In the wake of the debt ceiling negotiations that paralyzed Washington for weeks and the ensuing last-minute deal that has been criticized by many on the right for failing to change the way Washington spends money, it looks like Republicans supportive of pending natural gas subsidy legislation are eager to avoid shining too much light on the bill – which makes sense considering it distorts the energy market by using taxpayer money to pick winners and losers in the natural gas industry.

Last Wednesday, the House Ways and Means committee abruptly cancelled a scheduled hearing on the NAT GAS Act. From Politico’s Morning Energy:

NOT ON TODAY’S AGENDA
House Ways and Means has postponed its hearing on energy tax policy, putting off a potentially testy intra-Republican squabble over the NAT GAS Act to subsidize natural gas vehicles.

What is the NAT GAS Act? Well, it’s right in line with the Obama Administration’s overreaching regulatory agenda, but because some Republicans favor it the blame can’t be laid at the foot of Obama and the Democrats. From an earlier post on Washington’s war on businesses:

-An item that’s technically legislation, not regulatory rulemaking, but stands to pack the same economically ruinous punch is the NAT GAS Act (H.R. 1380) which heavily subsidizes businesses and consumers who switch to natural gas-fueled vehicles directly benefiting billionaires T. Boone Pickens and George Soros at the taxpayers’ expense. The subsidies – ahem, ‘tax credits’ – come in at a whopping $7,500 per passenger car, $64,000 for heavy-duty trucks and 18-wheelers, and up to $100,000 for gas stations installing natural gas pumps.

Referring to government subsidies as ‘tax credits’ is the oldest trick in the book to rally Republican support for a liberal proposal, and in this case it worked. Although some Republicans have pulled their support for the bill, over 70 GOP Members of Congress are on record as still supporting the bill.

So, qui bono?

(more…)

Despite a small glimmer of hope from last Friday’s unemployment rate drop to 9.1%, business leaders know nearly all other economic figures continue to point to an anemic recovery or worse, a double-dip recession.

In reaction to the jobs numbers, Home Depot co-founder, Bernie Marcus had this to say on Politico:

While some may be relieved at today’s jobs numbers, the reality is that our economy is struggling to recover. And a big reason for that is the federal government. The impediments that the government imposes are impossible to deal with. Every day you see rules and regulations from a group of Washington bureaucrats who know nothing about running a business. And I mean every day. It’s become stifling.

And this is a theme that business leaders continue to make: over-burdensome regulations from Washington are stifling the economy and preventing serious job growth while the Obama administration only continues to make the problem worse.

Lets take a look at the cold hard numbers. In the past few weeks, major American companies had to announce more layoffs:

- Borders – 400 stores will close, costing almost 11,000 jobs.

- Boston Scientific – Announced restructuring that will cost up to 1,400 jobs.

- Goldman Sachs – Will let go 1,000 employees, or nearly 3 percent of their workforce.

- Merck – Will layoff 13,000 workers to cut costs.

- State Street – Announced it will cut 850 jobs, in a second round of layoffs within a year.

With all of this going on, President Barack Obama is promising (yet another) renewed focus on job creation. But what is his administration doing? Contrary to Obama’s promised regulatory reform from earlier this year, the administration continues to say one thing and do another.

(more…)

BILL DALEY:  The delegation is here, sir.

OBAMA:  All right.  Bring them in.  Let’s get this over with.

[enter Clintons, DNC Chair, Reid, Pelosi, Pollster John Zogby, Jesse Jackson, George Soros]

WASSERMAN SCHULTZ:  John, tell the President what you told us.

ZOGBY:  The debt-ceiling deal hasn’t helped you, sir.  We’ve just completed a telephone survey of 1000 people.  10% said they would hold their noses and vote to reelect you; 10% complained the aides were mean, the kids never visited, and the home smelled like disinfectant; and 80% vowed to vote for your opponent, whoever he is.

OBAMA:  Bad, yes, but there’s still time to  . . . .

NANCY PELOSI:  Tell him the rest, John.

ZOGBY:  The survey was limited to Democrats in Ms. Pelosi’s district, sir.  Of those who swear you won’t get their vote, 40% say they plan to register and cast ballots in neighboring districts as well.

