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I attempt to post a new issue each Sunday by 5 or 6 pm central standard time (I sometimes fail at this attempt).

I try to include factual material only, along with my opinions (it should be clear which is which). I make an attempt to include as much of this week’s news as I possibly can. The first set of columns are intentionally designed for a quick read.

I do not accept any advertising nor do I charge for this publication. I write this principally to blow off steam in a nation where its people seemed have collectively lost their minds.

And if you are a believer in Jesus Christ, always remember: We do not struggle against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the cosmic powers over this present darkness, against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly places (Eph. 6:12). If you do not believe in Jesus Christ, let me encourage you to do so: Jesus said, “I am the way, the truth and the life; no man comes to the Father but through Me.” “Believe in Me and you will have eternal life. Believe not, and the wrath of God will abide on you.” (John 14:6 3:16).

More entitlement nation; those people whose 99 weeks of unemployment benefits run out are now filing for disability payments from the government. We’re talking millions.

Michigan has experienced a pretty significant drop in its unemployment numbers. Certainly, we have seen several stories about Obama and GM in the papers. How many stories have you seen on Michigan and its governor? Do you know the party of Michigan’s governor?

President Obama releases a tax plan; and candidate Mitt Romney releases a tax plan as well.

in total, it appears that Obama is looking to raise the dividends tax as much as 44.8%. A lot of retired middle class people actually depend upon their dividends to live on.

England upped taxes on those making a lot of money (their 300,000 highest wage earners) to 50%. January 2012 tax revenues are below January 2011 revenues. Even Sept 2011, economists were claiming that this tax rate was damaging England’s economy.

President Obama and his West Wing aides ignored a subpoena of documents pertaining to the Solyndra loan guarantee even after congressional investigators met with White House officials to negotiate the scope of the subpoena, according to the House Energy and Commerce Committee.

President Obama's campaign has hired Oscar-winning director Davis Guggenheim to produce a short film chronicling the first three years of his administration. Guggenheim won an Oscar in 2006 for "An Inconvenient Truth."

In Maryland, a community college there will hold Occupy Wall Street classes for high school students. Were similar classes designed for young TEA partiers, about the constitution and the history of our government?

The federal government has filed a lawsuit to force anti-war activist Cindy Sheehan to provide her financial records to the Internal Revenue Service. An IRS revenue officer said Sheehan refused to answer any questions about her finances after receiving a summons at her Vacaville home. Sheehan received all kinds of attention by holding a demonstration outside of George W. Bush’s Texas ranch.

Taxpayers have advanced almost $50 million in legal payments to defend former executives of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac in the three years since the government rescued the giant mortgage

companies, a regulatory analysis has found. No doubt, this is a civil suit and not criminal. Greta Susteren, who used to be an attorney, says that these fees are outlandish. So, not only are we being taken to the cleaners once for the dishonesty of the FNMA and FHLMC executives, and then taken to the cleaners once again that we pay for their layers for civil suits, but we are being taken to the cleaners a third time simply by being overcharged by their lawyers.

Some employees of Solandra, while this company was going bankrupt, were getting raises as high as 70%. Now they want a bankruptcy court to approve bonuses for them. This is what crony capitalism looks like.

A leaked memo reveals that GE (the company that paid no taxes because of the green write-offs) placing an order for 12,000 Chevy Volts from GM (as well as other hybrid vehicles). GM received a lot of money from the federal government, which has not been paid off.

Speaking of global warming, there is a new “scientific” study warning us that we just might shrink because of global warming.

City officials in Rocklin, California (north from Sacramento) are considering a ban on outdoor smoking, including those smoking on their own property. It's already against the law for smokers to light up near businesses, parks and playgrounds in California. This is based upon the request of one family.

Conservative Virginian Gov. Robert F. McDonnell is backing off his unconditional support for a bill requiring women to have an ultrasound before an abortion.

The House Judiciary Committee recently passed a bill that would ban selective abortions based on race or gender by a 20-13 vote. The biggest hurdle to passage was the bill's name. Democrats proposed calling the bill "The Ronald Reagan Impose Your Beliefs on a Woman's Womb Act" and "The Tea Party Determines What Rights a Woman Has Act." Apparently, this is the idea of Hank Johnson, the representative who thought that Guam might tip over.

A Swedish artist who angered Muslims by depicting the Prophet Muhammad as a dog was pelted with eggs during a university lecture when he presented another drawing of Islam's revered prophet, police and the artist said Wednesday.

A suicide car bomber has killed at least three people at a church in the Nigerian city of Jos

A mob of some 50 Palestinian Muslims stoned a group of Christian tourists atop Jerusalem's Temple Mount on Sunday morning. Three of the Israeli police officers who acted to protect the Christian group were wounded by the stone-throwers.

Pakistanis poured onto Islamabad's streets Monday, chanting "death to America" and demanding holy war at a rally whipped up by right-wing, religious and banned organizations linked to Al-Qaeda.

Violent protests left at least 20 dead and others wounded as demonstrations over Quran burning intensified in Afghanistan. These demonstrations have continued for 6 days and they have included the desecration of the graves of British soldiers in Libya. These protests have spread to Malaysia and Pakistan as well. An Afghan policeman, on Saturday, murdered two high-ranking U.S. military advisors because he was so upset. Has NATO agreed to try the American soldiers who burned the Korans?

As a result of this, the top U.S. commander in Afghanistan recalled all NATO personnel working in Afghan ministries in the Kabul area

A 16-year-old girl who refused to marry an al-Shabaab commander who was three times her age was killed by his men and beheaded. Her head was brought back to the school as a warning to others.

In what it described as "an extremely dangerous turn of events," the American Center for Law and Justice said Monday it had learned from contacts inside Iran that Youcef Nadarkhani, the Christian pastor on death row for "apostasy," looks increasingly likely to be executed.

The Afghan government reported that police had rescued 41 children from becoming suicide bombers as they were about to be smuggled across the mountains into Pakistan.

Military personnel stationed in Afghanistan will undergo training over the next two weeks in the "proper handling of religious materials," after the burning of Qurans at Bagram Air Force Base sparked a protest by local Afghans today.

Suspected Nigerian Islamists opened fire and set off bombs at a market in the north-eastern city of Maiduguri on Monday, killing at least 30 people.

Hugo Chavez is sending fuel shipments to Syria, which will help out the Assad Regime.

Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) and Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.), who both serve on the Senate Armed Services committee, argued that arming rebel fighters in the country could help beat back a Syrian government with close ties to Iran.

President Barack Obama: "We're making new investments in the development of gasoline, diesel, and jet fuel that's actually made from a plant-like substance, algae - you've got a bunch of algae out here. If we can figure out how to make energy out of that, we'll be doing alright. Believe it or not, we could replace up to 17 percent of the oil we import for transportation with this fuel that we can grow right here in America."

President Obama: "Now, some politicians always see this as a political opportunity. And since it's an election year, they're already dusting off their three-point plans for $2 gas. I'll save you the suspense: Step one is drill, step two is drill, and step three is keep drilling. We hear the same thing every year. Well the American people aren't stupid."

President Obama: "A century of subsidies to the oil companies is long enough. It's time to end taxpayer giveaways to an industry that's never been more profitable, and double-down on a clean energy industry that's never been more promising...With or without this Congress, I'll continue to do whatever I can to develop every source of American energy, so that our future isn't controlled by events on the other side of the world"

President Barack Obama: "When Congress refuses to act, Joe and I are going to act."

President Obama during a press event on the payroll tax cut extension: "With or without Congress every day I'm going to be continuing to fight with them. I do hope Congress joins me. Instead of spending the coming months in a lot of phony political debates, focusing on the next election, I hope that we spend some time focusing on middle-class Americans and those are struggling to get in the middle class. We have a lot more work to do. Let's do it."

President Obama: "If you're willing to put in the work, the idea is that you should be able to raise a family and own a home; not go bankrupt because you got sick, because you've got some health insurance that helps you deal with those difficult times; that you can send your kids to college; that you can put some money away for retirement. That's all most people want. Folks don't have unrealistic ambitions. They do believe that if they work hard they should be able to achieve that small measure of an American Dream." Unrealistic ambitions like lowering the sea levels?

White House Press Secretary Jay Carney on whether the President should bear any responsibility for high gas prices: "If you're suggesting that there is responsibility for a rise in the price of oil, it's certainly not because of anything he hasn't done to expand oil production."

Deputy White House Press Secretary Josh Earnest on the high gas prices: "If there was a magic wand you could wave, one of the presidents would have waved it...Anyone who says that they can wave a wand or plant the magic beans to lead to a reduction in oil prices is just not telling the truth." Crude oil and gasoline futures fell after President Bush gave the Environmental Protection Agency the authority to relax regional clean-fuel standards to attract more imports of gasoline to the United States and to make it easier for supplies to be moved from one state to another. At the time that this was done, gas prices were at nearly $3/gallon and they dropped to almost $2/gallon by the end of the year.

Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner: "And that's the kind of balance you need. And why is that the case? Because if you don't try to generate more revenues through tax reform, if you don't ask the, you know, the most fortunate Americans to bear a slightly larger burden of the privilege of being an American, then you have to - the only way to achieve fiscal sustainability - is through unacceptably deep cuts in benefits for middle class seniors, or unacceptably deep cuts in national security." Raise the taxes on the rich and leave that 49.5% who pay no federal taxes as they are.

First lady Michelle Obama, to 300 supporters paying $300-$10,000 each to attend a fundraiser: "If a family in this country is struggling, we cannot be satisfied with our own families' good fortune...Will we be a country where success is limited to the few at the top? This country is strongest when we are all better off." I say it again; Michelle will be running in 2016—possibly for president.

DNC Head Debbie Wasserman Schultz: “[Republicans] would devote all their time in office reversing all the progress that we’ve made.”

Wasserman Schultz: “I still get goose bumps that I felt that night [when Obama was elected].”

Washington Gov. Christine Groggier (D) defended President Obama's record on gay rights: "I think we probably have succeeded as much as we have because of his leadership. He's used the bully pulpit. He's been the inspiration [for Washington’s gay marriage bill] that allowed the state of Washington recognize that we need to have equality."

Ed Schultz's radio show producer, James "Holmy" Holm: “To me, and I'm not, I'm not calling the fine folks in the Republican Party Nazis. But what this is, this is Joseph Mengele stuff. This is medical testing. This is arcane, ridiculous, basically torture what they're doing to these people.” Not only is the comparison absurd, the example given is all about 1% or less of the cases where an ultrasound would be required (which is required for all abortions anyway).

Former Speaker of the House, Nancy Pelosi: "Ninety-eight percent of women in childbearing age that are Catholic use contraception. So, in practice the church has not enforced this and now they want the federal government and private insurance to enforce it."

Obama Adviser Valerie Jarrett: "Even though we had a terrible economic crisis three years ago, throughout our country many people were suffering before the last three years, particularly in the black community. And so we need to make sure that we continue to support that important safety net. It not only is good for the family, but it's good for the economy. People who receive that unemployment check go out and spend it and help stimulate the economy, so that's healthy as well."

Caption under White House photo: “First Lady Michelle Obama (C) welcomes 124 middle and high school students from across the country to take part in an interactive student workshop at the White House in Washington, DC, February 21, 2012.” I didn’t catch it at first either. Remember that this is only one thing you can tell me about former Vice President Dan Quayle, that he misspelled potatoe. Will we see any SNL skits on this? Of course not.

Erika Christakis in a Time Magazine article: “There was lots of excitable talk last week about birth control, with President Obama dialing back his initial plan for mandating contraceptive coverage to exempt employers who object to such coverage on religious grounds. In those cases, the health-insurance provider, rather than the employer, will be on the hook to pay for the services. Tellingly, health-insurance companies seem quite happy with this compromise, knowing, as they do, that paying for contraceptives is a lot less costly than paying for pregnancies and neonatal care...At a minimum, the Catholic bishops and employers resisting contraceptive coverage should be willing to pay for the care of all those unwanted children. Or perhaps they'd be willing to spend some time in jail in protest. At my taxpaying expense, of course.”

Rich Latta, responding in a letter the USA Today’s piece on the Occupy movement: “Your piece accuses the protesters of sitting around and doing nothing. So maybe they should take up their Second Amendment-sanctioned guns and storm Wall Street and our nation's capitals. If our country doesn't change, it could very well come to that one day.”

Rep. Mike Honda: “My family and I were herded like cattle into the Amache internment camp in southeast Colorado. I was less than one year old at the time...We cannot stand idly by as an entire American community is demonized as a ‘religious enemy within.’ We cannot hide our eyes when failed leaders like State Rep. Rick Womack of Tennessee declare that Muslims must be purged from our military or that Muslims pray to a false God. We must not stay silent as Rep. Peter King - during a recent hearing on the 70th anniversary of Pearl Harbor - uses tragic but isolated crimes and unnamed sources to proclaim that one group - Muslims- are the source of all homegrown terrorist threats to the military.”

Billionnaire investor Warren Buffet in a letter to Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse: "I'm delighted to be identified as a supporter of S. 2059 [the “Buffet Tax” Bill]. I have no problem endorsing any large step in the direction of greater fairness in the tax code.Thanks for what you are doing for our country." Buffet has received no little notoriety for claiming that his secretary has a higher tax rate than he does. Most news stories about this rarely mention the ways in which Buffet has reduced his tax obligations and how he is presently fighting the IRS over a taxes they say he owes for 10 years.

Time Magazine’s Joe Klein on the Republican candidate field: "I got to say, this is Jonestown. These guys have all drunk this Kool-Aid that spews from places like the Rush Limbaugh program and certain things on Fox. And I've done 10 of these, God help me. And I have never seen a field go so extreme and so intemperate and caricature their opposition as the antichrist as this field has. The last time I think we saw anything even remotely resembling this was the way Democrats felt about Richard Nixon in 1972. And you saw what happened to George McGovern."

Nina Totenberg, NPR: “Well, you know, gasoline prices do affect, they take, they are like a big tax in that they take money out of people's pockets, particularly at the lower income levels when they have to get to work, for example. However, let us say, and I think we have seen enough of this for the last 20 years that people have some sense that that politicians don't control this. I mean, there was a study recently that showed if the United States actually was accountable for all, made all of its own gas, all of it was pumped in the United States, it still would only reduce the price of gas internationally and to us at about a few cents a gallon because it's we don't, we don't produce all the gas in the world, all the petrol in the world.”

Washington Post headline on the Maryland gay-marriage bill: “Black pastors take heat for not viewing same-sex marriage as civil rights matter”

Newsweek religion editor Lisa Miller: "Last week, the Christianity police, in the persons of Rick Santorum and Franklin Graham, came forward to discredit the president's religious beliefs." She herself has written many stories, making the final determination herself of who is truly Christian and who is not.

NBC Nightly News, anchor Brian Williams: "Birth control seems to have become, as one headline writer put it today, 'The Third Rail of American Politics Right Now,' and this happened really out of nowhere."

The Daily Show’s John Oliver of Rick Santorum: "America likes its conservatism cut with plenty of baking powder because one hit of the pure stuff, and you'll wake up with Eric Stoltz...having just plunged an adrenaline needle into your heart."

CBS Anchor Charlie Rose praised the offensive remark: "Don't you love John Oliver?"

Erica Hill: "Always gives us a good laugh. We like that."

Former New York Times executive editor Bill Keller: "We can't entirely leech the New York-ness out of The New York Times," said Keller. "If we somehow achieved absolute objectivity, it would be kind of tedious to read. ... Watching The New York Times try to be even-handed on some issues is like trying to watch somebody dance their kids' dance styles. We look like we're trying too hard. Yes, we should be even-handed, we should certainly follow the basic rule of reporting, challenging your assumptions, and we should be ruthless about having a public editor or an editors' note to call ourselves out. ... But it is possible to be fair and still radiate a cultural persona." If memory serves, it was under Keller that specific stories were simply ignored for months, like the TEA party movement and the demonstrations at the Ground Zero Mosque. Insofar as the Times was concerned, these stories did not exist and apparently Keller thinks it may have ben tedious to be so even-handed as to report on such questionable news.

Gene Sperling, MSNBC correspondent: “The president just put forward a plan to reduce expenditures, reduce loopholes, so that we can have a corporate tax rate of 28%., we can lower the incentive for manufacturing our country to 25%, have a basic minimum tax, uh—that is just a sound, common sense proposal, of course, you have to do it in a fiscally responsible way. And we’re not going to support plans that some people have where they would just cut corporate rates in a way that would balloon the deficit or make it have to be paid for by cutting medicare or other entitlements on other Americans. You need shared sacrifice, shared responsibility. That means, if you’re going to do corporate tax reform, you’ve gotta do it in a way that is fiscally responsible, that’s to the President is proposing, that is what we stand by, that is what the public would overwhelmingly support.” It is subtle, but if you notice, the president’s plan became “our” plan, as he explains it.

CNN’s Piers Morgan to Canadian-born Jennifer Granholm, after beating down the Republican candidates: “Well, many think that you should be serving us in higher office, Jennifer Granholm, so I hope you give that some serious thought. It's been a pleasure talking to you again.”

MSNBC political analyst Mark McKinnon “Republicans are literally trying to insert themselves into women's bodies.”

Andrea Mitchell: “I know that is a busy construction site behind you—“ Sperling is standing in front of the White House.

Dorian Warren, Columbia University: “The Republican strategy is basically to be a white party, and a white Southern party. And the time is, the clock is ticking on that demographic in this country.”

Melissa Harris-Perry: “And apparently an all-male party. I mean, what I kept feeling this week is, I hear you, when I first heard the discourse of the Tea Party, you know, as much as I wasn't in agreement with it, I kind of like populist movements that are asking for jobs and asking and worrying about, you know, about the effects of big government.”

Time magazine columnist Joe Klein "What the Republicans have is an awful lot of scared white people in their party and one of the things they’re most scared about is people of different colors and ethnicities, and, you know, backgrounds—polluting their white picket fence sense of America."

New York Magazine columnist John Heileman: “There is a racial - for some number of the president's enemies who talk about it in this way. Who cast him as a - in the way that we're talking about there is some undertone of persistent racial animosity that fuels that."

Mike Papantonio or Sam Seder, describing Republican party strategy: “We don’t want minorities, we don’t want Jews—don’t even apply to our party...we want the NASCAR white guy, and that’s all we’re gonna go after.”

Sam Seder: “This has been the subtext of the Republican party electoral strategy, in not the text for past 35 years—40 years now.”

The rest of this silliness is found here.

Michael Moore: "[Republicans] hate anything that has to do with unions, auto workers, African Americans - there's a racial element to this, there's Detroit, then there's the rest of us."

Laura Murphy, the Washington Chapter head of the American Civil Liberties Union: "No eligible citizen should have to pay to vote. The ACLU believes requiring voters to obtain a government-issued photo ID in order to vote is tantamount to a poll tax."

Mick Jagger about President Barack Obama's singing the blues: "I thought he was courageous, because there was some element of reluctance...it was a hard moment for the president to get out of."

Sean Lennon (John Lennon’s son): "I want to thank Michelle Obama for my style. Michelle has been my inspiration. I am studying her oeuvre. Her oeuvre is fascinating." Oeuvre is a substantial body of work constituting the lifework of a writer, an artist, or a composer.

Sean Stone, son of director Oliver Stone, who converted to Islam in Iran last week and claims that he is already experiencing a Hollywood backlash "I've already experienced the reverse of anti-Semitism, having people within the film industry express a reluctance to work with me.”

Sean Stone, who goes by the name Sean Christopher Ali Stone now (after all, it is Hollywood): “I didn't realize I would be so vilified. It is almost like I am a criminal for having accepted Islam. I didn't realize Islamophobia was that deep.”

Sean Stone: “I mean, with Ahmadinejad, he's a little bit misunderstood, because there are many factions in that country. And he said some sensational things. But for example, he said, you know, Israel should be dissolved in so far as he's talking about the West Bank.” Some people may have problems with O’Reilly bringing Stone on and letting him talk without strongly challenging him. Stone is a private citizen who does not write our tax policy or can he demand that we include contraction in healthcare coverage. O’Reilly simply lets him speak and trusts that we, the public, are smart enough to evaluate Stone’s remarks on our own.

Nancy Pelosi in 2007: "Drivers are paying a heavy price for the Bush Administration's failure to enact a comprehensive energy policy."

The wife of Martyr Mostafa Ahmadi Roshan Behdast, who was assassinated by Mossad agents in Tehran in January: "Mostafa's ultimate goal was the annihilation of Israel,"

Salafist leader Abdel Moneim al-Shahat: "We will prosecute the Bahai's on charge of treason." Bahia is a faith, if memory serves, that attempts to unite several faiths as one.

Commander of Iran's Basij (volunteer) force Brigadier General Mohammad Reza Naqdi, a top Iranian military commander of the Koran burnings: "The US has committed such an ugly action and burnt Quran because of the heavy slap it has been given by Islam...Nothing but burning the White House can relieve the wound of us, the Muslims, caused by the burning of Quran in the US."

Deputy Defense Minister Ahmad Vahidi of Iran: "Any act by the Zionist regime against Iran will bring about its destruction...Iran's warriors are ready and willing to wipe Israel off the map."

After the 3-page letter of apology from President Obama to Afghan President Hamid Kharzai, a Taliban leader: "Kill them, beat them, take them as prisoners and teach them such a lesson that they never summon the courage to abuse the Holy Qur'an again."

Former Rep. Alan Grayson: "This is part of the vilification and demonization of the President and he's articulating it for the Tea Party fanatics. He's playing to his paranoid audience. . . . Rick Santorum, like millions of other Americans, has been immersed in hate-radio and FOX News for years, for decades and now this is the result of it. He's the Tea Party candidate. He's the one that they really want and this is what you see. But there is a gaping chasm between the Tea Party and the rest of America. And they are going to generate the next Republican candidate whether we like it or not."

Former National Security Advisor under Jimmy Carter: Zbigniew Brzezinski: “Oh, without a question, without a question. I mean, look at those Republican debates. I must say I literally feel embarrassed as an American when I see those people orate. One of them sounds like a medieval Savonarola. Another one is trying to explain why he has some of his wealth located in the Cayman Islands. And someone else would go back to 1780. And then there is someone who is using his credentials as a repudiated Speaker of the Congress to be president. I mean, this is just embarrassing.”

Scottie Thomaston of the Daily Kos on Rick Santorum: “...[W]hile he is authentic, he's a f_g authentic terrorist. He's the David Duke of anti-LGBT sentiment. He can get people to like him by seeming polite but inside he wants to hurt us.”

President Barack Obama: "We've gone through three of the toughest years this country has gone through in my lifetime. And there are a lot of people who are still hurting all across the country-a lot of people here in Florida, a lot of people everywhere. There are still folks whose homes are underwater because the housing market collapsed. There are people who are still struggling because they can't find a job. There are folks who are just barely able to make ends meet. And obviously those of us who are here, we've been incredibly blessed. But one of the great things about America and one of the great things about those who are in professional sports is we've all got cousins, uncles, family members who are still struggling and are a reminder that we have a lot more work to do"

MSNBC’s Chris Matthews (speaking for President Obama): " ’I'm going to run as a populist’ and raise taxes. It's a masquerade. Liberals don't want to pay more. It’s all a game."

NBC Nightly News, correspondent Savannah Guthrie freely acknowledges that media coverage has been boosting President Obama this campaign season: "The commander in chief in song and in tune. It's getting to be a regular gig....spontaneous moments can give a president or candidate the kind of wall-to-wall goodwill coverage money can't buy."

Jessie Sansone, a Kitchener, Onterio father, after being arrested and strip-searched: "This is completely insane. My daughter drew a gun on a piece of paper at school." That is why he was arrested.

Daily Beast columnist and MSNBC contributor Meghan McCain: "I'm not pro-vaginal probing...I feel like I have to go on national television and delineate between the two things. I'm horrified by this bill as a woman, as a Republican woman I'm horrified. It scares me that this can go on. It scares me that a woman could be vaginally probed without consent or doctor's consent, and I think this is completely radioactive for Gov. McDonnell and I have no idea why he would even go on any form and say he would pass it."

President Obama, 2012: "It's the easiest thing in the world to make phony election-year promises about lower gas prices. What's harder is to make a serious, sustained commitment to tackle a problem that may not be solved in one year or one term or even one decade."

Candidate Obama, 2008: "For the well-off in this country, high gas prices are mostly an annoyance, but to most Americans they're a huge problem, bordering on a crisis."

New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie: "I'm so tired of talking about Warren Buffett. What are you going to bring up next, his secretary?"

Chris Christie on billionaire investor Warren Buffett: "He should just write a check and shut up. I'm tired of hearing about it. If he wants to give the government more money, he's got the ability to write a check - go ahead and write it." Warren Buffet’s company, Berkshire Hathaway, has been in a tax dispute with the government for a decade. Buffet does not pay himself a salary as a CEO, because that saves him gobs of money on taxes. Yet he has come out on several occasions saying that he is taxed too little.

White House Press Secretary Jay Carney: "I think Mr. Buffett, who is widely regarded for his success in business as well as in philanthropy, has been quite outspoken, as is his right, on what he believes is an issue of tax fairness," Carney said during today's press briefing. "He simply believes, as one of the wealthiest men in the world, that he should not be paying an effective tax rate lower than his secretary."

Carney: "[T]hat's a quip that tries to draw attention away from what is a very serious issue, which is the need to have a tax code that's fair and that helps the American people as they recover from this recession. So, quips aside, we think the Buffett Rule is absolutely an important principle to apply to individual tax reform."

Former Speaker of the House, Nancy Pelosi: "Wall Street profiteering, not oil shortages, is the cause of the price spike. Unfortunately, Republicans have chosen to protect the interests of Wall Street speculators and oil companies instead of the interests of working Americans by obstructing the agencies with the responsibility of enforcing consumer protection laws."

Nancy Pelosi, circa 2007: "This Memorial Day, American families and businesses are yet again

paying record prices for gasoline. With high gasoline prices this year already costing consumers and our economy an extra $20 billion, families are feeling a serious drain on their pocketbooks. Drivers are paying a heavy price for six years of the Bush administration's failed energy policies. Instead of investing in clean, domestic alternative fuels and renewable energy, Republicans lined the pockets of Big Oil, which was already making record profits. This has resulted in unprecedented dependence on foreign oil and record prices at the pump.”

Jake Tapper: "How can you say that you have an all the above on approach if the President turned down the Keystone pipeline? And you blame the Republicans for making it political."

White House Press Secretary Jay Carney: "But the President didn't turn down the Keystone pipeline. There was a process in place, with long precedent, run out of the State Department because of the issue of the pipeline crossing an international boundary, that required an amount of time for proper for review after an alternate route was deemed necessary through Nebraska at the request of the Republican Governor of Nebraska and other stakeholders in Nebraska and the region that needed to play out, to be done appropriately. You can't review and approve a pipeline, the route for which doesn't even exist.”

Ludwig Gaines, the African American leadership and engagement director for Planned Parenthood Federation of America, responding to a question about abortion's disproportionate affect on black women: "If you look at the records of the proponents of this bill [which limits abortion to 20 weeks and younger] and others who would support it, they are the very same people who will not support after-school care, or food stamps, or other programs meant to elevate communities of color. Suddenly, they're concerned about black children quite frankly prior to birth, but could care less once they arrive."

Douglas Johnson, legislative director of the National Right to Life Committee said in a letter supporting the legislation: "Currently, in our nation's capital, unborn children may legally be killed at any point up to birth, for any reason. Abortions are advertised, and performed, in the sixth month and later. This means that unborn children who are capable of experiencing excruciating pain are killed every day."

Scott Whitlock, of the Media Research Center: “Earlier tonight, you were talking about Nixon and the Southern Strategy and bigotry and things like that you and you said, quote, "If you're really anti-gay, you become a Catholic now." [Audience laughs.] I was wondering if you were saying that bigots become Catholic now and if you wanted to expand or apologize for that?” [Audience laughs.]

Chris Matthews: “I think there are people who have chosen to convert to the Catholic faith because they don't like the liberal positions taken by their sectarian groups. That's a fact. So, you can write that down. No, you can write that down.”

Whitlock: “So, you're saying Catholicism is drawing bigots? Is that what you're saying?”

Matthews: “I'm saying that some people who are bigoted against gay people have changed religions. Yes. You got it right.”

MSNBC contributor: "Virginia is my home state and I actually ran for Congress there in 2010. So this hits very close to home for me also being a woman. What they are saying in Virginia is not only do women have to undergo an ultrasound, they have to undergo a trans-vaginal ultrasound. Mandatory state probing, okay. That's what this legislation is talking about. It actually meets the Virginia definition of rape. So, the bigger picture here is this is a bigger piece of a whole range of anti-woman extreme legislation that was pushed through the Virginia legislator and really the legislators across the country." The law requires that an ultrasound be done and shown to the patient. Ultrasounds are a part of the abortion procedure.

Planned Parenthood on a telephone hotline: "Patients who have a surgical abortion generally come in for two appointments. At the first visit we do a health assessment, perform all the necessary lab work, and do an ultrasound.”

Mohammad Hejazi, the deputy head of the Islamic Republic's armed forces: "Our strategy now is that if we feel our enemies want to endanger Iran's national interests, and want to decide to do that, we will act without waiting for their actions.''

Joint Chiefs of Staff chair Gen. Martin Dempsey: "We think that it's not prudent at this point to decide to attack Iran. I mean, that's been our counsel to our allies, the Israelis, well-known, well-documented."

Presidential candidate Newt Gingrich: "The idea that a President of the United States would say you can't drill but I've got a jar of algae [to solve our fuel problems] will strike most people as something from a Saturday Night Live skit."

Newt Gingrich: “You did not once in the 2008 campaign, not once did anybody in the elite media ask why Barack Obama voted in favor of legalizing infanticide...If we're going to have a debate about who the extremist is on these issues, it is President Obama who, as a state senator, voted to protect doctors who killed babies who survived the abortion.” The news media has gone nuts over this. It is easier to find “fact check” articles on this than it is to find Gingrich’s actual quote. Even though CNN did a 5 minute piece on this issue, I do not recall hearing this question being asked of candidate Obama at any time.

Presidential candidate Rick Santorum: "We have a society. the increasing number of teens being born out of wedlock in America, teens who are sexually active. The left gets so upset: `Oh, look at him talking about these things.' Here is the difference between me and the left - and they don't get this - just because I'm talking about it doesn't mean I want a government program to fix it. That's what they do. That's not what we do."

Santorum: "President Obama said he wants everybody in America to go to college. What a snob! There are good, decent men and women who go out and work hard every day and put their skills to the test that aren't taught by some liberal college professor trying to indoctrinate them." About 30–40% of students go to and graduate from college. This has been the case for a very long time.

Rep. Trent Franks: "The bottom line is, there are better ways to protect the health of women than by killing their children for them."

Sarah Palin: “Obama apologizes for the inadvertent Koran burning this week; now the U.S. trained and protected Afghan Army can apologize for killing two of our soldiers yesterday.”

George Will on Christian basketball star Jeremy Lin: “It’s nice to see Harvard produce someone who is not a net subtraction from the public good.”

The Rev. Franklin Graham: "The president has said that he is a Christian and we'll just leave it at that. Only God knows the heart of all of these candidates as it comes down to the candidates, it's really the issues that are the issue here."

Rand Paul, when asked if he would consider being Romney’s VP: "I don't know if I can answer that question, but I can say it would be an honor to be considered."

Rick Santorum spokeswoman Alice Stewart: “There is a type of theological secularism when it comes to the global warmness in this country. That's what he was referring to. He was referring to the president's policies in terms of the radical Islamic policies the president has."

Stewart soon after the interview: “[I meant] radical environmental policies [not] radical Islamic policies."

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu: "A year ago or so, when this [Egyptian] revolution began, people said you're not optimistic enough...We looked at it with sober eyes, and we said: It might go to the Google generation, but it might not. It might go to the Islamist direction. And by and large it has."

Rush Limbaugh: "The Democrats don't have one thing they can run on. There's not one aspect of Obama's first term that they can say, 'If you want four more years of this, vote for us.' They have to create fear, hatred, loathing, impugn the character, all that, of Republicans -- and that's what they do."

Rush Limbaugh: "This country was propelled by rugged individualism, rugged self-interest. It was made possible by virtue of the freedom this country offers its citizens thanks to our Constitution, founding documents, and Founding Fathers."

Rush Limbaugh: "All polls, as we've discussed on this program countless times, have bias. They are all rigged in one way or another from the percentages of each party as samples. For example, Democrats are always over sampled in every Drive-By Media poll. Independents are always over sampled. Republicans are always under sampled. I mean there's rigging in practically every poll that's out there."

Rush Limbaugh: "Honestly, when I hear some of these high-ranking Republicans discuss what this campaign is, sometimes I wonder if they really have a grasp on what's happening, at least in the minds of Republican voters."

Rush Limbaugh: "This is the most shocking and underreported significant story I can ever remember. It's all on the record: Obama and infanticide. And we talked about it during the 2008 campaign. Nobody wanted to hear it. The hopey-change thing was just too big of a theme. It was absorbing all the energy."

Rush Limbaugh: "The ignorance of establishment Republicans never ceases to amaze me, and I'm not talking about stupidity. Don't misunderstand. I'm talking about a genuine lack of understanding."

Rush Limbaugh: "We have, it seems like every week now, at least one story of outright failure by the regime regarding 'green energy,' and these stories never make it into the Drive-By Media!"

Rush Limbaugh: "Reagan did not mention Satan in his 1983 speech, but you heard that he did mention Screwtape. Screwtape is not quite Satan, but nevertheless a demon holds an administrative post in the bureaucracy of hell."

Rush Limbaugh: "Of the two men, Rick Santorum and Barack Obama, there's only one that is a threat to religious liberty. Who do you think that is?"

Former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush: "I used to be a conservative and I watch these debates and I'm wondering, I don't think I've changed, but it's a little troubling sometimes when people are appealing to people's fears and emotion rather than trying to get them to look over the horizon for a broader perspective and that's kind of where we are."

Ron Paul: "We've slipped away from a true republic. Now we're slipping into a fascist system where it's a combination of government, big business and authoritarian rule, and the suppression of the individual rights of each and every American citizen."

John Stossel’s “Illegal America.” I don’t agree with simply legalizing sin, but most of the show was excellent.

Allen West, who ought to be our next vice president (or Marco Rubio, of course). Unlike Mitt Romney, conservatism is infused with their souls; they don’t need to use the word conservative 25 times in a speech to convince people that they are conservative.

Chris Matthews and his panel complain incessantly about the petty topics covered in the Arizona Republican debate. He was right, of course, but the only way this debate could have been made substantive is if the candidates completely ignored the questions they were given and talked about something else. Where were the questions on the debt, the deficit, tax policy, social security and medicare reform, gas prices, China, Operation Fast & Furious, or Solandra?

Obama in 2008 complaining about $3.50/gallon of gas and telling us what he would do about it.

Oversharing? Virginian lawmaker details how ultrasound bill ruined a romantic night with his wife. Have our lawmakers just flat out lost their minds?

1) In any free society, the income gap between the rich and the poor will continue to grow wider simply because, people who are adept at making money will make money; and people who are not, won’t.

2) Far more important than the income gap is, how much money does the government control, either directly by its budgets, or less directly through legislative control?

3) One easy way to distinguish between an Occupy demonstration and a TEA party gathering; the latter will fly the flag and revere it; if the Occupy group brings an American flag, it is to burn it.

4) Here is a simple tax fix/compromise (between liberals and conservatives): set up a specific factor which must be maintained between the rich and the poor. The rich cannot be required to pay, say, more than 3X (or 5X) what the poor pay. My own personal preference is, everyone pays the same percentage or there being a national sales tax (which excludes most foods); but I would like a mechanism in place so that, when Charley Brown votes to raise taxes, he is voting to raise taxes on himself.

