Part 21--November, 2010

* 11/3/10--WASHINGTON – Republicans reaped a windfall from independent voters and tea party activists to seize control of the House in midterm elections, gained seats in the Senate and served notice Wednesday they will confront President Barack Obama with a conservative agenda to cut government and spur private-sector jobs. "We've been given a second chance and a golden opportunity," Rep. Eric Cantor of Virginia, No. 2 Republican in the House, said as his party prepared to usher in an era of divided government. He called the outcome a rejection of Obama more than an endorsement of the GOP, cautioning fellow Republicans they must to work to win public confidence. "People want to see results," he said on CBS's "The Early Show." "They want to see the government go on a diet just like they have." Republicans scored the biggest party turnover in more than 70 years Tuesday with their win in the House and, in doing so, will dethrone Democratic Rep. Nancy Pelosi — a prime target of their campaign — who had crashed a political glass ceiling and made history with her elevation to speaker four years ago. Nevada Sen. Harry Reid, the Senate majority leader, overcame a tea party challenge from Republican Sharron Angle in one of the election's most brutally fought races....Incomplete returns showed the GOP picked up at least 60 House seats and led for four more, far in excess of what was needed for a majority. About two dozen races remained too close to call. On their night of triumph, Republicans also gained at least six Senate seats, and tea party favorites Paul in Kentucky, Mike Lee in Utah and Marco Rubio in Florida were among their winners....The GOP also wrested 10 governorships from the Democrats, Ohio and Pennsylvania among them, and gave two back, California and Hawaii.--AP


* 11/3/10--This is an unusual Morning Briefing because you need to understand what happened while you've been sleeping. Republican gains are massive. And when I say Republican gains are massive, I mean tsunami. No, the GOP did not take the Senate and some races are still outstanding, but the Senate GOP has moved to the right. More so, the Republicans picking up, in the worst case, seven seats is historically strong. But consider that as you wake up this morning the Republican Party has picked up more seats in the House of Representatives than at any time since 1948 - that is more than sixty seats. Ike Skelton, Class of 1976, is gone. Many, many other Democrats are gone. That, in and of itself, is significant. But that's not the half of it. The real story is the underreported story of the night - the Republican pick ups at the state level. There will be 18 states subject to reapportionment. The Republicans will control a majority of those - at least ten and maybe a dozen or more. More significantly, a minimum of seventeen state legislative houses have flipped to the Republican Party. The North Carolina Legislature is Republican for the first time since 1870. Yes, that is Eighteen Seventy. The Alabama Legislature is Republican for the first time since 1876. For those saying this is nothing because it is the South, consider these: The entire Wisconsin and New Hampshire legislatures have flipped to the GOP by wide margins. The State Houses in Indiana, Pennsylvania, Michigan, Ohio, Iowa, Montana, and Colorado flipped to the GOP. The Maine and Minnesota Senates flipped to the GOP. The Texas and Tennessee Houses went from virtually tied to massive Republican gains. The gains in Texas were so big that the Republicans no longer need the Democrats to get state constitutional amendments out of the state legislature. These gains go all the way down to the municipal level across the nation. That did not happen even in 1994. This was a tsunami.-redstate.com

* 11/3/10--Neither rookies nor seasoned veterans were spared in Tuesday's House Democratic bloodbath, which saw Republicans defeat three major committee chairmen and at least seven lawmakers who claimed 20 years' seniority or more in Congress. While the losses of 16 freshmen "Obama babies" — those elected during the president's 2008 sweep — were expected, the number of long-serving Democrats who lost re-election this week is staggering, and suggests a widespread dissatisfaction with Washington. All told, with about a dozen races still uncalled, Democrats have already shed 376 years of congressional experience, and that could go as high as 430 years if five other Democrats lose races in which returns show they are trailing.--Washington Times

* 11/4/10--The Federal Reserve, in a dramatic effort to rev up a "disappointingly slow" economic recovery, said it will buy $600 billion of U.S. government bonds over the next eight months to drive down interest rates and encourage more borrowing and growth. Many outside the Fed, and some inside, see the move as a 'Hail Mary' pass by Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke. He embraced highly unconventional policies during the financial crisis to ward off a financial-system collapse. But a year and a half later, he confronts an economy hobbled by high unemployment, a gridlocked political system and the threat of a Japan-like period of deflation, or a debilitating fall in consumer prices. --wsj.com

* 11/4/10--WASHINGTON -- The Republican takeover of the House has Rep. Charlie Rangel playing beat the clock to finish his ethics trial while his "friends" are still in charge. The embattled Harlem Democrat will have to hurry to wrap up the congressional trial on 13 ethics violations during a short lame-duck session this month. Otherwise, he could face a much tougher ethics panel put together by the new Republican majority when the next session of Congress convenes in January. --NY Post

* 11/4/10--US private sector employment rose 43,000 in October, exceeding expectations, according to the ADP employment report released Wednesday. Analysts forecast a 22,000 increase in private sector jobs last month. Employment in the service-producing sector rose 77,000, while the goods-producing sector fell by 34,000. On Friday, the US government will report nonfarm payrolls for October. Economists are looking for a gain of 70,000, compared with a decline of 95,000 in the prior month. The unemployment rate is expected to rise to 9.7 percent from 9.6 percent.--Marketwatch/Newscore, NY Post

* 11/4/10--The number of workers who filed new applications for unemployment benefits in the US jumped 20,000 to 457,000, reversing a sharp decline from the week before. Economists expected initial claims to climb to a seasonally-adjusted 445,000 in the week ended Oct. 30. Claims for last week were revised up by 3,000 to 437,000, according to US Labor Department data. The latest increase put weekly claims back to the same level as the end of 2009, meaning there has been no change this year. Continuing claims, which reflect workers already receiving benefits, dropped 42,000 to 4.34 million.--Marketwatch/Newscore

* 11/4/10--State officials did release numbers but left out the numbers for Bridgeport entirely: Foley has 556,787 votes without Bridgeport. Malloy, and Malloy’s Working Families party have a combined 548,347. That’s a difference of 8,409 votes without the state’s largest city, which tends to vote for Democrats--nbcconnecticut.com

* 11/5/10--In what has become one of the stranger twists in an already bizarre Governor's race, a bag of uncounted ballots was found in Bridgeport Thursday night. Republican officials were approached by Democratic operatives and told about the surprise ballot bag, according to Bridgeport GOP Chairman Marc Delmonico. “It adds to the inconsistencies from the Democratic Party in Bridgeport. It just keeps adding to it,” said Delmonico. “There’s nothing odd about it; there’s certainly nothing missing about it,” said Ed Maley, a representative for the Democratic Party.--nbcconnecticut.com

* 11/5/10--(Bloomberg) -- Unemployment probably held near 10 percent in October, evidence of what the Federal Reserve called the “disappointingly slow” U.S. recovery, economists said before a report today. The jobless rate was 9.6 percent for a third month, according to the median of 80 estimates in a Bloomberg News survey. Unemployment has been at 9.5 percent or higher since August 2009, a record stretch of such elevated readings since monthly data began six decades ago. Payrolls likely rose by 60,000, the first gain since May, economists also predicted.

* 11/5/10--The inverse silver lining to today's jobs report that will be lost in the shuffle of what is perceived as a good NFP (despite consistent initial jobless claims of around 450K, which means that either there is a massive data error, or the rate of job creation has somehow surged) is that labor force participation has now dropped to the lowest rate it has been since 1984, at 64.5%. Assuming a reversion to the long-term average participation rate of 66%, means that the civilian labor force is in reality 157.4 million as opposed to the disclosed 153.9 million, a delta of 3.5 million currently unaccounted for. Maybe someone can ask the president during his imminent press conference what happened to the unemployed population, which would have been 18.3 if this labor force delta was incorporated, resulting in an unemployment rate of 11.6%.-zerohedge.com

* 11/5/10--A top UN panel on Friday called for increased taxes on carbon emissions and international transport to raise 100 billion dollars a year to combat climate change. The group led by the prime ministers of Norway and Ethiopia also said there could be a tax on international financial transactions.--breitbart.com

* 11/6/10--Hartford, Conn. -- Democrat Dan Malloy has won Connecticut's gubernatorial election after days of back-and-forth over vote totals and irregularities. The Associated Press' count shows Malloy winning by 7,762 votes. Secretary of the State Susan Bysiewicz posted unofficial tallies that showed Malloy leading Republican Tom Foley by 5,637 votes. --AP

* 11/6/10--WASHINGTON -- Hours before departing for India yesterday, President Obama acknowledged the unpopularity of his major policies but insisted that Americans would like them if they knew more about them. "I think that, over the course of two years, we were so busy and so focused on getting a bunch of stuff done that we stopped paying attention to the fact that leadership isn't just legislation -- that it's a matter of persuading people and giving them confidence and bringing them together and setting a tone," Obama said in an interview that will air Sunday night on "60 Minutes." "Making an argument that people can understand -- I think that we haven't always been successful at that," Obama said. "And I take personal responsibility for that, and it's something that I've got to examine carefully . . . as I go forward." The president's comments -- coming three days after what he called a "shellacking" of Democrats at the polls -- had Republicans guffawing that Obama would claim once again that it's not that people don't want his policies, it's just that he failed to sell them. "Mr. President: It's not the message, it's your job-killing policies," said a statement issued yesterday by House Republicans, who won back the chamber by a wide margin in Tuesday's elections. Republicans eagerly pointed out that there were only 21 days in the first year of his administration when Obama did not hold a public or press event, which are almost always used to sell policies to the public. In his first year, Obama "participated in 42 press conferences, gave 158 interviews (including five Sunday shows in one day), held 23 town-hall meetings and seven campaign rallies," Republicans noted. Last month, when White House officials saw the looming political bloodshed and began trotting out the argument that Obama had merely failed to explain how much Americans should like his policies, Republicans countered with a sampling of headlines from the last year. "Obama the Omnipresent," "Too Much Obama?" and "Obama Saturation" were three examples indicating that the president had been talking plenty. At one point in the "60 Minutes" interview, the president complained that many of the steps that were taken early in his presidency, such as the auto and bank bailouts and the stimulus package, made people say, "Boy, this feels as if there's a huge expansion of government." When interviewer Steve Kroft replied, "Well, it was a huge expansion of government," Obama repeated his message that he didn't adequately sell his plan. "What I didn't effectively, I think, drive home, because we were in such a rush to get this stuff done, is that we were . . . taking these steps not because of some theory that we wanted to expand government. It was because we had an emergency situation and we wanted to make sure the economy didn't go off a cliff." --Chas. Hurt, NY Post

* 11/6/10--President Barack Obama and First Lady Michelle arrived in India's commercial hub of Mumbai on Saturday, days after voters punished his Democrats in mid-term elections. Probably not since the days of the Pharaohs or the more ludicrous Roman Emperors has a head of state travelled in such pomp and expensive grandeur as the President of the United States of America. While lesser mortals – the Pope, Queen Elizabeth and so on – are usually happy to let their hosts handle most of the security and transport arrangements when they venture beyond their home shores, the United States creates a mini-America on the move to ensure that nothing is left to chance. --dailymail.co.uk

* 11/6/10--$10.2 trillion: The amount of money advanced-nation governments will need to borrow in 2011. As the debts of advanced countries rise to levels not seen since the aftermath of World War II, it’s hard to know how much is too much. But it’s easy to see that the risk of serious financial trouble is growing. Next year, fifteen major developed-country governments, including the U.S., Japan, the U.K., Spain and Greece, will have to raise some $10.2 trillion to repay maturing bonds and finance their budget deficits, according to estimates from the International Monetary Fund. That’s up 7% from this year, and equals 27% of their combined annual economic output. Aside from Japan, which has a huge debt hangover from decades of anemic growth, the U.S. is the most extreme case. Next year, the U.S. government will have to find $4.2 trillion. That’s 27.8% of its annual economic output, up from 26.5% this year. By comparison, crisis-addled Greece needs $69 billion, or 23.8% of its annual GDP.--wsj.com

* 11/7/10--NEW ORLEANS (Reuters) – Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu told Vice President Joe Biden on Sunday that only a credible military threat can deter Iran from building a nuclear weapon, Israeli political sources said. In comments signaling growing Israeli impatience with diplomacy, the sources said Netanyahu, beginning a five-day U.S. visit, argued that economic sanctions have failed to persuade Iran to stop its nuclear program. Netanyahu and Biden met on the sidelines of an American Jewish conference in New Orleans that both are due to address, and also discussed Israeli-Palestian peace talks suspended in a dispute over building in settlements in the West Bank.

* 11/7/10--Calif. borrows $40 million a day to pay unemployment. With one in every eight workers unemployed and empty state coffers, California is borrowing billions of dollars from the federal government to pay unemployment insurance. The Los Angeles Times reports that the state owes $8.6 billion already, and will have to come up with a $362-million payment to Washington by the end of next September. The continued borrowing means federal unemployment insurance taxes are going to increase, upping the annual payroll costs $21 a year per worker. California tops the list of 32 states that have borrowed a total of $41 billion to pay claims. The state took out its first loan from the federal government early last year, to deal with rising payment of benefits and number of claims.--AP

* 11/8/10--NEW YORK — Democrats cannot spin Tuesday’s election as an anti-incumbent exercise. Rather, it was Washington, D.C.’s biggest mid-term shift in party power since 1938. At this writing, no sitting Republican senator and only two GOP House members lost re-election. Meanwhile, two Senate and 49 House Democrats — including the Armed Services, Budget, and Transportation Committee chairmen— will clear their desks and go home. (Several tight tallies could shift those numbers.) The American people gagged on government — gargantuan, profligate, and pugilistic — especially in its domestic quintessence: ObamaCare. Calls to repeal the Democrats’ wheezing contraption grew louder Tuesday. Voters shunned the few Democrats who shouted their support for ObamaCare. Senator Russ Feingold of Wisconsin and Representatives Tom Perriello of Virginia and North Dakota’s Earl Pomeroy were the only incumbent contenders who waved their ObamaCare pom-poms. Voters sacked the trio. Conversely, Governor Joe Manchin (D – West Virginia) seemed trapped in Charleston until he said this in mid-October: ObamaCare “needs to have a lot of it repealed. If you can’t fix that, repeal the whole thing.” His numbers rose, and he won.--Deroy Murdock, Human Events

* 11/8/10--The United States got a grilling last week at the UN Human Rights Council, where its unmatched ac complishments went on trial before a jury of killers, er, peers. You see, in the upside-down world of the UN, countries like China, Pakistan and Saudi Arabia are recognized as de fenders of human rights -- holding coveted seats on the council. President Bush refused to join this farce, but the Obama gang naturally jumped right on board. So on Friday our nation faced its Periodic Universal Review, where UN officials, enemy states and left-wing activists offer a public indictment of America. Among the violations they've outlined:

* Covert CIA operations.

* Cops with Tasers.

* America's federalist system.

* The decades-long economic embargo of Cuba.

* Gun-control laws, as in the lack thereof.

* The continuing imprisonment of confessed cop-killer Mumia abu-Jamal (born Wesley Cook).

* And, of course, that hardy perennial, the infamous detention facility at Guantanamo Bay. In particular, Iran, Cuba and Venezuela joined together to bash Washington for its alleged abuses -- an amusing case of inmates in charge of the asylum. Not so funny is the fact that the Obama administration is taking their indictments quite seriously. One top State Department official responded: "While we are proud of our achievements, we are not satisfied with the status quo." What? Free Mumia? Close Gitmo? Strip the cops of non-lethal weapons? Is that what the department is saying? To be sure, loose words come easy to O & Co. Remember when an administration official apologized to China for Arizona's "troubling" immigration law? But there is nothing to be gained from civil discourse with the likes of Tehran, Beijing and Caracas. It's past time to quit the UN Human Rights Council.--NY Post Editorial

* 11/9/10--Possibly the most important event of the vice president's day Tuesday is to meet at 2:15 with Earl Devaney. Everyone knows him as chairman of the Recovery Accountability and Transparency Board -- the top guy monitoring the gazillion-dollar stimulus and the overdue economic recovery, and ensuring that the taxpayers financing same know all about it. However, no one outside the room will know what goes on in that Biden-Devaney meeting. That's because the government meeting on government transparency has been closed.--latimes.com

* 11/10/10-While we are constantly being schooled in how insensitive we are to Muslims and how we should be bowing to the idea of a Ground Zero mega-mosque, or are being admonished for not embracing the Sharia, the state of wartime siege continues unabated. The Muslim world is under no such mandate to reach out or reciprocate. They only have to demand, and the West apologizes. The war that no one will talk about for fear of reprisals blazes on. And when the brave actually do talk about it, they are relegated to the pile of racist-islamophobic-antimuslim-bigots. This schema defies reason. The rise and resurrection of Islamic jihad, and its ensuing war on the west, rages on, thanks to the largest transfer of wealth in history from Western societies to petrol-rich Muslim nations and an incomprehensible, suicidal surrender of our once-exalted values system. Now the West chooses to respect barbarism and eschew the decent and the good. We live in a constant state of low-grade war. And with each new Muslim attack, we lose a right. We lose a freedom. We have to adhere to some new restriction or loss of privacy. You cannot enter a major building in New York City without being carded. (I am not sure what illegal aliens do. Perhaps they are given a free pass -- as in so many things.) There are daily brutal, bloody attacks by Muslim supremacists across the world, and the major concern is not to discuss or insult Islam. The only accepted dialogue is dawah, Islamic supremacist-dictated terms of dialogue (in mosques no less). The general silence from the mainstream media and our governing officials on last weekend's wholesale slaughter of Christians praying in a Church is indicative of how decayed, empty, and morally inverted our leaders and media have become. The slaughter of the churchgoers in Baghdad was a crime against humanity. And there are thousands of stories of Islamic slaughter, but the lambs remain silent. Have we become so inured to Islamic jihad that human life is cheap to us as well? We have relinquished our most basic human right -- free speech. The media self-censors; our political leaders self-censor and obey the Sharia rule of not insulting Islam. We are not permitted to identify the enemy; doing so is "hate speech." According to the Department of Defense and media elites, the motive behind the Fort Hood jihad remains a "mystery." Yet Major Hasan's proposed "insanity" defense is dashed by the "premassacre preparations," his business card, his dawah before jihad, and his Powerpoint presentation. So crippled have our military and other branches of government become by this self-imposed Sharia (do not insult Islam!) that despite the staggering loss of U.S. soldiers, the chief concern of Army chief Casey in the bloody aftermath of the Fort Hood jihad was that "speculation could potentially heighten backlash against some of our Muslim soldiers and what happened at Fort Hood was a tragedy, but I believe it would be an even greater tragedy if our diversity becomes a casualty here." That was the concern. Meanwhile, every aspect of the daily social fabric of our life has changed. There was a time when air travel was fun, exciting. Instead it has become wretched, like entering into Sing Sing on the first day of a prison sentence. This, too, is part of the war. The time lost, the hassle. And think of the money. Vast wealth is being spent on this inane strategy, "Operation Fetal Position," instead of being spent on vanquishing our enemy (which we could do in a heartbeat with the will). Think of the ridiculous TSA, another huge bureaucratic agency created at the insistence of the Democrats. Bush did not want to create another bloated government agency. He wanted to keep it in the private sector, but the Democrats could not resist another parasitic, money-sucking agency, replete with all the entitlements of government mooching and looting. And now, in Britain, our stupidity is being exploited for cash. It's just the next stage of the West's ongoing Operation Fetal Position.--americanthinker.com

