Tea Party Groups Attack Rove Machine

/4 Comments/in , /by

Photo Credit: Breitbart.comWith Karl Rove under heavy fire after his group, the Conservative Victory Project, took to the pages of the New York Timesto attack the Tea Party, donors are beginning to turn on the Project. Politico reports Friday morning that the Project will “essentially preform oppo research and grade potential candidates on a variety of factors that might affect their ability to win a general election contest.” Some donors are overjoyed at the opportunity, including media honcho Stan Hubbard and Fred Malek of the American Action Network.

But others don’t trust Rove and the American Crossroads team to judge talent for office, says Politico: “the plan has sparked nearly unanimous opposition from anti-establishment deep-pocketed conservatives who have begun formulating their own big-money counter plans.” Those opponents could include other major super PACs who have long believed that Rove’s establishment bona fides prevent him from making truly conservative decisions about candidates.

And even some of Rove’s heretofore allies may be wary of his crystal ball strategy after the disastrous 2012 election cycle, which heralded not just the loss of Senate seats in Tea Party-influenced races like Indiana, but establishment strongholds like Wisconsin. American Crossroads had a mere 5.7% rate of return – just 5.7% of the money they spent on the 2012 election was actually spent on winning candidates.

Steven Law, president of American Crossroads, understands that he is now facing an uphill battle with conservative, especially given his group’s less-than-stellar 2012 performance. Law promises an investigation into “all of our activities last year, as well as external factors that contributed to last year’s deeply disappointing results.”

Read more from this story HERE.

More Holes in White House Denial Of Arms To Jihadists

/2 Comments/in , /by

Photo Credit: WNDThe White House denial of supplying arms to the al-Qaida-saturated Syrian rebels may be somewhat more difficult for some to swallow now that it has been revealed the arms-to-rebels plan had been endorsed by the leaders of the CIA, Pentagon and State Department.

If, indeed, President Obama rejected the arms plan, as reported earlier by the New York Times, it would mean the White House went against the recommendations of outgoing Defense Secretary Leon Panetta, Gen. Martin Dempsey, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and then-CIA Director David Petraeus.

The plan was said to have been generated by Petraeus and Clinton.

During Senate hearings on Benghazi yesterday, Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., asked Panetta and Dempsey whether they had supported a plan “that we provide weapons to the resistance in Syria.”

“We do,” Panetta replied.

“You did support that?” McCain asked again.

“We did,” added Dempsey, who was sitting next to Panetta.

Neither Dempsey nor Panetta elaborated on their positions.

This past weekend, the New York Times reported the White House rebuffed the Clinton-Petraeus plan developed last summer to arm and train Syrian rebels.

Read more from this story HERE.

Conservative Doc Reveals Why He Spoke Out Against Obama’s Policies At Prayer Breakfast- Plus, Would He Ever Run For President?

/10 Comments/in , /by

Photo Credit: Getty ImagesWith President Barack Obama sitting just feet away, Dr. Benjamin Carson stood up for conservative principles in his speech at Thursday’s National Prayer Breakfast, discussing the national debt, political correctness and even healthcare. Readers loved his speech so much that TheBlaze’s story on it went viral.

On Friday, Carson appeared on Fox News’ “Hannity” to explain why he felt compelled to speak out against the big government policies endorsed by Obama, in front of Obama.

Carson, a renown neurosurgeon, said the response to his speech has been “overwhelmingly” positive. However, he argued he didn’t make a conservative argument, but rather a “logical” and “common-sense” one.

“I don’t know where we left our brains,” he told host Sean Hannity.

Carson went on to talk about his life story, saying he grew up in a single parent home in a poverty-stricken area. He said his mother “refused to be a victim” and “never felt sorry for herself,” despite only having a third grade education.

Regarding his comments on political correctness, the neurosurgeon emphasized the importance of “freedom of speech and freedom of expression” in the United States.

Read more from this story HERE.

ACLU Sues To Force Removal Of Ohio Middle School’s 65-Year-Old Jesus Portrait

/8 Comments/in , , /by

Photo Credit: Fox NewsTwo advocacy groups have gone to court to force the removal of a large portrait of Jesus Christ which has hung inside a rural southern Ohio middle school since 1947.

The American Civil Liberties Union of Ohio and the Freedom from Religion Foundation filed the lawsuit on Thursday in U.S. District Court in Columbus, reports the Columbus Dispatch.

The suit claims that the portrait hanging in Jackson Middle School violates the First Amendment’s Establishment Clause by endorsing Christianity.

“The maintenance and display of the portrait has the effect of advancing and endorsing one religion, improperly entangling the State in religious affairs, and violating the personal consciences of plaintiffs,” the lawsuit claims, according to Fox News.

There are three plaintiffs in the suit. One plaintiff is a student at the middle school; the other two are parents of children at the school. The plaintiffs are reportedly only identified as “Sam Doe.”

Read more from this story HERE.

Tea Party Changes Tack To Hit McConnell

/1 Comment/in , /by

Photo Credit: Tom WilliamsSome individuals in the tea party movement will try anything to undermine Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, even going so far as to question the Republican’s tenacity in bringing money back to Kentucky.

It’s an unusual stance for a conservative movement best known for opposing federal spending on just about everything. But McConnell has long been a target of anti-establishment conservatives, and their latest attack on his failure to secure funding for a deteriorating bridge over the Ohio River would seem to bring them closer to President Barack Obama’s position on federal infrastructure spending.

After all, Obama used the Brent Spence Bridge as a backdrop for a September 2011 event in an attempt to pressure Republicans to back more infrastructure spending. That Obama picked a “functionally obsolete” bridge which carries motorists between Cincinnati, Ohio, and Covington, Ky., for the photo-op was no surprise. It connects the congressional district of Speaker John A. Boehner, R-Ohio, with McConnell’s Kentucky.

Despite the notoriety the president brought to it, efforts to upgrade the bridge remain delayed. So last month, a former Northern Kentucky Tea Party leader named Cathy Flaig used the deferred construction to criticize McConnell, questioning, “What has he done for Kentucky?”

Read more from this story HERE.

EPA Moves Forward With ‘Climate Change’ Protection Plan

/5 Comments/in , , /by

Photo Credit: DonkeyHoteyThe Environmental Protection Agency is formally moving forward with its Climate Change Adaptation Plan.

Beginning Friday, the EPA is accepting comments on its draft plan, which calls for the agency to amend its operations — including the promulgation of new regulations — to account for increasingly rapid global warming. The effort comes in response to a 2009 government-wide directive via President Obama’s Council on Environmental Quality, requiring agencies to plan this year for future climate change.

“It is essential that EPA adapt to anticipate and plan for future changes in climate,” according to the 55-page plan, which carries a 2012 date but was put forth now for public consideration. “It must integrate, or mainstream, considerations of climate change into its programs, policies, rules and operations to ensure they are effective under future climatic conditions.”

Rising sea levels, loss of snowpack and drought linked to climate change will likely require the agency to take additional steps to protect watersheds, wetlands and water supplies, the report argues.

Increasing temperatures and more frequent extreme weather events, meanwhile, will demand measures to protect public safety and adapt emergency response plans, it says.

Read more from this story HERE.

Weapons Seizure In Yemen Shines Light On Iran’s Attempts To Destabilize Region (+video)

/0 Comments/in , /by

Photo Credit: paffairs_sanfranciscoA recent shipment of weapons intercepted in Yemen, including surface-to-air missiles, shows Iran’s determination to further destabilize the region, according to the head of the House Intelligence Committee.

“This new chapter is, with the chaos that you see in Northern Africa, with what you see happening in Yemen, is to escalate arms flow,” Republican Rep. Mike Rogers told Fox News. “Why? They’re feeling the pressure of sanctions, they’re feeling the pressure of international isolation because of their pursuit of nuclear weapons.”

Video of the weapons shipment, posted to YouTube this week by the Yemen Embassy in Washington, D.C., for the first time revealed the scope and sophistication of the weapons intercepted in late January. A Yemeni military source tells Fox News the shipment included circuits, wires and nearly 200 explosive packages for improvised explosive devices, remote detonators, military binocular and what were described as Iranian man-portable, infrared-guided surface-to-air missiles. Known as “Manpads,” the missiles can bring down civilian aircraft.

The weapons — bound for a Shia insurgent group that has called for an end to the small U.S. military presence in Yemen — were hidden inside a metal tank on a fishing vessel that was intercepted as part of a joint U.S.-Yemen operation.

Read more from this story HERE.

Michelle Malkin: The Blame Righty Mob Falls Silent

/2 Comments/in , /by

Photo Credit: humanevents.comQuestion: How many times over the past four years have exploitative liberal journalists and Democratic leaders rushed to pin random acts of violence on the tea party, Republicans, Fox News and conservative talk radio?

