Clapper to Publish Numbers of Secret Spying Orders

The top U.S. intelligence official says he'll now release figures every year on how many new top secret court orders and national security letters are issued and how many people are targeted because of them.

Director of National Intelligence James R. Clapper said Thursday that the number of Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court orders and national security letters authorizing spying will be published. It's part of President Barack Obama's edict to provide more transparency, and to try to convince Americans they are not being spied on.

The new information follows lawmakers' calls to declassify the court orders after leaks by former National Security Agency systems analyst Edward Snowden revealed the NSA annually gathers millions of U.S. phone records and scoops up thousands of U.S. emails mixed with those of terror suspects.

Via: Newsmax

Continue Reading....

Arizona AG: Arrests made in state’s largest undercover food stamp operation seizure

Arizona Attorney General Tom Horne announced the state’s largest undercover food stamp fraud bust and the arrests of three individuals involved on Thursday.

K & S convenience store employees Kameel Sweiss, 51, Ameer Sweis, 22, Faday Sweiss, 33, were arrested Wednesday for allegedly illegally conducting an enterprise, fraudulent schemes and artifices, money laundering, unlawful use of food stamps and computer tampering.

According to Horne, Wednesday morning SWAT units of the Phoenix Police Department entered the K & S convenience store to execute search warrants and seized $32,876 in cash, a key to a private bank vault holding $550,480 in cash, bank records, accounts, food stamp cards, business ledgers and three vehicles.

The arrests came following months of an undercover investigation involving the Arizona Attorney General’s Office, Phoenix Police Department, United States Department of Agriculture, Office of the Inspector General, Arizona Department of Economic Security, as well as the Arizona Department of Revenue, which is conducting a separate and ongoing investigation.

“This business was stealing taxpayer money by allowing a person with a food stamp card to purchase something small, such as a bag of chips, and then overcharge that card to make a fraudulent profit,” Horne explained in a statement.

“This seizure is the largest in our state’s history with regard to food stamp fraud and should serve as a strong warning to those who continue to engage in these kinds of illegal actions,” he added.

The defendants appeared before a judge Wednesday night, in addition to the $100,00 bonds all are required to turn over their passports and if they are able to post bond, the judge ordered they will have to wear an ankle monitor.

“The Office of Inspector General at USDA remains committed, alongside our law enforcement partners, to investigate individuals and retailers involved in the trafficking of food stamp benefits in exchange for cash,” deputy counsel for the Office of the Inspector General Paul Feeney added.

Via: The Daily Caller

Continue Reading....

The Empty Chair Strikes Back: Obama Doesn’t “Consult” With Congress On Syria, Meets With Magic Johnson Instead

There has been a lot of discussion that the President hasn’t even spoken to Congress on Syria, let alone brought the matter to Congress for approval, as is required by the Constitution. Remember this tweet from Ted Cruz yesterday?

So last night there was an administration conference call with several Congressional leaders to “consult”.

Oh, invitation-only, by the way. Here is a list of the 26 people invited to the Friends of Barack meeting

Even the most basic of town hall meetings is required to follow the Sunshine Law. The discussion was unclassified. So why is this not before the rest of Congress in a open public meeting?

We have discussion of how we will strke, leaking like a sieve, but discussion about why, being conducted in the dark. Even Britain realized the necessity of bringing the matter to Parliament for an open discussion. And they don’t have our Constitution.

Susan Rice, with all her usual aplomb, tweeted about it.

Via: Weasel Zippers

Continue Reading....

ENZI, VITTER BILL PUTS CONGRESS INTO OBAMACARE EXCHANGES

On Tuesday, Sens. Mike Enzi (R-WY) and David Vitter (R-LA) introduced legislation to reinstate the requirement that members of Congress, and their staffs, receive health coverage through ObamaCare exchanges, as well as pay the costs of their premiums. Earlier this month, the federal government issued a regulation issuing an exemption for Congress from the requirement included in the ObamaCare law. 

During the debate on ObamaCare, Sen. Chuck Grassley (IA) won approval for an amendment requiring Congress and its staff to enroll for coverage in the health exchanges set up by ObamaCare. This requirement also threatened the ability of the federal government to continue to pick up 75% of the costs of health insurance premiums for Congress, as it currently does. 

After close consultation with the White House and Capitol Hill, the Office of Personnel and Management ruled that the federal government could continue to provide Congress with its existing health insurance coverage, forgoing the exchanges or any dramatic increase in out-of-pocket premium payments. 

Politico reported that the exemption was driven by fears of a "brain drain" on Capitol Hill, causing aides to leave for other jobs rather than pay more for insurance under ObamaCare. 

It is a bit rich to argue that a law forced on all Americans has such potentially negative consequences that members and aides might quit unless they are made exempt. Where do I go to get an exemption?

The Enzi-Vitter bill would reverse the OPM exemption. 

Via: Breitbart

Continue Reading....

[VIDEO] Ed Schultz: I Don’t Care If It’s Been Ruled By Democrats, Republican Policies Destroyed Detroit

Sometimes you have to wonder if anyone at MSNBC is actually watching what is being said on the network.

On Thursday’s Ed Show, host Ed Schultz actually said, “Thanks to Republican policies, and I don't care if [Detroit's] been under Democratic rule or not, it's Republican policies that have come down from the state and the country that have put this city in a bad position” (video follows with commentary):

To be sure, this wasn't the first time Schultz has blamed Republicans for Detroit's demise, but from what I can tell, this is the first time he said so in the same sentence admitting that Democrats controlled the city.

In fact, they controlled the city for 51 years.

As for Republican policies from the state, Rick Snyder (R) has been governor since January 2011.

However, Democrats in the statehouse have largely overseen Detroit's demise with James Blanchard as governor from January 1983 to January 1991 and Jennifer Granholm running the ship from January 2003 till January 2011.

With Republican John Engler in control of things from January 1991 to January 2003, that means Michigan's had a Democratic governor sixteen of the last 30 years.

Facts sure are a stupid thing at MSNBC, ain't they?

Via: Newsbusters

Continue Reading....

[VIDEO] Krauthammer: Vindicating the Vanity and Ego of a President Who's Become a Laughingstock Around the World Is No Reason to Go to War

Shamed into war?

By Charles Krauthammer, Published in The Washington Post

Having leaked to the world, and thus to Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, a detailed briefing of the coming U.S. air attack on Syria — (1) the source (offshore warships and perhaps a bomber or two), (2) the weapon (cruise missiles), (3) the duration (two or three days), (4) the purpose (punishment, not “regime change”) — perhaps we should be publishing the exact time the bombs will fall, lest we disrupt dinner in Damascus.

So much for the element of surprise. Into his third year of dithering, two years after declaring Assad had to go, one year after drawing — then erasing — his own red line on chemical weapons, Barack Obama has been stirred to action.

Or more accurately, shamed into action. Which is the worst possible reason. A president doesn’t commit soldiers to a war for which he has zero enthusiasm. Nor does one go to war for demonstration purposes.

Want to send a message? Call Western Union. A Tomahawk missile is for killing. A serious instrument of war demands a serious purpose.

Via: Fox News

Continue Reading....

Obama's Syria plans in disarray after Britain rejects use of force

Barack Obama's plans for air strikes against Syria were thrown into disarray on Thursday night after the British parliament unexpectedly rejected a motion designed to pave the way to authorising the UK's participation in military action.

The White House was forced to consider the unpalatable option of taking unilateral action against the regime of Bashar al-Assad after the British prime minister, David Cameron, said UK would not now take part in any military action in response to a chemical attack in the suburbs of Damascus last week.

Although Britain's support was not a prerequisite for US action, the Obama administration was left exposed without the backing of its most loyal ally, which has taken part in every major US military offensive in recent years.

Caitlin Hayden, a spokeswoman for Obama's national security council, indicated the administration would consider acting unliaterally. "The US will continue to consult with the UK government – one of our closest allies and friends. As we've said, President Obama's decision-making will be guided by what is in the best interests of the United States.