* 11/11/10--There might not have been a second round of quantitative easing, if Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke shopped at Walmart. A new pricing survey of products sold at the world’s largest retailer showed a 0.6 percent price increase in just the last two months, according to MKM Partners. At that rate, prices would be close to four percent higher a year from now, double the Fed’s mandate. The “inaugural price survey shows a small, but meaningful increase on an 86-item grocery basket,” said Patrick McKeever, MKM Partners analyst, in a note. Most of the items McKeever chose to track were every day items like food and detergent and made by national brands. On November 3, the Fed announced its much-anticipated purchase of $600 billion in Treasury securities. An effort to keep market rates low since the central bank’s benchmark rate is already at zero. The Federal Open Market Committee’s statement said, “Currently, the unemployment rate is elevated, and measures of underlying inflation are somewhat low, relative to levels that the Committee judges to be consistent, over the longer run, with its dual mandate.” But since that statement, interest rates have actually gone up, backfiring on a Fed chief who wants his quantitative easing to spark inflation of 2 percent annually. A moderate amount of inflation would be considered good for the economy. The problem is that inflation is already running well above a healthy level, investors said, Bernanke is just not looking in the right place, like a Walmart.-cnbc.com

* 11/11/10--WASHINGTON -- Today is Veterans Day. Do you know where your president is? With his feeble flame of "hope" thoroughly doused here in the United States by last week's elections, President Obama has set out around the globe in search of throngs still enthralled by his flowery rhetoric. He found them, of course, in Indonesia this week by telling them about how Americans must stop mistrusting Islam. So that is why your president is halfway around the world instead of being here in the United States to celebrate the sacrifices American soldiers, sailors and airmen have made around the world to keep the real, still-burning flame of freedom alive. Obama honored our veterans from afar by laying a wreath during a ceremony at an Army base in South Korea last night. That is a distance from here matched only by the chasm that has opened up between him and the voters who elected him two years ago. This aloofness of his really is becoming a problem. Not that Obama doesn't appreciate the sacrifices of veterans. He absolutely does. Just ask the Indonesians. He was in Jakarta for their Heroes Day this week to honor their veterans "who have sacrificed on behalf of this great country." "This great country," of course, being Indonesia. "When my stepfather was a boy, he watched his own father and older brother leave home to fight and die in the struggle for Indonesian independence," Obama told the audience. And the White House wonders why so many people think there is something foreign about this guy. In the same speech, Obama gave voice to a harsh criticism he has heard about freely elected governments. "Today, we sometimes hear that democracy stands in the way of economic progress," he said. The shocking statement raises the question: Where has Obama heard this fatuous claim and with whom has he been talking politics? Thankfully, your president tepidly disputed this calumny against democracy, but the alarming questions remain. He went on to tell the Indonesians, "Democracy is messy." "Not everyone likes the results of every election. You go through ups and downs," he said. At least it sounds like Obama is starting to get the message voters sent him last week.--Charles Hurt, NY Post

* 11/12/10--Well, that didn't take long. According to Clinton-appointed U.S. District Judge Vicki Miles-LaGrange, 70 percent of Oklahoma voters are wrong and one man is right. That man is Muneer Awad, who is the head of the Council on American-Islamic Relations for Oklahoma. He filed suit to block the adoption of the state constitutional amendment to prevent judges from considering international or Sharia Law in their decisions, claiming the amendment "stigmatizes his religion." Miles-LaGrange agreed, and the state cannot now certify the results of its election until a Nov. 22 hearing where Miles-LaGrange will rule on whether to grant a preliminary injunction to block the amendment. Awad filed suit because he claims his will, which is based on Islamic law, would be made invalid by the amendment. "We are humbled by this opportunity to show our fellow Oklahomans that Muslims are their neighbors and that we are committed to upholding the U.S. Constitution and promoting the benefits of a pluralistic society," he said. Awad didn't comment on whether those benefits of a "pluralistic society" would include honor killings or stonings of adulterous women, both of which are permissible in some interpretations of Sharia law.--Patriot Post Digest

* 11/12/10--Sen. John Kerry (D-MA) is so busy lamenting the "know-nothingism" of America that he has "forgotten" to pay the $400,000 state tax bill on his $7 million, 76-foot yacht. Just as he promised several years ago to release his full military records without result, he promised several months ago to make prompt payment to the state of Massachusetts. He said, "We've reached out to the Massachusetts Department of Revenue and made clear that, whether owed or not, we intend to pay the equivalent taxes as if the boat's home port were currently in Massachusetts. That payment is being made promptly." Apparently, "promptly" is completely relative. No money has been sent and, when asked, Kerry's spokesperson claimed that the senator is waiting to receive a bill. Meanwhile, the boat remains berthed in Rhode Island so that Kerry can duck out of further Massachusetts taxes and fees.--Patriot Post Digest

* 11/12/10--The big news last week was the Republican victories that swept the nation, but there were several other important developments that went largely unnoticed. One is the election of five governors who have vowed to legalize same-sex unions in their states. Considering the left-leaning politics in these states -- namely New York, California, Illinois, Rhode Island and Hawaii -- the election of these candidates is no surprise. But same-sex marriage is one of the few hot-button issues that crosses party lines. New York State legislators -- including Democrats from New York City -- recently voted down a same-sex marriage bill. Outgoing Democrat Gov. David Patterson voiced his disappointment with the decision, but didn't take unilateral action. Governor-elect Andrew Cuomo, on the other hand, has vowed to make legalizing same-sex marriage a top priority of his administration. Throughout the ongoing battle in California, Governor-elect Jerry "Moonbeam" Brown made it clear which side of the debate he's on, even when it conflicted with his duties as state attorney general. Although bound by his office to advocate for the marriage amendment known as Proposition 8, Brown repeatedly refused, perhaps with an eye toward his political future. After being elected last week, he said he would continue to be a "champion of LGBT Californians." But what of the Californians who elected him and voted for Prop 8? Apparently Brown cares for their votes only when they're cast in his direction. Former Republican (in the loosest sense of the word) senator and now-independent Lincoln Chaffee, who was elected Rhode Island's new governor, has said he will sign a bill allowing civil unions. Chaffee lost his LGBT endorsement shortly before the election after saying he favors the issue being put before the voters. Finally, the governors-elect in Hawaii and Illinois have made their intentions known. Neil Abercrombie told the Hawaii legislature to "try again" when he takes office. He's referring to the same-sex marriage bill vetoed by the outgoing Republican governor, Linda Lingle. And Illinois Democrat Pat Quinn wants a civil union bill on his desk by the time he begins his next term. One thing's for sure: This issue isn't going away any time soon.--Patriot Post Digest

* 11/12/10--SEOUL, South Korea (AP) - Leaders of 20 major economies on Friday refused to back a U.S. push to make China boost its currency's value, keeping alive a dispute that raises fears of a global trade war amid criticism that cheap Chinese exports are costing American jobs. A joint statement issued by the leaders including President Barack Obama and China's Hu Jintao tried to recreate the unity that was evident when the Group of 20 rich and developing nations held its first summit two years ago during the global financial meltdown. But deep divisions, especially over the U.S.-China currency dispute, left G-20 officials negotiating all night to draft a watered-down statement for the leaders to endorse. "Instead of hitting home runs sometimes we're gonna hit singles. But they're really important singles," Obama told a news conference after the summit.Other leaders also tried to portray the summit as a success, pointing to their pledges to fight protectionism and develop guidelines next year that will measure the imbalances between trade surplus and trade deficit countries. The G-20's failure to adopt the U.S. stand has underlined Washington's reduced influence on the international stage, especially on economic matters. In another setback, Obama also failed to conclude a free trade agreement this week with South Korea.

* 11/12/10-- DENAIR, CA -13-year-old Cody Alicea rides with an American flag on the back of his bike. He says he does this to be patriotic and to honor veterans, like his own grandfather, Robert. He's had the flag on his bike for two months but Monday, was told to take it down. A school official at Denair Middle School told Cody some students had been complaining about the flag and it was no longer allowed on school property. "In this country we're supposed to be free," said Cody. "And I should be able to wave my flag wherever I want to. And they're telling me I can't." Cody's grandfather says the school was concerned about racial tensions or uprisings because of the flag. He feels if there was really a problem it should have been brought up two months ago, not during Veterans week. "No action should be taken. We don't want any repercussion," said Roger. "We just want Cody to be proud of what he's doing." --fox40.com

* 11/12/10--Union bosses and their Democrat cronies are breathing a collective sigh of relief. On Wednesday, the Financial Accounting Standards Board (FASB) gave them something to be thankful for this Thanksgiving and they must be positively giddy. As opposed to reality biting on December 15th, as was originally scheduled, FASB just threw a temporary lifeline to companies with union multi-employer pension fund liabilities. Last month, we told you about the financial Armegeddon that is looming for unions, unionized companies and Democrats. The date was set as December 15th for a new accounting rule that requires companies to more accurately account for the pension liabilities owed to union multi-employer pension. On Wednesday, FASB punted, giving those companies more time to keep their pension liabilities hidden, while allotting unions, as well as Democrats, more time to come up with some other solution to deal with their pension ponzi scheme: Disclosures about an employer's participation in a multiemployer plan.--"The September 2010 Exposure Draft, Compensation—Retirement Benefits—Multiemployer Plans (Subtopic 715-80): Disclosure about an Employer’s Participation in a Multiemployer Plan, had proposed that public entities would begin providing enhanced disclosures in financial statements for fiscal years ending after December 15, 2010, with a one-year deferral for nonpublic entities. The Board decided that a final standard will not be effective for the 2010 calendar year-end reporting period. It will decide on an effective date at a future meeting, after it has substantially concluded its redeliberations." While FASB did not give a reason for the delay, some obvious political possibilities spring to mind: With the resounding “shellacking” that Democrats experienced on November 2nd, it looks less and less likely that the $165 billion union pension bailout bill would make it through the Senate (lame duck or not). FASB may be trying to stave off a shock to the stock market that liability transparency could cause once the unionized companies reveal the true nature of their liabilities. Lastly, FASB may be merely trying to give Democrats (and unions) time to try to convince Republicans to back a bailout, or work up some other political solution. Whatever the case, although eventually there will be a reckoning with reality, Democrats and their union bosses have been given a gift for the Holidays.--redstate.com

*11/13/10--Did you get a raise last year? Seventy-four percent of White House staffers did, according to a Gawker analysis of the White House's annual salary reports to Congress. Probably for the great job they're doing with the economy. Earlier this week, USA Today published an analysis of the federal workforce showing that it pays to work for the government: The number of feds earning more than $150,000 per year has increased tenfold since 2005, and the number earning above $180,000 has increased twentyfold. That prompted us to take a look at White House salaries, and it turns out that working for Barack Obama is not a bad gig. Obama famously instituted a salary freeze for all White House staffers earning more than $100,000 on his first day in office because "during this period of economic emergency, families are tightening their belts, and so should Washington." But there wasn't a lot of belt-tightening for the rest of the staff: We crunched the numbers and found that, of the 344 White House employees who were listed on the payroll in both White House's 2009 and 2010 salary reports, 253—or 74%—got raises in 2010. And among that lucky overwhelming majority, the average raise was 9%. And plenty of people making more than $100,000 a year did get a raise as long as a title change came with it. That's a lot better than most people did! According to the compensation-tracking firm Hewitt Associates, base salaries for executives and salaried workers went up 2.4% over the same time period. And John Challenger, the CEO of the executive consulting firm Challenger, Gray & Christmas, says "nine percent is double what we'd see for most executives, and even more for the rank and file. In 2009, companies were in recession at least half the year. Raises were much more in the range of 2% to 3%, maybe 4% to 5% for executives." And while Challenger says its not unusual for companies to reward 75% of staffers with annual raises, last year many firms skipped the practice. "Many more companies than normal cut raises altogether," he says. "Nine percent would be unusual," says Paul Rowsen, managing director of WorldatWork, a trade association for human resources professionals. "Most employers froze pay last year, and some even reduced pay to get through tough times.--Gawker.com

* 11/14/10-- Iran said on Sunday that the world economy is in a position to absorb an oil price of 100 dollars a barrel even as it finds the current price range suitable for investments. "Oil prices increasing to 100 dollars (per barrel) would not hurt the global economy," Mohammad Ali Khatibi, Iran's representative at the Organisation of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC), told the oil ministry news agency SHANA. Khatibi also said that the current price range of 70 to 90 dollars was a "suitable" range. "Not only producers, but consumers have reached this agreement that 70 to 90 dollars is a suitable price for oil because it encourages investment and does not hurt the global economy," he said. His remarks come days after OPEC revised upward its world oil demand growth estimates for both 2010 and 2011. --Breitbart.com

* 11/15/10--WASHINGTON (CBS 2 / 1010 WINS / WCBS 880/ AP) — A panel of Rep. Charlie Rangel’s peers in Congress are continuing the ethics trial against him after a fiery and frustrated Rangel excused himself, arguing he would not represent himself and had not been given enough time to hire counsel. “My role here is as a respondent and I am not here representing myself. I’ve been a lawyer long enough to know that it is very, very unwise for any person, a lawyer or a judge, to be his own counsel at a proceeding like this,” Rangel said after being asked whether he was making a motion to continue the hearing. Rep. G.K. Butterfield (D-N.C.), one of the judges on the panel of four Democrats and four Republicans, requested that the hearing go to recess so the panel could discuss whether to continue Monday despite Rangel’s claims that he had not been given adequate time to hire counsel. The panel declined Rangel’s request Monday morning and the proceeding – rare in the annals of the House – went forward without the 20-term congressman’s presence. Rangel said “50 years of public service has to suffer” because he did not have the money himself to pay for a lawyer, that he did not have enough time to cultivate a legal defense fund, and that free counsel offered to him would be considered a gift and therefore prohibited. “I object to the proceeding and with all due respect I’m going to have to excuse myself from these proceedings because I have no idea what [the prosecutor] has put together over two years that was given to me last week, and I just hope that the history of this committee turns to fairness and will be judged for what it is,” he said. “I respectfully remove myself from these proceedings.”

* 11/15/10--DRUDGE REPORT Headlines: White House hands out 111 Obamacare waivers...List peppered with unions.

* 11/16/10--The House ethics trial against Rep. Charlie Rangel began and ended in a flash yesterday, skipping oral argument and any semblance of a defense; the 40-year incumbent now awaits a verdict. Shed no tears for Charlie: He's a sad old man, but he brought it on himself. Rangel walked out of the proceedings after just 30 minutes, demanding a delay because he had no lawyer -- and "I don't have the opportunity to have a legal defense fund set up." (The panel -- rightly -- said no dice.) But as The Post's Isabel Vincent and Melissa Klein reported Sunday, for the last two years Rangel raided his political action committee, illegally shifting some $393,000 to his lawyers. On top of all his other transgressions. And, unlike normal folk, Rangel wouldn't think of digging into his own pocket to pay his bills, as Ethics Chairwoman Rep. Zoe Lofgren suggested. Instead, he asked for "pro bono" lawyers. In English, "pro bono" means for free; in Rangelese, it means for me. It's all so pathetic. It was Rangel's own behavior -- over the course of years -- that triggered the trial in the first place. His alleged abuses (most first reported by The Post) include underreporting assets and income, using House stationery to solicit funds and leasing four rent-regulated apartments in Harlem. And don't forget that villa in the Dominican Republic for which he failed to pay taxes. Rangel's guilt is so clear, says the ethics panel prosecutor, "there are no genuine issues as to any material facts in this case." Indeed, Rangel admitted to them in a House floor speech in August. What happens next is unclear. Indeed, all that's certain is that a 40-year congressional career is ending in well-earned obloquy. Given that the GOP takes over the House in January, it's unlikely that Charlie Rangel will ever again be in a position to abuse the public trust. We hope he can live with himself.--NY Post Editorial

* 11/16/10--WASHINGTON — Saying he was "deprived of due process," Rep. Charles Rangel, once one of the most influential House members, was convicted today on 11 counts of breaking ethics rules and now faces punishment. After the conviction, Rangel said the committee's decision was wrong. "How can anyone have confidence in the decision of the ethics subcommittee when I was deprived of due process rights, right to counsel and was not even in the room?" he said. "I can only hope that the full committee will treat me more fairly, and take into account my entire 40 years of service to the Congress before making any decisions on sanctions. "I am disappointed by the unfortunate findings of the ethics subcommittee. The Committee's actions are unprecedented in view of the fact that they arrived at without rebuttal or counter evidence on my behalf." An ethics panel of eight House peers deliberated over two days before delivering a jarring blow to the 20-term New York Democrat’s career. Rangel was originally charged with 13 counts of financial and fundraising misconduct. The conviction also was another setback for Democrats who lost control of the House to the GOP in the midterm elections. "This unfair decision is the inevitable result of the Committee's insistence on moving forward despite the absence of any legal representation on my behalf. The Committee elected to reject my appeal for additional time to secure new counsel and thus acted in violation of the basic constitutional right to counsel," said Rangel. "The committee's findings are even more difficult to understand in view of yesterday's declaration by the committee's chief counsel, Blake Chisam, that there was no evidence of corruption or personal gain in his findings. From here forward, it is my hope that the full Ethics Committee will take into consideration the opinion of its chief counsel as well as the statement by Rep. Bobby Scott, a member of its investigatory subcommittee who said that any failings in my conduct were the result of "good faith mistakes" and were caused by 'sloppy and careless recordkeeping, but were not criminal or corrupt.'" Rangel, a founding member of the Congressional Black Caucus, is not expected to resign. He is 80 years old and remains a dominant political figure in New York’s famed Harlem neighborhood. He was forced to step down last March as Ways and Means chairman when the House ethics committee, in a separate case, admonished him for taking two Caribbean trips paid for by corporations. At his one-day trial on Monday, Rangel was reduced to pleading for a postponement — arguing that his lawyers abandoned him after he paid them some $2 million but could afford no more. The panel rejected his request, and Rangel walked out of the proceeding. Only last spring, Rangel wielded significant power in the House from his position as the main writer of tax legislation. He was not present Tuesday when the verdict was announced. The full ethics committee will now conduct a hearing on the appropriate punishment for Rangel, the silver-haired, gravelly-voiced and sartorially flashy veteran of 20 terms in the House. Possible sanctions include a House vote deploring Rangel’s conduct, a fine and denial of privileges. The congressional panel, sitting as a jury, found that Rangel had used House stationery and staff to solicit money for a New York college center named after him. It also concluded he solicited donors for the center with interests before the Ways and Means Committee, leaving the impression the money could influence official actions. He also was found guilty of failing to disclose at least $600,000 in assets and income in a series of inaccurate reports to Congress; using a rent-subsidized New York apartment for a campaign office, when it was designated for residential use; and failure to report to the IRS rental income from a housing unit in a Dominican Republic resort. The ethics panel split 4-4 on a charge that Rangel violated a ban on gifts because he was to have an office — and storage of his papers — at the Charles B. Rangel Center for Public Service at City College of New York. Two counts charging him with misuse of Congress’ free mail privilege were merged into one. Rangel said that while he is "required to accept the findings of the ethics committee, I am compelled to state again the unfairness of its continuation without affording me the opportunity to obtain legal counsel as guaranteed under the U.S. Constitution." --NY Post, With AP

