Morality is not determined by the church you attend nor the faith you embrace. It is determined by the quality of your character and the positive impact you have on those you meet along your journey
The Supreme Court is set to hear a seemingly minor case later this month on the status of administrative judges at the Securities and Exchange Commission, an issue that normally might only draw the interest of those accused of stock fraud.
But the dispute turns on the president's power to hire and fire officials throughout the government. And it comes just as the White House is saying President Trump believes he has the power to fire special counsel Robert S. Mueller III.
Trump's Solicitor Gen. Noel Francisco intervened in the SEC case to urge the high court to clarify the president's constitutional power to fire all "officers of the United States" who "exercise significant authority" under the law.
"The Constitution gives the president what the framers saw as the traditional means of ensuring accountability: the power to oversee executive officers through removal," he wrote in Lucia vs. SEC.
"The president is accordingly authorized under our constitutional system to remove all principal officers, as well as all 'inferior officers' he has appointed."
In addition to representing the administration before the Supreme Court, Francisco, a former law clerk for the late Justice Antonin Scalia, could be in line to oversee the Mueller inquiry if Deputy Atty. Gen. Rod Rosenstein is fired. Atty. Gen Jeff Sessions has recused himself from the investigation.
Peter Shane, a law professor at the Ohio State University, called Francisco's argument a "radical proposition," and one that goes beyond what is at issue in the case. The justices said they would focus only on how the SEC in-house judges are appointed. But Francisco is asking them to go further and rule on the "removal" issue.
"The solicitor general is obviously trying to goad the court into a broad statement about the removability of all officers of the United States," Shane said. "Were the court to make any such statement, it would surely be cited by Trump as backing any move by him to fire Mueller directly."
To be clear there really is no other logic reason to do this other than to gain the ability to fire Robert Mueller.
This would allow Trump to do that directly, and not have to jump through the hoops of firing Rod Rosenstein and then attempting to hire a replacement that would do the firing for him.
And while all of this is happening, we see this response to protecting Mueller from Paul Ryan.
I actually think that Ryan KNOWS that Trump is preparing to fire Mueller and that is most of the reason that he is not running for reelection.
He knows that once it happens he will get the blame for not protecting the Special Counsel and he will be so vilified that he could not get elected dog catcher in this country.
Former Trump presidential campaign aide Rick Gates has agreed to testify against former Trump campaign chairman Paul Manafort and will plead guilty to fraud related charges, according to the Los Angeles Times.
The Times reported Sunday a revised plea will be presented in federal court "within the next few days."
CNN first reported last week that Gates was finalizing a plea deal and that he had been in plea negotiations with special counsel Robert Mueller's team for a month.
Gates can expect "a substantial reduction in his sentence," to likely about 18 months in prison if he cooperates with the investigation, according to the LA Times report. He is also likely going to have to forfeit any cash or valuables obtained through his alleged illegal activity.
Aside from the legal maneuvering, the father of four has faced personal and financial pressure to bring his legal proceedings to a speedy resolution, a person familiar with the situation told CNN.
Apparently Gates had hoped that wealthy GOP donors would have come to his rescue and donate to his defense fund, but since he is not a gun lobby or a candidate running for office, they simply could not be bothered.
I wrote about this on Friday, but now we know some of the details.
This of course ramps up pressure on Manafort who seems so far to be holding his ground, and maintains that he is not guilty of the charges against him.
San Francisco will retroactively apply California's new marijuana legalization laws to prior convictions, expunging or reducing misdemeanors and felonies dating to 1975, the district attorney's office announced Wednesday.
Nearly 5,000 felony marijuana convictions will be reviewed, recalled and resentenced, and more than 3,000 misdemeanors that were sentenced prior to Proposition 64's passage will be dismissed and sealed, Dist. Atty. George Gascón said. The move will clear people's records of crimes that can be barriers to employment and housing.
San Francisco's move could be the beginning of a larger movement to address old pot convictions, though it's still far from clear how many other counties will follow the famously liberal city's lead.
Proposition 64 legalizes, among other things, the possession and purchase of up to an ounce of marijuana and allows individuals to grow up to six plants for personal use. The measure also allows people convicted of marijuana possession crimes eliminated by Proposition 64 to petition the courts to have those convictions expunged from their records as long as the person does not pose a risk to public safety.
They also can petition to have some crimes reduced from a felony to a misdemeanor, including possession of more than an ounce of marijuana by a person who is 18 or older.
