Obama’s ‘Congress Has Blocked Every Single Serious Idea’ Earns 3 Pinocchios From Washington Post

Photo CRedit: IJ Review

Photo CRedit: IJ Review

During Barack Obama’s weekly address last Saturday, he once again trotted out one of his favorite mantras:

“So far this year, Republicans in Congress have blocked every serious idea to strengthen the middle class.”

The question is, is it true? I mean, it has to be, right? After all, he’s said it before. A lot. For example, on June 27 during a speech in Minneapolis:

“So, let me just be clear I want you to think about this, so far this year the Republicans in Congress have blocked or voted down every single serious idea to strengthen the middle class.”

Then again on July 1:

“So far this year, Republicans in Congress have blocked or voted down every serious idea to strengthen the middle class.”

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America: No Longer 1 Nation, 1 People

Photo Credit: Serfs UP ! Roger Sayles

Photo Credit: Serfs UP ! Roger Sayles

Speaking to the Hispanic Chamber of Commerce in Albuquerque in 2001, George W. Bush declared that, as Mexico was a friend and neighbor, “It’s so important for us to tear down our barriers and walls that might separate Mexico from the United States.”

Bush succeeded. And during his tenure, millions from Mexico exploited his magnanimity to violate our laws, trample upon our sovereignty, walk into our country and remain here.

In 2007, supported by John McCain, Hillary Clinton, Teddy Kennedy and Barack Obama, Bush backed amnesty for the 12 million people who had entered America illegally.

The nation thundered no. And Congress sustained the nation.

The latest mass border crossing by scores of thousands of tots, teenagers and toughs from Central America has killed amnesty in 2014, and probably for the duration of the Obama presidency.

Read more from this story HERE.

Deficit To Soon Skyrocket To Historic World War II Heights

Photo Credit: REUTERS / Jonathan Ernst

Photo Credit: REUTERS / Jonathan Ernst

The Congressional Budget Office’s (CBO) latest report says that although the federal deficit this year is the lowest of the Obama era, in the near future, it is expected to skyrocket to World War II heights.

The years between 2009 and 2012 saw the largest recorded federal government deficits since 1946, based on percentage of the economy. And although the White House also reported that the deficit this year is the lowest of the Obama administration, there is little reason for celebration.

Currently, the amount of federal debt is exactly 74 percent of the economy, and if measures aren’t taken to reign in the deficits, the CBO projects that by 2039 the U.S. will see a debt to GDP ratio of 106 percent. According to the CBO, the rate of debt growth is expanding at an undeniably unsustainable rate.

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GCHQ's Dark Arts: Leaked Documents Reveal Online Manipulation, Facebook, YouTube Snooping

Photo Credit: GCHQ via CNET

Photo Credit: GCHQ via CNET

GCHQ has developed a toolkit of software programs used to manipulate online traffic, infiltrate users’ computers and spread select messages across social media sites including Facebook and YouTube.

The UK spy agency’s dark arts were revealed in documents first published by The Intercept, and each piece of software is described in a wiki document written up by GCHQ’s Joint Threat Research Intelligence Group (JTRIG). The document, which reads like a software inventory, calls the tools part of the agency’s “weaponised capability.”

Some of the most interesting capabilities of the tools on the list include the ability to seed the web with false information — such as tweaking the results of online polls — inflating pageview counts, censoring video content deemed “extremist” and the use of psychological manipulation on targets — something similar to a research project conducted with Facebook’s approval, which resulted in heavy criticism and outrage levied at the social media site.

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Barack Obama and a Farewell to Trust

Photo Credit: Gulf News

Photo Credit: Gulf News

What did the president know and when did he know it? Such was demanded of Richard Nixon, who resigned 40 years ago. In no sense can US President Barack Obama be morally compared with the man who brought the US Watergate.

Obama is neither a crook nor a liar. But Obama shares one problem that can cripple what remains of his presidency — most people no longer trust him. The sentiment spans foreign allies as well as domestic critics. When trust goes, respect is seldom far behind.

The most surprising example is Germany. It was in Berlin in 2008 that then senator Obama had unveiled his global promise — an America that could once again be trusted. Germans no longer believe it. In the wake of the “friendly spying” ring allegations, less than 40 per cent of Germans consider the US a trustworthy partner, according to one survey.

