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Smoking Gun? Glen Cook Email Shows ATF and DOJ KNEW That Fast and Furious had Walked over 2000 Guns To Mexico – Killing Hundreds Just Two Days After Brian Terry’s Murder
Gov. Rick Perry is on record as saying his administration would start foreign aid at “zero,” a position that some of his fellow candidates agreed with.
If you support America or are an ally, like Israel, we’ll share with you, but if you’re not with us, NO SOUP FOR YOU!
It’s the right thing to do.
Those two Republicans? Mike Huckabee and Norm Coleman.
Foreign aid helps preserve stability, the two write: “Stability comes hard in nations and regions weakened by AIDS, malaria or starvation. Problems such as terrorism, pandemics and human trafficking take root in failed states and ungoverned territory.”
Foreign aid also can help develop markets for U.S. exports, Huckabee and Coleman write. And it can act as a counterweight against China. The country has stuck to foreign aid even when economic conditions were worse than today’s, “because these actions were necessary and right.”
“Now we are the nation fighting AIDS and malaria in Africa and around the globe. Not long ago, Republican leaders designed and supported these efforts — motivated by a certain view of our national interests and our national character.”
U.S. foreign aid has saved millions of lives, Huckabee and Coleman say. Republicans must realize that such aid fits with conservative philosophy. “True conservatism doesn’t ignore a problem but approaches it with prudence and purpose,” they write.
Well, that’s one take. But what if everything they said is wrong and foreign aid actually does more harm than good?
Because in most cases, if not all, it does:
Foreign aid is nothing more than an international welfare program. It does not foster radical reforms or positive progress. Foreign aid gives dictators the ability to reward cronies, punish enemies and embezzle millions into nice, fat retirement accounts in Sweden. It gives them the ability to continue repressing the country the foreign aid is supposed help. It props up corrupt governments. And you and I get to pick up the check.
Foreign aid also goes against the Constitution. There is no basis for it in any way. Rep. Ron Paul nailed it when he said:
“Our annual foreign aid bill is one of the most egregious abuses of the taxpayer I can imagine. Not only is it an unconstitutional burden on America’s working families, but this yearly attempt to buy friends and influence foreign governments is counterproductive and actually results in less goodwill toward the United States overseas.”
James Madison, the father of the Constitution, refused to give federal money to individual states in for roads and canals. I can’t believe he would approve of hundreds of millions to men like Robert Mugabe. Nor should we.
Oh, but what about food aid, right? What about sending tons and tons of grain to countries that need food?
What does that do to the local farmer? Do you think anyone is going to buy grain if someone is giving it away? Maybe if there was a market for grain, someone would be growing it.
Honestly, if you wanted to help these poor destitute people, you don’t send them surplus goods. Send them some capitalists.
Send a starving country some farmers and give them the freedom to succeed. But don’t send them money. It never gets to where it supposed to be.
And don’t send them goods. It just destroys the market for it wherever it goes.
Foreign aid does more harm than good. These countries don’t need aid. They need freedom.
And as we see in Afghanistan, it’s near impossible to export that.
It probably doesn’t have anything to do with the Occupy Wall Street movement. I mean, just because a protester threatened to but New York to the ground and said America would see what a Molotov cocktail would do to Macy’s doesn’t mean this guy is associated with the same group:
Authorities say a Utah man has been arrested after throwing a Molotov cocktail at a Wells Fargo branch.
Police responded early Thursday morning in West Jordan, about 15 miles south of Salt Lake City. A bank window was cracked, but authorities say the device didn’t explode.
The man arrested is 20 years old. His name wasn’t released. Authorities say a bomb squad removed suspicious items from his car, but it wasn’t immediately clear if they were explosive.
Terrorism fail.
Hat Tip: Gateway Pundit
It looks like the supporters of Cain in Iowa are leaving his train for someone who has demonstrated a firmer grasp on the issues:
The latest Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey of Likely Iowa Republican caucus-goers shows Gingrich with 32% followed by former Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney at 19%. Georgia businessman Herman Cain, who led in Iowa last month, drops to third with 13% of the vote. Texas Congressman Ron Paul draws 10% of the vote in Iowa, while Texas Governor Rick Perry and Minnesota Congresswoman Michele Bachmann each grab six percent (6%).
