Report: Sweeping New Hostage Policy Due to ‘Idiot’ at State Dept, WILL Harm Americans

/3 Comments/in , /by

The federal government will stop threatening families with criminal prosecution for attempting to pay ransom for loved ones taken hostage by terrorist groups, President Barack Obama will announce Wednesday in an executive order clarifying and changing the way the government handles hostage situations. The sweeping new policy is due to “an idiot” at the Department of State, an official close to the review process told The Daily Caller News Foundation– and “it’s going to encourage more kidnappings of U.S. service members and U.S. diplomats stationed abroad, and it’s going to make Americans targets.”

The changes are the result of an extensive review of federal policy regarding hostages abroad. Obama ordered the review in December after frustrated family members of current and former hostages complained about the process, and in light of changing national security realities, such as the rise of ISIS, since the policy was written in 2000.

The official told TheDCNF that the Justice Department has not wanted to issue blanket immunity because there are times when a duress defense would not hold up in court, such as if the a family crowd-sourced for ransom money. That, the officials said, is because providing material support to terrorists is a blatant violation of U.S. law. Other agencies also opposed the change.

It’s long been an unofficial policy to turn the other way if a family tries to pay a ransom, but making that policy official could prove problematic if non-family members try to get financially involved or if family members try to solicit the public for the money they need to pay a ransom.

“This is really media-driven,” the official told TheDCNF. “The White House wants this issue to go away.” (Read more from “Report: Sweeping New Hostage Policy Due to ‘Idiot’ at State Dept, WILL Harm Americans” HERE)

Follow Joe Miller on Twitter HERE and Facebook HERE.

10 Years After This City Seized a Woman’s Land: An Empty Lot

/1 Comment/in , /by

It’s been a decade since the city of New London, Conn. forcibly took the Fort Trumbull neighborhood for what became private-development, and now all that remains is an empty lot.

In 1998, the area surrounding the waterfront neighborhood saw an increased surge of economic development. This prompted city officials to decide the Fort Trumbull could be better used for other purposes.

According to the Institute for Justice, the plan was to take the land from the residents and give it to the New London Development Corporation (NLDC), a private body. Eminent domain allows the government to take land for the purposes of the public good so long as property owners are offered just compensation.

Residents, however, did not like the idea. In an effort to protect their homes, Susette Kelo and her neighbors took their city to court. After years of fighting, Kelo v. City of New London went all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court. To the dismay of the residents, however, the court ruled in 2005 in favor of New London.

“When I first started this battle, it was about me and this little pink house,” Kelo told The Daily Signal. “But it grew into something much bigger than that. It turned into a nationwide battle to save the Fort Trumbull neighborhood.” (Read more from “10 Years After This City Seized a Woman’s Land: An Empty Lot” HERE)

Follow Joe Miller on Twitter HERE and Facebook HERE.

Study: Electric Cars Worse for Environment Than Gas Powered Cars

/0 Comments/in , /by

A study published by the nonpartisan National Bureau of Economic Research found that on a per-mile basis electric cars were on average worse for the environment when compared to their gas-run counterparts.

The study concluded that on average per mile, electric cars were half a cent worse for the environment than gas-powered vehicles.

The environmental effects of the different vehicles depended largely on where they were driven. In urban areas, electric vehicles performed better, while the opposite occurred once the cars left the city. In Grand Forks, North Dakota, electric vehicles were 3 cents worse for the environment per mile, while in Los Angeles, they performed 3.3 cents better per mile.

The authors of the study believe that this is an important distinction, especially when taking into account the federal government pays a $7,500 subsidy for every electric car purchased.

“Because electric vehicles, on average, generate greater environmental externalities than gasoline vehicles, the current federal policy has greater deadweight loss than the no-subsidy policy,” wrote the authors in their study. (Read more from “Study: Electric Cars Worse for Environment Than Gas Powered Cars” HERE)

Follow Joe Miller on Twitter HERE and Facebook HERE.

