Prepare 504 goats...

Black-eyed virgins are in short supply...

Khaama Press reported:

At least seven militants were killed while making improvised explosive devices (IEDs) in eastern Ghazni province of Afghanistan.
The interior ministry following a statement said the incident took place inside a mosque in Deh Yak district on Saturday.
The statement by interior ministry further added that the explosion left seven militants dead and there were no other casualties.
Interior ministry condemned the anti-government militant groups for using religious places for conducting terrorist activities and said such activities show that the militant groups are acting against the principles of Islam.
The anti-government militant groups including the Taliban militants frequently use improvised explosive device (IED) as the weapon of their choice to target Afghan and coalition security forces, however innocent civilians are mostly targeted in such attacks.

While you weren't looking, Obama released 68,000 illegal immigrants with criminal convictions on their records

I wonder if he gave them Obamacare applications and voter registration cards already marked democrat. 

Via Washington Times:

Immigration agents tried to deport only about a fourth of the cases they encountered in 2013, said a report being released Monday from the Center for Immigration Studies that shows just how much President Obama’s policies have cut down on potential enforcement.
Jessica Vaughan, the report’s author, called it a form of “catch and release.” She said agents at U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement received more than 720,000 hits on immigrants who could be eligible for deportation but filed charges against fewer than 195,000 of them.
Of those let go, 68,000 had criminal convictions on their records. All told, more than 870,000 immigrants have been ordered removed from the U.S. but are defying the government and refusing to leave.

New study: Only one-third of exchange sign-ups were previously uninsured

So, only 1.5 to 2 million have gotten insurance because of Obamacare, not the 6 million number touted by the administration.

Via Forbes:

Today is March 31, 2014: in theory, the last day you can sign up for coverage under the subsidized Obamacare insurance exchanges. If you’ve been a regular reader of this space, you know that the numbers routinely paraded by the Obama administration regarding Obamacare website sign-ups don’t tell us much about the actual number of uninsured individuals who have gained coverage. A new study from the RAND Corporation indicates that only one-third of exchange sign-ups were previously uninsured.
The RAND study hasn’t yet been published, but its contents were made available to Noam Levey of the Los Angeles Times. RAND also estimates that 9 million individuals have purchased health plans directly from insurers, outside of the exchanges, but that “the vast majority of these people were previously insured.”
The RAND report appears to corroborate the work of other surveys. Earlier this month,McKinsey reported that 27 percent of those signing up for coverage on the individual market were previously uninsured.
Around 1/4 of exchange enrollees were previously uninsured
One important finding of the McKinsey survey was that the proportion of those who had formally enrolled in coverage, by paying their first month’s premium, was considerably lower among the previously uninsured, relative to the previously insured. 86 percent of those who were previously insured who had “selected a marketplace plan” on the exchanges had paid, whereas only 53 percent of the previously uninsured had.

Keep on reading…

Outrage: Iran names member of the militant group that held 52 Americans hostages its next ambassador to UN

Well, this is a real slap in the face...

Bloomberg reported:

Iran has named a member of the militant group that held 52 Americans hostage in Tehran for 444 days to be its next ambassador to the United Nations.
The Iranian government has applied for a U.S. visa for Hamid Aboutalebi, Iran’s former ambassador to Belgium and Italy, who was a member of the Muslim Students Following the Imam’s Line, a group of radical students that seized the U.S. embassy on Nov. 4, 1979. Imam was an honorific used for Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, the leader of the Islamic Revolution.
Relations between the Islamic Republic and the U.S. and its allies are beginning to emerge from the deep freeze that began when the self-proclaimed Iranian students overrun the embassy and took the hostages. The State Department hasn’t responded to the visa application, according to an Iranian diplomat.

Educational Obamacare Video: Learning to "Internets" with Dana Loesch

Published on Mar 28, 2014

Dana Loesch teaches people how to use the internet in the wake of the latest Obamacare delay.

GM 2014 recalled vehicles now at 4.8 million and the year is only three months old

If GM holds this recall pace, they will hit 12 million vehicles in 2014. That's going to leave a mark on the financial statement.

Via The NY Times:

General Motors announced on Saturday morning that it was recalling 490,000 trucks and 172,000 compact cars, meaning the automaker has now recalled about 4.8 million vehicles in the United States during the first three months of the year. That is about six times the number of vehicles it recalled in all of 2013.

This year’s recalls involve many of G.M.’s most popular and best-known models.

The recall announced on Saturday morning covers the 2014 Chevrolet Silverado 1500 and GMC Sierra 1500 pickups, as well as the 2015 Chevrolet Suburban and Tahoe and the GMC Yukon and Yukon XL with six-speed automatic transmissions. G.M. said a loose fitting for the transmission’s oil cooler line could allow oil leaks and possibly lead to fires. The automaker said it was aware of three fires but no injuries linked to the defect, and officials decided to recall the vehicles within a week of learning of the problem, said Alan Adler, a G.M. spokesman.

The compact cars being recalled are the 2013-14 Cruze models with 1.4 liter four-cylinder engines. G.M. said the right-front axle half-shaft could break, cutting power to the front wheels, although the engine would continue to run and the steering and brakes would still function. The company said it was aware of several dozen episodes but was not aware of any crashes or injuries related to the problem. 

Couple gets voter registration card marked "Democratic Party" from Covered California

Obamacare has always been about politics.

LA MESA, Calif. - A local couple called 10News concerned after they received an envelope from the state's Obamacare website, Covered California. Inside was a letter discussing voter registration and a registration card pre-marked with an "x" in the box next to Democratic Party.
The couple – who did not want their identity revealed – received the letter and voter registration card from their health insurance provider Covered California, the state-run agency that implements President Obama's Affordable Care Act.

Stupid: Bleachers built with parents money for boys' baseball torn down because they were nicer than girls

How did we end up with government officials this stupid micromanaging our lives? 

Via The Blaze:

The U.S Education Department’s Office for Civil Rights has forced a school in Michigan to tear down a brand-new set of bleachers for its boys’ varsity baseball team because the new seating is nicer than the girls’ softball bleachers.
The raised seating deck for the boys’ baseball team, which was paid for with money raised by parents, was put in place because fans who’d come to watch games at Plymouth High School in Canton, Mich., were having a hard time seeing the game through the chain-link fence WJBK-TV reported.
The parents installed the new bleachers themselves and even added a new scoreboard to the field, the station reported.
But after an investigation by government officials, which was prompted by an anonymous complaint, the school was told it had to remove the new seating because it was “no longer equal” to the adjacent girls’ softball bleachers, which have yet to get a makeover of their own.
Keep on reading…

This proves once again, modern liberalism is a form of insanity.

Amusing: IPCC climate change report predicts increase in number of boaters, golfers and beach-goers.

Climate change never sounded so good.

#IPCC 's scariest #climate prediction ever - a global surge in the number of golfers. THIS MUST BE STOPPED! @IPCC_CH pic.twitter.com/rKuCrSw9VB
— Jonathan Leake (@Jonathan__Leake) March 29, 2014

Interesting: Bridget Anne Kelly, New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie's former deputy chief of staff, might cooperate in Bridgegate investigation

Lawyers tapped for the Internal investigation have cleared Chris Christie of wrongdoing in the Bridgegate scandal, but the report was hard on Gov. Chris Christie's former deputy chief of staff. She is not a happy camper.

In a statement obtained by the Newark-based Star-Ledger newspaper, Kelly's attorney Michael Critchley condemned the Christie-commissioned report released on Thursday, saying "the report's venomous, gratuitous, and inappropriate sexist remarks concerning Ms. Kelly have no place in what is alleged to be a professional and independent report."
He also hinted that, given the right circumstances, Kelly would cooperate with the investigation. "Ms. Kelly is not a liar," he said in the statement. "If Ms. Kelly were provided with the appropriate procedural safeguards," he went on, she would be "fully cooperative" with the probe.

Scary: Union president fighting for dozing CTA driver, "We’ve all dozed off driving a train"

This really inspires confidence. 

She is “torn to pieces’’ over the accident, Kelly said, and the union will fight any attempt to terminate her.

“She’s distraught over this. She is not happy with this. We don’t go out and say `Today we’re gonna take a train and ride it up a platform,’” Kelly said

The woman became qualified to operate a CTA train in January and admitted to investigators that she had dozed off and overshot a station just one month later, in February.

Two dozing incidents in two months “sounds bad. It sounds horrible in the public’s eyes,’’ Kelly said. “Each individual is different, and it all depends on what’s going on. Come on. We’ve all dozed off driving a train [or a car]. There’s a difference between dozing and falling asleep, in my opinion.’’

The operator had worked 69 hours in the eight days that ended with the accident shift, Kelly said. The CTA, apparently subtracting for lunch, put the number at 55.7 hours over seven days — still well over a 40-hour work week.

Piers Morgan bows out with another anti-gun rant...

Don't let the door hit you in the butt on the way out Piers.

And I want to say something more about that before I bow out. I have lived and worked in America for much of the past decade, and it is a magnificent country. A land of true opportunity that affords anyone, even British chancers like me, the opportunity to live the American dream. The vast majority of Americans I have met are decent, hard-working, thoroughly dependable people. As my brother, a British Army colonel, says, “You’d always want an American next to you in a trench when the going gets tough.” But that’s where guns belong – on a military battlefield, in the hands of highly trained men and women fighting for democracy and freedom. Not in the hands of civilians. The scourge of gun violence is a disease that now infects every aspect of American life. Each day, on average, 35 people in this country are murdered with guns, another 50 kill themselves with guns, and 200 more are shot but survive. That’s 100,000 people a year hit by gunfire in America.

Scary: OFA threatening to visit global warming skeptics homes on April Fool's Day...

Will they wear brownshirts?

Via barackobama.com

Putin threatens countries if they vote in UN against his Crimea annexation...

 A Russian spokesman claims,

"We never threaten anyone. We just explain the situation."

Is that a distinction with a difference? 

(Reuters) - Russia threatened several Eastern European and Central Asian states with retaliation if they voted in favor of a United Nations General Assembly resolution this week declaring invalid Crimea's referendum on seceding from Ukraine, U.N. diplomats said.
The disclosures about Russian threats came after Moscow accused Western countries of using "shameless pressure, up to the point of political blackmail and economic threats," in an attempt to coerce the United Nations' 193 member states to join it in supporting the non-binding resolution on the Ukraine crisis.
According to interviews with U.N. diplomats, most of whom preferred to speak on condition of anonymity for fear of angering Moscow, the targets of Russian threats included Moldova, Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan as well as a number of African countries. A spokesman for Russia's Mission to the U.N. denied that Moscow threatened any country with retaliation if it supported the resolution, saying: "We never threaten anyone. We just explain the situation."

Amusing: Unionized Northwestern U. student athletes could have to pay taxes on their “full rides.”

If they are employees as Obama's NLRB has ruled, their  “full rides” of scholarships, room and board and free healthcare should be taxable as income.

