The so-called peaceful leftists and Pro-Gaza activists who attacked the Israeli soldiers today with pipes, metal rods and chairs belong to a terrorist-linked organization. The International Humanitarian Fund (IHH), which plays a central role in organizing the Gaza Flotilla, is a Turkish humanitarian relief fund with a radical Islamic anti-Western orientation. The president of IHH (Bulent Yildirim) recruited “Jihad warriors” and transferred firearms, and explosives to Al Qaeda and other Islamic terrorists organizations.

For some strange reason the state-run media forgot to mention this in their reports today?

Here is one video that shows the Gaza Flotilla activists chanting “Kill the Jews”.
Via Palestinian Media Watch:

From the video: Gaza flotilla participants chanted Islamic battle cry invoking killing of Jews. The name Khaibar mentioned in battle cry was the last Jewish village defeated by Muhammad’s army in 628. The battle marked the end of Jewish presence in Arabia. There are Muslims who see that as a precursor for future wars against Jews. At gatherings and rallies of extremists, this chant is often heard as a threat to Jews to expect to be defeated and killed again by Muslims.

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A newly emboldened James O’Keefe speaks to reporters moments after receiving probation for a misdemeanor in New Orleans.

He promises new videos in the spirit of the ACORN investigation he engineered with Hannah Giles last fall.

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Rand Paul’s controversial remarks about the 1964 Civil Rights Act illustrate what I have been saying for years, that Republicans would benefit tremendously from knowing and appreciating the heritage of our Grand Old Party.  That landmark legislation was the culmination of a century of efforts by Republicans to protect African-Americans from their Democrat oppressors.  Let’s look at the facts.

On his deathbed in 1874, Senator Charles Sumner (R-MA) told a Republican colleague: “You must take care of the civil rights bill – my bill, the civil rights bill.  Don’t let it fail.”  In March 1875, the Republican-controlled 43rd Congress followed up the GOP’s 1866 Civil Rights Act and 1871 Civil Rights Act with the most comprehensive civil rights legislation ever.  A Republican president, Ulysses Grant, signed the bill into law that same day.

Among its provisions, the 1875 Civil Rights Act banned racial discrimination in public accommodations.  Sound familiar?  Though struck down by the Supreme Court eight years later, the 1875 Civil Rights Act would be reborn as the 1964 Civil Rights Act.

During the twenty years of the FDR and Truman administrations, the Democrats had refused to enact any civil rights legislation.  In contrast, President Dwight Eisenhower signed the 1957 Civil Rights Act, which had been written by his Attorney General, a former Chairman of the Republican National Committee.  The original draft would have permitted the federal government to sue anyone violating another person’s constitutional rights, but this powerful provision would have to wait until the 1964 Civil Rights Act.  The bill had to be weakened considerably to secure enough Democrat votes to pass, so violations would be civil, not criminal offenses, and penalties were light.  Vice President Richard Nixon helped overcome a Democrat filibuster in the Senate.  The GOP then strengthened enforcement with its 1960 Civil Rights Act.

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Last week, President Obama brought his unique brand of leadership to the U.S. Military Academy. Speaking to the West Point graduation, the commander-in-chief outlined a foreign policy that sharply differed from the Bush Doctrine that was proclaimed from that same podium eight years ago.

In those tense, post-9/11 days, George W. Bush declared that the U.S. would carry the fight to our jihadist enemies, that we would not wait for those who were preparing weapons of mass destruction to strike us a first, devastating blow, and that we would regard any government that harbored terrorists as a foe. The Bush Doctrine was certainly controversial then. It has been effectively superseded by the Obama Doctrine. President Obama recognized that America’s economy is the basis of America’s military strength. No argument there. He told the Corps of Cadets, that illustrious “Long Gray Line,” including hundreds of graduates who will soon join their brothers in combat:

Simply put, American innovation must be the foundation of American power – because at no time in human history has a nation of diminished economic vitality maintained its military and political primacy. And so that means that the civilians among us, as parents and community leaders, elected officials, business leaders, we have a role to play. We cannot leave it to those in uniform to defend this country – we have to make sure that America is building on its strengths.

During World War II, American productivity saved freedom for the world. But Obama’s economic policies will choke American innovation. Small businesses are already contemplating the grim decision whether to lay off workers or pay the fine and dump their employees from company-provided health plans. Obama’s Cap & Trade legislation, should it be passed, will vastly increase the cost of doing business. At the very time the President seeks to engage “soft power”–economic and non-military resources, his policies are rendering that power ineffective.

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As one of the few Jews willing to admit to a politically conservative slant, I get asked the same question all the time, “How can you be both politically conservative and a Jew?” Most of the questioners are either liberal Jews who consider me something of a heretic, or a non-Jewish fellow conservative who is shocked at the rare find of a conservative who is a Jew.

My response to the query is usually “How can a Jew not be politically conservative?” Conservative principals such as limited government, individual responsibility,  and traditional morals are all deeply rooted in Jewish tradition. Even the fact that America’s  founders intended for the county to be led by people who based their political decisions on religious values (something that scares the heck out of most liberal Jews) complements Jewish tradition.

The  creation narrative in Genesis explains that man is created in God’s image.  But we also taught that our maker has no bodily form, so how can that be?  The Bible is not teaching us that we are all dead ringers for  ”big guy upstairs,”  if that was the case the pictures on everyone’s drivers licenses would look alike and no one would be able to get a check cashed and CSI would be a very boring TV show.

“Created in God’s image”  is supposed to teach us that just as God acts as a free being, without prior restraint to do right and wrong, so does man. God does good deeds as a matter of his own free choice,and because we are created in his image so can man. Only through free choice, can man truly be, in the image of God.  It is further understood that  for Man to have true free choice, he must not only have inner free will, but an environment in which a choice between obedience and disobedience exists. God thus created the world such that both good and evil can operate freely; this is what the Rabbis mean when they said, “All is in the hands of Heaven except the fear of Heaven” (Talmud, Berachot 33b). God controls all the options we have, but it is up to man to pick between the correct or incorrect option.

As explained by the Rabbis, free will is the divine version of limited government. God picks the winning direction, but does not pick winners and losers.

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Memorial Day is a day to recognize the sacrifice of all the men and women who have given their lives in defending our country. It began during the Civil War when cities and towns held special days to lay flowers on the graves of fallen, husbands, sons, and fathers. Women of the fallen who organized groups to place flowers on the graves of their loved ones may have started it.

Memorial Day has grown over the years to be commemorated with flag waving ceremonies, military parades and memorial services held at military cemeteries and parks across America.  Many cities and towns line the streets with the American Flag and some do not.  Patriotic citizens fly the flag in front of their homes on days like this, do you?

I lived in Simi Valley, California for over 10 years, it is infamous for the Rodney King trial and the home to many Los Angeles Police Officers, and has been rated in the top ten safest cities in America several times.  It is not like a city full of “rednecks” like some believe.  My neighbor on one side was a family from Mexico; next to him was a black family, across the street were some Arabs and down the street lived a Chinese family.  Yes there are many folks from India running the local gas stations and 7 Elevens and they are all very polite.  Simi Valley is a great place to raise a family.

On holidays like the 4^th of July and Memorial Day one could drive down any residential street in Simi Valley and see numerous American flags. Now I live in a neighborhood near the San Fernando Valley, where out of over 500 homes only one or two flags are flown. But when the Lakers are in the playoffs their flag adorns many cars.

It seems like political correctness dictates that flying your countries flag is not politically correct. Folks from countries like El Salvador, Mexico, Guatemala, etc. will adorn their cars with their flag, why don’t more Americans?

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Hillary Clinton touched off an age old discussion this week about whether the rich are paying their “fair share.”  It is, of course, one the Left’s most used demagogic cries and one of its biggest proponents is former Labor Secretary now University Professor Robert Reich.  He was on Larry Kudlow’s show recently demonstrating, in glaring fashion, the Left’s the case for big government and higher tax rates.  It was a case study on why the American economy is slumping today.

What is Fair?

Hillary, Nancy, Harry, Obama and many others on the Left use the fair share argument, which is nothing more than a class-warfare tactic, as a prelude to raising tax rates to pay for social welfare programs. Stephen Moore, who was also the show and has been fighting this fight for years, and ably so, pointed out that the top 2 ½% of income tax payers pay the same amount in income taxes as the bottom 97 ½%.  It is also fact that the bottom 50% of income earners pay almost no income tax at all. If that is unfair in the minds of the Left, then clearly they want a chosen few to pay for everything and believe FDR when he said: “increasing the tax paid by individuals in the higher brackets . . . was the American thing to do and increasing still further the taxes paid by individuals in the highest brackets was even more the American thing to do.”

Of course, the problem with such policies is that wealth moves in the form of businesses and their owners moving away, along with sensible people realizing that it is not worth their time to risk everything only to have the state confiscate their rewards, and for still others to simply engage in tax evasion such as under reporting income and bartering.

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Today, give thanks that you are here to complain about the government. Now, do something about it.

The Mayor of New York backs the fifteen-story mega-mosque that is slated to be built near Ground Zero. He said Friday: “I think it’s fair to say if somebody was going to try, on that piece of property, to build a church or a synagogue, nobody would be yelling and screaming. And the fact of the matter is that Muslims have a right to do it, too.” The Mayor is wrong. This mosque is not about freedom of religion. It’s about Islamic supremacism.

This why the Stop Islamization of America (SIOA) June 6th rally against the proposed mega-mosque is so important. The Islamic supremacists must be shamed into withdrawing and not doing a victory dance on the hallowed burial ground of Ground Zero.

Bloomberg also said: “What is great about America and particularly New York is we welcome everybody, and if we are so afraid of something like this, what does that say about us?…If you are religious, you do not want the government picking religions, because what do you do the day they don’t pick yours?”

While I agree that that the government should keep its big fat nose out of religion (separation of mosque and state), I do not agree that the Mayor should publicly take one side if he really believes government should stay out of it. It’s why I believe petitions to the Mayor are a waste of time. New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg has on his New York City Human Rights Commission Omar Mohammedi, the former President of the New York chapter of the unindicted co-conspirator, Hamas-linked Muslim Brotherhood front, the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR). Terror lawyer Mohammedi represents a number of organizations that are the defendants in a 9/11 lawsuit for the murder of 3000 innocent people. One of the organizations he is working for is the World Assembly for Muslim Youth (WAMY), a Saudi-based group with offices around the globe that publishes incendiary materials against Jews and openly supports Hamas and violent jihad.

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Critics of the amount of golf President Obama has been playing need to look at the bright side: it’s equipped him for a very serious task at hand.

Since he’s shown such pitiful leadership for a president purporting to care about the environment, perhaps he can put his finely-tuned golf skills to the test and stop the oil spill in the gulf.

The New York Times reported that BP now plans to use such things as golf balls to plug the hole and stop the oil from spewing into the Gulf of Mexico.

The lights should be going off above the heads of all the handlers in the White House: the president’s moment of glory has arrived.  He suddenly would be hip and cool again.  Mr. President, we need you to shoot the golf balls into the hole.

If Kosmo Kramer can shoot a ball into the blow-hole of a whale, surely you can land a few in the name of saving the southeast coastal region.  You’d be the hero.  Everything would turn around and your party might not be decimated nearly as badly in November.

Then you can stand up and tell America that you lent your unique abilities to save the day.

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Is she right? It depends on what you consider fair. Using 2006 data, The New York Times found that the richest 20 percent of households were paying 26 percent of their income to the federal government in the form of income, payroll, corporate, and excise taxes. The average for all familes? 21 percent.

And there’s this: “In 2006, the top quintile of households earned 55.7 percent of pretax income and paid 69.3 percent of federal taxes, while the top 1 percent of households earned 18.8 percent of income and paid 28.3 percent of taxes.”

Paying in a lot more than you get out? That doesn’t seem fair.

The rich are different than you and me; they’ve got more money. And they pay more federal taxes, both in absolute and percentage terms.

Politicians are different too. they rarely say what they really mean. Perhaps what Secretary Clinton means is that the rich can always pay more than they’re already paying.

That would explain why she and the president are lobbying to let the Bush tax cuts expire at the end of the year, a policy that would raise all sorts of taxes on all sorts of people.

Which doesn’t sound all that fair either.

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Unions have stepped to a new low by protesting churches in California. Protesting churches because of their use of private contractors instead of union labor. Churches who only employ one or two pastors and one head administrator and operate off of donations.

