Author: kingsjester

64 year old Christian Conservative husband, father, and grandfather who has been writing since April 2010.

Eric Holder’s DOJ: Covington and Boling, West

On By kingsjesterIn Politics2 Comments

Eric Holder has staffed the United States Department of Justice for the past three years with, naturally, his own people.  Unfortunately, they all seem to come from his former law firm of Covington and Boling, which has a history of interesting clients, to say the least, which, in turn, affects the United States Department of Justice.

Judicialwatch.org has the story:

In a scary development, a major Obama fundraiser who defended a convicted al Qaeda terrorist will become the third highest ranking official at the Department of Justice (DOJ), which, ironically, is charged with defending the interests of the United States.

Northern California lawyer Tony West has been named Assistant Attorney General for the Civil Division, making him the No. 3 guy at the agency. In 2009 West, who helped Obama raise tens of millions of dollars as finance co-chairman of his first presidential campaign, was appointed to help run the DOJ’s civil division which represents the government, Congress and presidential cabinet officers and handles cases dealing with significant policy issues.

In a statement announcing the promotion this week, Attorney General Eric Holder says West has served the department with “professionalism, integrity and dedication.” Holder also mentions West’s work before coming to the DOJ a few years ago, including a stint as a Special Assistant Attorney General in California and a lengthier career at a large San Francisco law firm.

Conveniently omitted in the press release is that West represented convicted al Qaeda terrorist John Walker Lindh, who is serving a 20-year prison sentence. Lindh was captured in Afghanistan in 2001 while fighting against the U.S.-backed Northern Alliance as a member of the Taliban army. He actually pleaded guilty to aiding the Taliban and carrying explosives while fighting U.S. troops in the region.

Holder also knows a thing or two about defending terrorists. After all, he was a senior partner in a prestigious Washington D.C. law firm (Covington & Burling) that represented more than a dozen Yemeni terrorists held at the U.S. military prison in Guantanamo Bay Cuba. While Holder was a senior partner the firm employed a number of radical attorneys to provide the Islamic extremists with thousands of hours of free legal representation, according to a news report.

Another highlight in Holder’s resume is that he orchestrated Bill Clinton’s shameful last-minute pardons, including that of a fugitive financier and a pair of jailed domestic terrorists. In fact, shortly after the pardon scandal, Holder predicted that his public career was over. Under his leadership the DOJ has been embroiled in a number of high-profile scandals, including a gun-running operation (Fast and Furious) in which weapons were sold to Mexican drug cartels. One was later used to murder a federal agent. Judicial Watch has sued the DOJ to obtain records involving the operation.

United States Attorney General Eric Holder has a three year history of dubious decisions and deals, and a lot of them involve Covington and Boling.

In her best seller, Culture of Corruption, published in 2009, Michelle Malkin wrote that

Holder returns to a more modest $186,000 salary as Obama’s attorney general. But parting has its perks, too. The Washington revolving door pays.

Covington & Burling will make a separation payment valued at between $1 million and $5 million, plus a repayment of up to $1 million from the firm’s capital account, plus a retirement plan of up to $500,000. His net worth: $5.7 million. Reflecting on his past eight years raking in the dough and watching him schmooze friends and clients from his “elegant new Manhattan offices,” an American Lawyer profile observed: “Life is good for private citizen Eric Holder, Jr.” President Obama and the missus, such outspoken detractors of climbing the corporate ladder and influence-peddling, were unavailable for comment.

Some “Separation Package”, huh?

But, when is leaving a firm not really leaving a firm?  When you bring the firm with you.

Reuters News recently reported that

U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder and Lanny Breuer, head of the Justice Department’s criminal division, were partners for years at a Washington law firm that represented a Who’s Who of big banks and other companies at the center of alleged foreclosure fraud…

…The firm, Covington & Burling, is one of Washington’s biggest white shoe law firms. Law professors and other federal ethics experts said that federal conflict of interest rules required Holder and Breuer to recuse themselves from any Justice Department decisions relating to law firm clients they personally had done work for.

Both the Justice Department and Covington declined to say if either official had personally worked on matters for the big mortgage industry clients. Justice Department spokeswoman Tracy Schmaler said Holder and Breuer had complied fully with conflict of interest regulations, but she declined to say if they had recused themselves from any matters related to the former clients.

Reuters reported in December that under Holder and Breuer, the Justice Department hasn’t brought any criminal cases against big banks or other companies involved in mortgage servicing, even though copious evidence has surfaced of apparent criminal violations in foreclosure cases.

The evidence, including records from federal and state courts and local clerks’ offices around the country, shows widespread forgery, perjury, obstruction of justice, and illegal foreclosures on the homes of thousands of active-duty military personnel.

In recent weeks the Justice Department has come under renewed pressure from members of Congress, state and local officials and homeowners’ lawyers to open a wide-ranging criminal investigation of mortgage servicers, the biggest of which have been Covington clients. So far Justice officials haven’t responded publicly to any of the requests.

…Senior government officials often move to big Washington law firms, and lawyers from those firms often move into government posts. But records show that in recent years the traffic between the Justice Department and Covington & Burling has been particularly heavy. In 2010, Holder’s deputy chief of staff, John Garland, returned to Covington, as did Steven Fagell, who was Breuer’s deputy chief of staff in the criminal division.

The firm has on its web site a page listing its attorneys who are former federal government officials. Covington lists 22 from the Justice Department, and 12 from U.S. Attorneys offices, the Justice Department’s local federal prosecutors’ offices around the country.

Between the Black Panther Intimidation Cover-up after the Midterm Elections, the attempt to try Islamic Terrorists in the heart of New York City, and now this, it appears that corruption, or at the very least, the appearance of it, is the norm, not the exception under Attorney General Eric Holder.

It is time for him to go.

His boss, too.

Rush Apologizes to an Activist

On By kingsjesterIn Politics28 Comments

Yesterday, Rush Limbaugh issued the following statement on his website, rushlimbaugh.com:

For over 20 years, I have illustrated the absurd with absurdity, three hours a day, five days a week. In this instance, I chose the wrong words in my analogy of the situation. I did not mean a personal attack on Ms. Fluke.

