Ignoring the Facts on the IRS

House Democrats are not backing away from their claim that the Internal Revenue Service’s targeting of groups applying for tax exemption was politically neutral. Representatives Elijah Cummings and Sander Levin on Tuesday hauled forth another tranche of documents that they say highlight “IRS scrutiny of progressive groups.” It is the duo’s sixth such effort, but this one, Cummings says, “should put a nail in the coffin” of the GOP’s claims that the agency’s actions were politically motivated or aimed exclusively at conservative organizations. That’s because, according to Levin, the latest papers show that IRS scrutiny “covered a broad spectrum of political ideology.” In fact, the documents show just the opposite.

Cummings and Levin, the ranking Democrats on the congressional committees investigating the IRS scandal, make claims that contradict the testimony of key witnesses, who have told investigators that progressive groups were not targeted. The latest is Cindy Thomas, the 35-year IRS veteran who ran the agency’s Cincinnati office during the two-year period when tea-party applications were thrown under the microscope. She had the following exchange with investigators:

Q: Okay. And were [the progressive] cases sent to Washington?
A: I’m not — I don’t know.
Q: Not that you are aware?
A: I’m not aware of that.
Q: As the head of the Cincinnati office you were never aware that these cases were sent to Washington?
A: There could be cases that are transferred to the Washington office according to, like, our [Internal Revenue Manual] section. I mean, there’s a lot of cases that are processed, and I don’t know what happens to every one of them.
Q: Sure. But these cases identified as progressive as a whole were never sent to Washington?
A: Not as a whole.

Via: Natinal Review Online

Continue Reading....

The Scandal Society: From Nixon to Clinton to Obama

Remember Black Jesus? The Lightworker? The One? The next Lincoln, the Democrats’ Reagan, the neo-FDR? He is now standing next to Tricky Dick and Slick Willie, caught in a quartet of burgeoning scandals, charged with rewriting the facts when they became inconvenient, harassing the press, and using the Internal Revenue Service to get at his enemies, subverting their rights of assembly, and speech. “Richard Milhous Obama,” writes Carl M. Cannon, and there are also Clintonian levels of cover-ups, literally in the case of Hillary Clinton’s role in the Benghazi debacle. In The Presidents’ Club, Nancy Gibbs and Michael Duffy tell us of the bonds that unite former presidents, but within this club is a still smaller subset, the Scandal Society, those shadowed by crimes and abuses of power, who were caught up in snares of their own making and traps that they set for themselves. How do their troubles compare with each other’s, and with those that the current incumbent is facing? Let us look at them and see.

Born in obscurity, to far-from-rich parents, all three used their wits to rise to fame early. But while the Democrats adapted quite quickly to ruling-class manners, Nixon saw himself as a lifelong outsider, despised by the press, the establishment, and the people who mattered, forever imperiled and circled by foes. Where others evolved as they rose, he took the wrong side of the tracks along with him, never believing he really had made it, and the higher he rose in the rankings of power, the more embattled he thought he became. Never a charmer, he built his career on the corpses of three liberal icons​—​Rep. Jerry Voorhis, whom he defeated when he won his House seat in 1946; Rep. Helen Gahagan Douglas, the film star he trounced in a Senate race four years later; and Alger Hiss, the well-born New Dealer he exposed as a traitor, which opened an early-day culture war, and made him despised by the left. When he was just 39, he was picked by Dwight Eisenhower to balance his ticket, but the hero of D-Day looked down on the eager, unsure, young politician, letting him twist in the wind in 1952 in his fundraising scandal, trying to force him off the ticket four years later, using him as a hatchet man, and, perhaps worst of all to the insecure Nixon, never inviting him into his house. When Nixon ran on his own, Ike refused to endorse him before the convention; said “If you give me a week, I might think of something” when asked to name what Nixon had done to help him in office; and in his prime-time speech at his last convention, recalled the achievements of his eight years in office without mentioning his vice president’s name.

Via: The Weekly Standatd

Continue Reading...

Rep. Clyburn likens American media to Nazi propagandists

Dem Rep. James Clyburn Compares “Extreme Right Wing Bloggers” To Nazi Propagandists…

Rep. James Clyburn (D-S.C.), the third-ranking House Democrat, on Wednesday accused the U.S. media of spreading "manufactured controversies" that pose dangers similar to the propaganda spread by the Nazis during the Holocaust. 

Speaking to "The Morning Briefing" program on Sirius XM, Clyburn accused the modern Internet-based media of misrepresenting the statements of people in order to hurt their reputations.

"You have people's words and phrases being misrepresented and looped through the news media and thrown out there on the Internet, and people run with it because these things start getting reported in the mainstream media, and before you know it, people believe that stuff," Clyburn said. 

The consequences of such misrepresentation, Clyburn warned, could be severe.

“The people of Germany believed Hitler’s foolishness that led to the Holocaust. They believed that stuff,” Clyburn said. “People will tend to believe what they hear through the media.”

Clyburn singled out “extreme right-wing” bloggers in particular for criticism. He accused such bloggers of forcing Shirley Sherrod to resign from the Department of Agriculture after misrepresenting statements she made to make her appear racially biased. He also said they had libeled the progressive group ACORN, leading to the group’s disbandment. 

Via: The Hill

Continue Reading....

Union boss: I’m not saying we need to bail out Detroit, but we need to bail out Detroit

YOU CREATED THE PROBLEM AND NOW YOU WANT HELP?? FAT CHANCE!!

Appearing last night on Chris Hayes, AFSCME President Lee Saunders made the (I think pretty much hopeless) case that Detroit’s bankruptcy filing is illegal, and argued (I think correctly) that city workers should be paid what they were promised in pensions. But he also endorsed a federal bailout, arguably the least likely (and worst possible) outcome:

We’ve got to deal with this, Chris. I believe not only as it affects Detroit but the national government. This administration has a responsibility to deal with the problems and impact on urban centers across this country. The engines — the engines of states who are experiencing financial difficulty. I’m not saying we’ve got to bail everything out, but if we can rescue cities and countries in Europe, if we can bail out Wall Street — which we did — if we can rescue the auto industry, which was the right thing to do, then i think we’ve got to think about creative measures in which we can help urban centers across the country experiencing financial difficulty.

As repugnant as a bailout is, conservatives should think carefully about the consequences of what happens next. I think there’s a very good case to start rooting for the unions here. Yes, they were much of the problem in Detroit — not necessarily because pensions are excessively large, but because of chronic overstaffing, featherbedding, and the early-retirement deals they negotiated.

But some good can come out of this. The best hope is either that the unions win or that after they lose, the bankruptcy court shaves the city’s bondholders clean and then forces the sale of the city’s artwork and other assets in order to pay promised pensions to the maximum extent possible. This isn’t only justice for the workers involved — who as Hayes points out merely worked and banked on the unrealistic promises they were made. It’s also forward-looking if you care about the deleterious effects of big government.

Via: Conservative Intel

Continue Reading...

Napolitano: DHS Has ‘Deferred’ Deportation of 430,000 Illegals; Approved 98.3% of Applications Reviewed

(CNSNews.com) - Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano says that over the past year the Obama Administration has exercised what she calls “prosecutorial discretion” in allowing 430,000 self-declared illegal aliens to stay in the United States without any worry that her department—which is charged by law with enforcing the immigration law—will take action against them.

Napolitano calls this non-enforcement of the law “Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals” (DACA). Under the program, the administration considers anyone who had not yet turned sixteen when they first entered the United States illegally, or first overstayed a visa, to be a “childhood arrival.”

“Because of the action we have undertaken through the DACA process, thousands of hardworking young people who are American in every way but a piece of paper now have the ability to continue their educations and contribute to their communities,” Napolitano said in a written statement marking the first anniversary of the program, which began accepting applications from illegal aliens on Aug. 15, 2012.

“In just its first year, over 500,000 individuals have requested Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals and after a thorough review of each of those cases, including a background check, 430,000 requests have already been approved, with others still under review,” Napolitano said.

Via: CNS News

Continue Reading....

Abandoned Dogs Roam Detroit in Packs as Humans Dwindle

Detroit Now Officially In Third-World Territory, 50K Stray Dogs Roaming Deserted Streets…

As many as 50,000 stray dogs roam the streets and vacant homes of bankrupt Detroit, replacing residents, menacing humans who remain and overwhelming the city’s ability to find them homes or peaceful deaths.

Dens of as many as 20 canines have been found in boarded-up homes in the community of about 700,000 that once pulsed with 1.8 million people. One officer in the Police Department's skeleton animal-control unit recalled a pack splashing away in a basement that flooded when thieves ripped out water pipes.

“The dogs were having a pool party,” said Lapez Moore, 30. “We went in and fished them out.”

Poverty roils the Motor City and many dogs have been left to fend for themselves, abandoned by owners who are financially stressed or unaware of proper care. Strays have killed pets, bitten mail carriers and clogged the animal shelter, where more than 70 percent are euthanized.

“With these large open expanses with vacant homes, it’s as if you designed a situation that causes dog problems,” said Harry Ward, head of animal control.

Via: Bloomberg

Continue Reading....

DOE EXPANDS SCHOOL MENTAL HEALTH SERVICES

APPARENTLY WE CANNOT TAKE CARE OF OUR OWN KIDS!! GET WASHINGTON OUT OF CLASSROOMS!!

The Department of Education (DOE) announced Friday that it is awarding $12.3 million to 35 school districts in 17 states to expand mental health services to elementary school students.

CNS News reported the DOE news release regarding the grants:

Research shows that having adequate counseling services can help reduce the number of disciplinary referrals in schools, improve student attendance and academic performance, and enhance development of social skills.

Funds also may be used to support parental involvement, counselor and teacher professional development, and collaboration with community-based organizations that provide mental-health and other services to students.

Education Secretary Arne Duncan said, “These grants will enhance school-based counseling programs, which have proven to be a great source of help for students with mental-health issues.”

California is home to 11 of the school districts that will receive grant funds. Two of the school districts are in Connecticut where the Sandy Hook shootings took place. The full list of school districts receiving the grants is located at the DOE website.

CNS News reported that the grants announced on Friday were already anticipated prior to the Sandy Hook shootings. Following the tragedy, however, Obama reportedly called for additional support for mental health services in schools.

In January, President Obama issued 23 gun violence executive orders. Accompanying hisgun control plan were other proposals, among them a plan for a Comprehensive School Safety program which would provide $150 million to school districts and law enforcement agencies to hire up to 1,000 school resource officers, school psychologists, social workers, and counselors. 

Via: Breitbart

Continue Reading....

Free California's transit funds

U.S. Labor Secretary Perez is threatening to withhold billions of dollars in grants for state projects. State officials should keep pressing to change his mind.

The rising cost of public employee pensions represents one of the biggest fiscal challenges for California governments over the long term. The state took an important step to rein in those costs last year when the Legislature adopted a pension reform law pushed by Gov. Jerry Brown. Transit unions complained about the law to U.S. Labor SecretaryThomas E. Perez, however, and he's threatening to withhold billions of dollars in grants for California mass-transit projects in response. Perez is wrong on the issue, and state officials should keep pressing to change his mind.

The secretary's authority over transit grants comes from the 1964 Urban Mass Transportation Act, which sought to preserve collective bargaining rights for transit workers as private bus and train lines were being taken over by public agencies. The law calls on the secretary to withhold grants as needed to assure "the preservation of rights, privileges and benefits (including continuation of pension rights and benefits) under existing collective bargaining agreements or otherwise."

