Idiots all of them. Stupid pandering that would do nothing to quell the out-of-control violence in Mexico. Attorney General Holder’s answer was not a surprise – the administration wants to bring it back.

This administration has consistently favored the reinstitution of the assault weapons ban. It is something that we think was useful in the past with regard to the reduction that we’ve seen in crime, and certainly would have a positive impact on our relationship and the crime situation in Mexico.

Catch that second sentence? Holder actually stated the Obama administration thinks the AWB was useful in the past with regard to the reduction that we’ve seen in crime. WTF? The federal AWB expired more than seven years ago. Since then, the sales of sporting rifles – a.k.a. extraordinarily dangerous assault weapons – have gone through the roof especially during and just after the 2008 federal election. Manufactures could not make the things fast enough.

Of course, after the AWB expired, the gun-grabbers claimed “blood would run in streets” throughout America. Bull shit. There is no evidence that would or did come to be, rather just the opposite happened in the United States.

Has Holder even bothered to look at the FBI crime statistics? The FBI is part of the Department of Justice right? How do people allow Holder to outright lie like this?

Of course, Mexico has an issue with a small percentage of weapons that might cross into their country. We’ll maybe if we both made the effort to secure the border, Mexican law enforcement would cooperate with the DOJ, and the ATF would stop letting guns walk into the hands of the drug cartels, Mexico wouldn’t have such a big issue. Then their is that whole War on Drugs thing…

Fig. 1: NOT Defined as an "Assault Weapon"

What was the definition of an assault weapon in the federal ban?

Good question. First, it had to be a semi-automatic rifle that had a detachable magazine (usually with a maximum of between 10 and 20 rounds) and two or more of the following.

• Folding or telescoping stock
• Pistol grip
• Bayonet mount
• Flash suppressor, or threaded barrel designed to accommodate one
• Grenade launcher

All of these rifles generally had a pistol grip, therefore if you had something like what is shown in Fig. 1 to the right, it was a perfectly legal rifle under the 1994 Clinton Federal Assault Weapons ban.

In other words, the Obama administration – Holder included – and the attorney general in Mexico draw the hard line at having either an adjustable stock, flash suppressor or a bayonet on a rifle. Somehow those features make the rifles extraordinarily dangerous.

What the hell are they smoking?

(Don’t worry about grenade launchers  … even if you had the launcher … you can’t get any grenades.)

Look, the chance of a new federal AWB passing within the next four years is slim to none. That said, I’m willing to bet the DOJ and the Obama administration will do everything they can to completely eliminate Congress from the equation and “make things happen” without having to deal with Congress at all. You know … ignore the will of the people.

Check out Holder’s testimony starting at about 2 hrs & 27 minutes.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fuqt5mgtI3w

From the Washington Times, with my emphasis in bold.

Rick Santorum clobbered Mitt Romney in a head-to-head match-up in Missouri’s non-binding primary, easily won Minnesota’s caucuses and snagged a close victory in Colorado’s caucuses in a clean sweep Tuesday that once again rewrote the story of the Republican presidential nomination battle.

None of the three contests leads immediately to any delegates being awarded toward the nominating convention in Tampa, Fla., this summer, but Tuesday’s results suggest a strong pool of support for Mr. Santorum and highlight dangers going forward for Mr. Romney, who had by far his worst showing of the campaign.

Mr. Santorum said he was able to win on Tuesday because Mr. Romney didn’t commit millions of dollars to negative attack ads in these three states. Mr. Santorum said that leveled the playing field.

Of the example items listed in Hall’s piece, I can find only one that might be categorized as Constitutional since it was used to improve an interstate highway interchange. Everything else was local projects, not benefiting the national welfare and as such completely unconstitutional in my opinion.

From the Washington Post…

A U.S. senator from Alabama directed more than $100 million in federal earmarks to renovate downtown Tuscaloosa near his own commercial office building. A congressman from Georgia secured $6.3 million in taxpayer funds to replenish the beach about 900 feet from his island vacation cottage. A representative from Michigan earmarked $486,000 to add a bike lane to a bridge within walking distance of her home.

Thirty-three members of Congress have directed more than $300 million in earmarks and other spending provisions to dozens of public projects that are next to or within about two miles of the lawmakers’ own property, according to a Washington Post investigation.

Under the ethics rules Congress has written for itself, this is both legal and undisclosed.

And yes, both Republicans and Democrats are listed. Certainly, when federal government funds are used to improve local roads, you can always make an association with a congress-critter from a local area who may have sponsored or voted for legislation that put those funds into local hands. There is no getting around it and both liberals and conservatives can point to each other all day long. “Well, you got this … well you got this … but you got this, and I got none of it…”

Winners and losers, and simply another example of symptoms of the disease.

If you want to see the entire list, it’s available – with responses from the local congress-critters – in this Capital Assets investigation piece in the Post.

If you want to actually cure the disease, stop the federal government from funding any project it is not authorized to fund per Article 1, Section 8 of the US Constitution. If you want it … pay for it at the local and/or state level.

And yes, that means your local property taxes and state taxes will necessarily skyrocket, hopefully offset by a tremendously huge drop in your federal taxes.

To get you started, here are a few excerpts.

Is it fair that the richest 1% of Americans pay nearly 40% of all federal income taxes, and the richest 10% pay two-thirds of the tax…

Is it fair that President Obama sends his two daughters to elite private schools that are safer, better-run, and produce higher test scores than public schools in Washington, D.C.—but millions of other families across America are denied that free choice and forced to send their kids to rotten schools…

Is it fair that after the first three years of Obamanomics, the poor are poorer, the poverty rate is rising, the middle class is losing income, and some 5.5 million fewer Americans have jobs today than in 2007…

Is it fair that those who took out responsible mortgages and pay them each month have to see their tax dollars used to subsidize those who acted recklessly, greedily and sometimes deceitfully in taking out mortgages they now can’t afford to repay…

Is it fair that some of Mr. Obama’s largest campaign contributors received federal loan guarantees on their investments in renewable energy projects that went bust…

Is it fair that federal employees receive benefits that are nearly 50% higher than those of private-sector workers whose taxes pay their salaries, according to the Congressional Budget Office…

Is it fair that in 27 states workers can be compelled to join a union in order to keep their jobs…

Is it fair that nearly four out of 10 American households now pay no federal income tax at all—a number that has risen every year under Mr. Obama…

Is it fair that Boeing, a private company, was threatened by a federal agency when it sought to add jobs in a right-to-work state rather than in a forced-union state?

And finally,

Is it fair that our kids and grandkids and great-grandkids—who never voted for Mr. Obama—will have to pay off the $5 trillion of debt accumulated over the past four years, without any benefits to them?

Please read the full article and remember it the next time you hear the President speak of fairness.

From Williams’ post yesterday.

The Congressional Budget Office estimates that it’s possible to sustain today’s level of federal spending and even achieve a balanced budget. All that Congress would have to do is raise the lowest income tax bracket of 10 percent to 25 percent and the middle tax bracket of 25 percent to 66 percent and raise the 35 percent tax bracket to 92 percent.

Oh, joy. Read the whole thing.

The article is posted in Armed Forces Journal, and as I noted I found it through another web forum. The first post of the topic included “this guy’s career is over” in the title. Lt.Col. Daniel Davis writes…

I spent last year in Afghanistan, visiting and talking with U.S. troops and their Afghan partners. My duties with the Army’s Rapid Equipping Force took me into every significant area where our soldiers engage the enemy. Over the course of 12 months, I covered more than 9,000 miles and talked, traveled and patrolled with troops in Kandahar, Kunar, Ghazni, Khost, Paktika, Kunduz, Balkh, Nangarhar and other provinces.

What I saw bore no resemblance to rosy official statements by U.S. military leaders about conditions on the ground.

Entering this deployment, I was sincerely hoping to learn that the claims were true: that conditions in Afghanistan were improving, that the local government and military were progressing toward self-sufficiency. I did not need to witness dramatic improvements to be reassured, but merely hoped to see evidence of positive trends, to see companies or battalions produce even minimal but sustainable progress.

Instead, I witnessed the absence of success on virtually every level.

AP at Hot Air notes…

Plenty of anecdotes about Afghan troops’ haplessness and/or corruption at the link. The thing is, I’ve been reading news stories in that vein sporadically for years now. Davis would presumably say that that’s the point, that as the years roll on the same problems recur, but you don’t need his report to realize that.

Is the general consensus from those who have served in Afghanistan or are currently serving the same as the LTC’s? My guess is “yes” but I’ve only heard from a few.

Only time will tell…

From the Washington Post.

In all, the city estimates it has paid out as much as $800,000 in unemployment benefits to working city employees since 2009. …

Monday’s action, which follows at least three years of scrutiny from local and federal authorities, represents an unusually broad crackdown on corruption in the District government workforce. The volume of benefits claims has soared alongside the District’s jobless rate, and investigators have taken an increasing interest in how the unemployment program guards against fraud.

D.C. Inspector General Charles J. Willoughby and Attorney General Irvin B. Nathan are involved in the investigation, and authorities anticipate referring at least some cases to federal prosecutors for criminal action. Mallory, whose office continues to review cases, also said she has worked with the U.S. Department of Labor to prevent this type of fraud.

Employees accused of wrongdoing worked in various arms of the District government, including the public schools and the D.C. Council staff, according to a high-ranking official to Mayor Vincent C. Gray (D) who was not allowed to speak publicly on the investigation.

Let’s watch to see if even one employee is brought up on criminal charges. Sighting privacy concerns, not one name was released to the public.

Exit question: If you’re working for the government and therefore your salary is coming from the public, should you be held to a higher standard? Should every employee who intentionally cashed checks while at the same time getting a government salary be brought up on criminal charges?

An appropriate balance? Their definition of an appropriate balance is to provide waivers to some Catholics and leaving the mandate in place for other Catholics. That’s like saying an appropriate balance would be to select a certain percentage of women from a hat and letting them know they can not have access to any contraception services at all.

Even if a health care insurance policy does not cover abortion or contraception, that does not mean women do not have access to those services. Services are certainly just available as they would be if covered in a health plan, it’s just that women would need to pay for those services.

What I find interesting here is Obama’s health care plan pushed this issue into the spotlight for many Catholics. Quite honestly, there were plenty of Catholic small business owners who provided health care to employees who probably did not give much thought as to what was included in the certificate of coverage (COC) documents. Now, specifically due to the Obama administrations self-defined mandate on the subject, a lot more people are interested … and coming to the conclusion they need to fight back.

A clip from Carney’s press briefing yesterday from CNSNews with a hat tip to Gateway Pundit.

From NBC2 in Florida.

Two elections supervisors are taking action after an NBC2 investigation uncovers flawed record keeping and human error allowing people who are not citizens of the United States to vote.

No one knows how widespread this problem is, because county election supervisors have no way to track non-citizens who live here.

So NBC2 did something election officials never thought to do, and found them on our own.

“I vote every year,” Hinako Dennett told NBC2.

The Cape Coral resident is not a US citizen, yet she’s registered to vote.

NBC2 found Dennett after reviewing her jury excusal form. She told the Clerk of Court she couldn’t serve as a juror because she wasn’t a U.S. citizen.

We found her name, and nearly a hundred others like her, in the database of Florida registered voters.

Naples resident Yvonne Wigglesworth is also a not a citizen, but is registered to vote. She claims she doesn’t know how she got registered.

“I have no idea. I mean, how am I supposed to know.”

Records show Wigglesworth voted six times in elections dating back eleven years.

Exit Question: If checking off the box stating they are a citizen when registering to vote when they are not a citizen is a third degree felony, how many people have been charged in Florida?

From Investors Business Daily…

The nonpartisan budget scorekeeper released the estimates Tuesday as part of broader economic and budget forecasts. CBO expects the trust fund to peak in 2018 and decline to $2.7 trillion in 2022 — a full $1 trillion less than Social Security’s own actuaries predicted last year.

Considering the federal government keeps running up yearly tabs of well over $1 trillion a year … what can we expect?

Under current law, once the trust fund is gone, Social Securi ty could only pay 78% of benefits. Since older retirees and the disabled would be protected, new retirees would face much deeper cuts to a benefit that is not especially generous to begin with.

The average retired worker received a $1,200 monthly benefit last year before Medicare premiums were subtracted.

Social Security’s earlier reckoning day gives people less time to set aside savings to make up for what the program can’t afford.

Thanks a lot.