PELOSI:  Obviously, they’re good Democrats, sir.  They’ve simply had it with you.

OBAMA:  So, you want me to stand down in 2012 for . . . Hillary?

WASSERMAN SCHULTZ:  God no, sir.  It’d look like we pushed you out.  Poof goes the black vote.  We want you to run but . . . welcome her primary challenge.

VALERIE JARRETT:  Ah, I get it.  He’s supposed to lose gracefully, then stump for Hillary next fall in places like Harlem, Watts, and Liberty City, where his approval rating is holding steady at 97%.  I’d pass, sir.

HILLARY:  Way I look at it, Mr. President, Billy Jeff here broke trail for you in the 90s.  “First Black President,” and all.  You owe us.

(more…)

Nobody ever said all the criminal street thugs at ACORN were bright.

The left-wing astroturfers of ACORN’s new front group in California, Alliance of Californians for Community Empowerment (ACCE), were behind a garbage-dumping stunt at a branch of Wells Fargo bank in San Jose, Calif.

News reports consistently depict the players as angry homeowners who spontaneously erupted in a spasm of righteous indignation.

As if.

These “homeowners” were reportedly unhappy about the upkeep at a foreclosed property they thought Wells Fargo was responsible for so they decided to dump uncollected garbage at the bank. The problem is that while Wells Fargo is listed as a trustee for the property, it is actually owned by Bank of America, a longtime ACORN ally. (In recent years Bank of America Charitable Foundation Inc. has given $5 million to the mortgage bubble generators at ACORN Housing Corp.)

In a still from a TV news report on ACORN’s act of political theater (shown above) an angry protester can be seen holding a sign that reads: “MAKE THE BANKS PAY! ACCE.” (Full video is here.)

Whoops.

(more…)

From The Financial Times:

George Soros, the billionaire hedge fund manager best known for defeating the Bank of England on “Black Wednesday” in 1992, is to close his Quantum fund to outside investors and hand back the remaining outside capital.

Blaming the requirement under new financial regulations to register next year with the Securities and Exchange Commission, the fund will continue to manage around $24.5bn of family money.

(more…)

As the Administration’s push for alternative fuels grows stronger, Congress is set to consider H.R. 1380, which would create very generous tax credits to manufacturers who retrofit existing work vehicles to run on natural gas rather than on that terrifying global menace known as oil, and very generous subsidies to natural gas vehicle consumers: $7500 per car and a whopping $64,000 for heavy-duty trucks and 18-wheelers. It’s common knowledge in DC that Texas hedge-fund operator and natural gas-magnate T. Boone Pickens is the force behind this bi-partisan, pork-laden legislation, possibly because his natural gas empire would greatly profit from the sudden influx of billions of taxpayer dollars in the form of subsidies listed in the bill.

But hidden behind the scenes is another multi-billionaire, one with a much more sinister motive than mere profit. A man who’s vast fortune of nearly $7 billion is being used to subvert nearly every American institution to conform with his dream of a worldwide socialist utopia.

George Soros.

According to the website GuruFocus, which tracks the investment habits and portfolio trends of some of the world’s richest people, George Soros has made some intrigiung investments into alternative fuel companies of late, specifically those at the forefront of natural gas. This would not be so troubling except that, as GuruFocus points out, Soros has accurately predicted both economic bubbles and quickly growing industries. As a result, Soros’s funds have turned out a 30% return on investments since their inception.

(more…)

Ever since these two interviews in Forbes Magazine, in which CEOs of rent-seeking utilities blurted out that that of course they were behind the cap-and-trade/global warming legislative agenda, because they receive a large wealth transfer in return for helping the statists grow the state, I have maintained the following very basic principle: crony capitalists, when engaged in behavior the public would be less than pleased with were it brought to their attention, ought to not allow their CEOs to give interviews.

But here we go again. Today, T. Boone Pickens went on the air with Bloomberg and proved way too much about his latest great idea — on the heels of also pushing the global warming agenda, specifically a national windmill mandate — to mandate a market for his huge natural gas investments (windmills generally don’t work so require a gas plant to be built for ‘backup’. Windmill mandates failed, politically, but he had a backup ready there, too).