In Bakersfield, California the local carpenters union is protesting the Grace Baptist Church for hiring a contractor who hired non-union labor. Grace Baptist Church had no control over who the contractor hired. You would think the local carpenters union would take a pass at protesting a church, but I guess not. Though the church greeted the protesters with water, coffee, cookies and candy. Do they feel bad for standing in front of a church with a “Shame On the Grace Baptist Church”? No.

The current recession and, especially, the related financial panic in the fall of 2008 have given rise to an extraordinary surge in the U.S. government’s size, scope, and power. As I write, the financial panic has subsided, but the recession, already the longest since the 1930s, seems likely to continue for a long time. Even when it has passed, however, the government will certainly retain much of the augmentation it has gained recently. Hence, this crisis will prove to be the occasion for another episode of the ratchet effect in the growth of government.

According to the National Bureau of Economic Research, the recession began early in 2008, but the decline became severe only in the latter part of the year. The financial panic that came to a head in late September 2008 proved to be the catalyst for an accelerated decline in real GDP and rise in the rate of unemployment. The so-called credit crunch in the fall of 2008 prompted the Fed, the Treasury, and the Congress to take a series of extraordinary actions in quick succession.

In September 2008, the Federal Reserve System (“the Fed”) took control of the insurance giant American International Group (AIG), and the Federal Housing Finance Authority took over the huge government-sponsored enterprises Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, secondary lending institutions that held or insured more than half of the total value of U.S. residential mortgages. On October 3, the president signed the Emergency Economic Stabilization Act, which, among other things, created the Troubled Assets Relief Program (TARP), authorizing as much as $700 billion for the purchase of so-called troubled assets, primarily mortgage-related securities, held by banks and other financial institutions. Instead of making the authorized purchases, however, the Treasury used the TARP to inject funds into the banks by purchasing their preferred shares. In this way, the government acquired an ownership interest in nearly 600 commercial banks.

Meanwhile, the Fed made a series of unprecedented types of asset purchases and loans, loan guarantees, and asset swaps, and provided other forms of assistance to securities dealers, money-market mutual funds, Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac, the Federal Home Loan Banks, Citigroup, fourteen foreign central banks, and buyers of certain asset-backed securities based on consumer and small-business loans. As a result, the monetary base of the United States increased by more than 100 percent between August 2008 and January 2009.

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Okay, the President isn’t actually on the beach in Hawaii, but he might as well be. After a three hour diversion to Louisiana, the Obama’s are vacationing in Chicago. We’re forty days into probably the biggest environmental disaster in U.S. history, but a three-day weekend is a three-day weekend; even for the President.

From the Associated Press:

Conservative activist-videographer James O’Keefe said video he shot of conversations with staffers of U.S. Sen. Mary Landrieu was deleted when his cell phone was returned after he and three others pleaded guilty to charges in a caper he orchestrated at the Democrat’s New Orleans office.

A spokeswoman for the U.S. attorney’s office said Saturday that U.S. Magistrate Daniel Knowles III ordered the footage removed. O’Keefe made the claim Friday in a posting on his Twitter social networking site.

O’Keefe, 25, and the others pleaded guilty on Wednesday to misdemeanor charges of entering federal property under false pretenses. They were sentenced by Knowles.

They were sentenced to probation, community service and fines. O’Keefe received the heaviest sentence, three years probation, 100 hours of community service and a $1,500 fine.

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“The adults are in charge now.” That was a much-repeated phrase after the 2008 election all around the Left.  It never seemed right to me; like when you’d overhear a thirteen-year old girl calling a boy “immature.”  But now there is scientific evidence of something I suspected long ago.

It doesn’t make sense that the party who stresses personal responsibility could really be less mature, than the party of entitlement. The entire Democrat platform is structured to give away things that most adults find for themselves.

Republicans thinks people are better of finding their own way in the world, the Democrats want a government who pays for college, gives them an allowance, and helps out with the groceries and rent. Things that we consider privileges, they consider rights. (Is the Left’s push for public transit really about the environment, or is it more like borrowing dad’s car on date night?)

The new health care bill will force health insurance companies to cover adults unable to leave their parents, which certainly doesn’t seem mature. On the bright side, 27 year old “children” still living with mom, will no longer have to make the difficult choice, between paying for Health Care, or unlimited texting.

