6 Arguments Only A Liberal Could Believe

"Arguing with liberals...it's like playing chess with a pigeon; no matter how good I am at chess, the pigeon is just going to knock over the pieces, crap on the board and strut around like it's victorious." -- Anonymous

"If you can somehow force a liberal into a point-counterpoint argument, his retorts will bear no relation to what you’ve said — unless you were in fact talking about your looks, your age, your weight, your personal obsessions, or whether you are a fascist. In the famous liberal two-step, they leap from one idiotic point to the next, so you can never nail them. It’s like arguing with someone with Attention Deficit Disorder." -- Ann Coulter

It's almost impossible to have any kind of meaningful discussion with a liberal because while you're trying to come up with logical points to support your position, he’s trying to come up with new ways to convince people you're Hitler. Modern liberalism has turned into a willful embrace of stupidity. It's all about setting reason and intellect aside in order to take an emotionally-satisfying position that makes a liberal feel better about himself. This is how people who are undeniably intelligent can feel good about taking brainless positions that hurt a lot of people. While liberals have emotionally blinded themselves so totally that they believe they're taking compassionate, intellectual, well-crafted stands, this is how they sound to everyone who's not a liberal.

1) Everyone who disagrees with a liberal is racist! The Tea Party? Racist! Republicans? Racist! Fox News? Racist? Black conservatives? Racist! Barack Obama's grandma? Racist! Do I think Social Security is solvent? My position on that is that "You're a racist!" What do I think about flattening the tax code? Sarah Palin is a racist! Do I like potatoes? Well, Republicans eat potatoes sometimes; so potatoes are racist! Racist, racist, racist!

Via: Townhall
Continue Reading..... 

A New Obama Doctrine? With his presidency in a tailspin, Carter radically changed course. Will Obama do the same?

By the beginning of 1980, Jimmy Carter was in big trouble. Almost everything he had said or done in foreign policy over the prior three years had failed — and he was running for reelection.

Carter had come into office in 1977 promising a new American stance abroad predicated on human rights. He bragged of an end to our supposedly inordinate fear of Soviet-inspired Communism. He entertained the hope of not losing a single American soldier in combat during his tenure. And he rejected the realpolitik of the Nixon-Kissinger years.

The State Department would end the excessive influence of the bellicose National Security Council. Secretary of State Cyrus Vance would put a kinder, gentler face on American diplomacy. We championed Robert Mugabe in Zimbabwe over more moderate black reformers. We broke with the Shah of Iran, who fled his country in January 1979. We for a while praised the Ayatollah Khomeini and sought ways to reach out to him. Carter’s U.N. ambassador, Andrew Young, called Khomeini “some kind of saint.” Young met secretly with PLO representatives in Kuwait. In an interview, he falsely alleged of his own country that “We still have hundreds of people that I would categorize as political prisoners in our prisons.”

The same formula was used in Nicaragua, as we welcomed the end of the despised Somoza regime and looked to Marxist rebels to provide long-delayed social justice for the region. Carter spurned South Korea, as if North Korean threats were not all that serious, or perhaps were even understandable, given U.S. Cold War machinations. Carter wanted to pull U.S. troops out of South Korea as a way of easing tensions on the 38th Parallel. He was clearly uncomfortable with Israel. He often distanced himself from Europe.

For a while, there was calm. Stunned potential aggressors only eyed one another to see who might be the first to test this strange new break with nearly four decades of bipartisan American foreign policy. But then, in late 1979, things started going downhill fast — as if the gamblers thought it was time to cash in their chips for fear that Carter might not win another four years in office.

Via: NRO

Continue Reading....

[VIDEO] Moms: This Is What Your Government Expects of You

If you’re a mom of grown children, this is for you.

Did you know that the Obama administration and the state of Rhode Island are counting on you to nag your kids into signing up for Obamacare?

Good old-fashioned guilt and annoyance—that’s the ticket, apparently. But just giving your kids a call or sending them an email isn’t enough.

Rhode Island’s newest strategy is urging mothers to sign up for social networking and even online dating sites to send messages to their children.

The state’s Obamacare exchange has put together the “Nag Toolkit.” The website isn’t subtle. It says, “learn how to be where your kids are. And how to nag them mercilessly.”

If your child is on social networks and apps like Twitter, Snapchat, or Vine, the Nag Toolkit encourages you to get on there, too, and “Tweet ‘get health insurance’ @yourkids.” It sure is a lot of trouble to go to just to say that.

From NagToolkit.com

But the site goes even further by recommending that you, their mom—regardless of your own relationship status—create a profile on a dating site like OKCupid or Tinder. And then find your child’s dating profile and send him or her a message about health insurance.

Maybe what Rhode Island really wants is young people’s email addresses, though. Because after the tutorials, this message comes up: “If this all seems too confusing, give us your kid’s email address and we’ll do the nagging.”

If you’re not in Rhode Island, the Obama administration will bring in celebrities’ moms and the First Mom to nag your kids.

Via: The Foundry

Continue Reading.....

Democrats Count on Good News Out of Illinois Primaries

One week after a disappointing loss in the closely watched Florida special election, national Democrats expect brighter news from the top race to watch in Tuesday’s primaries in Illinois, where the party hopes to cut into Republicans’ House majority.

In one of Democrats’ top targeted districts in the country, Ann Callis is likely to prevail in the 13th District Democratic primary. That would set up a competitive race against freshman Rep. Rodney Davis, R-Ill., in a swing district that stretches across the state.

Davis’ primary challenge from a former Miss America has received far more national press. But it’s Callis, a former Madison County judge and top recruit of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, who has had the bumpier ride to the nomination — and Republicans believe she will emerge weakened for the general.

Illinois is the second state to host primaries for the 2014 midterms. But among the various federal races on Tuesday, including the GOP primary to take on Democratic Sen. Richard J. Durbin, the 13th features nomination fights with the greatest impact on the general elections in November.

The DCCC plucked Callis for the race early on and recently named her to its Red to Blue program, which identifies the party’s strongest candidates in the cycle’s most competitive races. The party is banking on Callis to give Davis a run for his money in a district that President Barack Obama and GOP presidential nominee Mitt Romney each received 49 percent of the vote in 2012. After a 1-point win by Davis last cycle, the seat is again hosting one of the marquee House contests.

First, though, Callis faces physics professor George Gollin on Tuesday. While Republican and Democratic operatives alike predict Callis will earn the Democratic nod, some say the primary did her no favors in a race that was always going to be an uphill climb in November.

Gollin forced Callis to spend significant resources for the primary, including $96,000 on TV, according to a source tracking media buys. Callis has raised more than $800,000 so far and had $449,000 in cash on hand with less than two weeks to go in the primary.

Callis was actually outspent on the airwaves by Gollin, who dropped $122,000 on district-wide TV advertising, according to the same source. Gollin has also notably received endorsements from a handful of newspapers in the district, plus the Chicago Tribune, which all hit Callis for a lack of depth or candor regarding where she stands on the issues.

Should Callis win Tuesday, Republicans are almost certain to use those non-endorsements against her as the cycle progresses.

Via: Roll Call

Continue Reading....

Van Hollen: Dem Caucus Told ‘Don’t Run Away from the Affordable Care Act’

The past chairman of the Democratic National Campaign Committee predicted “Democrats are going to be increasingly on the offense on the Affordable Care Act even as we talk about other critical issues” heading toward the midterm elections.

Rep. Chris Van Hollen (D-Md.) told MSNBC that “the number one issue, of course, on the minds of American people, jobs and the economy, but the Affordable Care Act will get people more economics certainty.”

“I think Republicans are going to make a big mistake by doubling down on their anti-Affordable Care message. People are tired of it,” he continued. “They want to improve it as we go along, not shut down the government to get rid of it, not vote for the 53rd time to get rid of it — especially, one, as you know, and the American people know, the Republicans have not put any alternative on the table. They want to go back to the days when the insurance companies called all the shots.”

Van Hollen echoed DNC chairwoman Debbie Wasserman Schultz (D-Fla.) in saying that anyone who thought the Florida special congressional election last week was a referendum on Obama “misread” the results.

“It is a Republican-leaning district, then they got more Republicans out. But, in terms of the message on the Affordable Care Act, the Republican message did not work there just like it did not work in the Virginia governor’s race where Terry McAuliffe said he would support the Affordable Care Act, he want to improve it where it was broken, but move forward on it,” Van Hollen said.

“…Let them talk all about the Affordable Care Act and how they want to get rid of it. We’re going to talk about how it helps people, but also where our voters are focused, which is of course jobs, economy, minimum wage, and it’s part of the package of economic security and moving the country forward. So, Republicans have only a negative message, people know that, they want a positive message that’s going to move the country forward.”

Van Hollen said the message in the Democratic caucus is “don’t run away from the Affordable Care Act.”

“Be strong about Obamacare, but also, again, focus on those other fundamental questions, right, economic security issues, minimum wage, trying to make sure that more people have benefit from a growing economy, getting the economy kicked in the higher gear, all that is part and parcel of said message. The Affordable Care Act is an important piece of it.”

Via: PJ Media

Continue Reading.....

Townhall's Benson Slams Media for Uncritically Swallowing Obama's '5 Million Enrolled' Spin

Townhall's Guy Benson today took Washington Post's Aaron Blake and Vox.com senior editor Sarah Kliff to task for uncritically furthering Obama White House spin that 5 million Americans have successfully registered for ObamaCare.