Northwestern U. student athletes initiated the lawsuit and their financial situation provides a good example of what these athletes have to face in the near future.  Should the student athletes at NU become employees, they will face the prospect of having to pay taxes on their incomes.  Currently they enjoy a unique and privileged tax status: while their free college tuition is technically income they do not pay income taxes on it.  They are not only receiving a free ride on tuition but a free ride on the taxes. 
Should they have to pay taxes here’s a thumbnail sketch of how their finances will change.  At NU the tuition is about $65,000 per year.  If the student athletes receive this as pay, then they will have to pay Federal income tax, state income tax, local income taxes, and payroll taxes; which include social security and Medicare.  These are taxes paid by other residents of Evanston, Illinois where Northwestern U. is located. 
These amounts are not trivial and will add up to approximately one third of the value of the scholarship, roughly $22,000 per year.  Then they will also no longer receive free health care.  Currently most universities with big football programs also have medical schools and it is economical for them to provide free health care to their student athletes.  In the near future NU athletes may have to pay for their own ObamaCare health premiums.  But given that President Obama is fond of college basketball their union may receive an exemption from participating in ObamaCare. 
And since they are members of a union they will have to pay union dues.  This will bring the cost of being an employee to roughly $26K to $28K a year.

Obama administration wants dairy farmers to reduce gas emitted by cows...

You can't make stuff this stupid up...

Via Daily Caller:

As part of its plan to reduce U.S. greenhouse gas emissions, the Obama administration is targeting the dairy industry to reduce methane emissions in their operations.
This comes despite falling methane emission levels across the economy since 1990.
The White House has proposed cutting methane emissions from the dairy industry by 25 percent by 2020. Although U.S. agriculture only accounts for about 9 percent of the country’s greenhouse gas emissions, according to the Environmental Protection Agency, it makes up a sizeable portion of methane emissions — which is a very potent greenhouse gas.
“Cows emit a massive amount of methane through belching, with a lesser amount through flatulence,” according to How Stuff Works. “Statistics vary regarding how much methane the average dairy cow expels. Some experts say 100 liters to 200 liters a day… while others say it’s up to 500 liters… a day. In any case, that’s a lot of methane, an amount comparable to the pollution produced by a car in a day.”
“Of all domestic animal types, beef and dairy cattle were by far the largest emitters of [methane],” according to an EPA analysis charting greenhouse gas emissions in 2012. Cows and other animals produce methane through digestion, which ferments the food of animals.
Keep on reading…

Is Harry Reid the biggest scumbag in Washington?

Yes.

Via Free Beacon:

Another man might have assumed, correctly, that launching a campaign of insult and insinuation against two billionaires would result in renewed attention to his own finances. Not Harry Reid. The Senate Democratic leader since 2005, and the Senate majority leader since 2007, is not one to reflect before speaking. His mouth runs far ahead of his brain.
In recent years Reid has declared an American war “lost” while our troops still fought overseas; praised President Obama for his “light” skin and “no Negro dialect, unless he wanted to have one”; asserted falsely and without evidence that Mitt Romney had not paid any taxes for a decade; and said “Why would we want to do that?” when asked if he would fund cancer research during the government shutdown.
Keep reading…

Former Demo U.S. Senator Bob Kerrey: Obama knew he was lying about Obamacare...

I'll bet former sen. Kerrey wouldn't admit that is he was still in office. 

Via The Daily Mail

Former U.S. Senator Bob Kerrey thinks President Barack Obama, a fellow Democrat, was re-elected in 2012 because he ‘sucked less’ than former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney.
The Nebraskan straight-talker told MailOnline in an exclusive interview that Obama isn’t up to the job of bringing liberals and conservatives to the table to rescue America’s slowly choking entitlement programs.
And Obama, he said Wednesday in his Manhattan office, knew full well he was lying when he promised that the Affordable Care Act would allow Americans to keep insurance plans they liked.
‘He had to know he was misleading the audience,’ Kerrey said quietly, recalling the newly minted president’s countless promises as Congress and the public debated his signature health insurance overhaul.
On the other hand, he may have said it so many times,’ he added, ‘that the spell-checker wasn’t in the room – the spell-checker, the fact-checker – somebody who says, “Excuse me, Mr. President, but I hope you know this…”‘
Obama’s infamous four-Pinocchio pledges, Kerrey explained, never stood a chance of being fulfilled because there were ‘a million people out there with policies that, for one reason or another, run short of the minimum standard. I mean, they bought something cheaper!’

Interesting: GOP Iowa candidate Joni Ernst grew up "castrating hogs"

Joni Ernst is a nice contrast to all the metro-sexual men and big city feminist the democrats run.

Squeal 

Joni has been endorsed by SARAH PALIN and MITT ROMNEY. 

Hypocrisy Alert: Alleged Gun Runner Leland Yee's Anti-Gun Tweets

Once again @NRA uses lies & distortion to try stopping commonsense #GunControl bill http://t.co/xOIPQzl2 Time to stop mass reloading in #CA.
— Leland Yee (@LelandYee) August 3, 2012

Thank you @PiersMorgan for your commitment and passion to ending gun violence. We must never forget Sandy Hook.
— Leland Yee (@LelandYee) December 21, 2012

4 weeks after Newtown I'm still shocked & prepared to take steps to stop gun violence, close assault weapon loopholes. http://t.co/JdnUSmn3
— Leland Yee (@LelandYee) January 14, 2013

HT: Twitchy

Amusing: New Matt Bevin ad clads Mitch McConnell in Duke uniform

Coffee spitting funny...

The National Science Foundation spends $700,000 on a climate change musical

I'll bet it was fabulous...

Via Daily Caller:

It looks like the National Science Foundation has been handing out grants for some unorthodox research projects, according to House Republicans.
This includes $700,000 in funding for a climate change musical.
House Science Committee Chairman Lamar Smith questioned White House science czar John Holdren in a Thursday hearing over whether or not the National Science Foundation (NSF) should have to justify its use of taxpayer dollars to fund projects. Smith pointed out some examples of questionable projects the NSF has funded.