Our protests are definitely more mature. At Tea Parties, we often pick up the trash that was left behind from the Earth Day rally. Leftist protests are full of screaming, rock throwing, and the ultimate end when the protesters drop on the floor and refuse to move, like a spoiled kid who has decided that he will not go to bed. Of course when the police finally take the protestors into custody they start kicking and screaming in full-on tantrum mode.

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One would think that the President of the United States would have enough respect for the people who put him in office to offer an explanation that was remotely believable.

The White House released an explanation of the Job offer. The claim is that Rahm Emanuel sent Bill Clinton to meet with Congressmen Sestak to offer an unpaid advisory position which he would hold along with his congressional job if he were to give up his quest for the Democratic nomination.

The letter issued by the White House Attorney Robert Bauer (embedded below) says in part:

“We found that, as the Congressman has publicly and accurately stated, options for Executive Branch service were raised with him. Efforts were made in June and July of 2009 to determine whether Congressman Sestak would be interested in service on a Presidential or other Senior Executive Branch Advisory Board, which would avoid a divisive Senate primary, allow him to retain his seat in the House, and provide him with an opportunity for additional service to the public in a high-level advisory capacity for which he was highly qualified. The advisory positions discussed with Congressman Sestak, while important to the work of the Administration, would have been uncompensated.”

“White House staff did not discuss these options with Congressman Sestak. The White House Chief of Staff enlisted the support of former President Clinton who agreed to raise with Congressman Sestak options of service on a Presidential or other Senior Executive Branch Advisory Board. Congressman Sestak Declined the suggested alternatives, remaining committed to his Senate candidacy.”

Come on, do they really mean to tell us that it took the best and brightest in America ten weeks to come up with that?

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The following is a document that James O’Keefe sent to me last night and has authorized me to publish. It is O’Keefe’s version of events in New Orleans. I believe this is the first time anywhere that he has publicly given his full statement of what occurred.

The document was drafted by lawyers based on O’Keefe’s statements, and was intended to be offered as the factual basis for his plea. O’Keefe confirmed for me that this document is an accurate account of what happened.

What Really Happened in New Orleans

Factual Basis

On January 25, 2010, Messrs. James O’Keefe, Stan Dai, Joe Basel, and Michael Flanagan (collectively “Defendants”) entered the Hale Boggs Federal Building located at 500 Poydras Street, New Orleans, Louisiana (“Hale Boggs Building”), with no intent to commit a felony, but rather an intent to engage in political speech with respect to pending national healthcare legislation (the “Healthcare Bill”). During the several days before their entry to the Hale Boggs building, Defendants discussed opportunities to engage in independent journalism and political advocacy. One of the ideas raised during those discussions was a method to test the truthfulness of Senator Landrieu’s statements as to the reason for the inability of Tea Party members and other Louisiana constituents to contact her staff on the telephone to discuss her vote on the Healthcare Bill. The Defendants were advised that this was a recent story in the news in New Orleans. (more…)

One day Team Obama announces a plan for enhanced rescission authority to impound wasteful spending, and the next day the House surfaces a plan for $200 billion in “stimulus” spending on transfer payments for welfare, even more unemployment compensation, still more Medicaid, and a bunch of special-interest subsidies.

So are we to believe that Obama will rescind the excess appropriations? Hardly. And since pay-go is dead, most of this new spending will not be offset. It will add to deficits and debt.

It’s the Greek disease. The welfare state run amok. Right here at home.

And in true class-warfare style, a small portion of the $200 billion is supposed to be offset by jacking up capital-gains taxes for investment partnerships. If passed, this would reduce investment, jobs, and economic growth, and enlarge the deficit. Higher spending and investment taxing is a true austerity trap.

This business of raising the tax rate on investment partnerships would be a particularly onerous burden on American entrepreneurs. And it would put this country at a decided disadvantage to our competitors in China and elsewhere in Asia (outside of Japan).

Increasing the tax rate on the investment portion of these partnerships (i.e., the capital gains) would boost the penalty rate from 15 percent to 38 percent — and that includes the Obamacare payroll tax on investment scheduled for 2013.

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