It should come as no surprise that what candidate Obama has said is not what President Obama has done. During the 2008 campaign, Obama repeated the promise of not awarding no-bid contracts, however, Fox News uncovered a no-bid contract the Obama administration awarded to a big time Democrat contributor.
After this $25 million no-bid contract was exposed by Fox, the administration immediately cancelled the deal. State Department Spokesman P.J. Crowley was asked how many other no-bid contracts were awarded and he did not immediately have an answer telling the reporter that he would “get back to him”.
The U.S. has canceled a $25 million federal contract for work in Afghanistan awarded to a company owned by a Democratic campaign contributor who did not face competitive bids. The cancellation comes after Fox News first reported on the details of the contract last week, prompting lawmakers to make inquiries into the deal. State Department Spokesman P.J. Crowley said that USAID terminated the award and is now working on an appropriate resolution. “If you want to say this violates the basis on which this administration came into office and campaigned, fair enough,” Crowley told Fox News. The contract had been awarded on Jan. 4 to Checchi & Company Consulting, a Washington-based firm owned by economist and Democratic donor Vincent V. Checchi that was hired to provide “rule of law stabilization services” in war-torn Afghanistan… continued
The U.S. has canceled a $25 million federal contract for work in Afghanistan awarded to a company owned by a Democratic campaign contributor who did not face competitive bids.
The cancellation comes after Fox News first reported on the details of the contract last week, prompting lawmakers to make inquiries into the deal.
State Department Spokesman P.J. Crowley said that USAID terminated the award and is now working on an appropriate resolution.
“If you want to say this violates the basis on which this administration came into office and campaigned, fair enough,” Crowley told Fox News. The contract had been awarded on Jan. 4 to Checchi & Company Consulting, a Washington-based firm owned by economist and Democratic donor Vincent V. Checchi that was hired to provide “rule of law stabilization services” in war-torn Afghanistan… continued
Those who voted for Obama had “hope” for “change”, but clearly, Obama is more of the same. Obama campaigned against another 4 years of Bush policies, however, liberals may be disappointed that his Iraq policy, Afghanistan policy, no-bid contracts, lobbyist influences, back room deals, partisanship politics, Guantanamo Bay “torture” camps, payoffs to political cronies, wiretapping, cuts in Medicare and Medicaid, and steering of political jobs are a continuation of the supposed practices of Bush. Will Obama’s political identification be enough for the liberals to find this palatable?
____________
The above propaganda was passed out in an 11th grade history class to students in an effort to recruit them for an internship for Obama’s ‘Organizing for America’. This “internship” is geared toward the upcoming 2010 election.
Check out the recommended reading list on page 4:
*Rules for Radicals, Saul Alinksy *The New Organizers Zack Exley *Stir It Up: Lessons from Community Organizing and Advocacy Rinku Sen *Obama Field Organizers Plot a Miracle Zack Exley, Huffington Post *Dreams of My Father Chicago Chapters, Barack Hussein Obama
It’s extremely disturbing that our schools are now being used to recruit and brainwash our children. Parents and citizens should be concerned that their children are being used this way. The student who received this recruitment material attends Perry High School in Massillon, Ohio. Outraged Americans should contact Superintendent, John Richard at 330-477-8121 ext. 111 and demand an explanation.
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Former Democrat vice-president candidate John Edwards' pregnant mistress.
Do you remember John Edwards? You hardly hear about the former Democrat Senator from North Carolina who was one state away from becoming the next vice-president in 2004 and twice ran for president. Most media attention is on a former Alaskan governor who dared to give birth to a child with Down Syndrome. There was even talk that he might be selected to be Obama’s attorney general- the chief law enforcement officer of the land.
The media really loved Edwards– he was all over the place. Liberals and unions embraced him. Given that, you would think we’d be hearing a lot more about Edwards’ scandal and a lot less of Palin… well, maybe not. Maybe if Palin had cheated on her cancer-stricken husband, been involved in a cover-up, and had a sex tape involving her lover in the hands of a campaign aid… well, perhaps then the media would leave Palin alone out of respect for her family, right? Certainly, there is no double-standard in the press. I mean, if there wa, how would I be able to publish this jaw dropping article about the Edwards’ cover-up from ABC news:
When presidential contender John Edwards decided he had to hide his mistress and her pregnancy from his wife — and from the voters — he concocted an elaborate scheme to keep the scandal a secret, according to the once-loyal aide who helped smuggle the woman through a series of luxurious hideaways. Wealthy benefactors were called on and their sizable contributions funded the lavish life on the lam. “I know of at least a million dollars. And there was much, much more,” said Andrew Young of the scheme that brought him to testify in front of a grand jury. “We were living in mansions, flying around in jets. … Money was no object.” The Iowa caucuses were just two weeks away in December 2007, when Young falsely claimed he was the father of his boss’s love child. “We knew we were going to have to leave town as soon as this hit the Enquirer,” Young recalled of the bombshell that broke in the supermarket tabloid the National Enquirer. Young and his wife, Cheri, said they had less than 12 hours to make the decision to go on the lam with his boss’s mistress — Rielle Hunter — but ultimately agreed to go into hiding with her. According to Young, Edwards’ campaign finance chairman, Fred Baron, who’s now deceased, made it possible for them to effectively disappear. “Fred said to me, ‘Andrew, I got more money than I can ever spend. You spend whatever it takes to take care of the situation. And let us focus on making him president, vice president or attorney general,” Young recalled. Young gives his account of life on the run with the pregnant mistress of a presidential contender in a new tell-all book titled “The Politician,” which will be released Jan. 30. According to Young, they left in the middle of the night in December 2007 on private jet provided by Baron and flew to the Westin Hotel in Hollywood, Fla., to take cover from the media firestorm. In a statement to ABC News on the “20/20″ interview, Edwards’ attorneys said that according to media reports “there are many allegations which are simply false” and that Young appeared to be “motivated by financial gain and media attention.” At that point, the Youngs said they had no idea where they were going or how long they’d be gone, but sent their three kids — Brody, 8, Gracie, 7 and Cooper, 5 — to stay with their grandparents. “We couldn’t tell our families where we were going,” Young said. “We said …’You’re going to see our names in the newspapers. We love you. Everything is fine. Trust us. But we can’t tell you where we are.’” Cheri Young said she was shocked and displeased, but said she felt as if the couple was taking a hit for the greater cause. “Ultimately, we felt like … his chance to be president of the United States laid in our hands because he could continue if we said yes. And we did,” she said. Young told ABC News that Edwards knew where they were going and how it was being financed. “He might not have known the exact figures, he might not have known where exactly we were living. But he knew about the money, he knew about the methodology and he knew about the sources,” Young claims. “He would — arrange things, but then … he would say, ‘You know, I can’t know about this in case, you know, I’m going to be sworn in for attorney general.’” Baron had claims before he died that it was his idea, not Edwards’, to get Hunter out of town. “Fred, on his own and without discussing it with anyone else, provided financial help to Andrew Young and Rielle Hunter when they were being besieged by the media to try to help them protect their and their families’ privacy,” Abbe Lowell, a friend of the family, said in a statement to ABC News on behalf of Fred Baron. “It would be awful if anyone who was a willing beneficiary of Fred’s generosity and friendship was now so ungrateful that he or she tried to mischaracterize what happened, blame Fred for their decisions, and especially try to put words in Fred’s mouth now that he has passed on and cannot speak for himself.” Overnight, the middle class Young family said they were suddenly living like kings — with Edwards’ benefactors footing the bill. When they first arrived in Florida in late December 2007, Young claims he received a FedEx package of “an envelope full of cash, hundred-dollar bills, was wrapped in Fred Baron’s stationery. And it said, ‘Old Chinese saying, use cash, they can’t trace it,’” Young told ABC News. And on Christmas Eve, when the Youngs wanted to spend the holiday with their kids, a private jet picked them up and whisked them all to Baron’s $14 million vacation home in Aspen, Colo. “Fred’s house has this indoor swimming pool with a Jacuzzi and the constellations up in the ceiling. To the kids, it was a big adventure. They were getting private ski lessons, sledding in the front yard, riding in jets,” said Young. Baron even paid for their kids’ Christmas presents, according to Young. Cheri Young said the “private masseuses” and “a chef that had been featured in Food and Wine magazine” were a world away from what they were used to. Days later, Baron moved the Youngs and Hunter to the Loews Coronado Resort in San Diego, where they celebrated New Year’s Eve. Two weeks and nearly $23,000 in hotel bills later, Baron rented a sprawling ranch house in Montecito, Calif. — close to Oprah Winfrey’s estate — for $20,000 a month, where Hunter and the Youngs waited for the baby to be born. But Young said despite the free-flowing funds, keeping Hunter under wraps wasn’t easy. At the Diplomat Hotel in Hollywood, Fla., he said she demanded to see their rooms before they checked in to make sure they had “the right energy.” “We were up on the top penthouse suite … and then that had the right energy,” he recalled. Young said it almost seemed like Hunter was itching to be discovered. And according to Young, she had grown accustomed to a life of extravagance. In early October 2007, after Hunter’s two-week stint living in the Young’s North Carolina home, Young said she was moved into a home nearby paid for with money that Mellon had provided. There, he said, she was allowed to spend freely to furnish the four-bedroom rental home, using a new credit card in the alias “Jaya James.” Young said she was also given a $28,000 BMW. Young said these fresh expenses were paid for by Rachel “Bunny” Mellon, a reclusive 99-year-old heiress and Edwards fan, who gave more than $700,000 which ended up in accounts controlled by Young with no strings attached. Young told ABC News that Mellon did not know her funds were going to support Hunter until after the fact. “She [Mellon] would send them in boxes of chocolate with a note like … ‘This is to save the nation,’ or ‘This is … to save the world’ or whatever,” Young said. “The checks would range from $10,000 up to $200,000.” Mellon declined to comment. During this time, Young was also pitted against Edwards’ increasingly demanding mistress and suspicious wife. In a voice mail to Young on Dec. 14, 2007 at 8:19, the day after Young said he agreed to claim paternity of Hunter’s child, Edwards warned his aide that Elizabeth may be listening in on their next call: “I am going to leave this message just in case you get a call from me where I ask you what’s going on. The reason we are calling is because Elizabeth is standing there. So, just be aware of that. If I am calling saying what happened, how did this happen, or what’s going on, then that’s because Elizabeth is standing there with me.” In hiding, Young said they all watched as Edwards finished a distant second in Iowa, third in New Hampshire and South Carolina, and suspended his campaign in January 2008. But since Edwards was angling for a position in a Hilary Clinton or Barack Obama administration, the cover-up continued, Young said. After Hunter gave birth to daughter Frances Quinn Feb. 27, 2008, life on the lam became life in limbo — according to Young — waiting for Edwards to put an end to all the lies. It wasn’t until last week, with Young’s book about to be published, that Edwards abandoned his long denial, revealing in a statement that he was the father of Hunter’s almost 2-year-old daughter. But Young’s relationship with Edwards had rapidly deteriorated to the point that Edwards wouldn’t return the aide’s phone calls. Young said his role in the scandal made it impossible to get another job. He claims that Edwards led him to believe that Baron and Mellon were setting up a foundation of which Young would be the executive director. “[He] promised me … that our family would never want for anything. That they were going to take care of us for life …. hat John Edwards had never had such a good friend. That he loved us,” Young said. But as fast as they went into hiding, everything came crashing down even faster. On July 21, 2008, Edwards attended an event in Los Angeles and, without the knowledge of the Youngs, went to the Beverly Hilton to visit Hunter and her baby. The National Enquirer had been tipped off by a source, staked out the hotel, and caught Edwards in a public bathroom during the visit. In May 2009, a federal grand jury in Raleigh, N.C. began investigating whether any crimes were committed in an effort to conceal Edwards’ affair with Hunter. Young testified about his role in the cover-up, as well as the senator’s. “Everything that I did was at the direction of John Edwards, everything,” Young said. “So I don’t understand how the senator could even begin to deny that he was involved in every aspect of this.” Edwards issued a statement in May 2009 saying he was “confident that no funds from my campaign were used improperly.” Young said he provided phone records, hotel bills, videos and voice mails, documenting the time he spent hiding Edwards’ mistress with virtually unlimited funds to the grand jury and was given “limited immunity.” Young told Woodruff any benefit he got from the cover-up is balanced by the reality that he has been unemployable for 2½ years. Young said he had to write “The Politician” to survive financially. Their sole source of financial support is his wife’s work as a nurse. But in his book, Young writes that about midway through their several months on the lam in five-star hideaways, they set aside thousands of dollars of Mellon’s money for “future use.” Asked by Woodruff if the money was still set aside, Young said it had all been spent. “The money went into the house and we were supposed to sell the house and go somewhere else,” Young said. “We couldn’t come back to Chapel Hill.” The Young’s 5,300 square foot home — just three miles from the Edwards’ mansion and valued by the tax assessor at $893,000 — was built, in part, with a $325,000 gift from Baron, who wired the money directly to the builder, according to Young. The Youngs claim they were encouraged by Baron to build the house with no expense spared, and then sell it and move to another city. “We’ve completely lost our reputation. We have a house that we can’t finish that’s threatening to bankrupt us,” he said. “We were seduced by the power and the lights and the money … we were. And there’s no excuse for that. There’s no excuse for a lot of our behavior.” “It’s not something we’re proud of. It’s not something, we’re humiliated, we’re embarrassed … we know we made the wrong decision,” Cheri Young said. August 2008, shortly after Edwards admitted to ABC News that he’d cheated on his wife in an exclusive interview with Woodruff, was the last time Young saw Edwards. But the decisions Young made still haunt him. “For myself, I am so sorry for my part in this. I am so sorry for what I did to my family,” he told ABC News. “This is going to be on my tombstone. Slideshow
When presidential contender John Edwards decided he had to hide his mistress and her pregnancy from his wife — and from the voters — he concocted an elaborate scheme to keep the scandal a secret, according to the once-loyal aide who helped smuggle the woman through a series of luxurious hideaways. Wealthy benefactors were called on and their sizable contributions funded the lavish life on the lam.
“I know of at least a million dollars. And there was much, much more,” said Andrew Young of the scheme that brought him to testify in front of a grand jury. “We were living in mansions, flying around in jets. … Money was no object.”
The Iowa caucuses were just two weeks away in December 2007, when Young falsely claimed he was the father of his boss’s love child.
“We knew we were going to have to leave town as soon as this hit the Enquirer,” Young recalled of the bombshell that broke in the supermarket tabloid the National Enquirer.
Young and his wife, Cheri, said they had less than 12 hours to make the decision to go on the lam with his boss’s mistress — Rielle Hunter — but ultimately agreed to go into hiding with her. According to Young, Edwards’ campaign finance chairman, Fred Baron, who’s now deceased, made it possible for them to effectively disappear.
“Fred said to me, ‘Andrew, I got more money than I can ever spend. You spend whatever it takes to take care of the situation. And let us focus on making him president, vice president or attorney general,” Young recalled.
Young gives his account of life on the run with the pregnant mistress of a presidential contender in a new tell-all book titled “The Politician,” which will be released Jan. 30.
According to Young, they left in the middle of the night in December 2007 on private jet provided by Baron and flew to the Westin Hotel in Hollywood, Fla., to take cover from the media firestorm.
In a statement to ABC News on the “20/20″ interview, Edwards’ attorneys said that according to media reports “there are many allegations which are simply false” and that Young appeared to be “motivated by financial gain and media attention.” At that point, the Youngs said they had no idea where they were going or how long they’d be gone, but sent their three kids — Brody, 8, Gracie, 7 and Cooper, 5 — to stay with their grandparents.
“We couldn’t tell our families where we were going,” Young said. “We said …’You’re going to see our names in the newspapers. We love you. Everything is fine. Trust us. But we can’t tell you where we are.’”
Cheri Young said she was shocked and displeased, but said she felt as if the couple was taking a hit for the greater cause.
“Ultimately, we felt like … his chance to be president of the United States laid in our hands because he could continue if we said yes. And we did,” she said.
Young told ABC News that Edwards knew where they were going and how it was being financed.
“He might not have known the exact figures, he might not have known where exactly we were living. But he knew about the money, he knew about the methodology and he knew about the sources,” Young claims. “He would — arrange things, but then … he would say, ‘You know, I can’t know about this in case, you know, I’m going to be sworn in for attorney general.’”
Baron had claims before he died that it was his idea, not Edwards’, to get Hunter out of town.
“Fred, on his own and without discussing it with anyone else, provided financial help to Andrew Young and Rielle Hunter when they were being besieged by the media to try to help them protect their and their families’ privacy,” Abbe Lowell, a friend of the family, said in a statement to ABC News on behalf of Fred Baron. “It would be awful if anyone who was a willing beneficiary of Fred’s generosity and friendship was now so ungrateful that he or she tried to mischaracterize what happened, blame Fred for their decisions, and especially try to put words in Fred’s mouth now that he has passed on and cannot speak for himself.”
Overnight, the middle class Young family said they were suddenly living like kings — with Edwards’ benefactors footing the bill.
When they first arrived in Florida in late December 2007, Young claims he received a FedEx package of “an envelope full of cash, hundred-dollar bills, was wrapped in Fred Baron’s stationery. And it said, ‘Old Chinese saying, use cash, they can’t trace it,’” Young told ABC News.
And on Christmas Eve, when the Youngs wanted to spend the holiday with their kids, a private jet picked them up and whisked them all to Baron’s $14 million vacation home in Aspen, Colo.
“Fred’s house has this indoor swimming pool with a Jacuzzi and the constellations up in the ceiling. To the kids, it was a big adventure. They were getting private ski lessons, sledding in the front yard, riding in jets,” said Young.
Baron even paid for their kids’ Christmas presents, according to Young.
Cheri Young said the “private masseuses” and “a chef that had been featured in Food and Wine magazine” were a world away from what they were used to.
Days later, Baron moved the Youngs and Hunter to the Loews Coronado Resort in San Diego, where they celebrated New Year’s Eve. Two weeks and nearly $23,000 in hotel bills later, Baron rented a sprawling ranch house in Montecito, Calif. — close to Oprah Winfrey’s estate — for $20,000 a month, where Hunter and the Youngs waited for the baby to be born.
But Young said despite the free-flowing funds, keeping Hunter under wraps wasn’t easy. At the Diplomat Hotel in Hollywood, Fla., he said she demanded to see their rooms before they checked in to make sure they had “the right energy.”
“We were up on the top penthouse suite … and then that had the right energy,” he recalled.
Young said it almost seemed like Hunter was itching to be discovered. And according to Young, she had grown accustomed to a life of extravagance.
In early October 2007, after Hunter’s two-week stint living in the Young’s North Carolina home, Young said she was moved into a home nearby paid for with money that Mellon had provided.
There, he said, she was allowed to spend freely to furnish the four-bedroom rental home, using a new credit card in the alias “Jaya James.” Young said she was also given a $28,000 BMW.
Young said these fresh expenses were paid for by Rachel “Bunny” Mellon, a reclusive 99-year-old heiress and Edwards fan, who gave more than $700,000 which ended up in accounts controlled by Young with no strings attached. Young told ABC News that Mellon did not know her funds were going to support Hunter until after the fact.
“She [Mellon] would send them in boxes of chocolate with a note like … ‘This is to save the nation,’ or ‘This is … to save the world’ or whatever,” Young said. “The checks would range from $10,000 up to $200,000.”
Mellon declined to comment.
During this time, Young was also pitted against Edwards’ increasingly demanding mistress and suspicious wife. In a voice mail to Young on Dec. 14, 2007 at 8:19, the day after Young said he agreed to claim paternity of Hunter’s child, Edwards warned his aide that Elizabeth may be listening in on their next call: “I am going to leave this message just in case you get a call from me where I ask you what’s going on. The reason we are calling is because Elizabeth is standing there. So, just be aware of that. If I am calling saying what happened, how did this happen, or what’s going on, then that’s because Elizabeth is standing there with me.”
In hiding, Young said they all watched as Edwards finished a distant second in Iowa, third in New Hampshire and South Carolina, and suspended his campaign in January 2008. But since Edwards was angling for a position in a Hilary Clinton or Barack Obama administration, the cover-up continued, Young said.
After Hunter gave birth to daughter Frances Quinn Feb. 27, 2008, life on the lam became life in limbo — according to Young — waiting for Edwards to put an end to all the lies.
It wasn’t until last week, with Young’s book about to be published, that Edwards abandoned his long denial, revealing in a statement that he was the father of Hunter’s almost 2-year-old daughter.
But Young’s relationship with Edwards had rapidly deteriorated to the point that Edwards wouldn’t return the aide’s phone calls.
Young said his role in the scandal made it impossible to get another job. He claims that Edwards led him to believe that Baron and Mellon were setting up a foundation of which Young would be the executive director.
“[He] promised me … that our family would never want for anything. That they were going to take care of us for life …. hat John Edwards had never had such a good friend. That he loved us,” Young said.
But as fast as they went into hiding, everything came crashing down even faster. On July 21, 2008, Edwards attended an event in Los Angeles and, without the knowledge of the Youngs, went to the Beverly Hilton to visit Hunter and her baby. The National Enquirer had been tipped off by a source, staked out the hotel, and caught Edwards in a public bathroom during the visit.
In May 2009, a federal grand jury in Raleigh, N.C. began investigating whether any crimes were committed in an effort to conceal Edwards’ affair with Hunter.
Young testified about his role in the cover-up, as well as the senator’s.
“Everything that I did was at the direction of John Edwards, everything,” Young said. “So I don’t understand how the senator could even begin to deny that he was involved in every aspect of this.”
Edwards issued a statement in May 2009 saying he was “confident that no funds from my campaign were used improperly.”
