U.S. Taps New Energy Sources, And Potential Geopolitical Clout

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Photo Credit: David McNew / Getty Images

Photo Credit: David McNew / Getty Images

The recent oil and natural gas boom in the U.S. is paying major dividends for Washington’s geopolitical clout. Thanks to hydraulic fracturing, the U.S. is awash in domestic energy, which is having a ripple effect globally.

If you want to gauge one effect of this newfound energy wealth, you don’t have to look any further than the current crisis between Russia and Ukraine, says Michael Levi, a senior fellow for energy and the environment at the Council on Foreign Relations.

He says the U.S. would be reacting very differently to what’s happening now if it was still a big natural gas importer. There’s concern Moscow could cut natural gas supplies to the Ukraine, which, in turn, would disrupt the flow to much of Europe.

Even five years ago, Levi says, Washington would have been alarmed that European nations could turn to U.S. suppliers, driving up the cost.

“We would be asking ourselves with every policy option we face: Will this disrupt markets and come back to hurt the U.S. economy? We’re not asking ourselves that question, because we’re not dependent on imports,” he says. “That’s a surprise — and a good one.”

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Japan Orders Military to Strike Any New North Korea Missile Launches

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Photo Credit: REUTERS / Issei Kato

Photo Credit: REUTERS / Issei Kato

Japan has ordered a destroyer in the Sea of Japan to strike any ballistic missiles that may be launched by North Korea in the coming weeks after Pyongyang fired a Rodong medium-range missile over the sea, a government source said on Saturday.

Japanese Defense Minister Itsunori Onodera issued the order on Thursday, but did not make it public in order to avoid putting a chill on renewed talks between Tokyo and Pyongyang, the first in more than a year, local media reported earlier.

“The defense minister made the order from April 3rd through to the 25th to prepare for any additional missile launches,” the source said.

Onodera, the source said, did not deploy Patriot missile batteries that would be the last line of defense against incoming warheads.

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Top Senate Republican Says Obama ‘Disarmed America’

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Photo Credit: AFP / Getty Images / Mandel Ngan

Photo Credit: AFP / Getty Images / Mandel Ngan

The ranking member of the Senate Armed Services Committee said the Obama administration has left the United States vulnerable to a growing list of enemies.

Sen. Jim Inhofe (R-Okla.) introduced a resolution Thursday to put Moldova on the U.S.’s radar, arguing that it’s another country now vulnerable to Russian aggression. Inhofe told TheBlaze he hopes it will send a message that the former Soviet state, located between Russia, Turkey and European Union, is not up for grabs. He admitted, however, there is little the U.S. can do militarily to stop Moscow’s aggression if President Vladimir Putin chooses to move forward.

“Here’s the problem, our military leaders admit we are weakened to the point that we cannot do one longterm contingency plan,” Inhofe told TheBlaze after Thursday’s hearing on the Defense Authorization Request for fiscal year 2015. “What do you think is going through the minds of potential adversaries out there? Our enemies don’t fear us, our friends don’t trust us — this is what the Obama administration has done. We have a direct interest in that part of the world. While Obama disarmed America, [our enemies] have been expanding in every area.”

The resolution also stresses that a “stable Europe is a key priority for the United States, and this can only be achieved if the principles of sovereignty and territorial integrity are respected,” Inhofe said.

Russia currently has 40,000 troops on the Ukrainian eastern border and roughly 1,200 near the Moldova border. U.S. intelligence officials access that there is a strong possibility that Putin is also preparing to move those troops toward Moldova in the near future, much like he did in last month’s annexation of Crimea.

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Why Does John Boehner Want to Keep 40 Million Americans From Buying Guns?

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Photo Credit: Yahoo

Photo Credit: Yahoo

By Philip Bump.

Reacting to the shooting at Fort Hood on Wednesday, House Speaker John Boehner reiterated a popular NRA talking point: “There’s no question that those with mental health issues should be prevented from owning weapons or being able to purchase weapons.” Those suffering the same diagnosed illnesses as the shooter — depression and anxiety — might be surprised by Boehner’s willingness to take away their Second Amendment rights.