5) After this Koran nonsense, I am beginning to favor pulling out of Afghanistan. We need to establish some bases there and in Iraq; but apart from that, I don’t think that these people are rational. In the alternative, if Kharzai okays killing violent demonstrators in the street, I could see staying.

6) Right now, oil companies have our gas prices sky high and they are exporting so much refined fuel overseas, that it has turned our trade balance to a net pos. Now, who do we know that has “hands-on” experience dealing with oil companies and corruption? Sarah Palin.

7) Lores “Live” made the point that Muslims are always lecturing us about a proportional response; and yet, have rioted and killed over 20 people over the burning of a few books.

8) Most people like to believe in a power greater than themselves. In fact, it might even been seen as innate in human nature. This may explain why agnostics and atheists tend to be very liberal, putting their faith in a large and powerful government; and how they nearly deify the concept of science.

Jason Peuquet, a policy analyst with the Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget, points out that “The net worth of Bill Gates, roughly around $56 billion, could only cover the deficit for 15 days,” and “The net worth of Warren Buffet, roughly around $50 billion, could only cover the deficit for 13 days.” In the 1920's the richest man in American could write a check and pay off the entire national debt, and still have money left over.

Unions say they are gearing up to spend more than $400 million to help re-elect President Barack Obama and lift Democrats this election year in a fight for labor's survival.

46% of respondents saying they are confident that GOP legislators can solve the country's budget problems;

This poll seems like an outlier here. Certain the conclusions seem reasonable to me, however.

50% of Americans want to see the U.S. Supreme Court overturn Obama's health care reform law.

Unlike many of the graphs you see in the news, Gallup’s 30 day rolling average is practically a straight line for these 3 statistics (2 years are given in this interactive chart). Who do you think is most objective? The government graphs on these figures or Gallup’s?

Americans are more likely to say his presidency has been a failure than a success, 50%-44%.

53% of Republican voters say they're more enthusiastic than usual about voting, compared with 45% of Democrats.

These figures include 41% who Strongly Favor repeal and 28% who are Strongly Opposed.

29% of likely U.S. voters favor $10,000 in government subsidies to encourage the purchase of electric cars

Weasel Zipper readers, post-debate, are still leaning toward Newt. When asked who they expect to win, Santorum was in front, but just barely (Romney in second).

CNN 2008: High gas prices = BUSH!!! | CNN 2011: High gas prices = no easy answers. Along the same lines, NBC and ABC blame oil speculators and these greedy oil companies for high gas prices. If Bush were still in office....

There were 21 broadcast network news references to gas or fuel prices between Jan. 20 and Feb. 20, 2012 and 97 broadcast news stories from March 24 and April 24, 2008 (about 4X as many). Coverage during the time periods differed not only in quantity, but in tone as well. During Bush's tenure, gas prices were a huge economic threat and cause of suffering. The networks also used the high gas prices to attack the administration. In 2012, the networks aired mostly matter-of-fact stories on the rising gas prices, and worried primarily that they would hinder the economic recovery, not that they are making people suffer.

LA Times runs a story “What to do about $4 gas” (LA gas highs are above $5 now, but that story was written 3 days ago). Buy a moped and move closer to work.

The media skewers both Santorum and Romney on their faith. In fact, there is an impression that the media seems to be attempting to make that Santorum will impose his Catholic values on all America. However, President Obama not only went to one of the most divisive churches in America, but his political stances seem to be very much in synch with the warped ideals of his ex-pastor, the Reverend Jeremiah Wright.

The Washington Post is still not informing its readers that Virginian abortionists already conduct ultrasounds. There is all of the controversy over such an horrendous invasion of the female body demanded by a new ultrasound law; yet, ultrasounds are routinely done on all abortion patients.

Meanwhile, the NY Times likens Pre-abortion ultrasound to rape and MSNBC’s Luke Russert asks if such ultrasounds are a sex crime of sorts.

NPR public radio host Garrison Keillor is hosting a fundraiser for President Obama in his home state of Minnesota. I finally stopped listening to him because of his intense dislike of George W.

Philadelphia's two daily newspapers have long been accused of liberal bias, but it appears that it may be purchased by former Gov. Ed Rendell. Bias in the news? With for DNC party head as the purchaser? Perhaps I am just being paranoid. Big Journalism does a story on What Happens when Politicians Buy Newspapers?

The Arizona debate run by CNN in Arizona—did you notice that there was not a single question about Operation Fast&Furious?

Here’s a subtle bias; AP runs a story on a recent case in Texas where landowner’s rights are “expanded” to where they are allowed unfettered access to the water beneath their property.

However, reporting the same story, Julia Fisher on KFYO: “The controversial ruling says the government has no right to restrict a landowner's usage of water underneath their property without providing proper compensation.”

In the first story, government control of the land is assumed, and the court is treated as if it is an activist court, giving out rights and privileges to property owners that perhaps they ought not to have.

Despite horrible housing market number, AP still reports that “Still, the pickup in sales at the end of last year coincides with other improvements in the housing market and should bolster the view that the depressed sector is starting to revive.”

Pro-military and pro-American movie Act of Valor came out this weekend. Liberals—and you may be shocked by this—panned the movie.

Couldn’t SNL do a lot with President Obama’s algae solution to the oil problem. He could have a whole list of projects like this that his energy department is working on. Don’t forget to use the shrimp on the treadmills, as we do have the video for that.

You have been talking recently about using algae to mediate against high gas prices. How long before you expect algae-based products to make up 1% of the market?

Framing the dispute: the White House does not want to discuss the economy, and how people feel about it. So, they decided to take up contraception. Over a month ago, George Stephanopoulos brought this topic up at a debate, apropos of nothing (he claims it was a bet with Dianne Sawyer). And now, what a surprise, all of the media is abuzz with discussion about contraceptives. Rick Santorum and the Republican party in general is being portrayed as being anti-contraception and the Obama administration is being portrayed as pro-contraception. However, President Obama has determined that contraception is so important and that his power is such that, he can now mandate that all insurance companies simply give contraception away for free on their plans. Republicans oppose this on two grounds: (1) is it reasonable that the president can make such a mandate of private businesses and (2) what about this violating the conscience of some religions that oppose contraception? Is the government able to overrule their doctrines for the higher goal of free contraception. A third issue is, nothing is free, even if the government says that it is.

I must admit being slightly awe-struck by the Democratic party. They know that many people do not pay attention to things political and that, all they have to do is get impressions and suggestions out there, and allow those who are ill-informed to vote based upon their impressions. I am sure that there are people out there—college-educated people, in fact—who really believe that, the Republicans, led by Rick Santorum, are out to take contraction from the public. Notice when a Democrat (like Wasserman Schultz or Pelosi speaks). I don’t think that either one of them will out-and-out accuse Republicans of wanting to ban contraception, but they give that impression.

I must admit, one of the things that has puzzled me this election cycle is, Ron Paul is running attack ads on Gingrich and on Santorum, but he does not attack Romney—not even in the debates. Someone recently asked Senator Rand Paul, his son, if he would be interested in being vice president for Mitt Romney. He answered, "I don't know if I can answer that question, but I can say it would be an honor to be considered." So that is the key. Romney’s people have spoken to Paul’s people and said, “Rand Paul will be my VP if your attacks are focused on my opponents.”

One of the Republicans—probably Newt, is going to occasionally refer to President Obama as President Algae Obama. Or just President Algae. Expect some ads on Obama and his algae solution, and a kicker like, “Choose a candidate with real solutions.” Vote for ____ (whoever the Republican candidate is)

It really does not matter who our president is now with regards to Afghanistan. Any president would begin to withdraw troops based on the riots that have occurred there.

If we see a Republican candidate like Rick Santorum, who is clearly pro-marriage and pro-family, we are going to see the homosexual coalition crank up and go on the attack as we have never seen before. What happened in California during their gay marriage referendum will be repeated in at least the battleground states.

If you do not believe in Jesus Christ, you’ll probably want to skip over this article.

This week, the Grand Ayatollah Jafar Sobhani, a top Iranian Twelver Shia said, "The Quran is very clear that the inheritors of the Earth will be those of the righteous who represent the force of the truth against the force of the false. The Quran is the proof that the world will be controlled and managed by the forces of truth and that there will be one government ruling everyone throughout the world."

Eschatology, in theology, is the study of future things. Interestingly enough, the Bible does teach end-time events which are not dissimilar to Sobhani’s statement above. Those who believe in the truth will inherit the earth and there will be, one government over all the world, which will be ruled by Jesus Christ.

Since it is out there that Rick Santorum believes in a literal Satan (although he has backed off on that, somewhat), I also believe in a literal Satan. I believe in both the principle and existence of evil; but I also believe that evil is personified in Satan.

In the Bible, Satan is known as the great counterfeiter, and those things which are true and good are often counterfeited by Satan.

In the end times (which date, no man knows the day or the hour; apart from Harold Camping, of course), Jews will be scattered throughout the earth in every country, as they are now. The church will be taken out of the world (the church are all of those people who have believed in Jesus Christ), and for some short period of time, there will be no believers in the world.

Jews, in some way or another, will believe in Jesus Christ, and they will evangelize those around them in every nation.

What will follow is 7 shortened years of great suffering on the earth, known as the great tribulation.

Jesus Christ will then return for the 2^nd advent and He will destroy all of the armies surrounding Jerusalem, and then He will remove all unbelievers from the earth (this is known as the baptism of fire), and He will set up a 1000 year millennial rule on the earth.

I have spared you the Scriptures to back this up, but, in a nutshell, this is what many Christians (including myself) believe. There is a theological term for those who hold to these general beliefs: pre-millennialists.

Here is the possible counterfeit: there will be armies surrounded Jerusalem; there will be Arabs in every land, and they will, all around the same time, make their strike or claim for allah, their god. My guess is, this could very well be a coordinated effort in countries all over the world.

So there is no misunderstanding, this particular counterfeit is not specifically named in the Bible. Based upon world events, based upon Satan counterfeiting what God has done, and based upon the events of the end times, this seems like a reasonable scenario to posit for the future—the near future (within, say, our lifetimes).

I also base this upon something else. When you have that much anger and that much hatred and rage in a people, it will come out. The recent riots in Afghanistan obviously show not even the slightest appreciation for what we have done there over the past decade; they have shown no appreciation for the restrain our soldiers have shown, for the money and lives that we have invested, or our willingness to hand back the reins of power to the Afghan people. These rioters appear to not even consider if what occurred may have been a misunderstanding or an accident.

Allow me a tangent at this point. President Bush was a great student of history, something which is almost never acknowledged. He was one of our most well-read presidents, and I suspect that, for every 1 book Obama has read in office, Bush read 10 or more. So, when going into Iraq and Afghanistan, President Bush’s intentions were to guide these countries into a functioning democracy, as we did in South Korea and Japan. However, he missed the most vital ingredient: Christian missionaries. General Douglas MacArthur called for Christian missionaries to come and join him as he went into the land of our defeated enemies to try to change history by making them our friends and allies. This was a great thing that he did, but it could not have been done apart from the Christian evangelism which took place.

That was the missing ingredient in Bush’s mission. His heart was in the right place, but, he figured that the key was democracy, when the key was Christian evangelism. So, Christian evangelism was discouraged. No missionaries were called for, soldiers who took Bibles there to give out had their Bibles burned, and, as a result, we have two democratic countries who fundamental teachings are still to oppose us and to kill us. That does not make for a lasting ally.

One more tangent here: you may think that Christianity has nothing to do prosperity or the greatness of a nation, even when those of you who are reading this live in the greatest nation that has ever been on this earth. We have had the greatest blessing, the greatest security, and the greatest freedom of any nation ever, in all of human history. That is because a huge number of people in the United States have put their faith in Jesus Christ. When Jesus spoke of His disciples being the salt of the earth, that refers to the preservative properties of salt, which were well-known in the ancient world.

If you ever want to see the power of Christian evangelism and a national stage in a previous era, find a map of the British empire. Locate England on the map and note just how tiny England was compared to how much of the world they had gone into, civilized and then brought the gospel of Jesus Christ to. It is quite amazing. That tiny country control nearly a quarter of the earth. And everywhere the British went, they brought law and order and the gospel of Jesus Christ.

So, unfortunately, this is why we will fail in Iraq and in Afghanistan. But, even more dramatic than this could be a nearly world-wide Muslim offensive, set up as a parallel to what will happen in the end times.

As I have mentioned in previous issues, it is a good time to pray for our nation and the nation Israel. And, if you have not yet believed in Jesus Christ, it is a good time to believe in Him.

15 Questions The Mainstream Media Would Ask Barack Obama If He Were A Republican

If you deny that there is liberal bias in the mainstream media, you are living under a rock. We saw George Stephanopolos take marching orders into debate questioning.

The only thing they don't ask Republican candidates about much is economic questions and debt questions. Instead they ask horribly slanted, often irrelevant questions designed to make them look bad and help Obama. We've heard questions about contraceptives, religion, Newt's angry ex-wife, Cain's employees, Romney's personal wealth, Gardasil, etc. Newt's rise was because of the way he attacked the media and Obama in the debates because of the stupid and obviously planted questions.

So, what would happen if the mainstream media treated Barack Obama the exact same way they treat Republicans? The questions might sound a little something like this.

1) Numerous Mexican citizens and an American citizen have been murdered with weapons knowingly provided to criminals by our own government during Operation Fast and Furious. If Eric Holder was aware that was going on, do you think he should step down as Attorney General? Were you aware of Fast and Furious and if so, shouldn't you resign?

2) In 2010 you said Solyndra, a company that donated heavily to your political campaign, was "leading the way toward a brighter and more prosperous future." Today, Solyndra is bankrupt and the taxpayers lost over $500 million on loans that your administration knew might never be paid off when you made them. How do you respond to citizens who say this is evidence of corruption in your administration?

3) Unions invested a lot of time and money in helping to get you elected. In return, unions gained majority control of Chrysler, the taxpayers lost $14 billion dollars on General Motors, and General Motors received a special $45 billion dollar tax break. What do you say to people who view this as corruption on a scale never before seen in American history?

4) Through dubious means you and your Democrat allies in Congress managed to force through an incredibly unpopular health care bill that helped lead to the worst election night for the Democrat Party in 50 years. Since the bill has passed, many of your claims about the bill have proven to be untrue. For example, we now know the bill won't lower health care costs and despite your assurances to the contrary, big companies like McDonald's say they may drop health care because of the health care reform. Congress has exempted themselves from the health care reform and instead has their own taxpayer-funded premium health care plan. Many large companies (that donate to Democrat political campaigns) have received special exemptions from the health care plan. Since the majority of the American people have rejected your health care reform and it doesn't do what you said it would, shouldn't you work with the Republicans to repeal it?

5) When you took office, the national average for one gallon of gas was $1.89 per gallon. Since then, you've demonized the oil industry, dramatically slowed offshore drilling, blocked ANWAR, and rejected the Keystone Pipeline. Now, gas is $3.54 per gallon and rising and is expected to reach $5 per gallon by May of this year. How much higher do you anticipate driving gas prices?

6) Occupy Wall Street has been protesting against Wall Street and the richest 1 percent in America. You are in the top 1 percent of income earners in America and you have collected more cash from Wall Street than any other President in history. So, aren't you exactly the sort of politician that Occupy Wall Street wants to get rid of?

7) How do you decide which foreign leaders to submissively bow towards and why do you think that's appropriate for an American President?

8) If they could, don't you think the Nobel Committee would take back the Nobel Peace Prize that you were awarded after serving just one month in office?

9) You made bipartisanship one of the central themes of your campaign in 2008. Yet, you've worked to push bills through Congress with almost no Republican support, spent much less time negotiating with Congress than George Bush did, and you've said things like, "But, I don't want the folks who created the mess to do a lot of talking. I want them to get out of the way so we can clean up the mess. I don't mind cleaning up after them, but don't do a lot of talking." Why did you decide to break your campaign promise to pursue bipartisanship?

10) America lost its AAA credit rating for the first time under your watch. What do you think you should have done differently to have prevented that historic failure?

11) You cut more than 500 billion dollars out of Medicare to fund your wildly unpopular health care reform bill. Given that Medicare is running in the red already, don't you think it's irresponsible to cut money out of one entitlement program, that millions of seniors depend on - to put it into a risky new entitlement program?

12) Back in July, you said, "Nobody's looking to raise taxes right now. We're talking about potentially 2013 and the out years." Since you plan to raise taxes if you're elected and you've had kind words for a value added tax, shouldn't every American expect a tax increase if you're reelected?

13) Why should the American people reelect you when your 10 year budget saddles America with more debt than all previous Presidents combined?

14) Your stimulus bill cost more in real dollars than the moon landing and the interstate highway system combined. Many prominent economists have concluded the stimulus plan was a total failure. What do we have to show for all of that money spent?

15) Members of your administration promised that the trillion dollar stimulus would keep unemployment under 8 percent. Instead, we've had 35+ months of 8% and above unemployment. Doesn't that mean we wasted a trillion dollars on nothing?

Rick Santorum is right. Pushing back against Democrats' attempts to frame him as a religious menace, the GOP presidential candidate forcefully turned the tables on the White House: "When it comes to the management of the Earth, they are the anti-science ones."

Scrutiny of the White House anti-science brigade couldn't come at a better time (which is why Santorum's detractors prefer to froth at the mouth about comments he made four years ago on the existence of Satan). It's not just big-ticket scandals like the stimulus-subsidized Solyndra bankruptcy or the Keystone pipeline debacle bedeviling America. In every corner of the Obama administration, the radical green machinery is hard at work - destroying jobs, shredding truth, and sacrificing our economic well-being at the altar of environmentalism.

Take Obama's head of the National Park Service - please. While serving as the Pacific West regional director of the NPS, Jon Jarvis was accused of at least 21 instances of scientific misconduct by Dr. Corey Goodman, a high-ranking member of the National Academy of Sciences. Extensive information about Jarvis's alleged role in cooking data about a California oyster farm's impact on harbor seals at Point Reyes was withheld during the 2009 nomination process. Interior Secretary Ken Salazar has ignored complaints and follow-up from both Democratic senator Dianne Feinstein and Republican senators James Inhofe and David Vitter.

