The United States Of Debt: Total Debt In America Hits A New Record High Of Nearly 60 Trillion Dollars
By Michael Snyder
What would you say if I told you that Americans are nearly 60 TRILLION dollars in debt? Well, it is true. When you total up all forms of debt including government debt, business debt, mortgage debt and consumer debt, we are 59.4 trillion dollars in debt. That is an amount of money so large that it is difficult to describe it with words. For example, if you were alive when Jesus Christ was born and you had spent 80 million dollars every single day since then, you still would not have spent 59.4 trillion dollars by now. And most of this debt has been accumulated in recent decades. If you go back 40 years ago, total debt in America was sitting at about 2.2 trillion dollars. Somehow over the past four decades we have allowed the total amount of debt in the United States to get approximately 27 times larger. This is utter insanity, and anyone that thinks this is sustainable is completely deluded. We are living in the greatest debt bubble of all time, and there is no way that this is going to end well.
‘Exhausted’ Obama to drive golf balls as ISIS drives on Baghdad, Twitter erupts
CBS News White House Correspondent Mark Knoller was simply doing his job when he tweeted President Barack Obama‘s weekend plans. Little did he know that his effort would unleash a wave of criticism directed at the president.With the situation in Iraq at critical mass and Baghdad on the verge of falling into the hands of the Islamic militant group known as ISIS, and the impending humanitarian crises unfolding on the southern border with Mexico, folks were simply astonished at what they were seeing.
From ND, Pres Obama heads to CA for a
long weekend that includes golf in Palm Springs, another commencement
& Dem fundraiser on Saturday.
Obama Compares Skepticism Towards Climate Change To Believing Moon Made Of Cheese
By Chuck RossPresident Obama didn’t let a graduation commencement speech at the University of California, Irvine go to waste, using his spot at the podium to rail against skeptics of climate change, whom he called “a radical fringe.”
“Since this is a very educated group, you already know the science [on climate change],” Obama told the crowd of nearly 8,000 graduates, gathered at Angel Stadium on Saturday.
“The 18 warmest years on record have all happened since you graduates were born,” said Obama, who cited fires in Western states, smaller snow packs in mountainous tourist areas, and flooding streets in cities like Miami to make his case about the fallout from climate change.
Obama also used those examples to unveil a new $1 billion competitive fund
to help communities that have been hit by natural disasters due to extreme weather.He also took jabs — without mentioning political parties — at those who are considered to be skeptical of man-made climate change.
“Part of what’s unique about climate change is the nature of some of the opposition to action,” Obama said, claiming that “it’s
pretty rare that you’ll encounter somebody who says the problem you’re trying to solve simply doesn’t exist.”...“I don’t remember anybody saying that the moon wasn’t there or that it was made of cheese,” said Obama.
White House week ahead: Obama tries to craft Iraq response
By Brian HughesPresident Obama returns from a California golf vacation Monday hoping to answer a vexing question from Republicans and Democrats alike: What is his plan for Iraq?
Obama is weighing whether to approve U.S. airstrikes to slow insurgents who have seized a growing number of Iraqi cities and have their sights set on Baghdad.
....On Tuesday, Obama will travel to Pittsburgh for an economic event, and he will attend an LGBT event and fundraiser in New York City.
The president Wednesday will host the White House Maker Faire, an event that will highlight youth inventors and entrepreneurs, and on Thursday will award the Medal of Honor to Cpl. William Carpenter.
And Obama Friday meets with New Zealand Prime Minister John Key at the White House.
How the Supreme Court's upcoming rulings will affect Obama, unions and you
By Sean Lengell....And with just two weeks left in the 2013-14 session, the high court has yet to rule on several landmark cases that could limit the scope of President Obama's health care reforms, scale back the president's authority to make appointments -- and in the process strike a blow to labor unions -- and curb privacy rights in a digital age.
Here’s what’s at stake:
Sebelius v. Hobby Lobby, Conestoga Wood v. Sebelius
The two cases, argued jointly, are probably the most anticipated of the current session and could kill a major provision of Obamacare.The debate centers on whether businesses can opt out of an Affordable Care Act provision that requires they provide coverage of birth control for employees at no extra charge.
Hobby Lobby, a chain of craft stores, and Conestoga Wood Specialties Corp., a small furniture manufacturer, say forcing them to insure certain forms of contraception violates their First Amendment right of freedom of religion.
The Christian families who separately own the companies also say they’re protected under a 1993 federal law designed to prevent other laws that place a substantial burden on the free exercise of religion. But the government argues the law was meant to protect people — not for-profit entities.
