As Russia invaded Ukraine, Governor Palin posted the following on her Facebook page. That’s right; Prescient Palin strikes again!
Yes, I could see this one from Alaska. I’m usually not one to Told-Ya-So, but I did, despite my accurate prediction being derided as “an extremely far-fetched scenario” by the “high-brow” Foreign Policy magazine. Here’s what this “stupid” “insipid woman” predicted back in 2008: “After the Russian Army invaded the nation of Georgia, Senator Obama’s reaction was one of indecision and moral equivalence, the kind of response that would only encourage Russia’s Putin to invade Ukraine next.”
During the 2008 election, Governor Palin was mocked for postulating that Russia may invade Ukraine if then Senator Obama was elected. As Tony Lee at Breitbart noted, during the 2008 election, some in the media called Palin’s scenario “far-fetched”. In reality, Governor Palin has proven prescient, almost clairvoyant, on many occasions from death panels to the Arab Spring to rare earth metals to quantitative easing to common core. Just to name a few.
There’ is a sense of vindication when a woman so mocked by the media and the establishment’s of both parties is proven right time and time again. There is also a sense of a frustration and sadness that such a great nation lacks the leadership it needs. A Russia bold enough to invade Ukraine can only do so because of a vacuum of leadership in America. President Reagan famously won the Cold War with the USSR without firing a single shot because of his principled and strong leadership, not “flexible” leadership that declares “happy hour” when the world is in chaos.
“Older Americans are using technology more and more frequently”, the President said, ” this new new device will allow for healthcare to be more efficient by allowing patients to know whether or not they will be able to receive treatment before they even leave the house”.
Some major components of his healthcare plan have or potential will be delayed, including business mandates and some information technology based aspects of the law. However, other parts of the law he has chosen to implement more quickly. The new Apple iPAB was introduced through a new executive order from the President.
With this executive order, rather than appointing member to the Independent Payment Advisory Board to be confirmed by the Senate, the President has ordered that this board be replaced by Siri.
HHS Secretary Kathleen Sebelius stated in a press release that seniors will simply have to ask Siri, “will Medicare cover my blood pressure medication?”. Using already collected personal data from the NSA and IRS, Siri will be able to quickly determine whether or not a patient will be rationed whatever particular medication or procedure they have queried. This is will save patients the hassle of having to go the doctor, which, subsequently will help reduce carbon emissions from travel.
Vice President Joe Biden has been tasked with Beta testing the new iPAB and has run into some minor issues after he shot the iPAB with a shotgun after he consistently mistyped his passcode. ” God love, Siri. You know what they say, ‘an apple a day–an iPAB– keeps the doctor away’. Barack and I want to make sure that’s true”.
Former Governor of Alaska Sarah Palin has denounced the iPAB as a digital death panel that continues to give too much power to the federal government and rations care.
Note: This is simply satire. Please read it as such.
On Thursday, CNN reported that nearly three dozen CIA agents were on the ground during the attacks at the Benghazi consulate on September 11, 2012. Additionally, the Obama administration is subjecting many of these individuals to very frequent polygraph tests (and changing Benghazi survivors’ names). These revelations beg two questions. One–why is the Obama administration subjecting agents to what Jake Tapper’s source is calling an “unprecedented attempt to keep the spy agency’s Benghazi secrets from ever leaking out” if this is simply a phony scandal? Of course, that is a rhetorical question. Second–why were so many CIA agents in Benghazi at the time?
On Thursday night, Virginia Congressman Frank Wolf indicated that the CIA was moving guns in Benghazi, per Breitbart News:
“We’re getting calls from people who are close to people who were [in Benghazi at the time] that they were moving guns. So where are the guns?” asked Rep. Frank Wolf (R-VA), a sub-committee chairman of the Appropriations Committee. Wolf also wonders what Ambassador Chris Stevens was actually doing in Benghazi on that night. Stevens and three others were killed over the course of the attacks.
“Are they in a warehouse somewhere? Some people say they moved on to Turkey and then from Turkey to Syria,” Wolf told Breitbart News on Thursday. “Did they fall into the hands of some of the Jihadis?”