You know what they say, where California goes the country is sure to follow.
But that certainly will not happen with Jeff Sessions leading the Justice Department.
I believe his response to marijuana use is some version of "shoot on sight."
Special counsel Robert S. Mueller III has recalled for questioning at least one participant in a controversial meeting with a Kremlin-connected Russian lawyer at Trump Tower in June 2016, and is looking into President Trump's misleading claim that the discussion focused on adoption, rather than an offer to provide damaging information about Hillary Clinton.
Some defense lawyers involved in the case view Mueller's latest push as a sign that investigators are focusing on possible obstruction of justice by Trump and several of his closest advisors for their statements about the politically sensitive meeting, rather than for collusion with the Russians.
Investigators also are exploring the involvement of the president's daughter, Ivanka Trump, who did not attend the half-hour sit-down on June 9, 2016, but briefly spoke with two of the participants, a Russian lawyer and a Russian-born Washington lobbyist. Details of the encounter were not previously known.
It occurred at the Trump Tower elevator as the Russian lawyer, Natalia Veselnitskaya, and the lobbyist, Rinat Akhmetshin, were leaving the building and consisted of pleasantries, a person familiar with the episode said. But Mueller's investigators want to know every contact the two visitors had with Trump's family members and inner circle.
I think that if Trump were to pull the trigger on trying to fire Mueller, it would be right about now.
Going after Ivanka is probably the one thing that Trump simply cannot tolerate.
This will push him over the edge, if anything will.
A gunman's deadly rampage through rural Rancho Tehama on Tuesday was stopped when police rammed his vehicle and exchanged shots in a fierce gun battle, authorities said.
"The suspect was actually shooting at the police vehicle, back at them, the officer rammed the vehicle, forced it off the road, an exchange of gunfire — resulting in the shooter's death," said Tehama County Assistant Sheriff Phil Johnston.
The shooting ended what authorities described as a 45-minute attack through Rancho Tehama, a quiet reserve about 120 miles northwest of downtown Sacramento.
The gunman at one point terrorized a local elementary school. Witnesses said he crashed through the school's gates with his truck and opened fire, spraying walls and classrooms with bullets. Teachers and other adults on campus frantically got the students under desks.
Before the rampage was over, five people were dead, including the gunman, and at least 10 were wounded.
It could have been much worse if local teachers had not been so quick to respond to the threat.
No children were killed in the shooting spree that began at shortly before 8 a.m. PT in the community of Rancho Tehama Reserve, about 130 miles north of Sacramento, Tehama County Assistant Sheriff Phil Johnston said.
The rampage could have been worse, Johnston said, had not the staff at the school heard gunshots around a quarter-mile away and initiated a lockdown.
"The shooter literally took his vehicle and rammed their fence and gate, entered the grounds on foot with a semiautomatic rifle," Johnston said at a Tuesday afternoon news conference.
"It appears that because he couldn't make access to any of the rooms — they were locked — that he gave it up and re-entered the vehicle and then went on his killing spree and took it to the streets of Rancho Tehama,” Johnston said. "So I really want to say that the quick action of those school officials, there is no doubt in my mind based on the video that I saw, saved countless lives and children."
I say it all the time, but it bears repeating, teachers are the true American heroes. And it should not take a terrible incident like this to remind us of that fact.
The gunman who killed four in a sprawling rampage Tuesday before being fatally shot by police was about to go on trial for stabbing and robbing women in his Northern California community.
Kevin Jansen Neal, 43, was charged with assault in January. Little is known about the incident, except that Neal was charged with assault for shooting at two female neighbors through a wooden fence while they were walking. Neal then "jumped the fence, confronted the women, stabbed one and took a cellphone from the other," Tehama County District Attorney Gregg Cohen told Red Bluff Daily News. Authorities said one of the four individuals killed Tuesday was a female previously targeted by Neal in his neighborhood.
Neal, 43, was arrested again in February for assault with a deadly weapon, battery, crimes against an elder or dependent adult and discharging his firearm with gross negligence, among other charges outlined in Red Bluff Police Department logs. Neal was scheduled to stand trial on January 11, 2018, for the assault against the neighborhood women, with trials beginning in December.
And yet he was still able to get his hands on an AR-15 Bushmaster rifle as well as several other firearms.
As we approach the five-year anniversary of the horrifying shooting at Sandy Hook, it’s heartbreaking that we’ve made so little progress in preventing these shootings. Elementary schools like the one in Rancho Tehama Reserve shouldn’t have to prepare for mass shootings.