The National Research Council determined that the NPS had "selectively" slanted its report on the oyster farm. The federal Marine Mammal Commission found that "the data and analyses are not sufficient to demonstrate a causal relationship" between the farm's operations and harbor-seal health. In a letter blasting the NPS for bullying the small oyster farm, Feinstein - normally a reliable eco-ally - concluded earlier this month that the "crux of the problem is that the Park Service manipulated science while building a case that the business should be shuttered."

Given Salazar's own role in manipulating science while building his case for the White House offshore-drilling moratorium - actions for which several federal judges spanked Salazar over the past two years - it's no wonder he's looking the other way.

Remember: Two years ago, Salazar and former Obama eco-czar Carol Browner falsely rewrote the White House drilling-ban report to wholly manipulate the Obama-appointed panel's own overwhelming scientific objections to the job-killing edict. Despite repeated judicial slaps for their "determined disregard" for the law, the Obama administration continues to suppress documents related to that junk-science scandal. Last month, House Republicans threatened to subpoena the Interior Department for information. Call it a greenwash.

Water wars and the Delta smelt. The infamous, endangered three-inch fish and its environmental protectors continue to jeopardize the water supply of more than 25 million Californians. Federal restrictions have cut off some 81 billion gallons of water to farmers and consumers in Central and Southern California. Previous courts have ruled that the federal biological opinions used to justify the water cutoff were invalid and illegal. Last September, the U.S. District Court of the Eastern District of California admonished two federal scientists for acting in "bad faith." The judge's blistering rebuke of the Obama-administration scientists concluded that their slanted testimony about the delta smelt was "an attempt to mislead and to deceive the Court into accepting what is not only not the best science, it's not science."

GOP representative Devin Nunes, who represents the hard-hit San Joaquin Valley area, noted that Salazar recently "doubled down on the illegal policies of the Department of Interior and attacked critics as narrow minded and politically motivated. Ironically, these were the same basic criticisms levied against his department by the federal court."

While Salazar manufactures a new biological opinion on the matter to get the courts off his back, unemployment and drought plague the Central Valley. And the White House stands by its "scientists."

Dams in distress. In Siskiyou County, Oregon, local officials and residents announced last week that the county intends to sue Salazar and Team Obama over their potential removal of dams on the Klamath River. Once again, the administration's systematic disregard for sound science and the rule of law is in the spotlight.

Salazar is expected to make a decision by the end of March on environmentalists' demands that four private hydroelectric dams be demolished to protect salmon habitats and "create" demolition and habitat-restoration jobs. Opponents say Salazar has already predetermined the outcome. Green activists blithely ignore the massive taxpayer costs (an estimated half-billion dollars) and downplay the environmental destruction the dam removals would impose. GOP congressman Tom McClintock put it most charitably: "To tear down four perfectly good hydroelectric dams at enormous cost is insane."

People of faith aren't what's bedeviling America. Blame the voodoo high priests of eco-destruction in Washington who have imposed a green theocracy on us all. Science be damned.

An examination of "administrative earmarks" around the time of congressional votes on key pieces of President Obama's agenda suggests the White House used its power to fund local projects as a means to "buy" votes for major legislative efforts.

Administrative earmarking refers to the federal government's allocation of funds from its discretionary budget for specific projects. The practice is less transparent than legislative earmarking, since, according to the Congressional Research Service, "[t]here is no source that defines and comprehensively identifies Administrative earmarks."

But an analysis of grants from agencies during the early years of the Obama administration shows that the districts of moderate Democrats, whose support was so crucial for Obama during the 111th Congress, received large sums right around the passage of three key pieces of legislation: Obamacare, Dodd-Frank financial regulations, and the cap-and-trade bill.

During the run-up to votes in the House of Representatives for each of those pieces of legislation, the rate of administrative earmarking spiked. This chart shows the number of grants requested by 12 federal agencies, as documented at Grants.gov.

The number of grants given by those agencies spiked precisely when the House was considering each of the three pieces of legislation.

Even more troubling: during the same time periods, significant grant money went to the districts of numerous Democratic representatives who looked to face tough battles for re-election. The legislation Obama was attempting to get through Congress was generally unpopular, and vulnerable members needed other ways to appeal to constituents. Federal grants made for a perfect opportunity.

Then-Rep. Chris Carney (D-PA), for instance, kept his support for Dodd-Frank quiet. His website never posted a press release announcing his "yes" vote on the bill. It did, however, tout two federal grants totaling $3.6 million for businesses in his district two days before the Dodd-Frank vote.

Then-Rep. Zach Space (D-OH) hailed from a district reliant on the coal industry, which would have been hit particularly hard by cap and trade. He voted for the measure, but neglected to publicize the vote on his website. He did, however, announce eight federal grants totaling roughly $1.8 million all made during the month before the House passed cap and trade.

At least 32 vulnerable House Democrats received significant federal grant money in the periods leading up to or directly after their votes on at least one of these three pieces of legislation (see charts below), raising concerns that those grants may have been used either to encourage or reward votes in favor of the administration's position.

The use of administrative earmarks to "buy votes" is not new. President Richard Nixon saw the practice as "a way to gain political support for Nixon's re-election by using federal resources and grants to influence key states and voting blocs."

President Franklin Roosevelt was an early pioneer of the political use of administrative earmarking. He "deliver[ed] large defense projects to key states whose electoral votes he wanted to secure," according to historian Burt Folsom.

But while administrative earmarking is a practice used by nearly every administration, CRS found in a report published in April 2010 - immediately after the time period at issue - that "[b]oth the number and value of earmarks requested solely by the President increased since FY2008." The number of earmarks had increased by 54 percent, CRS found, while the value of those requests had increased by a whopping 126 percent.

The timing of those requests also suggests political factors at play. Heritage's Hans von Spakovsky, a former Federal Elections Commissioner, said the administration's actions "show how taxpayer funds are used for crass political purposes - it is a rank abuse of the government's power and another sign of this administration's lack of a moral compass."

While speculating on the motives of individuals responsible for these grants is difficult, this administration has a history of using its powers for political purposes. In the case of "vote-buying" in particular, the administration offered to expand Medicaid funding to residents of Louisiana and Nebraska to the tune of roughly $145 million to secure the votes of Sens. Mary Landrieu (D-LA) and Ben Nelson (D-NE) for the Obamacare bill.

Further in this story, there is a chart of the vulnerable House members followed by a chart of the grants given to their state.

Great article on government dependence and how quickly it is growing. Tons of graphs.

A top ten collection of vicious anti-Santorum quotes made by various members of the media.

An example of how the left distorts laws that they disagree with. This is about the proposed law in Virginia which requires that a sonogram be done for those considering an abortion.

October surprise? Obama speech writer is behind the new NBC presidential comedy. NBC has not released party affiliation of the President Pullman. That is such a mystery to me as well. Now didn’t Pullman recently play a conservative, polygamist Mormon in another televisions series?

Emily, of the Washington Times, gets a gun; it takes her 5 months. This is a series of stories of just how hard it is for an honest and law-abiding citizen in Washington to secure a weapon.

Auto union orchestrates and leads '99% Spring' campaign, then denies it and scrubs it from their website.

U.S. News story: Americans' Satisfaction Almost as Low as It Was Under Carter; shocking that this story is found in U.S. News.

The Democratic message “We still have a long way to go but we have restored hope and possibility to the economy ” is not testing well; no one is buying it. This is James Carville’s research group doing polling to determine what Democrats need to say and do for the upcoming election and it is a fascinating read. This is a 100% Democrat document.

Eco-Extremist in Ohio attempts to hire hitman to kill random person for wearing fur; she compares animal-welfare work to liberation of nazi concentration camps.

RUSH: Let's face it. Way too many of us... In fact, let me amend that: Way too many of you, 'cause I don't do this anymore.

Way too many of you care way, way, way too much about what other people think. And you know what's bad about that? Aside from just it being bad. In order to care what other people think, you have to subordinate yourself to 'em. You're automatically saying those people are smarter or they're better or they're hipper or whatever. But they're certainly smarter, better, or more hip than you are, otherwise you wouldn't care what they think. And that's one of the aspects of that whole thing that's always bothered me. Now, we're raised this way, by the way. It's called "being polite" and "being humble" and not being braggadocios. I got over that a long time ago. A lot of people, they're prisoners to what other people think. In fact, a lot of people lead their lives based on what they think others think and based on what they want others to think. Rather than how they think about themselves.

So everybody running around, "Oh, man, all these people, 'The Republicans are nuts,' and I'm a Republican. Oh, they think I'm a nut, I'm a kook. They think I'm an abortion freak. They think I'm a contraception freak.'" Who are they? Why are they any better than you are? "They vote, Mr. Limbaugh, that's why. We're not concerned about them being better than we are, we're concerned because they vote and their misinformed on this." Well, okay. If they're misinformed then tell 'em.

Now, I've got some stories about this, which is why I led into it that way. First up from the Huffing and Puffington Post: "Newt Gingrich Calls Obama An 'Extremist' Who Supported 'Infanticide' At GOP Debate." Do you realize -- I have looked at this -- do you realize how many Democrats do not know this about Obama? Do you realize how many people in the media do not know this about Obama? It's not that the media knew about it and didn't report it. They didn't know. They didn't know that as a state Senator Obama sponsored a bill, and he did more than sponsor it. This is the one time he invested every bit of his power as a state legislator to allow doctors to finish the job if they botch the abortion and the baby is born live. Obama sponsored and promoted that legislation. That's why Newt called it infanticide.

I'm watching the reaction to this and I'm stunned. Either they're lying through their teeth when they say they didn't know anything about it... A guy in The Politico, what's his name, Alexander Burns, he was so clueless about it, he thought Newt was talking about partial-birth abortion. He wrote a piece making fun of Newt for not knowing what he was talking about. And then a couple of conservative commenter's to the guy's blog at The Politico corrected him, and he ran one of these update corrections on his blog, "A couple of conservative readers suggested I might be wrong in razzing Gingrich on this, as his point referred to this legislation specifically." The guy links to a NationalReview.com story. "Rather than late-term abortion in general, Obama may or may not have been asked about that during the race."

It doesn't matter, the truth, it still CYA for these guys or COA. Cover Obama's rear end. Because what Newt's claim was, "Okay, you're gonna sit there and you're gonna ask us all night about contraception and I don't remember the elite media asking Barack Obama about his support for infanticide." And so now rather than deal with did Obama actually do that, they're out trying to find if Obama was ever asked about it, to try to prove Newt wrong on his point that Obama wasn't asked about it. But in terms of looking into the details and doing a story on Obama supporting infanticide, ain't no way that's gonna happen. (interruption) How can they not know? Well, yeah, okay. They listen to me, but they think I make things up.

They think I lie. And I'll tell you something, Snerdley, if Media Matters doesn't tell 'em what I say, they don't know what I say. I'm talking about anybody, MSNBC, ABC News, CBS News, NBC, they don't listen to me. That's where you're wrong. They read Media Matters. That's where they find out what supposedly happened on this program. And if Media Matters doesn't tell 'em that I spent a lot of time talking about Obama and infanticide they'll never know it and they'll never know it on their own because, as we have well documented, they live in a bubble. They're not curious. They're hacks. They have an agenda. They are part of a movement and their daily existence is to move it forward, to advance the cause.

Here the Huffing and Puffington Post: "The Republican presidential candidates Wednesday night, during a GOP debate in Arizona, took shots at President Barack Obama for his pro-choice history. Newt Gingrich deflected a question about Obama's recent decision mandating that employers' insurance plans cover contraception by pointing out that Obama voted in favor of a law that protected abortion providers during --" See? Protected abortion providers, that's how it's reported, protecting abortion providers. Either a Planned Parenthood doctor or a hospital doctor who botches the abortion is allowed to finish the job after the baby's born alive. That's the legislation. That's infanticide.

You've got a live, breathing baby that was supposed to have been aborted. The abortionist botches it, the Illinois law that Obama sponsored and promoted allows the doctor to kill the baby to finish the job. And they refer to that as protecting abortion providers. And they say, "You didn't once during the '08 campaign ask why Obama voted in favor of legalizing infanticide." If we're gonna debate about who is the extremist on this issue, it's President Obama who as a state senator voted to protect doctors who kill babies. And that's all the story says. How can there be no comment after this. It's as if infanticide is no more controversial than voting on a highway bill. Honestly. It's no controversial. Oh, Obama, okay, nothing to see here. Well, let's focus on whether or not Obama was actually asked about it.

So they start doing fact checks on that and that becomes the focus of the story and that's where this Alexander Burns guy at Politico: "Surprise! Newt Gingrich is attacking the press. Coming out of the debate's first break, CNN moderator John King read off a question: What are the candidates' views on contraception? As the audience booed, Gingrich assumed a familiar role -- talking over Mitt Romney and winding up for a denunciation of the mainstream press." And he goes on to describe Gingrich as being critical of Obama for late term or partial-birth abortion, and he has to be corrected by a couple of his readers.

Now, a companion story here. This is from Fox News: "Seven US states filed a lawsuit Thursday to block the federal government's requirement that religious organizations offer health insurance coverage that includes free access to contraception for women. The attorney generals of Texas, Florida, Michigan, Nebraska, Ohio, Oklahoma and South Carolina jointly filed the lawsuit in a Nebraska US District Court."

This is along the lines of that North Carolina story where the federal agent is investigating the school lunch boxes of fourth graders and determining that the parents had not packed a healthy lunch and took it away from the little four-year-old and made her eat Chicken McNuggets. And of course the real point of that story was a federal agent telling a four-year-old that her mommy wasn't properly caring for her. That we at the government are doing it.

So you may think that this contraception stuff, you may shudder and cower in fear, get all nervous, "Oh, gosh, can we stop talking about that? What about the economy?" In the meantime we're losing our religious liberty over this. Obama is acting as a dictator on this. And at least seven states now have stood up and said, "To heck with this." The issue isn't going away. And I'll tell you something else. The Democrats, they are gonna rue the day that they ever conceived this trick because it is going to backfire on 'em.

RUSH: I want to go back, audio sound bite. We had this, we played this during the campaign of 2008. This happened April 2002. It's in the Illinois state Senate. It's 17 seconds of Obama describing infanticide.

OBAMA APRIL 2002: And that essentially adding an additional doctor who then has to be called in an emergency situation to come in and make these assessments is really designed simply to burden the original decision of the woman and the physician to induce labor and perform an abortion.

RUSH: What he's talking about here is the "burden of decision" means the woman's decision is to abort. So, they do the procedure. Something goes wrong -- imagine that -- and the baby's born alive. The legislation brings in another doctor to finish the job so as not to burden the woman with an unwanted child and to take the original doctor off the hook and not have him undergoing a guilt trip. And that's what the legislation was, and that's what Newt Gingrich was talking about. And he was saying, "How come nobody talked about that? You want to talk about extremism? Nobody asked Obama that in 2008." So the media immediately starts doing a fact-check to find out if, indeed, Obama was asked about it, and they said, "Well, of course he was! He was asked about partial-birth abortion all the time."

RUSH: Late yesterday afternoon, this is in the Coral Gables, this is at a fundraiser, this is after Obama sang the praises of pond scum as the next substitute for oil.

OBAMA: We've gotta make sure that everybody's doing their fair share. Everybody needs a fair shot, everybody's gotta play by the same set of rules, everybody's gotta do their fair share. Everybody's gotta do their part! Everybody in this room, we are here, successful, because somebody down the road have not just thinkin' about themselves, they were takin' responsibility for the country as a whole.

RUSH: What an absolute crock! That is the exact opposite of what goes on. That is his translation of Karl Marx: "From each according to his ability, to each according to his need." This is absolutely full of it. "Everybody gotta do their part. Everybody in this room, we're here, successful, 'cause somebody down the road was not just thinkin' about themselves, they were takin' responsibility for the country as a whole." That is not what propelled this country! This country was propelled by rugged individualism and rugged self-interest, and it was made possible by virtue of the freedom this country offers its citizens thanks to our Constitution, founding documents, and Founding Fathers.

Now, this may be a fine line. Obama wants you to think that everybody that he deems "successful" is first thinking of government and then, second, thinking of government, and then the last thing they think of is government, and everything they do is oriented toward making the government better. And that isn't true. Most people today are finding a way to avoid the government! Because of guys like Obama, most people are trying to find a way to evade the government. Because the government, run by guys like Obama, is an obstacle. It's in people's way.

OBAMA: We're not gonna win the race for new jobs and new businesses and middle class security if we're responding to today's challenges with the same old, tired worn out "you're on your own" economics that hasn't worked. What these other guys are peddling has not worked. It didn't work in the decade before the Great Depression. It did not work in the decade before I became president. It will not work now.

RUSH: Do you believe this? The country has never worked. Capitalism has never worked. America was not great until the New Deal, and then America plunged into the abyss again, and only is on the path to reclaiming its greatness now that Obama is replicating the New Deal by a factor of ten. Has he ever heard of the Roaring Twenties? Has he ever heard of the boom in the fifties and the sixties and the seventies? Has he ever heard of what happened in the 1980s? It never worked? This is the second time he's said this in such a prominent way. Last time was when he made his speech, I guess it was in December, might have been January, the days run together so quickly now, in Osawatomie, Kansas, where he said, America, as founded, hasn't worked.

Mr. President, you keep talking. And, by the way, Stan Greenberg has a memo out there saying that what you're doing isn't working. Don't bother reading that memo. People aren't believing your lies about how great this country's doing, how great the economy's doing. They're not buying it 'cause they're not living it, sir. And contrary to you, most people don't get up every day and face the direction of Washington and bow down and pray. Government is not first and foremost in people's lives. That's not how Americans are wired.

Since there are some links you may want to go back to from time-to-time, I am going to begin a list of them here. This will be a list to which I will add links each week.

The Greeley Gazette, which carries a lot of news and abortion/pro-life news as well.

Conservative Review
Issue #217	Kukis Digests and Opines on this Week’s News and Views	February 26, 2012