Obama: Americans Have Distorted Impression of Muslims

/8 Comments/in , /by

Speaking at the annual White House Iftar dinner on Monday night, President Barack Obama explained the unfair stereotypes that Muslim Americans have to deal with in the United States and called on others to support their community.

The Iftar dinner is to honor the Muslim holiday of Ramadan, which marks the time when Muslims believe that the Koran was shown to the prophet Muhammad for the first time. The holiday, which began last week, goes on for a month. During the time, Muslims fast during the day in remembrance of their leader.

In his remarks, the President spoke about the “distorted impression” many Americans have of Muslims.

“Here in America, many people personally don’t know someone who is Muslim,” he said. “They mostly hear about Muslims in the news – and that can obviously lead to a very distorted impression.”

He also said that the dinner “is also a reminder of the freedoms that bind us together as Americans, including the freedom of religion – that inviolable right to practice our faiths freely,” USA Today reported. (Read more from “Obama: Americans Have Distorted Impression of Muslims” HERE)

Follow Joe Miller on Twitter HERE and Facebook HERE.

Mike Huckabee on Charleston: God Already Solved Racism [+video]

/1 Comment/in , /by

In a discussion with Fox News’ Ed Henry, [Mike] Huckabee was criticized for flip-flopping on the Confederate flag issue.

“You say voters want a leader, somebody who will stand up,” Henry noted. “A few days ago, I saw you asked right here on Fox about the Confederate flag issue down in South Carolina and you basically punted, and said it’s a state issue.”

“Is that leadership?” asked Henry.

“I didn’t punt at all,” Huckabee said. “I think we’ve missed the real point in this. When I’m asked that question as a presidential candidate, what I’m being baited for is, is South Carolina a racist state?”

“And so what I said was, Ed, as a frequent visitor to South Carolina, I look at this objectively,” he continued. “You’ve got a female governor who is of Indian descent, you have the only elected African-American U.S. senator in the South from a state of 4.8 million people, elected largely by people who are mostly white. That’s not racism.” (Read more from “Mike Huckabee on Charleston: God Already Solved Racism” HERE)

Follow Joe Miller on Twitter HERE and Facebook HERE.

Cruz Flips Against TPA/ Fast Track; Sessions Hammers ObamaTrade [+video]

/3 Comments/in , /by

Citing corruption, “backroom deal-making,” and leaks that show the Obama administration is violating its assurances not to include immigration in its trade agreements, Senator Ted Cruz (R-Texas; shown on left) reversed his earlier support for Trade Promotion Authority (TPA) and voted Tuesday against the cloture measure to end debate on Fast Track authority for the president. Even with Cruz’s defection, however, President Obama and his Republican allies in the Senate succeeded in getting the 60-vote super-majority they needed to cut off debate. The 60-37 vote sets up a vote on TPA itself, which is scheduled for Wednesday. If it passes then, it will go to President Obama’s desk to be signed into law. Although most commentators are viewing TPA passage now as a done deal, it is still possible that it could be derailed again, as recent history has shown the battles over these pseudo-“free trade” pacts are full of surprises.

In an op-ed published on Brietbart.com today, Senator Cruz explained why he has switched from pro to anti on TPA. “The American people do not trust President Obama. And they do not trust Republican leadership in Congress,” Cruz wrote. “And the reason is simple: for far too long, politicians in Washington have not told the truth.”

As a general matter, Cruz said, he supports free trade. “But TPA in this Congress has become enmeshed in corrupt Washington backroom deal-making, along with serious concerns that it would open up the potential for sweeping changes in our laws that trade agreements typically do not include,” the Texas senator noted.

Since his earlier pro-TPA vote on May 22, Cruz says, two troubling material changes have come to light. The first was the revelation by WikiLeaks regarding the secret Trade in Services Agreement, or TiSA, which President Obama is attempting to use to open the immigration floodgates.