Answer: Nearly a dozen times, including the 2009 massacre of three Pittsburgh police officers (which lib journos falsely blamed on Fox News, Glenn Beck and the “heated, apocalyptic rhetoric of the anti-Obama forces”); the 2009 suicide insurance scam/murder hoax of Kentucky census worker Bill Sparkman (which New York magazine falsely blamed on Rush Limbaugh, “conservative media personalities, websites and even members of Congress”); the 2009 Holocaust museum shooting (which MSNBC commentator Joan Walsh blamed on Limbaugh, Bill O’Reilly and yours truly); the 2010 Times Square jihad bomb plot (which Mayor Michael Bloomberg falsely blamed on tea party activists protesting Obamacare); and the 2011 Tucson massacre, which liberals continue to blame on former GOP vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin.

Question: What will this rabid Blame Righty mob do now that an alleged triple-murderer has singled out prominent lefties in the media and Hollywood for fawning praise as part of his crazed manifesto advocating cop-killing?

Answer: Evade, deflect, ignore and whitewash.

This week, former Los Angeles Police Department Officer Christopher Dorner allegedly shot and killed three innocent people in cold blood. He was the subject of a massive manhunt as of Thursday afternoon. Dorner posted an 11,000-word manifesto on Facebook that outlined his chilling plans to target police officers.

Read more from this story HERE.

National Poll: Obama Approval Sinks After Reelection

/1 Comment/in , /by

Photo Credit: John Althouse CohenFebruary 8, 2013 – Hillary Clinton Is Most Popular National Figure, Quinnipiac University National Poll Finds; Obama Approval Sinks After Reelection.

President Barack Obama defeated Hillary Clinton in the 2008 Democratic presidential primary, but today the former Senator and Secretary of State is more popular, with a 61 – 34 percent favorability rating among American voters, compared to the president’s 51 – 46 percent favorability, according to a Quinnipiac University national poll released today.

President Obama has a split 46 – 45 percent job approval, according to the independent Quinnipiac (KWUIN-uh-pe-ack) University poll, down from 53 – 40 percent approval among registered voters in December, a month after his re-election. Today’s figure is closer to the president’s negative 45 – 49 percent job approval in July, in the middle of his reelection campaign, and similar to his job score for much of his first term.

Ms. Clinton’s favorability is higher than those measured for other national figures:
46 – 41 percent for Vice President Joseph Biden;
25 – 29 percent for former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush, with 45 percent who don’t know enough about him to form an opinion;
20 – 42 percent for House Speaker John Boehner;
27 – 15 percent for Florida Sen. Marco Rubio, with 57 percent who don’t know enough;
34 – 36 percent for U.S. Rep. Paul Ryan;
43 – 33 percent for new Secretary of State John Kerry;
14 – 18 percent for Defense Secretary nominee Chuck Hagel, with 67 percent who don’t know enough about him.

“Hillary Clinton ends her term as Secretary of State and the bruising inquiry into the Benghazi murders as easily the most popular actor on the American political stage today,” said Peter A. Brown, assistant director of the Quinnipiac University Polling Institute.

Read more from this story HERE.

Noonan: So God Made A Fawner

/4 Comments/in , /by

Photo Credit: APSo many people this week mentioned Dodge’s great Super Bowl spot, “So God Made a Farmer,” from a 1978 speech by the late Paul Harvey. Here are some reasons it was great:

• Because it spoke respectfully and even reverently of others. We don’t do that so much anymore. We’re afraid of looking corny or naive, and we fear that to praise one group is to suggest another group is less worthy of admiration. So we keep things bland and nonspecific. Harvey wasn’t afraid to valorize, and his specificity had the effect of reminding us there’s a lot of uncelebrated valor out there. It would be nice to hear someone do “So God Created Firemen,” or “So God Created Doctors,” but I’m not sure our culture has the requisite earnestness and respect. We do irony, sarcasm and spoofs: “So God Created Hedge Fund Managers.” Anyway, it was nice—a real refreshment—to hear the sound of authentic respect.

• Because it spoke un-self-consciously in praise of certain virtues—commitment, compassion, hard work, a sense of local responsibility. The most moving reference, to me, was when Harvey has the farmer get up before dawn, work all day, and “then go to town and stay past midnight at a meeting of the school board.” Notice the old word “town,” not “community”—that blight of a word that is used more and more as it means less and less.

• Because it explicitly put God as maker of life and governor of reality, again un-self-consciously, and with a tone that anticipated no pushback. God, you could say anything in Paul Harvey’s day.

• Because it was Paul Harvey, a great broadcaster and a clear, clean writer for the ear, who knew exactly what he was saying and why, and who was confident of the values he asserted. He wasn’t a hidden person, he wasn’t smuggling an agenda, he was conservative and Christian and made these things clear through the virtues and values he praised and the things he criticized.

Read more from this story HERE.