COLLECTIVE MADNESS


“Soft despotism is a term coined by Alexis de Tocqueville describing the state into which a country overrun by "a network of small complicated rules" might degrade. Soft despotism is different from despotism (also called 'hard despotism') in the sense that it is not obvious to the people."

Wednesday, December 30, 2009

The Chicago Way - Year One


Judicial Watch announced the ten most corrupt politicans in Washington for 2009, and it's no surprise that nine of the ten are Democrats.

Let's focus on the big one, President Barack Obama:

Even before President Obama was sworn into office, he was interviewed by the FBI for a criminal investigation of former Illinois Governor Rod Blagojevich's scheme to sell the President's former Senate seat to the highest bidder. (Obama's Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel and slumlord Valerie Jarrett, both from Chicago, are also tangled up in the Blagojevich scandal.)

The Obama administration made the startling claim that the Privacy Act does not apply to the White House. The Obama White House believes it can violate the privacy rights of American citizens without any legal consequences or accountability.

President Obama boldly proclaimed that "transparency and the rule of law will be the touchstones of this presidency," but his administration is addicted to secrecy, stonewalling far too many of Judicial Watch's Freedom of Information Act requests and is refusing to make public White House visitor logs as federal law requires.

The Obama administration turned the National Endowment of the Arts (as well as the agency that runs the AmeriCorps program) into propaganda machines, using tax dollars to persuade "artists" to promote the Obama agenda.

President Obama has installed a record number of "czars" in positions of power. Too many of these individuals are leftist radicals who answer to no one but the president. And too many of the czars are not subject to Senate confirmation (which raises serious constitutional questions).

Under the President's bailout schemes, the federal government continues to appropriate or control -- through fiat and threats -- large sectors of the private economy, prompting conservative columnist George Will to write: "The administration's central activity -- the political allocation of wealth and opportunity -- is not merely susceptible to corruption, it is corruption."

Government-run healthcare and car companies, White House coercion, uninvestigated ACORN corruption, debasing his office to help Chicago cronies, attacks on conservative media and the private sector, unprecedented and dangerous new rights for terrorists, perks for campaign donors – this is Obama's "ethics" record -- and we haven't even gotten through the first year of his presidency.


48 comments:

  1. Power mad, and ethically challenged though he be, it's his lack of ept that's astonishing.

    What other Democrat could take a huge majority in the house, and a veto-proof majority in the Senate, and pass absolutely Zero important (devastating) legislation in the first year?

    He Might be the perfect Dem placeholder.

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  2. TSA subpoenas bloggers, demands names of sources

    TSA special agents served subpoenas to travel bloggers Steve Frischling and Chris Elliott, demanding that they reveal who leaked the security directive to them. The government says the directive was not supposed to be disclosed to the public.

    Frischling said he met with two TSA special agents Tuesday night at his Connecticut home for about three hours and again on Wednesday morning when he was forced to hand over his lap top computer. Frischling said the agents threatened to interfere with his contract to write a blog for KLM Royal Dutch Airlines if he didn't cooperate and provide the name of the person who leaked the memo.

    "It literally showed up in my box," Frischling told The Associated Press. "I do not know who it came from." He said he provided the agents a signed statement to that effect.

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  3. Executive Order Amended to Immunize INTERPOL In America - Is The ICC Next?
    Steve Schippert


    In light of what we know and can observe, it is our logical conclusion that President Obama's Executive Order amending President Ronald Reagans' 1983 EO 12425 and placing INTERPOL above the United States Constitution and beyond the legal reach of our own top law enforcement is a precursor to more damaging moves.

    The pre-requisite conditions regarding the Iraq withdrawal and the Guantanamo Bay terrorist detention facility closure will continue their course. meanwhile, the next move from President Obama is likely an attempt to dissolve the agreements made between President Bush and other states preventing them from turning over American military forces to the ICC (via INTERPOL) for war crimes or any other prosecutions.

    When the paths on the road map converge - Iraq withdrawal, Guantánamo closure, perceived American image improved internationally, and an empowered INTERPOL in the United States - it is probable that President Barack Obama will once again make America a signatory to the International Criminal Court. It will be a move that surrenders American sovereignty to an international body whose INTERPOL enforcement arm has already been elevated above the Constitution and American domestic law enforcement.

    For an added and disturbing wrinkle, INTERPOL's central operations office in the United States is within our own Justice Department offices. They are American law enforcement officers working under the aegis of INTERPOL within our own Justice Department. That they now operate with full diplomatic immunity and with "inviolable archives" from within our own buildings should send red flags soaring into the clouds.

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  4. "He Might be the perfect Dem placeholder."
    ---
    If he destroys healthcare, bankrupts the country, and gives away our sovereignty, he'll be remembered as one Hell of a placeholder.

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  5. Consider this, Rufus:
    The British Healthcare system is the third largest organization in the World, after the Chinese Army, and the Indian Railway.

    That would mean Obamacare would constitute the first or second largest organization in the World.

    Does anyone really think anything that humongous and centralized can be efficient and well run?
    ...much less by ignorant, incompetent, corrupt politicians and bureaucrats.

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  6. doug said...

    "Consider this, Rufus:"

    Doug...Doug...Doug...You must keep up; the Chinese are a marvel of efficiency.

    Yes, there were some bumps in the road to collectivization and The Great Leap; but when you are making an omelet, what are tens of millions of broken eggs out of a billion?

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  7. Couldn't have been that bad, Allen.
    POTUS has Mao on the WH Christmas tree.
    ...and Barry next to Lincoln on Rushmore.

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  9. Interpol is on the loose, WIO!

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  10. OUR INTEREST IS PIQUED: Treasuries Set for Worst Year Since 1978 as U.S. Steps Up Sales

    "Treasuries headed for the worst year since at least 1978 as the U.S. stepped up debt sales to help spur growth in an economy recovering from its deepest recession in six decades," according to Bloomberg.

    "U.S. seven-year notes were little changed before today’s $32 billion sale of the securities, the last of three auctions this week totaling $118 billion.

    The Treasury sold a record- tying $42 billion of five-year securities yesterday and $44 billion in two-year notes on Dec. 28. U.S. government securities have fallen 3.6 percent this year, according to Bank of America Merrill Lynch indexes, the worst annual performance since at least 1978, when Merrill began collecting the data."

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  11. We interrupt this thread with breaking news from the middle east.

    It has been reported that Israel still IS and that a fabled nation of "Palestine" still isn't...

    That is all....

    Now back to your regularly scheduled thread....

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  12. Why can't the damn Muzzies quietly lite themselves afire, and jump off a cliff???
    (like an all-American SoCal Rap-Child)

    A few weeks later, early on the morning of Dec. 21, the slightly built man who worked behind the deli counter at a Ralphs in Dana Point walked up the steep road to Harbor Point Park, a can of gasoline in his hand.

    He stood on hard dirt at the edge of a 100-foot beachfront cliff, above tidepools. Then he doused himself with the fuel, lit himself on fire, and jumped to his death.

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  13. Doug: The British Healthcare system is the third largest organization in the World, after the Chinese Army, and the Indian Railway.

    That would mean Obamacare would constitute the first or second largest organization in the World.


    The Roman Catholic Church, the oldest continually operating organization in the world, would still be four times bigger than that.

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  14. Rufus: What other Democrat could take a huge majority in the house, and a veto-proof majority in the Senate, and pass absolutely Zero important (devastating) legislation in the first year?

    What do you call the Porkulus Bill, chopped liver?

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  15. Man poured hot coffee on his head arrested naked after dog attacked, killed.

    SAN CLEMENTE – What started out as a call about a loud radio early this morning ended with the arrest of a nude 26-year-old man who officials suspect killed a family dog with his bare hands, then poured hot coffee on his head while running naked in a tennis club, authorities said.

    The man held the dog for a few feet as he ran away and then dropped it on the side of the road. Kokanee, who the Donnellys have had since she was 8 weeks old, crawled for a few feet as Donnelly ran toward her and then the dog collapsed onto her side.

    Minutes later, authorities received another call. This time, a caller reported that a man was running naked in the Rancho San Clemente Tennis Club, 111 Vista Montana. Officials say that the man was seen pouring hot coffee on his head.

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  16. Hey Doug,

    Are you going over to visit Rush? See how he's doin? Maybe take some flowers from the EB?

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  17. Tony: Of course, the conspirators who dreamed up this myth and built it carefully, “scientific” lie by lie, wouldn’t have gotten anywhere if there hadn’t already been a huge audience who tend to think of man’s progress as a shame, even of humanity itself as an unfortunate virus infecting the planet.

    Anthropogenic Global Warming is a flimsy rationalization for laws to transfer wealth and power from those deemed politically incorrect, to those deemed politically correct. It is a program akin to the Islamic Jizra, the tax on the non-Muslim people of the Book. The impious are to be physically humiliated and forced to pay tribute to the politically correct. The politically correct will fly above the heads of the politically incorrect in private jets to climate summits that emit tens of thousands of tons of carbon, like Al Gore, while the politically incorrect will go on public transport. AGW is a religion that, like Islam or Socialism, justifies the exercise of state power to take other people’s freedom and wealth.

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  18. Things to be Grateful For.

    Imagine where we would be if Obama had been able to fill all of his political appointment positions.

    "U.N. financial nominee Zeitlin withdraws amid problems with his Indian firm


    UNITED NATIONS -- President Obama's nominee to oversee financial reform at the United Nations has withdrawn his name from consideration for the job, several weeks after revelations that a wireless company he owns in India faced legal and financial troubles, according to U.S. officials.

    Jide J. Zeitlin, a former Goldman Sachs executive, informed the White House in a letter this week that he had withdrawn for personal reasons. His decision comes amid indications that Zeitlin may have understated his company's financial and legal troubles in a Nov. 4 congressional hearing.

    The move leaves the Obama administration nearly a year into its term without a point person to press for financial accountability at the United Nations and sets the stage for a potentially lengthy effort to replace him. White House spokesman Tommy Vietor said, "We appreciate his willingness to serve and wish him the best of luck in the future."

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  19. Finnish police said Thursday they have found a body believed to be the gunman who killed four people in a shopping center in the city of Espoo.

    Police said they found a body in the apartment of the man suspected of opening fire and killing four.

    The gunman was identified by police as 43-year-old Ibrahim Shkupolli.

    His ex-wife has also been found dead in an apartment in Espoo.

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  20. WiO,

    You are going to get it, now! ;)

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  21. ...on my way to SC...Shabbat Shalom and a happy and prosperous New Year to all...

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  22. Free Lunch: There was no whistle-blowing. Anthropogenic climate change is still a real problem for us to deal with and the reactionaries who have misled you are still indifferent to what happens to your grandchildren.

    Think of the grandchildren? That doesn't seem to stop Obama, who keeps borrowing money from China that our grandchildren will have to pay back.

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  23. Whit,
    He better go back to being a fat slob.
    Since he slimmed down and started excercising, his neck went out, and now this.
    Hope he is at Straub Hospital, best in the State, imo.

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  24. Allen: Look, girlfriend, on Refaeli we have a problem...It's every man for himself, as it were :D

    "And we'd steal away every chance we could
    To the backroom, the alley, the trusty woods
    I used her she used me
    But neither one cared
    We were getting our share
    Workin' on our night moves
    Trying to lose the awkward teenage blues" (Bob Segar)

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  25. Nowadays NASA would get slapped down by the ACLU. This is from the actual Apollo 11 mission:

    APOLLO CONTROL (10:44 AM) The spacecraft Columbia has gone behind the moon in the 23rd lunar revolution. Not since Adam has any human known such solitude as Mike Collins is experiencing during the 47 minutes of each lunar revolution when he's behind the moon with no one to talk to except his tape recorder aboard Columbia.