Young said he provided phone records, hotel bills, videos and voice mails, documenting the time he spent hiding Edwards’ mistress with virtually unlimited funds to the grand jury and was given “limited immunity.”
Young told Woodruff any benefit he got from the cover-up is balanced by the reality that he has been unemployable for 2½ years. Young said he had to write “The Politician” to survive financially. Their sole source of financial support is his wife’s work as a nurse.
But in his book, Young writes that about midway through their several months on the lam in five-star hideaways, they set aside thousands of dollars of Mellon’s money for “future use.”
Asked by Woodruff if the money was still set aside, Young said it had all been spent.
“The money went into the house and we were supposed to sell the house and go somewhere else,” Young said. “We couldn’t come back to Chapel Hill.”
The Young’s 5,300 square foot home — just three miles from the Edwards’ mansion and valued by the tax assessor at $893,000 — was built, in part, with a $325,000 gift from Baron, who wired the money directly to the builder, according to Young. The Youngs claim they were encouraged by Baron to build the house with no expense spared, and then sell it and move to another city.
“We’ve completely lost our reputation. We have a house that we can’t finish that’s threatening to bankrupt us,” he said. “We were seduced by the power and the lights and the money … we were. And there’s no excuse for that. There’s no excuse for a lot of our behavior.”
“It’s not something we’re proud of. It’s not something, we’re humiliated, we’re embarrassed … we know we made the wrong decision,” Cheri Young said.
August 2008, shortly after Edwards admitted to ABC News that he’d cheated on his wife in an exclusive interview with Woodruff, was the last time Young saw Edwards. But the decisions Young made still haunt him.
“For myself, I am so sorry for my part in this. I am so sorry for what I did to my family,” he told ABC News. “This is going to be on my tombstone.
Slideshow
The seriousness of this can not be overlooked. This scandal could have placed the entire country at risk should this man have become vice-president. Imagine how foreign governments or foreign entities could have used this information to blackmail the country. Equally as disturbing would have been Edwards’ position as the highest law enforcement officer in the country had he been made attorney general. Luckily, Edwards’ behavior is trivial when compared to Palin’s decision to give birth to her son Trig and to embrace values that are important to her.
The cost of Obama’s policy to try the 9-11 terrorist in New York City is skyrocketing. Latest estimates put the security cost alone at $200 million each year. Yes, that’s right, $200 million a year for security for terrorists who Obama has already declared are guilty and would be found guilty and who, regardless of the outcome of the trial, would never be released. Yes, I’m confused too.
We know that Obama and his liberal enablers have said it was necessary to apply the Constitution of the United States that was drafted to protect American rights to these terrorist in an effort to show the world that we abide by the law. I guess the former constitutional law “professor” forgot that these terrorist must be presumed innocent. Isn’t it wrong for the President to declare someone guilty and insist that they will be found guilty before they’ve been given a “fair” trial if his administration has insisted that the sole purpose of this spectacle was to show the world our “values”? And how can we keep someone indefinitely if they’ve been given a trial and they’ve been declared innocent or the case dismissed because of some legal machination? What would the world think of us then?
Personally, I couldn’t care less. I’ve been of the opinion that they are enemy combatants and should be held as long as they’ve declared war on us. But what do I know. I mean, I’m not a constitutional professor and was shocked to learn that the US Constitution applied to the world’s citizens; that the Constitution stated that if your a terrorist the President has the right to presume your guilty and declare that you will be found as such and that if you’re not, that he still has the authority to imprison you indefinitely. Who knew?
Let’s talk about the cost. We know that the estimates is $200 million each year and you and I know that the government always spends a lot more, but lets just see what $200 million that could be spent on protecting us from terrorist could be spent on.
1. 166,667 senior citizens could have received an extra $100 per month increase in their social security for the next year rather than a freeze.
2. 5,715 Americans could have been paid $35,000 a year in salary.
3. 23,810 Homeless American families could have been provided an apartment for a year.
4. 55,556 Hungry Americans could have been fed for an entire year.
5. 11,111 Unemployed Americans could have received benefits for a year.
Let’s be frank with one another. Trying these terrorist in civilian court has nothing to do with honoring our Constitution nor does it have anything to do with demonstrating to the world our commitment to the values of the law- military tribunals for enemy combatants would have been adherence to both. No, these civilian trials were motivated by campaign rhetoric by a candidate who wanted to placate a base that was ignorant as to why these terrorist were held indefinitely and the process by which military tribunals work.
With $1.5 trillion in deficit spending each year, boondoggles, fancy vacations, Congressional party flights with Grey Goose and caviar… what’s a mere $200 million plus on one trial… we got money to burn.
________________
From WND.com
It reads like a dream order for a wild frat party: Maker’s Mark whiskey, Courvoisier cognac, Johnny Walker Red scotch, Grey Goose vodka, E&J brandy, Bailey’s Irish Crème, Bacardi Light rum, Jim Beam whiskey, Beefeater gin, Dewars scotch, Bombay Sapphire gin, Jack Daniels whiskey … and Corona beer.
But that single receipt makes up just part of the more than $101,000 taxpayers paid for “in-flight services” – including food and liquor, for House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s trips on Air Force jets over the last two years. That’s almost $1,000 per week. Documents obtained under the Freedom of Information Act by Judicial Watch, which investigates and prosecutes government corruption, show Pelosi incurred expenses of some $2.1 million for her use of Air Force jets for travel over that time.
“Speaker Pelosi has a history of wasting taxpayer funds with her boorish demands for military travel,” Judicial Watch President Tom Fitton said today. “And these documents suggest the Speaker’s congressional delegations are more about partying than anything else.”
Pelosi, D-Calif., recently joined President Obama on a Judicial Watch list of Top 10 corrupt politicians because of her “sense of entitlement,” the group said.
“Politicians believe laws and rules (even the U.S. Constitution) apply to the rest of us but not to them. Case in point: House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and her excessive and boorish demands for military travel. Judicial Watch obtained documents from the Pentagon in 2008 that suggest Pelosi has been treating the Air Force like her own personal airline,” the evaluation said… Continued
Top 10 corrupt policians:
According to the report others on the list are:
__________
An insulted Supreme Court sits as Democrats stand to applause their objection to the high court’s decision.
Constitutional scholar and professor, Randy E. Barnett wrote a scathing piece in today’s Wall Street Journal calling for Obama to apologize to the Supreme Court. Barnett went further, calling the President’s statements factually incorrect. Barnett points out that the ruling leaves in place the ban on foreign companies who wish to contribute to political campaigns and merely allows for the right of labor unions and domestic corporations, including nonprofits, to express their views about candidates in media such as books, films and TV within 60 days of an election. In short, it concerned freedom of speech…
Here’s the piece:
In his State of the Union address, the president of the United States called out the Supreme Court by name for sharp condemnation and egged on his congressional supporters to jeer its recent decision: “Last week, the Supreme Court reversed a century of law to open the floodgates for special interests—including foreign corporations—to spend without limit in our elections. Well I don’t think American elections should be bankrolled by America’s most powerful interests, or worse, by foreign entities. They should be decided by the American people, and that’s why I’m urging Democrats and Republicans to pass a bill that helps to right this wrong.” Even before he finished, hundreds of Democratic senators, congressmen and cabinet officials surrounding the six seated justices stood, applauded and cheered. Suppose for a moment that you were a justice seated there as the president of the United States singled you out for criticism and the room stood and cheered. Could they take it? Yes, of course. Should they have been put in this position? Absolutely not. This is not to deny that the Supreme Court may be criticized. I do it regularly in class, op-eds, blog posts, and in the pages of law reviews. So too should the president when he thinks the Court is wrong. But not when the justices are in attendance as a courtesy to him, seated as a captive audience on national television, while surrounded by hundreds of his political partisans. Imagine the howls if the president had been a guest in the House of Commons when the British prime minister called him out for failing to live up to his promises in Copenhagen about imposing a carbon tax. Judge not the words themselves, but their effect on the audience. The president fully expected that his hundreds of supporters in the legislative branch would stand and cheer, while the justices remained seated and silent, unable to respond even afterward. Moreover, the president’s speech was only released about 30 minutes before the event, after the justices were already present. In short, the head of the executive branch ambushed six members of the judiciary, and called upon the legislative branch to deride them publicly. If you missed it, check the YouTube video. No one could reasonably believe in their heart that this was respectful behavior. Then there is the substance of the remark itself. It was factually wrong. The Court’s ruling in Citizens United concerned the right of labor unions and domestic corporations, including nonprofits, to express their views about candidates in media such as books, films and TV within 60 days of an election. In short, it concerned freedom of speech; in particular, an independent film critical of Hillary Clinton funded by a nonprofit corporation. While the Court reversed a 1990 decision allowing such a ban, it left standing current restrictions on foreign nationals and “entities.” Also untouched was a 100-year-old ban on domestic corporate contributions to political campaigns to which the president was presumably referring erroneously. That is a whole lot to get wrong in 72 sanctimonious words. Clearly, this statement had not been vetted by the president’s legal counsel. Solicitor General Elena Kagan, for example, would never have signed off on such a claim. Never. Then there is the lack of any reference to the Constitution or First Amendment upon which the Court rested its decision. The president made a nakedly result-oriented criticism: Because interest groups and foreigners (gasp!) will allegedly get to influence our elections, the Supreme Court made a legal mistake. As though this is the way the Supreme Court should decide constitutional cases. Oh, and how exactly is Congress supposed to override a constitutional ruling by the Supreme Court by enacting a statute? Or was the president merely urging Congress to evade it? If the president, himself a Harvard Law School graduate, is going to criticize a judicial opinion, it is incumbent upon him to be legally accurate and responsible in his commentary. If that is too much to expect of a politician giving a nationally televised speech to the general public, then this again illustrates the inappropriateness of making this remark in this venue. For those who strongly object to the ruling in Citizens United and still do not see the impropriety of criticizing the Court this way, consider Rep. Joe Wilson’s “You lie!” outburst during the president’s address to a joint session of Congress in September. No one denied the right of a congressman to criticize the accuracy of the president’s remarks. The objection was to the rudeness and disrespect shown the president, for which Mr. Wilson promptly apologized. So too should the president. Mr. Barnett teaches constitutional law at Georgetown Law Center
In his State of the Union address, the president of the United States called out the Supreme Court by name for sharp condemnation and egged on his congressional supporters to jeer its recent decision:
“Last week, the Supreme Court reversed a century of law to open the floodgates for special interests—including foreign corporations—to spend without limit in our elections. Well I don’t think American elections should be bankrolled by America’s most powerful interests, or worse, by foreign entities. They should be decided by the American people, and that’s why I’m urging Democrats and Republicans to pass a bill that helps to right this wrong.”
Even before he finished, hundreds of Democratic senators, congressmen and cabinet officials surrounding the six seated justices stood, applauded and cheered.
Suppose for a moment that you were a justice seated there as the president of the United States singled you out for criticism and the room stood and cheered. Could they take it? Yes, of course. Should they have been put in this position? Absolutely not.