Former Pennsylvania Senator Rick Santorum draws support from five percent (5%) of caucus-goers while former Utah Governor Jon Huntsman picks up two percent (2%). Only one percent (1%) would prefer some other candidate and six percent (6%) more are undecided.
Ed Morrissey points out that newt winning Iowa doesn’t really hurt Romney, since no one expects him to win there anyway. But what happens after Iowa? Romney wins New Hampshire. That’s pretty much a given. Then comes South Carolina, where Cain leads for now.
Then, the all important Florida. The latest poll in Florida has Cain up by six points. That poll was taken on November 8th. Who knows where it’s at now, but second place with Romney, followed by Newt.
This wouldn’t be up for grabs if Cain had just followed my advice, or listened to Jimmie.
What could’ve been.
Ace sums up my biggest issue with Cain, and why I’m now looking for someone to support:
It’s the “zero interest in policy” thing I zero in on. Cain is not an unintelligent man — former math whiz and CEO? He’s got brains.
Which is why I put this down to a character problem. If you’re running for president, and it requires, as it does, essentially cramming for One Big Test for a month, studying briefing books, etc., and you don’t do that, what can I say?
If you haven’t taken the candidacy seriously enough to do something you did 40 times before in college, then why should anyone else take it seriously?
Cramming for a test is not exactly climbing Mount Kilamanjaro. It’s a pain in the ass, but it can be done. It’s done every single day.
To just blow off that basic homework? I don’t get it.
Yeah, neither do I. But I’m not jumping from Cain to Newt just yet, especially considering his past. And I’m not talking about the social issues, like his divorces. I’m talking about his party first issues.
Dede Scozzafava ring a bell?
Occupy San Diego decided, for some reason, that they needed to so solidarity with the guy who did a drive by on the White House.
No, really:
If you remember, MSNBC went ballistic (pun intended, cause it’s awesome) over a man carrying a rifle at a Tea Party rally outside an arena the President was attending.
They even went so far as to edit the video to keep their drones from learning it was a black man with a gun, but that’s neither here nor there. The Tea Party didn’t honor anyone who committed violence.
Think of the outrage the media would rightly show if a Tea Party anywhere showed solidarity with the nutcase who flew his plane into an IRS building.
There will be no coverage of this. Count on it.
But let a nutcase with a gun shoot a Congresswoman and they’ll find a way to blame Sarah Palin for it.
Meanwhile, I’d like to hold a moment of silence for all the people who have businesses being adversely affected by the Occupy movements and all the people who have lost jobs because these Marxists and anarchists hate capitalism.
Hat Tip: Newsbusters via Fox Nation
While Obama is in Australia selling cap and trade as something that is good for our economy over the long term, the CBO is busy telling Sen. Jeff Sessions the “agency’s long-term projections about President Obama’s first stimulus bill show a negative long-term effect on economic growth.”
It’s important to note Sen. Sessions’ point about how the stimulus will impact the economy after that ten year projection. We will still have all that money to pay back, and that will require taxes to be paid by the citizenry.
It’s the plan that just keeps on taking. And failing.
The bill the Politico flat out lied about passed the House yesterday. Currently, there is no similar bill in the Senate:
Under the House legislation, people with a concealed carry permit in one state could carry a concealed weapon in every other state that gives people the right to carry concealed weapons. While states have various standards for issuing such permits, currently only Illinois and the District of Columbia prohibit the concealed carrying of weapons.
“The Second Amendment is a fundamental right to bear arms that should not be constrained by state boundary lines,” said GOP Rep. Lamar Smith of Texas, chairman of the House Judiciary Committee.
The bill’s chief co-sponsor, Rep. Cliff Stearns, R-Fla., said states should consider concealed carry permits no differently from driver’s licenses recognized by all states. He noted that many states already have reciprocity agreements with other states.
