The department dismissed the Panthers case despite the fact that the government had already won it, due to the defendants’ contemptuous default. The dismissal occurred despite the fact that career prosecutors judged the case to be exceedingly strong. Nevertheless, Holder’s top staffers have maintained for months that the rationale for the dismissal was a good-faith disagreement between low-ranking civil servants (i.e., career prosecutors) about the correct construction of the Voting Rights Act.Previously:
'The tea party has to a certain extent scared the Republican Party,' said one poll respondent, Tim Bahmer, a 44-year-old Republican and self-employed auto mechanic from Charlotte, Mich. 'From what I've seen of what the tea party is saying, I think that could be the change [Republicans] could benefit from.'That reminds me of something Thomas Jefferson said:
When the people fear their government, there is tyranny; when the government fears the people, there is liberty.After decades of being told to fear terrorists, fear big banks, fear Wall Street, fear global
Despite a finding by the Federal Election Commission’s (FEC) general counsel that the Service Employees International Union (SEIU) violated election law when it required local affiliates to contribute to its political action fund, the FEC’s full board nonetheless quietly voted to overrule its staff attorney and dismissed the original complaint -- clearing the way for the union to squeeze its locals to amass a $9 million war chest for the next election.
Federal law enforcement and national security officials are preparing to seek sweeping new regulations of the Internet, arguing that their ability to wiretap criminal and terrorism suspects is 'going dark' as people increasingly communicate online instead of by telephone.
Essentially, officials want Congress to require all services that enable communications -- including encrypted e-mail transmitters such as BlackBerry, social networking websites such as Facebook and software that allows direct 'peer-to-peer' messaging such as Skype -- to be technically capable of complying if served with a wiretap order. The mandate would include being able to intercept and unscramble encrypted messages.
Small Business Endorses Ed Martin for Congress
Key voting bloc knows Martin is supporter of free enterprise system
WASHINGTON, D.C., Sept. 27, 2010 — Today the National Federation of Independent Business, America’s leading small business association, announced its full support and endorsement of Ed Martin for election to the U.S. House of Representatives in Missouri’s 3rd District.
“Ed Martin is the clear pro-small business candidate in this race. He has a long track record of supporting fiscal responsibility and encouraging tax relief for our nation’s job creators,” said Lisa Goeas, NFIB’s vice president for political operations. “Our small business membership knows that Ed Martin will support policies that will help small businesses do what they do best: create jobs and grow the economy.”
There are more than 120,000 small employers in Missouri. Nationally, small businesses create more than half of the nation’s non-farm gross domestic product and have created more than 60 percent of net new jobs in the U.S. over the past 15 years.
Small business owners and their employees vote in high numbers and are known for actively recruiting friends, family members and acquaintances to go to the polls. NFIB will encourage Missouri’s members to help turn out the small business vote on Martin’s behalf on Election Day.
Today’s endorsement comes from NFIB’s Save America’s Free Enterprise Trust, the association’s political action committee, and is based on candidates’ positions on key small business issues including healthcare, taxes, and labor and regulatory issues.
Californians are left with a deeply unsatisfying choice for the U.S. Senate this year. The incumbent, Democrat Barbara Boxer, has failed to distinguish herself during her 18 years in office. There is no reason to believe that another six-year term would bring anything but more of the same uninspired representation. The challenger, Republican Carly Fiorina, has campaigned with a vigor and directness that suggests she could be effective in Washington - but for an agenda that would undermine this nation's need to move forward on addressing serious issues such as climate change, health care and immigration.
It is extremely rare that this editorial page would offer no recommendation on any race, particularly one of this importance. This is one necessary exception.
President Barack Obama's $30 billion small community business lending program faces one big challenge: many of the community banks and businesses it's supposed to help don't want it.Let me slow it down for you government types: small businesses want paying customers not a stream of future financing costs. While talking about a previous small business loan program at an Ed Martin (R-MO) event, David McArthur had this to say:
which was recently re-released with a new epilogue, believes that the stimulus has made the American economy worse:U.S. President Barack Obama and his administration weakened the country’s economy by seeking to foster growth instead of paying down the federal debt, said Nassim Nicholas Taleb, author of “The Black Swan.”I believe we are at a moment in time where continued Keynesian fiscal policies will not work. Our debt, both public and private, is much too large for the endless spending of Keynesianism. The day of reckoning has been postponed by government policies that consolidated the banking system into fewer, larger banks. Our government is fostering common mode failures in the financial sector under the absurd rubric of financial reform. We need a financial system—indeed, all sectors of civilization—that allow failure to have little impact on the rest of society. A few big banks won't do that. A lot of small banks will.
“Obama did exactly the opposite of what should have been done,” Taleb said yesterday in Montreal in a speech as part of Canada’s Salon Speakers series. “He surrounded himself with people who exacerbated the problem. You have a person who has cancer and instead of removing the cancer, you give him tranquilizers. When you give tranquilizers to a cancer patient, they feel better but the cancer gets worse.”
Today, Taleb said, “total debt is higher than it was in 2008 and unemployment is worse.”
KABUL, Afghanistan – Much like the United States in the mid-20th Century, Afghanistan is experiencing changes in the rights afforded to women. Afghan women can now hold jobs previously unavailable to them, such as serving in a position of authority as an officer in the Afghan National Army.
A group of eight U.S. Army women mentors and 29 Afghan female officer candidates are ushering in that change.
In a joint effort between NATO Training Mission-Afghanistan and the Afghan Ministry of Defense, the ANA Female Officers Candidate School opened its doors in April. Over the past 20 weeks, 29 Afghan women – mostly housewives – have made history. The first class of female officers will graduate Sept. 23 with the candidates serving as finance and logistics officers.
If you thought the health care bill recently passed by the House was bad, you’ll shudder at what I captured on video this weekend at the 2009 Healthcare-Now.org National Strategy Conference at the Sheraton Westport Lakeside Chalet in St. Louis.
Though uninvited, I introduced myself as a journalist and gained access to the meeting’s opening session late Saturday afternoon. There, I fully expected to find a room full of people in favor of the latest iteration of government-run health care. Instead, I found more than 100 people voicing widespread opposition to the bill.
Unlike those who oppose government-run health care on strong Constitutional grounds, the conference attendees with whom I spoke said they oppose the bill because, first, it lacks a strong-enough public option component and, second, it does not include coverage to pay for abortions.
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| Russ Carnahan and Ed Martin at their first debate (Photo by: JD Wilson) |
Six months ago, President Obama, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi rammed Obamacare down the throats of an unwilling American public. Half a year removed from the unprecedented legislative chicanery and backroom dealing that characterized the bill's passage, we know much more about the bill than we did then.Instead of quoting the whole thing, just click through. It's required reading.
...shifting from a pay-as-you-go program to a funded system entails significant “transition costs,” which are borne by the very citizens who would decide to make the change. Since today’s Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid benefits are paid from today’s taxes, if we decide to pre-fund these programs then the current generation must pay twice: first for current beneficiaries, and second for their own benefits. Put simply, to shift from an unfunded program to a funded program, someone must contribute extra funds. When the defining characteristic of domestic policy has been for voters to shift their own cost burdens to future generations, it is highly optimistic to expect current voters to accept a double burden. The expected result is to kick the can down the road, such that deficits grow and future taxpayers become even worse off.
Republican Joe Miller attracts 42% of the vote in the first Rasmussen Reports poll of the Alaska Senate race since GOP Senator Lisa Murkowski announced her write-in campaign to try to keep her job.
The telephone survey of Likely Voters in Alaska shows Murkowski picking up 27% of the vote and Democrat Scott McAdams earning 25%. One percent (1%) say they’d prefer some other candidate, and five percent (5%) are undecided.
In a dramatic development that could shake the political leadership of the Justice Department, career lawyer Christopher Coates has sent a letter to the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights offering to testify Friday on matters related to the controversial New Black Panthers voter-intimidation case....
Ten months ago, Coates, the award-winning former chief of the Voting Section of the Civil Rights Division, was subpoenaed by the Commission to testify about the case. He was subsequently instructed by DOJ officials to ignore the subpoena. Within the past hour, commissioners were informed that Chairman Gerald Reynolds had spoken with Coates and that the chairman would reconvene the Commission’s ongoing hearing on Friday at 9:30 a.m. to hear Coates’s testimony.
The Civil Rights Commission has sought to obtain Coates’ testimony on Justice’s dismissal of the New Black Panther Party voter intimidation case in Philadelphia. In a recent request to Justice, the Commission agreed to limit initial questioning of Coates to accusations made by former career lawyer J. Christian Adams about statements and other actions by Julie Fernandes, an Obama administration political appointee, if DOJ produced Coates.
The DOJ refused.
White House officials expect Lawrence Summers to leave his job as the president’s National Economic Council director after November’s congressional elections, according to three people familiar with the matter.
His departure would leave Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner as the only member of President Barack Obama’s original top-tier economic team. Summers, 55, and the president have discussed his future plans, according to one person.
@RobinCarnahan is tied with @RoyBlunt 48-48 http://bit.ly/akwwVf Congrats, Robin! What's your strategy for 63% women voters on 11/2?24thState.com brings news that the polling situation for Robin Carnahan has not improved:
The Missouri Democratic Party is touting a new poll from Global Strategies Group claiming a statistical dead heat with Roy Blunt. Without having access to the anything other than the toplines, it would be difficult to say that the poll is accurate, but it does show Blunt with a 4% lead when leaners are included (which they should be, this close to the election).I disagree with Editor on this one. Any topline that shows Jerry Beck (Constitution Party-MO) and Jonathan Dine (L-MO) pulling 3% each isn't credible in my opinion. The 2006 MO Senate race between Jim Talent (R-MO) and Claire McCaskill (D-MO) saw 96.9% of the vote go to the two candidates from the Republican and Democrat parties. Beck and Dine are fighting over three or four percent total between them. The poll has an error range of +/-4, but I maintain that those two were included in the poll to bring down Roy Blunt's numbers.