Critics fear a ruling in favor of Hobby Lobby would be a slippery slope to discrimination, saying a business could then use religion as grounds to refuse health insurance to gay employees or others.
The three liberal-leaning female justices on the high court expressed concern that denying female employees access to even some contraceptives is unfair and threatens their health. But several of the five conservative-leaning justices appeared reluctant to accept that argument.
National Labor Relations Board v. Noel Canning
This dispute is between Republicans and the White House over whether President Obama exceeded his authority when appointing three members to the National Labor Relations Board during a congressional recess in 2012.If the high court rules against the labor board, which resolves complaints of unfair labor practices and conducts elections for union representation, NRLB decisions made by the recess-appointed members could be deemed invalid. And with many of the rulings favoring unions, the decision could have a huge impact on organized labor.
The case is among several this term dealing with unions, with others poised to effect how organized labor recruits and keeps members.
Presidents can circumvent required Senate approval of nominations if the chamber is on recess, a move Obama deemed necessary because of repeated Republican blocks of his nominations to the NLRB.
At issue is the definition of “recess.” The administration argues a recess applies to breaks between annual sessions as well as time off Congress takes within the year. But Republicans say the term should only apply to breaks between official sessions of Congress.
Riley v. California; U.S. v. Wurie
This pair of cases has re-examined — and is poised to possibly expand — the power of the police to mine for evidence.The debate centers on whether police need a warrant to search the cellphones of people they arrest, pitting law enforcement and the federal government against privacy advocates.
In each of the two cases, criminal defendants were convicted and sentenced to prison partly because police obtained evidence from their cellphones after a warrantless search.
Justice Elena Kagan worries that those searches violate fundamental privacy rights because “people carry their entire lives in their cellphones.”
And with 90 percent of adult Americans owning a cellphone, critics worry police could trump up dubious arrest charges on suspects to access their phones.
But police and the government argue cellphones searches pose little legal difference than police searching a person’s wallet at the time of an arrest, which they have the authority to do.
Supreme Court: Law-Abiding Citizen Cannot Buy a Gun for Another Law-Abiding Citizen
By Awr Hawkins
On June 16, the Supreme Court ruled 5-4 that a law-abiding citizen cannot buy a gun for another law-abiding citizen.
Justice Elena Kagan wrote the majority opinion and Justice Antonin Scalia wrote the dissent.
As Breitbart News reported on January 25, the case centered on whether a law-abiding citizen could buy a gun he or she planned to sell to another law-abiding citizen. It arose when former police officer Bruce James Abramski purchased a Glock handgun so he could get a discounted law enforcement price, then "transferred the gun to his uncle in Pennsylvania."
According to ABC News, Kagan wrote that "the federal government's elaborate system of background checks and record-keeping requirements help law enforcement investigate crimes by tracing guns to their buyers." She said this is undercut if a person can buy a gun for another person.
Scalia countered by writing that the language Congress used in fashioning background checks "does not support making it a crime for one lawful gun owner to buy a gun for another lawful gun owner."
Did the IRS Break the Law by Failing to Safeguard Those ‘Lost’ Emails?
By Pete Kasperowicz
The IRS may have violated U.S. law by failing to properly protect its emails, a possibility that could further frustrate lawmakers as they continue to investigate the agency.
Late last week, the IRS surprised Congress by saying it cannot find more than two years’ worth of emails between former IRS employee Lois Lerner and people outside the IRS, because of a computer crash. Congress had been searching for those emails to look for evidence that the IRS purposefully tried to slow or prevent conservative groups from gaining tax-exempt status.
The IRS’s own internal rules say employees are supposed to keep paper records of most emails they receive. That indicates that Lerner may have violated IRS rules, since presumably the IRS cannot find any paper copies of Lerner’s emails.
But the agency itself may have also broken U.S. law by not taking steps to avoid this situation.
A section of the law titled Records Management by Federal Agencies says the head of every federal agency must take steps to preserve pertinent records. And it specifically says the leader of an agency must “establish safeguards against the removal or loss of records he determines to be necessary.”
Those safeguards must include telling the government employees that records cannot be destroyed except under certain circumstances, and that there are penalties for removing or destroying records.
That section of law also says the head of a federal agency must also notify the National Archives and Records Administration of “any actual, impending, or threatened unlawful removal, defacing, alteration, or destruction of records in the custody of the agency.”
Agency leaders must then work with the Archivist to “initiate action through the Attorney General for the recovery of records he knows or has reason to believe have been unlawfully removed from his agency.
“In any case in which the head of the agency does not initiate an action for such recovery or other redress within a reasonable period of time after being notified of any such unlawful action, the Archivist shall request the Attorney General to initiate such an action, and shall notify the Congress when such a request has been made,” the law states.
Sharyl Attkisson has a few questions about the Lerner e-mails
By Jazz Shaw
Will there be an investigation into the questionable (to put it kindly) story about the “lost” e-mails from Lois Lerner’s computer? And if so, will any of the seemingly obvious and substantive questions about this tale be asked? At her blog, Sharyl Attkisson provides a list of the questions she would like to see asked, assuming anyone in DC is actually interested in finding the truth. Here are just a few.
Please provide a timeline of the crash and documentation covering when it was first discovered and by whom; when, how and by whom it was learned that materials were lost; the official documentation reporting the crash and federal data loss; documentation reflecting all attempts to recover the materials; and the remediation records documenting the fix. This material should include the names of all officials and technicians involved, as well as all internal communications about the matter.I think it’s possible that at least some of the Republicans will be able to engineer a set of questions which are both as specific as those and as professionally stated. What will be revealing – if it happens – is if and how such questions are answered. Of all the strange tales and fables coming out of this investigation, the Sorry, but the dog ate my homework defense has to be the one which comes from furthest out in the Twilight Zone. It would be instructive to see how the administration and the upper management at the IRS respond to a set of questions such as this.
Please provide all documents and emails that refer to the crash from the time that it happened through the IRS’ disclosure to Congress Friday that it had occurred.
Please provide the documents that show the computer crash and lost data were appropriately reported to the required entities including any contractor servicing the IRS. If the incident was not reported, please explain why.
Please explain why redundancies required for federal systems were either not used or were not effective in restoring the lost materials, and provide documentation showing how this shortfall has been remediated.
Please provide any documents reflecting an investigation into how the crash resulted in the irretrievable loss of federal data and what factors were found to be responsible for the existence of this situation.
I would also ask for those who discovered and reported the crash to testify under oath, as well as any officials who reported the materials as having been irretrievably lost.
Busted: IRS Commissioner testified on video Lois Lerner emails were archived
By Michelle Kirk
Talk about not passing the smell test.
Rep. Jason Chaffetz, R- Utah had no trouble finding testimony from Internal Revenue Service Commissioner John Koskinen claiming in March that Lois Lerner’s emails were archived. He posted the telling video on Twitter after hearing the IRS has claimed that two years of emails have vanished due to a supposed computer crash.
This GOP Congressman has a brilliant response to IRS claiming Lois Lerner emails were “erased by a glitch”
By Joshua RiddleSteve Stockman decided to enough is enough, and wrote this letter to the director of the NSA:
June 13, 2014
Admiral Michael S. Rogers
Director, National Security Agency
Fort Meade, MD 20755
Admiral Rogers:
First, thank you for your 33 years of, and continued service to, our country.
Second, as you probably read, the Internal Revenue Service informed the House Ways and Means Committee today they claim to “lost” all emails from former Exempt Organizations division director Lois Lerner for the period between January 2009 and April 2011.
According to chairman Camp, “The IRS claims it cannot produce emails written only to or from Lerner and outside agencies or groups, such as the White House, Treasury, Department of Justice, FEC, or Democrat offices” due to a “computer glitch.”
I am writing to request the Agency produce all metadata it has collected on all of Ms. Lerner’s email accounts for the period between January 2009 and April 2011.
The data may be transmitted to our Communications Director at Donny@mail.house.gov.
Your prompt cooperation in this matter will be greatly appreciated and will help establish how IRS and other personnel violated rights protected by the First Amendment.
Warmest wishes,
STEVE STOCKMAN
Member of Congress
Arizona may sue Feds for dumping illegal aliens
By Rick MoranThe state of Arizona is considering legal action against the federal government for dumping thousands of illegal aliens into the state - in many cases, dropping them off at a bus station and letting them go.
The state claims the Feds gave them no warning of the dumping and didn't even ask permission to do so.
Washington Post:
Arizona officials are threatening legal action to stop the Obama administration from moving hundreds of undocumented immigrants from Texas to their state after a surge of illegal border crossings swamped immigration officials in the Rio Grande Valley.The Feds fly the illegal aliens from Texas to Arizona just to let them go? And warehousing the illegal alien minors while sticking the state with part of the bill?
The U.S. Border Patrol has acknowledged flying hundreds of migrants from Texas to Tucson and Phoenix, where many have been dropped off at Greyhound bus stations. Last week, immigration agencies began sending hundreds of undocumented minors apprehended while crossing the border to a holding facility in Nogales.
Arizona officials say they were not notified before the transports began.
In a letter to the Department of Homeland Security, Arizona Attorney General Tom Horne (R) insisted the department’s border security units stop the transports.
