It's sooooooo irritating. And predictable. And typical. And weak.

"Those who support individual rights and free markets are supporting a society based on voluntary association, choice and cooperation among citizens.

Conversely, those who advocate for government-based collectivist "solutions" for every conceivable ill in the world are in fact the ones who call for the use of coercion, and if needed, force to make others comply with their wishes."

January 9, 2011
American Thinker
Richard J. Little

Have You No Sense of Decency Left?

January 09, 2011
Leftists: Have You No Sense of Decency Left?
Richard J. Little

Having seen the effects of violence first hand in my profession, my deepest sympathy goes out to the families of the victims of today's attack in AZ. Please pray for them.

However, I am also saddened to see all the knee-jerk comments in our media and many others who are attempting to use this criminal action for political advantage.

I have one question for you who seek to distort this crime to push your political ideology: Have you people no shame? Have you, at long last, no sense of decency left?  Read More

Giffords shooter shows pattern of psychiatric derangement; no clear political affiliation

Saturday, January 08, 2011
by Mike Adams, the Health Ranger
Editor of NaturalNews.com

Of all the senseless acts of violence we've seen over the years, today's shooting at a Gabrielle Giffords public event in Tucson really strikes home. I spent time in the company of "Gabby" Giffords and met many members of her staff during her first run for Congress. I saw her as a "balanced" representative (a former Republican turned Democrat who still, for example, supported Second Amendment rights) who I thought could bring some new energy into Washington, which seems to perpetually suffer from "Good 'Old Boys" syndrome.

That she has been violently attacked by an individual who is obviously mentally deranged is shocking and extremely disturbing. Almost as disturbing is how the mainstream media has latched onto this story as a way to demonize anyone who believes in the U.S. Constitution. The shooting suspect Jared Lee Loughner, is, by any sensible interpretation, mentally deranged. Yes, he mentioned the Constitution among his various ramblings, but he also listed the Communist Manifesto as being among his favorite books. In addition, he released a YouTube video containing unintelligible ramblings of repeated nonsense phrases, including references to the government taking away "grammar," of having a colorful bird on his shoulder, brainwashing and what he called "conscience dreaming."

The utterly false and irresponsible accusation floating around certain circles on the 'net that Loughner was some sort of extreme right winger who targeted a Democrat is extremely irresponsible and hateful.
Read More

Local News...Add police patrols — West Maui residents

MPD officials hear concerns over drugs, vagrants, speeding
January 8, 2011 - By LILA FUJIMOTO, Staff Writer

LAHAINA - Raising concerns about drugs, derelicts and speeding on Front Street and in other areas, West Maui residents Thursday asked Maui Police Chief Gary Yabuta for additional officers and more police presence in the community.

"From the Jodo Mission to Mala is like a safe zone for druggies," said Lahaina resident Paul Laub. "They steal things. They harass people. It's a free zone."

Donna Soares, general manager of the Wharf Cinema Complex, cited nuisance problems with drunken and disorderly people, including some who urinate in Banyan Tree Park.

In 25 years, "this is the worst I've ever seen," she said.

A woman who works at the Lahaina Public Library said a "new influx of derelicts" has resulted in people using the library lanai as a bathroom, as well as drug use at adjacent Library Park.

"There's nothing worse than reading story time to a 3rd-grade class and smelling all the drugs coming in," she said. "We really do need help."  Read More

Obama Administration Reportedly Plans to Create Internet ID for All Americans

Published January 08, 2011
FoxNews.com

President Obama is putting plans in motion to give the Commerce Department authority to create an Internet ID for all Americans, a White House official told CNET.com.

White House Cybersecurity Coordinator Howard Schmidt told the website it is "the absolute perfect spot in the U.S. government" to centralize efforts toward creating an "identity ecosystem" for the Internet.

The National Strategy for Trusted Identities in Cyberspace is currently being drafted by the Obama administration and will be released by the president in a few months.