Ivan Lopez, the alleged shooter, was being evaluated for post-traumatic stress disorder at the base, where he was stationed and lived with his wife. According to CNN, Lopez “was undergoing a variety of treatments for conditions including depression, anxiety and sleep disturbances,” according to Army Secretary John McHugh. Lopez “was prescribed drugs that included Ambien” and “was fully examined last month by a psychiatrist.”

An estimated one-in-10 Americans suffers from depression, according to the Centers for Disease Control. That’s about 31 million people, skewed told older people and women. The National Institutes of Health puts those suffering from “major depressive disorder” at the lower figure of 14.8 million. As for anxiety? The NIH says that 40 million Americans suffer from that.

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Photo Credit: Reuters

Photo Credit: Reuters

Fort Hood Shooter Enraged at Army Over Mom’s Funeral

By Bob Fredericks and Post Wires.

Authorities on Thursday were still investigating why an Iraq War veteran shot and killed three people and wounded 16 others at Texas’ Fort Hood before committing suicide — and have not ruled out terrorism.

“We’re going to keep an open mind. … Possible extremist involvement is still being looked at very, very carefully,” Army Secretary John McHugh told the Senate Armed Services Committee on Thursday.

Authorities said gunman Ivan Lopez, 34, enlisted in the Army in 2008 and served four months in Iraq but never saw combat and was not wounded in action, but was still being evaluated for post-traumatic stress disorder.

“We do not know a motive,” Lt. Gen. Mark Milley said. “We do know that this soldier had behavioral health and mental health issues, and was being treated for that.”

Lopez was a native of Puerto Rico who was married with children and had other relatives living near the Fort Hood area, where 13 people were murdered in 2009 in an attack by a soldier who had embraced radical Islam.

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Obama: Republicans’ Message is Like “Groundhog Day,” But Not Funny (+video)

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Photo Credit: J. Scott Applewhite

Photo Credit: J. Scott Applewhite

It was officially billed as a speech to promote raising the minimum wage, but President Obama’s trip to the University of Michigan Wednesday had all the hallmarks of a campaign pitch – one that the nation will likely hear several more times as the midterm elections approach.

There was a laundry list of achievements (economic recovery, ending the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, signing 7.1 million people up for health care), a recitation of the rest of the Democratic agenda (paycheck fairness, expanding college affordability) and a nod to the local restaurant (Zingerman’s Deli, an Ann Arbor institution) where the president enjoyed a Reuben that he regretted splitting with his adviser, Valerie Jarrett.

Most importantly for any campaign speech, it included a takedown of his opponent’s agenda. Democrats began to distill that message when Rep. Paul Ryan, R-Wis., released a GOP budget this week full of spending cuts to help balance the budget in 10 years.

“Just yesterday Republicans in Congress put forward a budget for the country that I believe would shrink opportunity for your generation,” Mr. Obama said, arguing that their plan would start with a huge tax cut for the wealthy at the expense of less fortunate members of society. In particular, he highlighted cuts to the Pell Grant program and a repeal of the health care law, which would jeopardize the ability of young people to stay on their parents’ insurance.

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Coulter: MILLIONAIRES NEED YOUR HELP!

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Photo Credit: AP

Photo Credit: AP

Last Sunday, The New York Times published a front-page article about the heartfelt need of California farmers for more illegal aliens.

The first tip-off that heinous public policy ideas were coming was that the Times introduced farmer Chuck Herrin, owner of a farm-labor contracting company, as a “lifelong Republican.” That’s Times-speak for “liberal.”

Herrin admitted that he employs a lot of illegal aliens and bitterly complained that they lived in fear of “Border Patrol and deportations.” (But, apparently, he doesn’t live in fear of admitting he’s violating our immigration laws.)