This is not to deny that the Supreme Court may be criticized. I do it regularly in class, op-eds, blog posts, and in the pages of law reviews. So too should the president when he thinks the Court is wrong. But not when the justices are in attendance as a courtesy to him, seated as a captive audience on national television, while surrounded by hundreds of his political partisans. Imagine the howls if the president had been a guest in the House of Commons when the British prime minister called him out for failing to live up to his promises in Copenhagen about imposing a carbon tax.
Judge not the words themselves, but their effect on the audience. The president fully expected that his hundreds of supporters in the legislative branch would stand and cheer, while the justices remained seated and silent, unable to respond even afterward. Moreover, the president’s speech was only released about 30 minutes before the event, after the justices were already present. In short, the head of the executive branch ambushed six members of the judiciary, and called upon the legislative branch to deride them publicly. If you missed it, check the YouTube video. No one could reasonably believe in their heart that this was respectful behavior.
Then there is the substance of the remark itself. It was factually wrong. The Court’s ruling in Citizens United concerned the right of labor unions and domestic corporations, including nonprofits, to express their views about candidates in media such as books, films and TV within 60 days of an election. In short, it concerned freedom of speech; in particular, an independent film critical of Hillary Clinton funded by a nonprofit corporation.
While the Court reversed a 1990 decision allowing such a ban, it left standing current restrictions on foreign nationals and “entities.” Also untouched was a 100-year-old ban on domestic corporate contributions to political campaigns to which the president was presumably referring erroneously.
That is a whole lot to get wrong in 72 sanctimonious words. Clearly, this statement had not been vetted by the president’s legal counsel. Solicitor General Elena Kagan, for example, would never have signed off on such a claim. Never.
Then there is the lack of any reference to the Constitution or First Amendment upon which the Court rested its decision. The president made a nakedly result-oriented criticism: Because interest groups and foreigners (gasp!) will allegedly get to influence our elections, the Supreme Court made a legal mistake. As though this is the way the Supreme Court should decide constitutional cases.
Oh, and how exactly is Congress supposed to override a constitutional ruling by the Supreme Court by enacting a statute? Or was the president merely urging Congress to evade it?
If the president, himself a Harvard Law School graduate, is going to criticize a judicial opinion, it is incumbent upon him to be legally accurate and responsible in his commentary. If that is too much to expect of a politician giving a nationally televised speech to the general public, then this again illustrates the inappropriateness of making this remark in this venue.
For those who strongly object to the ruling in Citizens United and still do not see the impropriety of criticizing the Court this way, consider Rep. Joe Wilson’s “You lie!” outburst during the president’s address to a joint session of Congress in September. No one denied the right of a congressman to criticize the accuracy of the president’s remarks. The objection was to the rudeness and disrespect shown the president, for which Mr. Wilson promptly apologized. So too should the president.
Mr. Barnett teaches constitutional law at Georgetown Law Center
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Have you read or heard about James O’Keefe- he’s being labeled by the media as the ”Acorn conservative antagonist”. Most of you are probably hearing or reading his name for the first time these last few days. Oddly, O’Keefe is best known for undercover filming of Acorn employees engaging and promoting illegal activity that no less included tax fraud, prostitution, money laundering, human trafficking, and pedophilia. It’s no surprise that so many would not know that since the mainstream media went out of its way to ignore the story. In fact, it took the New York Times SIX days to report the story. But, they are getting better– almost immediately, the New York Times published an article about the arrest of O’Keefe for allege wiretapping.
Liberals in the media and in the blogshpere have been quick to pass judgment on O’Keefe. Yes, the same liberals who want to read terrorist their Miranda rights and who want to grant them the benefit of the doubt until proven guilty in a court of law. But, O’Keefe? No, of course not. O’Keefe dared to investigate the machinations of Acorn. To liberals, O’Keefe is the true enemy of “their” democracy not some terrorist blowing up innocent people on a Christmas day.
But, were the liberals too quick to accuse O’Keefe of some insidious plan to wiretap Senator Landrieu’s office in the hopes of somehow tying this to a Republican sanction operation? Democrats are already calling it the Louisiana Watergate. Well, things might not pan out for the liberals hoping to score a big one. Andrew Breitbart seems to believe that O’Keefe will be exonerated and the press will have egg of their face once again. If that happens, don’t expect the New York Times to be so quick to report the vindication.
Join us as we discuss American Idol starting at 8:00pm and the State of the Union at 9:00pm- a night full of entertainment, blame Bush, and empty promises.
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Obama must think people are stupid. I believe that reporters are beginning to take issue to being lied to and used to advance his lies.