* 11/17/10--It's official: Charlie Rangel is a crook. A liar. And a tax cheat. The guilty finding by a bipartisan group of his peers lays to rest any illusion the flimflam man's disgraceful conduct was an aberration or mere sloppiness. The case revealed a decades-long pattern of willful deceit and intentional evasion. In a better world, we would be bidding him good riddance. He would be expelled from Congress, and a federal prosecutor would be waiting at the door, ready to pounce on the ton of evidence that convicted him. A grand jury would be going through the bank accounts bulging with cash, the sources of which remain suspiciously unclear. In that better world, his colleagues, shocked and embarrassed by how he flaunted his violations of tax laws and ethics rules, would immediately tighten the screws and increase the penalties. They would denounce him from the floor, ashamed to have accepted his friendship and favors. They would call for a vote on term limits, conceding that permanent incumbency magnifies the corruption of power. Rangel, after all, was just elected to his 21st term, and men and women of goodwill would proudly shout "aye" to eliminate the temptations that pile up in a job for life. Of course, that's not the world we live in. What justice we have in this one is too often corrupted by a double standard, one for the public and one for our government masters.
Any ordinary American who scammed the IRS the way Rangel did would be socked with fines and probably jail. Any private worker who cheated his employer the way Rangel cheated taxpayers would get fired and arrested. Rangel will most likely get a letter of reprimand. Tsk, tsk. And where are the prosecutors? Quaking in their hideaways, afraid to take on someone so big. Cowards all. Try a little experiment. Walk into a government building -- a courthouse, motor vehicles, unemployment-- and take note of how you, the taxpayer, are treated. My experience is that it quickly becomes clear who is working for whom. Most government workers don't believe they work for you or me. They know we work for them. Public servants? Grow up, sucker. That's the overarching lesson of the Charlie Rangel moment. His unruffled arrogance, his air of entitlement, his lack of remorse personify everything wrong with Washington in particular and government in general. He was shocked -- genuinely, I believe -- that anybody would dare accuse him of doing anything remotely wrong. Don't we know who he is! In fact, we do know his kind all too well, and that was the point voters made two weeks ago. President Obama and Democrats in Congress lost the consent of the governed, just as Republicans sitting in their seats lost it in 2006 and 2008. Members of both parties believed their own smoke until it was too late, then took turns being shocked to find themselves cast from the temples and into the shadows. They lost their jobs, but too many who have them still don't get it. There are thousands of Charlie Rangels in Washington and Albany and in state capitals and city halls across America who believe they are above the law. They have convinced themselves they are public rulers, not public servants. For too long, we let them get away with it. We the people always deserve the government we get. If we want a better one, we have to earn it by working like crazy for it. We have to relentlessly demand a single standard of justice and refuse to accept anything less. Above all, we must root out all the Charlie Rangels until all the people in those jobs know they work for us. We can do it. Yes we can.--Michael Goodwin, NY Post

* 11/17/10--Senate Republicans yesterday agreed to stop tucking money for pork-barrel projects known as "earmarks" into bills. The nearly unanimous vote was aimed at avoiding a rift with the powerful Tea Party movement and sending a message to the public that the GOP is serious about reform. The Republican Senate Conference agreed to a moratorium on earmarks -- which pols of both parties had used regularly to bring home federal monies -- for two years and challenged Democrats to get on board. "The sooner we get rid of earmarks, the sooner we can go to work on the difficult task of getting our budget under control," said Sen. Tom Coburn (R-Okla.). --NY Post

* 11/17/10--A deal to extend soon-to-expire Bush-era tax cuts won’t be completed until December, and some Democrats in Congress said an accord may not be reached this year. President Barack Obama and congressional leaders postponed until Nov. 30 a White House meeting, previously scheduled for tomorrow, to negotiate whether to extend lower tax rates for all taxpayers or just those with incomes of $250,000 or less. Separately, Democrats, who control the Senate, said they haven’t agreed on a plan.--Bloomberg.com

* 11/18/10--The House Ethics Committee voted 9-1 to recommend that Rep. Charlie Rangel (D-N.Y.) be censured by the full House and required to pay restitution for any unpaid taxes. The Rangel case will move to the full House for a vote in this current, lame-duck Congress, which has a Democrat majority led by Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi. Rangel was sentenced to be censured by the committee for the 11 ethical violations, for which he was convicted earlier this week. Thursday’s sanction is only the 17th time that the Ethics Committee has punished one of its own. “It is my unwavering view that the actions, the decisions, and the behavior of our colleague form New York can no longer reflect either honor or integrity,” said the ranking member of the House Ethics Committee, Rep. Jo Bonner (R-Ala.).--humanevents.com

* 11/18/10--Is there any better proof that Team Obama's preferred approach to fighting terror -- through civilian courts -- is dangerously misguided than yesterday's acquittal of one of the 1998 US embassy bombers on all but one of 285 charges? Ahmed Ghailani, the first Guantanamo Bay detainee to be tried in a civilian court, was convicted of only a single count of conspiracy to destroy government property and buildings using explosives. Murder? No. Terrorism? No. He was up to his ears in a plot that took 224 lives, and he's not a terrorist? Preposterous. He might as well have blown up an empty phone booth in some desert. That obscene verdict -- and the tortured, civilian-court process the led to it -- should put an end, once and for all, to any thought of trying other terrorists in similar fashion. Particularly, 9/11 mastermind Khalid Sheik Mohammed. Unless, that is, Team Obama is willing to roll the dice on seeing him and his ilk walk free. As we've long said, enemy combatants simply don't belong in federal courtrooms in a time of war. After all, on the merits, the evidence against Ghailani was overwhelming: He helped buy the truck that carried the bomb in the attack on the embassy in Tanzania; A detonator was linked to him; A key witness had told authorities that he sold Ghailani the explosive. Indeed, Ghailani practically confessed to his role in the affair himself. But his statements weren't introduced at trial. Defense lawyers had argued that Ghailani's disclosures were inadmissible because they were coerced -- and prosecutors were loath to risk having their entire case tossed by the judge. Under normal circumstances, that's fine. But this case involved a foreigner making war on America. The result: A bloody-handed terrorist will now largely escape accountability for his heinous acts. Yes, Ghailani is facing 20 years to life -- but that's only about a month for each of the 224 people he helped kill. Team Obama is still trying to figure out what to do about KSM & Co. There's no longer any question: Trying them in a civilian court would invite disaster. President Obama and Attorney General Eric Holder need to learn from this horrific case. No more civilian trials for terrorists.--NY Post Editorial

* 11/18/10--WASHINGTON -- House Democrats yesterday elected Nancy Pelosi to remain as their leader, despite their massive election losses that prompted some lawmakers to call for new leadership. Pelosi, the nation's first female House speaker, will become minority leader when Republicans assume the majority in the new House in January. She defeated moderate Democratic Rep. Heath Shuler of North Carolina, 150-43, in secret balloting in a lengthy closed-door gathering of House Dems in the Capitol. Pelosi, 70, overcame a rebellion from party centrists -- and even some fellow liberals -- who argued that Democrats need to offer a new face of leadership after losing at least 60 House seats on Nov. 2. "The truth is, she is the face that defeated us in this last election," said Rep. Allen Boyd (D-Fla.), who lost his re-election bid this month. --NY Post

* 11/19/10--To just about everyone's surprise, the House Ethics Committee last night voted overwhelmingly to recommend that Rep. Charles Rangel be formally censured by the House of Representatives -- the most serious sanction short of outright expulsion. The committee's judgment was not only severe, it was genuinely bipartisan: Only one member of the 10-member panel, evenly divided between Democrats and Republicans, dissented. Make no mistake. This was not the widely expected wrist-slap. If the House goes along with the recommendation, Rangel will be required to stand silently before all 434 members while his transgressions are spelled out and he is formally rebuked by the House speaker. Imagine the humiliation he will feel. Deservedly so. The outcome represents what the committee chairwoman, Rep. Zoe Lofgren, demanded: "accountability for [Rangel] and credibility for the House itself." Specifically, Rangel was found guilty by his peers on 11 counts of ethical transgressions. To be sure, outright expulsion was unlikely; that penalty has only been imposed five times in the House's history. But Rangel could have spared himself this embarrassment -- either by stepping down or by abandoning his latest re-election bid, which he won handily. By yesterday, all he could do was plead, pitifully, for mercy -- while continuing to blame the committee and especially the "totally unfair" press (most of his misdeeds were exposed by The Post) for his troubles. Typical Charlie Rangel -- whining to the end. It was left for Rep. Jo Bonner to deliver a more spot-on judgment. "Mr. Rangel can no longer blame anyone other than himself for the position he now finds himself in," said the Alabama Republican. "Not this committee, not his staff or family, not his accountants or lawyers and not the press." Rangel has rarely done the right thing -- since, that is, leaving the Army after creditable combat service in Korea. He can do the right thing now. He can spare himself further humiliation, and the House additional agony, with a simple letter of resignation. Pity it had to end this way. But it's over.--NY Post Editorial

* 11/19/10--Who says Congress never gets anything done? On Thursday, the Senate Judiciary Committee unanimously approved a bill that would give the Attorney General the right to shut down websites with a court order if copyright infringement is deemed “central to the activity” of the site — regardless if the website has actually committed a crime. The Combating Online Infringement and Counterfeits Act (COICA) is among the most draconian laws ever considered to combat digital piracy, and contains what some have called the “nuclear option,” which would essentially allow the Attorney General to turn suspected websites “off." COICA is the latest effort by Hollywood, the recording industry and the big media companies to stem the tidal wave of internet file sharing that has upended those industries and, they claim, cost them tens of billions of dollars over the last decade....COICA must still be approved by the full House and Senate before becoming law. A vote is unlikely before the new year....In short, COICA would allow the federal government to censor the internet without due process.--wired.com

* 11/19/10--(Reuters) - President Barack Obama's fellow Democrats in the U.S. Congress, many upset with him for election losses, are in disarray over what to do about tax cuts for millions of Americans that are set to expire on December 31. With time running out and high political and economic stakes, Obama is pushing Democratic leaders to determine if they can win an acceptable extension of the cuts, which he could sign into law. Resurgent Republicans are demanding that all the tax cuts be renewed, including those for wealthier Americans -- individuals making more than $200,000 and families above$250,000. Obama favors renewing the tax cuts only for those at or below those level, saying the nation cannot afford to renew them for wealthier Americans. Despite a number of options -- including renewing all tax cuts or only those for the middle class or tying any extension to a renewal of jobless benefits -- there is no indication a consensus is near. "How the hell should we know when we will figure this out?" said a senior Senate Democratic aide. "This is the Democratic Party," long known for internal struggles and diverse views. "It seems like no one is on the same page," said Chris Krueger of MF Global, a private firm that tracks Washington for investors. "It has the potential to be a train wreck." With some Democrats blaming Obama for their loss of control of the House in the November 2 elections, Obama's ability to rally his troops is being tested on the expiring tax cuts, which were signed into law by Republican President George W. Bush. "A lot of our guys, the progressives, don't want to extend these tax cuts for anyone," said a senior House Democratic aide. "They never liked them in the first place." The aide said some Democrats are now wary of Obama, who convinced them to overhaul the U.S. healthcare system -- a landmark achievement that backfired and hurt them with voters.

* 11/19/10--The Obama administration has quietly forged ahead with its proposal to sell $60 billion worth of fighter jets and attack helicopters to Saudi Arabia unhampered by Congress, despite questions raised in legislative inquiries and in an internal congressional report about the wisdom of the deal. The massive arms deal would be the single largest sale of weapons to a foreign nation in the history of the U.S., outfitting Saudi Arabia with a fully modernized, potent new air force. "Our six-decade-long security relationship with Saudi Arabia is a primary security pillar in the region," Defense Sec. Robert M. Gates and Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton wrote in a Nov. 16 letter to congress. "This package continues that tradition." But some critics are questioning the deal, and the stealthy effort by the Obama administration to avoid a more probing congressional review by notifying Congress last month, just as members were headed home for the November elections. Congress had 30 days to raise objections -- a review period that concludes Saturday. With most members leaving Washington today, any significant effort to block the deal appears dead for now, officials said. "I do not think there will be any action" to hold up the sale, Rep. Howard Berman, the chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, told Bloomberg News Thursday. Rep. Anthony Weiner, a New York Democrat, submitted a resolution this week to try and block the deal, and was among those who objected to the way the administration approached the required congressional review. "Hiding this in a recess announcement is a sign of how unpopular it is," he said. "It's bad policy that now is further tainted by shameful process."--abcnews.go.com

* 11/21/10--WASHINGTON -- An American nuclear scientist saw hundreds of centrifuges in North Korea this month, sources said yesterday, strengthening the argument that the country has a uranium-enrichment program that would give it a second way to obtain material for bombs. The expert, Stanford University's Siegfried Hecker, was told by North Korean officials they had 2,000 centrifuges operating, but the American team that visited the country was unable to verify that claim, one source said. "But it certainly looked like an operating facility [to the US team]," the source said. --NY Post

* 11/21/10--Pick your favorite: "Those who ignore history are doomed to repeat it." Or, "Insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different result." Either way, the wisdom is wasted on President Obama and congressional Democrats. They learned nothing from the historic shellacking voters gave them. Whether through ignorance or intent, the White House, Harry Pelosi and Nancy Reid -- what's in a name? -- are again setting their sails against public opinion. Damn the voters, full speed backwards. They still want to raise taxes on small businesses and families making over $250,000. They want to pour billions more into the unemployment pot, which is becoming a welfare program. They refuse to stop sky-high spending, preferring to keep the debt bomb building. They reject the clamor for a ban on earmarks. The whole world wants a new economic approach from Washington, but Democratic leaders see the lame-duck session as another chance to impose their wrong-headed will. The voters spoke -- they roared! -- and the Dems respond by becoming the party of No. The result is a growing chatter among loyalists that 2012 already is shaping up as another disaster. Skillfully tacking to the center is the only hope, but so far, party leaders are still steering hard left. It's a startling scene, as though the election never happened, with the same crew running the Titanic. Pelosi, freshly minted as minority leader for the January term, intends to squeeze a final burst of partisanship out of her beaten crew. Ditto for Reid, meaning the last vote many members cast will be yet another one in defiance of their countrymen. Obama, to his credit, came back from Asia seemingly ready to recognize reality, or, as spinmeister David Axelrod put it, "We have to deal with the world as we find it." Alas, that bright and shining moment was brief. When the wackadoo wing insisted the president not budge, Obama told Pelosi and Reid he'd follow their lead on taxes and spending. So we're back to where we were before the election. But there is something new -- another revision on what voters allegedly want. Ridiculed for first claiming they lost because of a failure to communicate, Dems have a new talking point. Call it the failure equivalence theory. Voters don't "have a lot of faith in the Republican Party and they don't have a lot of faith in the Democratic Party," Vice President Joe Biden now says. "And so they're saying, 'OK, we want you guys to work together.' " Obama's on message, too, saying "the American people were not issuing a mandate for gridlock." Nonsense. The mandate is for stopping the Obama agenda and taking the country toward smaller and less expensive government. It's not complicated. The only way to arrive at any other conclusion is to twist the facts and argue voters were equally angry at all incumbents. But the lopsided numbers don't lie. In the House, the GOP took 65 new seats, while losing only three of its own, for a net gain of 62. In the Senate, the GOP took six new seats, and held all its own. It was a one-sided election, just as 2006 and 2008 were. Not incidentally, when they won big in those years, Obama & Co. didn't see victory as a mandate for bipartisanship. As the president boasted during his first 2009 showdown with Republicans, "I won." Well, now he and his party have lost a referendum on their policies. Finally, they ought to admit it and work for the majority of Americans, instead of against them. Otherwise, history will repeat itself in 2012.--Michael Goodwin, NY Post

* 11/21/10--Printer bombs planted on two cargo flights last month cost only a few thousand dollars and were intended to affect the American economy, according to a newly published Al Qaeda-affiliated magazine. The magazine also revealed the attack was not meant to kill more than the plane's pilot and co-pilot, and was meant to force the U.S. government to spend billions of dollars on preventive security screening measures. The strategy, the magazine said, was "of attacking the enemy with smaller, but more frequent operations is what some may refer to as the strategy of a thousand cuts. The aim is to bleed the enemy to death." AQAP also took credit for the September crash of a UPS cargo flight in Dubai. However, U.S. and U.A.E. officials have concluded that the crash was not an act of terrorism.--abcnews.go.com

* 11/22/10--"It has become an annual tradition: The days grow shorter, the holidays approach, and the American Humanist Association rolls out an ad campaign promoting atheism and disparaging religion. Last year, the organization placed ads reading 'No god? No problem!' on billboards and buses in more than a dozen cities. Its theme in 2008 was: 'Why believe in a god? Just be good for goodness' sake.' This year, the association is taking a more combative tone. It is spending $200,000 to 'directly challenge biblical morality' in advertisements appearing on network and cable TV, as well as in newspapers, magazines, and on public transit. ... Can people be decent and moral without believing in a God who commands us to be good? Sure. There have always been kind and ethical nonbelievers. But how many of them reason their way to kindness and ethics, and how many simply reflect the moral expectations of the society in which they were raised? In our culture, even the most passionate atheist cannot help having been influenced by the Judeo-Christian worldview that shaped Western civilization. 'We know that you can be good without God,' [executive director of the American Humanist Association Roy] Speckhardt tells CNN. He can be confident of that only because he lives in a society so steeped in Judeo-Christian values that he takes those values for granted. But a society bereft of that religious heritage is one not even Speckhardt would want to live in. For in a world without God, there is no obvious difference between good and evil." --columnist Jeff Jacoby, Patriot Post Brief

* 11/22/10--Nobody is safe. Velma Hart, who burst onto the media scene after telling President Obama she was scared about her financial future, has been laid off. Hart was let go as the chief financial officer for Am Vets, a nonprofit Maryland-based veteran services organization. Hart has become another casualty of the tough economy in which so many people have lost their jobs. "It's not anything she did," said Jim King, the national executive director of Am Vets. "She got bit by the same snake that has bit a lot of people. It was a move to cut our bottom line. Most not-for-profits are seeing their money pinched." King would not say whether the organization had had other layoffs.... King hadn't seen the irony in Hart being fired just two months after she emotionally told Obama about her fears for her own financial well-being during a town hall meeting in Washington....Hart's comments to Obama became political fodder as proof that the president was losing his die-hard supporters - African American voters. --Washington Post

*11/22/10--WASHINGTON — Just about as many Americans want Tea Party-backed members of Congress to take the lead in setting policy during the next year as choose President Obama, a USA TODAY/Gallup Poll finds. In a survey taken Friday through Sunday, 28% say Obama should have the most influence on government policy next year while 27% say the Tea Party standard-bearers should. Gop congressional leaders are chosen by 23%, Democratic congressional leaders by 16%. The results reflect the strength of the Tea Party movement as the GOP prepares to take control of the House of Representatives in January.--usatoday.com

*11/23/10--SEOUL (AFP) – North Korea fired dozens of artillery shells onto a South Korean island on Tuesday, killing one person, setting homes ablaze and triggering an exchange of fire as the South's military went on top alert. In what appeared to be one of the most serious border incidents since the 1950-53 war, South Korean troops fired back with cannon, the government convened in an underground war room and "multiple" air force jets scrambled. The firing came after North Korea's disclosure of an apparently operational uranium enrichment programme -- a second potential way of building a nuclear bomb -- which is causing serious alarm for the United States and its allies. Some 50 shells landed on the South Korean border island of Yeonpyeong near the tense Yellow Sea border, damaging dozens of houses and sending plumes of thick smoke into the air, YTN television reported. One South Korean marine -- part of a contingent based permanently on the frontline island -- was killed and 13 other marines were wounded, the military said. YTN said two civilians were also hurt. "A Class-A military alert issued for battle situations was imposed immediately after shelling began," a military spokesman said. Sporadic firing by each side continued for over an hour before dying out, the military said....The Yellow Sea border was the scene of deadly naval clashes in 1999, 2002 and last November. Tensions have been acute since the sinking of a South Korean warship in March, which Seoul says was the result of a North Korean torpedo attack. Pyongyang has rejected the charge. South Korean President Lee Myung-Bak convened an emergency meeting of ministers and top advisers in an underground war room, a presidential spokesman said. He urged the officials "to prevent further escalation". The firing comes after Kim Jong-Un, the little-known youngest son of ailing North Korean leader Kim Jong-Il, was officially recognised as his father's eventual successor. "This is an intentional provocation to heighten cross-border tensions," Dongguk University professor Kim Yong-Hyun told AFP. "The North made a series of gestures but there has been no response from South Korea and the United States. It is now using its brinkmanship aimed at forcing Seoul and Washington to take action and agree to dialogue." Kim said the North would try to use the clash to promote solidarity among its people during the leadership succession. "It is also sending a strong message to the United States and the international community that the peninsula urgently needs a peace regime." A US special envoy headed to China Tuesday to seek its help in curbing North Korea's new nuclear project, revealed to US experts who described a sophisticated programme to enrich uranium..--yahoo.com

* 11/23/10--SEOUL, Nov. 23 (Yonhap) -- North Korea threatened to continue "merciless" strikes on South Korea on Tuesday after the communist state launched a deadly artillery attack across their western sea border. In a statement carried by the official Korean Central News Agency, the North's top military command accused the South Korean military of initiating the exchange by shooting toward its side.--yonhap.co.kr

* 11/23/10--Nov 23 (Reuters) - South Korea said it was conducting regular military drills off the west coast before North Korea started firing dozens of shells, but that its firing exercises did not aim to the North. "We were conducting usual military drills and our test shots were aimed toward the west, not the north," a South Korean military official said. North Korea said on Tuesday that Seoul had initiated firing of shells, prompting it to take an instant military action.

* 11/23/10--President Obama has passed the Big 4-0 -- going the wrong way. Turns out voters were not simply satisfied to spank the Democrat and his party in the Nov. 2 midterm elections with historic losses in the House of Representatives. Obama's job approval rating as calculated by the Zogby Poll has now sunk to 39%, a new low for his 22-month presidency that began with so much hope and excitement and poll numbers up around 70. As recently as Sept. 20, his job approval was 49%. A whopping 60% now disapprove of his job, up from 51% disapproval Sept. 20. Obama now trails in hypothetical 2012 matchups against Republicans Mitt Romney, Newt Gingrich and the next Bush, Jeb. And, oh, my! Lookee here! Obama has even fallen into a statistical tie with none other than Sarah Palin, the former Alaska governor. How embarrassing that is because other polls have shown a majority of Americans believe she is unqualified for the presidency. So it appears many have now decided, on second thought, Obama looks that way too.--latimes.com

* 11/24/10--WASHINGTON -- More than 80 percent of Americans say it is at least "somewhat important" that Congress extend the Bush tax cuts before they expire at the end of this year, according to a poll by Gallup. A stunning 56 percent of Americans also say it is "very important" that Congress do something to prevent the estate tax from going up significantly next year as it is scheduled to do, according to the poll. Half of Americans say it is "very important" that the rest of the Bush's tax cuts be extended as well, compared to just 16 percent who say it is not important. Taxes top the list of important issues Americans want the Democratic-run Congress to address during the lame-duck session between now and the start of next year, when Republicans take control of the House. Democrats have been divided over how to address the expiration of the Bush tax cuts. Some have joined Republicans to demand that all the cuts be extended for all income levels. But a majority of Democrats and President Obama have been harshly critical of the tax cuts since they were enacted by a Republican Congress and former President George W. Bush. Those Democrats have since eased their criticism of the tax cuts for lower-income earners and insist that taxes be raised only on those earning more than $250,000 a year -- including small businesses that file as individuals.--NY Post

* 11/24/10--St. Petersburg, Russia - China and Russia have decided to renounce the US dollar and resort to using their own currencies for bilateral trade, Premier Wen Jiabao and his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin announced late on Tuesday. Chinese experts said the move reflected closer relations between Beijing and Moscow and is not aimed at challenging the dollar, but to protect their domestic economies. "About trade settlement, we have decided to use our own currencies," Putin said at a joint news conference with Wen in St. Petersburg. The two countries were accustomed to using other currencies, especially the dollar, for bilateral trade. Since the financial crisis, however, high-ranking officials on both sides began to explore other possibilities. The yuan has now started trading against the Russian rouble in the Chinese interbank market, while the renminbi will soon be allowed to trade against the rouble in Russia, Putin said.--chinadaily.com

* 11/24/10--The average American could buy a house for the amount of money it takes to run Air Force One every hour. The U.S. military has provided an updated estimate on that cost, first published by a taxpayer watchdog group and confirmed by FoxNews.com, and the number is staggering -- $181,757 per hour. That's the price tag for shuttling around President Obama, who, as it turns out, has spent more days abroad in his first two years than any other president. --foxnews.com

* 11/26/10--YEONPYEONG ISLAND, South Korea (AP) - North Korea warned Friday that U.S.-South Korean plans for military maneuvers put the peninsula on the brink of war, and appeared to launch its own artillery drills within sight of an island it showered with a deadly barrage this week. The fresh artillery blasts were especially defiant because they came as the U.S. commander in South Korea, Gen. Walter Sharp, toured the South Korean island to survey damage from Tuesday's hail of North Korean artillery fire that killed four people.

* 11/28/10--The United States was catapulted into a worldwide diplomatic crisis today, with the leaking to the Guardian and other international media of more than 250,000 classified cables from its embassies, many sent as recently as February this year. At the start of a series of daily extracts from the US embassy cables - many of which are designated "secret" – the Guardian can disclose that Arab leaders are privately urging an air strike on Iran and that US officials have been instructed to spy on the UN's leadership. These two revelations alone would be likely to reverberate around the world. But the secret dispatches which were obtained by WikiLeaks, the whistlebowers' website, also reveal Washington's evaluation of many other highly sensitive international issues. These include a major shift in relations between China and North Korea, Pakistan's growing instability and details of clandestine US efforts to combat al-Qaida in Yemen. Among scores of other disclosures that are likely to cause uproar, the cables detail:

• Grave fears in Washington and London over the security of Pakistan's nuclear weapons programme

• Alleged links between the Russian government and organised crime.

• Devastating criticism of the UK's military operations in Afghanistan.

• Claims of inappropriate behaviour by a member of the British royal family.

The US has particularly intimate dealings with Britain, and some of the dispatches from the London embassy in Grosvenor Square will make uncomfortable reading in Whitehall and Westminster. They range from serious political criticisms of David Cameron to requests for specific intelligence about individual MPs. The cache of cables contains specific allegations of corruption and against foreign leaders, as well as harsh criticism by US embassy staff of their host governments, from tiny islands in the Caribbean to China and Russia. The material includes a reference to Vladimir Putin as an "alpha-dog", Hamid Karzai as being "driven by paranoia" and Angela Merkel allegedly "avoids risk and is rarely creative". There is also a comparison between Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and Adolf Hitler. The cables name countries involved in financing terror groups, and describe a near "environmental disaster" last year over a rogue shipment of enriched uranium. They disclose technical details of secret US-Russian nuclear missile negotiations in Geneva, and include a profile of Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi, who they say is accompanied everywhere by a "voluptuous blonde" Ukrainian nurse. The cables cover secretary of state Hillary Clinton's activities under the Obama administration, as well as thousands of files from the George Bush presidency. Clinton personally led frantic damage limitation this weekend as Washington prepared foreign governments for the revelations. She contacted leaders in Germany, Saudi Arabia, the Gulf, France and Afghanistan. US ambassadors in other capitals were instructed to brief their hosts in advance of the release of unflattering pen-portraits or nakedly frank accounts of transactions with the US which they had thought would be kept quiet. Washington now faces a difficult task in convincing contacts around the world that any future conversations will remain confidential. "We are all bracing for what may be coming and condemn WikiLeaks for the release of classified material," state department spokesman PJ Crowley said. "It will place lives and interests at risk. It is irresponsible." The state department's legal adviser has written to Wikileaks founder Julian Assange and his London lawyer, warning that the cables were obtained illegally and that publication would place at risk "the lives of countless innocent individuals … ongoing military operations … and cooperation between countries". The electronic archive of embassy dispatches from around the world was allegedly downloaded by a US soldier earlier this year and passed to WikiLeaks. Assange made them available to the Guardian and four other newspapers: the New York Times, Der Spiegel in Germany, Le Monde in France and El Pais in Spain. All five plan to publish extracts from the most significant cables, but have decided neither to "dump" the entire dataset into the public domain, nor to publish names that would endanger innocent individuals. WikiLeaks says that, contrary to the state department's fears, it also initially intends to post only limited cable extracts, and to redact identities. The cables published today reveal how the US uses its embassies as part of a global espionage network, with diplomats tasked to obtain not just information from the people they meet, but personal details, such as frequent flyer numbers, credit card details and even DNA material. Classified "human intelligence directives" issued in the name of Hillary Clinton or her predecessor, Condoleeza Rice, instruct officials to gather information on military installations, weapons markings, vehicle details of political leaders as well as iris scans, fingerprints and DNA. The most controversial target was the leadership of the United Nations. That directive requested the specification of telecoms and IT systems used by top UN officials and their staff and details of "private VIP networks used for official communication, to include upgrades, security measures, passwords, personal encryption keys". When the Guardian put this allegation to Crowley, the state department spokesman said: "Let me assure you: our diplomats are just that, diplomats. They do not engage in intelligence activities. They represent our country around the world, maintain open and transparent contact with other governments as well as public and private figures, and report home. That's what diplomats have done for hundreds of years."--guardian.co.uk

* 11/29/10--WASHINGTON — Rep. Charles Rangel is ready to make a last stand to salvage his reputation and tell the House that a censure should be reserved for crooked politicians. He will argue that he’s not one of them. The 80-year-old Democrat from New York’s Harlem neighborhood wants his punishment for ethics violations downgraded to a reprimand, according to congressional and nongovernment sources who are in touch with Rangel but are not authorized to be quoted by name. Rangel will ask the House ethics committee chairman, Rep. Zoe Lofgren, D-Calif., for time to plead his case on the floor of the House, where he has served for 40 years, including a stint as chairman of the tax-writing House Ways and Means Committee. The ethics committee voted 9-1 on Nov. 18 that Rangel should be censured for committing 11 counts of fundraising and financial misdeeds that violated House rules. --NY Post

* 11/29/10--No matter the situation, one thing always remains the same. There are the rules. And then there are Charlie's rules. When Charlie Rangel appeared before the ethics committee for his trial for a scandalous array of charges, he was supposed to hire a lawyer to represent him. Instead, he let his lawyers walk away and claimed poverty instead of hiring a new one. During the actual trial, Rangel -- or the lawyer he had chosen to go without -- was supposed to plead his case for him. Instead, Rangel walked out of the proceedings and left the opposing counsel to erect a crushing case against him. And now comes the time for the House to vote on whether to censure Rangel as the ethics committee has recommended. Instead of just taking his punishment like a man responsible for a host of odious misdeeds, Rangel once again is playing by his own set of rules. Now he wants to make his case before the entire House and insist that while, yes, he displayed an astonishing disregard for the law for which he often financially benefited handsomely, he is no crook. Only in Congress would an adult with a straight face claim that there is no corruption in flouting the very tax laws you are responsible for writing. And only in Congress would someone similarly claim that there is no "self-dealing" in getting cheaper apartments and squeezing others to cough up money for a monument to yourself -- all because you are a member of Congress. It is like the guy still does not understand that he was not on trial for typos on his tax returns and financial-disclosure forms. He was not on trial for some clerical error that misidentified his rental status. He was not on trial for grabbing the wrong box of stationery. Charlie Rangel was on trial because for decades he has behaved as if there are the rules we all abide by and then there are the rules he abides by when he chooses. And, apparently, he still believes it.--Charles Hurt, NY Post

* 11/29/10--The United States is considering military options against Iran since the Islamic regime announced it has a nuclear power plant up and running, the top US military officer said yesterday. "We've actually been thinking about military options for a significant period of time," Adm. Mike Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said in an interview on CNN's "Fareed Zakaria GPS." Mullen said he doesn't believe "for a second" that Iran's nuclear plant is for civilian use. "In fact, the information and intelligence that I've seen speak very specifically to the contrary. Iran is still very much on a path to be able to develop nuclear weapons, including weaponizing them, putting them on a missile and being able to use them," he said. Mullen said the United States was focused on dialogue and engagement about Iran's nuclear ambitions, but "in a realistic way." "They've got a history of gamesmanship that certainly doesn't include closing on significant steps to indicate to the international community that they're not doing this," he said. On Saturday, Iran said its first atomic-power plant, built by Russia in Bushehr, had begun operations, before of a new round of talks with Western powers over the country's nuclear drive. --NY Post

* 11/29/10--"How did the White House respond to North Korea's shelling of South Korea? Our president is said to be 'outraged' -- according to his spokesmen. That'd be a first. For has Barack Obama ever shown more than Thoughtful Concern on any matter, foreign (Iran's nuclear program) or domestic (the national debt)? Early on Tuesday morning, as the Koreans were collecting their dead, the president's press secretary, Robert Gibbs, issued a statement calling on North Korea 'to halt its belligerent action and to fully abide by the terms of the armistice agreement' signed in 1953. ... Dispatches from Washington Tuesday evening said President Obama wasn't planning to speak publicly about the shelling on the peninsula, preferring to issue a written statement later on. Why rush? It'll doubtless be neatly typed. Can you imagine a Harry Truman, or, for that matter a Reagan or Kennedy or Eisenhower or either Roosevelt just having an aide issue a press release when an ally comes under fire? Isn't it time for the current occupant of the White House, officially acclaimed a great statesman by the Nobel committee, to say something to both enemies and friends to assure the peace? Or do we have to sit through another yawner from his soporific press aide? ... As I write these lines, the current occupant of the White House remains silent, as in Silence Gives Consent. In this case, to war." --columnist Paul Greenberg, (From Patriot Post Brief)

* 11/29/10--"Obama's non-stop world tour has not made America any more loved or any safer. Soft power has not stopped terrorists or the regimes that arm and fund them. If anything it has emboldened them. And the civilian trial of Ahmed Ghailani, one of the FBI's Most Wanted, ended with his unprecedented acquittal on 284 out of 285 charges, including all the murder charges, leaving only a single charge of conspiracy. The Ghaliani trial, presided over by Judge Lewis A. Kaplan, a Clinton nominated Federal judge, who did everything but put on a cheerleader uniform and wave his pom poms for the Al Qaeda terrorist, was a farce that ended a millimeter away from freeing one of the FBI's Most Wanted men. The media is trying to spin it as a victory, but that's like describing a game between the New York Yankees and a little league team as a success because the Yankees managed to win by one point. Ghaliani was never convicted of the crimes he committed. He was only convicted of conspiracy, which in this context essentially means being a member of Al Qaeda. It gets him off the street, but it does not convict him of the crimes he specifically committed. It's not justice. It's barely containment." --columnist Daniel Greenfield, (From Patriot Post Brief)

* 11/29/10--"It's a lame-duck session [of Congress]. Time is running out. Unemployment is high, the economy is dangerously weak and, with five weeks to go, no one knows what tax they'll be paying on everything from income to dividends to death when the current rates expire Jan. 1. And what is the president demanding that Congress pass as 'a top priority'? To what did he devote his latest weekly radio address? Ratification of his New START treaty. ... President Obama insists that New START is important as a step toward his dream of a nuclear-free world. Where does one begin? A world without nukes would be the ultimate nightmare. We voluntarily disarm while the world's rogues and psychopaths develop nukes in secret. Just last week we found out about a hidden, unknown, highly advanced North Korean uranium enrichment facility. An ostensibly nuclear-free world would place these weapons in the hands of radical regimes that would not hesitate to use them -- against a civilized world that would have given up its deterrent. Moreover, Obama's idea that the great powers must reduce their weapons to set a moral example for the rest of the world to disarm is simply childish. Does anyone seriously believe that the mullahs in Iran or the thugs in Pyongyang will in any way be deflected from their pursuit of nukes by a reduction in the U.S. arsenal? ... The worst thing about this treaty ... is that it is simply a distraction. It gives the illusion of doing something about nuclear danger by addressing a non-problem, Russia, while doing nothing about the real problem -- Iran and North Korea." --columnist Charles Krauthammer (From Patriot Post Brief)

Part 20--October, 2010

* 10/1/10--Instead of addressing taxes and taking that back to their constituents, the Senate likewise voted to adjourn, and Congress will hold a two-week lame-duck session beginning Nov. 15. Before they fled the swamp, both chambers passed a stopgap measure to fund the government until Dec. 3. After all, with the fiscal year having started today, this fear-stricken Congress has yet to pass any of the 13 appropriations bills for 2011. Apparently, voter anger over skyrocketing deficits hasn't fallen on completely deaf ears. Democrats are prioritizing a series of leftist wish-list items they want to ram through in that lame-duck session, including repealing Don't-Ask-Don't-Tell, providing citizenry for American-born children of illegal immigrants, extending unemployment benefits (already at 99 weeks), continuing a freeze of cuts for doctors' Medicare reimbursement payments, etc. However, there's little chance that many of these items will see the light of the debate floor, considering that all of them failed at some stage already. Still, Democrats seem determined to go out in a blaze of glory.--Patriot Post Digest

* 10/1/10--The "horrors" continue for the jihadis housed at the U.S. prison camp at Guantanamo Bay. An intrepid journalist from the Miami Herald recently photographed two signs on a refrigerator there. One said "DETAINEE FOOD ONLY," while the other read, "Only 1 ice cream for each detainee!" Imagine, only one ice cream! What more must these poor souls endure? After being captured on the battlefield, shipped to Club Gitmo, given first-rate medical and dental care, fed decent food for the first time in their lives -- such that they gained 10-20 pounds or more -- given Muslim prayer mats and sanitized Korans, then gently questioned under strict rules, and now this? Where's Amnesty International when you need them?--Patriot Post Digest

* 10/2/10--Don't you think President Obama is taking this tall-skinny-president-from-Illinois bit a tad too far? Obama has been hanging with friendly crowds lately, drumming up support wherever he can find it -- Thursday night urging a troop of well-wishers to get "fired up" for his domestic agenda. "I'm impatient. But I also know this: Now's not the time to quit." After all, he told the young DC crowd: "It took time to free the slaves!" Shades of Abe -- all that's missing is the top hat and beard. At another event, he told unhappy Dems they really ought to act more like slaves, who were famous for their, um, patience: "You know, the slaves sitting around a fire singing freedom songs, they weren't sure when slavery would end, but they understood it was going to end." Implying, we guess, that America presently will be delivered from its modern-day bondage -- and he will be the agent of that delivery. Downright bizarre, if you ask us. Sensing dismay about the looming November elections, Obama tried lecturing his constituents into a frenzy: "There better not be an enthusiasm gap, people." It's a little late for that, if the polls are to be believed -- though no one can blame Obama for trying. But he's turned griping into an art form -- and carrying on like a peevish professor isn't reassuring to anyone. Least of all to his dwindling base.--NY Post Editorial

* 10/2/10--WASHINGTON (AP) - Thousands of people flocked to the Lincoln Memorial for a rally Saturday organized by labor and civil rights groups, hoping to show support for the Democratic agenda in the face of expected GOP election gains next month. More than 400 organizations, including faith, environmental and gay rights groups, sponsored the "One Nation Working Together" demonstration on the same end of the National Mall where a month ago tea party activists met to hear conservative commentator Glenn Beck and Sarah Palin. "We're here to show the rest of the country that there are people who support the progressive agenda," said Ken Bork, who came from Camas, Wash. But he acknowledged that Republicans are enjoying an advantage heading toward the Nov. 2 election that will determine whether Democrats retain control of Congress. "There may be an enthusiasm gap, but we're not going to know until we have an election," Bork said. "A lot of the noise from the extreme right-wing stuff, it's been well orchestrated by big money. But it's not as bad as they're making it out." There were people with union T-shirts and others participants who carried banners advocating expanding Medicare for all Americans. While the Beck rally stretched well down the National Mall, Saturday's event was shaping up to be far smaller, with sparse groups lingering around the reflecting pool and other monuments....In a fiery speech that opened the "One Nation Working Together" rally on the National Mall, (MSNBC host Ed) Schultz blamed Republicans for shipping jobs overseas and curtailing freedoms.