I think it is absolutely absurd that during these very serious political times, we are discussing personal sexual recreational activities before members of Congress. I personally do not agree that American citizens should pay for these social activities. What happened to personal responsibility and accountability? Where do we draw the line? If this is accepted as the norm, what will follow? Will we be debating if taxpayers should pay for new sneakers for all students that are interested in running to keep fit?In my monologue, I posited that it is not our business whatsoever to know what is going on in anyone’s bedroom nor do I think it is a topic that should reach a Presidential level.

My choice of words was not the best, and in the attempt to be humorous, I created a national stir. I sincerely apologize to Ms. Fluke for the insulting word choices.

Let’s stop for a moment and consider just whom it is that Rush has issued this apology to:

Mr. Sandra Fluke, who is attending Georgetown Law School, is a 30 year old Women’s Rights (i.e., Abortion) Activist, who was originally described by the Main Stream Media as a “23 year old co-ed”.

She revealed that she was actually 30 years old in a Today Show interview on Friday morning with host Matt Lauer.

What she did not say was that she is a past President of the Georgetown Law School Chapter of Law Sudents for Reproductive Justice.

In a statement titled LSRJ Proudly Stands With Sandra Fluke, the organization voices its support for her:

We are proud of our member and past president of Georgetown LSRJ, Sandra Fluke, for her courage and commitment in the face of cruelty. Fluke is the Georgetown law student whose contraceptive access advocacy has been called into question with language that falls, as Fluke said in her press statement, “far beyond the acceptable bounds of civil discourse.” Such personal attacks are intended to shame women out of advocacy and into silence, but Fluke refuses to back down, ”No woman deserves to be disrespected in this manner. This language is an attack on all women, and has been used throughout history to silence our voices.”

Here’s an interesting factoid, per LSRJ: 

In 2010, LSRJ launched a funded legal fellowship program for current 3Ls and recent law school graduates interested in working to advance reproductive justice through policy advocacy. Following a tremendous response from students and advocates in the field, LSRJ successfully selected and placed six Reproductive Justice (RJ) Fellows with six organizations in Washington, D.C. for the 2010-11 fellowship year.

The RJFP is intended to enhance capacity at reproductive justice organizations working to influence law and policy and to build a pipeline for future reproductive justice lawyers. The RJ Fellows are each paid $50,000 plus benefits and placed with placement organizations in Washington, D.C. for a year-long program (running August to August) that includes mentoring, professional development, training, and networking opportunities.

Ms. Fluke’s activism doesn’t stop there.  Her profile on the Georgetown Public Interest Law Scholars 2012 Graduates Page shows that:

Sandra Fluke’s professional background in domestic violence and human trafficking began with Sanctuary for Families in New York City. There, she launched the agency’s pilot Program Evaluation Initiative. While at Sanctuary, she co-founded the New York Statewide Coalition for Fair Access to Family Court, which after a twenty-year stalemate, successfully advocated for legislation granting access to civil orders of protection for unmarried victims of domestic violence, including LGBTQ victims and teens. Sandra was also a member of the Manhattan Borough President’s Taskforce on Domestic Violence and numerous other New York City and New York State coalitions that successfully advocated for policy improvements impacting victims of domestic violence.

As the 2010 recipient of the Women Lawyers Association of Los Angeles Fran Kandel Public Interest Grant, she researched, wrote, and produced an instructional film on how to apply for a domestic violence restraining order in pro per. She has also interned with the Coalition to Abolish Slavery & Trafficking; Polaris Project; Neighborhood Legal Services of Los Angeles County; Break the Cycle; the Domestic Violence Legal Empowerment and Appeals Project; NOW Legal Defense and Education Fund; Crime Victim and Sexual Assault Services; and the Human Services Coalition of Tompkins County.

Through Georgetown’s clinic programs, Sandra has proposed legislation based on fact-finding in Kenya regarding child trafficking for domestic work, and has represented victims of domestic violence in protection order cases. Sandra is the Development Editor of the Journal of Gender and the Law, and served as the President of Law Students for Reproductive Justice, and the Vice President of the Women’s Legal Alliance. In her first year, she also co-founded a campus committee addressing human trafficking. Cornell University awarded her a B. S. in Policy Analysis & Management, as well as Feminist, Gender, & Sexuality Studies in 2003.

Whether an apology from Rush may or may not appease the “Moderate” Republicans and the Liberal Democrats, remains to be seen.

The fact of the matter is, Ms. Fluke is not some innocent co-ed.  She is a 30 year old professional student/activist, who was probably planted at Georgetown Law School to do exactly what she did.

She most certainly has an agenda.

Just a Fluke?

On By kingsjesterIn Politics6 Comments

President Barack Hussein Obama has stuck his nose into a political firestorm of his own device.

Reuters.com has the story:

President Barack Obama called a law student on Friday to express his support after she was branded a “slut” by controversial right-wing talk-show host Rush Limbaugh for her outspoken support of Obama’s new policy on contraception coverage.

Sandra Fluke, a 30-year old student and women’s rights activist at Georgetown University in Washington, has been caught in the middle of a contentious election-year fight between Obama and Republicans over the policy, which requires health insurance plans to cover contraception.

Religious-affiliated organizations, the Roman Catholic Church and social conservatives have protested Obama’s new policy as an infringement on religious liberty. An effort by Republicans in the Senate to overturn it failed this week.

House of Representatives Speaker John Boehner, the top Republican in Congress, distanced his party from Limbaugh’s comments. A spokesman for Boehner called them “inappropriate” in a statement that also criticized Democrats for using the issue to raise funds before the November 6 election.

Fluke has spoken out against the Republican effort to scrap the birth control policy and advocated making contraception available to all women, drawing fire from Limbaugh and some other conservative commentators.

In an interview, Fluke told Reuters she was initially hurt, then outraged by Limbaugh’s remarks, but said she hoped the incident had raised awareness about the new policy.

She said had received “an avalanche” of supportive emails from women and men around the United States, including many from women who said they needed contraception to respond to medical conditions such as seizures, not just to prevent pregnancy.