Hope Hicks, who worked for Trump's campaign before becoming White House communications director, will be grilled by Mueller's team as early as next week, a source told Newsweek — and the questions will center on possibly fabricated statements she helped produce about the campaign's contacts with Russian operatives during the 2016 election.
At issue is a statement provided to the media just days after the election, when Hicks flatly denied any campaign member conducted meetings with Russian representatives.
"It never happened," she said at the time, even as Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov was admitting "there were contacts" made with the Trump team. "There was no communication between the campaign and any foreign entity during the campaign."
It is increasingly clear that Hicks's statement is untrue.
I know that Trump demands absolute loyalty from his people but it is hard to imagine that this young woman would be willing to do hard time to protect that orange tinged asshole.
Pretty sure she will spill the beans.
Speaking of spilling the beans, Mueller is now also shifting some of his focus to Rep. Dana Rohrabacher. Oooh now we're talking!
As part of his investigation into Russian attempts to influence the 2016 presidential campaign, FBI special counsel Robert Mueller is questioning witnesses about a meeting that allegedly took place shortly before the election between Rep. Dana Rohrabacher and former Trump advisor Michael Flynn, NBC is reporting.
Rohrabacher (R-Costa Mesa) has long advocated for a friendlier relationship between the United States and Russia. His name has tangentially come up in relation to the investigation, but this is the first direct mention that the FBI is looking at a meeting in which Rohrabacher participated.
Rohrabacher's name has been bouncing around since this whole Russia investigation first began, I figured it was only a matter of time before the Mueller team would shift their attention his way.
I actually think there are far more American politicians besides Trump and Rohrabacher that Putin has managed to put under his control, and I am hoping that Mueller will be able to flush a number of them out into the open.
Brett J. Talley, President Trump’s nominee to be a federal judge in Alabama, has never tried a case, was unanimously rated “not qualified” by the American Bar Assn.’s judicial rating committee, has practiced law for only three years and, as a blogger last year, displayed a degree of partisanship unusual for a judicial nominee, denouncing “Hillary Rotten Clinton” and pledging support for the National Rifle Assn.
On Thursday, the Senate Judiciary Committee, on a party-line vote, approved him for a lifetime appointment to the federal bench.
Talley, 36, is part of what Trump has called the "untold story" of his success in filling the courts with young conservatives.
“The judge story is an untold story. Nobody wants to talk about it,” Trump said last month, standing alongside Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) in the White House Rose Garden. “But when you think of it, Mitch and I were saying, that has consequences 40 years out, depending on the age of the judge — but 40 years out.”
The Trumpification of America is right on track.
Unqualified judges, inexperienced cabinet members, and unrepentant sexual predators in the Senate.
Donald Trump was a change candidate alright, and just look what he has changed us into.
EPA Administrator Scott Pruitt said a newly released government report that lays most of the blame for the rise of global temperatures to human activity won't deter him from continuing to roll back the Obama-era Clean Power Plan, a major rule aimed at combating climate change.
"We’re taking the very necessary step to evaluate our authority under the Clean Air Act and we’ll take steps that are required to issue a subsequent rule. That’s our focus," Pruitt said in an interview with USA TODAY Tuesday. "Does this report have any bearing on that? No it doesn’t. It doesn’t impact the withdrawal and it doesn’t impact the replacement."
You might be asking yourself why a scientific report would have zero impact on EPA policies, considering the job they are supposed to perform, and the answer to that is because it's only some report done by scientists.
Rigorous, independent research and analysis should undergird everything the government does. Nowhere is that more true than at the Environmental Protection Agency, which crafts and enforces a wide range of regulations aimed at limiting damage to the environment — and to people — from pollutants. Democratic administrations tend to use data to justify more aggressive regulation, while Republican administrations tend to prefer a lighter touch. But the current administration is following a third path, seemingly bent on converting the EPA into a science-be-damned rubber stamp for industry. And if director Scott Pruitt is successful, we will be living in a much more dangerous environment.
So no, a report from a bunch of scientists will NOT have an impact on the polices of the EPA, because the head of the EPA, Scott Pruitt, simply does not believe in all that science mumbo jumbo.
President Trump has decided to end the CIA’s covert program to arm and train moderate Syrian rebels battling the government of Bashar al-Assad, a move long sought by Russia, according to U.S. officials.
The program was a central plank of a policy begun by the Obama administration in 2013 to put pressure on Assad to step aside, but even its backers have questioned its efficacy since Russia deployed forces in Syria two years later.