Senior German figures cannot agree whether Obama was unaware of Washington’s double agents, or dissembling. Either way, when Obama spoke to the German Chancellor, Angela Merkel, the day before the initial revelations, he did not raise it. It was enough to make you want to cry, said Wolfgang Schauble, the Finance Minister. Never before has a close US ally expelled a CIA station chief.

Mistrust is a nebulous concept. In the case of Nixon, people rightly suspected he was crooked. In the case of Obama, it is based on the perception that he is ineffectual. His words are so rarely joined to deeds. The net result is not radically different.

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Hundreds of Cities Fight Back Against 'Invasion'

Photo Credit: AP

Photo Credit: AP

By Leo Hohmann.

A massive protest scheduled for July 18 and 19 across the United States is aimed at stopping the influx of Central American children flooding across the border, and more than a dozen smaller community protests already have played roles in stopping the children from being brought there.

Citizens in Westminster, Maryland; Oracle, Arizona; Vassar, Michigan; Greece, New York, and many other places have blocked the importation of illegal aliens into their communities through public protests, letters and official resolutions from elected leaders.

Radio host Rush Limbaugh led his show Tuesday with stories about the successful pushback against the illegals going on across America.

“Here’s what you do not know,” he said. “There are towns all over America standing up to this invasion, just like they did in Murrieta, California. You’re not hearing about it, however, and I am here to tell you why you’re not hearing about it. Westminster, Maryland, is a town standing up to it, just like Murrieta, California, did. Oracle, Arizona, is standing up to it.

“In Nebraska they’re gonna stand up to it when they find out. The governor is fit to be tied,” Limbaugh continued. “Upper Michigan, same thing. There are towns all over America standing up to this. There are protests happening, but they’re not being covered.”

Read more from this story HERE.

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Photo Credit: Getty Images

Photo Credit: Getty Images

Reid: Southern border is secure

By Alexander Bolton.

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) on Tuesday asserted the southern border is secure despite the massive surge of illegal minors from Central America that has overwhelmed federal agencies.

“The border is secure,” he told reporters after the Senate Democrats’ weekly policy lunch. “[Sen.] Martin Heinrich [(D-N.M.)] talked to the caucus today. He’s a border state senator. He said he can say without any equivocation the border is secure.”

Reid said lawmakers need to worry less about border security and focus instead on President Obama’s $3.7 billion request to help process the tens of thousands of children from Honduras, Guatemala and El Salvador who have been apprehended on the border.

Secretary of Homeland Security Jeh Johnson warned Congress last week that Immigration and Customs Enforcement is due to run out of money by mid-August because of the large number of minors attempting to cross into Texas. He said Customs and Border Protection would run out of funding by mid-September.

He estimated that as many as 90,000 illegal minors would be apprehended by the end of September.

Read more from this story HERE.

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Photo Credit: AP

Photo Credit: AP

SESSIONS WARNS ALL OF CONGRESS: OBAMA’S NEW IMMIGRATION STRATEGY ‘THREATENS FOUNDATION OF OUR CONSTITUTIONAL REPUBLIC’

By Matthew Boyle.

Senate Budget Committee ranking member Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-AL) has warned all of his colleagues in Congress that President Barack Obama’s new immigration strategy—his plans to legalize millions of illegal alien adults through executive power—could destroy America as we know it.

“I write to inform you of a development that threatens the foundation of our constitutional Republic,” Sessions, Congress’s top immigration hawk, wrote in a letter that was hand-delivered to all 535 members of Congress on Monday and provided exclusively to Breitbart News.

Sessions cites a recent report from the National Journal, in which reporter Major Garrett detailed how, despite the ongoing crisis at the border, Obama plans to legalize anywhere from five to six million illegal alien adults in much the same way he did for illegal alien minors through the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) in summer 2012.

“Obama made it clear he would press his executive powers to the limit,” Garrett wrote on July 3, as cited by Sessions. “He gave quiet credence to recommendations from La Raza and other immigration groups that between 5 million to 6 million adult illegal immigrants could be spared deportation under a similar form of deferred adjudication he ordered for the so-called Dreamers in June 2012.”