“Nobody knows, so I think there are so many questions from the failure to respond to where the guns went,” he stated.
Wolf is currently attempting to create a Select Committee to investigate the Benghazi attack by launching a discharge petition from committee. He needs 218 signatures to take the issue to a vote on the floor.
In January, Senator Rand Paul asked then Secretary of State Hillary Clinton if guns were being run to Turkey from Libya, which she did not answer, but deferred to the CIA (see the 2:17 mark):
About that same time, the CIA denied that guns were being run from Libya through Turkey to Syria.
To look at this more completely, we must take a step back. It was an absolute failure of security to not have more protection at a consulate in an Islamist country on a date with such significance as September 11th, especially with the threats and violence that had already occurred in Libya in the previous months. Remember too that in August 2011, Gaddafi was overthrown. A dictator was defeated, and a country in a volatile region of the world was even more unstable. When that happened, Governor Palin warned (emphasis added):
Finally, we must make sure that terrorist groups don’t try to co-opt the revolution, as Al Qaeda is trying to do in Syria. We should continue to use our intelligence assets to monitor the situation in Libya to ensure that potentially dangerous weapons are secured, and that terrorist organizations such as Al Qaeda don’t gain a foothold in Libya.
The President has often touted that bin Laden is dead and that al Qaeda is decimated. He has cheered the death of Gaddafi. While these three things help rid the world of evil, only two of them are true. Al Qaeda seems to still be very much active. On Friday, the State Department issued worldwide travel warnings for the entire month of August because of al Qaeda threats. US Embassies are closed this Sunday (President Obama’s birthday) throughout the world including places like Iraq and Egypt.If a terror network was truly decimated, there would be no need to take caution over their threats.
It is phony reasoning to suggest that the death of two evil men means the death of an entire network of evil. It is phony leadership to not heed real warnings of the potential for evil and to intimidate those who were survivors of such evil by subjecting them to polygraph tests in an attempt to silence them.
On Friday, Governor Palin hammered President Obama for characterizing his lapses of leadership, his administration’s corruption, and his neglect of the Constitution as merely “phony scandals”:
On her “redneck whiteboard”, Governor Palin noted several real scandals of the Obama White House: 1) IRS targeting of Tea Party groups 2) Benghazi 3) Accessing Fox News journalist, James Rosen’s email 4) NSA spying 5) Holder’s perjury 6) Fast and Furious 7) Obamacare lies…and the list continues.
Governor Palin is the perfect person to distinguish between real and phone scandals. When she took the reins as Governor, she did so on the heels of a massive vote buying scandal that indicted members of the Alaska legislature and Governor Murkowski’s staff. Prior to that, she had called out the real scandal of the head of the Alaska GOP, Randy Ruedrich, doing party business on state time. She recognizes scandal because she has often had to clean it up.
When it comes to Governor Palin herself, the media, the Left, and establishment Republicans have all tried to spin faux scandals as legitimate scandals and have tried to turn lies and half truths into scandals. During the 2008 presidential campaign, the media claimed that Palin, as mayor, tried to ban books before they were even written. Some in the media, and people like Andrew Sullivan to this day, questioned that she was the mother of her son, Trig. The Left once tried to claim that during Palin’s childhood, the Heath family, received socialized medicine in Canada (before Canada even had universal health care). At one point in 2010, the media tried to turn the language in her speaking contracts into a giant scandal over, gasp, bottles of water and bendable straws. The media and the Left have searched her emails looking for scandal only to find that she was a hard working dedicated governor. Recently, the media, the Left and the Establishment GOP have all tried to paint her as a consultant-laden, hypocritical politico because she dared to have her PAC spend money on things like postage. The list could go on and on of examples of phony scandals drudged up by the triumvirate of hypocrisy–of the media, the Left, and the Establishment GOP.
If the Obama administration is trying to find phony scandal, look no further than all the garbage that has been thrown at Governor Palin over the years. Real scandal lies in the fact that the American people have been the targets of intense, gratuitous IRS scrutiny, that the 4th amendment has been desecrated by the NSA, and that four brave, patriotic men died in Benghazi because of a lack of true leadership. Those are real scandals, and it is an insult to the American people to assume we are in capable of recognizing the truth about the lies of the Obama administration.