Officials said the phasing out of the secret program reflects Trump’s interest in finding ways to work with Russia, which saw the anti-Assad program as an assault on its interests.
The shuttering of the program is also an acknowledgment of Washington’s limited leverage and desire to remove Assad from power.
Officials said Trump made the decision to scrap the CIA program nearly a month ago, after an Oval Office meeting with CIA Director Mike Pompeo and national security adviser H.R. McMaster ahead of a July 7 meeting in Germany with Russian President Vladimir Putin.
If that were not troubling enough, we also have this bit of troubling news, courtesy of Bloomberg:
Secretary of State Rex Tillerson is shutting down an office that coordinates cyber issues with other countries, according to two people familiar with the plan, in a move that critics said will diminish the U.S. voice in confronting hackers.
The Office of the Coordinator for Cyber Issues, established under President Barack Obama in 2011, will be folded into the State Department’s Bureau of Economic and Business Affairs, according to the people, who asked not to be identified in advance of an announcement. The coordinator will no longer report directly to the secretary of state, going instead through the bureau’s chain of command as Tillerson pushes ahead with a department-wide reorganization, they said.
“It’s taking an issue that’s preeminent and putting it inside a backwater within the State Department,” said Robert Knake, a senior fellow for cybersecurity at the Council on Foreign Relations in Washington who was director of cybersecurity policy at the National Security Council under Obama. “Position to power matters both within the U.S. government and within the international community.”
If somebody actually believe this move will help protect us from the next cyber attack, or that it is NOT playing right into the hands of the Kremlin, then they have not been paying attention at all.
As far as I am concerned Tillerson is likely just as compromised as Donald Trump and allowing him oversight of this crucial government department is like putting the fox in charge of guarding the door to the hen house.
These are of course only a few of the things that Putin clearly demanded of Trump, and the Russian government has now become so used to getting their way in Washington that when there is a hiccup they get pissed off.
Russia said Tuesday that it is losing patience over the return of properties that the United States seized as penalty for Moscow's election interference, as tense talks between the two countries have yielded no resolution.
In Moscow, officials threatened to take "retaliatory measures" if the United States continued to "hinder" their government's diplomatic mission, and the spokesman for President Vladimir Putin said the Kremlin's patience "is expiring."
"We are still counting on the reasonableness of our American counterparts to at least bring the situation into the legal framework in accordance with the international law," said the spokesman, Dmitry Peskov.
To be clear the Russian government has done NOTHING to deserve the return of these compounds, which were taken from them in response to their very aggressive interference in our last presidential election, for which they have not yet even admitted responsibility, and yet they feel empowered to make threats?
Let's face it if America were one of Trump's casinos the roulette wheel would be rigged to land on whatever number Putin picked and the slot machine would pay off for every Russian's pull of handle.
Even as the U.S. military takes on a greater role in the warfare in Iraq and Syria, the Trump administration has stopped disclosing significant information about the size and nature of the U.S. commitment, including the number of U.S. troops deployed in either country.
Earlier this month, the Pentagon quietly dispatched 400 Marines to northern Syria to operate artillery in support of Syrian militias that are cooperating in the fight against Islamic State, according to U.S. officials. That was the first use of U.S. Marines in that country since its long civil war began.
In Iraq, nearly 300 Army paratroopers were deployed recently to help the Iraqi military in their six-month assault on the city of Mosul, according to U.S. officials.
Neither of those deployments was announced once they had been made, a departure from the practice of the Obama administration, which announced nearly all conventional force deployments.
The excuse for this is that Trump wants the element of surprise, as if the enemy is not aware when large numbers of American soldiers land on their shores unless they read it in the America press first.
What seems to actually be happening is that Trump is escalating conflicts all around the globe and keeping the American people out of the loop.
That is essentially the tactics used during the Vietnam era to keep us from knowing how many of our soldiers were fighting and dying in a war that we had already lost.
And you can bet your ass that if the Trump Administration is not going to tell us how many troops are being deployed, and where they are fighting, that there is no way they are going to keep us apprised of the casualties that result from those decisions.
Here let be take a moment to laugh at the people who claimed they were not voting for Hillary because she was a "war monger," and then further claimed that Trump was antiwar.
Americans paid more than $6.6 billion over eight years to care for victims of gun violence, according to a new tally of hospital bills. And U.S. taxpayers picked up at least 41% of that tab.