This is patently false, Benson charges, noting that, at best, the number is somewhere closer to 4 million, assuming the very generous estimate of a 20 percent "non-payment" rate on the registered policies. Benson explains (emphasis mine):

Back in reality, the generally-accepted estimate of the nationwide non-payment rate is 20 percent -- meaning that one-fifth of the "newly enrollment" are not, in fact, enrolled. The administration "counts" anyone who's placed an Obamacare exchange plan in their virtual shopping cart as signed up. Kathleen Sebelius again testified last week that HHS is not keeping track of who checks out and pays their first month's premium, which are necessary steps to becoming fully enrolled. (I've included that video below). As of a few weeks ago, payment delinquency rates were close to 50 percent in certain states. Nearly half of the few previously-uninsured Americans who have selected plans through Obamacare are not paid up. Also, the overwhelming majority of these "new" enrollees are not obtaining coverage for the first time. Most had insurance prior to Obamacare. According to estimate, fewer than 30 percentof those signing up are first-time enrollees. Two independent studies revealed that roughly 90 percent of eligible consumers who were uninsured before the law's implementation have chosen not to purchase plans on Obamacare's exchanges. The top reason cited was lack of affordability. Here's my back-of-the envelope math about the real progress
That's based on the White House's original target of seven million, which they've since tried to pretend never happened. If you take these calculations a step further by only tallying enrollments of (a) newly-insured people who (b) have activated their coverage by paying, the accurate "new enrollment" number sits just north of one million. And that's using the relatively generous 20 percent nonpayment rate assumption. Remember, according to the McKinsey study, the delinquency percentage among this group is more than double the broader national one-fifth figure.

Via: Newsbusters

Continue Reading.....

An annotated chart about why Presidential approval ratings matter.

Strictly speaking, I am not criticizing the Fix for not drawing a more explicit link between Presidential approval ratings and Senate churn in a midterm election. They established the basic point, which was that both parties are increasingly taking seriously that the President’s current low numbers will translate into Democratic losses in the Senate. The Monkey Cage spells it out:

Presidential approval is strongly correlated with midterm congressional election outcomes. Gallup has polled Americans on presidential approval during every midterm election cycle since 1954. Across the 16 midterm election cycles from 1954 through 2012 the average level of presidential approval during the first quarter (January to March) of the election year is about 58 percent. Over the available Gallup presidential approval polls for the first quarter of this year, Obama’s approval is significantly below the average, about 42 percent, worse than every other year except 2006 and 1974.

Or, you can see it as a spreadsheet. ‘Year’ is midterm election year, ‘App’ lumps in the average 1st quarter Gallup approval rating for the sitting President into one of three categories (above 75%, 50% to 74%, 25% to 49%), and ‘G/L ‘ is the number of seats that the President’s party gained or lost in the Senate that year. It’s grim reading for Democrats, this cycle.

Year	App	G/L
1954	50%+	-2
1958	50%+	-13
1962	75%+	+3
1966	50%+	-3
1970	50%+	+2
1974	25%+	-4
1978	25%+	-3
1982	25%+	+0
1986	50%+	-8
1990	50%+	-1
1994	50%+	-8
1998	50%+	+0
2002	75%+	+2
2006	25%+	-6
2010	25%+	-6
2014	25%+

As you can see, there’s no magic equation for this situation, but generally it’s clear enough that while high Presidential popularity may not gain his party seats, low Presidential popularity is a great way for his party to lose them. In fact, merely holding the Presidency at all is a great way for his party to lose seats. Again, this is not a magic bullet. But if you look at that chart… there’s absolutely nothing stopping the Democrats from losing six or more seats this year. In fact, it’s not even unprecedented for the Democrats to lose Senate seats in the double-digits this year: it happened to Eisenhower in 1958, and the country liked him.

So what caused that one to happen? Oh, just an economic recession.

Via: Red State
Continue Reading.... 

Man Stuck with $407,000 Medical Bill After ObamaCare Breakdown

The busted ObamaCare websites cost a lot of people a lot of time. But for one Nevada man, problems with the state insurance exchange reportedly cost him $407,000.

The Las Vegas Review-Journal reported that Larry Basich, a 62-year-old Vegas resident, has been stuck with the massive medical bill despite signing up for an insurance plan via the state exchange last fall. 

Basich, according to the article, selected a UnitedHealthcare plan in November, and even paid his first premium. But he never received confirmation that he was enrolled, despite being assured that he was by Nevada Health Link.

Amid the confusion, Basich suffered a heart attack at the end of December, and had to undergo a triple bypass. Now, according to the Review-Journal, no insurer will claim his bills -- and he's caught in a financially frightening battle as he appeals to the exchange and its contractor, Xerox, for help.

"All I wanted to do when I moved here was buy a house, get a dog and go to some spring training games for the Dodgers," Basich, who moved from Hawaii, told the newspaper.

Xerox reportedly tried to assign Basich's bills to another insurance plan, but that plan is refusing to accept them. Basich's insurance broker also complained that Xerox is spending a lot of time lawyering up and documenting all of Basich's communications. 

Via: Fox News

Continue Reading.....