WASHINGTON — More than 100 pages of e-mails released by the White House on Wednesday reveal intensive jostling between the C.I.A. and the State Department over the government’s official “talking points” in the aftermath of last September’s attacks in Benghazi, Libya, that killed four Americans.
May 20th, 2013
2 days ago
Is it possible that more people tune in to watch the (almost) daily “Blazecasts” (the online broadcasts from TheBlaze editors) than watch the President’s weekly address?
Image: WhiteHouse.gov
This past weekend, TheBlaze posted a story quoting Mr. Obama’s online video address. After watching it, we wondered…”How many people are actually clicking on this?” That question is easily answered by simply looking at the YouTube posting of the video where a counter is updated with each click. Here are the latest counts for the last four weekly video addresses from the President.
- 5/18 – 33,433
- 5/11 – 41,953
- 5/4 - 66,523
- 4/27 – 33,176
Compare those numbers with the viewer numbers from the last four Blazecasts from the previous week.
- 5/17 – 101,510
- 5/16 – 85,047
- 5/15 – 94,941
- 5/14 – 61,884
In a way, the comparison we’re making here is “apples and oranges.” Then again, in some ways, it’s not. Both are online broadcasts. Both are free and available on-demand. The White House also uses its Twitter account to promote things like the weekly address…so does TheBlaze.
Image: Twitter.com
The difference is social media is obvious. Consider the number of Twitter followers for White House and TheBlaze.
- The White House – 3,904,666 followers
- TheBlaze – 179,455 followers
There was also something else about Obama’s weekly address that sticks in the craw of this writer — the informal way the President opens almost every address. Mr Obama uses a “folksy” delivery and phrasing for his Saturday morning message. Instead of the very formal, “My fellow Americans,” or even the basic “Good morning,” preferred by the last President Bush, Obama starts virtually every online address by simply saying; “Hi everybody…”
Hi Everybody? It just feels a tad informal for an address from the President of the United States to all Americans. The most powerful man in the free world sounding (to me) more like a Morning Zookeeper cracking the mic before introducing the next phony phone call. It was so informal that some on TheBlaze staff were reminded of the irritating “Hey Guys” viral video.
(By the way, if you were able to watch more than :30 of that video, you are among the strongest people on the planet.)
In case you are among the 99.9% of the country that has not seen this week’s address, we have embedded it here.
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Filed under News | Comment (0)May 17th, 2013
5 days ago
The Obamas announced today that they will be hosting another “Performance at the White House” event on May 28 to honor American singer and songwriter Carole King:
As part of their “In Performance at the White House” series, the President and First Lady will host a concert in the East Room honoring singer-songwriter Carole King, who will be awarded the 2013 Library of Congress Gershwin Prize for Popular Song. President Obama will present the award as he did when the Library of Congress honored Stevie Wonder (2009), Sir Paul McCartney (2010), and the songwriting team of Burt Bacharach and Hal David (2012). The program will include performances by King, as well as Gloria Estefan, Billy Joel, Jesse McCartney, Emeli Sandé, James Taylor and Trisha Yearwood.
King also happens to be a big Obama political supporter. WHD’s Keith Koffler reports that King campaigned for Obama in 2008 and again in 2012. In addition, King headlined a fundraiser for the president’s second campaign, an event with tickets running from $ 2,500-$ 5,000 each.
Last summer, she also appeared in this Obama campaign video targeting rural voters:
Although the sequester may have halted White House tours and canceled Jewish American Heritage Month, the King party will be the second such concert event for the Obama White House in as many months. As you may recall, the Obamas partied with Justin Timberlake, Queen Latifah, Cyndi Lauper and others during an April “performance” celebration of soul music.
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Filed under News | Comment (0)May 17th, 2013
5 days ago
In our posting yesterday entitled “Is Flexibility Another Word For Surrender” we questioned the President’s decision to make what we feel is irresponsible unilateral nuclear cuts. We apparently are in good company. In the following posting, Lord Conrad Black has similar concerns.
Obama’s decision to make these cuts are folly and dangerous. They must be stopped.
Additionally, not including the Congress in the decision reeks of the Imperial Presidency that Obama has tried to create. He is not the king or emperor and he should submit such a significant action to Congress.
Conservative Tom
Filed under News | Comment (0)
Obama’s decision to make these cuts are folly and dangerous. They must be stopped.
Additionally, not including the Congress in the decision reeks of the Imperial Presidency that Obama has tried to create. He is not the king or emperor and he should submit such a significant action to Congress.