This is, naturally, a backdoor for the climate agenda. As Christine Todd Whitman recently and precisely admitted about the whole ‘clean energy’ Plan B, incidentally, in defending President Obama from Al Gore’s barbs.

His next Pickens Plan is at root a cash or clunkers scheme gone stark raving mad.  And remember, this was considered less appealing than a windmill mandate. It seeks to force the transport sector onto natural gas where that is not in fact economic. Hence the big ol’, new government scheme a la ethanol and wind and solar subsidies and preferences, and the mélange of ethanol subsidies and mandates which it more closely resembles.  Requiring, e.g., auto dealers to float not five grand or so but up to $64,000 per vehicle, to ultimately be paid back by you and I, it is little wonder Pickens thought a windmill mandate was the less-bad bet.

T. Boone is of course not alone among gas interests to have bet big and come up short on the global warming agenda, seeking to scare people into allowing the state to for all intents and purposes regulate coal, our most abundant energy supply, out of existence.

(more…)

ABANDON ALL HOPE OF CHANGE

PALIN DELENDA EST

Democratic National Committee

Unposted Principals’ Meeting

July 5, 2011

OFFICERS PRESENT

Debbie Wasserman Schultz, National Chair

Mike Honda, Vice Chair

Linda Chavez-Thompson, Vice Chair

OFFICER NOT TOLD OF MEETING

Donna Brazile, Vice Chair

INVITED GUESTS

Harry Reid, Senate Majority Leader

Nancy Pelosi, House Minority Leader

John Zogby, Pollster

Brian Williams, Network Liaison

George “Daddy Warbucks” Soros

WASSERMAN SCHULTZ: John, what’s the latest?

ZOGBY:  No change.  A commenter picked at random from Breitbart’s biggovernment.com would thrash President Obama next year in all 57 states, despite ACORN’s Get-Out-the-Dead-Vote project.  The down-ticket effects would be equally catastrophic. (more…)

Andrew Breitbart and ACORN critics everywhere have been vindicated yet again.

That’s because the U.S. Supreme Court denied an ACORN appeal, effectively ruling that Congress was absolutely entitled to cut off federal taxpayer funding of ACORN. Earlier today the high court denied the petition for certiorari in ACORN et al. v. United States (docket 10-1068) without comment.

The Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now had asked the high court to review a decision of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit which found that the funding cutoff enacted in 2009 was not a “bill of attainder” forbidden by the Constitution. ACORN had advanced the novel, nonsensical argument that Congress had no power to stop funding the group unless it could prove it had done something wrong.

As I write in my new book Subversion Inc.: How Obama’s ACORN Red Shirts are Still Terrorizing and Ripping Off American Taxpayers, the ACORN network has taken in an astounding $79 million in federal funding, not just the $53 million figure previously reported.

At least 54 individuals associated with ACORN have been convicted of voter fraud. ACORN itself was convicted of felony voter registration fraud in Nevada in April, the book reports.

ACORN became well known nationwide in 2009 for its advocacy of brothels for pedophiles. Hannah Giles and James O’Keefe caught the group on undercover video offering advice on tax fraud and on importing underage illegal alien sex slaves from El Salvador.

(more…)

Seriously, I’m getting really tired of all the comments accusing my articles of being satirical.  Cut it out.  It’s not funny and you cannot defend the indefensible.   I’m pressing on anyway with my plan for fixing America.

Foreclosures

The housing crisis is completely and entirely the fault of the banks.  I reject the notion that borrowers had any culpability whatsoever.  All those rules and regulations made it necessary to have a Ph.D. to understand all those mortgage documents.  There was too much paperwork for any borrower to actually wade through and read.  And don’t give me the excuse that all that paperwork was the result of government regulation.  We needed all that paperwork so that banks wouldn’t take advantage of borrowers.  And even though we had all that paperwork, they still took advantage of borrowers.  Everybody knows that nobody reads contracts, so saying that it was the borrower’s fault for signing something they didn’t understand makes no sense.  The borrowers were all duped into signing all that mortgage paperwork and didn’t understand that mortgage rates would reset and that they couldn’t afford to own the home.  Besides, the housing bubble was so out of control that who could blame a borrower for wanting to cash in?  Everybody else was!

So I say that anybody who can’t pay their mortgage should not have to pay their mortgage.  Banks should be forced to modify any loan that any borrower has fallen behind on.  They should modify it so that the borrower can live in the house for as long as they want as long as they can’t pay the mortgage.  The bank never should have approved the loan in the first place, even though the loan documents weren’t necessarily truthful.  The banks should be able to read people’s mind, and since they can’t, they should pay the price.

For everyone who has paid their mortgage on time, why should you get a break for being responsible?

(more…)

From Accuracy in Media’s Cliff Kincaid:

A Washington Post story about Catholic professors challenging Rep. John Boehner’s Catholic faith with an open letter to the House Speaker ignores the role of one of the key signers in a George Soros-funded group.
The letter to Boehner says, “Your record in support of legislation to address the desperate needs of the poor is among the worst in Congress.” Ignoring the Catholic tradition of subsidiarity, or decentralized government, and voluntarism, the letter claims Boehner’s votes against expansion of the federal welfare state are anti-Catholic.

Letter signer Stephen F. Schneck of the Catholic University of America (CUA) is a board member of the Soros-funded Catholics in Alliance for the Common Good (CACG). Because of the significant funding the group has received from Soros, an atheist, CACG has been called a “fake Catholic” group designed to undermine official Catholic teaching on abortion and homosexuality and promote Obama Administration Big Government policies. The former CACG executive director, Alexia Kelley, now works for the Obama Administration.

A major financial backer of the ACLU, Soros supports such causes as drug legalization, the rights of “sex workers” and felons, euthanasia, radical feminism and abortion rights.

In addition to helping organize the protest against Boehner, Schneck recently hosted two socialists on the CUA campus at a one-sided forum on how and why the Catholic Church should be promoting liberal and pro-union social policies.

The focus of the anti-Boehner article by Post religion reporter Michelle Boorstein is the letter that she notes was “organized by faculty at Catholic University, the national university of the Catholic Church in Northeast Washington.” She adds, “Of the nearly 80 signers, about 30 are from Catholic University, including faculty from the schools of law, nursing, history and theology, among others.”

What this means, of course, is that CUA has become a hotbed of liberal social activism designed to benefit the national Democratic Party.

(more…)

This Wednesday, Congress will have its first chance to look under the hood of the proposed $39 billion acquisition of T-Mobile by AT&T. The Senate will hold a hearing on the deal, featuring representatives from AT&T, T-Mobile, Sprint, Cellular South, the Communications Workers of America, and Public Knowledge.

The hearing is a kabuki dance of sorts because, though the Congress plays an important oversight role, it has no formal part in approving (or not) the acquisition.  That job rests with the FCC and DoJ.

While no one knows if, when, or in what form the resulting approval will look like (if approval in fact occurs), the hearing will help all sides begin to put forward their best PR case to the American public.

I believe that the acquisition – though complex and challenging for policymakers – will benefit the public interest.  Yes, it will pare the market down by one, resulting in three major nationwide providers.  But the market will remain effectively competitive.  Consumers will benefit through the roll out of new and better mobile broadband services from a stronger AT&T.  And this will in turn spur direct competition from the major and regional wireless players, as well as in services that are considered substitutes.

But, as the existence of the hearing reveals, the acquisition is not a done deal.  Many questions abound, which Congress and the American public have a right to know about.

So, if I were a Senator sitting up on the dais – one who could see consumer benefit as a result of this acquisition – what top five questions would I want answered?

(more…)

The INET Bretton Woods summit, summoned by George Soros and those who alternatively hide behind, or gather around him, has now happened.

But before trying to analyze whatever we may discover of what occurred there, it is critical to discern how it fits an overall picture.  For context, one must also see what the IMF and World Bank “communitarian” elitists are up to.

We find that before the Bretton Woods affair, focusing upon “new solutions,” there was a similar IMF meeting, called “New Ideas for a New World.”  It was centered upon “Post-Crisis Policy Making” and occurred March 7-14.  That gave some of them a lot of time to communicate and plan in quiet (the traditional word for that is conspire) when they were not attending official sessions, or making videos.