That’s just the tip of the iceberg, say the authors of a study published this week in the American Journal of Public Health. Their sum does not include the initial — and very costly — bill for gunshot victims’ care in emergency rooms. Nor does it include hospital readmissions to treat complications or provide follow-up care. The cost of rehabilitation, or of ongoing disability, is not included either.
“These are big numbers, and this is the lowest bound of these costs,” said Sarabeth A. Spitzer, a Stanford University medical student who co-wrote the study. “We were surprised” at the scale, she added.
That, arguably, makes gun-injury prevention a public health priority, Spitzer said. The GOP’s healthcare reform measure would reduce federal contributions toward Medicaid, which foots roughly 35% of the hospital bills for gunshot victims. The GOP plan would also cut payments to the hospitals that absorb much of the cost of caring for self-paying (in other words, uninsured) patients, whose hospital bills accounted for about 24% of the $730 million-per-year tab.
“These are expensive injuries,” Spitzer said.
But can we REALLY put a price on a citizen's constitutional right to bear arms?
Hell yes we can! And it is a lot less than 730 million dollars a year.
I think that every gun owner should not only be forced to register their weapon, AFTER going through a strenuous background check, but that they also be forced to purchase insurance that specifically pays for any injuries that they or others may suffer as a result of that purchase.
I can tell you that I personally do not want to pay for the hospital bills of some fool who accidentally shot himself with his own gun. In my opinion he is too dumb to live anyhow.
With President Trump now vowing to put forward a replacement for the Affordable Care Act in March, some California politicians and healthcare advocates are once again promoting the idea of a state-run “single-payer” system that operates like Medicare.
Backers say the uncertainty surrounding Trump’s promise to repeal Obamacare presents California with a chance to rethink how healthcare is delivered to its 39 million residents.
“Why wouldn’t we take this as an opportunity to create what we want in California?” Dr. Mitch Katz, head of L.A. County’s health department, said at a conference in December. He mentioned a single-payer system as a possible solution.
Other suggestions for how California can capitalize on the threat to Obamacare include creating a public option, a state-run health plan to sell on the state’s insurance exchange, and mimicking how Massachusetts provided universal healthcare.
And it is not as if California does not have reason for concern.
Courtesy of Vox:
Republican replacement plans for Obamacare would lead to significant declines in the number of Americans with health insurance coverage, according to an analysis presented Saturday at the National Governors Association and obtained by Vox.The analysis includes graphs on what the Republican plan to overhaul Obamacare’s tax credits, generally making them less generous, would do. They are based on the recent 19-page proposal that Republican leadership released about their plan to repeal and replace Obamacare.
The report estimates what would happen in a hypothetical state with 300,000 people in the individual market that has also expanded Medicaid. In the individual market, enrollment would fall 30 percent and 90,000 people would become uninsured.
California has almost 39 million people, that means multiple millions would potentially lose their coverage.
By the way yesterday Trump said that "Nobody knew that health care could be so complicated."
Actually EVERYBODY knew. Except Donald Trump apparently.
And if he listened to those who knew this (The Democrats.) he might understand that the best thing he could do would be to leave the Affordable Care Act in place and work to improve it.
President Obama says he plans to stay in Washington after the end of his presidency so that his younger daughter can finish high school with her class, a rare disclosure about his family's personal plans.
During a visit with voters in Milwaukee on Thursday, Obama said he wasn't sure where he and wife Michelle Obama would settle down for the long term, but added that they were putting off the decision until daughter Sasha finished at Washington's Sidwell Friends School in spring 2019.
"Transferring someone in the middle of high school — tough," Obama told a group of people gathered to have lunch with him at a Milwaukee restaurant.
I am sometimes impressed by gifted politicians, but great parents are the people I admire the most.
And my admiration for President Obama just went through the roof.
(House and Senate Budget Committee) chairmen announced that they won't bother to hold the customary hearing on the president's annual budget proposal — a proposal that Congress has required presidents to submit since 1921 — before coming up with its own, nonbinding budget resolution for fiscal 2017.
The message to the administration, in short: We don't want to work with you. But we're still going to cry foul if you don't work with us.
In case it wasn't clear enough, here's what House Budget Committee Chairman Tom Price (R-Ga.) said about the decision not to hold a hearing:
"Nothing in the president's prior budgets — none of which have ever balanced — has shown that the Obama Administration has any real interest in actually solving our fiscal challenges or saving critical programs like Medicare and Social Security from insolvency. Rather than spend time on a proposal that, if anything like this Administration's previous budgets, will double down on the same failed policies that have led to the worst economic recovery in modern times, Congress should continue our work on building a budget that balances and that will foster a healthy economy."
