Certifiable: Liberal Activist Attributes Chicago’s Murder Rate To . . . Climate Change (+video)

/8 Comments/in , /by

On Wednesday’s broadcast of MSNBC’s “Morning Joe,” the Center for American Progress’ Christie Hefner said that Chicago’s sky-high murder rate could be blamed — at least in part — on climate change.

“Yes, last year we hit a record number of murders from guns [in Chicago],” Hefner, the former chairwoman and chief executive officer of Playboy Enterprises, said. “And this year we are already outpacing last year’s numbers. Now, there are contributing factors that are not under anybody’s control and may seem odd, but it is factually true. One of them is actually the weather. There is a dramatic increase in gun violence when it is warmer. And we are having this climate change effect that is driving that.”

The average high temperature July, the hottest month in both Chicago and the much-safer New York City, is the same for both cities at 84 degrees Fahrenheit. Scarborough took a moment to sardonically thank Hefner for that statement on behalf of conservative bloggers.

Read more from this story HERE.

Dollar Hits 14-Month Low v. Euro

/1 Comment/in , /by

(Reuters) – The euro held near a 14-month peak against the dollar and a 2-1/2 year high versus the yen on Thursday, having risen solidly as investors expect central banks in both the United States and Japan to keep an aggressive easing stance.

The U.S. Federal Reserve underscored that view by leaving in place its monthly $85 billion bond-buying stimulus plan on Wednesday, arguing the support was needed to lower unemployment.

“The bottom line is that there are no signs of a shift away from QE3,” said Vassili Serebriakov, strategist at BNP Paribas referring to the Fed’s bond-buying program.

“Moreover, recent data suggest that the economy remains well short of the substantial and sustained improvement that the Fed is looking for.”

That saw the euro break above key resistance around $1.3500 and move close to $1.3570, a high not seen since November, 2011. As a result, the dollar index .DXY fell to a six-week low around 79.183. It was last at 79.263.

Read more from this story HERE.

Coulter: Rubio’s Amnesty a Path to Oblivion for GOP

/0 Comments/in , /by

Apart from finding out that Barack Obama did far worse in his re-election than nearly any other incumbent who won re-election, the only thing that perked me up after Nov. 6 was coming across a Time magazine published after the 2004 election, when George W. Bush won a second term.In the mirror image of all the 2012 post-election analyses, the Democrats were said to be finished, out of ideas, hopelessly unpopular. It’s like watching MSNBC, with the word “Democrats” replaced with “Republicans.”

Democrats had thrown everything they had into beating Bush, crushing the Howard Dean wing of their party and running a moderate — a Vietnam veteran, no less! They had George Soros, Michael Moore and Code Pink working like fiends to topple Bush.

Still, they lost to an incumbent. As Time noted, the Democrats had “lost five of the past seven presidential elections.”

But the pendulum swings. The Democrats came roaring back in 2006 and again in 2008. There’s no reason Republicans can’t do the same, unburdened by having to run against an incumbent in 2016.

Unless Marco Rubio has his way.

Read more from this story HERE.

ATF Operation Marred by Mistakes, Failures

/2 Comments/in , /by

A store calling itself Fearless Distributing opened early last year on an out-of-the-way street in Milwaukee’s Riverwest neighborhood, offering designer clothes, athletic shoes, jewelry and drug paraphernalia.

Those working behind the counter, however, weren’t interested in selling anything. They were undercover agents from the U.S. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives running a storefront sting aimed at busting criminal operations in the city by purchasing drugs and guns from felons.

But the effort to date has not snared any major dealers or taken down a gang. Instead, it resulted in a string of mistakes and failures, including an ATF military-style machine gun landing on the streets of Milwaukee and the agency having $35,000 in merchandise stolen from its store, a Journal Sentinel investigation has found.

When the 10-month operation was shut down after the burglary, agents and Milwaukee police officers who participated in the sting cleared out the store but left behind a sensitive document that listed names, vehicles and phone numbers of undercover agents.

And the agency remains locked in a battle with the building’s owner, who says he is owed about $15,000 because of utility bills, holes in the walls, broken doors and damage from an overflowing toilet.

Read more from this story HERE.

Egypt: Faith in the Muslim Brotherhood Failing

/0 Comments/in , /by

Photo Credit: Mr. TheklanFive days of protests in Egypt, with dozens of people killed and entire cities in turmoil, have revealed a whopping deficit of public trust in the Muslim Brotherhood, the Islamic group that dominates the leadership of this young democracy of the Arab Spring.

In cities like Port Said, the protesters have displayed an open defiance of President Mohamed Morsi’s orders on a curfew and state of emergency. Egypt’s Army chief warns of the state collapsing. And indeed, many Egyptians now talk of splitting up the Arab world’s most populous state.

The triggers for this upheaval were the second anniversary of the fall of Hosni Mubarak and a court sentencing 21 people for the deaths of 74 people after a soccer match last year. But below the surface of this dissent lies a deeper struggle. It is one trying to define the source of legitimacy for Egypt’s new leaders, or the kind of sentiment that cements trust between a government and its people.

As it has slowly risen to power in the past two years, the Muslim Brotherhood has broken many promises about the role it would play in representative government. Its flip-flops and power grabs in forming a new regime have only added to a worry among democracy advocates that Mr. Morsi would define his authority from Islam, or sharia law, rather than from constitutional rights and secular pluralism.

Even within the Brotherhood, a decades-long debate on reconciling Islam as a revealed religion with liberal democracy has yet to be settled, resulting in splits and high-level defections. A younger generation in the group wants to rely on persuasion to gain support while an old guard sticks to al-sama’ wa’l-ta’a, or “hearing and obeying.”

Read more from this story HERE.

Poll: Young Americans Overwhelmingly Support Right to Own ‘Assault Weapons’

/4 Comments/in , /by

A vast majority of young adults under the age of 34 believe that Americans have a right to own an “assault weapon,” according to a new Reason-Rupe poll released Thursday.

Seventy percent of 18-24 year-olds and 58 percent of 24-34 year-olds indicated the government “should allow the private ownership of assault weapons.”

But a majority of older Americans disagree, with 57 percent of 55-64 year-olds and 61 percent of people over the age of 65 asserting that “assault weapons should be prohibited.”

Republicans and Democrats alike may be surprised at such results, which break with traditionally-held notions that a majority of seniors support the Republican Party, while the youth support the Democratic Party.

Overall, 51 percent said “assault weapons” should be allowed, including 68 percent of Republicans, 57 percent of independents and 33 percent of Democrats. Forty-four percent indicated that people “should be prohibited” from owning such weapons.

Read more from this story HERE.

Alabama Supreme Court Delivers Blow to Roe v. Wade

/5 Comments/in , /by

Some pro-lifers think that the Alabama Supreme Court dealt a massive blow to Roe v. Wade by specifically stating that the preborn child is a person (and therefore protected by the 14th Amendment). The Court’s ruling exposes 40 years of hypocrisy and delusions in American law resulting from the most diabolic decree ever issued by an institution of man.

The case involved two women tried for placing their preborn children at risk through the use of illegal drugs during pregnancy. One newborn tested positive for cocaine, the other actually died 19 minutes after birth of “acute methamphetamine intoxication.” Alabama law makes it a crime to endanger a child by exposing him or her to a controlled substance. The defense argued that the chemical endangerment law does not apply to preborn children.

However, the court disagreed, ruling, “The dictionary definition of the term ‘child’ explicitly includes an unborn person or a fetus. In everyday usage, there is nothing extraordinary about using the term ‘child’ to include a viable fetus. For example, it is not uncommon for someone to state that a mother is pregnant with her first ‘child.’”

By definition, fetus and child are interchangeable. And in Alabama, a child is defined as a person under the age of 18. Thus, since a preborn child is a person, the fetus is protected under the law like all other persons. Alabama attorney general Luther Strange describes the ruling as a “tremendous victory” for the “value of all life.”

Widespread legal recognition

The court said its ruling was “in keeping with the widespread legal recognition that unborn children are persons” and again exposed the indefensible legal noose that Roe artificially imposes upon our justice system undercutting our Constitution, our liberty, and our lives.

Read more from this story HERE.

Study: New E15 Gas Can Ruin Auto Engines

/1 Comment/in , /by

photo credit: fredthompsonThis week’s warm Washington temperatures had some thinking about rolling the Lawn-Boy out of the garage for the first cut of the year. And we all know what that means: Difficult starts due to E10 gas that gels when it sits.

Now, according to a new study, cars and truck may face the same fate thanks to President Obama’s demand for a higher ethanol in the new E15 gas.

The fuel industry’s American Petroleum Institute tested the 15 percent ethanol gas approved in 2010 and found it gums up fuel systems, prompts “check engine” lights to come on, and messes with fuel gauge readings.

“Failure of these components could result in breakdowns that leave consumers stranded on busy roads and highways,” said the industry report. Worse: API said the fuel problems–not found in E5 or E10 blends–aren’t always covered by auto warranties.

Read more from this story HERE.

School Choice: The Key to Saving the Nation?

/3 Comments/in , /by

The hopes and needs of children are clearly evident when charter, or pilot schools become available in school districts.

Lines, sometimes blocks long, of applicants eager to give their children a better shot at an education can be seen. Unfortunately, there are a limited amount of openings compared to the overwhelming demand by parents desperate to get their children a better education. These scenes, repeated around the country, are heartbreaking, but at the same time gives a sense of hope, that something is being attempted to shake up the government education system

This week is National School Choice Week. It is being celebrated throughout our country with over 3,500 events honoring the change that can transform our education system into one of the finest in the world…But it will take courage to change the status quo.

In honor of School Choice Week, I talked to Jeff Reed, communications director for the Friedman Foundation for Educational Choice. The Friedman Foundation has been spearheading school choice efforts throughout the country, working with new thinking Governors such as Louisiana’s Bobby Jindall and Wisconsins Scott Walker, in turning around a failing government education system.

Jeff shared many positive developments with me, as school choice starts to take hold around the country. See this map of where school choice is being implemented.

Parents love the freedom, when offered, to take a voucher to a private, or alternative school for the chance of a better education for their children.

Many Governors and Mayors love the idea of vouchers not only for the freedom of choice they offer, they love it because it can save them huge amounts of money. Sometimes the cost of a voucher for a student to enroll in a private school is ½ the cost of the public school. That can add up to substantial cost savings to states and cities struggling to keep their heads above water.

Additionally, when school choice is introduced into a state or district, through vouchers, tax credits, savings accounts, etc…It brings competition, which is lacking in the public school system.

But John Norquist, Democratic mayor of Milwaukee from 1988 to 2004, had a unique perspective on school choice and how it can restore our cities.

Norquist wrote: “If a young couple moves to, say, St. Louis and chooses a home in one of the city’s revitalizing neighborhoods, everything goes well until their first child approaches school age. They might decide to pay for private education at one of the few such schools in the city. Or they might take a chance on getting into one of the city’s elite magnet schools. But what looks like the surest way to enroll their child in a good school is to move to a suburb.”

He goes on with: “Although the couple enjoys urban life in St. Louis, they leave for better school opportunities. This process occurs all across the country; many parents with resources move away from cities and suburbs where poor people live.”

The lack of quality education choice leads to the further decay of our big cities and urban areas. Mr. Norquist believes “many more, including middle-class parents, would live in economically and racially diverse cities once school choice was universally available.”

When you hear a leader of the top public education union and fiercest foe of education choice say: “Union dues, not education, are our top priority,”…..it is plain to see we have lost our way as a country and have failed our children.

Lets give all of our parents and children a choice when it comes to education.

“Never Let A Dead Child Go To Waste”

/1 Comment/in , , , /by

Photo Credit: Rhys AsplundhBarack Obama, Dianne Feinstein, Michael Bloomberg, Andrew Cuomo, and their cohorts followed Rahm Emanuel’s advice to “never let a good crisis go to waste” when they used the Sandy Hook shooting to renew their assault on the Bill of Rights. Former Pennsylvania Governor Ed Rendell added, in effect, that one should never let a dead child go to waste if one can exploit him or her for political gain.

“…the good thing about Newtown is, it was so horrific that I think it galvanized Americans to a point where the intensity on our side is going to match the intensity on their side.”

This is difficult, if not impossible, to explain away. Suppose instead that an armed teacher or staff member had stopped Adam Lanza after two murders the way Pearl High Assistant Principal Joel Myrick stopped would-be mass murderer Luke Woodham. A case study for The American Rifleman’s Armed Citizen feature is not what Dianne Feinstein, Ed Rendell, and their cohorts need in order to eliminate the Second Amendment a piece at a time. They need a mass murder that is “so horrific” that it will manipulate the public, and legislatures like New York’s, into acting before they have time to think. Their modus operandi is to exploit grief, shock, and outrage for political gain the way itinerant rainmakers once exploited the plight of drought-plagued farmers, and quacks and charlatans peddle miracle cures to desperate cancer patients.*

Ed Rendell is not the only anti-Second Amendment leader who has done this. As stated by Joshua Horowitz, Executive Director of the Coalition to Stop Gun Violence,

A historic opportunity now lies before us to curb the gun violence destroying our families and communities. For the sake of future generations, let us hope our elected officials seize it.

Read more from this story HERE.