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FEBRUARY 7,  2014

SHORT TAKES ON THE DRIFTING WRECKAGE – AT 9:44 P.M. ET: 

WHOOPS – From Reuters:  "SOCHI, Russia - In what appeared to be a technical hitch during the opening ceremony at the Winter Olympics in the Russian city of Sochi on Friday, one of the five rings that make up the Games' symbol failed to open.  The apparent failure meant the ring could not be illuminated by fireworks as had happened during rehearsals."  The Obama administration blamed BUSH! and CHENEY!!.

SOME RECOVERY – From CNS:  "1,154,000 fewer Americans are working today than six years ago, according to data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics.  In January 2008, 146,378,000 Americans 16 and over were employed, and now in January 2014, 145,224,000 are employed, a difference of 1,154,000."  And remember that the total population has expanded since 2008.  What a pathetic record for this great nation.  Has Obama noticed?  Does he care?

HUH? – From the Daily Caller:  "The Department of Homeland Security is already preparing to implement immigration reform legislation, according to DHS Secretary Jeh Johnson.  'When reform legislation is enacted, DHS must be prepared to implement reform. So to prepare for this potential outcome, I have already directed the deputy director of homeland security to coordinate the process to ensure we are ready to implement the law,' Johnson said Friday at the Woodrow Wilson International Center, during his first major policy address since becoming DHS’s fourth secretary."  Isn't Homeland Security about defending the homeland and protecting our borders?  Aren't those the first priorities?  Maybe I'm misinformed.  Someone correct me.

YOUR TAX DOLLARS AT WORK – From the Weekly Standard:  "Documents recently released by the government show that the value of hotels and local transportation contracts for the U.S. delegation to Nelson Mandela's funeral in December were considerably higher than previous estimates. On December 19, we first reported the cost at about $11 million. However, rather than two hotels and one vehicle contractor, additional contracts have been disclosed bringing the total to five hotels and two vehicle contractors.  The transportation contracts include passenger vehicles, SUVs, vans, buses, pickup trucks, box trucks, and 'larger capacity vehicles,' but do not include the cost of traveling from the U.S. to South Africa and back. The combined total estimated cost of the two contracts is $12,521,851."  Well, we had money left over from the Margaret Thatcher funeral, which the Obama administration barely attended at all.

February 7,  2014     Permalink

SOCHI – AT 9:52 A.M. ET:  The Olympics formally begin in Sochi, Russia, today.  (Actually, some events have already been held.)  The Russians are trying to assure the world that, hey, Sochi is just as safe as your backyard.  From Fox:

Just hours before the start of the opening ceremony in the Sochi Winter Olympics, senior Russian government officials insisted security fears are unfounded -- practically guaranteeing it has done everything possible to make sure the games are as safe as possible.

Dmitry Kozak, a Russian deputy prime minister, told reporters in Sochi that Russian security forces were working with colleagues from Europe and North America to minimize the risk of a terrorist attack at the games, which officially started on Thursday, Sky News reported.

"There is no reason to believe that the level of danger in Sochi is greater than at any other point on the planet, be it Boston, London, New York or Washington," he was quoted as saying.

Really sensitive, isn't he?  The Boston Marathon was hit just last year.  London, New York, and Washington were the scenes of some of the worst terror attacks thus far in this century.

IOC President Thomas Bach said Friday that things are going smoothly in Sochi with only a "small hiccup here or there" heading into Friday night's opening ceremony.

The International Olympic Committee held its first daily coordination commission meeting Friday with Sochi organizers to review operations.

COMMENT:  Our fingers are crossed.  Groups in Russia have pledged to attack during the Olympics.  We hope they don't honor their pledges.

February 7, 2014       Permalink

REVOLT – AT 9:27 A.M. ET:  There is a revolt underway in Eric Holder's Justice Department, and for good reason.  This is the most radical, politicized Justice Department in memory.   And it is racialist.  From Powerline:

First it was the Justice Department’s career prosecutors; now it’s FBI agents. The federal employees responsible for fighting crime are simply unable to digest the anti-law enforcement slop being served up by their boss, Attorney General Holder.

The FBI’s beef is with the selection of Debo Adegbile as Assistant Attorney General for the Civil Rights Division. The FBI Agents Association’s opposition is based on the way in which Adegbile defended, and led the cheers for, cop killer Mumia Abu-Jamal.

The problem isn’t that Adegbile defended Abu-Jamal. The problem, as Bill Otis explains, is that Adegbile led a street campaign to denounce the policeman Abu-Jamal killed, Officer Daniel Faulkner, and the police in general, as an occupying fascist army.