Between the seemingly daily revelation of the federal (and even local) government’s violations of Americans’ privacy and the media and political reaction to the George Zimmerman verdict, the constant disregard for the human dignity has become tiresome.
The federal government collects all of this data on our lives (often “accidentally” disclosing it) often without our consent. Essentially, we become naked before the government, in an informational sense– our private data laid bare. This diminishes human dignity…and our liberty. The government knows (or has in place the potential to know) the intricate details of our comings and goings, and this makes us less free. It also means that the government knows our uniqueness, but only in the terms of categorical or continuous variables in some massive database that would put Karl Rove to shame.
While the surveillance state and a “big brother” government seek to know the unique details of our lives, the paternalism of such ideology also seeks to paint us with broad brush strokes of generalities. When a horrific shooting occurs in Aurora, Colorado or Newtown, Connecticut or when a FBI investigation or trial verdict violates preconceptions, the President calls for soul searching. In doing so he paints Americans with a broad brush–all Americans have the meditations in our heart to kill or to act in a racist manner. We’re a nation of cowards, according to Eric Holder. Somehow the government that seeks the unique details of our lives, also paints us as violent and racist across the board–even while they rightfully call out those who paint African Americans with broad brush strokes. This violates our dignity. We are not seen as unique individuals judged by the content of character through our words and actions. We are prejudged as needing to soul search because of the actions of others, not ourselves.
Again, the government seeks to become god. However, the true God both knows the number of hairs on our heads (Matthew 10:30), and He does so without having to keep a massive database. He has discerned the words on our lips before we speak them (Psalm 139:4). He knows the motivations of our hearts. The true “prism” is not a data mining surveillance government surveillance program, nor the “soul searching” prism through which the President often patronizing instructs us to view the world. The true prism by which we must see those around us is by through the prism of everyone being created in the image of God. This is the only way to ensure we are treating others with the dignity they deserve. God is the only one who truly knows such intricate details of our lives, and He is the only one who knows our motivations.
The late, great Margaret Thatcher once said, “being powerful is like being a lady. If you have to say you are, you aren’t”. The inverse statement is true as well–if you have to say you aren’t, you are. Over the last several months, there seems to be a pattern of denial from President Obama. This goes beyond his denial of knowledge on Benghazi talking point changes, IRS targeting of conservative groups, and other scandals. These are denials not of what he’s done, but who he is and to whom he is compared.
“Some people say, ‘Well, you know, Obama was this raving liberal before. Now he’s, you know, Dick Cheney.’ Dick Cheney sometimes says, ‘Yeah, you know? He took it all lock, stock, and barrel,’” the president told interviewer Charlie Rose in the exchange recorded Sunday, according to excerpts of the transcript published by BuzzFeed. “My concern has always been not that we shouldn’t do intelligence gathering to prevent terrorism, but rather are we setting up a system of checks and balances?”
President Obama denies comparisons to Dick Cheney, yet through double negative rhetoric confirms he does support “intelligence gathering” that may may mean that individuals’ privacy could be violated. Additionally, while the purpose may not be to prevent terrorism, he supports collecting massive amounts of data on Americans (and sharing it within government at all levels) when it comes to the issue of healthcare, immigration, and education. The candidate who ran as a proponent of civil liberties is hardly that anymore. In fact, polls show just the opposite.
2. Jay Carney’s Denial of the Obama comparison to Richard Nixon
Last month, following questions from the White House press corps surrounding the IRS targeting of conservative groups and the handling of Benghazi (among other questionable behavior), press secretary Jay Carney denied comparisons to Nixon.
Well…
On second thought, perhaps President Obama is right. He isn’t Nixon. President Nixon took responsibility for his arguably less corrupt actions.
3. I’m not a socialist
In an interview with the Spanish language channel Univision in late 2012, President Obama denied that his ideology mirrored that of the Castro brothers and the late Hugo Chavez. While America has certainly not suffered the same ill fate of these countries mired in socialism for years, the President has aimed to bring more and more industries under greater control of the State–from the auto bailout early in his presidency to the government control of healthcare under Obamacare to his student loan takeover. Additionally, he a signed into law a massive stimulus bill and has a strong desire to put a heavier tax burden on the rich.
