Tag Archives: Barack Obama

Videos

Andrew Klavan compares the Ryan budget to the Obama budget

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Andrew Klavan on the culture. (H/T Club For Growth)

Douglas Groothuis also tweeted this Fox News article by Paul Ryan, in which Ryan talks about the current economic crisis and his plan to address the issues.

Excerpt:

There are three main reasons why the president’s policies have made this recovery weaker than usual:

1. Regulatory uncertainty: After the stimulus passed, the president turned his attention immediately to costly overhauls of the nation’s financial and health-care sectors. These overhauls needlessly transferred more control over America’s economy to government bureaucrats in Washington, without fixing the problems they were intended to address. The transfer of so much power to the arbitrary dictates of federal regulators has made it hard for businesses to plan for the future with confidence, and things will remain this way until these laws are replaced with real reforms.

2. Tax uncertainty: The president’s ad hoc tax policies, with a mix of tax hikes on job creators and temporary rebates for others being the hallmarks of his approach, have left businesses in the lurch. Moreover, the president’s new health care law imposes a crushing $800 billion tax hike, and he continues to threaten businesses and families with higher rates in the future, even as he dithers on his vague promise to address America’s uncompetitive corporate tax rate, which is the highest in the developed world.

3. Debt uncertainty: The president has not put forward a plan that saves Medicare from bankruptcy, even though nonpartisan experts tell us that this could happen in 9-13 short years unless we act. Each year that we fail to put our critical government health and retirement programs on a path to long-term solvency, we are making trillions of dollars of unfunded promises to future retirees. We are already borrowing 40 cents of every dollar we spend, and Washington’s inability to solve its spending problems is leading rating agencies such as Standard & Poors to downgrade our credit outlook. Government under this administration is failing at its number-one economic job, which is to create a stable, predictable environment for job creators.

Also: One seniors group is already supporting the Ryan plan.

News

How Barack Obama gave top campaign donors government jobs

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Left-leaning Politico reports on corruption, cronyism, nepotism and patronage appointments in the Obama administration.

Excerpt:

Telecom executive Donald H. Gips raised a big bundle of cash to help finance his friend Barack Obama’s run for the presidency.

Gips, a vice president of Colorado-based Level 3 Communications, delivered more than $500,000 in contributions for the Obama war chest, while two other company executives collected at least $150,000 more.

After the election, Gips was put in charge of hiring in the Obama White House, helping to place loyalists and fundraisers in many key positions. Then, in mid-2009, Obama named him ambassador to South Africa. Meanwhile, Level 3 Communications, in which Gips retained stock, received millions of dollars of government stimulus contracts for broadband projects in six states — though Gips said he had been “completely unaware” that the company had received the contracts.

More than two years after Obama took office vowing to banish “special interests” from his administration, nearly 200 of his biggest donors have landed plum government jobs and advisory posts, won federal contracts worth millions of dollars for their business interests or attended numerous elite White House meetings and social events, an investigation by iWatch News has found.

These “bundlers” raised at least $50,000 — and sometimes more than $500,000 — in campaign donations for Obama’s campaign. Many of those in the “Class of 2008” are now being asked to bundle contributions for Obama’s reelection, an effort that could cost $1 billion.

As a candidate, Obama spoke passionately about diminishing the clout of moneyed interests. Kicking off his presidential run on Feb. 10, 2007, he blasted “the cynics, the lobbyists, the special interests,” who had “turned our government into a game only they can afford to play.”

“We’re here today to take it back,” he said.

Say one thing in public, and do the opposite in private. Don’t believe the words of a candidate in their stump speeches. Look at their voting record, and their legislative initiatives, and their ratings from non-partisan organizations, such as the Club For Growth, Citizens Against Government Waste, and the National Taxpayer’s Union. Don’t vote based on pleasant sounding words and pleasant appearances, do the research.

News

Obama administration allowed American gun shipments to Mexican cartels

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From the Houston Chronicle, the latest news on the investigation of Obama administration’s Mexican gun-trafficking program. (H/T Doug Ross)

Full story:

House and Senate lawmakers are threatening to block presidential nominees and subpoena Justice Department officials this week to force the release of documents on a controversial gun trafficking program that allowed American shipments of weapons to Mexican cartels.

Congressional investigators claim U.S. officials allowed American gun stores to sell weapons in bulk to Mexican buyers in order to track the shipments and identify the ringleaders, known as “Operation Fast and Furious” under “Project Gunrunner.”