"He believes that there are core interests at stake for the United States and that countries who violate international norms regarding chemical weapons need to be held accountable."

Via: The Guardian

Continue Reading...

[VIDEO] PBS NewsHour Paints Obama as Victim of ‘Racial Gridlock,’ Hails: ‘You’ve Been Able to Help the Country in Many Ways’

PBS’s Judy Woodruff and Gwen Ifill provided a tag team of Obama idolatry in their interview with President Barack Obama at the White House following Wednesday’s March on Washington anniversary event, gently pressing him from the left and treating him as a victim of racist opposition as Gwen Ifill forwarded the theory “you are a victim of partisan racial gridlock.”

When, in the session carried on the PBS NewsHour, Obama fretted “we have increasing inequality in this society,” Judy Woodruff buttered up Obama by first hailing how “you’ve been able to do -- help the country in many ways,” yet problems – remarkably – still remain, so “how much does it weigh on you that your policies haven’t made more of a difference in those areas?”

Audio: MP3 clip

Of course, not a syllable about the IRS or Benghazi or any other negative for Obama.

The PBS duo began with some questions about Syria before Woodruff pitched this softball:

Via: Newsbuseters

Continue Reading....

‘Indecision 2013′: The Five’s Bolling Hits Obama’s Syria ‘Flip-Flopping’

Fox’s Eric Bolling opened The Five Wednesday with a blistering attack against President Obama’s“indecision” on a potential U.S. military strike in Syria. Bolling accused the president of “flip-flopping” on the issue and made an aggressive case against intervention.

“Has America lost influence on the world stage due to President Obama’s flip-flopping?” Bolling asked. “This president seems naive and clearly is learning on the job. What would President Reagan do? Or President Bush? While I don’t think we should be going into Syria, this president has been changing his position more than Miley Cyrus at the VMA’s and that is becoming problematic.” He said the U.S. should “back off bombing Syria. We need more proof before we kill more people.”

When he was done with his intro, Bob Beckel accused Bolling of delivering “one of the most biased openings” he’s ever done. He took particular offense to the “flip-flop” accusation, saying, “he said the same thing every time he said it. It’s a red line, when cross it, we’re going to do something. They crossed it, we’ll do something.”

When Beckel pointed out that Reagan put 2,000 marines in Lebanon where 247 died, Bolling said whatever Reagan would do in this case, at least he would be “decisive” about it. But the bigger issue, he said is “I don’t think we should go. I think we should wait.

Andrea Tantaros backed Bolling up, lambasting the president for sitting down for an interview with PBS NewsHour to discuss what she called a “do-nothing missile strike.” She said Syria “makes Iraq look like small potatoes” and said “getting involved is a huge mistake.”

Bolling went on to lay out various reasons that the U.S. should not intervene in Syria, including the idea that some people think “Muslim extremists killing Muslim extremists isn’t necessarily a bad thing for America.”

If it’s merely “Muslim extremists” killing each other, Beckel shot back, “how do you account for children in the hospital?”

Bolling seemed to admit that “women and children are dying” in Syria, but said, “we don’t know who is doing it. We are hearing through reports out of Israel that it’s the Syrian government. We don’t know that for sure.”

Watch video below, via Fox News:

Via: Mediaite.com

Continue Reading....

Obama administration offers strategies to promote Obamacare in schools

The Obama administration has posted materials online aimed at promoting the new health-care law in schools.

The materials, offered at the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services’ (CMS) Health Insurance Marketplace website include a resource card directing students to online materials about the Health Insurance Marketplace, as well as “What it means” fact sheets about the Affordable Care Act for school communities, students and parents and teachers, and a document on ways to promote the new health-care options in schools.

Each of the fact sheets, which appear under the “Affordable Care Act series from the Department of Education” category, offer basic information about the new health-care law.

“The US Department of Education is working to make all schools healthier and safe,” the fact sheets explain. “To help states, districts, and schools ensure healthy schools and students, the Department encourages school communities to make use of exciting new provisions of the Affordable Care Act. … To get all of America’s schools covered, the Health Insurance Marketplace begins with YOU.”

The fact sheets in the series were also recently included in the latest Education Department’s bi-weekly newsletter “ED Review.”

In addition to the student, school community, and parent and teacher fact sheets, the Marketplace website also offers a how to guide on promoting the Affordable Care Act in schools, titled “Ten Ways Schools Can Promote New Health Insurance Opportunities” and explaining that “schools can play a vital role in making sure people know how to get coverage.”

The ways the government says schools can “contribute to the outreach effort” include spreading the message about the marketplace through special events, school materials and coaches.

The document also advises schools to help students and their families apply for coverage and make the school’s computer lab available to parents “to sign up for coverage, as well as sharing best practices with statewide training sessions.”

Via: Daily Caller

Continue Reading....

The Myth of a Runaway Amendments Convention

The Founders bequeathed Americans a method to bypass the federal government and amend the Constitution, empowering two thirds of the states to call an Amendments Convention. In the wake of Mark Levin's bestselling book, The Liberty Amendments, proposing just such a convention, entirely unnecessary alarms have been raised by even some of the leading lights of conservatism, based on an incomplete reading of history and judicial case law.

Phyllis Schlafly is a great American and a great leader, but her speculations about the nature of the Constitution's"convention for proposing amendments" are nearly as quaint as Dante's speculations about the solar system. Those speculations simply overlook the last two decades of research into the background and subsequent history of the Constitution's amendment process. They also ignore how that process actually has worked, and how the courts elucidate it.

The Founders provided, in Article V of the Constitution, for a "convention for proposing amendments." They did this to enable the people, acting through their state legislatures, to rein in an abusive or runaway federal government. In other words, the Founders created the convention for precisely the kind of situation we face now.

Mrs. Schlafly doesn't think we know much else about the process. She writes, "Everything else about how an Article V Convention would function, including its agenda, is anybody's guess."

Via: American Thinker

Continue Reading....

Black Preacher Calls Walmart A “Cracker Corporation From Arkansas” At D.C. Protest…

Living-Wage Bill Backers Make Final Push for Mayor’s Signature

With Mayor Vince Gray expected to receive the Large Retailer Accountability Act for a signature or veto by the end of the week, supporters of the bill rallied last night at Ward 7's Pennsylvania Avenue Baptist Church. Gray says he hasn't made up his mind on the bill yet, although statements from Deputy Mayor Victor Hoskins and threats from Walmart to pull out of proposed stores in the mayor's home Ward 7 point toward a veto.

Gray didn't attend the rally, but that didn't stop several speakers from addressing the mayor directly. Arguing that the decision to sign the bill is "black and white," a labor organizer lead the crowd in a "No Gray area!" chant while holding up a picture of Gray. 

"How will history record his use of this pen?" said At-Large CouncilmemberVincent Orange, waving a pen.

Following Orange, Council Chairman Phil Mendelson defended his decision to hold up the transfer of the bill from the Council to the mayor for 48 days (and counting). "That's 48 days of pressure on the mayor," Mendelson says.

Rev. Graylan Hagler asked the mayor why he was letting a "little bitty cracker corporation from Arkansas" push the District around. Then, closing the rally, Hagler asked audience members to come to the church's altar for an altar call, where they promised to lobby Gray over the bill.

Via: Weasel Zippers

Continue Reading...

No Turning Back on Obamacare’s Medicaid Expansion

Many states have chosen to take Obamacare’s Medicaid expansion expecting they can get out later if they wish. But that’s not the case.

Some states have said that if the federal government ever reneges on its promise of enhanced funding in the future, they’ll just withdraw from the expansion. But new legal analysis by the Buckeye Institute, an Ohio-based state think tank, shows there are both legal and political reasons why Obamacare’s Medicaid expansion is likely to be permanent.

While many states have already signed up for the expansion using this flawed backup plan, Ohio is still in a heated debate regarding expansion, and this idea is being used to garner support for it. For instance, one proposal would “create a ‘circuit breaker’ that would automatically roll back the expansion if the federal government didn’t stick to its end of the deal.”

Buckeye’s paper lays out the following reasons expansion is likely to be a permanent—once a state agrees to it, there might be no turning back.

Legal Barriers: When a state agrees to adopt Obamacare’s Medicaid expansion, it must amend its state plan, which is a contract between the federal government and each state governing the conditions of its Medicaid program. As the report explains, “Once the state plan has been amended to include the expansion, that agreement becomes part of the legally enforceable state plan contract. A state must be in compliance with its own state plan. The federal government enforces compliance by withholding federal funds. The mere threat of withholding federal dollars can generally ensure compliance.”

Via: The Foundry

Continue Reading....

Fast-Food Strike: Dumb Strike, or the Dumbest Strike Ever? (Update: It’s the Dumbest Strike Ever)

Unskilled entry-level workers demand double pay without offering more to their employers or customers.

NEW YORK — Beginning a day of protests that organizers say will spread to 50 cities and 1,000 stores across the country, a crowd of chanting workers gathered Thursday morning at a McDonald’s in midtown Manhattan to call for higher wages and the chance to join a union.

 About 500 people, including workers, activists, religious leaders, news crews and local politicians, gathered outside the McDonald’s on Fifth Avenue. The protesters chanted “Si Se Puede” (“Yes, We Can”) and “Hey, hey, ho, ho $7.25 has got to go,” holding signs saying “On Strike: Can’t Survive on $7.25,” referring to the federal minimum wage.

The protesters plan to spread out to other stores throughout New York during the day. Protests are also expected in Los Angeles, Chicago, Charlotte, N.C., and other cities.

Fast-food customer service is hard work, but it’s entry level. I know, because I’ve done a version of it in my storied career. It’s a skill-developing stepping stone from which an ambitious person should seek a better gig. It’s not an end, it’s a means. If you’re in a job like that, you’re very replaceable and you always will be. Knowing that should motivate a good worker to seek a better job where they will earn more and be harder to replace, not try to squeeze too much out of an-entry level job.

Aside: When was the last time you went to a fast-food restaurant and actually experienced good, friendly service? In my experience, that happens at Chick-fil-A, Sonic, Subway, sometimes Wendy’s, and…really, nowhere else but local franchises. Customer service at national chains is nearly dead — usually surly, slow, and prone to mistakes. They want more money for that? Robots can and probably soon will do the job better. The strikers should think about that.

Obamacare has changed the job market negatively and to some extent trapped workers in part-time underemployment, which is a terrible shame. But the unions that these strikers want to join support Obamacare. Well, they support it until they have to live under it. Then they get exemptions to escape it.

The fast-food industry used to employ mostly younger people just trying to make some extra money as they went through school. Now, workers are older and depend on the work to feed families. Analysis by the Economic Policies Institute shows that the average age of minimum-wage workers is now 35, and that 88% are 20 and older.

Via: PJ Media
Continue Reading.... 

IG:IRS ‘Hindered’ Efforts to Stop Illegals from Misusing Social Security Numbers

(CNSNews.com) - An audit report published this month by the inspector general for the Social Security Administration says that the Internal Revenue Service's reluctance to penalize employers who consistently file W-2s on which the Social Security Number and name do not match has "hindered" the SSA’s efforts to stop “unauthorized noncitizens” from using Social Security Numbers that are fake or belong to someone else.

The audit report looked at “inaccurate wage reporting”—or the filing of W-2 forms on which the name and the Social Security Number do not match. The SSA has long said these no-match W-2s are frequently filed on behalf of illegal aliens. According to the IG audit report released earlier this month, a senior IRS official admitted to the IG that the service knows this is the case.

“Furthermore,” said the report, “a senior employment tax official at the IRS acknowledged that unauthorized noncitizens accounted for a high percentage of inaccurate wage reporting.”

The audit looked at the U.S. employers who in tax years 2007-2009 (the latest for which all data was available) had the worst records for filing W-2s on which the names and Social Security Numbers did not match

Via: CNS News

Continue Reading....