Exactly.
For example, 38 states already recognize Missouri’s concealed carry permit holders. There are two reasons for this.
First, 38 states already sees how awesome we are.
Second, the other 19 voted for Obama, and therefore have no sense at all. (18 if you believe Obama when he says Hawaii is actually Asia.)
I have nothing to back those two statements up.
The resistance against this bill is from perennial anti-gun crusaders who think that the law abiding citizens who travel from one state to another will suddenly become shoot happy nutcases. Because, that happens all the time.
Democratic opponents said the bill would constitute a “race to the bottom,” with states that have strict requirements for issuing permits having to accept permits from states with far more lax standards.
“It’s a situation where weaker state laws become the national law,” said Rep. Bobby Scott, D-Va. He noted that some states require training for permit holders, or deny permits to those under 21 or who sell drugs to minors, commit sex offenses or are involved in domestic violence.
Frankly put, Rep. Bobby Scott is either an idiot, completely ignorant about gun death statistics, or an ideological liberal with no regard for facts.
So what if one state has less rigorous requirements for concealed carry? Do he honestly think that will cause gun crime to increase in his state? Does he feel the same way about driver’s licenses? Because more people die car related deaths than gun related.
For example, in 2007, 41,059 people perished because of cars. 31,224 people died in gun related deaths, and more than half of those, 17,352, were suicides.
And do I really need to get into how many crimes are stopped because of firearms?
Just Like the Tea Party: A List of Occupy Mayhem Sorted by Type
The National Rifle Association celebrates it 140th anniversary today:
Today marks the 140th birthday of the National Rifle Association, and it’s hard not to take a look back at the history of how we got to the place we are today. What started as a marksmanship training effort following the Civil War has evolved into the leading defender in Americans’ right to keep and bear arms. Help celebrate the NRA’s birthday today by becoming more involved in one of our many programs. From attending a local Friends of NRA Banquet, to trying your hand at competitive shooting, introducing a young person to hunting, or obtaining your concealed carry permit after taking an NRA firearms training course, NRA has a a way for every person to exercise their Second Amendment rights. So join us in wishing NRA a happy birthday, and help us preserve the same rights we’ve been protecting since 1871.
Congratulations! Here’s to another 140 years.
Hat Tip: Say Uncle
Dennis Miller announced on The O’Reilly Factor tonight that he was off the Cain Train for one reason – Herman Cain can’t win:
Ten years after its creation, the Transportation Security Administration took a verbal thrashing from two Republicans. And there isn’t anything they said that was arguable:
Rep. John Mica, R-Florida, a longtime critic who has fought to privatize TSA screening jobs, said Congress never intended the agency it created in November 2001 to “mushroom” into a workforce of 65,000 employees, “top heavy” with bureaucrats.
“I can tell you, in our wildest dreams … no one ever envisioned 4,000 administrative personnel in Washington, D.C., making on average … almost $104,000, and then nearly another 10,000 out in the field,” Mica said.
But the most scathing comment came from Rep. Paul Broun, R-Georgia.
“Americans have spent nearly $60 billion funding TSA and they are no safer today than they were before 9/11,” Broun said.
Pressed on the accuracy of that statement, Broun and Mica said the TSA has never stopped a terrorist attack, and gave credit to private citizens or others for terrorist plots disrupted thus far.
“Unfortunately, the focus has been diverted from security … into managing a huge bureaucracy,” Mica said.
A bureaucracy that is as rigid as the Army Corps of Engineers, who allowed the midwest to be flooded for four months and could only say, “We did exactly as the guide said.”
This rigidity is why we have wheelchair bound grandmothers getting their diapers checked for bombs and infants patted down for guns.
Meanwhile, guns are missed and bombers pass on through.
There is a bill in Congress right now that would allow owners of concealed carry permits to travel to other states with their weapons, however, they are still subject to all the gun laws in that state.