"We are not talking about a national ID card. We are not talking about a government-controlled system. What we are talking about is enhancing online security and privacy, and reducing and perhaps even eliminating the need to memorize a dozen passwords, through creation and use of more trusted digital identities," Commerce Secretary Gary Locke said at an event Friday at the Stanford Institute for Economic Policy Research, according to CNET.com.

Locke added that the Commerce Department will be setting up a national program office to work on this project.

The move has raised eyebrows about privacy issues.

"The government cannot create that identity infrastructure," Jim Dempsey of the Center for Democracy and Technology told the website. "If I tried to, I wouldn't be trusted."

Schmidt stresses that anonymity will remain on the Internet, saying there's no chance that "a centralized database will emerge."

History Channel pulls the plug on 'The Kennedys'

January 08, 2011 Thomas Lifson
 

 
It is hard to avoid deep suspicion that political pressure has been brought to bear on The History Channel to cancel broadcast of the multi-million dollar 8 part miniseries, "The Kennedys." An exclusive report in The Hollywood Reporter contains precisely the sort of language one might use if trying to avoid saying the obvious -- that the Kennedy clan retains powerful showbiz and political clout that could make life very uncomfortable for those damaging the Camelot myths.


"Upon completion of the production ofThe Kennedys, History has decided not to air the 8-part miniseries on the network," a rep for the network tells The Hollywood Reporter in a statement. "While the film is produced and acted with the highest quality, after viewing the final product in its totality, we have concluded this dramatic interpretation is not a fit for the History brand."

A network that features programs on pawn shops, ice road truckers, and space alien encounters suddenly decides, after spending millions of dollars, that the product doesn't fit the brand? C'mon. THR notes that the series producer Joel Surnow (who did 24) is regarded as a conservative, and that:  Read More

Massachusetts Supreme Court rules against banks in foreclosure paperwork case

By Ariana Eunjung Cha
Washington Post Staff Writer
Friday, January 7, 2011; 10:26 PM

In a ruling that could escalate the mortgage problems facing banks, the Massachusetts Supreme Court on Friday voided two foreclosures because the banks failed to show the proper paperwork to prove they owned the loans.

 The decision challenges the way mortgages were bundled and sold around the world and could lead to the invalidation of thousands of foreclosures across the state. The ruling comes in the wake of accusations last fall that lenders improperly handled thousands of foreclosures and possibly engaged in fraud, spurring federal and state investigations.


The Massachusetts court is the highest to rule on the issue, providing ammunition to borrowers in other states who will almost certainly use the decision as a precedent to seek similar rulings and perhaps bring a similar case before the Supreme Court.   Read More

Mystery of mass animal death epidemic deepens

Mystery of mass animal death epidemic deepens after 8,000 turtle doves fall dead in Italy with strange blue stain on their beaks.

By Wil Longbottom

Last updated at 3:45 PM on 7th January 2011


Blue stain believed to be sign of poisoning or hypoxia - lack of oxygen that is precursor to altitude sickness


Cold weather and overbreeding blamed for deaths of two 2million fish in Chesapeake Bay

Disease behind deaths of 100,000 fish in Arkansas River

At least nine incidents of mass animal deaths across the globe

Hundreds of confused birds plummeted to their deaths in multiple locations in the U.S.

Rapid movement of Magnetic North Pole towards Russia may have caused bird deaths

Thousands of dead turtle doves rained down on roofs and cars in an Italian town in the latest in a growing spate of mass animal deaths across the globe.


Residents in Faenza described the birds falling to the ground like 'little Christmas balls' with strange blue stains on their beaks.

Initial tests on up to 8,000 of the doves indicated that the blue stain could have been caused by poisoning or hypoxia.
Read More

The Investigations Begin: Holder on the Hot Seat in Black Panther Case

Posted on January 7, 2011 by Ben Johnson

 New Congressional leaders have begun their investigations into the most potent scandal facing the Obama administration, one that seems destined to expose injustice at the highest levels of government. Rep. Lamar Smith, R-TX, the new chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, has opened a probe into the Justice Department’s handling of the Black Panther case in a letter to Attorney General Eric Holder. Smith is looking into whether the case’s dismissal, and the underlying culture of the department’s Voting Rights division, show a decision to deny justice to a broad category of Americans based on race. In the five-page letter, Smith writes, “Allegations that the Civil Rights Division has engaged in a practice of race-biased enforcement of voting rights law must be investigated by the Committee.”  Read More

Barack Obama appoints William Daley as chief of staff

Ed Pilkington, Guardian.co.uk



Barack Obama has begun an overhaul of his inner circle, lending the White House a more business-friendly face with the appointment of an outsider banker, William Daley, as his chief of staff.

Daley continues the heavy Chicago bent of Obama’s White House. He is a son of the legendary Chicago mayor Richard Daley and brother of the city’s outgoing mayor, also named Richard. But he marks a departure for the president after two years in office by dint of his considerable Wall Street experience.

The new chief of staff has for the past seven years been a senior executive at JP Morgan Chase, and before that worked for a hedge fund and in telecoms. He straddles the business-politics divide, having been Bill Clinton’s commerce secretary for three years from 1997 and managed Al Gore’s failed run for the presidency in 2000.   Read More

Don’t Raise the Limit on Obama’s Credit Card

Posted on January 6, 2011 by Floyd Brown

Fear-mongering works – why not try again? This must be the thinking behind Obama’s latest attempts to manipulate the new Congress. Austan Goolsbee, chairman of the U.S. Council of Economic Advisers, trotted out before the cameras this week to threaten the Republican Congress, saying that if they don’t raise the limit on the USA’s debt ceiling, the “impact on the economy would be catastrophic.”

Goolsbee spun the new lines cooked up in the White House communications office on ABC’s This Week: “If we get to the point where we damage the full faith and credit of the United States, that would be the first default in history caused purely by insanity.”

The real insanity is to continue to roll up debts we have no hope of paying. Goolsbee’s comments are part of a coordinated preemptive plan to blame the new Tea Party Republicans as the economy sputters. When fear reaches high levels, people don’t think clearly, and this is exactly what Obama is counting on. Read More

GOP Introduces Bill to Roll Back Executive Branch ‘Czars’

Posted on January 6, 2011

A group of nearly 30 Republican members of the House of Representatives has introduced a bill to rein in the various “czars” serving in the Obama administration.

Van Jones, former WH green jobs "czar"

The bill mirrors similar legislation introduced in the 111th Congress that was not allowed to advanced under Democrats’ majority control.

But with Republicans commanding the House majority in the 112th Congress, Rep. Steve Scalise, R-La., and the 28 other Republican co-sponsors on the bill are hoping to do away with the informal, paid advisers President Obama has employed over the last two years. Read More

Uncovered: New Calls for the Updated Cloward-Piven Strategy

Posted on January 7, 2011
Uncovered: New Calls for the Updated Cloward-Piven Strategy to Overwhelm Americas Financial System from Frances Fox Piven with SEIU and Bertha Lewis Coordination

Obama Prepares To Rule By Executive Order

Thursday, 06 January 2011 07:13 J. D. Longstreet

Obama Assumes Dictatorial Powers?

In ancient times, the dictators/emperors ruled by proclamation. If they spoke it – it was made to happen. That is not supposed to happen in a republic, especially a democratic constitutional republic like the United States. But it is about to happen in the US. In fact, it has already begun.

Recently Charles Krauthammer said: “For an Obama bureaucrat … the will of the Congress is a mere speed bump.”

Recently, Americans received a Christmas present from the Obama Regime. The “Death Panels,” which had been stripped from Obamacare because even the dems knew there was no way they would get even their own pols to vote for Obamacare with the death panels a part of it, were made a part of US law by regulation.

Another proclamation/regulation came in late December from the Interior Department. They gave themselves the authority to designate public lands as “wild lands.” By doing so, they can restrict exploration for oil on those lands even though America is in dire need of more domestic sources of oil.

Oh, and the beloved Environmental Protection Agency, again in late December, announced it would draw up anti-carbon regulations on oil refineries and power plants in 2011.

Congress passed none of these new laws. None of them!  Read More

Manipulative cats fake illness when upset

American Thinker
January 05, 2011
Manipulative cats fake illness when upset
Thomas Lifson

Everyone knows that cats and dogs, America's most popular pets, are very, very different. Dogs are loyal, truly man's best friend. Cats, on the other hand are diffident at best. Now, from veterinary research comes confirmation that cats are psychologically manipulative:

They don't talk, but when cats are upset about a change in their environment they let you know by acting sick - refusing to eat and vomiting excessively, even if they're healthy, a new study finds.

"For veterinary clinicians, when you have a cat that's not eating, is not using the litter box or has stuff coming up out of its mouth, the quality of the environment is another cause that needs to be addressed in coming up with a diagnosis," said study researcher Tony Buffington, a professor of veterinary clinical sciences at Ohio State University.

When cats in the study experienced "unusual external events," such as a change in the caretaker or feeding schedule, the healthy ones were just as likely as the chronically ill ones to exhibit sickness behaviors.

This brings to mind one of my favorite humor pieces, whose author I do not know:

Excerpts from a Dog's diary:
8:00 am - OH BOY! DOG FOOD! MY FAVORITE!
9:30 am - OH BOY! A CAR RIDE! MY FAVORITE!
9:40 am - OH BOY! A WALK! MY FAVORITE!
10:30 am - OH BOY! A CAR RIDE! MY FAVORITE!
11:30 am - OH BOY! DOG FOOD! MY FAVORITE!
12:00 noon - OH BOY! THE KIDS! MY FAVORITE!
1:00 PM - OH BOY! THE YARD! MY FAVORITE!
1:30 PM - ooooooo. bath. bummer.
4:00 PM - OH BOY! THE KIDS! MY FAVORITE!
5:00 PM - OH BOY! DOG FOOD! MY FAVORITE!
5:30 PM - OH BOY! MOM! MY FAVORITE!

Excerpts from a Cat's diary
DAY 752 - My captors continue to taunt me with bizarre
little dangling objects. They dine lavishly on fresh
meat, while I am forced to eat dry cereal. The only
thing that keeps me going is the hope of escape, and
the mild satisfaction I get from ruining the
occasional piece of furniture. Tomorrow I may eat
another house plant.

DAY 761 - Today my attempt to kill my captors by
weaving around their feet while they were walking
almost succeeded, must try this at the top of the
stairs. In an attempt to disgust and repulse these
vile oppressors, I once again induced myself to vomit
on their favorite chair...must try this on their bed.

DAY 765 - Decapitated a mouse and brought them the
headless body, in attempt to make them aware of what I
am capable of, and to try to strike fear into their
hearts. They only cooed and condescended about what a
good little cat I was...Hmmm. Not working according to
plan.

DAY 768 - I am finally aware of how sadistic they are.
For no good reason I was chosen for the water torture.
This time however it included a burning foamy chemical
called "shampoo." What sick minds could invent such a
liquid? My only consolation is the piece of thumb
still stuck between my teeth.

DAY 771 - There was some sort of gathering of their
accomplices. I was placed in solitary throughout the
event. However, I could hear the noise. More
importantly I overheard that my confinement was due to
MY power of "allergies." Must learn what this is and
how to use it to my advantage.

DAY 774 - I am convinced the other captives are
flunkies and maybe snitches. The dog is routinely
released and seems more than happy to return. He is
obviously a half-wit. The bird on the other hand has
got to be an informant, and speaks with them
regularly. I am certain he reports my every move. Due
to his current placement in the metal room his safety
is assured. But I can wait; it is only a matter of
time......