“DEAR EDITOR: I am 8 years old.

“Some of my little friends say there is no Santa Claus.

“Papa says, ‘If you see it in THE SUN it’s so.’

“Please tell me the truth; is there a Santa Claus?

“VIRGINIA O’HANLON.

“115 WEST NINETY-FIFTH STREET.”

VIRGINIA, your little friends are wrong. They have been affected by the skepticism of a skeptical age. They do not believe except [what] they see. They think that nothing can be which is not comprehensible by their little minds. All minds, Virginia, whether they be men’s or children’s, are little. In this great universe of ours man is a mere insect, an ant, in his intellect, as compared with the boundless world about him, as measured by the intelligence capable of grasping the whole of truth and knowledge.

No Santa Claus! Thank God! he lives, and he lives forever. A thousand years from now, Virginia, nay, ten times ten thousand years from now, he will continue to make glad the heart of childhood.

Yes, VIRGINIA, there is a Santa Claus. He exists as certainly as love and generosity and devotion exist, and you know that they abound and give to your life its highest beauty and joy. Alas! how dreary would be the world if there were no Santa Claus. It would be as dreary as if there were no VIRGINIAS. There would be no childlike faith then, no poetry, no romance to make tolerable this existence. We should have no enjoyment, except in sense and sight. The eternal light with which childhood fills the world would be extinguished.

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Merry Christmas!

According to a Poll Position survey conducted in late October, 45 percent of Americans said “No” when asked whether the U.S. government should stop helping to fund NPR; 39 percent said “Yes.” Only those respondents identifying themselves as Republicans favored, by a 54 percent to 28 percent margin, ending taxpayer support for NPR.

Given that the federal budget is more than $1 trillion in the red and that deficits extend into the future as far as the eye can see, federal subsidies to public broadcasting understandably are on the table.

The just-released report of President Obama’s deficit-reduction commission recommends diverse measures to put Washington’s fiscal house in order, including a $100 billion reduction in defense spending, a substantial increase in the federal excise tax on gasoline, ending of the tax deductibility of home mortgage interest payments and eliminating all funding for the Corporation for Public Broadcasting.

Federal funding of public radio and television seems to be comparatively small potatoes in the larger budget picture.

This year, for example, congressional appropriations for CPB, the primary channel through which tax dollars are funneled to PBS television and NPR, amounted to $422 million.

At a time when economic stimulus programs, financed primarily by borrowing and the Federal Reserve’s recently announced second round of “quantitative easing,” total in the trillions, who could object to spending a mere few hundred million dollars to support the production and distribution of public programming? Well, I do!

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From the Associated Press:

Stymied in Congress, the Obama administration is moving unilaterally to clamp down on power plant and oil refinery greenhouse emissions, announcing plans for developing new standards over the next year.

In a statement posted on the agency’s website late Thursday, Environmental Protection Agency administrator Lisa Jackson said the aim was to better cope with pollution contributing to climate change.

“We are following through on our commitment to proceed in a measured and careful way to reduce GHG pollution that threatens the health and welfare of Americans,” Jackson said in a statement. She said emissions from power plants and oil refineries constitute about 40 percent of the greenhouse gas pollution in this country.

President Barack Obama had said two days after the midterm elections that he was disappointed Congress hadn’t acted on legislation achieving the same end, signaling that other options were under consideration.

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They’re emailing each other?

The New York Daily News reported Thursday that “Mayor Bloomberg’s top deputies went to great lengths to help those trying to build a mosque at Ground Zero – even drafting a letter to the community board for them, newly released documents show. City Hall on Thursday released a flurry of emails between its brass and Feisal Abdul Rauf, the imam pushing to build a mosque near the sensitive site, and his supporters.”

It’s worse than we imagined.

The release of these documents, emails and various exchanges between Mayor Bloomberg’s office and the radical Imam Rauf and his motley crew of Islamic supremacists shows evidence of collusion, inappropriate political support for the Ground Zero mega mosque, and favoritism given to the project.

The newly released documents show that Mayor Bloomberg’s office went to extraordinary lengths for the radicals trying to build a mega mosque at Ground Zero — even writing a letter to the Community Board for them. Is it any wonder that Rauf and his wife Daisy Khan were so confident at the hearings about whether the nineteenth-century building they’re going to tear down to build the mega-mosque should be designated a landmark?

At one of those hearings last May, those in opposition to the Ground Zero mosque were in the vast majority in the audience, and were having none of the nonsense being served up by the Community Board itself. From the very beginning the board was only presenting pro-mosque speakers, from elected officials to board members – although I was allowed to speak early after writing on my card that I wanted to speak about “outreach.” After I spoke, they closed the public remarks down for about an hour. After the lopsided vote in favor of the mosque, printed remarks were distributed from the Manhattan Borough President congratulating the Board for its vote.

How did he know how the Board would vote? Was the fix in from the start? The newly released emails certainly give that impression.

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Buried within the news that Jim Bopp is endorsing Reince Priebus for RNC chair, one discovers how an antiquated rule meant to demonstrate the importance of women within the GOP has helped to change the GOP’s image from the leader in women’s rights it traditionally was, into a party perceived to be of old white men.

As there isn’t even a declared male candidate for co-chair, two women currently running for Chair, Ann Wagner and Maria Cino, are at a distinct disadvantage. Talk about your unintended consequences. There is definitely something wrong with this picture, especially as contrasted with the rules original intent. See below for that.

MORE FROM THE RNC – PAYBACK: Indiana RNC Committeeman Jim Bopp has endorsed Wisconsin’s Reince Priebus in the chairman’s race, throwing his support to Michael Steele’s leading challenger days after the incumbent chairman called Bopp an “idiot” during a radio interview. Priebus, Bopp said, “understands that we need more active RNC member participation and that members need to be empowered to hold the leadership accountable. … It was a close decision, particularly between Saul and Reince, since I think Ann has an insurmountable difficulty reaching a majority of the votes, because of our unfair gender requirement for Co-Chairman.”

The tradition, now formalized by Rule 5, was actually intended to highlight the importance of women in politics as far back as 1937.

In the Rules of the Republican Party, Rule No. 5, which concerns the “Officers of the Republican National Committee,” states:

(a) The officers of the Republican National Committee shall consist of:

(1) A chairman and a co-chairman of the opposite sex who shall be elected by the members of the Republican National Committee. [Emphasis added.]

If the RNC elects a male chair, then, it must elect a female co-chair — and vice versa. Currently, the RNC has a male chair, Michael Steele, and a female co-chair, Jan Larimer, the committeewoman from Wyoming. Both are running for reelection. So far, Larimer and Sharon Day, the committeewoman from Florida, are the only declared candidates for co-chair.

From a brief history of the Republican Party. Women should not be forced to take a back seat to men in the race for Chair of the RNC because of a once well-meaning rule that is now so obviously antiquated.

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Today is Christmas Eve. Enjoy. Merry Christmas!

Yesterday, Pigford report co-author Peter Schweizer spoke to a specific USDA inside job wherein a federal employee was getting paid by Pigford lawyers to illegally sign up fraudulent claimants. Today, former Secretary of the Department of Agriculture Mike Espy, who now represents thousands of Pigford II claimants, says there is “no doubt” that he has heard those reports, and furthermore says there are FBI investigations that have looked into these troubling allegations. This comports with the Big Government witness report from a retired FBI agent who is willing to testify that he has evidence of widespread fraud involving Pigford claimants in Arkansas and a USDA employee, who still is on the job.

This is not tying Mike Espy into any fraud. This is just showing that what Big Government has been reporting is common knowledge amongst many Pigford insiders.

This video preview concludes the pre-Christmas roll-out of the Big Government Pigford report and ongoing documentary production. There are many more blockbuster interviews to come. More Pigileaks, as well. Even though the media continues conspicuously to ignore our revelations, we know that behind the scenes, Pigford principals are scrambling for cover and investigative bodies have been jump-started into action.

Much, much more to come in the New Year. (more…)

The following comes from a former FBI agent who was involved in the investigation of fraudulent Pigford claims in Arkansas:

We were brought in because there were numerous reports that fraudulent claims were being filed under Pigford.  Our investigation focused in part on the actions of a federal government employee who was reportedly helping to “broker” Pigford claims. This individual allegedly recruited people to file claims and then actually filled out the paperwork for them.  In exchange this individual apparently received a cut of the settlement.

In my mind there was ample evidence to proceed with legal action once our investigation was completed.  But the decision was made by the U.S. Attorney’s Office not to pursue them. Why?  I really don’t know.

By my estimation, perhaps 50% of all Pigford claimants in this instance were fraudulent.

From the Associated Press:

One of the first places to test the new pro-business push will be Wisconsin, where Republican Gov.-elect Scott Walker has promised to call the new GOP-led Legislature into an emergency session on his first day in office Jan. 3.

Walker wants to lower taxes on businesses with fewer than 50 employees, impose new business-friendly limits on liability lawsuits and transform the state Commerce Department into a public-private partnership to lure companies to the state.

“I think it’s basically put-up-or-shut-up time,” Walker said after his November election. “We have a mandate from the voters of the state, and it’s one we don’t take lightly.”

(more…)

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On today’s edition of Coffee and Markets, Brad Jackson and Ben Domenech are joined by Francis Cianfrocca to discuss the biggest stories from 2010 and some predictions for 2011.

We’re brought to you as always by BigGovernment and Stephen Clouse and Associates. If you’d like to email us, you can do so at coffee[at]newledger.com. We hope you enjoy the show.

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A bipartisan group of six Congressional lawmakers asked Wednesday the Government Accountability Office to reexamine its report on the for-profit education industry. The agency sent undercover applicants to some of these schools. The undercover investigators claim to have been misled on costs, job placement and future earnings.

In a letter to GAO comptroller Gene Dodaro, California Rep. Darrell Issa lectured the congressional watchdog on its charge to provide objective, factual and nonideological reports. In this instance, the incoming chairman of the House oversight committee said, “GAO has not met its own high standards.”

After releasing in August a sensational report on the alleged abuses within the career college community, GAO acknowledged earlier this month it had heavily revised portions of its findings, changing wrongfully attributed comments and lessening its charges of deception.

Issa wants to know if the GAO has investigated the failings in its initial report and if its office of general counsel had concluded the revised report accurately reflects the analysis contained therein.

A comparison of the modified and original versions revealed at least 13 key passages of the report had been altered.

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From Politico:

Former White House chief of staff Rahm Emanuel won a crucial ruling from Chicago election authorities Wednesday night, when the official charged with hearing challenges to Emanuel’s residency determined the mayoral candidate should be allowed to appear on the ballot.

Joseph Morris urged the Chicago Board of Election Commissioners to approve Emanuel’s candidacy, writing that his opponents “failed to bear their burdens of proof” as they challenged his right to appear as a candidate for local office.

“The preponderance of this evidence establishes that the Candidate never formed an intention to terminate his residence in Chicago; never formed an intention to establish his residence in Washington, D.C., or any place other than Chicago; and never formed an intention to change his residence,” Morris wrote.

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With public sentiment turning against organized labor, unions have enlisted obscure federal bureaucrats to help bolster their ranks. The Department of Labor has been busy rolling back transparency initiatives put in place during the last decade; the National Labor Relations Board is considering rules which would guarantee union organizers access to private property; the National Mediation Board (NMB) is easing union election rules for unions.

Of the three agencies charged with administering different facets of labor-employer relations, none has been more blatantly pro-union than the NMB over the past two years. Founded in 1934, the National Mediation Board is charged with overseeing labor-management disputes in the railroad and airline industries. The three member board—currently comprised of two former union officials and a Bush holdover—showed its true colors soon after its members were assembled. In its first major decision, the NMB ruled that transportation unions only needed to receive a majority of votes cast as oppose to a majority of all workers votes for the union to be certified.

From the union’s perspective, transportation workers are ideal union members. Workers are required to pay union dues if they want to keep their job—right to work laws are not applicable to this industry. Compounding workers’ problems, once a transportation union is elected it is virtually impossible to get rid of union representation. It is so difficult under the NMB’s rules that it has never been done in a group with more than 1000 employees. Coupled together, these policies make transportation workers a golden goose for unions—workers have to pony up hard earned cash, indefinitely.

This NMB’s move to facilitate union organizing was thought to have huge implications in looming union elections. One such showdown is between Delta’s flight attendants and the Association of Flight Attendants (AFA).

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Today, in 1970, the North Tower of the World Trade Center was completed. At the time, it was the tallest building in the world. In a little more than thirty years, it would be gone.

From the Associated Press:

The Alaska Supreme Court on Wednesday upheld a lower court decision in the disputed U.S. Senate race, saying the state correctly counted write-in votes for Sen. Lisa Murkowski.

It is now up to Republican Joe Miller to decide if the election is finally over.

The court said in its ruling that it found “no remaining issues raised by Miller that prevent this election from being certified.”

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