Sessions cites another paragraph from that National Journal piece as well, in which Garrett reported that President Obama has “now ordered the Homeland Security and Justice departments to find executive authorities that could enlarge that non-prosecutorial umbrella by a factor of 10.”

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Our Unwillingness to Defend Ourselves

Photo Credit: TownHall

Photo Credit: TownHall

The U.S. Justice Department’s Bureau of Justice Statistics reports that 2012 losses because of personal identity theft totaled $24.7 billion. The money losses from identity theft pale in comparison with the costs of paperwork, time and inconvenience imposed on the larger society in an effort to protect ourselves. According to LifeLock, while the laws against identity theft have gotten tougher, identity theft criminal prosecution is relatively rare. Unless we develop a low tolerance and a willingness to impose harsh sentences, identity thieves will continue to impose billions of dollars of costs on society.

Today’s Americans tolerate what would have been unthinkable years ago. According to the National Center for Education Statistics and the BJS, 209,800 primary- and secondary-school teachers reported being physically attacked by a student during the 2011-12 academic year. Hundreds of thousands more are threatened with injury. On average, 1,175 teachers are physically attacked each day of the school year. These facts demonstrate an unwillingness to defend ourselves against these young barbarians, who often will grow into big barbarians.

Read more from this story HERE.

CHENEY: Obama Is 'The Worst President Of My Lifetime'

Photo Credit: CNN

Photo Credit: CNN

Former Vice President Dick Cheney, who was born in 1941, thinks President Barack Obama is the country’s worst commander-in-chief of his lifetime.

“I think he is the worst president of my lifetime. I fundamentally disagree with him. I think he’s doing a lot of things wrong,” Cheney said Tuesday on CNN’s “The Lead with Jake Tapper.”

Cheney made the critical remarks when he was asked about former vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin’s call for Obama’s impeachment. Cheney said such efforts would be a “distraction” but praised Speaker John Boehner’s lawsuit against the president.

Read more from this story HERE.

Are Media Downplaying ObamaCare Progress — Or Is the GOP Just Giving Up On the Issue?

Photo Credit: REUTERS

Photo Credit: REUTERS

After a disastrous rollout last fall, ObamaCare has been fading from the news. But is it fading as a political issue?

The fear of those who oppose the program was always that it would be impossible to repeal if enough recipients got hooked on the benefits. That was the hope of advocates as well—that whatever potholes the ObamaCare bus hit, it would keep barreling toward a finish line of getting more Americans insured.

That goal appeared in jeopardy when the administration couldn’t get the website to work. And when the president had to admit that, well, it wasn’t exactly true that if you liked your doctor you could keep your doctor. And when lots of people were kicked off health plans they liked just fine, and faced with big premium hikes. And when the White House delayed the employer mandate yet again. And when many GOP governors refused to sign on to the Medicaid expansion that is a key underpinning of the law.

But now some of the law’s proponents are declaring victory—and the criticism has quieted down. (Sure, John Boehner plans to have the House sue Obama for unilaterally changing the law, but that effort, even it makes it to court, will drag on endlessly.)

Read more from this story HERE.

Sarah Palin is Right about Impeaching President Obama

Photo Credit: Jacquelyn Martin / AP

Photo Credit: Jacquelyn Martin / AP

Sarah Palin is right about impeaching President Obama.

No, not that the president should be impeached. But Palin is correct in arguing that, for those who assert that Obama has grievously abused his executive authority, impeachment is the proper course of action.

Of course this won’t happen, for the obvious reason that this tactic didn’t go so well for Republicans last time. Hence House Speaker John Boehner’s curt dismissal of Palin’s call for impeachment: “I disagree.”

Boehner’s alternative — a lawsuit — offers the political benefits of draining impeachment fever from the more rabid Republican precincts while rallying the base against Obama-as-evil-overlord, sans electoral downside.

“This isn’t about Republicans versus Democrats; it’s about the legislative branch versus the executive branch and, above all, protecting the Constitution,” Boehner pronounced in unveiling a resolution to authorize the lawsuit. “If this president can get away with making his own laws, future presidents will have the ability to as well. The House has an obligation to stand up for the legislative branch and the Constitution.”

Read more from this story HERE.