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  26. T @ 9:02

    That's it. You get it.

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  28. A suicide bomber disguised as a Afghan soldier killed eight US civilians inside base used by the CIA and wounded at least six others, officials said, in an audacious attack that marked a bloody end to 2009.

    Times Online - Jerome Starkey

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  29. The end is near.
    Deniers will die.

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  30. LONDON (Reuters) - Britain played down a report on Thursday that Iran masterminded the kidnapping in Iraq of a British man held hostage for more than 2-1/2 years, saying there was no firm evidence of direct Iranian involvement.

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  31. He was taken by ambulance to the Queens Hospital.

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  32. AP - Wisconsin Attorney General JB Van Hollen is joining the effort to keep Asian carp out of the Great Lakes. Van Hollen filed a brief with the US Supreme Court on Wednesday supporting Michigan's request for an injunction to close a Chicago canal that ...

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  33. If this was not such a damned racist country, we would have discovered White Holes.

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  34. Queens?
    Probly all Democrat Doctors!

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  35. Where did you read that, Whit?

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  36. UN to move some staff out of Pakistan for safety
    1 hour, 49 minutes ago
    (AP) The United Nations says it plans to temporarily relocate some of its international staff outside of Pakistan for security reasons.U.N. spokeswoman Ishrat Rizvi says 20 percent of the organization's expatriate workers will either leave the country for six months or be relocated to safer areas within Pakistan.

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  37. Local TV video via Breitbart.

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  38. Dec. 31 (Bloomberg) -- YRC Worldwide Inc. bondholders agreed to swap their debt for equity in the largest US trucker, enabling the company to avoid a bankruptcy filing that may have resulted in liquidation.

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  40. Lāna'i is also a fine option for Obama

    Maybe next year Barry-dem can go make Christmas on Lāna'i.

    ...population was 3193 as of the 2000 census.

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  41. More good news, coming at a rate that was surprising to the 'professionals'.
    Incremental change bringing short term improvements, back to pre-Obama standards.

    NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) -- The number of Americans filing first-time claims for unemployment insurance fell sharply last week to the lowest level in 17 months, the government said Thursday. Analysts had expected an increase.

    There were 432,000 initial jobless claims filed in the week ended Dec. 26, down 22,000 from the previous week's revised 454,000, the Labor Department said. The figure is the lowest since July 19, 2008, when there were 413,000 claims filed.

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  42. Allen yesterday:

    "The regime is changing..."

    a. Its socks.

    b. Its cafeteria menu.

    c. Its long distance calling plan.






    Beautiful day. You kids oughta being playing outside.

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  43. Yea!
    Only 400,000 more jobs lost.
    Go TeamO

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  44. The US government has recently approved the relocation of 1350 Palestinian refugees (roughly around 400 families) from Al Waleed refugee camp in Iraq to the US. Close to 45 families have already made it here and the government refugee support agencies have relocated them to various cities and towns around the US.

    Some of these families are refugees for the 3rd or 4th times. Starting in 1948, followed by 1967 and then fleeing Kuwait in 1991 and now leaving Iraq in 2009. Some of them are elderly; one couple who have left Haifa as refugees in 1948, both in their 70s now, were located to Houston, TX with no other family members. Others are young families with children. One family with two young daughters (age 1 and 3) who speak no English and coming from a desert camp near Iraq's border with Syria, have just been placed into an apartment in Utica, NY. I know something about Utica but I can't imagine the hardship and shock of being there, speaking only Arabic and having little food and money, no furniture, with two very young children and no contacts. Other families have been sent to Boise, ID, Salt Lake City, UT and other towns with little or no Arabic or Palestinian communities who can lend a hand.


    America, home of the brave, the stupid and the self destructive...

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