Is Anyone Minding the Store at the Federal Reserve?

Amazing. Once again we have evidence that our Federal government and their agencies such as quasi-public and quasi-private entities like the Federal Reserve, are poorly run and poorly monitored.

And we want them to run health care? Hell, no.

Obama’s issues crumbling

By Dick Morris

At last, there is convincing evidence that Obama’s poll numbers may be descending to earth. While his approval remains high — and his personal favorability is even higher — the underlying numbers suggest that a decline may be in the offing. Even as he stands on his pedestal, the numbers under his feet are crumbling. Read More...

Senators held stock in bailed-out banks
By Reid Wilson and Kevin Bogardus
TheHill.com

Senators who oversee the $700 billion Wall Street rescue package held stocks in many of the banks bailed out towards the end of last year, according to financial disclosure reports released Friday.

Narco-Terrorism in Peru: The Return of Shining Path

By James M. Roberts and Edwar Enrique Escalante

The Shining Path is revitalized and once again threatening the stability and security of not only Peru but Latin America and the U.S. as well.

The Obama-Berlusconi White House Meeting: Advancing U.S.-Italian Cooperation

By Ted R. Bromund, Ph.D.

The U.S.-Italian relationship will continue to thrive only if it based, as it has been in the past, on a clear vision, held by both countries, of the importance of cooperative action against the enemies of their shared values.

Russia's commodities strategy: While the West talks, Medvedev and Putin lock up resources for the future

The economic glitterati have descended on Russia's "second capital." President Dmitry Medvedev, vice premiers and ministers, CEOs of Intel, Nissan, Coca-Cola and other Forbes 500 companies, and oligarchs are rubbing shoulders with superstar pundits such as Thomas L. Friedman and Nuriel Rubini. All have flocked to the St. Petersburg International Economic Forum.

Russians are all smiles after the purchase of 2 percent of Facebook, and state-owned Sberbank's participation in acquisition of the General Motors Corp.'s German subsidiary Opel. The public discourse is all about diversification, innovation and coping with the global crisis. Mr. