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Rand Paul And Chris Christie Finding Headlines

There's the old story of a small town that had only one lawyer who was about to go broke, until another lawyer moved into town and then they both got rich suing each others clients.  Well, the struggle for Rand Paul and Chris Christie to get enough attention to be a contender for the 2016 GOP primary is getting easier.

Every day it seems Rand is lobbing shots at Christie who is firing back at Rand, and both men are getting plenty of headlines over the feud.

Now Rand is calling Christie "cheap and sad", or at least that's how POLITICO is reporting it.

“It’s really, I think, kind of sad and cheap that he would use the cloak of 9/11 victims and say, I’m the only one who cares about these victims. Hogwash,” Paul said on Monday to Sean Hannity on Fox News. “If he cared about protecting this country, maybe he wouldn’t be in this ‘give me, give me, give me all of the money’ that you have in Washington or don’t have and he would be more fiscally responsive and know the way we defend our country.”

Meanwhile, the Clintons are secretly enjoying the Weiner scandal which has brought Bill's bad behavior and Hillary's moment in the sun back into focus.  The media is in full "help Hillary" mode already and I'm sure that both Rand and Chris see that playing out.  Their job now is to remain relevant and get their own kind of attention.

What a goofy way to choose candidates don't you think?  I mean, having to play the left wing media like this is what is truly a sad and cheap comment on out ability to dig ourselves out of the hole we are in.

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Eric Holder: Caught Red-Handed Lying To Congress

Lying to Congress is a very bad idea.  When the Attorney General of the United States does it much is at stake.  And it now looks like Eric Holder has been caught red-handed doing just that.  And how do we know that he has been caught lying?  The report comes directly from Michael Isikoff at NBC.

Attorney General Eric Holder signed off on a controversial search warrant that identified Fox News reporter James Rosen as a “possible co-conspirator” in violations of the Espionage Act and authorized seizure of his private emails, a law enforcement official told NBC News on Thursday.

That is certainly not what Holder said to Congress under oath.  This is:

“First of all you’ve got a long way to go to try to prosecute the press for publication of material. This has not fared well in American history… In regard to potential prosecution of the press for the disclosure of material. This is not something I’ve ever been involved in, heard of, or would think would be wise policy.“

CAUGHT...RED...HANDED...LYING

source: Gateway Pundit

Wheels-Come-Off: New York Times Blasts Obama

I am hesitant to expect this sentiment to last but for the moment it seems that the wheels have come off of the Obama-Train.  This is from the New York Times:

With the decision to label a Fox News television reporter a possible “co-conspirator” in a criminal investigation of a news leak, the Obama administration has moved beyond protecting government secrets to threatening fundamental freedoms of the press to gather news.

The latest reported episode involves James Rosen, the chief Washington correspondent for Fox News.

Michael Clemente, the executive vice president of Fox News, said on Monday that it was “downright chilling” that Mr. Rosen “was named a criminal co-conspirator for simply doing his job as a reporter.” Bruce Brown, the executive director of the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press, added on Tuesday that treating “routine news-gathering efforts as evidence of criminality is extremely troubling and corrodes time-honored understandings between the public and the government about the role of the free press.”

The Rosen case follows other signs that the administration has gone overboard in its zeal to find and muzzle insiders.

When his greatest fans and protectors in the MSM lodge criticisms like this, the next shoe to drop could very well be enough to squash him.

Eric Holder Wire Tapped Congress?

Congressman Devin Nunes told Hugh Hewitt that the FBI ran its tapping operation by tapping phones in the Congressional Cloak Room, a place closed to everyone except for Senators and Representatives.  If this is true, this is an egregious violation of law and the separation of powers. 

HH: The idea that this might be a Geithner-Axelrod plan, and by that, the sort of intimation, Henry II style, will no one rid me of this turbulent priest, will no one rid me of these turbulent Tea Parties, that might have just been a hint, a shift of an eyebrow, a change in the tone of voice. That’s going to take a long time to get to. I don’t trust the Department of Justice on this. Do you, Congressman Nunes?

DN: No, I absolutely do not, especially after this wiretapping incident, essentially, of the House of Representative. I don’t think people are focusing on the right thing when they talk about going after the AP reporters. The big problem that I see is that they actually tapped right where I’m sitting right now, the Cloak Room.

HH: Wait a minute, this is news to me.

DN: The Cloak Room in the House of Representatives.

HH: I have no idea what you’re talking about.

DN: So when they went after the AP reporters, right? Went after all of their phone records, they went after the phone records, including right up here in the House Gallery, right up from where I’m sitting right now. So you have a real separation of powers issue that did this really rise to the level that you would have to get phone records that would, that would most likely include members of Congress, because as you know…

HH: Wow.

DN: …members of Congress talk to the press all the time.

HH: I did not know that, and that is a stunner.

DN: Now that is a separation of powers issue here, Hugh.

