Post-vacation...

Just back from a few days of stress-free vacation. Except for reading the news of course, where I'm treated to continued coverage of the deliberate destruction of the US by our Radical-in-Chief. This bit from Victor Davis Hanson on our "post-racial" president's too good not to excerpt (but go read the whole thing!):

From “Cowards” to “Wise Latina” — We Get it Already. Had Eric Holder not accused the nation of being cowards, had the president not appealed to voters in a recent video on the basis of race, had the president not intervened to stereotype the police in a minor matter at Harvard, had the Supreme Court justice not suggested racial background can make a better judge, had both the attorney general and the president not implied, before reading the bill, that 70% of Arizonans were intent on racially stereotyping, we would not quite be where we are — in which a bankrupt country in the middle of two wars is obsessed over the NAACP calling the tea party veritable racists and the dropping of charges against a fringe crack-pot group like the New Black Panther Party.

Obama attacks state of Arizona

On top of all his other deliberately destructive policies, Prez Fershizzle has decided to sue the state of Arizona. His legal theory: that the Feds have the legal authority to not enforce the law of the land. No kidding. It'll definitely be comical, watching government lawyers trying to make that argument.

How is the Obama administration not in breach of Article 4 Section 4 of the Constitution?

The United States shall guarantee to every State in this Union a Republican Form of Government, and shall protect each of them against Invasion; and on Application of the Legislature, or of the Executive (when the Legislature cannot be convened) against domestic Violence.

Aside from the legal points, Obama's brazen chutzpah in attacking an American state while the federal government is derelict in its duties: simply mind-boggling. I predict an ugly outcome.

Plus: a great comment on a blog I frequent:

Isn't it amazing that we have a hostile democrat federal govt that wants to prohibit a state from protecting it's borders from an invasion, not to mention the unspoken of war on our southern border where Mexican drug cartels and paratroopers have shootouts with US border patrol agents on US soil.

The Artist formerly known as Prince, blabbering like an old guy

Hah! My first non-political post in awhile!

Here's what rock-star Prince has to say about the internet:

"The internet's completely over," he said. "I don't see why I should give my new music to iTunes or anyone else. They won't pay me an advance for it and then they get angry when they can't get it. The internet's like MTV. At one time MTV was hip and suddenly it became outdated. Anyway, all these computers and digital gadgets are no good. They just fill your head with numbers and that can't be good for you."

The stuff about royalties & copyright I get completely, but his comments about "fill your head with numbers" sound much like a cranky old guy railing about the evils of new-fangled gizmos.

Great stuff!

This is too good not to pass along.

Relevant Tidbit on the 4th of July

I just saw this wonderful tidbit from the Declaration of Independence:

"He has forbidden his Governors to pass Laws of immediate and pressing importance, unless suspended in their operation till his Assent should be obtained; and when so suspended, he has utterly neglected to attend to them."

Sure sounds like our Narcissist in Chief.

Why is the Gulf Cleanup so Slow?

An excellent piece from the Wall Street Journal outlining Obama's unwillingness to do what needs doing in the Gulf. Maybe if he'd trim his golf game to nine holes...

Why Is the Gulf Cleanup So Slow?

There are obvious actions to speed things up, but the government oddly resists taking them.

As the oil spill continues and the cleanup lags, we must begin to ask difficult and uncomfortable questions. There does not seem to be much that anyone can do to stop the spill except dig a relief well, not due until August. But the cleanup is a different story. The press and Internet are full of straightforward suggestions for easy ways of improving the cleanup, but the federal government is resisting these remedies.

First, the Environmental Protection Agency can relax restrictions on the amount of oil in discharged water, currently limited to 15 parts per million. In normal times, this rule sensibly controls the amount of pollution that can be added to relatively clean ocean water. But this is not a normal time.

Various skimmers and tankers (some of them very large) are available that could eliminate most of the oil from seawater, discharging the mostly clean water while storing the oil onboard. While this would clean vast amounts of water efficiently, the EPA is unwilling to grant a temporary waiver of its regulations.

Next, the Obama administration can waive the Jones Act, which restricts foreign ships from operating in U.S. coastal waters. Many foreign countries (such as the Netherlands and Belgium) have ships and technologies that would greatly advance the cleanup. So far, the U.S. has refused to waive the restrictions of this law and allow these ships to participate in the effort.

The combination of these two regulations is delaying and may even prevent the world's largest skimmer, the Taiwanese owned "A Whale," from deploying. This 10-story high ship can remove almost as much oil in a day as has been removed in total—roughly 500,000 barrels of oily water per day. The tanker is steaming towards the Gulf, hoping it will receive Coast Guard and EPA approval before it arrives.

In addition, the federal government can free American-based skimmers. Of the 2,000 skimmers in the U.S. (not subject to the Jones Act or other restrictions), only 400 have been sent to the Gulf. Federal barriers have kept the others on stations elsewhere in case of other oil spills, despite the magnitude of the current crisis. The Coast Guard and the EPA issued a joint temporary rule suspending the regulation on June 29—more than 70 days after the spill.

The Obama administration can also permit more state and local initiatives. The media endlessly report stories of county and state officials applying federal permits to perform various actions, such as building sand berms around the Louisiana coast. In some cases, they were forbidden from acting. In others there have been extensive delays in obtaining permission.

As the government fails to implement such simple and straightforward remedies, one must ask why.
More

* As Storm Stalls Cleanup, House Passes Victims' Bill
* Florida Sees New Threat to Its Beaches

One possibility is sheer incompetence. Many critics of the president are fond of pointing out that he had no administrative or executive experience before taking office. But the government is full of competent people, and the military and Coast Guard can accomplish an assigned mission. In any case, several remedies require nothing more than getting out of the way.

Another possibility is that the administration places a higher priority on interests other than the fate of the Gulf, such as placating organized labor, which vigorously defends the Jones Act.

Finally there is the most pessimistic explanation—that the oil spill may be viewed as an opportunity, the way White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel said back in February 2009, "You never want a serious crisis to go to waste." Many administration supporters are opposed to offshore oil drilling and are already employing the spill as a tool for achieving other goals. The websites of the Sierra Club, Friends of the Earth and Greenpeace, for example, all feature the oil spill as an argument for forbidding any further offshore drilling or for any use of fossil fuels at all. None mention the Jones Act.

To these organizations and perhaps to some in the administration, the oil spill may be a strategic justification in a larger battle. President Obama has already tried to severely limit drilling in the Gulf, using his Oval Office address on June 16 to demand that we "embrace a clean energy future." In the meantime, how about a cleaner Gulf?

New Black Panthers and Obama's Dept. of Justice

This is so blatant, so overt a miscarriage of justice that Holder must be hauled in front of a truly independent board to answer for his actions. Firing him won't be enough; he needs to go to jail for this. Should the trail lead back to Obama, he'll have to go as well (among other impeachable offenses for which he's responsible).

Former U.S. prosecutor to testify on New Black Panthers charges

By Emilie Lounsberry

Inquirer Staff Writer

As voters were casting the ballots that elected America's first black president in November 2008, a troubling incident occurred outside a polling place in North Philadelphia, the Justice Department later contended.

There, two members of the New Black Panther Party for Self-Defense hurled racial threats and insults at black and white voters, federal prosecutors in the Justice Department's Civil Rights Division alleged in a complaint accusing the group and three members of violating the federal Voting Rights Act.

The prosecutors later won a default judgment against Minister King Samir Shabazz, whom they identified as leader of the Philadelphia chapter, and sought dismissal of charges against the organization and two other members.

Now, one of the prosecutors, J. Christian Adams, has resigned from the Justice Department amid a widening flap over the case. He said he was scheduled to testify Tuesday before the U.S. Civil Rights Commission in an investigation over dismissal of the charges.

Adams said Friday that he disagreed with the decision to dismiss charges. Though his name is on the court document seeking the dismissal, Adams said he believes the case should have been pursued.

"I was just following instructions to dismiss the case," Adams said in an interview.

Adams said there has been long-standing opposition in the Voting Section of the Civil Rights Division of the Justice Department toward "race-neutral enforcement" of the voting-rights law during the Obama administration as well as when President George W. Bush was in office.

"I believe in a robust protection of voters," said Adams, who has been busy doing interviews on Fox News and radio talk shows since leaving the Justice Department in early June.

According to court papers, Shabazz, brandishing a nightstick, and a second member stood at the entrance to the polling place in the 1200 block of Fairmount Avenue. The two "made menacing and intimidating gestures, statements, and movements," the complaint said.

While the prosecutors dismissed charges against the organization, its leader and the third member, they won an order barring Shabazz from displaying a weapon within 100 feet of any open polling location in Philadelphia on any Election Day through 2012.

Justice Department spokesman Tracy Schmaler told the Associated Press that the charges against the New Black Panthers were dropped because they were not supported by the facts or by the law.

On its website, the New Black Panther Party says that "the white man has kept us deaf, dumb, and blind," and that it seeks "the overdue debt of reparations." A group spokesperson could not be reached for comment.

Read more: http://www.philly.com/inquirer/local/20100703_Former_U_S__prosecutor_to_testify_on_New_Black_Panthers_charges.html#ixzz0sgmiODGZ