News

Virginia man arrested for plotting attacks in Washington, D.C.

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Fox News reports on the latest terror plot, this time targeting mass transit customers. (H/T Answering Muslims)

Excerpt:

A Virginia man has been arrested for allegedly trying to help Al Qaeda plan multiple bombings around the nation’s capital, according to U.S. officials.

Farooque Ahmed, 34, of Ashburn, Va., was arrested today by the FBI and charged with providing material support to terrorists and collecting information for a terrorist attack.

[…]According to an indictment filed in U.S. Court for the Eastern District of Virginia, between April 2010 and Oct. 25, Ahmed repeatedly met with individuals he thought were affiliated with Al Qaeda to discuss “jihad.”On May 15, in a hotel room in Sterling, Va., Ahmed told one individual that he might be ready to travel overseas to conduct jihad, but only after he completed the Hajj pilgrimage to Saudi Arabia in November, according to the indictment.

In addition, he agreed to watch and photograph Arlington Cemetery Metrorail station and a hotel in Washington, D.C., in order to obtain information about their security and busiest periods.

In fact, on July 7, he participated in surveillance and recording images of Arlington Cemetery Metrorail station. The next month, he allegedy participated in surveillance of the Courthouse, Pentagon City and Crystal City Metrorail stations outside Washington.

During a meeting at a hotel in Herndon, Va., on Sept. 28, he suggested that rolling suitcases be used instead of backpacks, and he said that he wanted to kill as many military personnel as possible, according to the indictment.

What does fearless leader Obama think about Islamic terrorism?

Well, according to the UK Telegraph, Obama wants NASA to help muslims feel better about their scientific accomplishments!

Excerpt:

Charles Bolden, a retired United States Marines Corps major-general and former astronaut, said in an interview with al-Jazeera that Nasa was not only a space exploration agency but also an “Earth improvement agency”.

Mr Bolden said: “When I became the Nasa administrator, he [Mr Obama] charged me with three things.

“One, he wanted me to help reinspire children to want to get into science and math; he wanted me to expand our international relationships; and third, and perhaps foremost, he wanted me to find a way to reach out to the Muslim world and engage much more with dominantly Muslim nations to help them feel good about their historic contribution to science, math, and engineering.”

He added: “It is a matter of trying to reach out and get the best of all worlds, if you will, and there is much to be gained by drawing in the contributions that are possible from the Muslim [nations].”

Ah yes. Taxpayer dollars to build Muslim self-esteem.

Meanwhile, the FBI and DOJ are targeting pro-lifers in their training. Democrats are so good at national security.

Commentary

Tammy Bruce on how the left treats conservative gays

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Tammy Bruce
Tammy Bruce

In the ultra-left-wing UK Guardian, Tammy Bruce explains why disagreement with homosexuality is not “hate”. (H/T Ari from Ruth Blog)

Excerpt:

The real story of bigotry and intolerance is the fact that it lives and thrives on the left. As a gay woman who spent most of her adult life pushing the cart for liberal causes with liberal friends in a liberal city, I found that sexism, racism and homophobia are staples in the liberal world. The huge irony is liberals spend every ounce of energy promoting the notion that they are the banner carriers of individualism and personal freedom, yet the hammer comes down on anyone who dares not to conform to, or who dissents even in part from, the liberal agenda.

Think about what would happen if you did act up? If you dared to say you like Sarah Palin, or admire Margaret Thatcher, or think global warming is a hoax, or think Bill Clinton is a sexual predator, or that George W Bush isn’t to blame for everything, or that Barack Obama has absolutely no clue what he’s doing, you know there would be a price to pay. Odds are that your “liberal” friends would very liberally hate you. At the very least, being shunned would be your new experience, condemning you to suffer that horrific liberal malady called social death.

So, when it comes to my comfort level as a conservative who happens to be gay, here’s what I know: while many conservatives are people of faith and their religion promotes a very different point of view than mine on homosexuality (and a few other things!), I have found conservatives to be more tolerant, more curious and more understanding of those who are different to them than I ever did when ensconced in US liberal leadership.

You can read a biography of Tammy Bruce here. I have heard her guest hosting for Laura Ingraham on her popular national radio show many times.

I noticed that Neil Simpson’s latest round-up linked to this article in HillBuzz, a political blog run by two gay guys who agree with Tammy Bruce.

Excerpt:

Here in Boystown, the only hostility we’ve ever received has been from the Left.

The worst religious people will ever say to us, for being gay, is that they will “pray for us” because they wish we were straight…not out of some meanness, but because they believe being straight would mean a happier life and they don’t want to see people unhappy.  So, this is a little ignorant on their parts to presume that the only definition of happiness is for us to like girls…but it’s not coming from an evil place.

I don’t think that people who disagree with homosexuality and same-sex marriage want anyone to feel bad. You can’t really persuade someone if you treat them badly – everyone knows that. And when you disagree with someone, you want to persuade them, so that means you have to treat them nicely. In fact, with people I disagree with, we usually compete to see who can be the nicest.

By the way, Neil has a book review of Tammy Bruce’s book “The Death of Right and Wrong”. I have the audio book of that!

News

Have the Democrats finally stopped spending money on bailouts?

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The AP reports that bailout spending is ongoing, despite Treasury Department claims that bailouts are over. (H/T ECM)

Excerpt:

The Treasury Department says its bank bailouts are over, but the spending continues.

In a Sept. 22 speech, Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner said the bailouts “are completely behind us.”

That’s not quite correct. In the final six months in which it could spend money from the Troubled Asset Relief Program, Treasury set aside $243 million for new contracts for law firms, accountants and money managers to help run what’s left of the bailouts – on top of the $529 million already spent on work by staff, private companies and other agencies. Many of the contracts last until 2019, and there’s nothing to stop the government from hiring even more help if it’s needed to chase down the remaining bailout money.

Treasury’s authority to spend more from the $700 billion fund expired on Oct. 3. The law requires officials to recoup as much as possible of the $185 billion still in the hands of shaky private companies. After all collections are made, the government expects to be out about $51 billion, mostly from housing programs.

Rising voter anger ahead of next week’s elections has made Obama administration officials reluctant to speak candidly about the ongoing cost of managing TARP. Politicians who voted for the TARP law now face tough re-election fights. By downplaying their efforts, officials sidestep criticism of bailouts that helped Wall Street without easing lending or keeping many people in their homes.

A government watchdog said this week that public statements by Treasury officials around the Oct. 3 deadline appeared designed to create a mistaken sense that TARP is over.

“The idea that TARP is dead is just not accurate,” said Neil Barofsky, the special inspector general overseeing the program, in an interview. “People can write its obituary, people can declare that it’s been put out of its misery, but there’s still close to $180 billion of TARP money outstanding, and $82 billion obligated to be spent.”

ECM also sent me this article from the Heritage Foundation which explains how to cut $343 billion from the federal budget without breaking a sweat.