Yes, the Obama Administration’s Actions Amount to Tyranny
/23 Comments/in Featured, Opinion /by William SullivanWhat the Obama Administration has done with the IRS is nothing short of tyranny.
Let’s begin by stating the obvious. If government were a business, and subject to economic realities and the consequences of its ignoring them, it would have been liquidated long ago — its remaining assets of value would have been reclaimed by its creditors and shareholders (both of which are the American taxpayer), and its market share of consumers (also the American taxpayer, and those they are gracious enough to financially support) would be sought by other, more efficient businesses.
But let’s pretend for a moment that it is a business. And let’s pretend that this business had engaged not only in unethical practices, but illegal practices, completely betraying the trust of its shareholders and customers and and disavowing the very foundational principles upon which its business is predicated.
The IRS, an agency under the control of this government that Obama assures youngsters is no threat to liberty whatsoever, has done exactly that. They have apologized for selectively harassing, excessively scrutinizing, and denying benefits to conservative groups these last years.
Of particular note, the Treasury Department’s inspector general J. Russell George disclosed on Friday that the Obama administration officials were well aware of his auditing the IRS for its political screening policies in June 2012. Convenient as the IRS’s targeting of Democrats’ enemies was, the Obama administration chose not to reveal any of this knowledge to the public in the 2012 election year, yet it now feigns shock and indignation at the prospect that the IRS could have acted irresponsibly and illegally…
Obama is reasonably implicated in this crime, and this crime is nothing short of tyranny.
Read more from this story HERE.
Judge Shafts Joe Miller in FNSB Case
/8 Comments/in Alaska News, Featured, Opinion /by Thomas LambPhoto Credit: KTUUIn yet another dubious move by the Alaska Court System, Judge Stephanie Joannides awarded the news blog Alaska Dispatch an inordinate sum totaling almost 100K in legal fees from the Miller v. FNSB court case. Joe Miller was ordered to pay 85K, this despite the fact that the majority of the fees were billed either before Miller intervened in the case or after they were a relevant party to the case.
The Alaska Dispatch remained party to the case long after the Anchorage Daily News and Fairbanks Daily News-Miner reasonably withdrew, and had agreed not to petition the court for legal fees.
To any remotely objective observer, the Dispatch had no legitimate reason to remain party to the case outside of the source material they may have been able to gain through first-hand observation of the Borough depositions, a raw profit motive, or perhaps prurient interest.
In fact, Dispatch attorneys even admitted that they had no reason to be in the case, given that Mr. Miller had filed no action against them. Yet they still sought fees long after the case was decided in their favor, and from actions they had unilaterally undertaken, dating all the way back to Sept. 2010, weeks before Miller intervened in the case.
How is Miller responsible for expenses accrued by the Dispatch’s lawsuit against the Borough before he chose to intervene? Or for the debts accumulated long after they ceased to be a relevant party to the case?
Following is the breakdown of the fee schedule stated in Mr. Miller’s appeal:
“According to Alaska Dispatch’s counsel, he billed 123.1 hours of attorney’s fees from September 9, 2010 through October 19, 2010, when Mr. Miller intervened in this lawsuit; 34.6 hours from October 20, 2010 through October 26, 2010, when Alaska Dispatch obtained its relief; and 291 hours after October 27, 2010, while the cross-claims and third-party claim between Mr. Miller and FNSB/Whitaker were being litigated.”
Equally troubling is how Judge Joannides was assigned to the case in the first place, and subsequent revelations that she had a financial relationship with a Dispatch employee.
Under normal circumstances a judge would be assigned through a random selection process. However, in the FNSB case, the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court intervened and hand-picked Judge Joannides. This is a very rare move, perhaps unprecedented outside of this particular case.
Moreover, Judge Joannides had rented her basement apartment to an Alaska Dispatch employee, but claimed that the fact was irrelevant to the case. This begs the question of whether it was a random coincidence. Does the Judge have further relationships with other folks at the Dispatch?
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Tom is author of the blog ‘It’s a Kwazy Life: Analyzing the Sanity in Politics That Control Our Lives’ and is also a Construction worker in Anchorage Alaska. This story first appeared at his blog HERE.
Half of America Wants Obama Impeached
/12 Comments/in Featured, News /by Bob UnruhPhoto Credit: WNDThe faux stone columns from his Denver acceptance speech are crumbling, the fireworks have fizzled and the unadulterated adulation of Barack Obama is a sour feeling of disillusion, as a new poll reveals half of Americans wants him impeached, including a stunning one in four Democrats.
“It may be early in the process for members of Congress to start planning for impeachment of Barack Obama, but the American public is building a serious appetite for it,” said Fritz Wenzel, of Wenzel Strategies, which did the telephone poll Thursday. It has a margin of error of 4.36 percent.
“Half or nearly half of those surveyed said they believed Obama should be impeached for the trifecta of scandals now consuming Washington.”
Actually, on the issue of the Benghazi scandal, where four Americans were killed when in what may have been a politically motivated series of moves, a surging danger to Americans at the foreign service facility there was ignored until al-Qaida-linked terrorists attacked, 50.1 percent of Americans said Obama should be impeached. That included 27.6 percent of the responding Democrats.
On the scandal of the Internal Revenue Service intentionally harassing conservative and Christian organizations? Forty-nine percent said they agree that impeachment is appropriate, including 24.4 percent of the Democrats.
Read more from this story HERE.
Lou Dobbs: The President of the United States “Lies Through His Teeth” (+video)
/17 Comments/in Featured, Video /by News EditorCincinnati IRS Office: The Tea Party Directive Came ‘from the Top’
/5 Comments/in Featured, News /by Lisa Rein and Dan ZakThe fog of scandal hangs over a boxy, modernist, 10-story building that looks like a monument to paperwork. Shrubs and chain smokers flank its front entrance here on Main Street, in the heart of downtown. Every day, 2,000 employees go to work at various federal agencies in this John F. Kennedy-era structure, whose chief tenant is the Internal Revenue Service — which is having just about the worst week an agency can have…
People in this Cincinnati unit have been accused of using “inappropriate” and “politically sensitive” criteria to scrutinize conservative groups that applied for tax-exempt status.
As could be expected, the folks in the determinations unit on Main Street have had trouble concentrating this week. Number crunchers, whose work is nonpolitical, don’t necessarily enjoy the spotlight, especially when the media and the public assume they’re engaged in partisan villainy.
“We’re not political,’’ said one determinations staffer in khakis as he left work late Tuesday afternoon. “We people on the local level are doing what we are supposed to do. . . . That’s why there are so many people here who are flustered. Everything comes from the top. We don’t have any authority to make those decisions without someone signing off on them. There has to be a directive.”
The staff member, who spoke on the condition of anonymity for fear of losing his job, said that the determinations unit is competent and without bias…
Read more from this story HERE.
Obama Admin. Apparently has Another National Security Leak
/0 Comments/in Featured, News /by Sharona SchwartzPhoto Credit: Channel 2 NewsThe Justice Department’s seizure of Associated Press reporters’ phone records was reportedly one element of a “sweeping” federal investigation to find out who leaked classified information about a failed Al-Qaeda plot to bomb an American airliner.
Now, the Obama administration has reportedly apologized to Israel for another leak of classified information to the media, one that occurred earlier this month and which Israeli officials are concerned could place Israeli lives at risk.
Israel Radio’s diplomatic correspondent Chico Menashe reported Sunday morning (via the Jerusalem Post):
American officials apologized to their Israeli counterparts for confirming that Israel was behind the airstrikes on the Damascus airport earlier this month, Israel Radio reported on Sunday.
The confirmation reportedly came from the lower ranks at the Pentagon, and the reasons for the leak are being investigated.
Read more from this story HERE.
D.C. Man Won’t Face Gun Charges for Shooting Pit Bull Attacking Boy
/6 Comments/in Featured, The Offbeat /by Andrea NoblePhoto Credit: washington timesAuthorities last week made an agreement not to prosecute a Northwest D.C. man who used his unregistered handgun to kill a pit bull in order to stop it from mauling a child in his neighborhood.
As part of the agreement, Benjamin Srigley, 39, was required to pay a $1,000 fine but will not have criminal charges filed against him for the three unregistered firearms and the ammunition that investigators found in his possession, said Ted Gest, a spokesman for the office of the attorney general.
“We took it into account that he saved this boy’s life,” Mr. Gest said.
Possession of an unregistered firearm or ammunition in the District is punishable by up to a year in jail and a $1,000 fine, and prosecutors said Mr. Srigley could have faced up to seven criminal charges in the case.
“In our recent memory this is a unique charge because of the unusual circumstances of this case,” said Mr. Gest, whose office generally prosecutes low-level crime in the District.
Read more from this story HERE.
True the Vote Founder Hounded by Obama’s IRS, OSHA and ATF (+video)
/7 Comments/in Featured, Video /by News Editor Photo Credit: YouTubeCatherine Engelbrecht of True the Vote has been harassed by seventeen separate visits from federal agencies since her efforts to start a national vote integrity organization, based in Texas.
She told Governor Huckabee this weekend that the the federal persecution included not just information requests from the IRS but also visits from OSHA, the FBI, and the ATF.
The IRS wanted to see very Facebook post, every tweet, and every place she’d spoken.
The FBI wanted to know the identity of those who were coming to the True the Vote meetings.
Even more outrageous, the ATF actually inspected her gun safe:
Michelle Obama Expands Anti-Obesity Campaign to Museums
/6 Comments/in Featured, The Offbeat /by News EditorPhoto Credit: CNSNews.com/Penny StarrBy Elizabeth Harrington. First Lady Michelle Obama has expanded her anti-obesity campaign to museums, enlisting them to offer “healthy food options,” and change their menus.
Mrs. Obama’s “Let’s Move!” initiative is now calling for museums, zoos, gardens, science and technology centers to “join the call to action,” to decrease obesity among children.
The first lady is recruiting these institutions to join the “Let’s Move! Museums and Gardens” project because of their power to “influence real and sustained behavior change” on the eating habits of kids.
“With their impressive reach and great potential for impact, museums and gardens can launch community efforts to create a healthier generation using interactive exhibits, outdoor spaces, gardens and programs that encourage families to eat healthy foods and increase physical activity,” the program said. Read more from this story HERE.
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HHS:’Telework’ Gives Gov’t Employees More Time for ‘Planning and Preparing Healthy Meals’
By Terence P. Jeffrey. The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services says it wants as many as 20 percent of its workers to “telework,” use an “alternative work schedule,” or do both, in order to “reduce green house gas emissions,” decrease “employee stress,” and give these government workers more time for “planning and preparing healthy meals.”
So says one of the HHS “performance measures” detailed in an appendix to the department’s latest strategic plan.
HHS’s performance measure “4.D.05” says: “Increase the percent employees on telework or on Alternative Work Schedule.”
Telework means working from home via phone and computer. An “alternative work schedule,” according to the federal Office of Personnel Management means having “flexible work schedules and compressed work schedules.” A compressed work schedule means putting the 80 hours of work required in a two-week government pay period into less than 10 work days. Read more from this story HERE.