Sequester Knocks the Navy’s Blue Angels Out of the Air

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Photo Credit: NY Times

A screaming comes across the sky. Again and again, all day long. Here at the 36th annual TiCo Warbird Airshow, fighter jets and vintage planes roar and rumble by as viewers ooh, aah, and then walk over to the line of food stands to buy funnel cakes and gyros, corn dogs and root beer floats.

The undisputed star, of course, is the Air Force Thunderbirds, whose six-plane precision flying team crisscrosses a perfect sky in ever-changing formations and gives an undiluted thrill to the crowd — at least those who brought earplugs.

But this is likely to be the last appearance by the Thunderbirds until the end of the federal government’s fiscal year on Sept. 30, if not longer. A performance this weekend by the Navy and Marine Corps’ Blue Angels near Key West, Fla., will also be their last for some time. The Army’s parachute demonstration team, the Golden Knights, is also suspending performances.

The failure of Congress to avoid the automatic spending cuts under what is known as sequestration is being felt in many ways, including the cancellation of White House tours and the loss of some 70,000 slots in Head Start early education programs. Along with less visible cuts, the Defense Department has suspended operation of the demonstration teams starting April 1.

(The Navy is hedging its bets, having simply announced its intent to cancel performances in April while waiting to see if financing problems are resolved, said Cmdr. Kevin Stephens, a Navy spokesman. “We want these cuts to be implemented at the last possible moment so they can be reversed where possible,” he said.)

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DC Continues Its Explosive Growth

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Photo Credit: 401(K) 2013

Adjusted for inflation, federal spending has gone up from an average of $882 billion every year in the 1980s to $1.48 trillion a year in the ’90s to $2.44 trillion a year in the first decade of the 21st century. It’s estimated that the government will have spent as much in the first four years of the new decade as it did in all of the 1990s.

Two crises — the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, and the so-called “great recession” — further propelled the growth of government in certain areas but without the commensurate cuts in other areas that earlier generations imposed in times of crisis.

“In the past when there were various crisis like World War II or the Korean War, non-defense spending was dramatically cut by 20 to 30 percent,” Schatz said. “That didn’t happen after 9/11, and it certainly didn’t happen after the financial crisis.”

Nothing typifies the expansion of government like the growing wealth of the Washington, D.C., area. The region has few natural resources and little manufacturing base to produce wealth, yet seven of the nation’s 10 richest counties surround Washington. The average government worker’s compensation now stands at over $126,000 a year. And the fact that Washington’s traffic congestion now ranks as the nation’s worst stands as more evidence of the region’s growth.

As the rest of the country suffered through the recession with layoffs and foreclosures, Washington’s work force and its home prices remained mostly stable.

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To Hell with the Sequester: Obama Designates Five New National Monuments

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Photo Credit: Linda Davidson

President Obama defied congressional opposition and designated five new national monuments Monday, using his executive authority to put historic sites and wild landscapes in a half-dozen states off limits to development..

The designations affect three areas managed by the National Park Service, including one honoring abolitionist Harriet Tubman and the Underground Railroad in Maryland and a collection of sites commemorating Delaware as the nation’s first state. Obama also used his power under the 1906 Antiquities Act to protect two swaths of land under the Bureau of Land Management’s control: Washington’s San Juan Islands and New Mexico’s Rio Grande del Norte.

“These sites honor the pioneering heroes, spectacular landscapes and rich history that have shaped our extraordinary country,” the president said. “By designating these national monuments today, we will ensure they will continue to inspire and be enjoyed by generations of Americans to come.”

House Natural Resources Committee Chairman Doc Hastings (R-Wash.), who has opposed the creation of new wilderness areas and national parks, questioned why the president would extend public lands protection at a time when the federal budget is under pressure.

“The Obama Administration not only sees the sequester as an opportunity to make automatic spending reductions as painful as possible on the American people,” Hastings said in a statement, “it’s also a good time for the President to dictate under a century-old law that the government spend money it doesn’t have on property it doesn’t even own.”

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Report Puts Obamacare’s Cost At $30.8B, 114 Million Paperwork Hours

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Photo Credit: José Goulão

Obamacare has so far cost $30.8 billion and 111.4 million hours to complete paperwork to individuals, healthcare institutions, and small businesses, according to a new report.

The American Action Forum, a Washington-based advocacy group that has long opposed the health law, said 55,742 employees — working 2,000 hours per year — would be needed to process all the red tape associated with Obamacare.

The report cites several examples of excessive costs from each category. In most cases, neither the Department of Health and Human Services nor the Congressional Budget Office has provided cost estimates, the organization said.

In the healthcare market, for instance, the Obamacare rule on “preexisting condition exclusions” is costing institutions $4.9 million and 38,000 paperwork hours, the group said.

Regarding premiums, the organization surveyed healthcare costs in five cities — Atlanta, Austin, Chicago, Phoenix, and Milwaukee. “The results are sobering: young and healthier individuals, including small employers, can expect a 169 percent premium increase, averaged across the five cities,” the report concluded. “Consumers in Milwaukee could experience the greatest sticker shock, with a 190 percent increase in 2014.”