HH: Sure.

DN: And it’s a freedom of press issue. And now you’ve got the IRS going after people. So these things are starting to cascade one upon the other, and you have the White House pretending like they’re in the clouds like it’s not their issue somehow. [Hugh Hewitt]

If this is true, can you say "Impeachment"?

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Media Running Scared Of Koch Brother's Plans

The media is hyperventilating over the prospect that the famed libertarian Koch Brothers might purchase a number of newspapers throughout the country.  But that seems odd doesn't it?  I mean, newspapers don't have a bias do they?  So what difference would it make who owned them?  Reaction is very telling.

Allahpundit at HotAir makes a similar point citing to a statement from the Newspaper Guild.  But here's the thing.  Nobody is reading newspapers anymore.

According to a study by the Pew Research Center by 2010 more people were getting their news online than by way of print and that trend has grown substantially in the last three years.  In fact, the number of people getting their news by way of social media and on mobile devices is climbing at an extraordinary rate.

But there is one thing I hope some in the GOP notice.  The Koch Brothers, as wealthy and powerful as they are, at least understand the core concept that I have been preaching, though their strategy is antiquated.  It is time for the GOP to stop complaining about the liberal filter being applied to the news and strive to deliver more accurate content to the public utilizing all of the tools available and cutting the edge themselves.

Secret McConnell Tape Being Called "Gold"

Here's where the left goes spinning off into La-La land.  The Washington Post is calling the secret tape from McConnell's inner group where someone is delivering an opposition research report on Ashley Judd "audio gold".  It's not gold.  It's fools gold at best. 

Sure it had the potential to knock McConnell off message for a while, but it's April 2013 and the election isn't until next year.  Besides, McConnell isn't likely to have a top tier challenger anyway.

But because conservatives have no serious media presence unfortunately the left can continue to drive this story until it gets a life of its own and could become a problem only because it will be mis-characterized to death.

Let's set the record straight.  All candidates do opposition research.  In Ashley Judd's case that wasn't too hard, she wrote most of the things being discussed in that meeting, herself.

Normally a campaign hires an outside vendor to do opposition research.  There is really no indication that wasn't the case here.  And chuckles from staff over some of the things that were being reported are far less newsworthy than Democrats booing the restoration of God in their platform, or various plans for gun confiscation, but you don't hear those stories 24-7 in the left wing media do you?

Of course Mitch knew the media would be coming after him.  They've taken his quote about trying to make Obama a one term president out of context for five years now, and of course Obama is their favorite president of all times.

McConnell is also pilloried by the TEA party as a compromiser, (as if compromise is to be reviled), and of course the media continues to drive that story as if the TEA party is any real threat.  But what the media will not do is point out how ridiculous it is for a group of people so dedicated to our "founding fathers" to treat 'compromise' like leprosy.  One would think that someone would help them get their history straight. 

Had it not been for compromise we would not have a Constitution, a Bill of Rights or a republican form of government to begin with.  Our founding fathers were the great compromisers that gave us a divided government where compromise is the only assurance that all voices are heard, all positions duly considered and government is controlled by the people.  Only tyrants need not compromise.

Don't swallow everything the media says hook, line and sinker.  They are clearly not the "public watchdog" they would like you to think.  And whatever you do, don't buy anything they are trying to sell you as "gold".

Do You Still Oppose Obamacare After THIS?

Opposition to Obamacare is rabid.  The concept of a "single payer" system in direct conflict with traditional notions of free choice and fee markets.  The entire program has been identified with encroaching socialism.  Add to that the editorial opinions of notables like Rush Limbaugh.

Limbaugh has predicted that before long the public will be "nudged" to disapprove of any form of medical care containing a profit motive.  He says that before long people will begin to clamor that the profits in "big medicine" are grotesque and that hospitals and physicians should not charge so much for services.  He says the discussion will fuel more class warfare.

Once again Rush is right, and you need look no further than this article in TIME magazine.  Here is the spin being put on that article by "Common Dreams" a progressive website:

Steven Brill's article in Time Magazine about the cost of private health care is likely to make most of his readers very angry. Angry about the prices we pay, about the lives that are devastated, and about the fact that we're one of the few developed countries without adequate health care for its citizens.

Brill's article begins with the story of a 42-year-old Ohio man named Sean Recchi, who traveled to MD Anderson Cancer Center in Houston for treatment of non-Hodgkin's lymphoma. He and his wife Stephanie had paid $469 a month, or about 20% of their income, for insurance that covered $2,000 per day of hospital costs. His financial troubles started when MD Anderson told him, "We don't take that kind of discount insurance."

But he had to go to the hospital. His wife recalled that he was "sweating and shaking with chills and pains. He had a large mass in his chest that was..growing. He was panicked."

Stephanie asked her mother to write a check for $48,900.

Sean waited for 90 minutes while the hospital confirmed that the check had cleared. He was also required to advance MD Anderson $7,500 from his credit card. The total cost for the initial treatment and chemotherapy was $83,900, including a $15,000 charge for lab tests for which a Medicare patient would have paid a few hundred dollars, $283 for an x-ray that Medicare categorizes as a $20 charge, and $1.50 for a generic version of a Tylenol pill.

Our private health care system has indeed failed us. We have by far the most expensive system in the developed world. The cost of common surgeries is anywhere from three to ten times higher in the U.S. than in Great Britain, Canada, France, or Germany.

Everyone has their hand in the money pot: insurance companies, pharmaceutical firms, physicians, hospitals, equipment suppliers, the AMA. Steven Brill notes that the medical industry has spent $5.36 billion on lobbying in the past 15 years, compared to $1.53 billion spent by the defense/aerospace industry and $1.3 billion spent by oil and gas interests.

When we look beyond industry malfeasance to the effects on human life, we find that Americans are paying the ultimate price. We now have a shorter life expectancy than almost all other developed countries. A National Research Council study placed the United States LAST among 17 high-income countries.

It wasn't always this way. Since 1960 there has been a close parallel between worsening life expectancy and increased health care costs as a percentage of GDP. Most disturbing is our growing infant mortality rate relative to other countries. A UNICEF study places the U.S. 22nd out of 24 OECD countries in "children's health and well-being."

In startling contrast, Americans covered by Medicare INCREASED their life expectancy by 3.5 years from the 1960s to the turn of the century. [Common Dreams]

After reading this, how do you feel?  Are you concerned about your own medical needs in the future?  Are you worried that you won't be able to afford the kind of care and treatment you would need to continue living?

Do you worry that the best medical care is going to be reserved for the wealthy and well connected who can afford it?  Are you beginning to think that maybe if other developed nations have longer life spans and more affordable health care that maybe the United States is behind the curve?

Do you begin to wonder if all the talk about how bad Obamacare is might really be driven by the "big medicine" industry and its vast lobbying efforts?

Or do you still oppose Obamacare after reading this?

Rush was right again.  Now, how do you feel, and what do you have to say?

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Are We Past The Point Of No Return?

I ran a little exercise on Facebook over the past couple of days.  I wanted to gauge a reaction to some topics of discussion.  So I linked together Obama's assertion of the right to kill by drone, and the fugitive rogue police officer in California.  I was a bit stunned.  The reaction was varied, but unsettling.

I asked whether it would be appropriate for a government official to determine that the officer on the run should be hunted down and killed by a drone strike.  The number of people who approved of such action was small, but their reasoning could reflect a widespread mindset.

First of all, the fugitive has been accused of crimes, not tried nor convicted in a court of law.  In fact, for most of the nation, all we know is what the media has told us.  Yet people have concluded that the man is guilty of murder and mayhem based solely upon media reports.  That's an odd thing when you think about it.  This is the same media they never trust when it comes to politics, snowstorm predictions or getting it right about Obama.  Yet the public accepts that a citizen is guilty without any evidence other than that the which the media pushes.

The next area of concern was how willing people were to kill the man upon the decision of a government official, not a jury of his peers, but on the order of a government official.  The reasons given generally fell along the lines of "well he refused to surrender".  This reaction from among the same group of citizens many of whom openly profess to be willing to fight a new revolution if necessary to oppose government overreach.

And the last area of concern was how quickly the responses came in favoring his immediate assassination.  There could be discerned a level of viciousness by that fact alone, a blood lust of sorts that seemed to make the whole idea of a public execution captured perhaps on tape, a desirable result for what, the entertainment value alone?

Now I'm not trying to defend anything the guy did.  As a lawyer for over 30 years I've made it very clear, I defend my client's rights,  not their wrongs.  But since when did we become a nation which was so anxious to stand up for the second amendment, but not the fourth, or the fifth, or the sixth or the fourteenth?  When did we tire of the burden of due process and agree to permit a government agent the right to determine who lives and who dies?

And doesn't this mean to some extent that we have a selective zeal for life and liberty capable of being manipulated by the passions inspired by the media?

Are we past the point of no return?  Or might this little exercise help us find our way back?

I hope it is the later.

Kudos To AP Photojournalist James Crisp

Appearing on the website of Kentucky.com is a photo of Rand Paul testifying before the Kentucky Senate agricultural committee.  The photojournalist who captured this pic, James Crisp of the Associated Press, obviously has a wonderful sense of timing.  Rand was testifying about hemp.  Even a photoshop rookie can see the humor potential in the way Rand is holding his hand and mouth in this shot.

Rand Paul Demands Answers On Gun Running

Rand Paul says the administration needs to answer the question: are you running guns to Syrian rebels?  Simple question and it seems fair enough.  They asked it of Reagan's administration regarding the Iran-Contra incident.  And Leon Panetta has said the President vetoed the plan.  So is that it?  It think Rand is right.

 

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