Another straw that broke the camel’s back for Cruz was the deal-making by Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.), promising a corporate welfare plum to Democrats and Republicans alike, in the form of billions of dollars for the U.S. Export-Import Bank. (Read more from “Cruz Flips Against TPA/ Fast Track; Sessions Hammers ObamaTrade” HERE)

Follow Joe Miller on Twitter HERE and Facebook HERE.

GOP Cannot Give in to Obama’s ‘Great Internet Giveaway’

/1 Comment/in , /by

The government’s job is simple: to protect freedom and promote free markets. And the Republican Party — which currently controls both chambers of the U.S. Congress — bills itself as the party of individual responsibility and economic growth. Furthermore, in 2011 and again in 2015, the GOP obtained its legislative power because the American people were fed up with the Obama administration’s overreach.

Unfortunately, upon arriving in Washington, far too many Republicans have decided to follow the path of accommodation and appeasement rather than standing on principle — and standing for the people who put them in office. This “go along to get along” mentality — championed by far too many GOP leaders — has empowered Obama’s liberal, rogue bureaucracies on multiple fronts.

One of these is the “great Internet giveaway” — Obama’s effort to surrender effective control of the World Wide Web to a group of multinational corporate interests and nonprofits (or if that fails, a United Nations bureaucracy).

President Obama’s Commerce Department — specifically the National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA) — wants to take the Web’s most essential operational functions and cede them to the “global Internet community.” Among these core functions are the resources provided by the Internet Assigned Numbers Authority (IANA), which coordinates all of the Internet’s globally unique identifiers (domain names, number resources, protocol assignments, etc.). This is literally the nuts and bolts of the web; its essential underlying architecture. Currently, the U.S. Department of Commerce contracts out responsibility for IANA to a Los Angeles-based nonprofit called the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN).

This relationship has secured a free and open Internet for nearly two decades, driving innovation and preventing censorship of content. Why would Obama want to undo that? According to Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal (R), a staunch supporter of Internet freedom, the proposed giveaway is yet another attempt by the administration to undermine U.S. sovereignty — in the process, “jeopardizing the freedoms of billions of citizens the world over.” (Read more from “GOP Cannot Give in to Obama’s ‘Great Internet Giveaway'” HERE)

Follow Joe Miller on Twitter HERE and Facebook HERE.

Israeli Diplomat: Obama Reaches out to Islam Because Two Muslim Father Figures Abandoned Him

/2 Comments/in , /by

In an op-ed published Friday, Kulanu Knesset member and former Israeli ambassador to the United States Michael Oren speculates that President Barack Obama’s relentless outreach to the Muslim world may stem from the fact that he was abandoned by the two Muslim father figures in his life and therefore seeks acceptance by their co-religionists.

In the article, in Foreign Policy Magazine, Oren also posits that the world may look back on Obama’s approach to Middle East issues as naive and hard to credit.

The piece marks Oren’s third op-ed critical of Obama published in major US media in less than a week. In the first of the series, the former ambassador published “How Obama abandoned Israel” in the Wall Street Journal, followed by “Why Obama is wrong about Iran being ‘rational’ on nukes,” in the Los Angeles Times. He also gave a lengthy interview to the Times of Israel this week in which he echoed charges in his new book, “Ally,” to the effect that aspects of US-Israel ties are “in tatters” because of the president.

The Obama administration responded bitterly to Oren’s earlier criticism of the president, calling it “absolutely false.” His opposite number, US Ambassador to Israel Dan Shapiro, said Oren was motivated by a desire to sell books. But while freshman MK Oren’s party leader Moshe Kahlon on Wednesday apologized and distanced the party from the Wall Street Journal piece, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu reportedly refused a US request to do likewise.

In the Foreign Policy article Friday, Oren writes that “Obama’s attitudes toward Islam clearly stem from his personal interactions with Muslims. These were described in depth in his candid memoir, ‘Dreams from My Father,’ published 13 years before his election as president. Obama wrote passionately of the Kenyan villages where, after many years of dislocation, he felt most at home and of his childhood experiences in Indonesia. I could imagine how a child raised by a Christian mother might see himself as a natural bridge between her two Muslim husbands. I could also speculate how that child’s abandonment by those men could lead him, many years later, to seek acceptance by their co-religionists.” (Read more from “Oren: Obama May Reach out to Islam Because Two Muslim Father Figures Abandoned Him” HERE)

Follow Joe Miller on Twitter HERE and Facebook HERE.

Obama Drops the N Word in Recent Interview on Racism

/1 Comment/in , /by

By Associated Press. President Obama said the United States has not overcome its history of racism and is using the N-word to make his case.

In an interview, Obama weighed in on the debate over race and guns that has erupted after the arrest of a white man for the racially motivated shooting deaths of nine black church members in Charleston, South Carolina.

“Racism, we are not cured of it,” Obama said. “And it’s not just a matter of it not being polite to say nigger in public. That’s not the measure of whether racism still exists or not. It’s not just a matter of overt discrimination. Societies don’t, overnight, completely erase everything that happened 200 to 300 years prior.”

Obama’s remarks came during an interview out Monday with comedian Marc Maron for his popular podcast, where crude language is often part of the discussion.

The president said while attitudes about race have improved significantly since he was born to a white mother and black father, the legacy of slavery “casts a long shadow and that’s still part of our DNA that’s passed on.” (Read more from “Obama Drops the N Word in Recent Interview on Racism” HERE)

_________________________________________________________________

President Obama Doesn’t Regret Using the N-Word

By Jordyn Phelps. President Obama did not plan to use the n-word in his interview with comedian Marc Maron, but he doesn’t regret the word choice either.

“As is as evident from the conversation, it was a free-flowing conversation,” White House Press Secretary Josh Earnest told ABC News’ Jonathan Karl at Monday’s press briefing. “It was pretty wide-ranging, and there was no decision made on the part of anybody here at the White House that we are going to capitalize on this audio interview from somebody’s garage in California, that this would be an opportune time for him to get this particular point off his chest.”

Although the president’s word choice was unconventional in the interview on Maron’s “WTF” podcast, Earnest said, the point he was making was “entirely consistent” with a message he has made numerous times on race relations — that although much progress has been made in recent decades, “we’re not cured” of the “legacy of slavery” and Jim Crow.

“It’s not just a matter of it not being polite to say n***** in public,” the president told Maron. “That’s not the measure of whether racism still exists or not. It’s not just a matter of overt discrimination. Societies don’t, overnight, completely erase everything that happened 200 to 300 years prior.”

While the president said the history of slavery still “casts a long shadow” on American society, he also reflected on the progress that’s been made. (Read more from this story HERE)

Follow Joe Miller on Twitter HERE and Facebook HERE.

Hamburger Helper: Jail Worker Smuggled Tools to Killers in Meat

/0 Comments/in , /by

A prison worker accused of helping two convicted killers break out of a maximum-security New York jail earlier this month smuggled them vital tools that were concealed inside frozen chunks of hamburger meat, according to a report published late Monday.

Joyce Mitchell, 51, has been charged with felony promoting prison contraband and misdemeanor criminal facilitation in connection with the escape of Richard Matt and David Sweat from Clinton County Correctional Facility on the night of June 5-6. Court documents allege that Mitchell provided the men with hacksaw blades, chisels, a punch and a screwdriver bit in the weeks prior to the escape.

Law enforcement sources told the New York Post that Mitchell came up with the idea to sneak the tools into the jail masked by the frozen food.

Meanwhile, authorities said they had recovered items from a remote cabin in northern New York state, near the Canadian border, that may be linked to Sweat and Matt.

State Police Maj. Charles Guess said at a news conference that authorities had “specific items” from the Adirondack cabin some 20 miles west of the prison and sent them to labs for DNA and other testing. He would not elaborate on the items but characterized the latest search effort — one of many over the past 17 days — as a confirmed lead. (Read more from “Hamburger Helper: Jail Worker Smuggled Tools to Killers in Meat” HERE)

Follow Joe Miller on Twitter HERE and Facebook HERE.