Accordingly the FBI Agents Association (FBIAA) has communicated its opposition to Adegbile’s nomination to Vice President Biden, Attorney General Holder, and the members of the Senate Judiciary Committee. Unfortunately, that Committee today approved the nomination 10-8 in a straight party line vote.

The FBIAA’s views are destined to fall on deaf ears both among Senate Democrats and at the Attorney General’s office. That’s probably because deep down the Democratic left’s view of the police isn’t much different from the contemptible portrayal offered by the man Holder has tapped to be Assistant Attorney General.

COMMENT:  It's sickening.  The widow of Officer Faulkner asked to testify against the nomination before the Senate Judiciary Committee, but the committee chairman, ultra-liberal Patrick Leahy of the People's Republic of Vermont, turned her down.   Isn't the usual practice, y'know.

I'd hoped there might be some courage in the Democratic Party.  It was a vain hope.  The party is under the control of the political left.  This nomination, though, is a step too far.  It is an insult to the American people.

By the way, the situation is just as bad in the civil rights division of the Department of Education, a division run by one Russlynn Ali, a radical leftist feminist who runs the division as a private grievance committee for certain groups only.  It's not too safe to be a male or a committed Christian on an American college campus today.

The term "un-American" applies to the conduct of this administration.

February 7, 2014      Permalink 

LATEST POLLS – AT 9:08 A.M. ET:  Two polls show that the GOP drive to take the Senate won't be a cakewalk.  From The Hill:

A new survey of the Kentucky Senate race shows Democrat Alison Lundergan Grimes leading both Republicans in the race, though it remains a tight battle nine months out from Election Day.

The Bluegrass Poll, conducted for WKYT-TV, the Lexington Herald-Leader, the Louisville Courier-Journal, and WHAS-TV, finds the Kentucky secretary of State taking 46 percent support to Sen. Mitch McConnell’s 42 percent among registered Kentucky voters.  McConnell’s Republican primary challenger, Matt Bevin, fares similarly, taking 38 percent to Lundergan Grimes’ 43 percent support.

Mitch McConnell is, of course, the Senate minority leader.  We cannot afford the loss of any Republican seats this year in the effort to take the Senate.  We need seven pickups, period.  Another Republican Senate seat in jeopardy is in Georgia.  Saxby Chambliss is retiring, and the Dems are featuring the daughter of popular, former Senator Sam Nunn.  The Republican candidates for the GOP nomination are not lighting any fires.

And in Arkansas, from Rasmussen: 

Congressman Tom Cotton holds a five-point lead over incumbent Democrat Mark Pryor in Rasmussen Reports’ first look at the 2014 U.S. Senate race in Arkansas.

A new statewide survey of Likely Arkansas Voters finds Cotton with 45% support to Pryor’s 40%. Five percent (5%) like some other candidate in the race, and 10% are undecided.

Pryor is a decent and well-regarded Democratic senator, but Tom Cotton, our guy, is superb.  I'd hoped he'd be more than five points ahead in Arkansas, a very red state.  Maybe the issue right now is name recognition.  We'll watch this closely.  It's not in the bag.

February 7, 2014       Permalink

PATHETIC – AT 8:52 A.M. ET:  From Fox: 

The U.S. economy added just 113,000 jobs in January, a small improvement over December’s disappointing report but not nearly enough to signal a much-needed rebound in the increasingly unpredictable U.S. labor market.

The headline unemployment rate was 6.6%, according to figures released by the U.S. Labor Department, down from 6.7% in the prior month.

The labor participation rate, a key gauge of the percentage of working-age Americans currently employed, was 63%, up from 62.8% in December.

Economists had forecast the addition of 185,000 jobs and that the unemployment rate would hold steady at 6.7%.

COMMENT:  This is awful.  We had hoped that last month's embarrassing jobs-creation number was an aberration, but apparently it was not.  We've noted here before that the United States must create 150,000 jobs a month just to keep up with population growth.  We're not even coming close to that.

Of course, we all know that this is Bush's fault.

February 7,  2014     Permalink

FEBRUARY 6,  2014

SHORT TAKES ON THE DRIFTING WRECKAGE – AT 11:31 P.M. ET: 

THE POST OFFICE? – From Fox:  "The perpetually-struggling U.S. Postal Service has bankers in a tizzy after floating a plan to branch into what it called 'non-bank financial services' that somehow sound a lot like what lenders do.  In a white paper distributed late last month, the Postal Service's inspector general discussed getting into an array of financial services as a means of keeping the money-losing mail operation afloat. Payday loans, check cashing and digital currency exchanges were among the possibilities outlined in the Jan. 27 report."  Watch.  They'll tell us "the check is in the mail," and everyone will break out laughing.

