Saturday, June 1, 2013

If That’s the Case for Holder Lying Under Oath, It’s Not Just Weak — It’s Bordering on Silly

Help me mull this over, will you?

Volokh Conspiracy  "The [Privacy Protection Act] prohibits the government from conducting a search or seizure of a reporter’s property unless there is probable cause that the reporter was involved in the crime. As it applies to investigations of national security leaks, the PPA requires the government to make the case that there was probable cause Rosen was involved in the offense before it can obtain a warrant.
Political Cartoons by Steve Breen
"Importantly, the PPA doesn’t require the government to actually be considering prosecuting the reporter. It only requires the government to establish probable cause that the reporter’s conduct was prohibited by Congress’s law. So, again, there is nothing inconsistent between Holder concluding that there was probable cause to believe Rosen committed a crime and Holder testifying that he has never “been involved in, heard of, or would think would be wise policy” to bring a criminal prosecution against a reporter.
In the comment threads to Jonathan’s post, some commenters argued that you can read Holder’s testimony as saying that there was not a “potential” for prosecution against Rosen. If the affidavit stated the basis for probable cause that Rosen committed a crime, they argue, isn’t there “a potential” that Rosen could be prosecuted, at least in a certain sense, thus making a possible case for perjury? This argument misrepresents what Holder said. "

‘Stupid Bible-Thumping…B**ch’: Bakery That Refused to Make Gay Couple’s Wedding Cake Speaks Out Amid Threats, Economic Woes

The Blaze  "In February, Aaron and Melissa Klein, owners of Sweet Cakes by Melissa, an Oregon-based bakery, found themselves at the center of a media firestorm after refusing to make a wedding cake for a lesbian couple’s ceremony. Nearly four months later, the small business continues to receive threatening and harassing phone calls and e-mails, as they grapple with the ongoing fall-out from their controversial decision. This week, they spoke with TheBlaze about the ongoing drama."
....
"This prospect, of course, is entirely possible, as the bakery is struggling following the cake debacle.
"It’s unclear what will happen next, as the lesbian couple is reportedly still considering its legal options. Regardless of what the government decides, though, Aaron says that he and his wife will stick by their convictions and that their religious freedom is protected under both Oregon and federal constitutions.
"“I can say I don’t want to take part in something that violates my religious beliefs. If they want to shut me down because of it, then they could shut me down,” he told TheBlaze."
How progressive.

Report: Obama Regime To Blame For Jailing Of Hero Pakistani Doctor Who Helped U.S. Kill Bin Laden…

Weasel Zippers introduces this Fox News piece thus: "This guy is rotting away in some Pakistani s--thole jail thanks to the big mouths in the White House while Obama runs around taking credit for killing Bin Laden. Sickening. 
Here is the Fox News report.
It was the Obama administration that sealed the fate of the Pakistani doctor jailed for helping nail Usama Bin Laden, by divulging key details after the fact and dooming any chance Shakil Afridi's cover story could win his freedom, according to a confidential Pakistani report..... 
“The lesson from the Afridi episode is, if it suits the political purpose of the Obama administration, you’ll be exposed and placed in jeopardy,” said Thomas Fitton, president of Judicial Watch.

Read more: 

See No Evil; President Obama may think that the threat from al Qaeda is receding. It isn’t.

Thomas Joscelyn at the Weekly Standard; 
 Political Cartoons by Glenn Foden
"The rest of [bin Laden's] 27-page document undermines the president’s case. “We still have a powerful force which we can organize and prepare for deployment,” bin Laden wrote. This cuts against the president’s claim that al Qaeda is mostly a spent force. And bin Laden emphasized that al Qaeda needs to “concentrate” its “jihad efforts in areas where the conditions are ideal for us to fight.” Bin Laden surmised that “Iraq and Afghanistan are two good examples.” Yet much of President Obama’s speech was devoted to proclaiming the “end” of the post-9/11 wars in both countries.
"The president cited just one of the 17 bin Laden documents declassified and released to the American public. And those 17 documents are just a tiny fraction of the hundreds of thousands of documents and files captured during the May 2011 raid in Abbottabad, Pakistan, hardly sufficient for any robust analysis of the al Qaeda network.
"Still, the president’s selective citation of bin Laden’s files is illustrative of a larger point: When it comes to fighting al Qaeda and its affiliates, the president and his advisers see only what they want to see."