* 10/2/10--(Reuters) - Syrian President Bashar al-Assad assured his Iranian counterpart Mahmoud Ahmadinejad on Saturday that their ties were solid -- a view unlikely to please Washington which is working to isolate the Islamic state. "We have stood beside Iran in a brotherly way from the very beginning of the (Iranian Islamic) revolution," Assad said during a one-day visit to Tehran. Ahmadinejad awarded Assad Iran's highest medal of honor in recognition of his support for Palestinians and Lebanon and his resistance to "global arrogance" -- a term which usually refers to the United States and its allies....The United States has tried to improve its relations with Damascus, something analysts say is in part aimed at distancing the country from Iran which Washington sees as a threat to Israel and other countries in the region. Secular Syria and the Islamic Republic of Iran are both supporters of Lebanon's militant Shi'ite group Hezbollah. Assad, who was later due to meet Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, said he saw no hope for peace talks between Israel and the Palestinians which he said were primarily intended to make U.S. President Barack Obama look good.

* 10/3/10--(AP) TEHRAN, Iran – Iran's president Sunday called for U.S. leaders to be "buried" in response to what he says are American threats of military attack against Tehran's nuclear program.Mahmoud Ahmadinejad is known for brash rhetoric in addressing the West, but in a speech Sunday he went a step further using a deeply offensive insult in response to U.S. statements that the military option against Iran is still on the table. "May the undertaker bury you, your table and your body, which has soiled the world," he said using language in Iran reserved for hated enemies. Several top U.S. officials including Adm. Mike Mullen, chairman of the U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff have said in recent months that the military option remains on the table and there is a plan to attack Iran, although a military strike has been described as a bad idea. The crowd of military men and clerics in the town of Hashtgerd just west of the capital chuckled at the president's insult and applauded. The speech was broadcast by both state television and the official English-language Press TV, but the latter glossed over the insult in the simultaneous translation. Ahmadinejad's remarks come in sharp contrast to ones he made to Al-Jazeera Arabic news channel in August in which he offered the U.S. Iran's friendship.

* 10/3/10--...A recent incident at the United Nations shows it's not going well. When Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said in the General Assembly that the 9/11 attacks were an "inside job" carried out by our government to help Israel, US diplomats walked out in protest. Delegations from all 27 European Union nations joined us, as did Australia, New Zealand, Canada and Costa Rica, according to an Associated Press tally. Nobody else budged. Not Russia, not China, Japan, South Korea or Mexico, and nobody from Africa or South America. Imagine that. A nut case who is building a nuclear bomb, whose regime tortures and kills its own people, slanders the living and the dead, and Obama and Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton can't rally even half of our allies to our side. In fact, there is no evidence they even protested the silence. This is not leadership. It is failure on a grand and consistent scale. --Michael Goodwin, NY Post

* 10/4/10--The ‘One Nation’ rally happened this weekend. The majority of the crowd was bussed in by union groups and other leftwing groups. Compare that to tea party activists, the majority of whom pooled their money to go to DC for the 8/28 rally. A large segment of the crowd was paid to be there. Unions pay. Tea party groups and Glenn Beck did not on 8/28. Nonetheless, the crowd was sparse — so sparse that even the Associated Press was compelled to take note of it. Of those who were there though, they were unapologetically of the left. Assorted communists, socialists, union goons, and Democrats. But I repeat myself. The Communist Party USA openly bragged about its effort to turn out the crowd in defense of its darling socialist Barack Obama. The left is finally being honest. They are embracing their socialist/communist identity. They even held up signs and banners proclaiming the return of the Reds.--redstate.com

* 10/4/10--They came, they preached Marx, they trashed D.C, disrespected WWII vets (yes, those are SEIU signs), attacked Tea Parties as 'insidious' and 'villainous', and they showed the rest of America what vile contempt they have for the Land of the Free. By all accounts, it was a success. For they were finally able to take their masks off—how liberating. From the Left's point of view, they arre now completely, unabashedly out in the open. There’s no more hiding behind bromides and phony feel-good names, the Left has now unmasked itself. Socialists, Communists, labor unions, liberals, progressives and other assorted riff-raff...why, they are all undisputedly, one big, incestuously happy family now. Congratulations! And for them, there is no going back into the closet, no turning back: We're socialists and we're proud. For the rest of America, however, Saturday’s OneNation socialist rally has brought clarity to the choices in the fall. And, here it is:

For Union Members…For the average union member across the nation, who still don’t view themselves as socialists, there should be no longer be a question of where “labor” sits. Even though AFL-CIO boss Richard Trumka fully exposed his Leninist leanings last week, it may have taken today to convince many of them that their movement has been corrupted and compromised at the highest levels. The fact that their union dues were used to organize and sponsor the event, as well as to pay for the bused-in astroturf to this Marxist March on America proves once and for all that the movement many patriotic union members believe in and pay into has been hijacked by socialists is now undisputed.

For Democrats…As the OneNation Marxist March was promoted by the Democratic National Committee's Organizing For America, their true colors have been laid out for all to see. Now, American can see what “change” really boils down to for the nation. Their, soft, pasty underbellies are now fully exposed. Howard Dean welcomes you to Marxism, and you either support this…or you don’t. Your choices are now clear.

For Independents…Your choice shouldn’t be too difficult at all. If you really want your independence, OneNation’s rally for socialism should clearly demonstrate that their intentions are very simple: You can’t have your cake and eat…you won’t have your cake at all, their collective pool will. Now that you know, it is time for you to get off the sidelines. Them or U.S.

We had been led to believe that there would be hundreds of thousands of progressives descending on Washington on Saturday. It would appear that there were far less.

In 30 Days…A mere month from now, Americans will be going to the polls to decide the fate of this nation. The two sides have never been clearer. The Left has completely unmasked itself for the Marxists they are and the choice Americans have before them is not the lesser of two evils, it is either you are voting for this evil, or you are not. It is that simple.

The Marxist Left, the Democratic Party and its union masters are in full panic right now. They may be scared but, unlike the real America, they are mobilizing and coordinating their Get Out the Vote efforts to try to salvage their dream of a socialist utopia. As an American, if you do not want their vision of America to supplant what was once the freest nation on earth, then you need to vote. More importantly, you need to work to get others to vote. If Saturday’s socialist rally did nothing else, it demonstrated how clear the choices are this November, and the importance of getting out the vote.--redstate.com

* 10/4/10--Former Vice President Walter Mondale said on CNN that President Obama relies too much on teleprompters -- which Mondale called "idiot boards" -- when speaking to the American people.--washingtonexaminer.com

* 10/5/10--(Bloomberg) -- The number of Americans receiving food stamps rose to a record 41.8 million in July as the jobless rate hovered near a 27-year high, the government said. Recipients of Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program subsidies for food purchases jumped 18 percent from a year earlier and increased 1.4 percent from June, the U.S. Department of Agriculture said today in a statement on its website. Participation has set records for 20 straight months. Unemployment in September may have reached 9.7 percent, according to a Bloomberg News survey of analysts in advance of the release of last month’s rate on Oct. 8. Unemployment was 9.6 percent in July, near levels last seen in 1983. An average of 43.3 million people, more than an eighth of the population, will get food stamps each month in the year that began Oct. 1, according to White House estimates.

* 10/6/10--Although rising moderately this year, US fixed capital investment has fallen far short of the level that history suggests should have occurred given the recent dramatic surge in corporate profitability. Combined with a collapse of long-term illiquid investments by households, they have frustrated economic recovery. These shortfalls, the result of widespread private-sector anxiety over America’s future, have defused much, if not most, of the impact of the administration's fiscal stimulus. Moreover, the activism embodied in such programmes has itself stoked the degree of anxiety.--Alan Greenspan, ft.com

* 10/6/10--Companies in the U.S. private sector shed 39,000 jobs in September, according to the ADP employment report released Wednesday. The reading was below expectations of a 20,000 gain. This was the first decline in the ADP report since January. Job cuts in August were revised up to a gain of 10,000 from the initial estimate of a drop of 10,000. According to ADP, the goods producing sector lost 45,000 jobs in September, including 17,000 in manufacturing. The service sector added 6,000 jobs. --Marketwatch/Newscore

* 10/6/10--WASHINGTON -- An overwhelming majority of voters thinks the government has squandered stimulus funds, according to a new poll, depriving Democrats of what was once thought to be a key campaign talking point. A stunning 68 percent of voters think stimulus funds have been mostly wasted, according to the ABC News/Washington Post poll. Just 29 percent think the funds have been well spent. Nine out of 10 Republicans think the money has been wasted, as do three-quarters of independents. Just four out of 10 Democrats think so. Democrats have little hope of turning around the perception of the $787 billion law with just four weeks before the election, although the administration is trying, recently issuing a report stating that many projects came in under budget, leaving extra cash for other projects. --NY Post

* 10/7/10--PRINCETON, NJ -- Underemployment, at 18.8%, is up from 18.6% at the end of August. Unemployment, as measured by Gallup without seasonal adjustment, increased to 10.1% in September -- up sharply from 9.3% in August and 8.9% in July. Much of this increase came during the second half of the month -- the unemployment rate was 9.4% in mid-September -- and therefore is unlikely to be picked up in the government's unemployment report on Friday.--gallup.com

* 10/7/10--The Federal Reserve spent the past three decades getting inflation low and keeping it there. But as the U.S. economy struggles and flirts with the prospect of deflation, some central bank officials are publicly broaching a controversial idea: lifting inflation above the Fed's informal target. The rationale is that getting inflation up even temporarily would push "real" interest rates—nominal rates minus inflation—down, encouraging consumers and businesses to save less and to spend or invest more. Both inside and outside the Fed, though, such an approach is controversial. It could undermine the anti-inflation credibility the Fed won three decades ago by raising interest rates to double-digits to beat back late-1970s price surges. "It's a big mistake," said Allan Meltzer of Carnegie Mellon University, a central bank historian. "Higher inflation is not going to solve our problem. Any gain from that experience would be temporary," adding that the economy would suffer later. Others warn that pushing inflation higher than the target could create public confusion and risk fueling financial bubbles and market instability. They say Fed policy already is weakening the dollar and as a result prompting a gold and commodity boom. "The Fed is treading upon a mine-laden path that has never been tip-toed through in this country," said Andrew Busch, a currency strategist at BMO Capital Markets.--wsj.com

* 10/7/10--TOKYO (AFP) – The dollar tumbled to a fresh 15-year low at 82.22 against the yen in Tokyo trading hours on Thursday on persistent fears over the US economic outlook.

* 10/7/10--Judge Lewis Kaplan yesterday delivered strong evidence of why terrorist trials don't belong in civilian court. He brought the federal trial of accused al Qaeda bomber Ahmed Ghailani to a halt on its opening day by barring the testimony of the government's key witness. Ghailani faces life in prison for his role in the 1998 bombings of three US embassies in Africa. The witness, Hussein Abebe, sold Ghailani the TNT used in the deadly bombings, and prosecutors say his testimony is critical to their case. But Kaplan ruled that, because the government only learned about Abebe from Ghailani himself during CIA questioning, he can't be allowed to testify. Kaplan ruled that Abebe's testimony would be unconstitutional, and that the Constitution must be followed "not only when it is convenient, but when fear and danger beckon in a different direction." That would be fine if Ghailani were, say, a mugger. But it's nonsense in the context of the war on Islamist terrorism: Ghailani is not a US citizen, and the crimes didn't occur on US territory. But don't hold this against Kaplan. The blame resides with the Obama administration, which ignored all warnings that trying terrorists like Ghailani in civilian court would invite such rulings. American criminal law is riddled with procedural and constitutional protections completely incongruous to wartime realities. Thugs like Ghailani and their "civil liberties" lawyers mean to take full advantage of them -- and in front of the right judge, like Kaplan, they'll succeed. Kaplan halted the trial until next week -- enough time for Attorney General Eric Holder to come to his senses and decide to try terrorists the right way: before military tribunals at Guantanamo Bay.--NY Post Editorial

* 10/7/10--WASHINGTON—The Obama administration was slow to ramp up its response to the Gulf of Mexico oil spill, then overreacted as public criticism turned the disaster into a political liability, the staff of a special commission investigating the disaster say in papers released Wednesday. In four papers issued by the National Commission on the BP Deepwater Horizon Oil Spill and Offshore Drilling, commission investigators fault the administration for giving too much credence to initial estimates that just 1,000 barrels of oil a day were flowing from the ruptured BP PLC well, and for later allowing political concerns to drive decisions such as how to deploy people and material—such as oil-containing boom—to contain the spreading oil. --wsj.com

* 10/8/10--WASHINGTON -- The stimulus couldn't raise the dead any better than it could raise employment -- but not for lack of trying. In a ghoulish example of pouring millions in taxpayer money down a 6-foot hole, the blundering federal government sent 72,000 checks for $250 to dead people, according to a bombshell report by Social Security auditors. The dopey feds sent another 17,000 checks to prison inmates, auditors found. The massive screw-up delivered $22 million to the long gone and inmates. Of course, because of their condition, the dead were unable to use the funds to purchase goods, start a business or install solar panels -- the type of investments the government was hoping would begin to rejuvenate a moribund economy. Most of the prisoners were entitled to get the cash, auditors found, because they weren't in the slammer during the three months before the law was enacted and had been getting Social Security benefits. The cash was part of a program to send checks to 52 million people who get Social Security or SSI benefits, for a cost of $13 billion, in an effort to get more cash into the economy quickly. But in the case of the checks that went to dead people, the feds were either unaware of the deaths because they hadn't gotten proper notice, used "questionable data in its payment records," or "did not review all available records," the report found. In a bad break for taxpayers, there isn't a provision in the stimulus law for the government to claw back the checks that went out by mistake, leaving the digital cash in a kind of economic purgatory in bank accounts of the deceased. "These findings represent the epitome of congressional stupidity and a total disregard for accountability," Sen. Tom Coburn (R-Okla.) said in a statement. The Social Security Administration responded that the payments were accurate 99.8 percent of the time, and the agency's inspector general agreed the "vast majority" went out correctly. "We worked with Treasury, developed new processes and began issuing [payments] about 30 days earlier than the legislatively mandated deadline," the agency said in a statement. "This was a major accomplishment for our agency."--NY Post

* 10/8/10--A silver lining of the Democrat hegemony in Washington has been the massive resurgence of conservative thinking and action among the general public. It certainly would have been nice two or four years sooner, but better late than never. Given that Republicans can't possibly win a veto-proof majority in the Senate, the job of cleaning up government will take more than one election cycle. One of the biggest messes is ObamaCare. It remains to be seen whether the GOP has the fortitude to follow through on their pledge to "repeal and replace," but the resounding defeats this primary season of several incumbent RINOs certainly serve as a motivation. Democrats up for re-election in three weeks are running from the issue like the plague, and little wonder. This week, it was revealed that 30 companies and organizations received exemptions from the federal requirement to increase the minimum annual benefits for low-cost health plans. Unless they were granted exemptions, McDonald's and other companies that offer so-called mini-med plans threatened to drop their health plans altogether -- leaving employees on the government dole. The biggest waiver was granted to the United Federation of Teachers Welfare Fund, which is a union in New York City that provides health coverage for city teachers. According to USA Today, "Without waivers, [these] companies would have had to provide a minimum of $750,000 in [medical insurance] coverage next year, increasing to $1.25 million in 2012, $2 million in 2013 and unlimited in 2014." Of course, all this was predicted by those of us who understand basic free-market economics. Meanwhile, in keeping with the "radical" notion that the federal government cannot force people to purchase things, voters in three states will decide this fall whether to tell the federal government to stay out of their health care decisions. If passed, the initiatives in Arizona, Colorado and Oklahoma will allow those states to opt out of ObamaCare. A similar initiative already passed in Missouri with an impressive 71 percent of the vote. Naysayers, such as Oklahoma's Democrat Gov. Brad Henry, call the initiative fruitless, saying that even if it "passes by 100 percent," the feds could overturn it because federal law trumps state law. In effect, the governor is saying that ObamaCare is inevitable, so we shouldn't even bother to fight. But this isn't true. According to what Jon Caldara of Colorado's Independence Institute calls that "pesky 10th Amendment," there are several instances in which the federal government is required to yield to the will of the sovereign states. The attorneys general of 20 other states are suing on that principle. Other opponents of the initiative argue that this collective lawsuit makes the ballots redundant and not worth the costly legal battle that's sure to follow. However, Caldara and others fighting for health care choice point out that even if this multi-state lawsuit is successful, the federal government could then pressure states to adopt programs similar to the one in Massachusetts. The problems with that system, and its parallels with ObamaCare, are well documented. The road to repeal hit another major roadblock Thursday when U.S. District Judge George Caram Steeh, a Clinton appointee, rejected the argument that the individual mandate to buy health insurance is unconstitutional. According to Steeh, the interstate commerce clause really does cover everything.--Patriot Post Digest

* 10/8/10--"[ObamaCare's] march to the sea is only beginning and the trail of destruction will grow. The last six months have seen 2011 premium increases as high as 9% due to ObamaCare; multibillion-dollar corporate writedowns by Verizon, AT&T, Caterpillar and others; disruption in the insurance markets leading to the erasure of child-only policies and other types of specialty coverage as shown in the McDonald's imbroglio; the Administration beginning to impose price controls on premiums; insurers withdrawing private options from Medicare Advantage; and Democratic protection of a 1099 tax reporting mandate that will slam small businesses. Republicans should be repeating all of these tangible harms in a litany, while predicting the damage to come." --The Wall Street Journal (From P.P. Digest)

* 10/8/10--Rep. Brad Sherman (D-CA) introduced legislation for the lame-duck session that would repeal right-to-work laws in 22 states. Currently, workers in those states employed in unionized companies can choose whether to join the union and pay dues. In the other 28 states, known as "forced dues" states, it's legal for unions to mandate that all workers pay union dues and to fire workers who don't comply. This is a blatantly obvious power grab by unions and their minions in the Democrat Party. Sherman disguises it as an attempt to level the playing field for "forced dues" states like his native California that "have to compete with the race to the bottom as our companies have to compete with those where the workers would like better wages, working conditions and benefits but are unable to organize to get them." Sherman is either incorrect or just plain lying about the fact that workers in right-to-work states don't have the right to unionize. Nothing prevents unionizing in these states other than workers' votes. Furthermore, while he's correct that California businesses are losing out to right-to-work states, that's because unions have put such a squeeze on companies to enrich their own bank accounts that many choose not to set up shop there. Others have simply moved to other states.--Patriot Post Digest

* 10/8/10--(CNN) - Americans are divided over whether President Barack Obama or his predecessor has performed better in the White House, according to a new national poll. And a CNN/Opinion Research Corporation survey released Friday also indicates in the battle for Congress, Republicans hold large advantages over the Democrats among independents, men and blue-collar whites. The poll also indicates that Republicans are much more enthusiastic than Democrats to vote. By 47 to 45 percent, Americans say Obama is a better president than George W. Bush. But that two point margin is down from a 23 point advantage one year ago. "Democrats may want to think twice about bringing up former President George W. Bush's name while campaigning this year," says CNN Polling Director Keating Holland.

* 10/8/10--WASHINGTON (AP) -- A wave of government layoffs in September outpaced weak hiring in the private sector, pushing down the nation's payrolls by a net total of 95,000 jobs. The unemployment rate held at 9.6 percent last month, the Labor Department said Friday. The jobless rate has now topped 9.5 percent for 14 straight months, the longest stretch since the 1930s. The report is the final one before the November elections, which means members of Congress will face voters next month who are frustrated with an economy that is still struggling to create jobs. The figure that may matter most is 18,000 -- the number of positions lost after subtracting the 77,000 temporary census jobs that ended in September. That marks the first loss for that grouping since last December, according to economists at Nomura Securities. Another troubling sign is a sharp rise in people working part time who would prefer full-time work. Their ranks have increased by nearly 1 million since July and total 9.5 million, the most on records dating from 1955. When adding that to the 14.8 million unemployed and the 2.5 million who have stopped looking for work, there are a startling 26.8 million Americans who are "underemployed." That's 17.1 percent of Americans who want to work.

* 10/9/10--As head cheerleader of the stagnant and stumbling economy, President Obama has lost all the frills on his pompoms. Exhausted, he stood before cameras yesterday and, in dreary cadences of despair, did his best to draw lipstick on the mouth of a sick pig. Any way you try spinning it, the latest job numbers are disastrous for Democrats desperate to hold on to power in next month's elections. Take the rosiest spin possible out of the White House. "Today's employment report shows that private-sector payrolls increased by 64,000 in September, continuing nine consecutive months of private-sector job growth," Obama's chief economist, Austan Goolsbee, proclaimed. The growth is "more evidence that the economy continues to recover," he said. But that claim is hard to justify since Goolsbee himself notes that last month's private-sector job gains are a dramatic drop-off from the average monthly gain of 91,000 jobs added each month over the last quarter. March and July saw over 100,000 private-sector jobs created, and April enjoyed over 200,000 jobs added. If anything, September's 64,000 private-sector jobs suggests a steep decline in private-sector growth. Of course, the reality is even bleaker with a total of 95,000 jobs lost last month after huge layoffs in public-sector jobs. Administration officials downplayed that, saying 77,000 of those were temporary census jobs that we knew all along would eventually go away. But that's not what they said earlier this year when they used the hiring of all the census workers as proof that the economy was rolling to recovery. The massive losses in public-sector jobs comes after Democrats dove $26 billion deeper into debt over the summer to save jobs for teachers, firefighters, police and other government employees. But Obama assured us that without all that added debt, public-sector job losses "would have been even worse." We just don't know how lucky we are.--Charles Hurt, NY Post

* 10/9/10--President Obama hit the golf course Saturday for what, by CBS News' Mark Knoller's calculation, was his 52nd such outing since taking office.--TheHill.com

* 10/10/10--WASHINGTON – As if voters don't have enough to be angry about this election year, the government is expected to announce this week that more than 58 million Social Security recipients will go through another year without an increase in their monthly benefits. It would mark only the second year without an increase since automatic adjustments for inflation were adopted in 1975. The first year was this year.--AP

* 10/10/10--In a move that school officials believe is the first of its kind in the state, Cambridge will close schools for one Muslim holiday each year beginning in the 2011-2012 school year. The school will either close for Eid al-Fitr or Eid al-Adha, also known as the Festival of Sacrifice, depending on which holiday falls within the school year. If both fall within the school calendar, the district will close for only one of the days. The school district’s decision, announced last month, was made as the national discussion about Islam continues, fueled by a Mosque proposal two blocks from the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks in New York and Florida preacher Terry Jones’s threat to burn a Koran. The discussion has also touched local schools, as Wellesley school officials drew criticism recently for a video that showed sixth-grade students kneeling during a prayer service at a Boston mosque during a field trip in May. But Cambridge School Committee member Marc McGovern, who pushed for the Muslim holiday in city schools, said he thinks people need to take a step back from what he called hysteria and the stereotypes of all Muslims as terrorists.--boston.com

* 10/11/10--If anyone still doubted that America's foreign policy is in crisis, the appointment Friday of Thomas Donilon to be our new national-security adviser should be final proof. Set aside the fact that Donilon served as in-house counsel at Fannie Mae, the epicenter of the subprime-mortgage mess and subsequent financial meltdown — something any other administration would see as evidence of less than stellar judgment. Set aside the reports that Defense Secretary Robert Gates had said Donilon's appointment would be a "disaster" or that Donilon fought hard against our military's strategy for winning in Afghanistan — although that seems precisely why Obama now wants him in the White House. Even set aside the fact that Donilon's mentor is our buffoon-in-chief, Vice President Joe Biden. The fact that such a lightweight now occupies the single most important job for shaping the future of American power, short of the presidency itself, shows that the administration sees national security as a relatively minor priority compared to, say, currying favor with the Muslim world or running down allies like Britain and Israel. --Arthur Herman, NY Post

* 10/11/10--The US government has decided not to appeal a judge's decision to ban a key prosecution witness from testifying at the first civilian trial for a Guantanamo Bay detainee, saying it would cause a delay. The government announced the decision in a letter yesterday to District Judge Lewis Kaplan, saying it would be ready to begin the trial against Ahmed Khalfan Ghailani tomorrow. "The government does not wish to delay the trial in order to take an appeal," the letter said. Ghailani has been accused by the government of being a bomb maker, document forger and aide to Osama bin Laden. He's charged with conspiring in the 1998 bombings of two US embassies in Africa. The attacks killed 224 people. Ghailani has pleaded not guilty and has denied knowing TNT and oxygen tanks he delivered would be used to make a bomb. The judge said last week that the witness could not take the stand in Ghailani's trial because investigators learned of his existence through coercive questioning. --AP

* 10/11/10--President Obama issued a waiver loosening Tiananmen arms sanctions for C-130 military transports for China a day after the Nobel Peace Prize was awarded to an imprisoned Chinese dissident who dedicated the prize this past weekend to the victims of the 1989 crackdown. Chinese state-run news media on Monday hailed the White House waiver announcement as a sign Washington is moving to lift the 11-year-old arms embargo.--Washington Times

* 10/11/10--When you’ve hung around with so many people who idealize communism and socialism and loath the United States, you tend to develop an inner-Soviet voice. Barack Obama sure has. He let it slip with Joe the Plumber and Obama’s talk of wealth redistribution. He let it slip when declaring that “I do think at a certain point you’ve made enough money”. He’s now let it slip again. His campaign farce, Organizing for America, sent out an email noting that Barack Obama declared the United States Chamber of Commerce “a threat to our democracy.” What. The. Hell. Why would the President of the United States want to slander 3 million American companies, and their tens of millions of employees? Why would he assume them evil enough to subvert the law deliberately like this? Is the man who got his political start in the home of a terrorist, who spent twenty years worshipping in the church of a man who preached contempt for America, whose childhood mentor was a communist radical, and who shows no more understanding of basic economics than a cliff notes reading of Das Kapital . . . projecting? He has now been echoed by his whole campaign team in an organized character assassination attempt with the Center for American Progress against the Chamber of Commerce. Why? The Chamber of Commerce accepts money from some foreign corporations that have American business interests. The Chamber has been quick to point out that it keeps those funds segregated and does not use them for political advocacy. But there are two larger points worth noting. First and foremost, if this is the standard Barack Obama is using, then Barack Obama himself is a threat to our democracy. Why? Barack Obama is the biggest recipient of British Petroleum dollars. British Petroleum is a foreign corporation. If that is the standard the Chamber of Commerce is held to, Barack Obama should hold himself to that standard. But there’s more. Back in 2008, the Washington Post documented the ease by which foreigners and others could give the Barack Obama’s Presidential campaign. The campaign, in fact, boasted of it. In addition to accepting pre-paid credit cards, the Obama campaign turned off the processing mechanism that verified only United States citizens were giving to his campaign. As Patrick Ruffini documented in 2008, the Obama campaign turned off the Address Verification Service mechanism to the campaign website, allowing virtually anyone to give to the campaign. In addition to this being another matter that Daryl Issa will have to investigate once the Republicans take back the House, the bigger issue is that several of us in the blogosphere back in 2008 knew people living overseas who gave to the Obama campaign just to see if it was possible. Yes, Europeans gave a few bucks just to see if they could. Of those I heard of who did this, I never heard of any of them getting a refund. In other words, unlike the Chamber of Commerce, the Obama campaign most likely accepted into its campaign coffers donations from foreign individuals and never returned the money. But there is a larger issue here too. The President of the United States has taken to the bully pulpit to declare an institution as American as mom, apple pie, and flags on Main Street to be a threat to our democracy. Were Rush Limbaugh or Sean Hannity or Mark Levin or Glenn Beck to say anything of the like, the left would dismiss them and say they were no longer worthy of being taken seriously. How then can we take Barack Obama seriously? Very easily — Barack Obama is the President of the United States. For him to call an organization instrumental to American commerce and business a ‘threat to our democracy” should trouble all of us. He and his administration have shown no ability to get the economy going again. Every advice from the Chamber of Commerce, the National Federation of Independent Businesses, and other supporters of the entrepreneurial class have been rebuffed. To now declare one of the few groups that has the bona fides to get the economy going again a “threat to our democracy” is as extremist as anything he and his goons would accuse conservative talk radio of saying. It also shows this President is out of ideas and is falling back on the Soviet rhetoric his mentors of long ago all embraced.--redstate.com

* 10/12/10--WASHINGTON -- Angry Americans had a field day in a new poll when asked to describe the federal government in one word or short phrase. It wasn't pretty. Among the most common words used were "too big," "corrupt," "confused" and "incompetent." Plenty also branded the government with "bad," "broken," "bloated," "lousy," "a mess," "it stinks" and "wasteful." New Yorkers were in line with much of the rest of the nation, calling the feds, among other things, "awful," "bad," bickering" and "corrupt." A New Jersey man, who identified himself as a conservative Democrat, said simply, "A pain." More than 7 in 10 responded with a negative word or phrase, according to the USA Today/Gallup poll, released yesterday, that asked Americans to give a short, off-the-cuff reaction to the federal government. "Overall, 72 percent of responses about the federal government are negative, touching on its inefficiency, size, corruption and general incompetence," the pollsters said. Just 10 percent of responses were clearly positive, such as "good" or "pretty good." About 18 percent gave neutral or mixed reactions. The same poll found that about 60 percent of Americans believe the government is too powerful, and nearly half agree with the statement: "The federal government poses an immediate threat to the rights and freedom of ordinary citizens." The results highlight the angry and dissatisfied mood of voters, which has fueled the anti-big-government Tea Party movement and put incumbent politicians in jeopardy in next month's midterm elections. Gallup said the mostly negative top-of-mind images of the government were consistent with poor ratings for the feds in its other polls. The sour mood is taking a toll on Democrats as the party in power in Washington. Another Gallup poll yesterday showed Republicans holding a 47-44 percent advantage over Democrats on a generic ballot for Congress-- fueled, in part, by the GOP's strong showing among independents. The Gallup daily tracking poll of President Obama's job-approval rating yesterday showed 48 percent disapproval and 46 percent approval. The poll about the federal government was conducted by telephone Sept. 20-21, with a random sample of 981 adults in all 50 states and the District of Columbia.--NY Post

* 10/12/10--This month, McDonald's warned that the health-care reform law passed in March could force it to drop health coverage for some 30,000 workers. A few days later, 3M announced that starting in 2013 it will no longer provide health-insurance coverage to its retirees. That came on the heels of a decision by Harvard Pilgrim, Massachusetts' second-largest insurer, to drop its Medicare Advantage health-insurance program at year's end, forcing 22,000 senior citizens in Massachusetts, New Hampshire and Maine back into traditional Medicare. Then there's the Principal Financial Group, which recently decided it was getting out of the health-insurance business. Roughly 840,000 people will likely lose their insurance as a result. This is just the tip of the iceberg. During the debate over health-care reform, President Obama told us nearly every day that if you had health insurance now and were satisfied with it, you'd be able to keep it. It should be clear by now that that statement was, well, less than accurate. In fact, it's becoming harder to find anyone who can keep their current insurance. As is well known by now, the health-care reform law con tains both an individual and an employer mandate. By 2014, employers with 50 or more workers must provide insurance or pay a fine. Individuals who don't get insurance through work or a government program must buy it on their own or they, too, will be fined. And not just any insurance will do: To qualify, a policy must meet a host of new regulatory requirements and offer a minimum, government-devised, set of benefits. It now looks like the secretary of Health and Human Services will grant McDonald's a waiver, so those 30,000 workers won't lose out thanks to ObamaCare. If so, the company will join the teachers unions and other politically connected winners of exemptions.... --Michael Tanner, NY Post

* 10/13/10--It's change they can no longer believe in. Three weeks ahead of the crucial midterm elections, a stunning 43 percent of likely voters who backed President Obama in 2008 say now that they don't support him as much as they did or don't support him at all, according to a Bloomberg LP poll released yesterday. Of that group, 19 percent say they support Obama, "but not as much as before," and another 17 percent say there are some days they support him and "some days I don't." About 7 percent say they no longer support Obama or now oppose him. Obama's job-approval rating doesn't break 50 percent in the survey, with 47 percent approving of him and 48 percent disapproving of him. --NY Post

* 10/13/10--The Justice Department is suing the state of New York for missing deadlines to mail ballots to overseas troops as part of a new federal overseas voting law after settling a similar case with New Mexico. The legal action comes less than three weeks before Election Day and as Republican attorneys are urging the Obama administration to closely monitor the distribution of the absentee ballots--Washington Post.

* 10/14/10--WASHINGTON -- President Obama's approval rating has taken another dive in the polls, down to a mere 43 percent -- while more than six of 10 voters believe the nation is on the wrong track. The dismal results highlight the heavy burden on Democrats as they run to keep their jobs and their majority in Congress. With the elections just three weeks away, Obama's job approval rating dropped 4 points, from 47 percent just a month ago. It's the lowest rating of his presidency in the Reuters/Ipsos poll. His disapproval rating has reached 53 percent. Obama's approval hasn't been above 50 percent since May in the monthly survey. Democratic approval of his handling of the economy dropped from 78 to 70 percent last month -- the lowest rating of his presidency in the poll.--NY Post

* 10/14/10--CHICAGO (WLS) - The U.S. Justice Department is investigating whether the state of Illinois missed the deadline for mailing absentee ballots to members of the military and other overseas American voters as part of a new federal overseas voting law. Cris Cray, Director of Legislation at the Illinois State Board of Elections, says not all of Illinois' 110 jurisdictions were compliant with the 2009 Military and Overseas Voter Empowerment Act (MOVE). The law requires every state to mail their absentee ballots 45 days prior to Election Day to overseas troops, government employees and other Americans who want to vote from abroad. Cray says she is currently compiling data from each of Illinois' jurisdictions to determine which were compliant and which were delinquent. Cray said it's possible the ballots may not be counted because the state was tardy in sending them out. Illinois was required to have all of its absentee ballots mailed by Sept. 18, the national deadline. Election officials have until Nov. 15 to count the absentee ballots, which must be postmarked by midnight Nov. 1 to be eligible. In an e-mail response, Justice Department spokeswoman Xochil Hinojosa confirmed that Illinois is being investigated for the absentee ballot infraction. "The Department is working with all states, including Illinois, to investigate and remedy any problems that will prevent our men and women serving overseas from having the opportunity to vote and have their votes counted," Hinojosa said. The Justice Department has brought a lawsuit against the state of New York after settling with New Mexico over a similar case of delinquent absentee ballots for overseas Americans. Several New York counties including the five boroughs of New York City were found to be in violation of the deadline after the state was permitted by the Defense Department to move its deadline to Oct. 1 because the state's primary day was four days before the deadline. The Justice Department settled a case with New Mexico Tuesday where six counties failed to mail ballots by the deadline. Overseas ballots could be a deciding factor in Illinois' mid-term elections where recent polls show a tight U.S. Senate race between Republican Mark Kirk and Democrat Alexi Giannoulias. Republican Bill Brady has an edge over Democratic incumbent Pat Quinn for governor.--wlsam.com

* 10/14/10--(Reuters) - U.S. states can proceed with a lawsuit seeking to overturn President Barack Obama's landmark healthcare reform law, a Florida judge ruled Thursday. U.S. District Judge Roger Vinson had said at a hearing last month that he would block efforts by the Justice Department to dismiss the lawsuit, led by Florida and 19 other states. "In this order, I have not attempted to determine whether the line between constitutional and extraconstitutional government has been crossed," Vinson, of the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Florida, wrote in his ruling. "I am only saying that ... the plaintiffs have at least stated a plausible claim that the line has been crossed," Vinson said. Opponents of Obama's overhaul of the $2.5 trillion U.S. healthcare system have said it violates the Constitution by imposing what they consider unlawful taxes and requiring citizens to obtain healthcare coverage, among other issues. The suit was originally filed in March by mostly Republican state attorneys general. The ruling allowing the case to proceed was a setback for Obama, who has made healthcare reform a cornerstone of his agenda and who is struggling to fight off a strong Republican challenge in November 2 mid-term Congressional elections. Vinson dismissed four of six claims the states brought against the healthcare law but said he saw grounds to proceed on two counts, including one relating to the way critics say it would force huge new spending by state governments. On the issue of the so-called "individual mandate," the law's provision that all Americans obtain healthcare insurance, Vinson said the plaintiffs had "most definitely stated a plausible claim" for their objections. "The power that the individual mandate seeks to harness is simply without prior precedent," he said. The White House said the government expects to prevail.