Los Angeles County Metropolitan Transit Authority workers claimed in November that the new state Public Employee Pension Reform Act violated that stricture, and the Labor Department has since refused to release the grants that would otherwise have flowed to California transit agencies. The impasse has cost Metro more than $250 million so far; the agency fears that $3.6 billion in grants could be lost, most slated for the so-called subway to the sea project.

But the state pension law doesn't eliminate current workers' right to bargain over wages, terms of employment or provisions of their existing pensions. It would eliminate some techniques used to artificially inflate pensions, but such practices hardly seem to be the sort of thing Congress was trying to protect in 1964.

Via: LA Times

Continue Reading....

[VIDEO] Not a Chance! CNN Anchor Cites Polls to Say Public 'Pretty Evenly Split' on Obamacare

CNN's Carol Costello said public opinion of Obamacare is "pretty evenly split" when recent polls are showing a double-digit gap between support and opposition of the law, with more people opposing the law than supporting it.

"Well most of the polls I've seen, it's pretty evenly split, right?" Costello interrupted her guest Will Cain, who had argued "Almost every poll now, over 50 percent of Americans oppose Obamacare and why wouldn't they?" [Video below the break. Audio here.]

"It's pretty evenly split," Costello insisted. However, CNN's last poll on the health care law from May shows 54 percent opposing the law, with only 43 percent favoring it – an 11-point gap. A CBS News poll from last month shows 54 percent opposing the law with only 36 percent favoring it – a massive 18-point gap.

Two separate NBC News/Wall Street Journal polls show the same trend. One poll from July had 47 percent opposing the law with a mere 34 percent supporting it. Another poll from May showed 49 percent opposing, with just 37 percent in favor.

Costello's false assertion on Wednesday morning follows an episode from last week when CNN's Piers Morgan threw out a completely false "fact" to disparage his guest's pro-gun argument. He later admitted it was "inaccurate" and apologized. Costello was also challenging her conservative guest's attack on Obamacare.

Via: Newsbusters

Continue Reading....

RNC Raises $5.9M; DNC Has $18.5M In Debt

DNC Loves Debt.  $17 Trillion and counting.

The RNC also has significantly more cash on hand than the Democratic National Committee. It had $12.3 million in cash on hand and no debt at the end of July, while the DNC had $4.1 million in cash on hand and nearly $18.5 million in debt — an increase from the end of June.

The RNC reported raising about $5.9 million and spending $6.3 million last month, while the DNC raised $3.9 million and spent $5.4 million. 

The RNC has outraised its Democratic counterpart every month this year, despite President Obama's involvement in fundraising for the Democratic party and campaign committees.

Via: The Hill

Continue Reading....

Companies sweating Obamacare tax—and acting on it: Study

Mid- and large-sized companies overwhelmingly expect health-care costs to increase under Obamacare—and most are eyeing possible changes to their health insurance offerings because of a looming excise tax for pricier plans under the health-care reform law, a new survey of employers finds.

In fact, 40 percent of 420 companies surveyed by Towers Watson said they will be changing their insurance plans' designs in 2014 in light of the coming excise tax as well as to control employee-related health costs.

And nearly 60 percent of the companies view private health insurance exchanges as a possible way to control their health-care and administrative costs by shifting the work of insuring their workers off to those exchanges in the future.

But most of those companies—which collectively employ 8.7 million people—don't have firm near-term plans to do so.

The study also found those same companies are increasingly unlikely to offer their employer-sponsored plan for retirees older than age 65 as Obamacare state insurance exchanges go into effect, and as Medicare remains available to those people.

The number of employers either very or somewhat likely to discontinue such plans for those retirees grows from 25 percent in 2014 to 44 percent in 2015, according to Towers Watson, the global professional services company, which released its study Wednesday.

Via: CNBC

Continue Reading....