“These aliens are not being transported for the purposes of detaining them in a federal facility located in Arizona. Rather, DHS is inexplicably moving them some 1200 miles and simply releasing them here (outdoors in temperatures exceeding 100 degrees) rather than in Texas,” Horne wrote [pdf].
Arizona state law prevents Horne from bringing suit against the federal government directly, but he could find someone else to sue.
Critics of the facilities where minors are held, ranging from Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) to the American Civil Liberties Union, have demanded access to assess conditions they say are substandard. McCain on Thursday called for Customs and Porter Patrol to allow media access to the Nogales Processing Center.
Lots of questions and no answers forthcoming from Washington. Border patrol agents are livid over the Mexican gang members who are coming across the border. Why let them in? No effort is being made to get Central American countries to do anything to stop the flood of children coming here.
There is a strange quiesence about this tidal wave of kids coming here, almost as if the government has better things to do than protect the border. There's little sense of urgency from the president on down. And besides McCain and Flake crying for help, there isn't much urgency in Congress either.
Instead of working to stop the migration, the government is trying to figure out ways to handle more illegals.
What has to happen for the Feds to wake up?
How US Policy Enabled the Rise of Al Qaeda 2.0 and the Collapse of Iraq
By Dr. Sebastien Gorka
....The fact is that ISIS – The Islamic State of Iraq and the Sham (or the Levant) – has grown in strength and ferocity in the last three years to a point that it now is more powerful and capable than the original Al Qaeda whence it came. It has become Al Qaeda 2.0. ISIS's growth is in part a result of conscious actions and policy decisions taken by the current US administration.
-
First, since very early on in his presidential campaign and then
after becoming the Commander-in-Chief, it became obvious that the
President had little interest in international affairs and national
security. In fact, in his first speech to graduating West Point cadets
in 2009, he was unequivocal. It was time to “end the war in Iraq"
because “we must rebuild our strength here at home.” The White House
agenda since 2008 has primarily been driven by domestic projects aimed
at expanding the state such as Obamacare. That is why none of the
National Security Advisers appointed by the White House since General
Jim Jones was ignominiously replaced in 2010 have been recognized names
in the world of national security. The issue just does not interest the
incumbent, and therefore there was no need for a Kissinger- or
Brzezinski-caliber replacement.
-
As attested to by a remarkably in-depth 2011 article in The New Yorker,
the administration sees all crises as unique and unrelated to one
another. So great is this belief that America does not need a strategy
to deal with the world and inform our national actions in a consistent
fashion that the President, when interviewed on national television,
actually stated that having "blanket policies" can get you "into
trouble." As a result, the idea that the chaos in Syria, where ISIS
built its forces, was connected to the future stability of Iraq did not
occur to the administration until Mosul, Fallujah, and Tikrit had fallen
to fighters trained and hardened in the war against Assad just next
door. Our government cannot connect the dots if the Commander-in-Chief
openly believes that doing so is a bad idea.
-
This lack of any strategic approach to the global threat of
jihadi groups is compounded by politically-driven censorship of the
national security and defense establishment. As documented elsewhere,
in 2011 putative "representatives" of the Muslim communities in the US
demanded that the White House review and censor all counterterrorism
training materials and trainers used by the Defense Department and
Department of Justice, their claim being that existing materials and
trainers were un-Islamic or "Islamaphobic." This event that has come to
be known as "the purge" – see this documentary
for the full story – and led to the forced removal of any mention of
Islam or jihad from all governmental training materials used by our
armed forces or the FBI. As a result, as a government, we have blinded
ourselves to such an extent that it has become practically impossible
for a national security professional to understand what is going on in
the Middle East and what drives groups like ISIS or Al Qaeda without
getting into trouble for being politically incorrect.
Of course, trying to understand the decapitation of enemy forces or the tactic of suicide attacks without referring to, or being allowed to refer to, jihad is analogous to our trying to understand the Third Reich in 1944 while banning our soldiers and intelligence professionals from talking about and analyzing Nazism.
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Lastly, the fact that Senator Obama built a campaign narrative on the foundation that Afghanistan is the "good war"
and Iraq was the "bad war" locked his administration onto a politically
defined track that short-changed America's national security interests.
Once in office, commitment to this narrative – that was deemed to have
helped him win office – meant that the Iraqi campaign had to end at all
costs. So great was the pressure that the administration was prepared to
pull all US forces out in 2011 without securing the standard Status of
Forces Agreement (SOFA) with Baghdad that would have allowed us to leave
enough forces in country to suppress and deter violence against the
Maliki regime and keep the country functioning after more than 4,000
Americans had died to free it from Saddam Hussein.
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