might be a good review. Credit is due to Barry Levinson, the famed Academy Award winning director, screenwriter, and producer who created and first published this two months ago in the Huffington Post. Enjoy!

COSTELLO: I want to talk about the unemployment rate in America.

ABBOTT: Good Subject. Terrible Times. It's 9%.

COSTELLO: That many people are out of work?

ABBOTT: No, that's 16%.

COSTELLO: You just said 9%.

ABBOTT: 9% Unemployed.

COSTELLO: Right 9% out of work.

ABBOTT: No, that's 16%.

COSTELLO: Okay, so it's 16% unemployed.

ABBOTT: No, that's 9%...

COSTELLO: WAIT A MINUTE. Is it 9% or 16%?

ABBOTT: 9% are unemployed. 16% are out of work.

COSTELLO: IF you are out of work you are unemployed.

ABBOTT: No, you can't count the "Out of Work" as the unemployed. You have to look for work to be unemployed.

COSTELLO: BUT THEY ARE OUT OF WORK!!!

ABBOTT: No, you miss my point.

COSTELLO: What point?

ABBOTT: Someone who doesn't look for work, can't be counted with those who look for work. It wouldn't be fair.

COSTELLO: To who?

ABBOTT: The unemployed.

COSTELLO: But they are ALL out of work.

ABBOTT: No, the unemployed are actively looking for work...
                Those who are out of work stopped looking.
                They gave up.
                And, if you give up, you are no longer in the ranks of the unemployed.

COSTELLO: So if you're off the unemployment roles, that would count as less unemployment?

ABBOTT: Unemployment would go down. Absolutely!

COSTELLO: The unemployment just goes down because you don't look for work?

ABBOTT: Absolutely it goes down. That's how you get to 9%. Otherwise it would be 16%. You don't want to read about 16% unemployment do ya?

COSTELLO: That would be frightening.

ABBOTT: Absolutely.

COSTELLO: Wait, I got a question for you. That means they're two ways to bring down the unemployment number?

ABBOTT: Two ways is correct.

COSTELLO: Unemployment can go down if someone gets a job?

ABBOTT: Correct.

COSTELLO: And unemployment can also go down if you stop looking for a job?

ABBOTT: Bingo.

COSTELLO: So there are two ways to bring unemployment down, and the easier of the two is to just stop looking for work.

ABBOTT: Now you're thinking like an economist.

COSTELLO: I don't even know what the hell I just said!

Now you know why Obama's unemployment figures are improving, and you should be ready for the State of the Union Address.

Senate Democrats Day of Infamy

Tue, 24 Jan 2012 13:52:00 GMT

Today marks the 1,000^th Day since the Democrat controlled U.S. Senate has passed a budget. And, yet in the nearly three years of flying fiscally blind, the federal debt has grown by a staggering $4 trillion.

Watch tonight’s State of the Union speech to see if Barack Obama calls on Harry Reid to get his act together and pass a budget – but, don’t hold your breath.

Peter Brookes: What Obama should address in the SOTU, but likely won't

Tue, 24 Jan 2012 13:26:00 GMT

By Peter Brookes

President Obama will spend most of tonight's State of the Union Address on domestic matters - but he also owes the nation a serious look at our pressing foreign-policy and defense issues.

It's fair enough to mention the elimination of 9/11 architect Osama bin Laden, al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula's Anwar al-Awlaki and Libyan strongman Moammar Khadafy. But Obama can't just look back.

Given the breadth and depth of world problems today, the president needs to tell us how his team is going to protect and advance US interests abroad.

Here's a quick checklist of what he should hit this evening to give us a sense of the state of our union in the world going forward:

First, lay out his strategy for Afghanistan, where nearly 100,000 US troops are battling the bad guys. Some fear that the withdrawal schedule will be driven more by election-year politics than policy.

Obama should also give us the plan for "peace" talks with the Taliban. What are the goals, and how will we prevent the Taliban from making promises they may not keep after we leave in full?

On Iran, what's the story with reports of an offer for direct Washington-Tehran talks? How do we plan to keep Iran from going nuclear? Sanctions may finally be biting, but Tehran seems little dissuaded from belligerence - or its atomic aspirations.

Iraq is a mess since US troops left last month. Violence is up (250 killed; 500 injured), the government is fracturing and Iran's influence is on the rise. The commander-in-chief should tell us the way ahead for ensuring Iraq remains a US ally.

The president also needs to talk on al Qaeda. Drone strikes continue in Pakistan, but what about al Qaeda in Yemen, which is now holding territory, and Somalia's al Shabab, whose violence is on the rise?

After a year, the promise of an Arab Spring has become the reality of an Arab Winter, with Islamists in the ascent in Tunisia and Egypt. Syria is on the brink of civil war with some 5,000 killed and who-knows-how-many detained. All this, without any real US response.

What about the Russian "reset"? The Kremlin is playing hardball on US missile defense plans and interfering with efforts to get tough on Syria and Iran. Last week, it totally dissed Obama's new ambassador to Russia - an architect of the extremely friendly US reset policy.

Or how does the White House plan to deal with North Korea, whose young, inexperienced leader is in charge of a large army and a small nuke arsenal?

Plus, China's expected next president is due in Washington soon for get-to-know-you talks. It'd be good to get a sense of what Obama thinks about Beijing's rise in the international system - and, more important, what he plans to do about it.

Many are also wondering if the president will mention this hemisphere tonight, which has been largely ignored on his watch. Problems in Mexico, Venezuela and Cuba would be good places to start.

Lastly, US defense spending is in free fall, with each new cut of hundreds of billions more dizzying than the last. Among other questions, how exactly does he plan to deal with growing global challenges using a shrinking US military?

In the end, you can't help but feel American strategy is adrift, with Team Obama presiding over our decline as a world power. Tonight would be a great time for the president to make the case to the contrary - if that's possible.

***Peter Brookes is a Heritage Foundation senior fellow, a former deputy assistant secretary of defense, and a Contributing Editor to A Line of Sight. This article also published January 24, 2012 in the New York Post.

Strange Bedfellows: Big Labor spends $1 million to aid Gingrich

Mon, 23 Jan 2012 14:18:00 GMT

If it wasn’t already strange enough to have professed free-market conservatives attacking a candidate for his free-market success, the GOP presidential primary just got even weirder.

The big labor union that represents government workers is spending $1 million on a television ad in Florida to attack Mitt Romney’s record as a businessman. It's an ad clearly designed to aid Newt Gingrich, but AFSCME, the Association of Federal, State, County, and Municipal Employees, is no friend of the GOP. They spent $67 million to elect Barack Obama in 2008 and they have every intention of doing everything in their power to elect Obama again. After all, this is likely the most Big Labor friendly President in American history.

As John Nichols explains in a new article celebrating the AFSCME strategy in The Nation, the mouthpiece of the radical left, Big Labor isn’t trying to help any Republican; just the opposite. The union is picking up on the attack against Romney first used by Newt Gingrich and former candidate Rick Perry. This is an investment designed to get the GOP to nominate what Big Labor believes will be a weaker candidate.

Nichols writes that it isn’t “any secret that AFSCME is looking to weaken Romney.” The Democrats “would much prefer to see Republicans field another candidate, such as the former House Speaker Newt Gingrich, against Mr. Obama in the general election,” says the Washington Times.

It a safe bet that the devious AFSCME plot is being applauded at the White House, too. As far back as August, the Obama campaign made it clear that they saw Romney as the toughest competition for Obama. We “have to kill Romney,” confessed one of the White House strategists to Politico.com.

Obama has done everything Big Labor asked for the last three years, and it looks like Big Labor is returning the favor.

Beauprez at Fox News.com: Pipeline pushover-What Obama’s Keystone XL decision really tells the American public

Thu, 19 Jan 2012 02:01:00 GMT

Editor's Note: The following was posted by Fox News.com moments ago. Yesterday they also posted another of my energy articles, America is poised to be the world's new energy leader, now let's vow to claim this crown

Short of announcing it outright, President Obama could not have signaled in stronger terms than he did Wednesday how little he cares for the plight of the American public.

With the news that the White House is definitively rejecting approval of TransCanada’s Keystone XL pipeline, a project that has the potential to employ 20,000 Americans almost immediately, the president has made clear that he’d rather placate a small group of environmental radicals than offer real relief to unemployed Americans struggling to pay constantly rising gas prices.....

On FoxNews.com: America is poised to be the world's new energy leader

Wed, 18 Jan 2012 23:30:00 GMT

FoxNews.com is featuring an op-ed by A Line of Sight's Editor-in-Chief, Bob Beauprez, on the exciting opportunities ahead for American's energy producers -- if it weren't for the radical environmental lobby and government regulators standing in the way.

"What countries like China boast in quantity they lack in expertise. And technique is where we are king. It was more than half a century ago that Americans pioneered hydraulic fracturing, a process whereby a high-pressured, water-based mixture is pumped into underground shale to release hydrocarbons.

"With coal- and oil-rich nations like China and Saudi Arabia so keenly interested in American energy-extraction methods, it would seem the tables have finally turned. But while we should continue rushing to capitalize on our own good fortunes, regulatory roadblocks continue to hamstring our production.

"The anti-shale-gas camp’s trump card is the unfounded threat of water contamination from hydraulic fracturing fluid (a liquid that's more than 99 percent water itself). Yet there has not been a single confirmed case of polluted drinking water anywhere, which stands to reason since the fracturing takes place more than 8,000 feet below surface level while groundwater sits only a few hundred feet below the earth's surface."

Read more at FoxNews.com

Obama to Kill Keystone Pipeline

Wed, 18 Jan 2012 18:24:00 GMT

Fox News is reporting that this afternoon Barack Obama is going to kill the Keystone Pipeline Project. This stands in direct opposition to a president who says he is committed to domestic energy production, energy independence, job creation, and economic recovery. As we've said before, his actions speak louder than his words. In fact, in direct contrast to his words. The Keystone Pipeline would have been a great boost for the American economy. Now, Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper has warned, if we don't buy it, someone else will. Most likely China.

While average Americans and working families will suffer this hit the most, Obama appeases his radical environmental constituency that he believes is necessary for his reelection. As evidence, the radical Sierra Club has already released a statement praising the President, with their executive director saying, "I think it shores up his base definitely." Obviously the only job Barack Obama is worried about saving is his own.

As a note to the President, there are currently about 20 million Americans either who are looking for work or who have given up and walked away. Obama just closed another door to them.

Tip-of-the-Hat: Rick Reilly and Tim Tebow

Mon, 16 Jan 2012 23:55:00 GMT

Rick Reilly is not only "one of the funniest humans on the planet," he's one of the most articulate and insightful. Rick grew up not far from me in Boulder, Colorado, where he started his extremely successful career as a sports journalist. Though I never met Rick until we were both considerably older and more traveled, I did get to know his wonderful, proud father. When I did finally met Rick, I could tell that the apple didn't fall far from the tree, as they say. He came from good stock.

Every month in this space we tip-our-hat to someone that inspires. Rick has been writing about the human interest side of sports of decades and we tip-our-hat to his glorious career in which he often told a very human inspirational side of athletics that is usually more important that what happens on the field or the court.

In his just published column for ESPN, even the great Rick Reilly may have raised his own high standards. "I believe in Tim Tebow" captures the essence of a phenomenon that has engulfed a nation and much of the world. The young quarterback for the Denver Broncos decency, humility, kindness, and open faithfulness to his God has ignited people from the playground to the pulpit.

Tebow and his Broncos were overmatched and crushed by the New England Patriots, but there will be more games on other days. Churchill said, "We make a living by what we get. We make a life by what we give." In just 24 years, Tim Tebow has already built a very great life even by Churchill's standards, and is showing many of the rest of us a better way in the process.

Rick Reilly does a better job that I could, so I'll let him explain some of why Tebow is such a good roll model for youngsters and us older folks, too. Here are a couple of excerpts and a link to Rick's fine column:

"I've come to believe in Tim Tebow for what he does off a football field, which is represent the best parts of us, the parts I want to be and so rarely am."

..."I've given up giving up on him. I'm a 100 percent believer. Not in his arm. Not in his skills. I believe in his heart, his there-will-definitely-be-a-pony-under-the-tree optimism, the way his love pours into people, right up to their eyeballs, until they believe they can master the hopeless comeback, too."

Click here for the entirety of "I believe in Tim Tebow"
By Rick Reilly

Good News of the Month: Gabby Giffords: Believing in Miracles

Mon, 16 Jan 2012 21:43:00 GMT

One year ago in Tucson a mentally deranged man walked into a citizen forum hosted in a parking lot by Arizona Congresswoman Gabby Giffords and opened fire. Moments later, six people were dead and at least a dozen wounded including Giffords who took a shot to her head.

The heinous nature of the crime, the slaughter of innocents including a 9 yr. old girl, and Giffords high profile notoriety immediately captivated the nation. In the first hours and days, Giffords survival was very much in doubt; then followed the questions of the amount of damage done to her brain. As the weeks and months passed, news of small but remarkable progress was made public. Eventually, even a few images of her and reports of progress from friends who had visited her were made known. Then came the dramatic moment on August 1 when Giffords returned to the floor of the House of Representatives to cast a vote.

Earlier this month, a memorial was held in Tucson marking the one year anniversary of the shooting. Not only was Gabby there, but with a little help from her astronaut husband, Mark Kelly, she led the crowd in the Pledge of Allegiance.

Giffords doctors have called her recovery "miraculous." It's good to see and believe in miracles. Gabby's struggle, courage, and recovery have also taught us how valuable and important every human life can be. Take a moment and click on the link below to see Gabby's Pledge. It'll do your heart good.

Gabby Giffords leads Pledge of Allegiance – Click here

National Debt Crosses the Line: U.S. in dubious company

Wed, 11 Jan 2012 14:06:00 GMT

The U.S. federal debt has surpassed the total production of the entire country. According to a feature article in USA Today, total debt of $15.3 trillion now exceeds GDP.

Anyone who has been paying just a little bit of attention has known for some time that at the rapid rate the debt was increasing it was destined to exceed the GDP. But, as the report documents, only six other nations in the developed world – all in perilous condition - have debt levels that exceed their total economic output: Greece, Iceland, Ireland, Italy, Japan and Portugal.

Within a decade, the Obama administration projects the debt will increase another 70 percent to $26 trillion. Even if the economy could grow at an average annual rate of 3 percent over the decade, GDP would be just barely $20 trillion, leaving a debt-to-GDP ratio of 128 percent.

A'jad's Latin Tango

Tue, 10 Jan 2012 14:10:00 GMT

By Peter Brookes, Contributing Editor

Even as his government back home was sentencing to death an American citizen it outrageously claims is a spy, Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad embarked on a five-day visit to four of Latin America's most anti-American regimes: Venezuela, Nicaragua, Ecuador and Cuba.

Naturally, Ahmadinejad's visit started with his pal, Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez (whose consul general in Miami is reportedly being booted for scheming with Iranian operatives on possible cyberattacks against us).

The "diabolical duo" then will head to Nicaragua, where they'll attend the inauguration of re-elected President Daniel Ortega, a fan of the Iranian Revolution since his Sandinista days during the Cold War.

Ahmadinejad's stops in Ecuador and Cuba will serve only to prove that their leaders, Rafael Correa and Raul Castro, have little real interest in improving relations with the United States, but still expect the Obama administration to look the other way as they sidle up to our enemy.

Why Latin America - and why now? Well, Ahmadinejad's power back home is in question. Posing as a global player by jetting half way around the world to the Americas may help silence not only his critics within the regime but also ease tensions from the Iranian people, who sense Tehran's increasing isolation and still resent the stolen 2009 presidential election.

To the same end, Iran is looking for friends that might help it fight potential diplomatic condemnation and evade economic sanctions imposed because of its nuke program.

Those sanctions are finally starting to have real teeth.

Last week, the United States announced plans to penalize Iran's Central Bank, making it harder for Tehran to sell oil - its main source of hard currency. (Europe may ban Iranian crude, but is worried about a ban's economic impact.)

It has long been a concern that Iran is using Latin America, especially Venezuela, to circumvent international restrictions on its banking, as well as to gain banned materials and technologies for its missile and nuclear programs.

The diplomatic visits to Latin America - plus a few billion dollars in trade and investment and an increasing number of embassies (six new ones in the region since 2005) - provide Iran with the "cover" for all manner of dark dealings.

It gets worse.

A 2010 Pentagon report to Congress on the Iranian military noted that the Qods Force of Iran's Revolutionary Guard "maintains operational capabilities around the world . . . Recent years have witnessed an increased presence in Latin America, particularly Venezuela."

Any skepticism about that assessment was dashed with the news last fall that Qods forces and a henchman tried to hire a Mexican drug cartel to assassinate the Saudi ambassador to the US and to bomb Israeli and Saudi embassies in Washington and Buenos Aires.

Indeed, it's long been believed that, in the event of an American or Israeli military strike on Iran's nuclear facilities, Iran's operatives - or its proxies - would likely attack the homeland and/or US interests in Latin America.

Although the plots were pretty ham-handed by most standards, it shows that operations like this are on the drawing board. "What's next?" is a very reasonable question - and a threat we should take seriously.

Iran wants the United States out of the Middle East, especially the Persian Gulf - and also wants to remind us that it, too, can be a player in our neighborhood.

As pernicious as Persian power is in the Middle East, it's especially troubling around here. Ahmadinejad's visit is a stark reminder that this is no time for shilly-shallying on counteracting Iran's iniquity in this hemisphere.

***Peter Brookes is a Heritage Foundation senior fellow, a former deputy assistant secretary of defense, and a Contributing Editor to A Line of Sight. This article also appeared October 25, 2011 in the New York Post. peterbrookes@heritage.org

Tensions Continue to Escalate in Straits of Hormuz

Mon, 09 Jan 2012 17:39:00 GMT

The ultra-high stakes game of chicken continues in the Straits of Hormuz – as well as in Tehran and Washington. Iran continues to escalate rhetoric and the saber rattling. The British have deployed their most advanced naval destroyer to the Gulf. Additionally, the Iranian press and the AP are reporting that uranium enrichment has begun at the new underground Fordo facility near Qom.

After issuing a bombastic threat last week to the U.S. Fifth Fleet “not to come back” to the Persian Gulf, the Iranian regime announced plans to conduct a second round of military exercises in February for the closure of the critical waterway through which about 17 million barrels of oil flows every day.

The head of Iran’s Navy, Ali Fadavi, made the announcement of the planned February operations in the Straits of Hormuz and added, “Today the Islamic Republic of Iran has full domination over the region and controls all movements within it.”

The British are obviously taking Iran’s bluster seriously. Defence Secretary Philip Hammond warned Iran that a blockade of the Straits of Hormuz would be “illegal and unsuccessful.” The Royal Navy is sending their “mightiest ship,” the HMS Daring, a technologically highly advanced destroyer to the gulf to back up Secretary Hammond’s statement.

On Sunday the Kayhan daily, an Iranian paper said to be “close to Iran’s ruling clerics” and managed by a representative of Supreme Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, reported uranium enrichment had begun at the Fordo plant near Qom. The Associated Press is citing diplomatic sources confirming the report. Fordo is reported “more efficient” and advanced than Natanz where enrichment began in 2006, as well as heavily fortified to withstand potential “enemy attacks.”

Uranium enrichment by Iran defies numerous United Nations resolutions. Thus far, Obama and the U.N. have proven completely impotent at stalling the Mullahs quest for nuclear capabilities.

The escalation of tension in the Gulf is clearly a reaction to the recently signed legislation by Barack Obama that requires the President to impose strict sanctions on Iran’s central bank hoping the economic pain will convince the regime to abandon their nuclear program. Obama claims the sanction provisions of the legislation are “non-binding” and there has been speculation that he may invoke waiver options in the bill to delay implementation.

While the mullahs in Iran may be far more arrogant than smart, even they probably don’t want to pick a military fight with both the U.S. and the British. But, what they do want is to cause Obama to dither long enough to buy them a few more months to further develop their nuclear weapon technology which would dramatically increase Tehran’s leverage on the west and alter the power structure in the Middle East and beyond.

Time is a friend of Iran, but not for her foes like Israel and the U.S. As the AP reports, the news of the Fordo facility coming into production is “particularly worrying because the site is being used to make material that can be upgraded more quickly for use in a nuclear weapon than the nation's main enriched stockpile” from Natanz.

During a CBS Face the Nation interview on Sunday, Defense Secretary Leon Panetta said he wasn't sure if Iran really wants a nuclear weapon. Oh, really? For three years the Administration has been doing a lot of hand wringing and talking about stopping Iran's nuclear program, but in reality Obama has seemed resigned to Iran eventually getting a nuke, and then worrying about a "containment strategy" to deal with it after the fact.

The regime in Tehran undoubtedly sees a weak, indecisive U.S. Administration. They just witnessed the U.S. pull out of Iraq, and Iran was quick to fill the void. The Mullahs must also be smiling at the announced massive cuts to the Pentagon budget and Obama's plan to reduce strategic capabilities. In a radical theocracy in which martyrdom is encouraged and celebrated, what American rationale views as “unthinkable” just might make perfect sense in Tehran. While the U.S. and British could eventually overwhelm the Iranian military, General Martin Dempsey, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, confirmed during the same Face the Nation interview that Iran has "invested in capabilities that could, in fact, for a period of time block the Straits of Hormuz."

Another Iranian newspaper quoted the deputy commander of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Ali Ashraf Nouri as saying, “The supreme authorities…have insisted that if enemies block the export of our oil, we won’t allow a drop of the oil to pass through the Strait of Hormuz. This is the strategy of the Islamic Republic in countering such threats.” Is he bluffing, or are the Mullahs just crazy enough to do it? However, irrational war in the Persian Gulf seems, it may fit right in with the madness of the Mullahs. With much of the globe already suffering economically, the last thing that is needed is even a temporary disruption of the waterway through which one-sixth of all the world’s oil passes, or worse an all-out war. That’s the game of chicken that’s being played out, and it is anyone guess who will blink first and how this eventually gets resolved.

Obama's Jobs Record: This is his idea of "healing"?

Mon, 09 Jan 2012 05:09:00 GMT

The Obama Administration would have us believe that the newest jobs data (i.e. 200,000 jobs created in December, and 8.5% unemployment) is proof that the President’s economic policies are working. His top economic adviser dutifully said the newest report proves that “it is critical that we continue the (President’s) economic policies that are helping us dig our way out of the deep hole.” Who would expect Obama’s staff economist to say anything different?

But, a little more analysis of the data proves that rather than “healing” the economy, as Obama likes to say, his policies have worsened the recession and prolonged the recovery.

As a recent Investor’s Business Daily editorial explained, over the past 30 months the size of the labor force has actually shrunk by 843,000 people – 170,000 in just the past two months. That just doesn’t happen in America. At a similar point in the Reagan recovery of the 1980s the labor force had expanded by more than 4 million workers according to IBD.

The labor force participation rate (LPR) – the percentage of people employed or looking for work of the total age eligible population – is currently just 64%. As the following chart from the Bureau of Labor Statistics indicates, that is worse by far than when Obama took office in January 2009, and it is still trending downward. In fact, the current LPR is at the lowest level in nearly 30 years. It’s disingenuous to talk of recovery when continually more people are still leaving the work force, and it is nearly impossible to increase economic output until more – not less – people are productive workers.

Labor Force Participation Rate, 2009-2011

Source: Bureau of Labor Statistics

Simply put, millions of Americans are still so disillusioned, disappointed, and disgusted that they aren’t even trying to get a job. When adjusted for the abnormally low participation rate, “unemployment would be more like 11.5%,” according to the IBD editors.

In addition to the unemployed, millions of Americans can’t find the full-time employment they need. According to the Labor Department, more than 8 million Americans have only part-time employment – twice the normal level of the work force and showing no significant sign of returning to normal levels.

Obama certainly knows the truth behind the numbers. Whatever spin the Obama campaign tries to apply; the reality is there are still 6.2 million jobs destroyed by this recession that haven’t come back. As we previously explained on these pages, this is by far the deepest and already the most prolonged recovery of the eleven recessions since World War II. At the current rate of job creation, it will be May, 2016 before the economy recovers from the jobs deficit.

With an election just ten months away, the 6 million plus jobs deficit apparently means very little to Barack Obama. He’s obsessively concerned about saving only one job – his. So, as IBD explains, “the only way Obama can make these mediocre results look good is by setting the country's expectations so low than even a tiny step forward seems like a giant leap. He mustn't get away with it.”