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Feds Prepping To End Colorado’s Marijuana Party?

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Photo Credit: Washington Post

The pot industry in Colorado is undergoing a massive makeover as it prepares to begin selling marijuana for recreational use legally under state law. Businesses are ramping up production, and trade associations are cleaning up their image, anticipating what could be a billion-dollar industry.

But the entrepreneurs who are hoping to cash in on the “green rush” starting next year are struggling with the unique challenges of conducting a business that the federal government considers a crime.

The state’s pot producers and retailers are having trouble securing business financing because banks won’t give them loans — and most of the time, not even an account.

State lawmakers are about to shake up the marketplace in unpredictable ways with regulations covering everything from the shape of containers to the labeling required for pot-laced brownies and other “infused products.”

And business owners say they’re anxious about the intentions of the federal government, which could seize millions of dollars they have invested or even send them to prison. At a hearing in the Senate Judiciary Committee earlier this month, Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr. said that he would soon announce a response to the initiatives in Colorado and Washington last year legalizing pot for recreational use. The federal government, which deems marijuana a controlled substance, could upend the plans of Colorado entrepreneurs at any moment.

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Social Security Disability Rolls Headed For Collapse

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Photo Credit: Examiner

America’s unemployment rate has come down significantly from its peak of 10 percent in late 2009. That may seem to suggest a steady improvement in the employment picture, but the impression is misleading.

We recently pointed out that workers age 25 to 54 are experiencing a jobs depression that has gotten slightly worse since the end of the Great Recession of 2007-2009, with nearly all job growth since the downturn’s end coming among older Americans. But also statistically concealing the dire reality are labor force dropouts. A smaller percentage of Americans now work or seek work than at any point since the Carter era. Jim Pethokoukis, of the American Enterprise Institute, has calculated that if labor force participation had not declined so much since Obama took office, the unemployment rate for January would have been 10.8 percent.

What happens to the workers who drop out of the labor force? Some retire, some become full-time parents, some go on welfare. But here’s an important answer that is often overlooked: In 2011, on average, one net person has been added to Social Security’s Disability Insurance rolls (and 3.3 to its retirement program) for every five net new jobs created. Since 1970, the number receiving DI has grown sixfold (from 1.4 million to 8.8 million), and the program expenses have grown tenfold, which is unsustainable. The federal government now spends more on disability than food stamps and welfare combined. In 2009, DI began paying out more in benefits than it took in from payroll taxes. By 2016, it is set to run out of money.

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Report: Obama Intentionally Blocking Oil And Gas Production

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Photo Credit: AP

Delays in federal permitting for oil and gas exploration on public land is likely reducing national energy production and depriving the federal government of revenue, according to a federal report released Friday.

The report is the latest addition to a mounting body of evidence undercutting the administration’s claims that it has fostered increased oil and gas production, critics say. Production on lands the federal government controls has plummeted during Barack Obama’s presidency.

The United States Department of Agriculture’s (USDA) inspector general examined 1,881 applications for drilling permits on public land. Fewer than 4 percent of those applications were “recent,” or filed in the last 180 days. The rest had experienced prolonged delays.

“By not processing these nominations as expeditiously as possible,” the Forest Service, a division of the USDA, “may be causing the federal government to forego revenue or prevent or delay the efforts of the private sector to provide energy to the public.”

The report is the second analysis by a federal body this month to support claims by administration critics that its energy policies have restricted domestic oil and gas production.

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Natalie Holloway Forensic Profiler: Obama “Harbors Evil Intentions,” Claims Situation Precarious for America

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Photo Credit: WND

A forensic profiler who worked on the disappearance of Natalie Holloway and the double-murder case against O.J. Simpson says he is becoming alarmed by some of the references President Obama is using…

Hodges noted that even activists on the left have expressed concern. Medea Benjamin, co-founder of the left-wing Code Pink, in a recent WABC radio interview with host Aaron Klein, called the potential abuse by the Obama administration’s huge domestic police power “extremely troubling.”

“Recall Obama’s earlier words which, importantly, he made spontaneously, strongly pointing toward an unconscious confession. ‘We’ve got to have a civilian national security force that’s just as powerful, just as strong, just as well-funded [as the military].’

“What exactly was he thinking and why? Undeniably this was extreme: a civilian force just as well funded and strong as our military – implying majorly armed. The question is what exactly was Obama secretly confessing about his future plans? His unconscious super intelligence suggests a warning from a very dangerous Obama,” Hodges contends.

The violent imagery Obama used in his first inaugural stunned Hodges. He cited “sacrifices borne by our ancestors,” “perils we can scarcely imagine,” “stained with blood,” “earlier generations faced down fascism …with missiles and tanks … and enduring convictions.”

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Retired Military Officer Demands that Federal Agencies End Preparation for War Against US Citizens, Turn Weapons Over to DoD

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This past weekend, a retired military officer shared his letter to Senator John Cornyn, demanding answers about the hundreds of millions of rounds of ammunition and thousands of armored vehicles being prepared for domestic law enforcement.