Weapons from those sales were found at the scene of two separate attacks on U.S. agents, and Congress wants to know if they were used specifically in the deaths of Immigration and Customs Enforcement special agent Jaime Zapata or Customs and Border Patrol agent Brian Terry.

Sen. Charles Grassley, R-Iowa, claims the Justice Department and the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives is conducting a cover-up in its refusal to hand over documents and witnesses to congressional investigators.

Grassley, the ranking Republican on the Senate Judiciary Committee, said he will block President Barack Obama’s nominees from confirmation until he gets the documents he needs for his panel’s investigation.

In the House, Rep. Darrell Issa, R-Calif., will hold the first of several hearings today into the failure of the Justice Department and the ATF to cooperate with the congressional probes. Issa is threatening to issue subpoenas to retrieve documents and to gain access to witnesses.

The efforts by Grassley and Issa have won bipartisan support from Texas lawmakers frustrated with the lack of information about the death of Zapata coming from the administration.

“The Justice Department engaged in an unauthorized activity which actually ended up putting guns in the hands of dangerous drug cartels in Mexico,” said Sen. John Cornyn, R-Texas. “Unfortunately, they seemed to be engaged now in a cover-up and refuse to be forthcoming with regards to Senator Grassley’s reasonable request for documents and information.”

Zapata, a Brownsville native, was working in Laredo as an ICE agent before he was transferred to Mexico to serve as a U.S. government consultant to the Mexican military’s battle against the cartels.

He was killed Feb. 15, and agent Victor Avila was wounded, when Los Zetas cartel members shot the agents in their SUV during an attempted car jacking along the highway between Mexico City and San Luis Potosi.

The Zapata family wants more information about the death of their son, said Rep. Henry Cuellar, D-Laredo, who supports Grassley’s attempt to obtain documents.

Congressman Darrell Issa tweeted this Daily Caller story.

Excerpt:

Four Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) agents in transcribed interviews with top GOP oversight official Darrell Issa’s office are contradicting the Justice Department’s account of “Operation Fast and Furious,” saying hundreds of weapons -– including assault rifles and military grade sniper weapons -– were allowed to escape into the clutches of Mexican drug cartels in an apparently reckless investigative strategy.

Their testimony raises the question of whether Ronald Weich, a deputy to Attorney General Eric Holder, lied to congressional investigators in a Feb. 4 letter denying the allegations. Weich is testifying before Issa’s committee Wednesday.

The four ATF agents describe how the weapons were tracked from sales at U.S. gun shops but not seized as is normal practice. The goal of the operation was to track the weapons as they progressed from the purchasers through criminal networks.

Yes, apparently Democrats are only opposed to legal gun ownership by law abiding citizens. If you are a murderous, torturing Mexican drug dealer, then the Democrats want you to have guns so you can murder people. And if the Democrats keep blocking border security measures, then the Mexican drug gangs can just come over and murder Americans on American soil. If you’re a Democrat, this makes sense to you. You voted for it. You support it. It’s “gun control”.

It’s similar to the way Democrats are only opposed to legal immigration. Illegal immigration is a great idea, according to Democrats. But if you have skilled workers who want to come here and work, start businesses, pay taxes and to NOT commit crimes, then the Democrats don’t want them to get green cards. People who pay taxes tend to vote Republicans, and that makes them bad – according to Democrats. Democrats only want illegals to become citizens – because illegals vote for more and more dependence on government.

And if you’re a Democrat, then executing convicted criminals is a bad idea, but murdering innocent babies is a good idea. Apparently, for Democrats, it’s a bad idea to deter criminals from committing violent crimes with the threat of capital punishment. But Democrats want people to have as much irresponsible sex as possible… and if a baby is created then people can just get rid of it. Babies are so inconvenient – for Democrats. Obama doesn’t want people who freely choose to have irresponsible sex to be punished… with a baby.

And if you want to start a business or get a job, that’s bad – according to Democrats. Bad people who work hard and don’t commit crimes should pay lots of income taxes – especially if you work really hard and make lots of money. But if you just want to be on welfare and collect federal benefits and food stamps, then you can do that and not have to pay any taxes. Democrats love to encourage people to be dependent on the government, because it’s easier to buy votes that way. The Democrats want to spend lots of money on people who choose not to finish high school and who choose not to get married before having children. They subsidize that – largely with the money they get from married workers.

And don’t even think about requiring people to have a photo ID before voting. Democrats think that it is unfair for illegal immigrants and criminals to not have the right to vote – multiple times, if possible. Because they probably don’t vote Republican, and that makes it OK.

Welcome to the Democrat party – check your moral sense at the door, please.