The president called “to offer his support and thank me for helping to make heard the voices of all the women who will benefit from this regulation,” Fluke said. “He just wanted to clearly express his distaste for the types of comments that have been made about me. He was very kind.”

White House spokesman Jay Carney said Obama thinks Limbaugh’s comments were reprehensible.

“It is disappointing that those kinds of personal and crude attacks could be leveled against someone like this young law school student, who was simply expressing her opinion on a matter of public policy,” Carney said.

On his program on Friday, Rush Limbaugh replied to this rapidly-escalating mess:

What can I do to the women of America?

Do I have the power to raise their taxes? I do not.

Do I have the power to regulate their behavior? I do not.

Do I have the power to make health care decisions for them? I do not.

Do I have the power to withhold birth control pills from them? I do not.

Do I have the power to audit their tax returns? I do not.

Do I have the power to take their little four-year-old kindergarten student’s lunch and throw it away and make ’em eat something else? I do not.

Do I have the power to look into their personal life and leak the information to the media? I do not.

Is there one bit of freedom that I can deny them? Can I raise their taxes?

They want to blame me as being the person they should fear, when in fact the people doing all these things I just said I have no power to do, the Democrat Party is doing. That’s who everybody’s afraid of in this country. You know that story about the four-year-old girl who had her lunch taken by the federal agent? When those stories happen, have you noticed the people involved don’t want their names known? Who are they afraid of? They’re afraid of Democrat Party. They’re afraid of the Obama administration. The Obama administration will take away your birth control, and if you let ’em do that, they’ll tell you when you can and can’t take it. And then they’ll tell you when you can and can’t have sex, and then they will tell you when you can or cannot have an abortion!

You give them this power, that’s what they want.

I can’t do any of this.

So, to recap, it turns out that the “sweet little co-ed” has turned out to be a 30 year old “Women’s Right’s” (i.e., Abortion) Activist, who entered Georgetown, a Catholic University, with a dual purpose:  to achieve notoriety and advance her political ideology.

Stepping back from all the “Who Shot John” and the P.T. Barnum-esque nature of this whole contentious media-driven exercise, starting with the opening salvo, i.e., the forcing of Catholic Hospitals to acquiesce to offer the “Holy Sacraments” (birth control pills and the morning after abortion pill) of the Obama Administration, I’m reminded of the words of one Karl Marx from A Contribution to the Critique of Hegel’s Philosophy of Right (December 1843-January 1844):

Religion is the sigh of the oppressed creature, the heart of a heartless world, and the soul of soulless conditions. It is the opium of the people.

The abolition of religion as the illusory happiness of the people is the demand for their real happiness. To call on them to give up their illusions about their condition is to call on them to give up a condition that requires illusions. The criticism of religion is, therefore, in embryo, the criticism of that vale of tears of which religion is the halo.

One of his most famous quotes was:

Religion is the opium of the masses.

He also said:

Anyone who knows anything of history knows that great social changes are impossible without feminine upheaval. Social progress can be measured exactly by the social position of the fair sex, the ugly ones included.

And, of course:

From each according to his abilities, to each according to his needs.

Evidently, Ms. Fluke is very needy.

Honoring Breitbart: Obama’s “Hahvahd” Years

On By kingsjesterIn Politics3 Comments

As I wrote yesterday, Conservative Blogger Andrew Breitbart passed away from a heart attack at the young age of 43, much too soon.

However, the very important and exciting project that he was working on when he died will be completed and brought to the American public by his loyal staff.

Mediate.com has the story:

On his program Thursday, Fox News’ Sean Hannity spoke with Steve Bannon (producer of The Undefeated, among various other films) about a series of tapes Andrew Breitbart claimed to have about Barack Obama. Breitbart mentioned the tapes during his recent CPAC speech, sharing that “[w]e are going to vet [Barack Obama] from his college days to show you why racial division and class warfare are central to what hope and change was sold in 2008.”

Bannon confirmed that there exists a series of tapes taken during Obama’s time at Harvard, which will be publicly released “in a week or two.” Breitbart has been “very systematic about going through this thing,” Bannon added.

Additionally, the late activist / media personality had been working around the clock on a new website slated to be launched this weekend.

Questions remain to this day, concerning this period of Obama’s life.  In order to gain some insight into Obama’s Harvard years, allow me to post this excerpt from my blog from July 1, 2010, “The Great Disconnect, Part 2: Columbia, Community Organizing, and Hahvahd”:

From 1985 – 1988, Obama was a Community Organizer in Chicago.  What does a Community Organizer do?  I’m glad you asked.

Per Byron York in an article found at nationalreview.com:

Community organizing is most identified with the left-wing Chicago activist Saul Alinsky (1909-72), who pretty much defined the profession. In his classic book, Rules for Radicals, Alinsky wrote that a successful organizer should be “an abrasive agent to rub raw the resentments of the people of the community; to fan latent hostilities of many of the people to the point of overt expressions.” Once such hostilities were “whipped up to a fighting pitch,” Alinsky continued, the organizer steered his group toward confrontation, in the form of picketing, demonstrating, and general hell-raising.

Obama was hired by Jerry Kellman, a New Yorker who had gotten into organizing in the 1960s.  Kellman was trying to help laid-off factory workers on the far South Side of Chicago, in a nearly 100% black community.   He led a group, the Calumet Community Religious Conference, that had been created by several local Catholic churches in the industrial community.   Kellman was advised to hire a black organizer for a new spinoff from CCRC.  They called it the Developing Communities Project, designed to focus solely on the Chicago part of the area.

One of Obama’s projects while he was there, was to try to build an alliance of white and black churches and enlist them in the cause of social justice.  Obama had a problem, though.   He didn’t go to church himself.   And that, brothers and sisters, is how Obama, drawn to the preaching of Rev. Jeremiah Wright (and a political opportunity), joined Trinity United Church of Christ on 95th Street.

If you ask Obama’s fellow Community Organizers what his most significant accomplishments were, they’ll say two things: the expansion of a city summer-job program for South Side teenagers and the removal of asbestos from one of the area’s oldest housing projects.   Those  were his biggest victories.

So, after 3 years of Community Organizing, Obama enrolled in Harvard Law School at the age of 27.  The question is:  How did he get the money for this?  In my article Why Haven’t I Heard of Khalid Al-Monsour? ,  I attempt to answer that question:

President Obama attended Harvard Law School from 1988 – 1991.  The average tuition during that time was $25,000 per year.  It would have cost $75,000 to attend there for 3 years.  As president of the Harvard Law Review, he received no stipend from the school, according to Harvard spokesman Mike Armini in a interview with Newsmax.

If numbers cited by the Obama Presidential Campaign for Scooter”s student loans are accurate, that means that Obama came up with more than $32,000 over three years from sources other than loans to pay for tuition, room and board.  Hmmmmm.

Along with the funding issue, very little is known about Obama’s time at Harvard Law School,and his sycophants in the Liberal hierarchy, Main Stream Media,  and even Harvard Law School Administrators have done a remarkable job in running interference against anyone trying to find out about it.

From Jodi Kantor’s article at nytimes.com:

He arrived there as an unknown, Afro-wearing community organizer who had spent years searching for his identity; by the time he left, he had his first national news media exposure, a book contract and a shot of confidence from running the most powerful legal journal in the country.

During his time at Harvard, Obama met and started dating Michelle Robinson, the future First Lady.  I don’t know if he was attracted to her arms or not.

He also managed to get himself elected the first black president of the Harvard Law Review.

Bruce Spiva, a former review editor who now practices civil rights law in Washington, said that the law review is:

fairly disconnected from the breadth and the rough and tumble of real politics.  It’s an election among a closed group. It’s more like electing a pope.

As the president of the review, Scooter had to walk a delicate line. He served on the board of the Black Law Students Association, often speaking passionately about the hot topic of the week, but in a way that would not make white classmates defensive.   He kept away from fiery rhetoric.  He even did a spot-on impersonation of the Rev. Jesse Jackson when he came to speak on campus, according to Franklin Amanat, now a federal prosecutor in Brooklyn.  Obama’s  brashest public speaking moment came at a rally for faculty diversity, where he compared Professor Derrick Bell, who had resigned after agitating for greater faculty diversity,  to Rosa Parks.

Most of the time, young Scooter stayed away from the fiery rhetoric of campus debate, choosing safer topics for his speeches. At the black law students’ annual conference, he fervently told students to remember the obligations that came with their privileged education.

Barack Hussein Obama graduated Summa Cum Laude from Harvard Law School.  We don’t know anything about his actual courses or grades.   The records have been sealed.

Hopefully, Breitbart’s posthumous expose will provide more insight into this un-vetted disaster of a president, which American continue to have to endure.

Breitbart: Shining a Light Into the Darkness

On By kingsjesterIn Politics10 Comments

I am a Christian Conservative Blogger.  I do not get paid for writing.  I wish I did.  Under God’s watch, perhaps some day, I will be.

I only wish that I could touch as many Americans’ lives as the Conservative Blogger whom we lost yesterday did.

Fox News has the story:

Widely read conservative Internet publisher Andrew Breitbart, whose flare for battle with politicians and the mainstream media earned him a reputation as one of the nation’s most influential commentators, died Thursday.

The websites he founded ran a statement Thursday morning announcing that Breitbart, 43, died “unexpectedly from natural causes” in Los Angeles shortly after midnight. His attorney and editor-in-chief of those sites confirmed his death to Fox News.

“We have lost a husband, a father, a son, a brother, a dear friend, a patriot and a happy warrior,” the statement said. “Andrew lived boldly, so that we more timid souls would dare to live freely and fully, and fight for the fragile liberty he showed us how to love.”

Breitbart was a prolific commentator who founded several websites devoted to covering politics, entertainment and everything in-between. Earlier in his career, he worked for the Drudge Report before breaking off to start his own outlets — including Big Government, Big Hollywood and Breitbart.tv.

The statement on his sites quoted the concluding passage from his book, Righteous Indignation.

“I love my job. I love fighting for what I believe in. I love having fun while doing it. I love reporting stories that the Complex refuses to report. I love fighting back, I love finding allies, and — famously — I enjoy making enemies. Three years ago, I was mostly a behind-the-scenes guy who linked to stuff on a very popular website. I always wondered what it would be like to enter the public realm to fight for what I believe in. I’ve lost friends, perhaps dozens. But I’ve gained hundreds, thousands — who knows? — of allies. At the end of the day, I can look at myself in the mirror, and I sleep very well at night,” Breitbart wrote.

The statement ended: “Andrew is at rest, yet the happy warrior lives on, in each of us.”

It has since been found out, as published by The Hollywood Reporter, after his death, that Breitbart spent the last hour of his life taking politics in a LA bar named The Brentwood.

There, he struck up a conversation with Arthur Sando, a marketing executive who didn’t know Breitbart but likely was the last person to talk extensively with him before he died.

In an interview with The Hollywood Reporter, Sando says he arrived at the bar in the tony Brentwood section of L.A. around 10 p.m. and soon the empty seat next to his was filled by a man with a familiar face.

“I tried to figure out how I knew him,” says Sando, a veteran publicity and marketing executive who works for dietary supplement company MonaVie and has worked at CBS, King World Prods and Turner Broadcasting. “He was on his BlackBerry. And I said ‘Andrew?’ I told him I had seen his work.”

Sando says the duo quickly struck up a conversation that would last a little less than two hours.

“He was friendly and engaging,” Sando recalls. “I said, ‘You can’t be very happy with the slate of Republican candidates’ and he said, ‘Why would you say that?’ I said, ‘Well, they’re talking about contraception,’ and he said, ‘The conversation is being framed by the liberal media.’ I said, ‘Well, the media isn’t writing Rick Santorum’s speeches for him.’ We had a back-and-forth for awhile until we said we weren’t going to agree on some things.”

The friendly debate continued in the bar as Breitbart sipped red wine, says Sando. “We just hit it off, he was delightful. There were other people who sat down and joined the conversation.”

Sando also mentioned that he hadn’t seen Breitbart as a guest on HBO’s Real Time With Bill Maher recently; Breitbart told Sando he enjoyed going on Maher’s show because it taught him how to deal with a hostile audience and how to react when getting booed.