* 10/15/10--WASHINGTON --President Obama yesterday got an earful from young voters disappointed that his promises haven't panned out -- a startling dose of buyer's remorse from the group that fueled his 2008 election. College students and 20-some-things confronted Obama at a televised town hall-style forum to ask why the economy is still bad and why race relations haven't improved. Adam Hunter, a New Jersey native who lives in DC, asked the president why the stimulus didn't keep unemployment below 8 percent, as Obama promised. "Now it's at 9.4 percent," Hunter said at the televised forum at BET studios in Washington, which was sponsored by BET, CMT and MTV. "Now we have young people who are out of college, out of grad school, who don't have the most experience, like myself, still trying to find work. But it's hard. "If the economy does not improve over the next two years, why should we vote you back in?" he asked. One of the moderators read two tweets in which viewers were asked to state their greatest fears. One was, "My greatest fear is that we're turning into a communist country." The other: "My greatest fear is that Obama will be re-elected." --NY Post

* 10/15/10--WASHINGTON—A late effort by Democrats to match record fund raising by conservative organizations has come up short, leaving the party more reliant than usual on the campaign efforts of labor unions. A key pro-Democratic group, recently created by top party insiders to build a "firewall" around the Democrats' majority in the House, said Thursday it hoped to raise $10 million. That's a fraction of the $50 million that an alliance of GOP groups said Tuesday they would spend to help Republicans in dozens of House races. --wsj.com

* 10/15/10--KABUL, Afghanistan (AP) — Three NATO troops were killed Friday in Afghanistan in a surge of attacks that raised the death toll to 17 in three days for international troops in the country.

* 10/15/10--"We have a lousy Supreme Court decision that has opened up the floodgates, and so we have to deal within the realm of constitutionality. And a lot of the campaign finance bills that we have passed have been declared unconstitutional by the Supreme Court. I think the Constitution is wrong. [emphasis added] I don't think that money is the same thing as human beings. I don't think money equals free speech. I don't think corporations should have the same equality as a regular voter in this district." --Rep. Jim McGovern (D-MA) on campaign-finance regulation and the January U.S. Supreme Court decision in Citizens United vs. Federal Election Commission--Patriot Post Digest

* 10/15/10--Federal District Court Judge Virginia Phillips, a Clinton nominee, this week ordered the Pentagon to halt its "Don't-Ask-Don't-Tell" policy immediately, freezing current and future procedures that could remove openly homosexual personnel from the Armed Forces. Phillips said that the law "infringes the fundamental rights" of those serving in the military. Leftists, eager to end the policy by any means necessary, applauded the ruling. However, Defense Secretary Robert Gates, who supports ending the policy, says such an action should come from Congress. He warned that such an abrupt change would have "enormous consequences for our troops." For what it's worth, the administration has announced that it will appeal the decision, but we expect that to be a half-hearted defense at best. The same goes for the appeal of July's Massachusetts court ruling that the Defense of Marriage Act is unconstitutional. The Pentagon had originally wanted to wait to act on the policy after a thorough review of its potential impact to soldiers currently fighting around the world. The House has already passed repeal legislation, leaving the Senate little time for the military's input on the matter, and they're expected to make their move during the lame-duck session.--Patriot Post Digest

* 10/15/10--Judge Susan Bolton, a Clinton appointee defined by the local Arizona press as an "intelligent and fair jurist," ruled this week that the ACLU, the Mexican American Legal Defense and Education Fund, and other so-called civil rights groups could continue their federal lawsuit challenging the state of Arizona's right to enforce its immigration law. Bolton previously blocked enforcement of the law, which merely reflects federal law on the matter, ruling that "harm to the organizational plaintiffs will occur if S.B. 1070 goes into effect, regardless of how it is enforced or applied." She also found merit in the argument presented by the plaintiffs that the law violates both the Fourth and 14th Amendments.The denied motion to dismiss the suit was filed by Arizona Gov. Jan Brewer along with two county sheriffs: Joe Arpaio of Maricopa County and Paul Babeu of Pinal County. They sought dismissal based in part on the doctrine of concurrent enforcement, since Arizona's law mirrors federal statute; however, the federal government believes Arizona is usurping its enforcement powers. Whatever the trial's outcome, the prospects of S.B. 1070 taking effect any time soon are dim at best. Meanwhile, La Raza rejoices.--Patriot Post Digest

* 10/15/10--After months of stalling, the Obama administration has lifted the moratorium on deepwater oil drilling -- only to replace the ban with new regulations that industry insiders fear are little more than a "de facto moratorium." The Interior Department itself admits that the costs associated with the new regulations "may result in a reduction in the pace of deepwater drilling activity on marginal offshore fields, and reduce investment in our domestic energy resources from what it otherwise would be, thereby reducing employment in [Outer Continental Shelf] and related support industries." Translated: Good-bye, even more jobs. (The moratorium has already cost some 20,000-plus jobs.) Hello, greater dependency on foreign oil. Interior Secretary Ken Salazar says that the higher costs are justified by the resulting risk reduction, but as the Heritage Foundation points out, "Salazar failed to identify how much risk the new regulations would reduce. How can the cost justify the risk if they don't even know what the risk is?" Meanwhile, whether through an outright moratorium or stifling regulations, a ban is still a ban. Interestingly, Salazar's "open for business" masquerade comes just weeks before the November elections -- a timeline which, of course, is purely coincidental.--Patriot Post Digest

* 10/15/10--It may be the best resignation letter in history. Last week renowned physicist Hal Lewis wrote the president of the American Physical Society to tell him that he no longer wishes to be part of an organization that is part of the "scam" of global warming and "accepts corruption as the norm." Lewis then did one better: He released his letter to the public. Lewis, who is also Professor Emeritus of Physics at the University of California at Santa Barbara, had been a member of APS for 67 years, and his sadness and disgust is apparent as he severs his relationship with the organization. He recalls the days when science was driven by a pure quest for knowledge, likening the choice to be a physicist before WWI as a monkish existence of "poverty and abstinence." Now, he says, the business of science is just that -- a business -- with the results slanted toward the highest bidder. And global warming -- as we have all seen by the astronomic increase in Al Gore's wealth -- is big business indeed. "The global warming scam, Lewis wrote, "with the (literally) trillions of dollars driving it, that has corrupted so many scientists, and has carried APS before it like a rogue wave." He also referred to it as "the greatest and most successful pseudoscientific fraud I have seen in my long life as a physicist." Well put.--Patriot Post Digest

* 10/16/10--The president of the National Organization for Women (NOW) may have said it is wrong for anyone to call a woman a "whore," but the head of the California NOW affiliate says Republican gubernatorial candidate Meg Whitman is one, FOXNews.com reported Friday. California NOW President Parry Bellasalma told the TPM blog on Thursday that the description of the Republican candidate for governor of California is accurate.--Newscore

* 10/16/10--The Donkeys are the teachers' pets. Teachers and professors statewide have donated $1.6 million to congressional candidates for the 2010 elections -- and 90 percent of the largesse has gone to Democrats. Sen. Charles Schumer was the most popular politician of all. He received $174,175 in contributions from educators -- tops among all federal officeholders running this year -- according to an analysis by the Center for Responsive Politics. In general, the study shows that educators are a rock-solid constituency for Democrats. Teachers unions overwhelmingly favor Democrats, but so do professors from elite colleges.--NY Post

* 10/16/10--Nationally-recognized pollster Scott Rasmussen last night predicted that Republicans would gain 55 seats in races for the U.S. House of Representatives November 2—much more than the 39 needed for a Republican majority in the House for the first time since 2006. But the man whose Rasmussen Reports polling is watched carefully by politicians and frequently quoted by the punditocracy said that whether Republicans gain the ten seats they need to take control of the Senate is in question.--Human Events

* 10/16/10--PERRY, Ga. — As if embattled Congressional Democrats did not have enough on their hands, some are opening up a new front in their fight to save their seats — against Nancy Pelosi, the speaker of the House and a leader of their own party. --NY Times

* 10/17/10--In the month after Homeland Security officials started a review of Houston's immigration court docket, immigration judges dismissed more than 200 cases, an increase of more than 700 percent from the prior month, new data shows. The number of dismissals in Houston courts reached 217 in August — up from just 27 in July, according to data from the Executive Office for Immigration Review, which administers the nation's immigration court system. In September, judges dismissed 174 pending cases — the vast majority involving immigrants who already were out on bond and had cases pending on Houston's crowded downtown court docket, where hearings are now being scheduled into 2012. Roughly 45 percent of the 350 cases decided in that court in September resulted in dismissals, the records show. The EOIR data offer the first glimpse into Homeland Security's largely secretive review of pending cases on the local immigration court docket.--Chron.com

* 10/18/10--PRINCETON, NJ -- Unemployment, as measured by Gallup without seasonal adjustment, is at 10.0% in mid-October -- essentially the same as the 10.1% at the end of September but up sharply from 9.4% in mid-September and 9.3% at the end of August. This mid-month measurement confirms the late September surge in joblessness that should be reflected in the government's Nov. 5 unemployment report.--gallup.com

* 10/18/10--New numbers posted today on the Treasury Department website show the National Debt has increased by more than $3 trillion since President Obama took office. The National Debt stood at $10.626 trillion the day Mr. Obama was inaugurated. The Bureau of Public Debt reported today that the National Debt had hit an all time high of $13.665 trillion. The Debt increased $4.9 trillion during President Bush's two terms. The Administration has projected the National Debt will soar in Mr. Obama's fourth year in office to nearly $16.5-trillion in 2012. That's more than 100 percent of the value of the nation's economy and $5.9-trillion above what it was his first day on the job. Mr. Obama frequently lays blame for soaring federal deficits on his predecessor.--cbsnews.com

* 10/18/10--Amid new warnings of possible terrorist attacks against the West, America's law enforcement agencies continue down a willful path of political correctness that permeates so-called Muslim "outreach" programs. Recent reports have exposed "outreach" to Muslim Brotherhood front organizations including operatives of Hamas, as a sermon from the new Muslim Brotherhood leader calls for violent jihad against the West. Terrorism expert Patrick Poole reported recently the known Hamas operative Kifah Mustapha—an unindicted co-conspirator in the Texas Holy Land Foundation (HLF) trial whose name appears on America's highest terror watch list—was given a tour of the top-secret National Counterterrorism Center and other secure government facilities, including the FBI’s training center at Quantico, Va. The tour is part of a six-week “Citizen’s Academy” Muslim community outreach program hosted by the FBI. Rep. Mike Rogers (R.-Mich.), a member of the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, spoke recently with HUMAN EVENTS about Mustafa's participation in the Citizen's Academy program. "It certainly takes outreach to a whole new level, doesn't it?" Rogers said. "I have not talked to them as to why they did it but I can tell you that at the right time we will have those conversations with the bureau."--humanevents.com

* 10/19/10--WASHINGTON -- More than $1 million from political-action committees affiliated with foreign companies has poured into Democratic coffers, according to new reports. The news comes after top Democrats, led by President Obama, spent weeks pounding Republicans for independent, pro-GOP ads run by the US Chamber of Commerce, which collects dues from member companies abroad. "Barack Obama criticized the Supreme Court and his adversaries over the bogus charge of foreign money tainting elections, while leaders in his own party had taken more than a million dollars from the foreign cookie jar," said Jonathan Collegio, a spokesman for American Crossroads, the political group at the center of the controversy. "The hypocrisy here is just stunning," he added. According to an analysis conducted by the nonpartisan Center for Responsive Politics for The Hill news paper, House and Sen ate Democrats have accepted approximately $1.02 million this election cycle from po litical-action committees af filiated with for eign companies. GOP leaders, meanwhile, have accepted almost $510,000 from such PACs. These PACs, which are legal, are entirely funded by US employees of subsidiaries of foreign companies. Pharmaceutical manufacturer GlaxoSmithKline and aerospace contractor BAE Systems are among the PACs with ties to foreign companies that gave the most to Democrats.--NY Post

* 10/20/10--Just when you thought it was safe to leave Iraq, al Qaeda is back -- with a vengeance. According to The New York Times, al Qaeda operatives are undoing the Anbar Awakening, which secured the American surge back in 2008. Under a hailstorm of brutal Islamicist violence, the Sunni sheiks living there are now abandoning their pro-American stance and going back to the terrorists. Meanwhile, we learn that Osama bin Laden, far from cowering in a cave with goats as his only friends, is holding court in northwest Pakistan and even supervising operations from his base -- while other al Qaeda operatives stream back into Afghanistan for new attacks. That puts still more pressure on a government that's on the verge of tossing in the towel to al Qaeda's old ally, the Taliban. In short, the work of almost a decade of US counterterrorist and counterinsurgency operations -- at a cost of thousands of US lives plus uncounted Pakistani, Afghan and Iraqi soldiers and civilians -- is coming unraveled. We're staring at the possibility of the entire region becoming a permanent al Qaeda base. How ironic that this comes under President Obama-- who during the presidential campaign excoriated George W. Bush for neglecting al Qaeda in order to invade Iraq. The reason is simple. This president has made it clear that his most urgent priority isn't victory or even regional stability, but getting every American out of there -- so that he'll be able to say at the 2012 Democratic Convention, "I brought our troops home." In the process, he'll have left a disaster that will make post-Vietnam Southeast Asia -- boat people, "killing fields" genocide and all -- look like "Mr. Rogers' Neighborhood," because Pakistan's nuclear weapons are at stake. --Arthur Herman, NY Post

* 10/20/10--President Obama last week urged Congress -- likely in a post-election lame-duck session -- to send senior citizens a payment of $250 to offset stagnant Social Security benefits. Total cost of this plan: $15 billion. Social Security's built-in cost-of-living adjustments are meant to protect seniors. But inflation has been flat, so the Social Security Administration hasn't raised benefit levels for two years. But that won't buy many votes, so the administration wants to borrow and spend another $15 billion to purchase as many as possible. At least, that's the only explanation that makes sense. Seniors, after all, as a group are the least supportive of ObamaCare -- and thus maybe the most likely to take it out on Democrats next month. It's transparent, and it's disgraceful.--NY Post Editorial

* 10/20/10--WASHINGTON -- Democrats face losing a devastating cascade of as many as 100 House seats in the upcoming elections, according to several newly adjusted forecasts. Less than two weeks from Election Day, Democratic candidates are fighting to keep their heads above water in the unlikeliest of districts from Massachusetts to California. House-race handicapper Charlie Cook says 97 seats -- the vast majority currently held by Democrats -- are on the chopping block. Analyst Stu Rothenberg puts the number at 100. Politico.com released an analysis yesterday listing 99 Democratic incumbents -- including nine New Yorkers -- in danger of losing re-election. The Associated Press yesterday reported that 75 seats -- mostly Democrats -- "are at serious risk of changing hands" with an additional 25 once-safe Democratic seats tightening. Anything approaching those numbers would be a major repudiation of President Obama's agenda.--NY Post

* 10/20/10--WASHINGTON -- Despite glaring security blunders, no intelligence officials will be fired or disciplined for failing to prevent a 2009 suicide bombing in Afghanistan that killed seven CIA employees in one of the deadliest attacks in the agency's history, CIA Director Leon Panetta said Tuesday. Panetta said separate internal reviews concluded that critical warnings about the Jordanian double agent who set off the explosion inside an Afgan base were not shared with other officials, security measures on the base were insufficient and it was unclear who was in charge of the operation.--NY Post

* 10/21/10--PRINCETON, NJ -- Barack Obama averaged 44.7% job approval during the seventh quarter of his presidency. His average approval rating has declined each quarter since he took office, falling by more than two percentage points in the most recent quarter to establish a new low.--gallup.com

* 10/21/10--Third time the charm? Probably depends on your perspective. But the facts are that a statement published on the government's official White House website confirms that for the third time in a little over a month, President Obama has censored a reference in the Declaration of Independence to people being endowed "by their Creator" with rights. He just says that people "are endowed." Obama repeatedly has used the reference in his campaign efforts to boost Democrat interest in the 2010 midterm elections, at which most analysts are predicting a Republican landslide sweeping through Congress and statehouses. The actual quote from the Declaration is: "We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness." But according to the transcript of Obama's remarks to a Democrat fundraiser in Rockville, Md., just days ago, he was talking about the greatness of America, and said: "As wonderful as the land is here in the United States, as much as we have been blessed by the bounty of this magnificent continent that stretches from the Atlantic to the Pacific, what makes this place special is not something physical," he said. "It has to do with this idea that was started by 13 colonies that decided to throw off the yoke of an empire, and said, 'We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that each of us are endowed with certain inalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.'" --WorldNetDaily

* 10/23/10--WASHINGTON (AP) -- Regulators on Friday shut down a total of seven banks in Florida, Georgia, Illinois, Kansas and Arizona, lifting to 139 the number of U.S. banks that have fallen this year as soured loans have mounted and the economy has sputtered.

* 10/25/10--There were weapons of mass destruction in Iraq after all. The massive cache of almost 400,000 Iraq war documents released by the WikiLeaks Web site revealed that small amounts of chemical weapons were found in Iraq and continued to surface for years after the 2003 US invasion, Wired magazine reported. The documents showed that US troops continued to find chemical weapons and labs for years after the invasion, including remnants of Saddam Hussein's chemical weapons arsenal -- most of which had been destroyed following the Gulf War. In August 2004, American troops were able to buy containers from locals of what they thought was liquid sulfur mustard, a blister agent, the documents revealed. The chemicals were triple-sealed and taken to a secure site. Also in 2004, troops discovered a chemical lab in a house in Fallujah during a battle with insurgents. A chemical cache was also found in the city.--NY Post

* 10/25/10--WASHINGTON, (UPI) -- U.S. President Obama, crisscrossing the country to stump for Democratic candidates, has the lowest approval rating of his presidency, Harris Poll reports. Results of the Harris Interactive survey released Monday indicate 63 percent of Americans have a negative opinion of the job Obama is doing while 37 percent have a positive opinion. Harris said the 37 percent of people who approve of Obama's job is the lowest of his presidency so far. The president's approval ratings may be low, but Congress's approval rating is even worse, Harris Poll said. Only 11 percent of Americans give Congress positive ratings for the job it is doing while 89 percent gave Congress negative marks. Results are based on online surveys of 3,084 people Oct. 11-18. Harris Interactive did not provide a margin of error.

* 10/25/10--(CNSNews.com) - When Rep. Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) gave her inaugural address as speaker of the House in 2007, she vowed there would be “no new deficit spending.” Since that day, the national debt has increased by $5 trillion, according to the U.S. Treasury Department. "After years of historic deficits, this 110th Congress will commit itself to a higher standard: Pay as you go, no new deficit spending,” Pelosi said in her speech from the speaker’s podium. “Our new America will provide unlimited opportunity for future generations, not burden them with mountains of debt." Pelosi has served as speaker in the 110th and 111th Congresses. At the close of business on Jan. 4, 2007, Pelosi’s first day as speaker, the national debt was $8,670,596,242,973.04 (8.67 trillion), according to the Bureau of the Public Debt, a division of the U.S. Treasury Department. At the close of business on Oct. 22, it stood at $13,667,983,325,978.31 (13.67 trillion), an increase of 4,997,387,083,005.27 (or approximately $5 trillion). Pelosi, the 60th speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives, has added more to the national debt than the first 57 House speakers combined.

* 10/25/10--Senate Judiciary Committee Republicans are demanding Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) stop its policy of selective law enforcement against illegal aliens including the termination of deportation proceedings for a number of dangerous criminal aliens. Led by Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-Ala.), top Republican on the Senate Judiciary Committee, Judiciary Republicans want an explanation from Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano of new selective and lax law enforcement policies for crimes including domestic violence, sexual crimes and driving while intoxicated. ICE has cited a lack of funding but the senators noted to date they have not seen any efforts by ICE, DHS, or the Obama Administration to "request an increase in ICE funding sufficient to address staffing shortages, detention capacity, and coordination of enforcement efforts nationwide to achieve a streamlined and robust immigration removal system." The result is the release of these dangerous criminal aliens into our communities.-humanevents.com

* 10/26/10--Just when we'd been told the Chamber of Commerce had bought the election, along comes the American Federation of State, Country and Municipal Employees to pour nearly $90 million into the campaign. According to The Wall Street Journal, this makes the public-sector union the biggest spender of all the outside groups. The National Education Association and the Service Employees International Union rank among the top five. Collectively, these three unions representing millions of public workers -- only the SEIU is majority private -- are devoting an estimated $170 million to an election Democrats insist that they are losing because of the nefarious influence of outside money. AFSCME is the ideal champion of a Democratic Party that is increasingly run by and for the public sector. At their most basic, the stakes of the 2010 election are whether government works for us, or we work for government. No one has a more direct political and financial stake in this question than AFSCME and its compatriots. Their bottom line depends on making us work for them -- for their ever-expanding ranks, for their salaries, for their benefits, for their pensions. And, ultimately, for their campaign coffers. The head of AFSCME's political operation, Larry Scanlon, explained to the Journal, "The more members coming in, the more dues coming in, the more money we have for politics." Q.E.D. In this sense, President Obama's signature economic initiative, the stimulus, contributed to AFSCME's extravagant campaign to save the officeholders who voted for the stimulus. More than $150 billion in stimulus and other federal funds flowed to the states to ensure that AFSCME members were spared layoffs from the recession, or from potential reforms to loosen the fiscal death grip unions have on states like California and New York. The Journal reports that AFSCME's ranks have grown 25 percent in the last 10 years, and its election spending has steadily increased from $19 million in 1998 to almost five times that today. Once they were allowed to organize and engage in collective bargaining beginning in the 1950s, public-sector unions steadily came to dominate the labor movement. A decade ago, public workers were 42 percent of unionized workers; they are more than half today. There is no self-generating check on their voraciousness. "In the private sector, the wage demands of union workers cannot exceed a certain threshold," Daniel DiSalvo writes in a compelling essay on public-sector unionism in the journal National Affairs. "If they do, they can render their employers uncompetitive, threatening workers' long-term job security. In the public sector, though, government is the monopoly provider of many services, eliminating any market pressures." The public-sector unions exemplify a government that is self-serving and out of control. They take government dollars paid to them and use them to elect management that will pay them even more, in a perpetual feedback loop of large-scale patronage. In President Obama, the unions have their natural ally, and in the Tea Party, their natural adversary. Obama represents the Democrats' transformation into an entity wholly at the service of the public workers. Bill Clinton came from the (now defunct) union-skeptical Democratic Leadership Council wing of the Democratic Party. In his new book, "Radical-in-Chief" Stanley Kurtz documents how Obama arose out of a world of leftist ferment, a complex of unions, foundations and community groups that sought to make themselves "socialist incubators," in the phrase of an influential left-wing strategist. AFSCME and its ilk can look to Obama as one of their own. The Tea Party, though, is anathema. It is a genuine grass-roots movement, whereas the unions are hierarchical. It is a collection of taxpayers, whereas the unions feast on tax revenue. It funds its activities from voluntary donations big and small, whereas the unions spend mandatory dues. It is devoted to reducing the size of government, whereas the unions can't abide any diminishment of their realm. In this epic conflict of visions, AFSCME and other public-sector unions will doggedly fight to the last taxpayer dollar.--Rich Lowry, nationalreview.com

* 10/26/10--TEHRAN (Reuters) – Iran began loading fuel into the core of its first nuclear power plant on Tuesday, its atomic energy chief said, taking the last major step to realizing its stated goal of becoming a peaceful user of nuclear energy. Officials said it showed Iran's nuclear plans were on track despite sanctions aimed at forcing it to curb uranium enrichment which many countries fear is aimed at developing atomic weapons.

* 10/26/10--In a last-ditch effort to salvage the Democratic majority, President Obama is encouraging Hispanic voters to remain inspired by stalled immigration "reform" to vote against Republicans on Election Day. More importantly, President Obama is inspiring his constituents to “punish our enemies and reward our friends,” encouraging a similar kind of “thugocracy” we have seen with labor unions....Obama’s assertion to “punish our enemies and reward our friends” (is) an affront to “fellow Americans who don’t agree with his liberal policies.” This comment by Obama is reminiscent of those subtly threatening remarks made by former Service Employees International Union (SEIU) President Andy Stern on a variety of occasions. During an interview with Naked Emperor News on June 15, 2007, Stern stated: "We’re trying to use the power of persuasion. And if that doesn’t work, we’re going to use the persuasion of power because there are governments and there are opportunities to change laws." During an interview with Chicago Public Radio, WBEZ, on February 20, 2007, Stern stated: "We took names. We watched how they voted. We know where they live." President Obama must embrace such thuggery, as he has allied himself with both SEIU and Andy Stern, who is a frequent visitor to the White House. Addressing SEIU members on January 15, 2008 just months before his election, Obama remarked: "I’ve been working with SEIU before I was elected to anything. When I was a community organizer, SEIU local 880 and myself, we organized people to make sure that health care workers had the basic right to organize …That’s how we built political powers on the south side of Chicago … And now the time has come for us to do it all across the country … And we are going to paint the nation purple with SEIU." And now we find President Obama making statements similar to those of Andy Stern. News organizations such as the National Review and Fox News view Obama's remarks during his Univision interview as polarizing, creating an “us vs. them” atmosphere. Worse, Americans see the comments as threatening. According to Prison Planet, the statements were “astounding new levels of rhetoric from the Great Uniter.” Weasel Zippers calls it “Leftist demagoguery at its finest.” Death By 1000 Papercuts asked: “Why does this president’s rhetoric sound increasingly like it’s coming from a dictator of some two-bit Marxist hellhole? Maybe it’s some sort of wish fulfillment." Perhaps, however, when President Obama elected to label his opponents as enemies, he forgot that old proverb, “The enemy of my enemy is my friend” — that may work against him in the upcoming elections.--the new american.com

* 10/26/10--President Obama along with the First Lady are taking a two-day trip to Mubai, India next week which involves the booking of all 570 rooms at the Taj Mahal Hotel, 125 rooms at the Taj President and 90 rooms at the Grand Hyatt and Oberoi hotels. The Obamas will be staying in a sea side room, and therefore the US Navy, Indian Navy and Coast Guard will be outside their window on the water for protection. In terms of actually getting to India, two jumbo jets have been booked to carry Obama’s entourage in addition to Air Force One and its security jets. Once in India, 45 cars will be used to escort the couple around…..again, for two days on the taxpayer dime, (at a cost of $200 million per day). Last time I checked, we didn’t have a royal family in the United States. Article 1, Section 9 of the US Constitution states:"No Title of Nobility shall be granted by the United States."--Townhall.com

* 10/26/10--SPRINGFIELD – Illinois may not be finished investigating those late military ballots. Members of the House Elections Committee say they're considering formal hearings into how and why 36 counties missed the deadline to send ballots to deployed servicemen and other overseas voters. State Rep. Dan Brady, R-Bloomington, said there is clearly something wrong when one-third of local election offices miss a federal deadline to ensure soldiers and sailors have their votes counted.--foxillinois.com

* 10/26/10--The suspect voting machines in Clark County Nevada are services by the SEIU. The SEIU is the same corrupt union that is behind thousands of bogus voter registrations across the nation. The group is spending millions this year to help democrats retain their majorities in Congress. The Washington Examiner reported: Clark County is where three quarters of Nevada’s residents live and where Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid’s son Rory is a county commissioner. Rory is also a Democratic candidate for governor. Since early voting started, there have been credible reports that voting machines in Clark County, Nevada are automatically checking Harry Reid's name on the ballot: Voter Joyce Ferrara said when they went to vote for Republican Sharron Angle, her Democratic opponent, Sen. Harry Reid’s name was already checked. Ferrara said she wasn’t alone in her voting experience. She said her husband and several others voting at the same time all had the same thing happen. “Something’s not right,” Ferrara said. “One person that’s a fluke. Two, that’s strange. But several within a five minute period of time — that’s wrong.” Clark County Registrar of Voters Larry Lomax said there is no voter fraud, although the issues do come up because the touch-screens are sensitive. For that reason, a person may not want to have their fingers linger too long on the screen after they make a selection at any time. Now there’s absolutely no independently verified evidence of chicanery with the voting machines (yet), but it is worth noting that the voting machine technicians in Clark County are members of the Service Employees International Union. The SEIU spent $63 million in elections in 2008 and is planning on spending $44 million more this election cycle — nearly all of that on Democrats. White House political director Patrick Gaspard is formerly the SEIU’s top lobbyist, and former SEIU president Andy Stern was the most frequent vistor to the White House last year.--redstate.com

* 10/26/10--(CHICAGO) (WLS) -- This year marks the first Illinois election that any registered voter can cast their ballot by mail, no excuses necessary. Even as the deadline for postmarking those ballots nears, problems are brewing. An Illinois county election official says that thousands, and potentially hundreds of thousands, of voters who are expecting a ballot sent to them by mail may be disenfranchised. --abc7chicago.com

* 10/27/10--Reports of broken voting machines and fraudulent ballots are coming from Illinois, Nevada, North Carolina and Pennsylvania. In Nevada, voters said that Harry Reid (D) was pre-selected on the electronic voting machine in the Senate race against Sharron Angle (R). The same voting machines are serviced by members of the Service Employees International Union, a huge Reid backer. Angle’s attorney said that “teachers' union representatives were offering Starbucks cards to people to get them to vote for Harry Reid.” President’s Obama’s home state of Illinois - where he voted early by absentee ballot —has a new policy this year in which anyone can vote early by mail. The Illinois Democratic Party has allegedly disenfranchised thousands of voters by tricking them into sending their vote-by-mail requests to their office, instead of the election office. Also in Illinois, over one-third of local election offices did not send the military their absentee ballots by the federal deadline. The Justice Department stepped in and ordered the deadline be extended. Others have received mail ballots with their wrong birth date, making them invalid. In North Carolina, the electronic voting machine automatically completed the ballots to vote for all the Democrats. In Pennsylvania, several citizens filed a petition with the Board of Elections accusing the campaign manager for Patrick Murphy (D) of coordinating fraudulent absentee ballots.--humanevents.com

* 10/27/10--In North Carolina and Nevada, early voters have encountered ballot machine glitches that favor Democrats in hotly contested races. In Troy, N.Y., and Daytona Beach, Fla., police investigations into suspected absentee ballot fraud by elected government officials are underway. In Harris County, Texas, the voter registrar admitted that 20 percent of voter registration forms submitted by liberal activist Houston Votes had problems. Election whistleblowers there are now being investigated by the Obama Justice Department and have been slapped with an ethics complaint by the Texas Democratic Party and a left-wing billionaire George Soros-funded group called Texans for Public Justice. In Yuma County, Ariz., election officials denied any fraud associated with thousands of requests for "permanent early voter list" status submitted en masse by open-borders group Mi Familia Vota (a social justice satellite group of the Service Employees International Union). But election officials admitted that some 6,000 out of 14,000 requests fielded by the Yuma County Recorder's Office "were reviewed and rejected, under Arizona law, either due to the fact the request was a duplicate or the requestor was not eligible to vote in this election or within the jurisdiction." Liberals shrugged their shoulders at reports of illegal alien canvassers trolling for votes in Washington State. Never mind the radical goals spelled out by SEIU International Secretary-Treasurer and Mi Familia Vota founder Eliseo Medina, who views illegal alien amnesty as a powerful Democratic recruitment tool to capture millions of new progressive voters. Funny. For the past two years, Democratic leaders have had nothing to say about the militant New Black Panther Party goons who took it upon themselves to police a Philadelphia voting booth in 2008 wielding billy clubs and shouting anti-white slurs to suppress votes. Now, they're treating citizen election monitors as if they are the jack-booted thugs. When I lauded efforts like the Minnesota Majority, which is training volunteers to watch polls and report on voter fraud, liberal critics accused me this week of "fascism." Silence dissent. Criminalize watchdogs. Whitewash fraud. Discourage grassroots engagement. Deny, deny, deny. These are the signature tactics of the left in the age of Obama. On November 2, Americans get their chance to say: Enough.--Michelle Malkin, Creators.com

* 10/27/10--Yesterday was just another day in the Middle East, Obamanauts would have you believe. Iran began fueling the core of its first nuclear reactor, but that's no big deal, they say. The Bushehr plant will be in full swing in months, but pay no heed. Worry-warts are supposed to relax, because Russia is supplying the enriched fuel that powers its reactor. Moscow is meant to supply outside oversight. That's reassuring. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton criticized the Bushehr arrangement as "premature" in March during a trip to Russia. But now she can't even manage a whimper. Clinton said yesterday the US is concerned solely by hidden nuke sites. "Iran is entitled to the peaceful use of nuclear power," she said. "They are not entitled to a nuclear-weapons program." But Bushehr only legitimizes Iran's own enrichment activity, which is conducted deep underground and away from the prying eyes of UN nuke inspectors. Clinton has glossed over a terrible truth: The Obama administration now considers Iran a fellow nuclear power -- one as yet unarmed, yet someday soon, perhaps, a nuclear equal, fully armed. But the US cannot acquiesce in this -- or the whole Middle East will fall under the mullahs' sway. That would confer an Iranian chokehold on the Strait of Hormuz, through which transits 90 percent of the Gulf's oil exports. It means Iranian supremacy over Shiite neighbors like Iraq and even Sunni rivals like Saudi Arabia. Worst of all, it puts Israel on the brink. These disasters can be averted, but not by a State Department burying its head in the sand or by toothless sanctions. President Obama may be loath to face Iran, but that doesn't free him of his duties. It's up to him to stop Iran's nuclear dash. There is no other option -- and not much time.--NY Post Editorial

* 10/27/10--As Turkey grows more hostile to Israel and cozy with Iran, Washington has chosen to collaborate in both the hostility and the coziness. That's what emerges from a report in Israeli daily Haaretz on NATO's planned missile-defense system. America, it says, has agreed to Turkey's demand that no information gathered by the system--whose primary goal is countering threats from Iran--be shared with Israel. President George W. Bush, who conceived the system, had planned to station it in Eastern Europe. But due to Russia's opposition, President Obama decided to relocate it to Turkey....Ankara posed another condition that may be even more worrying, given its coziness with Tehran: "direct Turkish access to any information gathered by the system."...Does NATO really want to gamble that (Turkey) won't pass this information on to Tehran, letting it know exactly what NATO knows about its capabilities? Under these circumstances, the system could end up doing more harm than good.--Evelyn Gordon, commentarymagazine.com

* 10/27/10--Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, rapped by the White House for pledging to make Barack Obama a one-term president, seems to have the support of a majority of Americans. A new poll provided to Whispers says that 56 percent of likely voters want the president fired. According to pollster Doug Schoen, whose new poll shows vast support for the Tea Party movement among voters, the president is still liked by about half the nation. In fact, more like him personally than like his policies. Some 48 percent think he's a nice guy, while just 42 percent approve of his job performance. But that personal favorability doesn't translate into re-election support when voters are asked if Obama deserves a second term. Says Schoen: "Despite voters feelings toward Obama personally, 56 percent say he does not deserve to be re-elected, while 38 percent say he does deserve to be re-elected president." Worse, Schoen adds, "43 percent say that Barack Obama has been a better president than George W. Bush, while 48 percent say Bush was a better president than Obama has been."--usnews.com

* 10/29/10--Jarvis Tyner, national executive vice-chair of the Communist Party USA, spoke in Detroit October 7, on the need to for “left and progressive” minded people to help insure a huge voter turnout for the midterm election. Tyner is uncompromising in his support for the Democrats and Communist Party "fiend" Barack Obama.--New Zealand Patriot

* 10/29/10--The Arizona Daily Star reports that the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals has overturned Arizona's requirement that people show proof of citizenship to register to vote. The split decision by a three-judge panel determined that the requirement to show proof of citizenship -- passed by voters in 2004 -- is not consistent with the National Voter Registration Act." On the other hand, the court did uphold Arizona's requirement of photo ID at polling places.--Patriot Post Digest

* 10/30/10--WASHINGTON (AP) - Democratic voters are closely divided over whether President Barack Obama should be challenged within the party for a second term in 2012, an Associated Press-Knowledge Networks Poll finds. That glum assessment carries over into the nation at large, which is similarly divided over whether Obama should be a one-term president. A real Democratic challenge to Obama seems unlikely at this stage and his re-election bid is a long way off. But the findings underscore how disenchanted his party has grown heading into the congressional elections Tuesday. The AP-KN poll has tracked a group of people and their views since the beginning of the 2008 presidential campaign. Among all 2008 voters, 51 percent say he deserves to be defeated in November 2012 while 47 percent support his re-election _ essentially a tie. Among Democrats, 47 percent say Obama should be challenged for the 2012 nomination and 51 percent say he should not be opposed. Those favoring a contest include most who backed Hillary Rodham Clinton's unsuccessful faceoff against Obama for the 2008 nomination. The poll did not ask if Democrats would support particular challengers.