4. I’m not a dictator
5. I’m not an emperor
Denials #4 and #5 are essentially the same with slightly different wording. In a press conference in March, President Obama responded to a reporter’s question about working with Congress by essentially bemoaning that he “was not a dictator” and could not dictate to Congress to “do the right thing”. Just a few weeks earlier, he quipped during a Google hangout, that he was “not emperor of the United States” and that his job was to “execute laws that are passed”. President Obama has regularly criticized Congress for not doing his bidding, but isn’t that part of the “checks and balances” that he supposedly supports (at least when he is trying to deny the aforementioned comparison to Dick Chaney)? President Obama has made it clear that when it is possible he will try to govern by going around Congress. Additionally, while he may claim to be a “dictator”, he has signed legislation into law that dictates an awful lot to the American people and businesses. Looking at Obamacare alone, Americans are mandated to purchase health insurance, most employers are required to provide it, and all are required to cover contraceptives. Would the President prefer to be called a “mandator”?
What is particularly interesting is that four of these five denials came in response to reasonably direct questions posed by a friendly press corps. The press is even asking the President about these common perceptions of the American people. Denial is not just a river in the Christian persecuting, war-on-women country of the Arab Spring. It is a defensive mechanism employed by the President when his rhetoric consistently doesn’t match his actions.
Over the weekend I saw the Vince Vaughn and Owen Wilson movie ” The Internship” (trailer shown above) Vaughn (Billy) and Wilson (Nick) played two veteran watch salesmen who had lost their jobs in part because people don’t wear watches anymore, but simply check their cell phones to determine the time. Billy ultimately lands two internships at Google for both himself and Nick where they were placed in a group with other (much younger) interns who were still in college.
During one scene, this group of interns discuss their concerns of finding a job after college. One of the college-aged interns said to Billy and Nick (paraphrasing), ” You could achieve the American Dream. The American Dream isn’t the same for us. It isn’t guaranteed”. I found this line intriguing. It is clear that this movie takes place in the present day. Thus, Hollywood and Google are essentially admitting that the Obama administration has not created confidence for young millennials seeking jobs after college. Hollywood, of course, is notorious for being quite Left in their political ideology. Also, Google is very tight with the Obama administration. Yet, both Hollywood and Google–whether intentionally or not–indicated that liberal ideology (and hope and change) have not lived up to the expectation of millennials. There are two key issues to consider when looking at the economic hope of those in their late teens to mid twenties–1) their educational choices 2) their means of funding their education.
The group of millennials depicted in the movie would likely enter the technology field, a field where there are more opportunities for jobs than other fields. However, some students are choosing fields that are not particularly employable. This, plus a sustained poor economy, has contributed to 48% of those with a college degree working in a job that does not require such education. This is not to say that people should forgo college, but the liberal ideal of universal college education is wrong. A high school graduate with a strong work ethic should not be frowned upon, nor should a high school graduate who seeks training at a technical school. In fact, likely due in part to our culture’s emphasis on intellectual output over tangible output, skilled trades like carpentry and car mechanics are among the ten hardest jobs to fill in America.. As a researcher in academia, I certainly don’t want to downplay intellectual output, but our society needs a myriad of outputs to continue to be the strongest nation in the world. As Governor Palin wrote in a post earlier this Spring:
It’s crucially important today for young people to think about the big picture when making education decisions. And the big picture is the goal of self-reliant business opportunities based on work ethic and not entitlements. One of the reasons I aggressively encouraged vocational training opportunities as governor of Alaska is because they lead to good paying jobs and happy careers. Young people should not be pressured into assuming that a college degree is the only path to employment today. It’s not. Some college degrees obviously lead to clear professions, like those in the medical and engineering fields, but that’s not the case with many of the liberal arts degrees young people today gravitate toward either because they aren’t sure what they want to do after college or because they’ve been led to believe that college life is a sort of rite of passage for any career. That might have been the case once, but the salary and career opportunities a liberal arts education alone can get you have been dramatically limited these days. It’s so sad to see young people holding expensive college diplomas that come with no practical job opportunities.