Let him be clear

Friday, May 31, 2013

How I Became Islamophobic

Infidel Bloggers Alliance  "The following was written by a British college student. The original article is posted here."
...."I was sitting in class one day, near the back of the room. The lecturer had finished talking and now we were told to discuss amongst ourselves the things we’d heard. A group of Muslim men just across from me were apparently uninterested in the lecture that day as they commenced to discuss videos they’d been emailing each other instead. It took me a short while, but I came to understand that these were decapitation videos. After hearing words and descriptions that I never want to repeat, I nervously looked over at the faces of the men and saw sick, sadistic smiles curling up their bearded faces.

"At the end of that year, I was a fully developed ‘Islamophobe’. I can’t and won’t deny what I witnessed and what I saw others go through. And more than this, I won’t help the taboo to survive which allowed for these abuses to go unreported."....

Obama-Bashing Leno Trounces Letterman in May Sweeps

Newsbusters  "As NewsBusters has been reporting, NBC Tonight Show host Jay Leno has been outfront amongst late night comedians in humorously attacking Barack Obama for the numerous scandals facing the White House.
"Viewers must be loving it, for as The Wrap reported Friday, Leno trounced CBS's David Letterman in the May sweeps:"
 
In reaction to news of a prostitution ring being run out of a retirement home.
“Boy, that Obamacare is amazing! It just provides everything!”

On a new IRS commissioner: “They’re called ‘acting commissioner’ because you have to act like the scandal doesn’t involve the White House.”

On comparisons to Nixon: “At least he’s not being compared to President Carter.”

On the Miami Heat beating Obama’s beloved Chicago Bulls: “You now what that means? LeBron James is going to get audited by the IRS.”
May 17:
“It’s casual Friday, which means that at the White House, they’re casually going through everybody’s phone calls and records.”
On Obama’s dismissal of the IRS commissioner: “Apparently he was fired for acting like Richard Nixon’s IRS commissioner.”
“Love him or hate him, you have to admit that President Obama is a new kind of Democrat. He’s embroiled in three scandals and not one of them involves sex!”
“This morning he called Mitt Romney and said, ‘Look, if you still want the job …’”
“Fox News has changed its slogan from ‘Fair and Balanced’ to ‘See, I told you so!’”
May 20:
“These White House scandals are not going away anytime soon. … People in Kenya are now saying he’s 100 percent American. That’s how bad it’s gotten.”
On Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) saying the Obama administration operates in a culture of intimidation. “Really? Anyone intimidated by Barack Obama? He can’t even keep Joe Biden in line.”
May 21:
On Obama’s commencement address: “He told the young graduates their future is bright unless, of course, they want jobs. Then they’re totally screwed.”
Read more. 

Rate Shock: In California, Obamacare To Increase Individual Health Insurance Premiums By 64-146%

Forbes  "One of the most serious flaws with Obamacare is that its blizzard of regulations and mandates drives up the cost of insurance for people who buy it on their own.

"This problem will be especially acute when the law’s main provisions kick in on January 1, 2014, leading many to worry about health insurance “rate shock.”"
 

Yes, but you can still dunk a crucifix in a jar of urine and have it considered “art”

Bare Naked Islam   "In its latest effort to protect followers of Islam in the U.S., the Obama Justice Department warns against using social media to spread information considered inflammatory against Muslims, threatening that it could constitute a violation of civil rights. By “spreading information considered inflammatory against Muslims” – even if it’s true – you could violate the civil rights act and be subject to prosecution." 
Quoting Judicial Watch:
The area’s top federal prosecutor, Bill Killian, will address a topic that most Americans are likely unfamiliar with, even those well versed on the Constitution; that federal civil rights laws can actually be violated by those who post inflammatory documents aimed at Muslims on social media.
Negative Posting About Islam in U.S. Now Subject to Federal Prosecution and Imprisonment  "Remember reading that England had arrested a guy for anti-Muslim Twitter postings in the aftermath of the Woolwich slaughter? And remember thinking, “Well, this is America, that can’t happen here”?

Oh yes it can.

Pianist convicted of insulting Islam in a tweet speaks out on "lost freedoms in Turkey" 
"Fazil Say, convicted by a Turkish court for insulting Islam, has spoken about the country’s fading freedoms at a meeting organized by the International Federation for Human Rights (FIDH) in Istanbul. You can watch him below (in Turkish). He said, among other things:
- As individuals, we have to fight for our lifestyles and our existence, opinions, art and future under pressure. In the past few years, the epic speeches, attempts to discriminate one to another, and exploitation of religion increased in Turkey. Manipulations increased too. We cannot share our thoughts or art.
-Thousands of people received sentences for being dissidents. Many people are oppressed and frightened.

The End of the Old Order; The well-intentioned social programs of the 1960s make no sense today.

Victor Davis Hanson 
"So who exactly should receive privileges in hiring or college admissions — the newly arrived Pakistani immigrant, or the third-generation, upper-middle-class Mexican-American who does not speak Spanish? Both, or neither? What about someone of half-Jamaican ancestry? What about the children of Attorney General Eric Holder or the self-proclaimed Native American senator Elizabeth Warren? What about the poor white grandson of the Oklahoma diaspora who is now a minority in California?
"Even if the 21st-century state could define who is a minority, on what moral grounds does the targeted beneficiary deserve special consideration? Is his disadvantage defined by being poorer, by lingering trauma from his grandparents’ long-ago ordeals, or by yesterday’s experience with routine racial prejudice?
So who exactly should receive privileges in hiring or college admissions — the newly arrived Pakistani immigrant, or the third-generation, upper-middle-class Mexican-American who does not speak Spanish? Both, or neither? What about someone of half-Jamaican ancestry? What about the children of Attorney General Eric Holder or the self-proclaimed Native American senator Elizabeth Warren? What about the poor white grandson of the Oklahoma diaspora who is now a minority in California?
Even if the 21st-century state could define who is a minority, on what moral grounds does the targeted beneficiary deserve special consideration? Is his disadvantage defined by being poorer, by lingering trauma from his grandparents’ long-ago ordeals, or by yesterday’s experience with routine racial prejudice?
If Latinos are underrepresented at the University of California, Berkeley, is it because of stubborn institutional prejudices, which, however, somehow have been trumped by Asian-Americans enrolling at three times their percentage of the state’s general population? If women are so oppressed by men, why do they graduate from college in higher numbers than their chauvinist male counterparts?

"If Latinos are underrepresented at the University of California, Berkeley, is it because of stubborn institutional prejudices, which, however, somehow have been trumped by Asian-Americans enrolling at three times their percentage of the state’s general population? If women are so oppressed by men, why do they graduate from college in higher numbers than their chauvinist male counterparts?"
He even takes us seniors to task, and justly, I think.
 

Britain's rabid dogs

Blackfive  "If you feed, house and submit to rabid dogs, you will be bitten. Homegrown Islamists blew up their subways before, and now they have beheaded a British soldier in broad daylight on a city street. We allowed the same thing to happen with the two vermin in Boston.Tolerance is a crime if it allows those sworn to our destruction the freedom to live amongst us, take our largess and then act as they said all along they would. These British scum were on watch lists, but just like the Tsarnaevs. Political correctness kept the Brits and us from doing what should be done to rabid animals.
"I get sick of stating that all Muslims are not responsible for the actions of these scum, and there is some truth there. But look at the Pew report and do the math."   Read more
 

Obama's DOJ Sharia Offensive: Social Media Posts Trashing Muslims May Violate Civil Rights

Atlas Shrugs  "How is this any different than Islamic law in, say, Turkey (Obama's favorite and most trusted ally)? In October, 43-year-old Fazil Say went on trial in Turkey for "denigrating" Islam for a series of tweets earlier that year. In one of his messages he had retweeted a verse from a poem by Omar Khayyám, in which the 11th-century Persian poet attacks pious hypocrisy. This is the same thing.
"If the DoJ pursued the vicious, offensive, racist, antisemitic tweets directed at me (and others) by Muslims and leftists, they would be pursuing little else. But they wouldn't and they shouldn't.
"Note to the Justice Department -- we will fight you on this every step of the way."....