Mary Katharine Ham notes that President Obama tells ABC: “Let’s just clarify. I didn’t make a bunch of deals [on health care]. … There is a legislative process that is taking place in Congress and I am happy to own up to the fact that I have not changed Congress and how it operates the way I would have liked.” But the Washington Post reported on December 20 that Obama’s top aides were involved in the negotiations with Nelson: Schumer, who spent more than 13 hours in Reid’s office Friday, said the Medicaid issue was settled around lunchtime, and the final eight hours of the talks focused on the abortion language. Boxer estimated she spent seven hours in Reid’s offices — without ever once sitting in the same room, even though they were all of 25 steps apart. Reid and Schumer kept up the “shuttle negotiation” between the leader’s conference room and his top aide’s office, Boxer said. Keenly aware how tense the talks were, the White House dispatched two aides who together have decades of experience in the Senate — Jim Messina and Peter Rouse — to work with Nelson. They relayed their intelligence to White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel, who monitored the talks from a dinner in Georgetown. Perhaps Messina and Rouse just showed up to provide the “Christmas cookies” that Reid and Schumer chowed down to sustain themselves during the tense negotiations, but it’s hard to believe that Obama’s aides didn’t sign off on both the abortion and Medicaid backroom deals. Michelle Malkin sums it up: The unmitigated chutzpah here is so blinding that I don’t just need sunglasses to protect my eyes. I need blackout curtains. Watch President Obama blame Congress for Demcare bribery and sabotage of transparency. As if Rahm and all the senior goons in the White House weren’t twisting arms and cracking heads to ensure that the deal met their boss’s timeline. As if the Cadillac tax break for unions hadn’t been hashed out at 1600 Pennsylvania. Read more at the Washington Examiner
Mary Katharine Ham notes that President Obama tells ABC:
“Let’s just clarify. I didn’t make a bunch of deals [on health care]. … There is a legislative process that is taking place in Congress and I am happy to own up to the fact that I have not changed Congress and how it operates the way I would have liked.”
But the Washington Post reported on December 20 that Obama’s top aides were involved in the negotiations with Nelson:
Schumer, who spent more than 13 hours in Reid’s office Friday, said the Medicaid issue was settled around lunchtime, and the final eight hours of the talks focused on the abortion language. Boxer estimated she spent seven hours in Reid’s offices — without ever once sitting in the same room, even though they were all of 25 steps apart.
Reid and Schumer kept up the “shuttle negotiation” between the leader’s conference room and his top aide’s office, Boxer said. Keenly aware how tense the talks were, the White House dispatched two aides who together have decades of experience in the Senate — Jim Messina and Peter Rouse — to work with Nelson. They relayed their intelligence to White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel, who monitored the talks from a dinner in Georgetown.
Perhaps Messina and Rouse just showed up to provide the “Christmas cookies” that Reid and Schumer chowed down to sustain themselves during the tense negotiations, but it’s hard to believe that Obama’s aides didn’t sign off on both the abortion and Medicaid backroom deals.
Michelle Malkin sums it up:
The unmitigated chutzpah here is so blinding that I don’t just need sunglasses to protect my eyes. I need blackout curtains. Watch President Obama blame Congress for Demcare bribery and sabotage of transparency. As if Rahm and all the senior goons in the White House weren’t twisting arms and cracking heads to ensure that the deal met their boss’s timeline. As if the Cadillac tax break for unions hadn’t been hashed out at 1600 Pennsylvania.
From Gawker.com
Sources have told us that, in the throes of their affair, John Edwards and Rielle Hunter made a sex tape that contains “several sex acts.” And that his aide, Andrew Young found it on an unmarked DVD. The tape, say both our sources, is explicit and reveals that Edwards “is physically very striking, in a certain area. Everyone who sees it says ‘whoa’. She’s behind the camera at first.” When rumors of the affair first broke Young was so loyal to Edwards that he pretended that he was the father of Hunter’s daughter Frances Quinn, now 2. But part of Young’s disillusionment with the 2004 vice presidential candidate and 2008 candidate came one day as he went through a stack of DVDs at Rielle Hunter’s house. It was this betrayal that prompted Young to write his tell-all book, The Politician, out February 2. Background: The New York Daily News reported last June that Young mentioned the existence of the tape in his book proposal. It’s expected that he’ll reveal further details in that story, and in the 20/20 interview to promote it, to air on Friday. “It [the tape] was kind of the last straw for people who had sacrificed savings and jobs to lie for John,” said one of our sources. “You should expect to see plenty more stories about him coming out of the woodwork when more people realize how… complicated… his motivations were.” Up until he discovered the DVD, says one of our sources, Young’s devotion was typical of the “cultish” fervor Edwards brought out in his staffers. This is why, says our source, who is close to Hunter, major media organizations could not stand up the affair story despite well-intentioned efforts. “They [staffers] would do anything to stop it coming out — they lied, they bullied, they called reporters’ editors and bad-mouthed them, they exchanged access.”
Sources have told us that, in the throes of their affair, John Edwards and Rielle Hunter made a sex tape that contains “several sex acts.” And that his aide, Andrew Young found it on an unmarked DVD.
The tape, say both our sources, is explicit and reveals that Edwards “is physically very striking, in a certain area. Everyone who sees it says ‘whoa’. She’s behind the camera at first.”
When rumors of the affair first broke Young was so loyal to Edwards that he pretended that he was the father of Hunter’s daughter Frances Quinn, now 2. But part of Young’s disillusionment with the 2004 vice presidential candidate and 2008 candidate came one day as he went through a stack of DVDs at Rielle Hunter’s house.
It was this betrayal that prompted Young to write his tell-all book, The Politician, out February 2. Background: The New York Daily News reported last June that Young mentioned the existence of the tape in his book proposal. It’s expected that he’ll reveal further details in that story, and in the 20/20 interview to promote it, to air on Friday. “It [the tape] was kind of the last straw for people who had sacrificed savings and jobs to lie for John,” said one of our sources. “You should expect to see plenty more stories about him coming out of the woodwork when more people realize how… complicated… his motivations were.”
Up until he discovered the DVD, says one of our sources, Young’s devotion was typical of the “cultish” fervor Edwards brought out in his staffers. This is why, says our source, who is close to Hunter, major media organizations could not stand up the affair story despite well-intentioned efforts. “They [staffers] would do anything to stop it coming out — they lied, they bullied, they called reporters’ editors and bad-mouthed them, they exchanged access.”