Breitbart had stopped in for a drink but wasn’t there to meet anyone in particular, Sando says. Nor were there any signs of health or other problems.

“He wasn’t drinking excessively,” Sando recalls. “He was on his BlackBerry a lot.”

After the two hours, Breitbart said he was leaving. “We exchanged contact information,” Sando says. “We were going to get together.”

Sando says he was “shocked” to read Thursday morning that Breitbart, who had a history of heart problems, had collapsed while on a walk near his home in the same neighborhood as the bar. Breitbart was rushed to a hospital and pronounced dead at 12:19 a.m., according to Reuters, less than an hour after leaving The Brentwood.

The exact cause of death has not been revealed but initial reports said it was natural causes.

“There were no signs that anything was wrong,” says Sando. “It’s very sad.”

That is an understatement.  Breitbart had made an unbelievable impact on the Internet since launching his “Big” websites.  And while, Tweets, e-mails, and articles expressing sympathy and grief reverberated across the Worldwide Web, classless Liberals were celebrating Breitbart’s passing by issuing vile, repulsive messages, which I refuse to repeat here.

Andrew Breitbart left a legacy of fearless, righteous reporting and “telling it like it is”.  If he were still here, he would be calling those clueless Liberals out on their hyena-like behavior.  And he would probably write something like…

Isn’t it funny how those who claim to be the most tolerant among us and actually the least tolerant of all?

RIP Andrew Breitbart.  Thank you for shining the light and making the cockroaches scurry for cover.

Santorum/Romney: The Country Mouse and the City Mouse

On By kingsjesterIn Politics2 Comments

I’m sick and tired of reading posters on Conservative websites and hearing from contributors on the Cable News Channels, including Fox News, pushing the idea that the Republican Primary is done, Mitt Romney is the winner, and there is no need for any more states to participate in the Republican Primary.

Rush Limbaugh (per usual) had a spot-on take on this on his Wednesday program:

…Oh, no, no, no. It’s not time to put a stop to it, anoint anybody and say that we’re done. Newt’s not getting out. He’s gonna stay in through Super Tuesday. That’s where he’s got all of his money banked. This thing could go on as far as May. Santorum’s not going anywhere. Santorum doesn’t have a lot of money even now. Romney outspent Santorum six to one in Michigan. I mean just some facts about Michigan. Romney won by nine points in 2008. He won by three points last night but got more votes last night than he did in 2008. But the percentage of his victory in 2008 was nine. It was three points last night. Santorum — and this is preliminary, I’ve gotta double-check this all, but this is what I have now — Santorum won 57 out of 83 counties.

As of now, Santorum, who lost the popular vote, won because of the way delegates are apportioned. Seven of the 14 congressional districts, Romney has won six. So that’s seven and six, a total 13 out of 14. One is still too close to call. Now, according to what I’m told, the 28 delegates, of those 28 delegates in Michigan, Santorum will either win 14 or 15, something like that, the way things get apportioned because of the number of delegates and counties, districts, so forth and he won in Michigan. So it’s not winner-take-all. So when you ask me if I should pronounce it over, it’s not my job to do that anyway.

I think the weakness that Romney has is not the conservatives won’t show up in November. They will. They want Obama out, and that will override everything. The problem is with the Reagan Democrats, the white working class that Obama lost in 2008 by I think about eight or ten points. You’ve gotta win that by 20 points, and you can do that. Some of the Republican candidates in theory could do that. Romney is weak with that segment. He knows it. That’s why he tries to do the everything and he keeps tripping over himself. If he wins that constituency, he wins the presidency, but that’s where he’s gotta work.He is just not all that good a candidate. So here are the numbers: Romney won by nine in 2008; he won 41-38 or three points last night.

Santorum won 57 out of 83 counties. That’s an incredible percentage, and it reminds me of the map of the United States, red and blue by county, when you look at that after a presidential race. The whole country is red (signifying Republican) except LA, San Francisco, Seattle, Miami, Washington, New York, Boston, Chicago and Detroit. The Republicans win 80% of America’s counties and lose the White House. Santorum won 57 out of 83 counties. And, as of now, Santorum, while losing the popular vote, has won seven of the 14 congressional districts; Romney won six; there’s still one at least right now (earlier this morning it was one) still too close to call. This means that, of those 28 delegates, Santorum will either win 14 (if the last district goes to Romney) and 16 if Santorum wins the last district.

So the delegate count from those 28 will be either a 14-14 tie or 16-12 Santorum.

The way that the state of Michigan was divided between the two candidates is a metaphor for the political blood bath currently going on between Conservatives and “Mitt Romney supporters” (which seems to encompass everyone from “Fiscal Conservatives” to Ron Paul tin foil hat wearing nutjobs) .

This whole primary battle reminds me of Aesop’s Fable  “The Country Mouse and the City Mouse”:

There once was a mouse who liked his country house until his cousin came for a visit.

“In the city where I live,” his cousin said, “we dine on cheese and fish and bread. Each night my dinner is brought to me. I eat whatever I choose. While you, country cousin, work your paws to the bone for humble crumbs in this humble home. I’m used to finery. To each his own, I see!”

Upon hearing this, the country mouse looked again at his plain brown house. Suddenly he wasn’t satisfied anymore. “Why should I hunt and scrape for food to store?” he said. “Cousin, I’m coming to the city with you!”

Off they went into the fine town house of the plump and prosperous city mouse.

“Shhh! The people are in the parlor,” the city mouse said. “Let’s sneak into the kitchen for some cheese and bread.”

The city mouse gave his wide-eyed country cousin a grand tour of the leftover food on the table. “It’s the easy life,” the city mouse said, and he smiled as he bit into a piece of bread.

Just as they were both about to bite into a chunk of cheddar cheese, In came the CAT!

“Run! Run!” said the city mouse. “The cat’s in the house!”

Just as the country mouse scampered for his life out of the window, he said, “Cousin, I’m going back to the country! You never told me that a CAT lives here! Thank you, but I’ll take my humble crumbs in comfort over all of your finery with fear!”

Conservatives, like myself, can identify with the Country Mouse.

We would rather hold on to our ethics and values, than compromise and elect a Left-leaning Moderate who will “reach across the aisle” to shake hands with Liberals.  

We feel that, if we elect a Conservative candidate, we won’t have to spend time worrying about the knifes that the Liberals are holding behind their backs with the other hand.

R.I.P. Davy Jones – December 30, 1945 – February 29, 2012

On By kingsjesterIn Entertainment3 Comments

I remember it as if it was yesterday.  I was 8 years old, and this cool new television show was coming on.

It was about the adventures of an American Rock ‘n Roll Band, who lived in a beachfront house and drove a GTO convertible.  I mean, what could be cooler than that?

The guys were all American boys, except for one little short feller.  This guy quickly became one of the biggest teen idols of all time. The girls, old and young, went nuts for him.

And on top of that, he sang with such a pure voice, you just knew that he had some training, somewhere.

And now, today, some 46 years later, I found out that he has passed away from a heart attack…much too soon.  You guessed it.  The band was The Monkees.  The man was Davy Jones.

Here’s some information you may not know about him, courtesy of Biography.com:

…A member of the Monkees, Davy Jones became a popular teen idol of the late 1960s. He started his acting career at the age of 11, winning a role on the popular British soap opera Coronation Street.

For a time, Jones trained to become a jockey but he gave it up to perform in the theater. He played the Artful Dodger in a London production of the musical Oliver! In 1963, Jones reprised the role for his Broadway debut. He received a Tony Award nomination for his performance that same year.

Jones landed a few television guest appearances and other roles before getting his big break. Along with Michael Nesmith, Peter Tork, and Mickey Dolenz, he was selected for a new television series about a rock group modeled after the Beatles. The Monkees debuted in September 1966 and audiences adored the humorous antics of this manufactured band. Jones especially attracted a lot of attention from fans for his charm and boyish good looks.

It wasn’t long before the Monkees scored on the music charts. Their version of Neil Diamond’s “I’m a Believer” and “Last Train to Clarksville” were their first number one hits. More successful singles followed, including another Neil Diamond tune, “Little Bit Me, Little Bit You,” Gerry Goffin and Carole King’s “Pleasant Valley Sunday”, and “Daydream Believer” by John Stewart of the Kingston Trio. Their albums sold millions of copies.

The Monkees even starred in their own feature film, Head (1968). Unfortunately for the so-called Pre-Fab Four, it was a dud at the box office. That same year, their series was canceled and Tork left the group. Jones and the remaining members soldiered on for a while, releasing 1969’s Instant Replay before splitting up.

After the Monkees, Jones continued acting and singing. He released a self-titled album in 1971. That same year, Jones made a memorable appearance on the hit family sitcom The Brady Bunch as himself. He was teenager Marsha Brady’s dream date for the prom. Jones had guest roles on a number of other shows, trading in on his popularity as a teen idol.

Returning to music, Jones teamed up with Dolenz and former Monkees songwriters Tommy Boyce and Bobby Hart. They released one album together in 1976, which failed to make much of an impression on the music buying public.

There was a renewed interest in the Monkees, however, in the 1980s. Some of their original recordings returned to the charts and Dolenz, Tork, and Jones reunited for a concert tour in 1986. That same year, the group released a greatest hits collection, Then and Now, which featured a new track, “That Was Then, This Is Now.” Reruns of the group’s series started airing on MTV in 1987, giving the band even more of a boost. That same year, the Monkees released the album Pool It!

Nesmith returned to the group in the mid-1990s for a successful tour and a new album, 1996’s Justus. While the new recording failed to make the charts, the Monkees previous albums have remained strong sellers over the years. The Best of the Monkees reached number 51 on the Billboard 200 chart in 2003.

Outside of his activities with the Monkees, Jones continued to act. He had a cameo in The Brady Bunch Movie (1995) and appeared on such shows as Boy Meets World, The Single Guy, and Sabrina, the Teenage Witch. On the London stage, Jones appeared in Oliver!—this time around playing Fagin. He also starred in a revival of Godspell as Jesus.

Known for his wit and warm sense of humor, Jones wrote several autobiographies, including 1987’s They Made a Monkee Out of Me. He also owned several thoroughbred race horses. Music, however, has remained his main passion. He has recorded several solo albums, including 2001’s Just Me.

In his later years, Jones spent much of the year on tour with his band. He released a collection of his most requested songs entitledIncredible Revisited in 2008. Jones also made numerous personal appearances to meet up with fans and participated in a number of sporting events for charity.

In 2009, Davy Jones was named Number 2 of the list of All Time Best Teen Idols

Active until the end, Jones died today of a heart attack, in Florida, at the age of 66.  He is survived by his wife Jessica; his four daughters from previous relationships, Annabel, Talia, Jessica, and Sarah; and several grandchildren.

As somebody who carried a Monkees lunch box to Elementary School and had a toy Monkeemobile in his bedroom, I just want to say thank you, Davy, for all those evenings I spent glued to the television and all of those hours I spent listening to my Monkees albums.

One of my step-sons gave me the Essential Monkees CD for Christmas, a few years ago.  I think I will go listen to it.

The Obama Administration: Using the Military as Guinea Pigs

On By kingsjesterIn Politics9 Comments

In my recent post, Moochelle and Her Food Police Strike Again, I brought you information concerning the First Lady’s efforts to make our Best and Brightest eat like a bunch of rabbits:

In an event at Little Rock Air Force Base, Obama announced a new Pentagon obesity and nutritional awareness campaign that will change nutrition standards across the services for the first time in 20 years.

The changes will bring more fruits, vegetables, whole grains and food choices that are lower in fat to 1.45 million troops a day at all 1,100 American military dining facilities in the coming months.

“This isn’t just a drop in the bucket – this is really a big splash,” Obama said.

“It’s happening because our military leaders know it’s not just a diet issue, it’s not just a health issue. This is truly a national security issue,” she said at the base, which already has a pilot program to improve nutritional quality of food available to service members and their families.

Moochelle and her Food Police are wasting no time implementing their new diet restrictions and using our Fighting Men and Women as guinea pigs (again).

CNSNews.com has the story:

During a panel discussion Thursday on how government can promote healthy eating habits, the U.S. Army touted its mess hall labeling system that places warning on desserts and fried foods.