On the night that he secured the Democrat nomination in 2008, Barack Obama arrogantly proclaimed it as “the moment when the rise of the oceans began to slow and our planet began to heal.” If true, that would put Obama in very exclusive company. “Moses made the waters recede, but he had help,” observed famed economist Irwin Stelzer.

The 2012 campaign version of Barack Obama has backed off the miraculous predictions. Now, it is all about lowering the bar – trying to convince voters to settle for less. That’s a pretty tough sell in America, and we think he’ll have about as much luck with that line as he did in getting the oceans to pay attention to him.

Iran threatens U.S. Navy, Obama Wavers

Wed, 04 Jan 2012 13:21:00 GMT

The head of the Iranian military has warned the U.S. Fifth Fleet to stay out of the Persian Gulf. The latest bluster comes on the heels of ten days of Iranian “exercises” to close the Straits of Hormuz, a mid-range missile launch, and reports that Iran has produced its first nuclear fuel rod, a critical step toward nuclear weapon capability.

As the USS John C. Stennis left the Persian Gulf on normal maneuvers, Gen. Ataollah Salehi, the commander of the Iranian armed forces, issued the threat. “We warn this ship, which is considered a threat to us, not to come back, and we do not repeat our words twice,” Salehi said.

The U.S. Defense Department immediately rejected the warning. “The deployment of the U.S. military assets in the Persian Gulf region will continue as it has for decades,” according to Pentagon spokesman George Little. “These are regularly scheduled movements in accordance with our longstanding commitments to the security and stability of the region and in support of ongoing operations,” Little said.

Iran’s new round of military bluster coincides exactly with new Congressional legislation signed into law on New Year’s Eve by the President that directs the President to implement crippling sanctions on Iran’s central bank. Despite claims by the Administration of seeking effective sanctions against Iran for quite some time, upon signing the bill Obama said he had “serious reservations about certain provisions” of the legislation including the sanctions. Further, the White House says in considers the Congressional mandate for sanctions “non-binding.” Obama managed to get wiggle room into the final bill that allows him a six month “waiver” for implementation of those sanctions. Charles Krauthammer and many others, expect Obama to use the waiver, effectively caving in to Iran’s threats.

While the U.S. State Department and many national security analysts seem to be convinced that the Iranians are mostly talk with little chance of military action, some in the international community are not so sure. The International Business Times published two articles in the last week speculating that however non-sensible, the Iranians may nudge the region into war.

Beneath the ominous headline of “War Imminent in Straits of Hormuz?” John C.K. Daly explained that Iran has 23 submarines, 100+ coastal and combat patrol craft, 5 mine warfare and anti-mine craft, 13 amphibious landing vessels and 26 logistics and support ships. American might certainly dwarfs that capacity, but as Daly explains, the Iranians don’t measure their might in numbers of ships, guns, sailors or soldiers. “Iran has emphasized that it has developed indigenous ‘asymmetrical warfare’ naval doctrines, and it is anything but clear what form Iran’s naval response to sanctions or attack could take,” Daly says. “The only certainty is that it is unlikely to resemble anything taught at the U.S. Naval Academy,” he adds.

Iran is very much aware that having their hands on the throat of the narrow water passage through which 40 percent of all the traded oil in the world passes on a daily basis offers them enormous global leverage. From time to time they have applied pressure; usually to the benefit of the mullahs. They were also quick to fill the vacant space in Iraq created by the evacuation of the American troops.

Tensions in the Middle East continue to escalate, and Iran is at the center of nearly all the trouble. As the mullahs move ever closer to nuclear weapon capability, the U.S. and the west continue to be unwilling or unable to stop them. And, every effort only seems to increase the tension. That much is known.

The unknown is when does the ever increasing tension reach the breaking point? When do the hostile threats turn into hostile actions? Or, is there still a way to put this nuclear genie back in the bottle? Maybe. But, the chance of cooling the hostile environment would sure be greater if the Leader of the Free World had the strength of conviction of a Reagan or a Thatcher, instead of the willingness to waiver of Barack Obama.