Conservative Tom
Conrad Black: Nuclear Cuts Would Encourage Iran, Other ‘Irresponsible’ Nations
Thursday, 16 May 2013 07:56 PM
Any further reduction in U.S. strategic nuclear warheads would encourage “completely irresponsible, ambitious, aspirant nuclear powers such as Iran,” former newspaper publisher and author Lord Conrad Black tells Newsmax TV.
“I do not question for an instant the president’s good intentions, but it will be just as conspicuous and in some ways more dangerous a failure than the plan of the late Defense Secretary [Robert] McNamara, who allowed the Soviet Union to gain nuclear power with the United States,” Black tells Newsmax in an exclusive interview. “The assumption was that the Russians would then negotiate more respectably. Instead, they just tended to achieve nuclear superiority.”
Unilateral disarmament has never worked. It is exactly the wrong thing to do.”
Black, a member of the British House of Lords and the former CEO of Hollinger International, was responding to a Newsmax report that President Barack Obama soon will announce that the United States will unilaterally reduce its arsenal of strategic warheads to around 1,000.T
hat position is expected as part of the Pentagon’s long-delayed Nuclear Posture Review implementation study that Obama was expected to sign earlier this year, and recent news reports say Obama may make the cuts by executive action, without congressional authorization.
The reduction represents a third of the nation’s arsenal. The United States currently has 1,550 deployed warheads, mandated by the 2010 New START arms treaty, according to the Newsmax report.
The author of five books, Black’s latest is “Flight of the Eagle: The Grand Strategies That Brought America From Colonial Independence to World Leadership.”
The work chronicles America’s strategic development into a world superpower from 1754 to 1992. Black details the specific strategic decisions of such statesmen as Benjamin Franklin, Abraham Lincoln, and Franklin D. Roosevelt that transformed the world and established America’s role in it.
“Abraham Lincoln masterfully handled the whole task of finding the underlying cause of the Civil War: slavery,” Black tells Newsmax. “Franklin D. Roosevelt did a brilliant job of tying the American national interest to the survival of the democracy, with the defeats of the Nazis and Japanese imperialists.
“These were all tremendous achievements that wouldn’t necessarily happen just because the United States is a rich, well-populated country.”
Black, 68, calls China one of America’s rivals — not adversaries — and it’s imperative that “they click with each other. The Americans need to make sure that their allies in the area, the Japanese, the Philippines, the South Koreans and others, are not intimidated by the Chinese.”
But radical Islam, Black says, poses a clear threat to the United States. “It is an enemy. It’s a nuisance and it’s a terrible nuisance. They commit these atrocities, and they kill a lot of people.”
Regarding the Middle East, Black tells Newsmax that “no durable achievement will be attained until there is a general recognition in the Muslim world of Israel’s right to exist as a Jewish state.
“The Islamic forces in general do not accept that, and Palestine could have its state next week if they would accept that. Israel should not be encouraged to and should not negotiate with anyone who does not accept the right of Israel to exist as a Jewish state.”
Black also wrote the 2007 biography, “Richard M. Nixon: A Life in Full.” The president faced impeachment proceedings over Watergate.
And in recent weeks, a bevy of scandals facing the Obama administration — the four Americans killed in Benghazi last Sept. 11, the Justice Department’s secret seizure of telephone records of The Associated Press, and the IRS’ targeting of conservative groups — has led to similar impeachment calls.
That would not be good for the United States, Black tells Newsmax.
“I don’t think this is, to be fair, a particularly scandalous administration. I don’t think it’s very successful, but I don’t think they’ve done anything that should cause the president to be under a moral cloud.
“We just shouldn’t be talking in those terms,” Black adds. “We shouldn’t be getting into this. I would hope that the powers that be in Washington would do something to try and reform the situation, but they’re not doing it.
“You have a prosecutorial glasnost — and it’s out of control.”
Read Latest Breaking News from Newsmax.com http://www.newsmax.com/Newsfront/black-iran-nuclear-warheads/2013/05/16/id/504927?s=al&promo_code=#ixzz2TYPkf1hM
Urgent: Should Obamacare Be Repealed? Vote Here Now!
May 17th, 2013
5 days ago
One scandal, two scandal, red scandal, blue scandal…
At Rep. Steny Hoyer’s weekly meeting with reporters on Tuesday, the Maryland Democrat was asked if he was concerned about the DOJ seizing phone records from Associated Press journalists working in the House press gallery in the Capitol building.
Hoyer’s answer was well-delivered: Articulate, clear, firm and precise.
One problem: He responded to the wrong scandal.
“The IRS activity was inappropriate, inconsistent with our policies and practices as a country, very concerning, needs to be reviewed carefully,” Hoyer, one of the top-ranking House Democrats, said in response to a question from Fox News’ Chad Pergram about the DOJ. “We need to ensure that this does not happen again, and we need to find out how long it continued, when it was stopped. It is my understanding—there was a front-page story on this at the [Washington] Post—it’s my understanding that [IRS official] Lois Lerner, who was apparently overseeing this, at some point in time found out about this and said …”
When Hoyer named Lerner, Pergram interrupted.
“We’re talking about two things,” Pergram, who apparently had not heard the first mention of the IRS, said from across the table, “You said Lois Lerner and the IRS.”
Another reporter sitting closer to Hoyer, Public Radio International’s Todd Zwillich, learned over and said softly, “He’s talking about the AP story.”
“Oh, I’m sorry, I’m sorry, excuse me,” Hoyer said, pausing briefly. “Whatever happened, we need to find out why it happened. But clearly it should not have happened. I don’t know enough about whether there was a warrant sought.”
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Filed under News | Comment (0)May 16th, 2013
6 days ago
It wasn’t the most important thing that happened, but it is worth mocking the president for… having two U.S. marines hold umbrellas during a Rose Garden press conference with the Turkish prime minister.
It was the dismissive way in which Obama spoke about the marines that riled so many people:
I am going to go ahead and ask folks why don’t we get a couple of, uh, marines… they’re going to look good next to us cause I, uh, I’ve got a change of suits but I don’t know about uh, our prime, uh, prime minister.
And so… here’s the best of the satire:
       
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Capitol Commentary’s Daily News
May 16th, 2013
6 days ago
E-Mails Show Jostling Over Talking Points on Libya Attack
By MICHAEL D. SHEAR and MARK LANDLER
Published: May 15, 2013
Related
-
Obama Dismisses Benghazi Furor but Assails I.R.S. (May 14, 2013)
The White House released the e-mails to reporters after Republicans seized on snippets of the correspondence that became public last Friday to suggest that President Obama’s staff had been complicit in trying to alter the talking points used by Susan E. Rice, the ambassador to the United Nations, in the days after the attacks.
White House aides have said the excerpts used by Republicans — and heavily reported by the news media — were an inaccurate representation of their involvement. On Tuesday, CNN obtained one of the e-mails in question that appeared to minimize the White House involvement.
But Democrats — including some of Mr. Obama’s former top aides — said Wednesday morning that the administration would have to release all of the e-mails in an effort to prove that the president had nothing to hide.
“I think they would benefit from getting all these e-mails out in public,” David Axelrod, a former senior adviser, said on MSNBC’s “Morning Joe” program on Wednesday morning.
During a brief news conference on Monday, Mr. Obama dismissed the Republican inquiry into the Benghazi aftermath as a “sideshow” and said there was nothing to the accusations of a cover-up.
“Suddenly, three days ago,” the president told reporters, “this gets spun up as if there’s something new to the story. There’s no ‘there’ there.”
May 15th, 2013
One week ago
For the second straight day, Comedy Central host Jon Stewart criticized the president for the way he’s managed this week’s ongoing scandals — from Benghazi and the DOJ to the IRS and possibly even the EPA.
Apparently President Obama’s chief advisor is now the nightly network news broadcast — it seems to be where he’s getting most of his information from. And, as The Daily Show demonstrated last night, today’s scandals aren’t the first examples of President Obama relying on media reports to keep him apprised of what’s going on in his own administration.
“I wouldn’t be surprised if President Obama learned Osama bin Laden had been killed when he saw himself announce it on television,” Stewart joked.
WATCH:
Additionally, Stewart extended his sympathies for “the real victim in all of this” — British PM David Cameron — who was awkwardly caught in the middle of the swirling scandals during Monday’s joint press conference.
See additional video after the jump!
Filed under News | Comment (0)May 14th, 2013
8 days ago
It’s not just the IRS that treats groups on the right differently from the rest. According to documents obtained by the Competitive Enterprise Institute, the Environmental Protection Agency is in on it too.
Public records produced by EPA in response to a lawsuit filed by CEI under the Freedom of Information Act illustrate a pattern of making it far more difficult for limited-government groups – in particular those who argue for more freedom and less EPA – to access public records.
Such groups are precisely those Congress and courts made clear FOIA was intended to protect from fees being used as a hurdle to obtaining information, without prejudice as to their perspective. Worse, CEI has now obtained proof of the spectacularly disparate nature of the practice, specifically revealing extraordinarily favorable treatment of the same green groups it’s been shown to be collaborating with on its agenda.
h/t DrewM. and his “Obama Scandal Scorecard” (via AP)
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Filed under News | Comment (0)May 10th, 2013
12 days ago
When January rolled around and President Obama prepared to take the oath of office for the second time, there was a lot of hullaballoo about keeping the partying to a minimum. After all, he and first lady Michelle Obama didn’t want to appear like aloof aristocrats while the national economy remained sluggish.
But as it turns out, they were aloof aristocrats — just not in public:
Bill and Hillary Clinton, actress Kerry Washington, Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel and producer Harvey Weinstein were among those who joined the Obamas at the White House’s secret post-inauguration bash.
President Obama and Michelle Obama held the hush-hush, swanky, ultra-A-list party to celebrate his second term the night he took the oath of office. The party was not announced or listed on his official schedule, but a few of the guests tweeted about the event, which is what publicly revealed its existence.
The guest list that reveals who attended was never released though the White House visitors log from January, which came out at the end of April and was examined by The Hill: a mix of rock stars, actors, top campaign donors, White House aides, Obama friends and leading Democratic politicians.
Some of the names include actor Jamie Foxx; Obama adviser David Axelrod; Rep. Joaquín Castro (D-Texas) and his twin brother, San Antonio Mayor Julian Castro; singer Kelly Clarkson; Sen. Tim Kaine (D-Va.); actress Eva Longoria; singer James Taylor; former NBA player Alonzo Mourning; Maryland Gov. Martin O’Malley (D); and former White House spokesman Robert Gibbs. Clinton aide Huma Abedin was on the list, but her husband, former New York Democratic Rep. Anthony Weiner, was not.
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Filed under News | Comment (0)May 9th, 2013
13 days ago
Except for the commercial at the end of the article, we agree with Root, 100%. This country would look significantly different if it were not for the unprecedented government spending on safety net programs which is the reason we see no food lines or tent cities. We have the same fundamental depression elements but they are covered over by the spending.
There will be those who disagree with Wayne, but they are the ones effected by the “normalacy bias” and those who believe that Obama is the second coming (which would include Obama himself.)
This country is a mess and spending 85 billion each and every month will only make things worse in the future. We are in the middle of the “Greater Depression” and most of us don’t even realize it.
Conservative Tom
The Ponzi Scheme That Masks The Obama Great Depression
May 9, 2013 by Wayne Allyn Root
Hello, I’m Wayne Allyn Root for Personal Liberty. At this moment, despite the lies and distortions you hear from the Barack Obama-adoring mainstream media, we are experiencing an Obama Great Depression to rival anything we experienced in 1929. But the truth is being covered up by an ever-rising stock market (that is completely disconnected from the economy) and a country awash in “Obama money.”
The Kool-Aid-drinking media is shocked by hundreds of hard facts I’ve put together proving we are in a Great Depression. They ask me: “Well then, why is the stock market doing so well? Why are there no bread lines or tent cities like 1929?”
The answer is simple: Big-government spending on an unimaginable scale masks the true picture of our economy. What you’re seeing is a fraud: the biggest Ponzi scheme in world history. There would certainly be bread lines and tent cities, if government wasn’t handing out billions of dollars in checks, paid for by the Federal Reserve printing trillions in fake dollars.
You’ve seen the numbers. Obama is the biggest spender in world history, adding $ 6 trillion to the debt in only four years. Where do you think that money is going? To all-time record numbers of Americans on food stamps, disability, welfare and unemployment benefits. Now, of course, we’re embarking on free healthcare for 40 million new patients, with money we don’t have (and no new doctors to treat them).
And just to be certain that the U.S. economy is completely destroyed, now for good measure we want to legalize 12 million illegal aliens, giving them access to more than $ 9 trillion in entitlements. Makes sense, doesn’t it?
The government is borrowing 46 cents for every dollar it spends. It’s all crazy… literally. We have borrowed from China to pay entitlement checks to Americans who no longer feel it pays to go to work, and to hand out billions of dollars in foreign aid to countries that hate us and support terrorism.
All of this while the Fed is running the printing presses day and night to fund its weapon of mass distraction: Wall Street. As long as the stock market is up, the lapdog media can report the economy is “in recovery.”
The plan is brilliant. You’d almost think Obama is relying on Bernie Madoff as his chief economic consultant — except even Madoff wouldn’t have the cajónes to pull off this scam. Obama has succeeded in turning Wall Street into a rigged craps game. The government is guaranteeing the results. Obama demands the Fed hands out $ 85 billion of fake money each and every month and drops it onto the plates of the richest publicly traded companies. This guarantees the stock market goes up while their CEOs get filthy rich with rising stock options, which guarantees banks, Wall Street and billionaires like Warren Buffett continue to support Obama.
Meanwhile, on Main Street the real economy is dying. There are no jobs. There is no recovery. Ninety million able-bodied, working-age Americans are not working. The workforce participation rate is setting all-time records for futility. U.S. worker hours are down and U.S. worker salaries are stagnating, while our cost of living is skyrocketing. Recent college grads are drowning in debt, with record levels of student loan default and post-college-graduation unemployment. Older Americans are dipping into their retirement savings in record numbers; 16.4 million Americans live in poverty in the suburbs; and almost 50 percent of Americans have less than $ 500 in savings.
The middle class is being systematically destroyed. Wiped out. Left with the short end of the stick. The real economy on Main Street is dying. And worst of all, our children and grandchildren will get the bill. This $ 85 billion per month being used to fraudulently prop up the stock market is all debt being piled onto future generations.
Then there’s Part II of this Obama Ponzi scheme. Separate from the Fed’s $ 85 billion per month of fake money is the government spending scheme. Obama has handed out billions of dollars in stimulus, bailouts, green energy investments and government contracts to the biggest publicly traded companies, the most corrupt unions and the most connected Democratic contributors. But none of the benefit goes to small business or the middle class that is stuck paying the bill.
Government deficit spending with money we don’t have is now paying for everything, at every level. It’s all to hide the reality that we are living in an Obama Great Depression. There are no bread lines or tent cities because we’re all living on the government dole, paid for with debt. Fraud on a massive scale. The greatest Ponzi scheme in world history.
Housing allowances and food stamps prevent bread lines and tent cities.
Free breakfasts and lunches at school make it seem like children aren’t going hungry.
Earned income tax credits are handed out to millions of lower-income Americans (including illegal aliens) who pay no taxes in the first place.
At the same time, government keeps interest rates artificially low to pump up home and car sales — and to keep the interest on the national debt from eating up the entire budget.
And if record low interest rates aren’t enough, government purchases of GM cars are up 79 percent. The government is artificially propping up GM with your tax dollars. It’s all a scam.
Take away all this spending and printing by government, and it would look exactly like 1929.
We are in an Obama Great Depression masked by government spending and debt that didn’t exist during the first Great Depression. The true extent of this economic Armageddon is being hidden, disguised and propped up with government spending, programs and Fed printing never imagined in the 1930s.
What’s the end game? First, all this spending and printing is to prevent economic collapse and total panic. Second, it’s to achieve the Marxist dream: redistribution of wealth to Obama’s voters and contributors. Third (and this is the big one), it’s to create a two-class society.
Karl Marx hated the middle class. He felt they needed to be eliminated to create equality, fairness and social justice (i.e., shared misery). Will people be hurt? Sure, they’ll lose their jobs and homes. But to Marxists, the end justifies the means. Obama needs a two-class society to make his plan work; the two classes are the super rich and the poor. The key is both are dependent on government to survive.
The super rich love crony capitalism — with Obama handing out stimulus, Fed printing and government contracts like candy. That’s how the super rich and politically connected stay rich and get richer. The rest of us will be poor, which makes us dependent on Obama for government checks to survive. Government will pay for our lives from cradle to grave, while confiscating most of our income.
This is a Ponzi scheme that even Madoff could never have imagined. That’s why you need to develop Y-PODS: Your Personal Obama Defense Shield. It’s all included in my new No. 1 national best-seller, The Ultimate Obama Survival Guide. I wrote it to show the middle class and small business how to survive, thrive and actually prosper from every move Obama makes for the next four years.
Don’t get mad, that does nothing for you. Get even!
You can find my best-selling book, The Ultimate Obama Survival Guide, online at Amazon.com or at Costco, Barnes & Noble, Sam’s Club, Books-A-Million or any fine bookstore. Or you can buy it in e-book form to read on your favorite e-reader.
That’s how you turn lemons to lemonade. And Obama is certainly the biggest lemon in the history of America. You can find more information in the box right under this article. Just look for the bright yellow book cover of The Ultimate Obama Survival Guide to order your very own copy.
I’m Wayne Root for PersonalLiberty.com. See you next week. Same time, same place. God bless.