The event, held at the Bipartisan Policy Center in Washington, saw Lt. Col. Sonya Cable highlight the “Go for Green” program, which labels healthy foods green, moderate foods amber, and high calorie foods red.

The nutrition education program alerts soldiers that “red” foods like bacon and apple pie should only be eaten rarely, with a warning: “limit intake.” Foods labeled green, however, such as mustard greens, are deemed “premium fuel for the soldier athlete,” “fresh and flavorful” and “nutrient dense.” Soldiers are advised to eat these frequently.

Cable represents the U.S. Army Soldier Fueling Initiative, which is remaking dining facilities at Initial Military Training sites across the country. She currently serves as a dietitian and the Chief of the Human Dimensions Division within the Initial Military Training Center of Excellence.

During the panel discussion she advised using the “red, amber, green” system in public schools too.

“My eyes got opened very quickly that it really is a community,” she said, about her visit to Fort Jackson, S.C. seven years ago to observe its dining facilities. “We talk about a village that raises a child. Well a community develops a brand new soldier, too. And that’s what we found there.”

“When I got there our dining facilities were typical dining facility type styles, you know, the fried foods, salad bars existed,” Cable continued.

“We had soda machines and the pastries were, you know, typical cookies, cake, cakes, pies, all of those types of things. Well, then we had the challenge of, okay, now we’re taking former civilians, now developing into soldiers and trying to develop them,” she said. This was the beginning of the Soldier Fueling Initiative and Cable’s efforts to influence the behavior of new recruits.

If you walk into a basic training cafeteria today you will find far fewer fried foods and soda machines have been replaced with “hydration stations,” she explained.

“In the military we all kind of know red means, ‘uh oh, there’s problems,’” Cable said. “Amber, middle of the road, we’re doing okay. And green is good to go, all is right. We took that same concept and we applied it to our menus.”

For instance, the program’s Recipe Nutrition Analysis lists pies, cookies, cakes, éclairs, and banana splits as “red” foods – highest in calories and lowest in vitamins and minerals.

Posters and placards encourage soldiers to opt instead for such “green” desserts as baked bananas and fruit cups.

“All the foods are labeled throughout the serving line so that our soldiers would be informed as to making choices related to their performance goals,” Cable said.

“I had some folks say to me, ‘Well, why on earth did you even include the red ones to begin with?’ Two reasons – one, we’ve got soldiers who have racehorse metabolisms that they needed every calorie I could get into them. And by taking off the ‘red’ we just found that we couldn’t get enough calories in them.”

The second reason for including “red” foods, Cable said, was “so they could learn what contributed positively and maybe what contributed negatively. Not to say that every food is bad, it’s just how they fit into your performance goals.”

So, within a year’s time, the Obama Administration has ended Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell, laid out a plan to cut our military’s health insurance, and now, they won’t even let them have a Coca-Cola.

Why does Obama and his Administration hate our Best and Brightest?

Romney: Meet the New Mod, Same as the Old Mod

On By kingsjesterIn Politics3 Comments

Republican Candidate for his party’s nomination, Mitt Romney, stuck his foot in his mouth again today.  Or was it intentional?

Here’s the quote from talkingpointsmemo.com:

It’s very easy to excite the base with incendiary comments. We’ve seen throughout the campaign if you’re willing to say really outrageous things that are accusative, attacking of President Obama, that you’re going to jump up in the polls. I’m not willing to light my hair on fire to try and get support. I am who I am. I’m a person with extensive experience in the private sector, in the economy.

Conservative Talk Show King Rush Limbaugh had an excellent observation about Mitt’s latest gaffe:

All right. Gosh, these guys are making it so hard for me. So Romney’s not willing to say “incendiary” things about Obama to excite the base. Well, what does he say? Nice guy, just in over his head. What does this tell you that Romney thinks of the base? That it takes incendiary comments to turn you on. That all you want is somebody beating up on Obama. Somebody to come along and beat up Obama or set their hair on fire to get attention, something like that, and that’s all you care about. And maybe not all you care about, but that’s what really gets you off your duff. And Mitt Romney says, “I have got extensive experience in the private sector. I am not gonna criticize Obama.” If he’s not careful, you know how we joke about John Kerry, who, by the way, served in Vietnam — been pointing that out now for eight years — it isn’t gonna be long before everybody’s gonna say, “Mitt Romney, who had extensive experience in the private sector.”

Look, Romney people, you got to know, I love you. But I’m not the one saying what he’s saying. I did not raise the white flag in Michigan today. I didn’t say I’m not gonna say incendiary things just to attract the base. At least McCain waited until the general campaign to make it clear that anybody criticizing Obama would be fired. Here it’s happening in the primary. I’m not gonna make any incendiary comments to attract the base. I have extensive experience in the private sector. Obama can say whatever he wants about us and does, and the media can, and we’re not talking about incendiary, we’re talking about truth, I thought.

I’m getting this strange feeling of deja vu…all over again.  

And here’s the proof, courtesy of The Wall Street Journal, in an article posted June 5, 2008:

Barack Obama and John McCain spoke on the phone Wednesday night and agreed to engage in a “civil discussion in the campaign moving forward,” according to an Obama aide.

McCain initiated the call at 7:00pm EDT to congratulate Obama on securing the nomination after a hard-fought primary against Hillary Clinton.

This is the first time the opponents have spoken since Obama clinched the number of delegates needed to capture the nomination on Tuesday.

As of now, Obama and McCain have exchanged rhetoric that by most counts would not be characterized as “civil.” Obama has come down on his Republican rival over a gaffe he made about troop levels and has accused him of not understanding the economy. McCain, meanwhile, has attacked the Democratic nominee over his lack of foreign policy experience and his willingness to meet with leaders of rogue nations.

During his victory rally in St. Paul, Minn., on Tuesday, Obama praised McCain for his military service and said he is “a genuine American hero.” But criticized him for offering “four more years of the failed Bush policies.”

McCain has called for a series of ten joint town hall style meetings with Obama. The Illinois senator is also open to the proposal of joint appearances, and the two campaigns are in talks.