Short version: Obama doesn't share our priorities (no, really?), so we're not going to give the administration the chance to talk about his.
I actually have a lot I wold like to say about this, but to be honest it really just comes down to three words, "Fuck the Republicans."
They have done this same crap since the night that President Obama was inaugurated, and clearly they have no intention of stopping until he is no longer in the White House.
And not even then really, because you know this is not going to end right?
I mean do you really think they are going to be any more willing to work with Bernie Sanders the "Socialist" or Hillary Clinton who they have spent two decades vilifying?
Oh hell no.
And literally the ONLY thing that could make it worse is if we allow a Republican into the Oval Office.
A bid by Bill Cosby’s lawyers to have the sexual assault charges against the entertainer dismissed was rejected by a judge here Wednesday evening, clearing the way for a potential trial.
The judge, Steven O’Neill, said that he found “no basis to grant the relief request” by the attorneys. They had mounted a case over the last two days arguing that former Montgomery County Dist. Atty. Bruce Castor had made a non-prosecution agreement with the comedian’s lawyer more than a decade ago.
Cosby has been charged with three felony counts of aggravated indecent assault stemming from a 2004 interaction involving drugs and alcohol with former Temple University basketball staffer Andrea Constand.
I am still not convinced that Cosby will face any jail time, but I think it will be cathartic for not only his victims, but all victims of sexual assault, to see that even money and fame cannot protect these assholes from justice.
I will predict that if Cosby is convicted of ANY of these charges that it will open a floodgate which will see multiple assault charges brought against attackers who their victims once saw as untouchable.
Sarah Palin, who is in town this week to flog her latest book, no longer has the ability to overshadow the Republican presidential field. But while everybody’s favorite former Alaska governor may have flamed out as a national political candidate, she succeeded in catalyzing a movement that may well become known "Trumpism."
“A lot of the forces we see coalescing around Donald Trump were the people we saw at Sarah Palin rallies in 2008,” said David Axelrod, a CNN political commentator and architect of Barack Obama’s political rise.
Seven years ago, said Axelrod, Palin inspired a voting bloc that seems to be flocking to Trump.
“He has a similar appeal to her because he is an anti-establishment voice and very much speaks for alienated, non-college educated, white voters who have been left out of this economy and feel their voices aren’t heard in Washington,” Axelrod said. “Having observed the 2008 election and what’s happened since, you’d have to say a lot of things began with her.”
This is of course what we have been saying here all along. And also why I have continued to cover Palin through all of her highs and lows, when many others thought she was yesterday's news.
While it's true that Palin no longer has the political power she once did, she is still the source of a lot of the craziness we see permeating the politics of today.
It was after all Palin who helped to galvanize support against Obamacare with her "death panels" bullshit.
It was also Palin who helped publicize and promote the fledgling Tea Party which has now metastasized into a cancer that is eating away at the body of the Republican party.
She also used her waning influence to endorse certain candidates like Ted Cruz, who is now one of the most dedicated saboteurs in Washington.
And yes the Donald Trump supporters are indeed the disenfranchised, knuckle draggers that we saw at her 2008 rallies.
That is almost impossible to deny if you listen to the language coming from his supporters, like the racist and neo-Nazi crap overheard during his rally right before the debate.
If you close your eyes you will find yourself almost immediately transported back seven years to when these inbred racist POS first crawled out of the woodwork.
And now they have a new standard bearer. Is it any wonder that Palin is rushing to his defense and sniffing around his coattails?
Seeking tighter controls over firearm purchases, the Obama administration is pushing to ban Social Security beneficiaries from owning guns if they lack the mental capacity to manage their own affairs, a move that could affect millions whose monthly disability payments are handled by others.
The push is intended to bring the Social Security Administration in line with laws regulating who gets reported to the National Instant Criminal Background Check System, or NICS, which is used to prevent gun sales to felons, drug addicts, immigrants in the country illegally and others.
A potentially large group within Social Security are people who, in the language of federal gun laws, are unable to manage their own affairs due to "marked subnormal intelligence, or mental illness, incompetency, condition, or disease."
Seems fair to me. If you are too mentally impaired to pay your bills on time, or make change for a dollar, you probably should not be trusted with a weapon.
In my opinion there are a whole lot of Americans running around armed to the teeth who really should not even be trusted with a sharpened stick.
Told of the plan, head NRA lobbyist Chris Cox issued a statement opposing the "executive fiat" and saying "the NRA stands ready to pursue all available avenues to stop them in their tracks."
(Okay who predicted this? I did that's who!) Politicians just don't get it. Their "Death Panels" still won't die. Last night Obamacare masterminds decided they'll pay healthcare providers for vulnerable patients' "end-of-life” plans. Remember that's the strange, intrusive, unaffordable, and unnecessary scheme that was actually stripped from Obamacare five years ago, once we "found out what's in it." (Actually she means "lied about what's in it.") So now that part of this socialistic healthcare takeover is back, but yesterday's decision isn't the entire point here.
Be clear, media. Think. Do your homework. Remember when coining “death panel” I focused on the dangers of rationing healthcare services – as it's the inevitable result of any government takeover of healthcare. I was right about this then, and I’m still right about it today. Do your dang homework – you've even admitted I was right, so don't claim I'm "universally discredited" on it. (No they did their "dang" homework and you were universally discredited.") Got it? In fact, even democrats now agree about “death panel" dangers they've found in Obamacare – specifically in the role that unelected, faceless bureaucrats on the Independent Payment Advisory Board (IPAB) will play in determining who will get government's limited supply of care, whose care will be covered, and they'll dangerously decide who will be denied. (Okay so here Palin is conflating two separate issues. Yes there is a point past where medical insurance will not pay for procedures deemed hopeless, and in the old days some insurance carriers would make that decision when the survivability of the patient was still quite viable, but the end-of-life plans are to pay physicians for their time helping a person accept that they have come to the end of their lives, IF they ask for that service, and providing support for them and their families in coping with that fact. It is not about cutting off funds, it is about providing funds.)
Media coverage of my position on this is skewed; as usual they got it wrong. (Nope, They are, if you'll pardon the pun, dead right.) I'm calling you out, L.A. Times. You underestimate the wisdom of the people with your claim that I'm "discredited."
(Okay now hear Palin is referring to this article by the LA Times pointing out how she was wrong about the "death panels." And bizarrely Palin then conducts an interview WITH HERSELF on behalf of the LA Times to answer questions she claims to have received from them.) Here's my response to one of your colleague's questions last night about the death panels:
Ms. Reporter - thanks for asking. On the record ("On the record?" How can it be on the record if there is no reporter to put it on the record?):
There's no denying that the ultimate fix for Obamacare's unsustainable, unaffordable promises is rationed care. Rationed care decided upon by a panel of faceless bureaucrats who, rational people like me will argue, will measure a person's worth using disagreeable criteria as they justify doling out limited government-controlled care. That, my friend, is a death panel.
1. Does this still concern you as possibly leading to death panels or encouraging doctors to deny care to save costs?
It doesn’t just lead to “death panels” it confirms even further that this “Affordable Care Act” is nothing of the sort, and more importantly it just affords government permission to deny care. (Nope, that is false. And if there were an actual reporter here they would call Palin on this lie.) This decision does not take into consideration the importance of every individual, nor the sanctity of life, as many of us have said for years. Certainly, all patients and families should be advised of options, but we engage in that today and we don't need government bribing any party to do so. (Actually insurance companies have been denying services to patients for years, THAT is why there has been such a outcry for the government to step in and regulate them so that people with preexisting conditions were not denied coverage and people with chronic illnesses were not kicked off of their insurance policies. THAT is what the Affordable Care Act helped to rectify.) See, Obamacare is about unnecessary government intervention and, ultimately, it's all about government control. Government needs to stay the hell out of our "end-of-life" discussions. I'm so angry at democrat and republican politicians who just rolled their eyes when I, and many others, rose up with warnings that each step forward taken by champions of this socialist program would jerk back two steps from every free American and our God-given rights. (There were no "God-given rights" when it came to insurance coverage. There were "insurance company rights" and now with Obamacare people have a whole lot more of them.) Life is not about the almighty dollar and someone's arbitrary decisions about who deserves rationed health care; life is sacred because it's provided by our Creator and in itself deserves to be treated with respect and dignity. Speaking of dollars, a bloated bureaucracy and weak-kneed politicians sent millions of Americans into financial distress, unseen in history, with this leftist scheme called Obamacare. (Also not true. In fact some insurance companies even refunded money to customers due to a provision in the Affordable Care Act which forces them to do so if they are not spending 80% of their premiums on actual medical care.) 2. Do you have any concerns about doctors and nurse practitioners being paid or encouraged to have end-of-life planning questions?