[…]
Follow your dreams, by all means. But don’t be blind to the fact that your dreams might be achieved outside of acquiring an outrageously expensive traditional college degree. Do not be lulled into thinking that good jobs grow on trees or that the government will somehow take care of you. The bottom line is – as my dad always told me – find out what you love to do, then find out how to make a living doing it. Learning a trade can do both. No one can take those vo-tech real life skills away from you.
It’s not only the choice of educational training that makes the difference; it is also how you fund it. For all the flack Governor Palin received for taking five years to graduate from college and for changing schools multiple times, she did something few people do–graduated from college with no debt. The governmental subsidization of education has lead to public higher education costs to increase 250% since 1982, which makes it harder for college to be affordable. However, it is still achievable. Some students are fortunate enough to have parents who fund their entire education. Some are able to obtain scholarship to assist them, and some work during college and summer breaks to pay for college and/or help mitigate the need for student loans.
Student loans, like any other construct with government intervention, have become a political football. In 2010, nearly concurrently with the passage of Obamacare, President Obama signed a student loan overall that wiped out fees paid to banks who act as intermediaries in administering student loans (i.e. the federal government took over the student loan industry). President Obama noted at the time (emphasis added):
Mr. Obama portrayed the overhaul of the student loan program as a triumph over an “army of lobbyists,” singling out Sallie Mae, the nation’s largest student lender, which he said spent $3 million on lobbying to stop the changes. “For almost two decades, we’ve been trying to fix a sweetheart deal in federal law that essentially gave billions of dollars to banks,” he said. The money, he said, “was spent padding student lenders’ pockets.”
Things haven’t changed since the three plus years after the bill took effect. The student lenders’ pockets are still being padded, but now those pockets are Uncle Sam’s pockets. In fiscal year 2013 alone, the federal government will reap $51 billion in “profit” from these student loan borrowers. This profit is greater than that of Exxon Mobil or Apple.
As was the case last year, student loan rates are set to double on July 1st, thus perpetuating the political game between Congressional Republicans and the Obama administration. The House has passed a bill that would make loan rates fluctuate based upon market rates, while the Obama administration wants rates fixed (i.e. controlled by the government). Politicians continue to use students as a political football, and the Department of Education is reaping the benefits. Students need to make smart choices in their education, but the government must stop trying to “fix” things only to pad their own pockets.
There is every reason for hope for millennials, and I say this as someone who is on the “old” end of that generation. America is rife with opportunity if people are willing to work hard enough, be rational, and plan ahead. Abraham Lincoln, one of our most famed presidents, did not have a college degree, but he had wisdom–and an ax. Lincoln is quoted as saying, ” if I had eight hours to chop down a tree, I’d spend six hours sharpening my ax”. He prepared for the goal ahead of him, and he was efficient. Millennials can act in the same manner by making wise decisions with educational, occupational, and financial choices. The American Dream is still achievable, in spite of a government that acts as a barrier.
It is encouraging to see increased American development of energy having a worldwide impact. However, such impact should not come at the expense of subsidies and loans footed by the American taxpayer or special deals. Exelon, the largest nuclear energy company in America, has a diverse energy production portfolio. They also are involved in liquefied natural gas production and solar energy. With the current natural gas glut, prices are quite low, which has cut into Exelon’s profits. These low prices also make natural gas power plants competitive with Exelon’s nuclear plants. Never fear for Exelon though! The Obama administration is on the way! As an article at Crain’s Chicago Business reports:
Don’t see the connection? Every cubic foot of natural gas that’s liquefied and shipped overseas is a cubic foot that doesn’t get sold at rock-bottom prices to gas-fired power plants that compete with Exelon’s nuclear plants. Low gas prices enable gas-fired plants to sell electricity cheaper, bringing down prices in wholesale power markets.
[…]
Exporting to non-free-trade countries requires special permission from the Department of Energy. Heated debate over the policy has erupted in recent months. Natural gas producers are pushing for more freedom to export, while environmental groups and big gas users like Dow Chemical Co. defend the current restrictions
Some see last week’s decision on the Texas facility as a sign President Barack Obama is leaning toward a looser export policy. It’s a little early to draw that conclusion. Rather than articulating a broad policy shift, the administration says it will evaluate proposed non-FTA export facilities on a case-by-case basis. Until Friday, the DOE hadn’t approved one since 2011. Nineteen applications are pending.
Seeing the implication that President Obama is going to loosen policy on anything related to non “green” energy development is a surprise. There is perhaps reason to evaluate such special situations for export to non-free trade countries, but when a company like Exelon receives a deal, it is suspect. Exelon has a reputation for being an energy giant, but it also has a reputation for its ties to President Obama.
It is exciting to see that natural gas production is booming in such a way that producers have opportunity to energize America and have opportunity for export. It is discouraging that “case-by-case” export opportunities are going to companies who have the political connections and clout to continue to receive special deals.
During the 2008 presidential campaign, then candidate Barack Obama was asked to compare his experience to that of Vice Presidential candidate Governor Sarah Palin. Obama made a disingenuous comparison by only referencing Palin’s mayoral experience, but he also tried to bolster his executive credentials by referencing his ability to manage “large systems” and millions of dollars in campaign funds:
It is now nearly five years later, and little has changed. The President’s executive experience still lies in running a campaign, but not one that comes at the expense of his donors (and actually often to his donors’ benefit) . He has turned his executive branch cabinet level departments into components of this perpetual campaign at the expense of American taxpayers.
When it comes to the President’s campaign claim of being able to manage “large systems”, it seems Obama has been disproved by his own former campaign adviser David Axelrod. In trying to defend the President’s ability to deal with multiple, simultaneous scandals, Axelrod inadvertently made the case for smaller government when he said that there is only so much a President can know “because the government is so vast”. The President has proven that when executive experience is manifested in a hybrid of small leadership and big government, it only perpetuates a campaign cycle that trickles down the blame.
Last week, President Obama gave the commencement address at Ohio State University where he mocked those who warned against the potential tyranny of overreaching government “around every corner” and accused such critics of “gumming up the works”:
In recent days, leaks from a soon-to-be released inspector general’s report have shown that the IRS targeted Tea Party groups starting in March of 2010 and that the IRS’s chief counsel knew as early as 2011 that such groups were being targeted. The targeting of Tea Party groups included in depth questioning from IRS officials ranging from inquiries regarding interactions with the media to predicting event revenue, expense, and other details of future rallies. Despite earlier claims from the Obama administration aiming to pin responsibility on low level field agents, it has become clear that IRS offices in Washington and at least two other offices were involved in the targeting of conservative groups. Additionally, IRS officials based in Cincinnati (just 100 miles from where President Obama gave his speech mocking government skeptics) disclosed confidential documents from Tea Party groups to Pro Publica, a left-leaning media group whose main funders also fund the Soros-backed Center for American Progress.
The news of the last two weeks alone has proven that those who support limited government have reason to question the size and scope of government and how such a large, over-reaching government can truly be held accountable. The Obama administration has been able to feign ignorance over the dealings of several of his own cabinet departments. He has claimed no previous knowledge of IRS targeting of conservative groups, calling the IRS an “independent agency”. The Obama administration has claimed only a stylistic role in the editing of Benghazi talking points by his own State Department and CIA. This evening, press secretary Jay Carney claimed that the Obama administration was unaware of that the Department of Justice obtained phone logs of AP reporters, again calling an executive branch entity like the Department of Justice, “independent”. All of these examples are proof that government has become too big and leadership has become too small to take responsibility for its own failures.
Late Leftist historian Howard Zinn quipped during the Bush administration that dissent was the highest form of patriotism. Now, dissent in the name of patriotism means that groups undergo harsh scrutiny from the government they wish to help restore to its proper purpose and size. Pardon us, for “gumming up the works”, Mr. President. We simply want our government to abide by the charter of liberties you swore an oath to uphold. We won’t be silenced.
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A Time For Choosing 