• $700,000 on a climate change musical
• $15,000 to study fishing practices around Lake Victoria in Africa
• $340,000 to examine the “ecological consequences” of early human fires in New Zealand
• $200,000 for a three-year study of the Bronze Age around the Mediterranean
• $50,000 to survey archived 17th Century lawsuits in Peru
• $20,00 to look at the causes of stress in Bolivia

Double-Down on Stupid: Dem Sen. Mark Udall Says He Would Vote For ObamaCare Again

Democratic Sen. Mark Udall should put that information in a campaign ad.

Who is up for planet Biden?

I am sure of one thing. There is no intelligent life there...

Via TPM

It seems Planet Hillary may have some competition.
Scientists reported on Wednesday that they have discovered a possible new dwarf planet that orbits the sun beyond Pluto, according to Nature.
The discovery team has named the object “2012 VP113″ for now, nicknaming it “VP” or “Biden” for short after Vice President Joe Biden. Scientists won’t submit its official name to the International Astronomical Union until they fully understand the dwarf planet’s orbit, according to Nature.
Co-discoverers Chad Trujillo, an astronomer at Gemini Observatory in Hilo, Hawaii and Scott Sheppard, an astronomer at the Carnegie Institution for Science in Washington, D.C., said that the discovery could help scientists better understand how the solar system came into existence.
“It goes to show that there’s something we don’t know about our Solar System, and it’s something important,” Trujillo told Nature. “We’re starting to get a taste of what’s out beyond what we consider the edge.”
Scientists discovered a similar object, Sedna, about a decade ago.

Strange: Chelsea Clinton talks about her obsession with "diarrhea"

Well, her parents are full of sh*t. Perhaps that is where the obsession came from.

Chelsea Clinton Confess About Her Diarrhea Obsession 

IRS Commissioner to Congress: It's going to take years to produce those Tea Party emails...

Years?

WASHINGTON — IRS Commissioner John Koskinen said Wednesday that he won’t be able to produce all of former employee Lois G. Lerner’s emails and those of other key employees by the end of this year, pushing it beyond this year’s congressional elections.
In a heated exchange over whether he and his tax agency employees are cooperating in Congress’s investigations into tea party targeting, Mr. Koskinen said the amount of time it will take to look through and redact private information from the documents could last years.
“What they want is something that’s going to take years to produce,” he told the House Oversight Committee, which six months ago issued a subpoena for Ms. Lerner’s emails because the IRS wasn’t acting quickly enough.
That subpoena remains outstanding and both Republicans and Democrats on the committee said the IRS needs to speed things up.
“We don’t want the excuses anymore. Prioritize them. Put more lawyers on the job,” said Rep. Jim Jordan, an Ohio Republican who has helped spearhead the committee’s investigation into IRS targeting.
Ms. Lerner, who used to run the IRS’s division that processed nonprofit applications, has been a key subject of the investigation given emails and other information the committee discovered that, members said, suggested she let her political leanings dictate her official actions.
Mr. Koskinen said his agency was preparing to turn over another 20,000 pages of documents later Wednesday. But he said if Congress wants to change his focus, he could stop that production and send his lawyers back to review other areas.
Keep on reading…

Two of Obama's 2013 vacation flights cost taxpayers $15.8 million.

Nothing is too good for the liberal messiah.

Via CNS News:

For President Barack Obama and his family to visit Africa in June 2013 and then Honolulu in December 2013, the cost to taxpayers for flight costs alone were $15,885,585, according to Air Force records obtained through the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) by the government watchdog Judicial Watch.
The flights to, from, and around Africa in June-July 2013 totaled 35.5 hours at a cost of $228,288 an hour, which totals $8,104,224, reported Judicial Watch in a press release.
The flights for the 17-day Christmas vacation in Honolulu in December 2013-January 2014 totaled 36.9 hours at a cost of $210,877 per hour, which totals $7,781,361.
Combined, flight costs for those two trips were $15.8 million.
Keep on reading…

Hump Day Video: Well That's Embarrassing, No One Clapped

Well, one person did clap briefly...

Obamacare deadline now extended for everyone...

The March 31st Obamacare sign-up deadline has now been extended for everyone. You only have to claim you tried to sign-up before march 31. It's based on the honor system. 

The Obama administration has decided to give extra time to Americans who say that they are unable to enroll in health-care plans through the federal insurance marketplace by the March 31 deadline.
Federal officials confirmed Tuesday evening that all consumers who have begun to apply for coverage on HealthCare.gov, but who do not finish by Monday, will have until about mid-April to ask for an extension.
Under the new rules, people will be able to qualify for an extension by checking a blue box on HealthCare.gov to indicate that they tried to enroll before the deadline. This method will rely on an honor system; the government will not try to determine whether the person is telling the truth. …

Administration officials said the accommodation is an attempt to prepare for a possible surge of people trying to sign up in the final days before the deadline. Such a flood could leave some people unable to get through the system.

Green Fail: Indiana Duke Energy clean coal plant uses more energy than it produces

Well, this plant isn't very environmentally friendly...

The National Legal and Policy Center reported:

NLPC has detailed extensively the wastefulness and folly of spending billions of taxpayer and consumer dollars to subsidize wind energy, solar energy and electric vehicles, all in the name of fighting climate change.
But the complicated, uneconomical boondoggle that Duke Energy built inEdwardsport, Ind. so as to burn coal gasrather than coal – and thus produce less carbon dioxide than a traditional coal plant – may be the dumbest idea to fight imaginary global warming to date. If you swallow the alarmists’ premise and “solutions,” the plant so far is a joke, as recent evidence shows it is using more energy than it produces.
Edwardsport was supposed to cost $1.9 billion but that estimate was about $1.6 billion short. The project has hacked and wheezed since 2006 under evidence of cronyism, corruption, conflicts of interest, cost overruns, delays, waste, and mismanagement, but at least it became operational in June – for six days. Then it broke down, and intermittently juiced the grid for the remainder of 2013. Duke was only able to extract 37 percent of Edwardsport’s maximum capacity during the period,according to the Indianapolis Star. Hoosier State customers are paying up to 16 percent more for the privilege – a rate hike pretty much cemented into their bills last week by a state Court of Appeals decision.
Technology is supposed to improve over time, apparently except in the case of electric vehicle batteries and Southwest Indiana power plants. As the Indianapolis Business Journal reported, in an extremely cold January, the art-of-the-state coal gasifier eked out only four percent of its capacity.
“Edwardsport generated 19,644 megawatt hours of electricity,” theJournal reported, “enough to power about 20,000 homes, in one of the most frigid months on record, according to a Feb. 28 filing with the Indiana Utility Regulatory Commission. The new plant, at its maximum capacity, could have generated almost 460,000 megawatt hours in January.”

Former Top Gun instructor: Focus on social issues demoralizing officers...

Most join the military to learn the martial arts and defend their country. They don't join to learn about gay rights and sexual harassment.

Via WaTi:

A Navy F-18 fighter pilot and former Top Gun instructor is publicly warning admirals that retention is beginning to suffer from the military’s relentless social conditioning programs.
Cmdr. Guy Snodgrass, until recently a Pentagon speech writer for the chief of naval operations, Adm. Jonathan Greenert, said sailors are becoming fed-up with the constant emphasis on social issues — an apparent reference to gays in the military, women in combat and ending sexual harassment.
“Sailors continue to cite the over-focus on social issues by senior leadership, above and beyond discussions on war fighting — a fact that demoralizes junior and mid-grade officers alike,” Cmdr. Snodgrass wrote this month on the U.S. Naval Institute website, an independent forum for active and retired sailors and Marines.
It is a remarkably frank assessment from an upwardly mobile fighter pilot who is due to become the executive officer of a F-18 unit in Japan.

Leading Democratic Pollster to Dems: “In terms of #Obamacare, don’t defend it..."

Obamacare is indefensible anyway...

Via Washington Examiner:

One of the nation’s leading Democratic pollsters and strategists is urging embattled House and Senate incumbents to abandon their defense of Obamacare and instead pledge to “fix it.”
Celinda Lake, whose firm Lake Research Partners provided the Democratic analysis of the new George Washington University Battleground Poll released Tuesday morning, summed up her advice to Democrats when it comes to Obamacare: “Don’t defend it.”
In unveiling the poll, she said that the new Democratic strategy should be for candidates to promise to fix the troubled system while pledging to help keep Americans out of the claws of greedy insurance firms.
“In terms of Obamacare, don’t defend it, say it was flawed from the beginning, and we’re going to fix it,” said Lake at a poll briefing hosted by the Christian Science Monitor.

Alaska Senate race looks up for Republicans...

Polls show Begich is very vulnerable...

Via The Washington Examiner:

Alaska is one of seven states which have a Democratic-held Senate seat up this year and which voted for Mitt Romney in 2012. Nate Silver of 538 and Chris Cillizza of the Washington Post's The Fix rate the seat, held by former Anchorage Mayor Mark Begich, as the least likely Republican turnover of the seven; 538 rates Begich's chances at 55 percent. Stuart Rothenberg rates it as toss-up/tilt Democrat, while Charlie Cook, slightly more bearish on Begich's chances, rates it as one of five pure toss-ups.

Others may move in that direction given the latest polling from Rasmussen Reports. It shows an even race, 44 percent to 44 percent, between Begich and Republican challenger Dan S. Sullivan, and perhaps a bit surprisingly, Republican Lt. Gov. Mead Treadwell leading Begich 47 percent to 44 percent.

Oregon spends $300 million on Obamacare exchange, tells people to sign up by snail mail...

$300 million and it doesn't work. 

Via Capitol City Project:

“At Cover Oregon we’re committed to helping you get the health insurance you need” the video uploaded to Youtube yesterday starts. It then explains that those seeking health insurance coverage through the Obamacare exchange can “enroll online” by entering their information through the Cover Oregon website. However, instead of being sent to the next section of the website to browse and select a plan, the video explains that “in about ten days” applicants will “get a packet” in the mail from the government-run exchange.
At this point the packet will either inform the applicant that they qualify for, and have been enrolled in, the state Medicaid system or that they need to purchase a private plan through the exchange. Those who need to purchase a private plan must then go back to the website and enter the information from the packet they got in the mail in order to actually look through the available plans and pick one. After that, if the site works properly, they’ll then be sent a bill and an insurance card through the mail. At that point they will be covered, the video promises.
Keep on reading…

Amusing: Dems still waiting for Obamacare popularity bounce...

It not going to happen...

Via The Hill:

Democrats have been waiting for ObamaCare to become popular for four years. And counting.

Congressional leaders and senior White House advisers have been saying since 2010 that public opinion will turn their way sometime soon. Be patient, they have told anxious members of their party again and again.

“I think as people learn about the bill, and now that the bill is enacted, it’s going to become more and more popular,” Sen. Charles Schumer (D-N.Y.) said on NBC’s “Meet the Press” in March 2010. “So I predict ... by November those who voted for healthcare will find it an asset, those who voted against it will find it a liability.” “I think that [the Affordable Care Act] over time, is going to become more popular,” David Axelrod, then a senior adviser to President Obama, declared on the same show in September of that year. Two months later, Democrats ceded six Senate seats and 63 House seats to Republicans.

ObamaCare helped catapult Rep. John Boehner (R-Ohio) to the speakership of the House, and demolished dozens of Democratic political careers.

Democrats now face the prospect of a second midterm drubbing in 2014, and the healthcare law is even more unpopular than it was last time around.

Indiana Gov. Mike Pence gives common core the axe...

Hero....

Via The Foundry:

Indiana’s experiment with Common Core is over.
Gov. Mike Pence signed legislation today requiring the state to come up with its own academic standards, making Indiana the latest state to pull its support for national education standards known as Common Core.
“I believe our students are best served when decisions about education are made at the state and local level,” the Republican governor said, adding:
“By signing this legislation, Indiana has taken an important step forward in developing academic standards that are written by Hoosiers, for Hoosiers, and are uncommonly high.”
Indiana was among the first states to adopt Common Core standards in 2010 when Mitch Daniels, another Republican, was governor. Pence, elected two years later, has watched as Indiana became a battleground in the fight over the standards.

MSNBC’s Joy Reid: “You’re More Likely To Be Beamed Up Into a UFO” Than Witness Voter Fraud…

Joy Reid shouldn't worry about alien abduction. I am sure they would be wanting intelligent life...

Via Mediaite:

MSNBC host Joy Reid dug into the topic of voter identification laws on Monday when she grilled a Republican guest about the stated necessity for instituting those laws: the need to reduce in-person voter impersonation fraud. Reid said that there have been a variety of studies conducted on the prevalence of in-person voter fraud, and asserted that a person is “literally” more likely to be abducted by aliens than to encounter that type of voter fraud.
“There have been a lot of studies on this,” Reid began. “There are a lot of studies that show, literally, you’re more likely to be beamed up into a UFO or struck by lightning than find in-person voter fraud.”
“Why is it your party seems fixated on trying to go after early voting?” the MSNBC host continued. “ Trying to go after, you know, forcing people to bring a birth certificate — all things that just happen to impact minorities and people who tend to vote for the Democratic Party?”
Keep on reading…

Hillary Clinton Advisers: Hillary's poll numbers will drop 20 points once she is a candidate...

Faster please...

Ebola outbreak is spreading in Guinea

Ebola has a kill rate between 25 and 90 percent...

Conakry (AFP) - An Ebola epidemic which has already killed dozens of people in Guinea's southern forests has spread to the capital Conakry, the United Nations Children's Fund said on Sunday.

"At least 59 out of 80 who contracted Ebola across the West African country have died so far. Over the past few days, the deadly haemorrhagic fever has quickly spread from the communities of Macenta, Gueckedou, and Kissidougou to the capital, Conakry," UNICEF said in a statement emailed to AFP.

Conakry, a vast, sprawling port city on Guinea's Atlantic coast, is estimated to have a population of between 1.5 and two million.

To date, no treatment or vaccine is available for Ebola, which kills between 25 and 90 percent of those who fall sick, depending on the strain of the virus, according to the World Health Organisation.

Nate Silver: GOP Has 60% Chance Of Winning Senate, Could Have A Really Big Win

Sunday Humor: NewsBusters (This is a good one!)

Via NewsBusted via NewsBusters:

"Operators of the Golden Gate Bridge may build safety nets to prevent people from jumping to their deaths. This design is very similar to the ones being erected beneath the Democratic National Headquarters for November.

Microsoft makes hundreds of thousands of dollars selling user's information to the FBI?

Wonderful...

Via The Daily Caller:

Secret invoices from Microsoft to the FBI obtained via hacks by the Syrian Electronic Army reveal the Silicon Valley giant charges a secret division of the bureau for legal access to users’ information.
The army has become notorious for infiltrating the networks and social media accounts of western companies and media outlets in recent years, and submitted the documents to The Daily Dot for analysis. Its most recent Microsoft hack took place in January, when the organization seized Microsoft’s Twitter and email accounts, reportedly to distract employees while achieving its “main mission.”
Emails and invoices between the FBI’s Digital Intercept Technology Unit and Microsoft’s Global Criminal Compliance team show a charge between $50 and $200 for access to customer information, with totals stretching into the hundreds of thousands of dollars – the most recent from November 2013 topping out at $281,000.
A specialist cited by the Dot confirmed the authenticity of the documents, but neither Microsoft nor the FBI would confirm or deny their contents.

Why does your Congress critter fly first-class on your dime?

Because they are the ruling class...

Via Town Hall

When was the last time you flew first-class on an airplane? For most people, the answer is never or once or twice thanks to an upgrade. I fall into the latter category. Not to mention, those who can afford to pay for first-class tickets, aren’t doing it on the backs of taxpayers…unless of course you serve in the U.S. Congress.
Last year, Bloomberg Businessweek ran a feature titled, The Pampered World of Congressional Air Travel. The story detailed the cushy and expensive travel bookings Congressman and Senators make on a regular basis with frequent trips back and forth to their home states and districts. The cost to taxpayers is enormous, but could be much less if they’d simply swallow their pride and sit in coach with the rest of us.
There is no more pampered class of air traveler than members of Congress.
At Washington’s Reagan National Airport, they have their own special parking spaces—right up close to the terminal—that they don’t even have to pay for. As Bloomberg Television’s Hans Nichols reports, this perk costs the Metropolitan Washington Airport Authority $738,760 in foregone revenue.
To members of our fly-in-Tuesday-fly-home-Thursday Congress, these perks are a big deal. Most fly a lot, and many fly first class. They don’t just jet home to their districts. Sometimes, they’re jetting around the world at taxpayer expense ($23,646, to be specific), as Democratic Representative Sheila Jackson-Lee of Texas did in February.
Now, Republican Reps. Paul Gosar and Walter Jones along with California Democrat Rep. Raul Ruiz are looking to end the first-class treatment out of respect for taxpayers. Earlier this week Gosar wrote and submitted a request with Ruiz and Jones to the Committee on Appropriations asking that language prohibiting lawmakers from traveling first-class on the taxpayer dime be added to the Fiscal Year 2015 Legislative Branch Appropriations Act.... More here...

