Farrakhan, Wright and Pfleger to Receive 'Living Legends' Award

Thursday, March 04, 2010

By Bill O'Reilly

An unbelievable show this Friday night in Chicago. Together on one stage: Louis Farrakhan, Jeremiah Wright and radical priest Michael Pfleger.

They will all be receiving an award called "Living Legends," and you can see it as a VIP if you have a hundred bucks.

The spectacle is being driven by Rev. Wright, who is actually giving himself the "Living Legend" award, as well as the other two guys. There's no third party involved.

All the money people pay to see this dog-and-pony show will go to Rev. Wright's charity. Pfleger will get a bit of it, and so will the Haitian singer Wyclef Jean.

Don't you love this?

Rev. Wright is honoring himself, Farrakhan and Pfleger, and is charging money for the exposition. Is America not a great country?

The serious part of the story is Father Pfleger, a radical-left Catholic priest who runs St. Sabina parish on Chicago's South Side. Pardon the pun, but what in God's name is Pfleger doing on the same stage as Farrakhan, a race-baiting anti-Semite? Why is the archdiocese of Chicago permitting that?

We contacted Archbishop Francis George, but the head of Chicago's 2.4 million Catholics has no comment.

Are you kidding me? This is a scandal. You can't have a Catholic priest whose message should be peace on earth, goodwill to men, standing there with a hateful guy like Farrakhan. I mean, Wright is bad, but Farrakhan is nuclear. This is unbelievable.

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,588004,00.html

The Letter Dogging Tom Campbell

IPT News
March 5, 2010

A tenured professor suspected of terrorist ties was in danger of being fired. Tom Campbell, a former congressman and Stanford Law professor, rallied to his side.

He expressed "sincere alarm" that the University of South Florida was treating Sami Al-Arian unjustly because of his views and urged the school's president to reconsider. The 2002 letter, obtained by the Investigative Project on Terrorism, has become a hot-button issue in the California Senate Republican primary campaign this year.

At the time, Al-Arian was under investigation for his ties to the Palestinian Islamic Jihad (PIJ). He was indicted a year later, but his 2005 trial ended in a mix of acquittals and deadlocked counts. Evidence in the case showed Al-Arian served on a PIJ governing board.

In 2006, he pled guilty to providing goods and services to the terrorist group.

Campbell's opponents say his letter stands among many signs that indicate he may be soft on terror or hostile toward Israel. Campbell has expressed regret over the letter, but claimed he was not aware of incriminating facts about Al-Arian when he wrote it.

http://www.investigativeproject.org/1834/the-letter-dogging-tom-campbell

Eric Massa rumors preceded probe

By GLENN THRUSH & JOHN BRESNAHAN | 3/5/10 4:58 AM EST

Eager to avoid a repeat of the Mark Foley scandal, House Democratic leaders moved quickly last month when a staffer for Rep. Eric Massa complained that he’d made advances to a junior male aide.

But rumors about Massa had been circulating for months in both Democratic and Republican circles on Capitol Hill, and GOP operatives even considered digging into them on their own. However, sources say there wasn’t evidence of any wrongdoing until Massa’s then-legislative director contacted the office of House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer (D-Md.) in early February.

POLITICO reported Wednesday that Ronald Hikel, who was then Massa’s deputy chief of staff and legislative director, went to the House ethics committee last month with allegations that his boss had been harassing another staffer. Massa, who announced Wednesday that he is not seeking reelection, denied the allegations, saying he’s simply a “salty old sailor” who sometimes speaks too bluntly.

http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0310/33960.html

March 5, 2010 7:00 A.M.

The Gitmo Volunteers
Detained terrorists received more legal help than American prisoners do. Why?

This is not that hard. The salient issue in the controversy over Justice Department attorneys who formerly represented our terrorist enemies detained at Guantanamo Bay is this: They were volunteers.

The lawyers and their lefty legions expect you to overlook that. Lawyers presume that they have an elite status in our litigious society and that their superior knowledge of the law will intimidate critics into silence. Since they are trained advocates, they figure that if they feign enough indignation over somebody’s “questioning their patriotism,” then Americans will shrink from asking, “How is it patriotic to go out of your way to help America’s enemies in wartime?”