Since its posting, the letter has gone viral. Here it is in its entirety:

The Honorable Senator John Cornyn, State of Texas
United States Senate
517 Hart Senate Office Building
Washington, D.C. 20510

Re: Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and that agencies preparation for war against citizens of the United States of America.

Dear Senator Cornyn,

It is with gravest concern that I write to you today concerning the recent appropriation of weapons by the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) that can only be understood as a bold threat of war by that agency, and the Obama administration, against the citizens of the United States of America. To date, DHS has been unwilling to provide to you, the elected representatives of the People, justification for recent purchases of almost 3,000 mine-resistant ambush-protected (MRAP) armored personnel carriers, 1.6 billion rounds of ammunition (with associated weapons), and other weapons systems, when, in fact, the DHS has no war mission or war making authority within the limits of the United States of America.

Significant is the fact that at the same time the Obama administration is arming his DHS for war within the limits of the United States against the People of the United States in accordance with his 2008 campaign speech claiming,

“We cannot continue to rely only on our military in order to achieve the national security objectives that we’ve set. We’ve gotta (sic) have a civilian national security force that’s just as powerful, just as strong, just as well funded [as the United States military]”–Candidate Barack Obama, 2008.

The Obama administration is deliberately defunding, overextending, and hollowing the Department of Defense; the only legitimate agency of the U.S. government with a war mission.

This act of the Obama administration stands as a glaring threat of war against our nation’s citizens! This act of the Obama administration can only be understood as a tyrannical threat against the Constitution of the United States of America! If left unresolved, the peace loving citizens who have sworn to defend the United States Constitution “against all enemies, both foreign and domestic” are left no option except to prepare to defend themselves, and the U.S. Constitution, against this Administration’s “coup” against the People and the foundations of liberty fought for and defended for the past 238 years. We have no choice if we honor our oaths.

The only proper response to this threat against the American people is for the representatives of the People, the members of the U.S. House and Senate, to demand in clear terms that the Administration cannot ignore, that the Department of Homeland Security immediately surrender their newly appropriated weapons of war to the Department of Defense (DoD). Further, since the DHS has assumed a position in the Administration to enforce the tyrannical acts of this president against the People of the United States against the limits of the United States Constitution, it remains for the United States Congress to exercise its limiting power in the balancing of powers established by our founding fathers, to disestablish and dissolve the DHS as soon as possible. One needs only to look to the rise of Adolf Hitler, and his associated DHS organizations, the SA and the SS, of 1932-1934, to see the outcome of allowing an agency of government this kind of control over the free citizens of a nation. The people of Germany could not have imagined, until it was too late, the danger of allowing a tyrant this kind of power. We must not be so naïve as to think it will not happen to us as well if we remain passive toward this power grab by the Marxist Obama administration!

Finally, for more than two centuries the nation has lived in peace at home because of the protections of our legitimate military and the many appropriate state and federal law enforcement agencies, supported by Constitutional courts. We stand today at a cross-road. Will we allow this present Administration to overthrow our United States Constitution and its legal processes to amend injustices, or, will we honor our obligations to defend the Constitution against a “domestic” enemy? Our Constitution lays out the proper methods of resolving our differences; and it does not include its overthrow by a rogue agency of a Marxist leadership at home. You, sir, are our constitutionally elected agent to defend our Constitution at home. We are counting upon you. We remain aware, however, of this present threat and will not expose ourselves as an easy prey to the authors of the destruction of our nation.

I know that this letter demands much of you. We elected you because we, the citizens of the State of Texas, believe that you are up to the task at hand and will, against all threats, honor your oath and office. We are also writing to your fellow members of the House and Senate to stand in integrity with the Constitution and against this present threat by the Obama administration and his DHS.

We refuse to surrender our Constitution or our nation!

Resolved,

Captain Terry M. Hestilow
United States Army, Retired
Fort Worth, Texas
March 23, 2013

‘I Cling To My Bible, Guns,’ Says Black Female Senate Hopeful

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Photo Credit: Human Events

Tennesee’s outspoken African American female Senate candidate in 2014 spoke to Guns & Patriots about gun rights, racism, and the Bill of Rights. “Gun control historically begins with blacks who were forbidden from owning guns,” said Brenda S. Lenard, a 2013 political science PhD candidate from the University of Tennessee and a resident of Kingston.

“It was very easy for slave owners to keep and control blacks with gun control,” she said. The same thing is happening today, she said. “It is a slow process of gun confiscation.”

It starts with certain groups of people, or certain types of rifles, and turns into an outright ban of firearms, said the two-year NRA member. Lenard said the term racism is over-used. “I think that diminishes real issues of racism.”

“The government should not infringe on anyone’s rights,” she said. Although blacks were one of the first groups to be targeted, today’s gun grab is not just about race, but about fundamentally altering civil rights for all Americans, she said.

The Bill of Rights does not matter anymore, she said. “This is about power and control.”

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