Then, we see that Soros’ April 8-11 conference ended just as the IMF and World Bank took up their April 11-17 Spring Meetings, just a limo ride away.  “Blossom of Spring, won’t you bloom and grow?”  Let us see what is budding in this intensive series of conferences, by the first one’s own promotional vid.

Here is a collection of pitches for “New Ideas for a New World.”  Hey, they left out the last word, “Order.”  Could it be that some of them know their version of order requires fomenting massive disorder first, the crises not to be wasted?  They also left out the word “Brave,” before “New World.”  Maybe that is because some of them like Huxley, have qualms.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Nsst1U8jidA

This video puts their dexterous foot forward about that March 2011 conference, while their sinister footfalls go on.  So who are these dudes, getting together and yukking it up (well, three out of four globalist manipulators seem to approve) and just how spooky are they?  What are the messages of the Big Money priests, to the unwashed, PITI-ful masses of principal, interest, taxes, and insurance payers?

(more…)

What would you think if George Soros were organizing his fellow anti-American, globalist, neo-Marxist “thought leaders,” in pursuit of globally governed banking and finance, in a second Bretton Woods conference?

Would you consider that their goals include dragging American influence and incomes down, while confiscating much of our personal finances and giving them to other nations (and yes, the age-old financier network behind them) in the name of “communitarianism?”

Would you find their goal is to replace the bad influences of the IMF and the World Bank, with a much worse, more powerfully controlling, post-American global apparatus?

What would you think, if that meeting were being held this April 8th through 11th?

I got an email, last week; it was Tuesday the 22nd.  It was from George Soros.  To hear as straight from the dragon’s mouth as feasible, I had subscribed.  In this emailed article, he lamented the inequities of wealth among the nation-states of Europe, under the strains of their continuing insolvency crisis.  He warned of the dangers of national interest.  Rather, he proposed, not surprisingly, a further blowing of the global insolvency bubble, so the more indebted European nations may get along owing, while their lending nations get along being owed — all the while, blending and worsening the  financial and monetary crises and spreading this yeasty recipe further throughout the world, especially to America.

That was quite provocative.

(more…)

Clearly there is no shame in the culture of conceit in which NPR’s “Morning Edition” co-host Steve Inskeep lives, and like NPR, he is lying to the American people.

The supposed point of his March 24 op-ed in the Wall Street Journal was to refute the irrefutable – that NPR is an egregiously and unabashedly hard left, Soros-backed operation subsidized by taxpayers.

But Inskeep, like other NPR representatives, fraudulently claims “emails show that NPR refused the money” from the Muslim Brotherhood front group.  At no point did NPR ever do so, and on the contrary the emails released by NPR did quite the opposite.  They confirmed that NPR’s top executives had no objections whatsoever to taking money from a front group controlled and primarily financed by a jihadist organization explicitly committed to the subversion and destruction of this country.  They were moving along with the perfectly standard procedures for accepting an institutional donation of that size.

Even long after we had established our Muslim Brotherhood front group status and explained that our purpose was to counter and replace the “Jewish” control over the American media, NPR’s top brass only became more and more eager, even putting “a dollop of urgency” on advancing the process, in Betsy Liley’s words.

(more…)

As the war against for-profit schools drags on, several organizations continue to cry wolf in the hopes of landing the final blow to the resilient colleges. One of the biggest players in recent battles has been the New American Foundation. A seemingly ‘nonpartisan public policy institute’, this group is layered with traces of political leanings and loaded assertions.

The most vocal arm of the New America Foundation has been their publication of ‘Higher Ed Watch.’ Editor Stephen Burd remains one of the strongest opponents of for-profit schools having slandered the industry at every turn. Articles such as, “For Profit Higher Education’s New Conspiracy Theory” and “Heads Will Roll At For-Profit Colleges — But Not The Right Ones,” have allowed Burd to preach from his soapbox and reveal the political tendencies of the foundations largest donors.

George Soros, one of the looming figures behind the war against for-profit schools, has managed to force his philosophies into the group by means of a quite sizeable contribution. New America Foundation received between $250-000 and $999,999 from short seller Soros’ Open Society Institute. Steve Coll, President of New America Foundation, receives a base compensation of $271,000. The former contributor at The New Yorker Magazine calls the shots at NAF amid a cloud of outsider influence. With staff salaries paid in part by the contribution of George Soros, NAF’s alleged ‘bi-partisan’ reputation becomes an ever harder pill to swallow.

Even the chairman of the New America Foundation’s board, Eric Schmidt, can be called into question. Schmidt, the Chairman and CEO of Google, not only campaigned for President Obama but is also rumored to be on the short list for Commerce Secretary. Given all the incestuous political ties, it remains difficult to ignore the administration’s ability to force the hand of various non-profits.

(more…)

**UPDATED

President Barack Obama has won praise from the media — and from himself — for putting the White House visitor logs online. Yet the visitor logs may hide more than they reveal.

The White House is still holding back “tens of thousands” of visitor logs, according to congressional testimony last week by Tom Fitton, President of Judicial Watch, who also added that “the Obama administration is less transparent than the Bush administration.”

We also know that some of the most important presidential visitors don’t even walk into the White House. The administration meets K Street lobbyists at Caribou Coffee, and holds secret meetings in Jackson Place townhouses where there are no visitor logs.

The visitor logs that have been released are problematic, because they are simply lists of names, with no way to verify whether a specific name belongs to a particular person.

When the first names were released on Oct. 30, 2009, late on a Friday afternoon, then-White House “ethics czar” Norm Eisen noted the lists included “false positives” — “names that make you think of a well-known person, but are actually someone else.” According to Eisen, these included ordinary visitors named “Michael Jordan, William Ayers, Michael Moore, Jeremiah Wright, Robert Kelly (“R. Kelly”), and Malik Shabazz.” (more…)

Last month, New York Times reporter James C. McKinley Jr. falsely reported that an FBI informant who helped to thwart a left-wing terrorist plot had actually encouraged the conspiracy. In the article “Anarchist Ties Seen in ’08 Bombing of Texas Governor’s Mansion” published February 22, 2011 online and in the print edition a day later, the Times indicated that former left-wing activist and BigGovernment.com contributor Brandon Darby urged two anarchists to firebomb the 2008 Republican National Convention in St. Paul, Minnesota [emphasis added]:

Yet federal agents accused two men from these circles of plotting to make firebombs and hurl them at police cars during the convention. An F.B.I informant from Austin, Brandon Darby, was traveling with the group and told the authorities of the plot, which he had encouraged.

We brought this to your attention on February 24th when we asked the Times to correct the record. We noted that according to the United States Attorney’s Office for the District of Minnesota, the assertion Darby “encouraged” the plot was patently false. On February 27th, we brought in Matthew Vadum, an expert on the circumstances surrounding the plot, to provide broader context to the Times’s smear.

Still, the error remained uncorrected.

Then, last week, a source informed BigJournalism.com that the New York Times reporter acknowledged the charge they published against Darby was in fact bogus, but still, the Times did not correct the article.

As of this writing, the false charge against Darby remains in tact.

Today, Brandon Darby filed a lawsuit against New York Times for libel and defamation. An official letter from Mr. Darby:

We’ll be following the story as it develops on BigJournalism.com and BigGovernment.com.

As a wave of left-wing violence threatens to engulf the nation, why is the progressive New York Times running an ugly campaign of character assassination against a real-life American hero who saved lives and helped to safeguard the nation’s sacred democratic process?

Could it be because the newspaper is sympathetic to the goals of the thuggish community organizers and union goons intimidating state legislatures across America and wants to help advance the liberal-left narrative?

The man with the bull’s eye on his back is Brandon Darby, formerly a far-left community organizer. This heroic defector from the Left stands accused by the New York Times and by angry radical groups of becoming an agent provocateur. Unhinged anarchists across the country would love to get their hands on him.

All over the Internet Darby’s name has been dragged through the mud by the Daily Kos and Crooks and Liars crowd. They accuse him of selling out and pushing the wrongdoers hard enough that he essentially became a co-conspirator. Search for his name with the words traitor, rat, or fink and you’ll see what I mean. (more…)