Often, that line of defense works. In 2007, these same lawyers managed to get a Defense Department official run out of town. His hanging offense? He observed that many American corporations might prefer to find a new law firm rather than continue retaining one that used clients’ legal fees to subsidize its representation of terrorists who murder Americans. The observation, of course, was common sense. If you found out a restaurant you patronized was using the profits from serving you to provide free meals for al-Qaeda, would you keep going there, or would you find another restaurant? But when The Profession shrieked, our politically-correct-on-steroids Defense Department cried “uncle” in about a nanosecond. The al-Qaeda Bar and its cheerleaders calculate that this sorry episode will make the rest of us pipe down if we know what’s good for us.

Not all of us.

There is no legal right to counsel in a habeas corpus case. The vast majority of American citizens and aliens who are incarcerated after being found guilty of crimes do not get lawyers to help them challenge the legal proceedings against them or the conditions of their confinement. They must represent themselves. The United States has detained millions of war prisoners in our history, and those prisoners have never been entitled to counsel in order to challenge their detention — indeed, until 2004, they didn’t have a right to challenge their detention, period. And even terrorist detainees who were charged with war crimes in military commissions had no right to representation by private counsel; instead, the rules provided for the assignment of military defense lawyers at the expense of the American taxpayer.

http://article.nationalreview.com/426964/the-gitmo-volunteers/andrew-c-mccarthy

Myths about Reconciliation
Using reconciliation to pass Obamacare would be inappropriate and unprecedented. Here’s why.

How could you tell when the Democrats had finally settled on the reconciliation route? It was at some point between the time Harry Reid told Republicans at the health-care summit that “nobody has talked about reconciliation” and the time the White House stopped uttering the word altogether.

But though their diction has changed, the Left continues to perpetuate a number of myths about reconciliation that should be dispelled before Democrats in Washington use the procedure to force-feed the American people this $2.3 trillion behemoth.Myth: Reconciliation is simply “majority rule.”
Democrats have referred to the maneuver that dare not speak its name as simple “majority rule.” In his March 3 speech, President Obama called for an “up-or-down vote” on health-care reform requiring “nothing more than a simple majority.” White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs told MSNBC the next day that in most American households, “51 percent represents a majority viewpoint. I don’t think that’s a crazy concept.” Ezra Klein claimed that “a simple majority process” has been “key to getting anything done” in the Senate since the 90s.

But this isn’t about lowering the thresholds for passage, as most reconciliation measures initially pass the Senate with sizeable majorities — sometimes even by voice vote or unanimous consent. Rather, the process is explicitly about bypassing the Senate’s usual order of business — an open debate and amendment process with an emphasis on consent and consensus and robust protections for minority rights — to ensure the speedy passage of budget-balancing legislation. As a result, reconciliation measures are “privileged,” meaning that the Senate must consider them when they come to the floor. Likewise, debate on their substance is strictly limited to 20 hours and amendments are allowed only insofar as they address the contents of the measure itself (though, as author Foster notes here, there is nothing to stop a determined minority from gumming up the works indefinitely by forcing votes on the germaneness of extraneous amendments).

There is nothing wrong with the principled use of this “front-of-the-line” treatment for measures meant to bring budgetary outlays in line with revenues, but in a Congress that demonstrably no longer takes its duty to balance budgets seriously, reconciliation is once again being abused as a matter of political convenience.

The truth is that every single piece of successful legislation to emerge from the Senate — via reconciliation or otherwise — has done so via a final, up-or-down vote with a 50-plus-one threshold. The debate about reconciliation is a debate about the path to that vote. It’s about whether the Senate is and ought to be something more than a slightly smaller, slightly crustier House of Representatives.

http://article.nationalreview.com/427048/myths-about-reconciliation/daniel-foster-stephen-spruiell

Counting the Heads of House Democrats / Updated 3-5

Update, 4 PM Friday: Eric Massa's planned resignation takes him off the list. There are now 37 Democrats who voted nay in November who will be Democrats when (if?) the next vote occurs. With the House vacancies being what they are now, Speaker Pelosi will need 216 votes to pass the bill.

...

The first group I label, "Very Hard to Persuade," i.e. it will be no little feat to bring that member from a nay to a yea. I put a member in there if:

(1) The member has communicated something negative about the Senate bill, or the pending House-Senate compromise.

(2) The member comes from a district where John McCain won 60% or more of the vote, and is running for reelection.

(3) The member has a lifetime National Right to Life Committee (NRLC) score greater than 80%.

Several of these members possess more than one of these qualities. I listed the above qualities in what I think their order of salience is. A member's most salient quality is the one I've listed next to his name below.

I count 24 in this group:

1. Jason Altmire (PA-4) (communication)
2. John Barrow (GA-12) (communication)
3. Dan Boren (OK-2) (communication)
4. Allen Boyd (FL-2) (communication)
5. Bobby Bright (AL-2) (communication)
6. Travis Childers (MS-1) (McCain won 62%)
7. Artur Davis (AL-7) (communication)
8. Lincoln Davis (TN-4) (McCain won 64%)
9. Chet Edwards (TX-17) (McCain won 67%)
10. Stephanie Herseth Sandlin (SD-AL) (communication)
11. Tim Holden (PA-17) (NRLC score of 87%)
12. Larry Kissell (NC-8) (communication)
13. Frank Kratovil (MD-1) (communication)
14. Dennis Kucinich (OH-10) (communication)
15. Jim Marshall (GA-8) (communication)
16. Mike McIntyre (NC-7) (NRLC score of 93%)
17. Mike McMahon (NY-13) (communication)
18. Charlie Melancon (LA-3) (communication)
19. Walt Minnick (ID-1) (communication)
20. Collin Peterson (MN-7) (communication)
21. Heath Shuler (NC-11) (communication)
22. Ike Skelton (MO-4) (communication)
23. John Tanner (TN-8) (communication)
24. Gene Taylor (MS-4) (communication)

http://www.realclearpolitics.com/horseraceblog/2010/03/counting_the_heads_of_house_de.html

Dems may have solution to one health-care obstacle, but path forward remains rocky

Chances for a health-care bill grew dimmer on Thursday, by most indications, but House Democrats may have found a way to force the Senate to work with them that would remove a key roadblock to passing the reform desired by President Obama.

Call it a “hold-plus-reconciliation” strategy.

The House could pass the Senate bill as is, then hold it in their chamber instead of sending it to the president so he could sign it into law. That bill, passed but not out of the House’s hands, would be the leverage to bring the Senate to the table.

Many House Democrats who dislike the Senate bill fear that the upper chamber would pay lip service to making improvements through reconciliation, only to back away from promises after the House passed the Senate bill.

http://dailycaller.com/2010/03/04/dems-may-have-solution-to-one-health-care-obstacle-but-path-forward-remains-rocky/

Lawmakers move to restrain EPA on climate change

By Juliet Eilperin and David A. Fahrenthold

Friday, March 5, 2010

As climate change legislation stalled in the Senate, the Obama administration noted that it had a workable -- although admittedly unwieldy -- Plan B. If Congress wouldn't cap U.S. emissions, officials said, the Environmental Protection Agency would do it instead.

Now, even Plan B may be in trouble.

On Thursday, Sen. John D. Rockefeller IV (D-W.Va.) introduced a bill that would put a two-year freeze on the EPA's ability to regulate greenhouse gases from power plants. His was the latest of various congressional proposals -- from both chambers and both parties -- designed to delay or overturn the EPA's regulations.

It is unclear how far Rockefeller's bill will go. Even if it passed, it could face a presidential veto. But environmentalists are worried that the measure could attract moderate Democrats, who are worried, in turn, about driving up the prices of fossil fuels such as oil and coal.

And, in a broader sense, activists are concerned about a loss of momentum for action on climate change.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/03/04/AR2010030404715.html

Rep. Eric Massa to resign

By JOHN BRESNAHAN & GLENN THRUSH | 3/5/10 3:48 PM EST

Democratic Rep. Eric Massa is expected to resign from Congress on Monday, only days after reports first surfaced that the freshman New York lawmaker was under investigation by the House ethics committee for allegedly sexually harassing a male staffer.

A House staffer with knowledge of the situation says Massa is preparing to announce his resignation and will break the news in the Corning Leader, his local newspaper, but several media outlets were already reporting the news Friday afternoon.

Massa, who was elected in November 2008, announced earlier in the week that he would not be seeking a second term following a cancer scare in December. He initially dismissed as “unsubstantiated” a POLITICO report that he was being scrutinized for improper advances to a junior aide in his office.

But the ethics committee formally announced on Thursday night that Massa was under investigation by the panel, although Reps. Zoe Lofgren (D-Calif.) and Jo Bonner (R-Ala.), the chairwoman and ranking member of the committee, did not announce the reason for their probe.

http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0310/34001.html

Top Taliban, al Qaeda leaders reported killed in Mohmand airstrikes

Unconfirmed reports from Pakistan indicate that a senior al Qaeda military commander and a top Taliban leader have been killed during airstrikes earlier today in the Mohmand tribal agency.

Pakistani military officials claimed that Qari Zia Rahman and Faqir Mohammed were among 30 Taliban and foreign fighters killed during helicopter and airstrikes in the Pindyali region in Mohmand, The Nation reported. A commander named Fateh was also killed, according to Geo News.

Faqir Mohammed is the leader of the Taliban in the Bajaur tribal agency; he is also the second in command of the Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan, or the Movement of the Taliban in Pakistan, the group founded by South Waziristan leader Baitullah Mehsud and thought to be led by Hakeemullah Mehsud. Faqir is a close ally of al Qaeda and of its second in command, Ayman al Zawahiri, who is known to have sheltered in Bajaur in the past.

Qari Zia Rahman is an al Qaeda leader who operates in Pakistan’s Bajaur tribal agency as well as in Afghanistan’s Nuristan and Kunar provinces, where the Taliban control most of districts. He is allied with Faqir Mohammed, the leader of the Taliban in Bajaur, as well as with Osama bin Laden. Rahman's fighters are from Chechnya, Uzbekistan, Turkmenistan, Afghanistan, and various Arab nations. He commands a brigade in al Qaeda's paramilitary Shadow Army, or the Lashkar al Zil, US intelligence officials have told The Long War Journal.

http://www.longwarjournal.org/archives/2010/03/top_taliban_al_qaeda.php

Liberals rap Kremlin as Stalin is worshipped

Federal pay ahead of private industry Updated 7h 13m ago

Accountants, nurses, chemists, surveyors, cooks, clerks and janitors are among the wide range of jobs that get paid more on average in the federal government than in the private sector.

Overall, federal workers earned an average salary of $67,691 in 2008 for occupations that exist both in government and the private sector, according to Bureau of Labor Statistics data. The average pay for the same mix of jobs in the private sector was $60,046 in 2008, the most recent data available.

http://www.usatoday.com/news/nation/2010-03-04-federal-pay_N.htm?csp=usat.me

Jim Bunning: Why I took a stand

‘If the Senate cannot find $10 billion to pay for a measure we all support, we will never pay for anything.’

By Jim Bunning

I have been serving the citizens of Kentucky for nearly 24 years in Washington. During that time I have been a member of both the House of Representatives and the United States Senate. I have taken thousands of votes in relation to spending the taxpayers' money. I will be the first one to admit that I have cast some bad votes during my tenure, and I wish I could have some of them back. For too long, both Republicans and Democrats have treated the taxpayers' money as a slush fund that does not ever end. At some point, the madness has to stop.

Over a month ago, Democrats passed and President Obama signed into law the "Pay-Go" legislation. It calls on Congress to pay for bills by not adding to our debt. It sounds like a common sense tool that would rein in government spending. Unfortunately, Pay-Go is a paper tiger. It has no teeth. I did not vote for the Democrats' Pay-Go legislation because I knew it was just a political dog-and-pony show to get some good press after some political setbacks. Since the Pay-Go rule was enacted, the national debt has gone up $244,992,297,448.11 (as of Wednesday, that is).

Why now?

Last week, Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., asked to pass a 30-day extensions bill for unemployment insurance and other federal programs. Earlier in February, those extensions were included in a broader bipartisan bill that was paid for but did not meet Sen. Reid's approval, and he nixed the deal. When I saw the Democrats in Congress were going to vote on the extensions bill without paying for it and not following their own Pay-Go rules, I said enough is enough.

Many people asked me, "Why now?" My answer is, "Why not now?" Why can't a non-controversial measure in the Senate that would help those in need be paid for? If the Senate cannot find $10 billion to pay for a measure we all support, we will never pay for anything.

America is under a mountain of debt. Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke said in a hearing last month that the United States' debt is unsustainable. We are on the verge of a tipping point where America's debt will bring down our economy, and more people will join the unemployment lines. That is why I used my right as a United States Senator and objected.

http://blogs.usatoday.com/oped/2010/03/column-why-i-took-a-stand-.html?csp=hf