Breitbart News editor Peter Schweizer writing in Newsweek:

When President-elect Obama came to Washington in late 2008, he was outspoken about the need for an economic stimulus to revive a struggling economy. He wanted billions of dollars spent on “shovel-ready projects” to build roads; billions more for developing alternative-energy projects; and additional billions for expanding broadband Internet access and creating a “smart grid” for energy consumption. After he was sworn in as president, he proclaimed that taxpayer money would assuredly not be doled out to political friends. “Decisions about how Recovery Act dollars are spent will be based on the merits,” he said, referring to the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009. “Let me repeat that: decisions about how recovery money will be spent will be based on the merits. They will not be made as a way of doing favors for lobbyists.”

According to the Los Angeles Times, with the exception of existing in locked freezers in Russia and U.S. labs, the smallpox virus was eradicated in 1978. Yet, in a no-bid contract, the Obama administration has given $443 million of American taxpayers’ money for a “experimental smallpox drug” to a bio-defense company, Siga, controlled by billionaire Democrat-donor Ron Perleman and whose board ex-SEIU boss Andy Stern sits on.

According to the Times:

When Siga complained that contracting specialists at the Department of Health and Human Services were resisting the company’s financial demands, senior officials replaced the government’s lead negotiator for the deal, interviews and documents show.

When Siga was in danger of losing its grip on the contract a year ago, the officials blocked other firms from competing.

Siga was awarded the final contract in May through a “sole-source” procurement in which it was the only company asked to submit a proposal. The contract calls for Siga to deliver 1.7 million doses of the drug for the nation’s biodefense stockpile. The price of approximately $255 per dose is well above what the government’s specialists had earlier said was reasonable, according to internal documents and interviews. [Emphasis added.]

Although Siga’s questionable government deal may eventually mean $2.8 billion in revenues for the company, Siga’s profits would have to be split with its former partner in a failed merger, PharmAthene. In September, after years of litigation following a failed merger, a Delaware court ruled that PharmAthene was entitled to 50% of Siga’s profits from its ST-246 smallpox vaccines. (more…)

The weirdos, losers and mutations who make up the Occupy movement showed the world their glass jaw when their Denver branch descended upon the FreedomWorks BlogCon 2011 new media convention on Friday.  There’s a lot for conservatives to learn from this close encounter of the dumbass kind.

Sure, we learned that their personal hygiene leaves much to be desired – like, well, personal hygiene.  We learned that their concept of private property is shaky at best; radio host Tony Katz hilariously schooled one shaggy gentleman on the air at length about who owned a particular chair the Occupier attempted to occupy.  And we learned that they wear Guy Fawkes masks not because of any particular affinity for the noted radical Catholic terrorist but because some guy wore it in the movie V For Vendetta and it was apparently a really bitchin’ movie.

These are not deep thinkers.

But the most important lesson is that the Occupiers are a joke; they are nothing but coddled, Potemkin protesters who collapse at the first sign of resistance.

These clowns have been treated with kid gloves by gutless (or even sympathetic) politicians from Zuccotti Park to the Port of Oakland.  They’ve been allowed to live in filth, dominate public spaces and generally descend into a festering petri dish of social, criminal and epidemiological pathologies by cowardly mayors and other enablers unwilling to do the most basic job of any government leader and keep order.

The mainstream media adores them, viewing them as advancing their shared left-wing agenda while also recalling the activist Sixties of legend.  And, of course, the media helpfully covers up the ever-growing roster of outrages perpetrated by these nimrods.  No accountability there.  Even the cops are required to treat these geniuses with professional respect.

It’s been all up-twinkles for them – until now.

(more…)

With a much-anticipated “60 Minutes” report on congressional insider trading set to air this Sunday night, Rep. Nancy Pelosi’s office has launched a preemptive strike against Stanford University Hoover Fellow and Breitbart News editor Peter Schweizer, the author of the new book, Throw Them All Out, upon which the “60 Minutes” report is said to be based.

During a press conference last week, CBS reporter Steve Kroft sent the Beltway buzzing when he asked Rep. Nancy Pelosi how she and her husband landed a highly lucrative initial public offering (IPO) for Visa credit card stock.  Pelosi, who appeared visibly shaken by the questions, attempted to dismiss Kroft’s queries and said her record on credit card reform was second to none.

But now, with the “60 Minutes” story scheduled to air Sunday night, Pelosi’s office has gone on the attack against Schweizer, a New York Times bestselling author, dismissing him as just a “conservative writer.”

Capitol Hill sources close to the story say Pelosi has good reason to fear Schweizer’s investigative reporting. Throw Them All Out, which hits bookshelves nationwide on Tuesday, reportedly contains a powder keg of original investigative information that suggests Pelosi leveraged her insider status to acquire her highly profitable Visa IPO and then used her congressional authority to shield Visa from disadvantageous legislation.

Developing…

Gov. Rick Perry stated at the outset of his presidential campaign that he is running for president based on his principles and leadership accomplishments, not his oratorical skills. Media focus on his debate missteps deliberately ignores Perry’s record and charisma.

Six months ago discussing Perry’s possible candidacy, a top conservative leader privately said, “Rick is a great leader. But he’s not a greater debater. And he knows it. The question would be whether he overcomes it.”

Technology regularly creates new challenges for presidents. Debating skill was a non-issue for many consequential presidents, but some are trying to make it an automatic disqualifier for the Texas governor.

America’s third president—Thomas Jefferson—was a lousy public speaker. He was literally a genius, and his singular eloquence as a writer is seen in his prose in the Declaration of Independence and other writings.

But Jefferson was no speaker, so much so that he only gave a couple speeches in his entire two-term presidency. He was so bad that he fulfilled his constitutional requirement to give an annual State of the Union by sending a written document to Congress.

The media would pan Jefferson’s radio and television performance today. Does America regret electing such a lackluster orator?

(more…)

I’m not a fan of international bureaucracies.

I’ve criticized the United Nations for wanting global taxes. I’ve condemned the International Monetary Fund for promoting bigger government. I’ve even excoriated the largely unknown Basel Committee on Banking Supervision for misguided regulations that contributed to the financial crisis.

But the worse international bureaucracy, at least when measured on a per-dollar-spent basis, has to be the Paris-based Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development.

American taxpayers finance nearly one-fourth of the OECD’s budget, at a cost of more than $100 million per year, and in exchange we get a never-ending stream of bad policy recommendations.

This Center for Freedom and Prosperity study has all the gory details. The OECD bureaucrats (who get tax-free salaries, by the way) endorsed Obamacare, supported the failed stimulus, and are big advocates of a value-added tax for America.

What’s especially frustrating is that the OECD initially was designed to be a relatively innocuous bureaucracy that focused on statistics. Indeed, it was even viewed as a free-market counterpart to the Soviet Bloc’s Council for Mutual Economic Assistance.

My, how things change.

(more…)

Some of my friends criticize me because they believe I am too hard on President Obama. They say they can’t believe that there is not one of his policies which I supported wholeheartedly. Even a broken clock is right two times a day they say, isn’t there one policy you can say, “lets help Obama on this one?” And I would reach down to the bottom of my soul and really try to come up with something, but I always failed-until today. I have finally found something we should all help Obama implement, he doesn’t like talking to Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu every day, all of America should be behind our President insuring that he doesn’t have to talk to Bibi every day.

During the G20 meetings, President Barack Obama and French President Sarkozy got caught talking in front of a microphone that was accidentally left on.

The conversation began with President Obama criticizing Sarkozy for not having warned him that France would be voting in favor of the Palestinian membership bid in UNESCO despite Washington’s strong objection to the move. But then the two got personal:

“I cannot bear Netanyahu, he’s a liar,” Sarkozy told Obama. The POTUS replied: “You’re fed up with him, but I have to deal with him every day!”

Nothing leads to good political pundit material  like pair of catty politicians accidently speaking  in front of an open mike.  In true Los Angeles Times fashion  the “journalists” in the room agreed not to report the comments (remember during the 2008 campaign the Los Angeles Times withheld a potentially damaging video tape of Barack Obama toasting his friend and former PLO press spokesman Rashid Khalidi).  Then all of the reporters in the room signed a pledge to withhold the damaging information (although there is no truth to the rumor that Abe Foxman of the ADL insisted on the written pledge).

What happened next is what usually happens in cases like this.

(more…)

Throughout the painful and paradoxical existence of Occupy Wall Street (OWS) we have been told by those in the mainstream media, as well as by sympathetic politicos, that at its root, at its genesis, the OWS Movement was both organic and legitimate. We were told that the movement was exclusively about a rebellion against high unemployment and crony Capitalism, even as those championing the cause disingenuously blurred the line between crony Capitalism and Capitalism. But, an honest examination of the underlying goal(s) of this movement – and who is serving to advance its agenda – exposes a nefarious, deceitful and dangerous reality.

The notion of “triangulation” is not new to American politics. Savvy politicians have triangulated messages and circumstances to their benefit ever since the creation of our country. One needs look no further than the debates that took place over the creation of the US Constitution to understand that even though our Framers and Founders were dedicated to their principles and positions, they were willing to employ rhetorical leverage to achieve their goals. Alexander Hamilton was a master at message triangulation.

Perhaps the most contemporary politician to masterfully employ the art of message triangulation was former Pres. Bill Clinton. In pursuit of re-election in 1996, Clinton senior advisor Dick Morris advocated for a set of statements, a set of policies, that differed from those of his fellow elected Democrats. These policies, which pandered to the ideological Middle and Right, included deregulation and balanced budgets, culminating in the false declaration, included in Mr. Clinton’s 1996 State of the Union Address, that the “era of big government is over.”

Triangulation, by way of definition, can be summarized as:

“…the name given to the act of a political candidate presenting his or her ideology as being ‘above’ and ‘between’ the Left and Right sides (or factions) of a traditional democratic political spectrum. It involves adopting for oneself some of the ideas of one’s political opponent (or apparent opponent). The logic behind it is that it both takes credit for the opponent’s ideas, and insulates the triangulator from attacks on that particular issue.”

The same triangulation tactics used by politicos to further their careers can also be used by organizations and movements. In the case of the OWS movement, the use of a triangulated message by Progressives serves to blur the line between crony Capitalism and Capitalism, luring the citizenry to focus on the word “Capitalism,” associating it with the idea of “unfairness,” while Progressives present the notion of redistribution of wealth – a Progressive, neo-Marxist tenet – as being “fair.”

(more…)

Things will get interesting over the next few days. Stay tuned and buckle up.

Greece is about to default on its public debt or ruin the European Union, or both. The Greeks are destroying themselves today much as they did during the Peloponnesian War. This looks like the inevitable result of the welfare statism and entitlement mentality that is destroying the entire Western world. We see similar forces of anarchy at work in the “Occupy” movements in American cities.

An important factor in these movements is the fundamentally anarcho-syndicalist tenor of the union movement, which demands an ever greater share of national income. Public-sector unions like the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees have been prominent in the “occupy” movement. Wisconsin AFSCME proudly sent pizzas “in solidarity” with the Wall Street occupiers.

Rutgers University labor economist Leo Troy calls public-sector unionism “the new socialism.” The old socialism was based on state ownership of the means of production. The new socialism involves the transfer of an ever greater share of the economy to the public sector. Government at all levels took about 5% of GDP a century ago and 13% on the eve of the Great Depression. The New Deal increased the proportion to one-third by 1960. We are in the forty percent range now, and the full nationalization of health care will put us over half.

Unions have been a primary force in the expansion of state power. Even the reputedly “conservative” American Federation of Labor called for “the abolition of the wage system.” A.F.L. President Samuel Gompers put organized labor’s goal as simply “more” — exactly what Johnny Rocco, the Al Capone-like figure portrayed by Edward G. Robinson in the 1939 film “Key Largo,” explained as his ultimate end. The New Deal’s expansion of state power was based principally on private-sector unionism that began with the “occupy Flint” sit-down strikes of 1936.

(more…)

This week’s defeat of Ohio Senate Bill 5 is just a preview of what can be expected during the 2012 elections, as Ohio voters rejected public union limits.

Big Labor, realizing that it had to protect its public unions, showed its solidarity as it spent almost $30 Million dollars and filled the streets with foot soldiers to ensure Senate Bill 5 was defeated (see Public Unions: Last Hope for Big Labor at America’s Expense!, Off-year Ohio election posts highest turnout in 20 years and Unions Target New Ohio Law). In a foreshadowing of the 2012 elections, the gasping dinosaurs showed they are not going down quietly!

Conversely, it was evident that Governor Kasich and other Ohio republicans were not prepared and did not understand the labor machine or their corporate campaign playbook, and they were subsequently steamrolled by these tactics (as described in Corporate Campaigns: Vehicle to Forced Unionism and Political Payback). Obviously, they did not learn from Wisconsin, where massive changes to collective bargaining laws were successful and, as a result, the state is now headed towards a balanced budget (as seen in A Win in Wisconsin! Next, the Rest of the Country). The difference in these two situations was that Wisconsin’s Governor had a plan and was prepared for Big Labor’s scorched earth attacks. (more…)

From the Salt Lake Tribune:

As a result of a man dying overnight at Salt Lake City’s Pioneer Park, Police Chief Chris Burbank on Friday ordered Occupy Salt Lake protesters to vacate their camps at both the west-side park and downtown’s Gallivan Center.

The protesters have until Saturday at sunset to pack up and leave.

Burbank said he would try to work with the group to find other avenues to express their opposition to Wall Street policies and corporate greed, but in the wake of the death early Friday morning he could no longer allow camping out in subfreezing weather on public sites.

Burbank said it appears the victim died sometime around 2 a.m., likely from a combination of carbon monoxide poisoning and a drug overdose. Along with a propane heater, police had reportedly been seen retrieving what appeared to be drug paraphernalia from the victim’s tent as they gathered evidence at the scene late Friday morning. (more…)

I just received the following email in response to my concerns…

Hi Lee,

Thanks for the call.  Here is our company position.

We issued our statement of support for Occupy Wall St. because it is consistent with our Mission Statement and our values.  The statement was drafted by our CEO and our independent Board of Directors.  The Board is directly responsible for our social mission, product quality and brand equity.

We believe that people can change America, and that caring capitalism can make a difference.  We’re showing our appreciation for those who are taking part in this non-violent, peaceful and democratic movement by coordinating ice cream through the Food Committee on site where they’ll distribute.  We continue to discuss with other organizations and partners to explore where we can be most supportive.

- Sean Greenwood

Director PR/Ben & Jerry’s

I sent the following in response… (more…)

From CBS News:

Martha Stewart went to jail for it. Hedge fund honcho Raj Rajaratnam was fined $92 million and will go to jail for years for it. But members of Congress can do the same thing -use non-public information to make stock trades — and there’s no law against it. Steve Kroft reports on how America’s lawmakers can legally make tidy profits on information only they know, simply because they won’t pass a law against themselves. The report will be broadcast on Sunday, Nov. 13 at 7 p.m. ET/PT.

Among the revelations in Kroft’s report:

(more…)

From CNBC:

As many as a dozen members of Congress and their aides took part in insider trading based on foreknowledge of market moving information on Capitol Hill, disgraced Washington lobbyist Jack Abramoff told CNBC in an interview.

Abramoff, who was once one of the wealthiest and most powerful lobbyists in Washington before a corruption scandal sent him to federal prison for more than three years, said that many of those members of Congress bragged to him about their stock trading prowess while dining at the exclusive restaurant he owned on Pennsylvania Avenue.

But Abramoff, whose black trench coat and fedora became one of the most notorious images in recent Washington history after his fall from grace, said he didn’t play the stock market himself — he considered it an inherently unfair “casino” in which the house had far more information than the players. Abramoff made most of his fortune representing — and, as it turned out, duping — Native American tribes rich with cash from casino operations.

The former lobbyist said the amounts members of Congress earned trading off their inside knowledge ranged from as little as $2,000 to, as much as “several hundred thousand dollars,” that was claimed by one member of Congress.

Abramoff declined to name the members of Congress. (more…)

OAKLAND, Calif. – We were dismayed a few weeks ago when hundreds of union teachers in Oakland, California skipped work and forced the shutdown of several schools, in observance of the Occupy movement’s national strike day.

We thought their commitment to their students should come before their outside political activities. We wondered how they could be so passionate about national tax issues, but fail to display the same type of concern about educational quality issues.

But now they’ve sunk to a new low, and it should not be tolerated.

Dozens (or perhaps hundreds) of teachers in the Oakland school district pledged to use taxpayer-funded class time to teach their students about the Occupy movement – from a positive viewpoint, of course. We can safely assume that critics of Occupy were not invited to participate in the lessons.

Here’s what the teachers pledged to do:

“During the week of 10/31 to 11/4, I pledge to teach about: the Occupy movement; the role of strikes in movement history; the systems and issues this movement is protesting against; the possibilities for change this movement is part of envisioning; what students need to know about how to stay safe during these protests.”

Unique lesson plans

Several teachers shared their ideas for lessons on the “Teach Occupy Oakland” website.

(more…)

Two nights ago, a group of Harvard students set up camp on the soggy ground in front of University Hall, staging an “Occupy” demonstration that has effectively shut down access to Harvard Yard for thousands of local residents, tourists, and at least one mildly amused alumnus.

Photo: Daniel M. Lynch, Harvard Crimson

To keep non-Harvard activists out, the administration has locked the gates to the Yard, posting Harvard University Police Department officers at the few open entrances. Only those showing current Harvard ID may enter. A shadow has fallen on one of America’s most picturesque campuses–on a crisp fall day when bright New England fall colors burst forth from every branch, no less.

The students’ demands are unclear, beyond urging the university to be mindful of its “perceived complicity in growing income inequality across the country.” (Given the rapid increase in economic inequality under Harvard Law graduate Barack H. Obama ‘91, that might not be such a bad idea.)

Regardless, there is something rather pathetic about a spectacle in which 1% of students from across the nation and around the world, having declined to join 99% of their high school classmates in community college, unemployment lines, or Yale, now claim to speak for that downtrodden majority. (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 Rick Perry’s resurgence after his debate stumble this week, the new leaders of Greece and Italy, and we pay tribute to Veteran’s Day.

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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