“The American people deserve a debate worthy of their concerns and hopes for the future. Everyone can celebrate today’s step toward that goal with an agreement, in spirit, between the McCain and Obama campaigns to participate in joint town hall appearances,” McCain spokeswoman Jill Hazelbaker said in a statement.

Back on January 19, 2012 at the CNN Republican Candidate Debate, Romney said:

And — well, let’s see. I guess — I guess I also would go back and take every moment I spent talking about one of the guys on the stage and spent that time talking about Barack Obama because…the — the truth is that — that Barack Obama is just way over his head and he’s taking our country down a path that is very dangerous. He’s making us more and more like a European social welfare state. He’s making us an entitlement society. He’s taking away the rights of our citizens. He believes government should run this country.

Look, the right course for America is to return to our fundamental principles, and I would be talking about that more, and probably about my colleagues less because frankly, any one of them would be a better president than the one we’ve got.

Gov. Romney is right about one thing:  America needs to return to our fundamental principles.  However, in order to accomplish that, we will need a leader who will fight to restore them, not stick his finger up in the air to determine from which direction the wind is blowing, before he makes a presidential decision.

And, we need a Republican Candidate who will fight to win the Presidency.

We already tried nominating a Moderate in 2008….and we all remember how that fiasco turned out.

Obama to Cut Troops’ Health Insurance

On By kingsjesterIn Politics7 Comments

Remember when we had a Commander in Chief who actually cared about our Best and Brightest?

Here’s a reminder:

From The Washington Times, 12/22/2008

For much of the past seven years, President Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney have waged a clandestine operation inside the White House. It has involved thousands of military personnel, private presidential letters and meetings that were kept off their public calendars or sometimes left the news media in the dark.

Their mission: to comfort the families of soldiers who died fighting in Afghanistan and Iraq since the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks and to lift the spirits of those wounded in the service of their country.

On Monday, the president is set to make a more common public trip – with reporters in tow – to Walter Reed Army Medical Center, home to many of the wounded and a symbol of controversy earlier in his presidency over the quality of care the veterans were receiving.

But the size and scope of Mr. Bush’s and Mr. Cheney’s private endeavors to meet with wounded soliders and families of the fallen far exceed anything that has been witnessed publicly, according to interviews with more than a dozen officials familiar with the effort.

“People say, ‘Why would you do that?’” the president said in an Oval Office interview with The Washington Times on Friday. “And the answer is: This is my duty. The president is commander in chief, but the president is often comforter in chief, as well. It is my duty to be – to try to comfort as best as I humanly can a loved one who is in anguish.”

Mr. Bush, for instance, has sent personal letters to the families of every one of the more than 4,000 troops who have died in the two wars, an enormous personal effort that consumed hours of his time and escaped public notice. The task, along with meeting family members of troops killed in action, has been so wrenching – balancing the anger, grief and pride of families coping with the loss symbolized by a flag-draped coffin – that the president often leaned on his wife, Laura, for emotional support.

“I lean on the Almighty and Laura,” Mr. Bush said in the interview. “She has been very reassuring, very calming.”

Mr. Bush also has met privately with more than 500 families of troops killed in action and with more than 950 wounded veterans, according to White House spokesman Carlton Carroll. Many of those meetings were outside the presence of the news media at the White House or at private sessions during official travel stops, officials said.

In contrast, this administration seems to view America’s Fighting Men and Women as nothing more that lab rats to be apologized for and jacked around with.

You’re not going to believe this.

The Washington Free Beacon has the story:

The Obama administration’s proposed defense budget calls for military families and retirees to pay sharply more for their healthcare, while leaving unionized civilian defense workers’ benefits untouched. The proposal is causing a major rift within the Pentagon, according to U.S. officials. Several congressional aides suggested the move is designed to increase the enrollment in Obamacare’s state-run insurance exchanges.

The disparity in treatment between civilian and uniformed personnel is causing a backlash within the military that could undermine recruitment and retention.

The proposed increases in health care payments by service members, which must be approved by Congress, are part of the Pentagon’s $487 billion cut in spending. It seeks to save $1.8 billion from the Tricare medical system in the fiscal 2013 budget, and $12.9 billion by 2017.

Many in Congress are opposing the proposed changes, which would require the passage of new legislation before being put in place.

“We shouldn’t ask our military to pay our bills when we aren’t willing to impose a similar hardship on the rest of the population,” Rep. Howard “Buck” McKeon, chairman of the House Armed Services Committee and a Republican from California, said in a statement to the Washington Free Beacon. “We can’t keep asking those who have given so much to give that much more.”

Administration officials told Congress that one goal of the increased fees is to force military retirees to reduce their involvement in Tricare and eventually opt out of the program in favor of alternatives established by the 2010 Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, aka Obamacare.

“When they talked to us, they did mention the option of healthcare exchanges under Obamacare. So it’s in their mind,” said a congressional aide involved in the issue.

Military personnel from several of the armed services voiced their opposition to a means-tested tier system for Tricare, prompting Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. Martin Dempsey to issue a statement Feb. 21.

Dempsey said the military is making tough choices in cutting defense spending. In addition to the $487 billion over 10 years, the Pentagon is facing automatic cuts that could push the total reductions to $1 trillion.

“I want those of you who serve and who have served to know that we’ve heard your concerns, in particular your concern about the tiered enrollment fee structure for Tricare in retirement,” Dempsey said. “You have our commitment that we will continue to review our health care system to make it as responsive, as affordable, and as equitable as possible.”

Under the new plan, the Pentagon would get the bulk of its savings by targeting under-65 and Medicare-eligible military retirees through a tiered increase in annual Tricare premiums that will be based on yearly retirement pay.

Significantly, the plan calls for increases between 30 percent to 78 percent in Tricare annual premiums for the first year. After that, the plan will impose five-year increases ranging from 94 percent to 345 percent—more than 3 times current levels.

According to congressional assessments, a retired Army colonel with a family currently paying $460 a year for health care will pay $2,048.

The new plan hits active duty personnel by increasing co-payments for pharmaceuticals and eliminating incentives for using generic drugs.

This is no way to treat the brave men and women who keep our country free.

Mr. President, you and your Administration should be ashamed of yourselves.

But…you aren’t.