...it's important to know who exactly the Dems are getting in bed with. GSG was recently smacked on the hand with a $2 million fine for a pay-to-play scheme in New York. GSG is also the firm started by Steve Rattner, Obama's auto czar, who had to leave the position over the rumors caused by GSG's missteps. If the Missouri Democratic Party wants to brag that their internal polling is done by Global Strategies Group, a powerful New York firm referred to no less than the New York Times as "one of New York’s top consultants to corporations and other special interests," by all means run their pretty little press releases.
I'm sure connecting the Missouri Democratic Party to corruption, powerful special interests, and New York politicians like Elliot Spitzer is all in Ryan Hobart's game plan.
While newspapers and broadcast outlets struggle to survive in the Internet age, two-out-of-three Americans (67%) feel they are more informed today than they were 10 years ago. A new Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey finds that just eight percent (8%) consider themselves less informed these days, while 22% think their level of knowledge is about the same.What's changed? Oh, right, the sources got blogs.
Among the 'green' projects in the report is a $107 million grant-in-lieu-of tax credit for the Lost Creek Wind Farm in northwest Missouri.No wonder someone recently registered the website: www.SlayForCongress.com. Mayor Slay would certainly be an improvement over Carnahan.
That project is developed by Wind Capital Group of St. Louis, whose president and CEO is Tom Carnahan. He's the brother of Rep. Russ Carnahan, D-St. Louis, and Missouri Secretary of State Robin Carnahan.
The report says that the award occurred in July and that the project created 300 jobs during construction. A Lost Creek spokesman said that the wind farm, which already is in operation, created 2,500 throughout the supply chain.
Judicial Watch made an explosive announcement today about the Justice Department’s stonewalling in the New Black Panther voter intimidation case dismissal. Forced to bring a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) lawsuit after DOJ rebuffed its public records request (so much for transparency), Judicial Watch obtained a privilege log from the DOJ last week.
It shows — in a rather dramatic way — that the DOJ has been untruthful about who was involved in the dismissal of the case.
In July, I complied with a subpoena and provided testimony to the United States Commission on Civil Rights. I did so in part because inaccurate statements had been made about the case by DOJ officials. Some of these statements falsely claimed that ethical rules mandated the dismissal of the charges against the New Black Panthers. This was nonsense.
But the real whopper? DOJ’s claim — repeated over and over again — that career civil servants were wholly responsible for the spiking of the case.
Today we learn, from the Department’s own records, that this claim is demonstrably false.
The privilege log produced in the FOIA litigation contains stunning entries. They show regular discussions and deliberations between the highest political officials inside the DOJ, including the deputy attorney general and the associate attorney general, about what to do with the case. This contradicts numerous statements made to Congress, the Civil Rights Commission, and to the public.
Some of these statements were under oath.
. Like modern governments, pirate ships operated with written codes that outlined the rules and laws of the ship. They also had democratic processes for choosing leaders. What I found most interesting was the contractual arrangement between each pirate crewman and the ship's leadership.
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, speaks at the 2010, 9-12 Tea Party under the Arch in St. Louis. He talked about the need for the media to stop identifying people by their race and focus on the issues. He also spoke about the Tea Party as a transformational force for revolutionizing America.
, speaks at the 2010, 9-12 Tea Party under the Arch in St. Louis. He spoke about the importance of individual activism to help get out the vote in the weeks before the November election.Return to senderAll of that's spot on, but what's omitted is also interesting. If you're going to use the sub-headline: "Return to sender", shouldn't you also mention Congressman Russ Carnahan's (D-MO) abuse of his franking privilege?
I live in the 3rd Congressional District. I saw a sign on Union today that said 'Russ Carnahan, he delivers for us.' Let me finish that saying. He helped deliver an $860 billion bailout bail that hasn't worked very well, if at all. He delivered a health care bill most Americans don't like or want. He delivered carmakers, insurance companies and banks to us, the American taxpayer. He helped deliver unemployment, up to 10 percent at it's peak. Yes sir, ol' Russ has really delivered for us in the 3rd District. Maybe we should give Ed Martin a chance to see what he can deliver. Could it be any worse?
Just obtained this letter from Justice Department Inspector General Glenn Fine to members of Congress informing them that he will open up a review of the Obama administration’s selective enforcement of civil rights laws by the Voting Section office of DOJ.
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