John Lott wrote about it today at Fox News.com:
The proposed National Right-to-Carry Reciprocity Act contains two provisions: if your state issues a concealed handgun license, that permit will let you travel to other states. Of course, you also have to follow the rules in the state you visit, so for Illinois — the single state that still bans concealed handguns — an out-of-state license wouldn’t let you carry a concealed handgun there.
That’s the simple way of putting it. Here’s exactly what the bill says:
‘‘§926D. Reciprocity for the carrying of certain concealed firearms
‘‘(a) Notwithstanding any provision of the law of any State or political subdivision thereof (except as provided in subsection (b)), a person who is not prohibited by Federal law from possessing, transporting, shipping, or receiving a firearm, and who is carrying a valid identification document containing a photograph of the person, and a valid license or permit which is issued pursuant to the law of a State and which permits the person to carry a concealed firearm, may possess or carry a concealed handgun (other than a machinegun or destructive device) that has been shipped or transported in interstate or foreign commerce, in any State, other than the State of residence of the person, that—
‘‘(1) has a statute that allows residents of the State to obtain licenses or permits to carry concealed firearms; or
‘‘(2) does not prohibit the carrying of concealed firearms by residents of the State for lawful purposes.
‘‘(b) The possession or carrying of a concealed handgun in a State under this section shall be subject to the same conditions and limitations, except as to eligibility to possess or carry, imposed by or under Federal or State law or the law of a political subdivision of a State, that apply to the possession or carrying of a concealed handgun by residents of the State or political subdivision who are licensed by the State or political subdivision to do so, or not prohibited by the State from doing so.
The bill lays it out very clearly. It took me no time to find this in the bill.
Which is what makes it hard to believe that this lede from the Politico is anything less than activist journalism:
If congressional gun-rights stalwarts get their way, a firearms owner with a concealed-weapons permit issued in Utah could be allowed to carry that gun in New York — regardless of the gun laws in the Empire State.
How do you come to that conclusion? Seriously. It says it very clearly in the bill. If you can carry in Utah, and New York allows concealed carry, you can carry in New York. If New York doesn’t allow concealed carry, you can’t carry in New York.
Even more bizarre, the same article says as much two paragraphs later:
GOP backers of the National Right-to-Carry Reciprocity Act — which would allow those with a concealed-weapons permit in one state to carry their firearms elsewhere as long as that state also allows concealed carrying — say they don’t see that as an issue.
Those two sentences completely contradict each other. Either it overrides state laws or it doesn’t.
Politico leads the story with misinformation, then corrects it in the body. And they call it “journalism.”
A member of the Occupy Chicago movement has been arrested for child porn.
Robert Reitz, 21, of the 2000 block of South Canalport Avenue, was arrested Monday in the 100 block of West Quincy Street for an active warrant for aggravated child pornography, police said. He is being held without bond, according to the Cook County Sheriff’s office.
At the time of his arrest Reitz said he was involved with security for Occupy Chicago–a claim that was denied by protest organizers.
Reitz was arrested after officers smelled burnt cannabis and approached to investigate. Officers did a name check and learned he was wanted for a probation violation by the sheriff’s police.
It fits that he would be a part of the security team. A predator would want to present a front that says “safe” while he moves in for his prey.
Occupy Chicago says they can’t be held accountable because they are an open organization and they don’t vet the people in the camp. Wonder if they would grant the Tea Party the same lee way regarding a racist in the middle of their rally?
You know they wouldn’t.
Meanwhile, on the left coast, a protester with Occupy L.A. decided that sitting on the front steps of city hall in full view of children was a good place to rub one out:
Angele Chaidez, 21, faces one count of lewd conduct and one count of indecent exposure for allegedly exposing himself and masturbating in front of several people, including children, Friday on the south steps of City Hall, said prosecutors with the L.A. city attorney’s office.
Just like the Tea Party, right Barry?
Maybe Angele Chaidez thought he was up north in San Francisco, where it’s ok to masturbate in public and children are welcome.
Occupy Everywhere.
Obama supported, Pelosi approved.
I gotta admit, I like Rick Perry, especially when he does ads like this:
