The globalists at the United Nations are busy preparing their agenda for the Rio + 20 Conference in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, which will be held on June 4 – 6, 2012.  They have prepared a draft entitled “Enabling a Flourishing Earth: Challenges for the Green Economy, Opportunities for Global Governance”.  It is truly amazing that this is not being devised in Dr. Evil’s hidden lair in the depths of some inactive volcano or on a deserted island.  This has been made available for everyone to read.  It reveals the true intent; the hopes, dreams and aspirations for this new world order that they have been working on for twenty plus years.  The entire document can be viewed here.

In the document they make reference to the Earth Charter, which is purported to be “an ethical framework for a more just, sustainable and peaceful world”.

They understand that their “green” initiative has not progressed as quickly as they had hoped it would.  Cap and trade schemes that involve redistribution of wealth from developed countries to developing countries based on a market price on carbon dioxide emissions have not generated sufficient revenue.  A new or additional economic or market solution should be implemented, because humankind has transgressed against nature.  Humans have been treating nature as a commodity.  The “loss of biodiversity,  desertification, climate change and the disruption of a number of natural cycles are among the costs of our disregard for nature and the integrity of its ecosystems and life-supporting processes.  As recent scientific work suggests, a number of planetary boundaries are being transgressed and others risk being so in a business-as-usual world”,  according to the U.N. Secretary General’s report to the U.N. on Harmony with Nature.

Their proposal is to create a new world organization, naming it  the World Environmental Organisation (WEO) which will have a global legitimacy and mandate to have jurisdiction over what are considered the “common goods”, defined as “fresh water, healthy soil and clean air, but also the oceans, the atmosphere and diversity of life” since it would be difficult to implement or trade on these “common goods” that are not privately owned or traded on markets.

This document states “Our proposed WEO should be mandated with a trusteeship function over global public goals and common goods”.  Much like a legal guardian is appointed in the case of a person who is unable to represent him/ herself, such as an infant, insane or senile person, they are proposing such a legal guardian to represent and give “legal voice for the otherwise voiceless environment”.

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From BusinessInsider:

From its inception, Solyndra’s business model was flawed. It’s unique cylindrical, silicon solar cells were innovative, but only made sense when solar panel prices were high. By the time the Energy Department approved Solyndra’s loan — the first granted by the department’s loan guarantee program —Chinese and Canadian manufacturers with low-cost structures had priced Solyndra out of the market.

In March 2009, Solyndra’s loan application, to build an advanced manufacturing facility in California, was fast-tracked through the DOE, despite the fact that the department had not completed its review of the company’s financial viability.

Solyndra was not the only company that was fast-tracked. A 2010 government audit of the DOE program found that the department lacked the ability to adequately evaluate applications to the federal loan program, and often approved loans before completing a full review.

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New York City mayor Mike Bloomberg, in a radio interview on Friday, warned that high unemployment could lead to widespread rioting. That’s right. He actually said that. At a time when European cities have suffered massively from hooliganism, and at a time when U.S. towns like Philadelphia and Kansas City have suffered huge human and commercial tolls from so-called flash riots.

For Bloomberg to come out with this statement is irresponsible and incendiary. But you know what? He’s got a personal agenda. This is a desperate talking point to sell Obama’s jobs plan, which Bloomberg favors as a solution to high unemployment and zero growth.

There’s a whole history here of liberals threatening riots if they don’t get their way. WABC radio host Mark Simone reminded me that back in 1994, Matilda Cuomo warned there would be race riots in New York if her husband Mario weren’t reelected governor in his race against George Pataki.

So now the liberal Mike Bloomberg is trying to go to bat for his pal Obama. And he’s doing so in a very clumsy and inappropriate way.

In fact, Bloomberg is pitching for the whole Obama jobs package — the $450 billion stimulus plan and the $470 billion tax hike. The package is totally unpopular. A recent Bloomberg poll (how ironic) showed that voters disapprove of more Obama stimulus by 51 to 40 percent, and that 56 percent of independents oppose it. Other polls show that more than 60 percent of Americans disapprove of Obama’s handling of the economy.

Memories are long. The $800 billion stimulus package nearly three years ago didn’t work. So why do it again?

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During Bibi Netanyahu’s 2010 visit to the White House, in the middle of a tense settlement concession conversation an irritated Obama left Mr. Netanyahu sitting in a room to rush upstairs for din-din with Shelley and the girls. Abruptly walking out of the room, the President said “Let me know if there is anything new.”  Either the Israeli Prime Minister was being officially dissed, or Michelle refuses to tolerate any excuse for Barack showing up late for dinner.

However, in the future, should the Prime Minister desire another sit-down with the President of the United States, he’ll have the option of purchasing a roll of tickets for the “Sometime soon, can we meet for dinner/Reelect Barack Obama” raffle.

Before the “Sometime Soon, Can We Meet For Dinner?” initiative, Netanyahu didn’t stand a chance in hell of getting Barack to sit through an entire conversation.  Now, at least Bibi has as much opportunity as anyone else willing to contribute five bucks.

Now, if by chance Bibi’s ticket is pulled out of the spinning drum, Obama, albeit under duress, will be obliged to endure eating blintzes and can no longer escape a Jerusalem settlement discussion using dinner getting cold as an excuse.

The President of the United States selling dinner raffle tickets may indicate that the man is forlorn and in need of genuine companionship. Begging to be shown love by the people who just three years ago were showering him with confetti and weeping at the mere mention of his name, frankly, is both “creepy” and pathetic.

Barack Obama’s dine-with-me/love-me idea started when the 2012 reelection campaign sent out an email with this subject line: “Sometime soon, can we meet for dinner?” Why would an American president ask such an unusual question? Obviously, to goad supporters into donating money in hopes of winning face time with Mr. Lonely.

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Wisconsin State Representative Steve Nass says that if Madison law enforcement authorities don’t begin to crack down on the repeated and escalating harassment of lawmakers and staff “somebody is seriously going to get hurt…or killed.”

Will Madison authorities allow politically motivated harassment escalate until someone is hurt or worse?

State Representative Steve Nass (R-Whitewater) believes that Madison law enforcement leaders are partially to blame for the escalation of disorderly and dangerous conduct by protesters in the Capitol city. Nass believes that Madison Police Chief Noble Wray, DaneCounty Sheriff Dave Mahoney, Capitol Police Chief Charles Tubbs and Dane County District Attorney Ismael Ozanne have been more interested in cooperating with protesters than enforcing the law.

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When Ronald Reagan proclaimed in his first inaugural “We are a nation that has a government—not the other way around,” he was not taking off on some libertarian tangent or making an obscure philosophical point. He was following in the footsteps of the Founding Fathers who erected a frame of government that began with the words “We the People.” He was also trying to return government to its important but limited role in people’s lives—a role that both political leaders and the people understood until 1912 but has been mostly misunderstood and abandoned since then. At Philadelphia in 1787, the Framers of the Constitution created a national government that would be effective—even energetic—in its functions but also limited to those functions. The people were to be the ultimate guardians of both the effectiveness and limitations of government. The only way such a republic—unprecedented in modern history—could work would be if the people acted as a vigilant and constitutionally-minded sovereign jealous of their rights.

The authority of the people is made clear in at least three respects in the Constitution, and their vitality is powerfully suggested in a fourth. First, the Constitution holds both the lawmakers and the executive accountable to the people through elections, whether direct or indirect. The foremost depository of the people’s will is obviously the House of Representatives, whose members are directly elected every two years. According to James Madison writing in The Federalist, every constitution is designed to find rulers with the wisdom and virtue to pursue the common good and to make sure those rulers remain virtuous while holding the public trust. Elections are the means to both of those ends. In other words, if those in office lose their virtue, they can be thrown out of office by the people through regular elections. The people are the true source of term limits.

Second, the Constitution embraces, indeed creates, the system known as federalism. Not only can the people exert their authority through elections at the federal (national) level, they can also throw their support behind the state governments against federal encroachment. The chief means of doing so in the original Constitution was through the Senate, whose members were elected by state legislatures. Indeed, the Framers of the Constitution originally thought that the people’s loyalties would lie overwhelmingly with the states, not the remote national government. Their opinion owed to the history of the Revolution—in which the states were extremely jealous of their powers; the confidence that men of great talents and ambitions at the national level would devote their energies to the high pursuits of “commerce, finance, negotiation, and war,” to quote Hamilton in The Federalist, not with local concerns; and the general tendency of human nature to prefer the things closest to us. (Not many people living in Dallas root for the Steelers.) To this end, should the national government extend its powers beyond those enumerated in Article I, section 8, the Senators—whose loyalties lie, and whose careers are made, not in the national capital but in the state capitals—would defend the prerogative of the states and thereby the liberties of the people.

Third, for the Constitution to be adopted, it was imperative that the first Congress adopt a Bill of Rights to be appended to it. The Bill of Rights, authored mostly by Madison, was meant to serve as an education to the people in what their rights are and an encouragement to them to guard those rights jealously. It is also abundantly clear what would be the greatest threat to their rights. The Bill of Rights begins with the words “Congress shall make no law respecting” and ends with the words “or to the people.” That is, the greatest threat to liberty would come from government—though republican—exceeding its constituted authority and encroaching on the rights of the people.

Finally, there is the latent suggestion in the Constitution that the people will be doing the vast majority of the work in civil society, and the government will be needed chiefly to establish the rule of law, to protect the society from internal and external enemies, and to set up a system of uniform commercial exchange.

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Today, in 1787, the U.S. Constitution was signed in Philadelphia. Can we please celebrate by agreeing to eradicate anti-intellectualism from the conservative movement? (Vaccines!) There are few greater intellectual endeavors than the drafting of the Constitution. It seems we have fallen very far from the branch.

As President Obama makes his way around the country to gin up support for his latest stimulus efforts, his underlings can’t seem to stay on the same page.

The two national teachers’ unions – the National Education Association and American Federation of Teachers – recently hosted a closed-media conference call with Vice President Biden to rally support for Obama’s “American Jobs Act.”

source: nea.org

According to a recording first revealed at PublicSchoolSpending.com, Biden told the audience:

“Nobody is saying this [plan] isn’t positive for the economy.  We’re ready to compromise with the Republicans.  But only compromise on things if they have a better way. …”

But less than 24 hours later, Campaign Manager David Axelrod appeared on Good Morning America and told host George Stephanopolous that “the package works together.”

“So it’s all or nothing,” Stephanopolous stated, attempting to pin Axelrod down.  Not answering the question (shock!), Axelrod responded, “We want them to act now on this package.  We’re not in a negotiation to break up the package – it’s not an ala carte menu.”

In other words, no, they’re not willing to compromise.  Take it or leave it, America.

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When the news of Fast and Furious first broke months ago, President Obama and Attorney General Holder remained almost completely mute on the subject. When they finally addressed it, it was to say they hadn’t heard of Fast and Furious until May 2011 (eighteen months after it started).  Slowly, however, as this ceased to satisfy questioners, they incorporated the simple assertion that neither of them had authorized walking guns into Mexico nor had they possessed detailed knowledge of the stateside inner-workings of the operation.

It’s ironic that their answer went from being one thing to being another thing to being yet another thing. And I point this because the weapons tied to Fast and Furious have gone from being assault rifles to sniper rifles to grenade components to (allegedly) a rocket launcher?

Yes – a rocket launcher.

And I add the word “allegedly” not because there’s any doubt over whether a rocket launcher has been found near the Mexico/Texas border, but because its origin in the Fast and Furious operation has yet to be established beyond a doubt. The jury’s still out because the launcher could be associated with another gun-smuggling operation the administration seems to be involved with in El Paso, TX and Columbus, NM.

For example, On July 27^th I had a post on Big Government which highlighted reports in the El Paso Times detailing “an alleged gun smuggling operation in which Obama administration officials were selling military grade weapons to drug cartel members in Mexico.” Supported by at least one former DEA official and one “CIA contract pilot,” the allegations were that weapons had been regularly transported from the Dallas/Fort Worth area to El Paso, TX, and/or Columbus, NM. From either of those locations they then crossed into Mexico.

Now it appears some of those “military grade weapons” didn’t make it all the way to Mexico, because along with the rocket launcher, U.S. Border Patrol Agents found “a grenade launcher, and three packages of what appeared to be C-4 explosives” by the Rio Grande on September 13^th.

What is going on here folks?

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It should come as no surprise that the radical left is rallying behind former Ohio Attorney general Richard Cordray to head to powerful Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) – a newly created government agency designed to regulate the American economy with little oversight from Congress.

MoveOn.org and other liberal groups are demanding Republicans play dead and allow Cordray to be confirmed by the Senate for a five year term where he can singlehandedly dictate regulations government nearly any financial transaction in America.

Quietly another interest group is rallying to Cordray’s corner – the securities lawyers.  Daniel Fisher, writing at Forbes.com noticed that despite the constant bashing of the financial industry by Cordray, he is wildly popular with securities class action lawyers and law firms:

Lawyers at Labaton Sucharow contributed $125,000 to various Cordray campaigns between 2008 and 2010, according to Ohio campaign-finance records. Delaware-based Labaton represented Ohio in the AIG case, which it settled last year for $1 billion including something like $90 million in fees (the final fee payout, surprisingly, isn’t on the AG’s website).

Lawyers at crosstown Delaware rivals Grant & Eisenhofer ponied up $25,000 for the Cordray campaign; they represented the state in a lawsuit against Marsh & McClennan that netted the state’s outside lawyers 13% on a $400 million settlement. Other out-of-state law firms that took a keen interest in Cordray’s campaign included Atlanta’s Chitwood Harley, which gave $146,000; Berman deValerio of San Francisco and New York’s Bernstein Litowitz, known for its generosity in seemingly obscure state political races, which gave $50,000.

That’s because Cordray has a scandalous record of “taking money from lawyers who profit from private litigation that often follows closely on the heels of government investigations…” So, the reality is that President Obama’s liberal white-hatted regulator appears to be neck deep in a pay to play scandal with trial lawyers.

Republicans appear ready to hold the line on the nomination with 44 Senators signing a letter refusing to support any nominee until the CFPB is reformed and proper checks and balances are put into place.  But there is a bigger story and a bigger scandal brewing.

Ed Koch was one of the first prominent New York Democrats to break ranks and endorse Republican Bob Turner in this week’s election to fill the vacancy left by the resignation of disgraced Congressman Anthony Weiner. Koch’s early endorsement of Turner set in motion of a chain of events, culminating in the election of a Republican to represent parts of Queens and Brooklyn. Turner is the first Republican to represent this area since the 1920s. Today, I spoke with the former mayor about the campaign.

BG: Given that Israel is a “national” issue, why did you get involved in the race in New York’s 9th district, in particular?

Koch: There were only two special congressional elections in the whole country–here and in Nevada. The election in the 9th congressional district was the only election in the City of New York. And I thought, and I expressed myself publicly, that it would be a good place, being the largest Jewish district in America–something like 300,000 Jews lived in that district, and the Jewish vote would be somewhere around 30% or more–it would be a good place to have a referendum on whether the President’s position on Israel, which I have described as hostile to Israel, was one representative of the voters of that district.

And I got a call from Bob Turner, who wanted to see me. I had never met him before. We talked, and I said, “I want to send a message to the President on Israel,” and he agreed, and I also said, “I want to send a message to the Republicans in Washington that you disagree with their effort to privatize Social Security and Medicare.” He said, “I do disagree.” I said, “Let’s put it in writing.” And we did, and I endorsed him, and I framed the issues carefully so people could understand them.

Bob Turner was a marvelous candidate. Without a good candidate, you can’t prevail, even if you’re on the right side. He’s honest, intelligence, courageous, and he’s got a good sense of humor.

So we went out there. I campaigned for him, and the Democratic Party took the district for granted up until the last, probably, ten days, and then they realized from the polls that Turner had turned it all around. He was now six points ahead, a week before the election. So they brought in Bill Clinton, Charles Schumer, and Governor Andrew Cuomo to do robo-calls. And we did robo-calls–myself, and Assemblyman Dov Hikind–and clearly, we prevailed, since Bob won with an eight percent message.

Was that a challenge, to frame that dual message? (more…)

First, a simple question: At retirement would you rather have a million dollars or social security benefits?

The answer to that one should be pretty simple. What boggles the mind, though, is that the former is not altogether impossible; in fact it may be more likely for those in Generation X or younger to save a million dollars than for social security to still be solvent when they retire.

Social Security has been a tremendous source of debate recently – an issue that becomes one of contention from time to time – particularly with the Republican candidates for the 2012 presidential election. Rick Perry has taken plenty of heat for referring to social security as a Ponzi scheme.

Since Social Security was created in the 1930s it has been a controversial issue; becoming only more contentious as the federal government borrowed against the trust to finance other government programs. The idea that it is a Ponzi scheme is certainly nothing new – Charles Ponzi having perpetrated his fraud that coined the term before the Social Security Act was ever passed.

The argument over whether Social Security is a fraud, heated though it is, is quite frankly overdone and irrelevant – not that it is near its end. No offence to Tea Partiers, but the odds of successfully seeking charges against the United States federal government for fraud seems somewhat low.

What can’t be argued about the United States Social Security System is whether it is a good investment plan for Americans. It is absolutely apparent to anyone who does the math that, fraud or not, Social Security is a loser from an investment perspective.

Supporters of social security, due to their lack of investment knowledge and ignorance of time value of money, often argue that Social Security is a profitable system for its participants. They point out that under the current system, Americans are repaid all their contributions in just 5 or 6 years, and that everything paid out after that is a gain to the contributor. This completely ignores the time value of money; and how it grows over time. So let’s do the math:

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From The Hill:

Senior administration officials met with Senate Democrats for an hour and a half on Thursday to answer their complaints about President Obama’s jobs bill.

Democratic lawmakers voiced objections to several of the president’s proposals to pay for the $447 billion stimulus package, including an elimination of tax breaks for the oil-and-gas industry.

David Plouffe, a senior adviser to the president, acknowledged after a marathon meeting in the Senate’s Mansfield Room that not all Democrats are sold on the plan.

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It looks like it is finally going to happen. The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) has finally gotten their net neutrality regulations through the bureaucratic mess, and now it [IS] only a matter of times before they start to take effect.

The National Journal reports:

Open Internet regulations, or network-neutrality rules, have cleared the final regulatory hurdle before getting on the books, a Federal Communications Commission spokesman said on Monday.

The rules, which limit how cable and phone companies can treat legal Internet traffic, are strongly opposed by Republicans in Congress, who have unsuccessfully attempted to repeal them on several occasions.

The FCC passed the regulations in December over Republican objections, creating the defining saga of commission Chairman Julius Genachowski’s tenure so far and fulfilling an Obama campaign promise.

The Office of Management and Budget, which had a procedural role in OK’ing the regulations thanks to the Paperwork Reduction Act, had to review new data-collection responsibilities that the rules apply to Internet service firms. “OMB signed off late Friday,” an FCC spokesman said in an e-mail.

An oft-repeated talking point and applause line has crept into President Obama’s repertoire of class-envy and demonizing rhetoric these days.

“At a time when countries like China are building high-speed rail lines and gleaming new airports, we’ve got over a million unemployed construction workers — many of them Latino — who could be doing the same thing right here in the United States. That’s not right. It’s time for us to fix it.”

Setting aside the ethnic pandering inserted especially for the Hispanic Caucus audience, the blatant coveting of China’s shiny new toys is  shameful.

There is something unseemly about the President of the United States publicly drooling in envy over the Potemkin Village that has been propped up in Communist China.  Yes, they have fast trains and cool airports, but they were put together with little regard for safety and by the equivalent of slave labor.  The central government of China has made a choice.  They have chosen to erect these symbols of modern technological wonder for the sole purpose of impressing foreign rubes like Barack Obama at the expense of the hundreds of millions of people who still live in squalor.

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“We have to cut $1.5 trillion out of this year’s budget,” says investment advisor, author, and radio host Peter Schiff.