SOCHI UPDATE – From ABC News:  "The Transportation Security Administration is temporarily banning travelers from bringing any amount of liquid, gel or aerosol in their carry-on luggage aboard flights between the U.S. and Russia, following a warning from the Department of Homeland Security that terrorists could target the Olympic Games with explosive components hidden in toothpaste tubes."  CNN did an excellent story tonight, complete with demo, showing what a toothpaste bomb could do.  It could easily blow a hole in the side of an airliner in flight.

HYPOCRITE – From the Daily Caller:  "In a speech during Thursday morning’s National Prayer Breakfast, President Barack Obama acknowledged, 'It’s also clear that around the world, freedom of religion is under threat.'  'No society can truly succeed unless it guarantees the rights of all its people, including religious minorities,' he added later.  The Obama administration has been harshly criticized by the Catholic church and civil liberties organizations concerned that Obamacare mandates that organizations provide their employees free access to contraceptives through their health care plans, even if their religious faith calls contraception a sin."  At last report, the Obamans were still going after the Little Sisters of the Poor, who wanted to opt out of parts of Obamacare that offend their religious principles.  And, oh, by the way, notice the deep concern at the White House over the persecution of Christians around the world.  I wonder what Obama actually means by religious freedom.

CHANGING HOLLYWOOD? – Not really, but there's been some interesting display of spine recently.  First, Scarlett Johansson told boycotters of Israel to drop dead when they tried to stop her from doing a commercial for Sodastream, which has factories on the occupied West Bank.  Then Jerry Seinfeld stiffarmed the ethnicity police who anguish over the lack of "diversity" in...comedy. From Newsmax:  "'[Do] people think it’s the census or something?' Seinfeld quipped, drawing laughter from the audience. 'We represent the actual pie chart of America? Who cares? I have no interest in gender or race or anything like that.'"  Ah, how refreshing. 

February 6, 2014       Permalink

I WONDER WHY – AT 10:36 A.M. ET:  An important Democratic group has decided to sit out the 2014 midterm campaign.  Hmm.  From Buzzfeed:   

The Democratic Party’s biggest super PAC, recently retooled as an early pro-Hillary Clinton effort, will sit out the midterm elections this year.

A spokesman with the group, Priorities USA Action, confirmed to BuzzFeed on Wednesday night that it would not be involved in House or Senate campaigns.

“House Majority PAC and Majority PAC are doing everything right and making a real difference. We fully support their efforts,” said the spokesman, Peter Kauffmann, referring to the main groups supporting Democratic congressional candidates.

Priorities USA, which operates under loose campaign finance rules that allow it to raise and spend unlimited sums, put $65 million behind Barack Obama in 2012.

Sources close to the group say its leaders considered helping Democrats in House and Senate races approaching this fall. The PAC’s principal financial backer, Hollywood magnate Jeffrey Katzenberg, has shown an interest in one midterm candidate in particular: Alison Lundergan Grimes, the Democrat gunning to unseat Sen. Mitch McConnell. Katzenberg, one of Obama’s biggest bundlers, raised more than $1 million for Grimes on her first trip to California last year.

COMMENT:  I just wonder if there's something more here.  The bandwagon effect is strong in American politics, and I'd love to know why this influential group is staying off the bandwagon.  Maybe they feel it's not going anywhere, that the House is out of reach for Dems and that the Senate has a good chance of being lost.  Most encouraging theory I've heard in a long time.   But just a theory for now.

February 6, 2014       Permalink

SYRIA ON OUR DOORSTEP – AT 9:48 A.M. ET:  During one of the Indochina crises of the early 1960s, President Kennedy said, "Laos is a long way from home, but the world is small."  Well, Syria is a long way from home, but the world is just as small.  Maybe smaller, given the speed of modern missiles.  And the horror of Syria may turn out to be a threat to the United States.  From the Los

WASHINGTON -- At least 50 Americans have joined the mix of extremist groups that are fighting to overthrow Syrian President Bashar Assad, and some could try to mount terrorist attacks at home, U.S. intelligence officials said Tuesday.

Intelligence officials say the Syrian civil war has become one of the biggest magnets for Islamic extremists around the globe since CIA-backed militants fought to oust Soviet troops from Afghanistan in the 1980s, a war that ultimately gave rise to Al Qaeda.

James Clapper, the U.S. director of national intelligence, told the House Intelligence Committee on Tuesday that “7,500 or so” foreign fighters are in Syria from 50 countries. Clapper had cited an estimate of 7,000 at a Senate hearing last week.

A U.S. intelligence official told The Times that the total includes at least 50 Americans, a more concrete estimate than authorities have given previously. He declined to be identified because he was not authorized to discuss the figure publicly.

A report in January by the Israel-based Meir Amit Intelligence and Terrorism Information Center estimated that as many as 1,800 people from European countries have also fought in Syria.

CIA Director John Brennan said Tuesday that Al Qaeda is training foreign fighters at camps in Syria and neighboring Iraq.

“We are concerned about the use of Syrian territory by the Al Qaeda organization to recruit individuals … to use Syria as a launching pad” for attacks on the West, Brennan said.

Clapper said he was particularly concerned about a small cadre of Al Qaeda operatives who have fought in Afghanistan and Pakistan, and who aspire to attack the United States.

“Not only are fighters being drawn to Syria, but so are technologies and techniques that pose particular problems to our defenses,” Clapper said.

James B. Comey, the FBI director, has said that counter-terrorism officials are trying to track U.S. veterans of the Syrian war who have returned home.

COMMENT:  We know that some Muslim Somalis from the Minnesota area have "gone missing" and are assumed to be in Africa fighting for Allah, or one of his nephews.  They pick up skills that can be deadly here.  Added to them are now the brothers going to Syria.  They may come back and become part of organized cells.  Or they can become lone wolves.  Think Boston Marathon.

February 6, 2014       Permalink

WAPO ON THE BALL – AT 9:16 A.M. ET:   We've said many times here that the Washington Post has the best liberal editorial page in the country, vastly superior to the adolescent offerings of The New York Times.  WaPo proved it once again with their latest wisdom on Keystone.  Worth reading: 

ENVIRONMENTALISTS HAVE drawn a line in the sand on the Keystone XL pipeline. It’s the wrong line in the wrong sand, far away from any realistic assessment of the merits — as yet another government analysis has confirmed. It’s past time for President Obama to set aside politics and resolve this bizarre distraction of an issue.

The State Department’s latest study — the product of more than five years of investigation — largely confirms the conclusions of previous assessments and those of many independent energy experts: Allowing the firm Trans­Canada to build Keystone XL, which would run across the Canadian border to Steele City, Neb., is unlikely to have significant effects on climate-change-causing greenhouse gas emissions. That’s because its construction, or its rejection, would not significantly affect the extraction of tar sands bitumen, an oil-like substance, in Alberta. Even if the president rejects Keystone XL and no other pipelines out of Alberta are built, the crude could still travel by rail and barge — with marginally higher greenhouse emissions and a higher likelihood of accident. One hundred eighty thousand barrels of Canadian crude already moves on train cars every day.

And...

Fighting for good climate policy may be more difficult than waging a symbolic war against a lone pipeline. But the battle for policies that might actually work is the one to which environmentalists must devote their time, enthusiasm and money.

COMMENT:  I don't agree with the entire editorial, but the sections on Keystone are compelling.  They show that there are still liberals with common sense, although they are rare enough to require zoos and preserves for conservation of the species.

February 6, 2014       Permalink

SOCHI MINUS ONE – AT 8:58 A.M. ET:  The fun and games, and, we hope, nothing else, begin tomorrow.  But there are, as you know, concerns.  We made a brief report on this last night.  Here is an extended version.  From Fox: 

WASHINGTON – The U.S. Department of Homeland Security warned Wednesday that terrorists may try to smuggle explosives on Russia-bound planes using toothpaste tubes.

The threat was passed on to airlines that have direct flights to Russia, including some that originate in the United States, according to a law enforcement official speaking Wednesday on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to discuss details of the warning, which came hours before competition began at the Winter Olympics in the Black Sea resort town of Sochi, Russia.

The official said the airlines were warned that explosive devices could be assembled in flight or upon arrival at the Olympics.

The department said in a statement that the U.S. "isn't aware of a specific threat to the homeland at this time." It said the department "regularly shares information with domestic and international partners, including those associated with international events such as the Sochi Olympics."

Delta Airlines is the only U.S. carrier with a direct flight from the United States to Moscow. Russian airlines Aeroflot and Transaero both operate several nonstop flights from the U.S.

United Airlines, the official airline of the U.S. Olympic team, does not have scheduled service to Russia but is operating some charter flights to Sochi.

Earlier Wednesday, Russia investigators said security forces killed a militant who may have helped train the two suicide bombers who struck the southern city of Volgograd.

The bombings of a train station and an electric trolleybus in late December killed 34 people and heightened security fears of the Olympics.

Competition began 32 hours before Friday's opening ceremony due to the addition of 12 new medal events for men and women. Men's slopestyle snowboarding was the first event to get underway, and was scheduled to be followed by women's slopestyle, women's moguls, and team figure skating.

COMMENT:  We should not ignore security right here in the U.S. during the Olympics.  MacArthur used to say, "Hit 'em where they ain't."  We'll be focusing on Olympic security.  We must not give the other side an opportunity here at home.

February 6,  2014     Permalink