Concerns? More than concerns! For anyone who's had health issues – from welcoming the blessing of a new life, to the frightening and unfortunate aspects of life – answering a government questionnaire that will be judged by faceless bureaucrats just doesn’t cut it. The Hippocratic Oath taken by our care providers is one of the oldest, most sacred binding oaths, and through any iterations it has never condoned the taking of innocent life through lack of care, and certainly not via direct action. If you've recently received care then you know the many intrusive, personal questions that government mandates a provider probe. Be aware that most of these questions are for the benefit of a far-away, bankrupt government, they're not for the benefit of the patient. It is happening in our assisted living facilities, our nursing homes, hospitals, doctors’ offices, and schools, despite many providers who disagree with the mandate but are forced or coerced to provide answers to the death panel of the fed. (Okay now if there had been a REAL reporter conducting this interview, this would be about where she snapped and went "What in the fuck are you babbling about? I can't hand this in to my editors! Their first question to me would why did I conduct an interview with a person who was clearly high on methamphetamines!".)
- Sarah Palin
Palin then links to this video which she seems to think proves her point.
Yeah how do you like that for seizure inducing editing? (Did she actually have Stephen Colbert on there making her side of the argument? Maybe she should watch his show before including him in her clip.)
Wow first it was crosshairs, and now it's death panels, I feel like I'm trapped in some weird Palin time warp.
So is this what happens when Palin loses her spot on Fox News and TAPP kicks her to the curb? Just endless summer reruns?
I will assume her next post will be one arguing that "Dammit! I was too pregnant!"
Amazingly, there are still some holdouts in the political and economic community who insist that the Obama stimulus failed--that is, failed to arrest a steep fall in economic output and launch a period of growth in gross domestic product, jobs, stock market valuations, and other metrics that continues to this day.
Menzie Chinn of the University of Wisconsin and Jeffrey Frankel of Harvard (and a former Clinton administration economics advisor) have just ganged up on the stimulus deniers. Their analyses are timely, since the stimulus has just passed its fifth birthday: The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act was signed into law on Feb. 17, 2009.
Chinn observes (and shows his work via a series of telling slides) that the launch of ARRA coincides almost exactly with the bottoming out of the stock market, the reversal of a trend of increasing negative GDP growth and an almost unbroken record of positive growth since the end of the first quarter of 2009.
"The burden of proof," he writes, "lies on those who assert the beginning of the recovery is due to anything, anything (Fed balance sheet expansion, TARP — both implemented six months earlier –, sunspots, or the return of Ancient Aliens) but the policies implemented by the Obama Administration."
I have heard a number of so-called "economists" on Fox News and CNN claiming that the stimulus did nothing, but all evidence proves their contention incorrect.
History will prove that what President Obama did to save the economy was just this side of miraculous, until then it falls to good liberals to right the good fight of facts against purposeful misinformation.
Divorce is higher among religiously conservative Protestants – and even drives up divorce rates for other people living around them, a new study finds.
The study, slated to be published in the American Journal of Sociology, tackles the “puzzling paradox” of why divorce is more common in religiously conservative “red” states. If religious conservatives believe firmly in the value of marriage, why is divorce especially high in places like Alabama and Arkansas?
To figure that out, researchers from the University of Texas and the University of Iowa analyzed county divorce statistics against information from an earlier study of religious congregations. They categorized Protestant denominations that believe the Bible is literally true as "conservative Protestants."
Researchers discovered that higher divorce rates among conservative Protestants were tied to earlier marriages and childbearing – factors known to ramp up divorce. Starting families earlier tends to stop young adults from pursuing more education and depresses their wages, putting more strain on marriages, University of Texas at Austin professor Jennifer Glass said.
But the study went a step further: Glass and another researcher also discovered that people living in areas with lots of conservative Protestants were at higher risk of getting divorced, even if they weren’t conservative Protestants themselves.
And these are the people who want to "protect the sanctity of marriage" from the gays.
Kind of late for that, now isn't it?
To be fair I myself am twice divorced so I don't get to throw stones.
However I could mention that my second wife was the daughter of a minister, and that my first became a Fundamentalist right after we split up as my excuse. However that would be blaming others for my failings and I don't do that.
People fall out of love all the time. It happens.
However it just feels especially ironic to have so many from a group that places so much importance on the institution and who want to deny it to others.
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