Reason’s Nick Gillespie sat down with Schiff at July’s FreedomFest in Las Vegas.

Schiff, whose most recent book is How and Economy Grows and Why it Crashes, says that the economic downturn of 2008 is only a mild preview of what’s in store for the U.S. economy in the future and predicts much higher unemployment and huge inflation over the next few years. The only way out of this mess, says Schiff, is for the government to get out of the way and let the inevitable market correction occur. “It would be painful to cut spending by that degree,” he acknowledges, “but not nearly as painful as it’s going to be if we don’t cut spending by that degree.”

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Last week, Air Force General William Shelton, Commander of Air Force Space Command, told Congressional leaders in a closed-door session that the White House tried to pressure him to change his testimony to favor a company that turns out to be a major donor to the Democratic Party.

LightSquared, a Virginia-based broadband satellite company, has been vying for permission to operate in a frequency band in the vicinity of our nation’s GPS system. In Gen Shelton’s presentation to Congress, he went prepared to warn of the dangers the LightSqaured project would pose to our GPS integrity. He said the White House attempted to pressure him into altering the substance of his testimony to indicate:

1. That the military would continue to test the proposed bandwidth for ways LightSquared could still use the spectrum space without interfering with GPS.
2. That he hoped the necessary testing for LightSquared would be completed within 90 days.

The general refused to make these changes.

Full disclosure. I know General Shelton and worked with him between 2005-07 when I was a member of the space community. I have not had any contact with him about this story, but I can comment on the type of officer he is. Willie Shelton is a stand-up guy who epitomizes the Air Force Core Values of Integrity (as evidenced by his willingness to do the right thing), Service Before Self (putting his career on the line by bucking the political hacks), and Excellence (he knows the GPS system must be protected to ensure our nation’s security, and that outweighs any profit a private company may make).

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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 markets rise this week, the possible moves of the Fed next week, and the latest developments in the broadening Solyndra scandal.

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.

Related Links:

Solyndra’s woes worried White House, emails show
Treasury Inspector General Opens Probe Into Obama’s Solargate
Loan Was Solyndra’s Undoing
Did State Tax Dollars Go Into Failed Solar Company Tied To Tulsa Billionaire?
Testify: In 2009, Solyndra CEO Said Obama and Steven Chu Were Personally “Instrumental” In Securing Half-Billion In Loans for SCOAMF Boondoggle

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A Politico item suggesting Obama’s Chief of Staff, Bill Daley, may not be up to the job is getting a good deal of buzz. Earlier yesterday, it was an item by James Carville suggesting some administration heads need to start to roll. Is Daley being set-up to be the first one to fall? Stay tuned.

Bill Daley is off to a very rocky start.

Several important questions remain unanswered as regards the failure of the White House’s pet solar company, Solyndra. The White House email trail on the company continues to be in the news. Let the sunshine in, as they say. It is solar energy we’re  talking about, after all.

Curious: 5 weeks before it declared bankruptcy, Solyndra sold its Accounts Receivable and Inventory to an entity called Solyndra Solar II. This company had been registered in Delaware just the day before. Because of the sale, these assets are not available to pay off creditors. The agent for the sale was Argonaut Solar. (Argonaut is a name used in many ventures of billionaire and Obama-donor George Kaiser.)

Meanwhile, a NJ State Senator is asking Gov. Christie to do away with a $420k tax credit for the production ofJersey Shore. Hopefully Chriwtie  can hook up with Snookie and work it all out. Hopefully any highlights will make their way to YouTube.

Nobel Prize-Winning Physicist Dr. Ivar Giaever has resigned from the lofty American Physical Society over the Global Warming debate:

“In the APS it is ok to discuss whether the mass of the proton changes over time and how a multi-universe behaves, but the evidence of global warming is incontrovertible?” he wrote in an email to Kate Kirby, executive officer of the physics society.

“The claim … is that the temperature has changed from ~288.0 to ~288.8 degree Kelvin in about 150 years, which (if true) means to me is that the temperature has been amazingly stable, and both human health and happiness have definitely improved in this ‘warming’ period,” his email message said.

So much for the science being settled.

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