Sorry that running a country inconveniences you, Chuck.

He said his illegal alien employees deserved amnesty because if “we keep them here and not do anything for them once they get old, that’s really extortion.”

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Ex-CIA Boss Morell Gives Unorthodox Reasons for Omitting Key Benghazi Details

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Photo Credit: Fox News

Photo Credit: Fox News

In his opening statement during highly anticipated testimony Wednesday on Benghazi, former CIA deputy director Michael Morell claimed to be an intelligence professional who was willing to lay out the facts — no matter how damaging.

“I take very seriously the allegations about how the CIA in general and about how I in particular handled the analysis and the talking points,” Morell told the House Intelligence Committee, in his first public testimony on the Benghazi attacks. “The ethical code under which intelligence officers carry out their responsibilities calls for total objectivity.”

But Morell’s own testimony would appear to undercut that statement.

Early on, Morell made a startling claim about the so-called “talking points,” the faulty narrative that initially blamed a protest for the attack.

On the talking points, Morell said he dropped information about CIA security warnings — which were factual and accurate — because he thought it would be unprofessional to embarrass then-Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s State Department.

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Bill Clinton Says We May Not Be Alone

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Photo Credit: Trev vG / Creative Commons

Photo Credit: Trev vG / Creative Commons

During an appearance on ABC’s “Jimmy Kimmel Live” Wednesday, the 42nd president was pressed by host Jimmy Kimmel about whether he saw any classified information while in office proving the existence of aliens.

While Clinton said he had “all the Roswell papers reviewed” and found no clear evidence that aliens exist, he also said he wouldn’t be shocked if intelligent life exists outside our planet or even if extraterrestrials one day visit Earth.

“We know now we live in an ever-expanding universe,” Clinton said. “We know that there are billions of stars and planets literally out there — and the universe is getting bigger. We know from our fancy telescopes that just in the last two years more than 20 planets have been identified outside our solar system that seem to be far enough away from their suns — and dense enough — that they might be able to support some form of life.”

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Senate Committee Votes to Declassify Parts of CIA Torture Report

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Photo Credit: J Scott Applewhite/AP

Photo Credit: J Scott Applewhite/AP

After years of inquiry, $40m in expenses and an unprecedented clash with the Central Intelligence Agency, the Senate intelligence committee voted on Thursday to declassify portions of a study into the agency’s use of torture on detainees suspected of being involved in terrorism.

The landmark 11-3 vote now places the Obama administration back at the center of an inherited controversy that it has sought for over five years to escape.

That controversy has immediate implications for the military tribunals of the 9/11 defendants at Guantánamo Bay, several of whom were subjected to the abuse.

Committee chairwoman Dianne Feinstein of California, a public champion of the investigation, called its findings “shocking” and the CIA’s behavior “in stark contrast to our values as a nation”.

“This nation admits its errors, as painful as they may be,” Feinstein said in a short statement following the vote, which took place in a secret session.

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Most Illegals Have ‘Close to Zero’ Chance of Being Deported…

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Photo Credit: John Moore / Getty Images

Photo Credit: John Moore / Getty Images

Immigration activists have sharply criticized President Obama for a rising volume of deportations, labeling him the “deporter in chief” and staging large protests that have harmed his standing with some Latinos, a key group of voters for Democrats.

But the portrait of a steadily increasing number of deportations rests on statistics that conceal almost as much as they disclose. A closer examination shows that immigrants living illegally in most of the continental U.S. are less likely to be deported today than before Obama came to office, according to immigration data.

Expulsions of people who are settled and working in the United States have fallen steadily since his first year in office, and are down more than 40% since 2009.

On the other side of the ledger, the number of people deported at or near the border has gone up — primarily as a result of changing who gets counted in the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency’s deportation statistics.

The vast majority of those border crossers would not have been treated as formal deportations under most previous administrations. If all removals were tallied, the total sent back to Mexico each year would have been far higher under those previous administrations than it is now.

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