The ‘Fatal Conceit’ of President Obama and Kathleen Sebelius

Photo Credit: Washington ExaminerI have lined up my Christmas presents this year for President Obama and Secretary of Health and Human Services Kathleen Sebelius.

I will send them both a copy of the last book written by one of greatest economists of the last century, and winner of the Nobel Prize in economics in 1974, F.A. Hayek.

The book is called The Fatal Conceit: The Errors of Socialism.

Although the language and discussion of the book is not all that simple, the basic point is, I think, pretty straightforward. Hayek summed it all up in his acceptance speech for his Nobel Prize.

He noted the critical importance that we know what we don’t know. Thinking you know what you don’t and can’t know, the illusion that men can plan, organize, and control things far beyond their understanding is the “fatal conceit” of socialism.

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Dozens of Lawsuits Used to Hide ‘Islamic Realities’

Photo Credit: WND The Council on American-Islamic Relations, which according to FBI evidence was founded by the Egyptian-based, Saudi-funded Muslim Brotherhood, has filed more than 150 lawsuits over a two-year period that have been aimed at stifling speech – all with the goal of hiding “Islamic realities,” according to a think tank’s report.

CAIR has been described by authorities as a front group for Hamas to promote Islam in the U.S.

It was the Florida-based national security think tank Citizens for National Security that released the report, “Council on American-Islamic Relations: Its Use of Lawfare and Intimidation” to every member of Congress.

CFNS co-founder William Saxton said the study focuses on CAIR’s practice of “lawfare” to silence critics and force corporations, private citizens and charitable organizations to pay large sums of money to settle lawsuits out of court.

Saxton said the two-year task force project found CAIR has filed more than 150 lawsuits with the intention of silencing critics.

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McConnell: Tea Party ‘Bullies’ Who Need Punch In Nose

Photo Credit: APSenate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell said on a conference call organized by Karl Rove’s Crossroads organization for large donors and their advisers on Oct. 30 that the Tea Party movement, in his view, is a “nothing but a bunch of bullies” that he plans to “punch … in the nose.”

On the call, according to a donor who was on it, McConnell personally named Sens. Mike Lee (R-UT) and Ted Cruz (R-TX) as Tea Party conservatives he views as problematic for him. “The bulk of it was an attack on the Tea Party in general, Cruz in particular,” the source, a prominent donor, said in a phone interview with Breitbart News.

But the most memorable line came at the end of the call. “McConnell said the Tea Party was ‘nothing but a bunch of bullies,’” the source said. “And he said ‘you know how you deal with schoolyard bullies? You punch them in the nose and that’s what we’re going to do.’”

Rove, as well as American Crossroads President and CEO Steven J. Law who also serves as the president of sister group Crossroads GPS, were also on the call. Rove “talked in a slightly gentler way, or let’s say, a more diplomatic way,” the source said. “But the message was pretty well the same: That if we’re going to save this thing, we have to back real Republicans.”

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New Poll: If Voters Had Known They’d Lose Insurance, Barack Obama Would Not Be President

If voters had been aware last year that they might lose their health-care plans when Obamacare went into effect, Republican President Mitt Romney would be sitting in the White House today, according to a poll released Friday.

A Wilson Perkins Allen Opinion Research survey conducted from Nov. 18-20 asked voters who supported President Barack Obama in 2012: “As you may know, millions of Americans have lost their insurance plans despite President Obama’s promise that, quote, ‘if you like your plan, you can keep it.’ If you knew in 2012 that this promise was not true, would you still have voted for Barack Obama?”

In response, 23 percent said they would not have voted to re-elect Obama, while 72 percent said they would still have voted for him. The largest number of defections were among female voters ages 18-54, 31 percent of whom said they would not have supported the president.

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The (Really) Do-Nothing Congress

Photo Credit: ReutersSen. Tom Carper had been wavering over the “nuclear option” for days — until one of his colleagues issued a blunt judgment of Congress.

“My colleague said, ‘It’s hard to imagine it getting much worse because we’re not getting anything done,’” the veteran Delaware Democrat said. “If there was an a-ha moment, that was probably it.”

Indeed, the 113th Congress is on track to go down as the least productive in history — a legacy that may be cemented after Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid gutted the filibuster on presidential nominees by deploying the “nuclear option.” Republicans say the unprecedented move will make them even less likely to cooperate with Democrats — not that there’s much collaboration to begin with.

So far, this Congress has only enacted 49 laws, the fewest since at least 1947, when the Congressional Record began tallying legislative activity on a yearly basis. In fact, the 80th Congress — famously dubbed the “do nothing” Congress by President Harry Truman — enacted 388 public laws by July 1947.

In the last 66 years, there are just four occasions in which fewer than 100 laws were enacted by a similar point in the legislative calendar. And two of those instances were in the last two Congresses, with the previous Congress making just 62 laws through November 2011.

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Pope Francis: ‘We Won’t Resign Ourselves to a Middle East Without Christians’

Photo Credit: AP/ Karim KadimPope Francis expressed new concern Thursday for the situation faced by “Christians who suffer in a particularly severe way the consequences of tensions and conflicts in many parts of the Middle East.”

“Syria, Iraq, Egypt and other areas of the Holy Land sometimes overflow with tears,” he told a gathering at the Vatican of leaders from Eastern rite churches that have links with the Roman Catholic Church.

“We won’t resign ourselves to a Middle East without Christians who for two thousand years confess the name of Jesus, as full citizens in social, cultural and religious life of the nations to which they belong,” he said.

The pope appealed for “everyone’s right to a dignified life and to freely profess their faith [to] be respected.”

He also said he would “not rest as long as there are men and women, of any religion, affected in their dignity, deprived of life’s basic necessities, robbed of a future, forced to the status of refugees and asylum-seekers.”

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Hobby Lobby President Proposes Public School Bible Course

Photo Credit: The Christian Post/Napp NazworthThe head of a major Christian retailer presently suing the federal government has proposed a Bible class elective for an Oklahoma high school.

Steve Green, president of the Oklahoma-based retail giant Hobby Lobby Inc., has proposed a class for Mustang High School with a curriculum focused on various aspects of the Holy Bible.

“There’s still some fine-tuning, but the curriculum breakdown would include an intro course covering the Old and New Testaments and the Bible’s impact on society. Three advanced courses would focus on deeper history and cultural influence,” reported KOCO 5 News.

At present, Mustang Public Schools Superintendent Sean McDaniel has expressed an interest in the idea and the proposed course will get official consideration next month.

Green’s proposal for a Bible course comes as his family-owned craft retail company may go before the United States Supreme Court regarding a lawsuit against the federal government.

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Price of Electricity Hit Record for October; Up 42% in Decade

Photo Credit: APThe price of electricity hit a record for the month of October, according to data released Wednesday by the Bureau of Labor Statistics. That made October the eleventh straight month when the average price of electricity hit or matched the record level for that month.

The average price of electricity in October was 13.2 cents per kilowatt hour (KWH), up from 12.8 cents per KWH in October 2012—and up from 9.3 cents per KWH in October 2003.

Americans now pay 42 percent more for electricity than they did a decade ago.

In November 2012, electricity was 12.7 cents per KWH, which was down from the 12.8 cents per KWH price of November 2011. But, in December 2012, the price of electricity stayed at 12.7 cents per KWH, matching the record monthly price of 12.7 cents per KWH that had been reached in December 2011.

In each of the ten months since then (January through October 2013), the price of electricity has hit a record level for that month.

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Subcontractor Working on Obamacare Site Under FBI Investigation

Photo Credit: REUTERS/Mike SegarOne of the subcontractors working on the Obamacare website is currently under investigation by the Federal Bureau of Investigation.

Client Network Services Incorporated (CNSI) became a sub-contractor on the Obamacare website in 2012, working hand in hand with QSSI, according to its website. QSSI was one of several contractors hauled before Congress to address the sites troubled rollout in October.

According to Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) “war room” notes released in October, CNSI was responsible for assisting with electronic data interchange (EDI) — defined as a system to transfer data between computer systems without human interaction.

Among the plethora of problems with the website rollout, insurance companies have complained that data received on their computers has often been inaccurate, suggesting a problem with the EDI.

CNSI is currently under investigation by the FBI, which has alleged that then-Louisiana Health and Hospitals Secretary Bruce Greenstein, a former CNSI employee, exerted undue influence in steering the Medicaid contract to Louisiana.

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Common Core Curriculum Teaching 4th Graders White Voters Rejected Obama Because of Race

Photo Credit: Illinois Review Fourth graders in Dupo Illinois are reading a biography of Barack Obama that’s raising eyebrows among St. Clair County parents. The book, which supplements the school’s Common Core curriculum, blames television for the negative behaviors the first African-American president picked up as a teen:

Photo Credit: Illinois Review

The book – brought to the attention this week of those on the “Moms Against Duncan – MAD” Facebook page, goes on to say white Americans were hesitant to vote for a black president, and that Obama pushed the race issue to bring the nation together.

“But some people said Americans weren’t ready for that much change. Sure Barack was a nice fellow, they said. But white voters would never vote for a black president. Other angry voices were raised. Barack’s former pastor called the country a failure. God would damn the United States for mistreating its black citizens, he said.”

The Bluffview Elementary students were told the book’s content would be tested for grades. That brought outrage among parents just across the Mississippi River from St. Louis, one of the “MAD” moms reported.

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