Don't look for this to change. Congress will deep-six any rules requiring them to fly coach. 

Nancy Pelosi whines about #Obamacare not being perfect socialized medicine...

Because socialized medicine is working so well elsewhere...

REP. NANCY PELOSI (D-CA): I take issue — I see these little things in the paper about this or that. But our members — the story that you don’t write or see, maybe because you’re in Washington and our members are out in their districts. And as I travel, I see our members standing tall. As I said to you before, we’re not running on this; we’re running on what the American people want us to run on and that is job creation. Show us the jobs. Where are the jobs?
Why are we not here passing a jobs agenda incident 51 times having political nonsense on the floor of the House? But I’m very proud of our members. Yeah, any bill that is passed is no perfect. I wanted single-payer, I wanted a public option.
You know, I have some changes I would make myself. But as the implementation takes place, as we see improvements that can be made to any compromise, which the bill was, we will do that. But just because people say I don’t want to repeal it but I do want to fix it doesn’t mean they are walking away from it.

Right set for big gains in France...

Socialism isn't working out. 

Paris (AFP) - France goes to the polls on Sunday in the first round of local elections set to represent a landmark for women in politics and, possibly, the far-right National Front.

The first nationwide vote since Francois Hollande's 2012 election as president takes place with the ruling Socialists battling record unpopularity and the main opposition UMP party grappling with scandals embroiling former president Nicolas Sarkozy.

Against that backdrop, polls have suggested around one in four voters are considering casting their votes for Marine Le Pen's National Front (FN), setting the scene for what could be a breakthrough election for the anti-immigration, anti-EU party led by the daughter of its founder, Jean-Marie Le Pen.

The vote is also set to be a groundbreaking one for women: whatever the final outcome of the two rounds of voting on consecutive Sundays, it is certain that Paris will end up with its first female mayor, while changes to the electoral rules are set to significantly increase the number of women in local governments across France's rural heartlands.

Lt. Gen. McInerney claims he has confirmation Malaysian Airlines Flight 370 is in Pakistan...

Hm...  I think it's at the bottom of the Indian ocean, but until we find it, we can't rule anything reasonable out.

New object spotted in Indian ocean by Chinese satellite...

 Malaysia Airlines Flight 370?

#Breaking:  China says it's spotted possible #MH370 debris in satellite images http://t.co/lipyJgJM8c pic.twitter.com/U3PLrvA1Fg
— David Nelson (@DavidNelsonNews) March 22, 2014

Liberal education update...

An Illinois middle-school handout has revised the Second Amendment.

“This amendment states that people have the right to certain weapons, providing that they register them and they have not been in prison”

Here is what the Second Amendment actually says.

“A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.”

I wonder what other BS they are teaching kids in Illinois. 

Matt Drudge starts paying Obamacare penalty, WH calls him a liar...

Matt Drudge has started paying the Obamacare penalty. The White House has called hem out as a liar because the penalty does not apply to tax year 2013.  What the people who now occupy the WH fail to understand is small businesses and the self-employed have to use IRS form 1040-ES and pay in estimated taxes quarterly. These estimations will include the Obamacare penalty if you owe it. We shouldn't expect the current people at the White House to understand this. They never ran a small business.

Via Breitbart:

A White House aide set off a stampede of liberal media criticism for Internet news pioneer Matt Drudge over Obamacare – but his critics don't seem to understand how small businesses pay taxes.

The brouhaha started when Drudge tweeted, “Just paid the Obamacare penalty for not 'getting covered'... I'M CALLING IT A LIBERTY TAX.”

Jesse Lee, the Director of Progressive Media at Barack Obama's White House, responded that that was a “Flat lie, no fee for previous year,” adding, “Scary how much influence he once had.”

Lee’s response to Drudge set off a firestorm in the liberal media, with many mainstream media and left-wing reporters countering him on Twitter and in their own articles to claim he does not have to pay Obamacare’s Individual Mandate tax until next year. The individual mandate went into effect Jan. 1 of this year, and most people paying their taxes right now are paying taxes for 2013.

“Dude, there's no penalty until next yr,” Sahil Kapur of the leftwing Talking Points Memo tweeted.

Top reason to elect Hillary revealed...

It's her sex. Well, it is hard to think of any other accomplishments...

Friday Fun Video: Putin Sings 'Come Back Barry, When You Grow A Pair' - SPOOF Via RUSH

RUSH: Putin Sings 'Come Back Barry, When You Grow A Pair' - SPOOF 

Hawaii police fight for exemption allowing them to have sex with prostitutes...

Laws are for the little people...

HONOLULU (AP) — Honolulu police officers have urged lawmakers to keep an exemption in state law that allows undercover officers to have sex with prostitutes during investigations, touching off a heated debate.

Authorities say they need the legal protection to catch lawbreakers in the act. Critics, including human trafficking experts and other police, say it's unnecessary and could further victimize sex workers, many of whom have been forced into the trade.

Police haven't said how often — or even if — they use the provision. And when they asked legislators to preserve it, they made assurances that internal policies and procedures are in place to prevent officers from taking advantage of it.

But expert Derek Marsh says the exemption is "antiquated at best" and that police can easily do without it.

"It doesn't help your case, and at worst you further traumatize someone. And do you think he or she is going to trust a cop again?" asked Marsh, who trains California police in best practices on human trafficking cases and twice has testified to Congress about the issue.

I wonder is Hawaii police wear their ninja outfits when they are doing a prostitute? 

Good News: You are paying Mexican sex workers to use condoms...

It's not like we have a $17 trillion national debt or anything. 

Via CNS News:

The National Institutes of Health (NIH) is spending $398,213 on a project studying whether paying male Mexican sex workers for being free of sexually transmitted diseases will increase condom use.
The study, “Conditional Economic Incentives to Reduce HIV Risks: A Pilot in Mexico,” began in June 2011 and is funded through the end of May 2014.
“The working hypothesis is that a program with modest economic incentives to stay free of sexually transmitted infections (STI) can be implemented among MSW (male sex workers) to incentivize condom use and reduction of sex partners,” the abstract of the study says. “We hypothesize that CEI (conditional economic incentives) treatment groups will exhibit greater program participation and retention rates as compared to the control group.”
The study includes male sex workers in Mexico City, who first must attend a workshop on the benefits of condom use and “condom negotiation” before they are broken up into smaller groups.
According to the study abstract, one group of 100 individuals will “receive low incentive ($200 pesos/each time) only if they are free of STIs at months 6 and 12.”

Most transparent administration evah bars press on Michelle Obama China trip...

The  First Lady's office never would say why the press was barred from the China trip...

On Tuesday night, The New York Times reported that no reporters would be traveling with First Lady Michelle Obama to China, and that she would be giving no interviews while there. Nicholas Kristof, the Times columnist, called the First Lady's decision "a mistake," and said it "signals weakness or fear of coverage." Several conservative outlets picked up the Times report, including the influential Drudge Report, which linked to a Weekly Standard article about it.
Shortly after noon on Wednesday, I reached out to the First Lady's office to inquire about the decision. A spokesperson for the First Lady responded to my inquiry but declared the response "off the record," meaning I wasn't allowed to use the information therein. When I told the spokesperson that I needed a response I could use, the spokesperson replied with another off-the-record statement regarding the First Lady's trip.

Don't worry. The mainstream media will jump in Michelle's lap when she returns. 

Crash of Malaysia Airlines flight MH370 found?

JUST IN: Australia's AMSA shares new satellite images of unidentified objects - Object Number 1: pic.twitter.com/u2nMjrgtrJ
— ABC News (@ABC) March 20, 2014

Debris has been found by satellite.

Search crews are scouring the southern Indian Ocean today after two objects that may be related to the missing Malaysia Airlines flight were spotted by satellite, officials said Thursday.

Officials described the sighting as the best lead at this stage in the investigation – saying four aircraft and one merchant ship are heading to the region off the coast of Australia.

A US Navy P-8 Poseidon is involved with the search, occurring about 1,500 miles off of Australia's coast. ABC News' David Wright was the only TV reporter on board the flight.

Crew members told ABC News that they received radar hits of "significant size," indicating something lurking below the water's surface -- but Commander William Marks, spokesman for the US Navy's 7th Fleet, later said the radar return was typical, and not connected to the missing plane.

Obama prepares for yet another vacation...

Is this 4 this year? I lose count. Well, it's not like Russia is invading Ukraine or anything. Oh, wait...

Via Boston Herald:

Like the swallows to Capistrano, the White House advance peeps have hit Martha’s Vineyard scoping out yet another Obama presidential vacation. Ukraine? Crimea? Putin? The president’s going to Mad Martha’s!
Word from The Rock is that Barry, first lady Michelle and kids Sasha and Malia will land on the island sometime around Aug. 9 for a week or so.
As you are so well aware, the first family has vacationed on the Vineyard every summer of Obama’s presidency, with the exception, of course, of 2012, when he was up for re-election and canoodling with the beautiful people in a $30 million estate didn’t exactly jibe with his message.
Sadly, the family’s original rented digs, the 28-acre Blue Heron Farm in Chilmark, were sold a couple of years ago to a couple from England. Who, after shelling out some $30 million, weren’t in the mood to share.
Keep on reading…

Guess which website crashed again...

It wasn't Amazon...

Via Politico:

HealthCare.gov went down for at least 30 minutes Tuesday, an outage blamed on “human error.”
Although resolved quickly, the occurrence was an immediate reminder of how much is riding on the federal enrollment website’s smooth functioning in the final two weeks of the 2014 enrollment season. On Monday, administration officials described a sharp increase in sign-ups during the first half of March that brought the total to 5 million people nationwide. …
“The system is down at the moment. We’re currently experiencing technical difficulties and hope to have them resolved soon. Please try again later,” read the error screen, which appeared upon clicking the “Log In” button on the site’s home screen. It also invited users to submit their email addresses to be notified when the site was back up.

Obama skips many national security meetings, but has time for his NCAA basketball bracket...

Priorities...

Donate $10 to DC abortion fund, get a coat-hanger pendant...

Whoever thought this up is an idiot...

Via The DC Abortion Fund:

DC Abortion Fund is the only organization in the D.C. region that focuses solely on disbursing small patient grants for abortion care in our community.  We are a 501(c)(3) nonprofit, and our work is possible because of supporters like you.
Please donate today!  Your gift is tax-deductible to the extent allowed by law.
We also accept in-kind donations!  Donate an item we can auction at a fundraiser event – for instance: gift certificates, art, sports tickets, gym passes. Or donate services.  Are you a graphic designer?  A skilled translator?  A financial planner? A printer who can assist with photocopies?  Contact dcafevents(at)gmail(dot)com – we’d love to hear from you.
Want to make an even bigger difference? Join our monthly sustainer program! DCAF relies on monthly sustainers to provide a steady source of income we can pledge to callers year-round.  Can we count on you to support our helpline and ensure our patients get the best care possible?
Donors who sign up to give $10/month or more will receive a DCAF coat hanger necklace as our way to say thank you. To join as a monthly sustainer and receive your pendant, visit our online donation page today and in the dedication box, type in “Coat Hanger.”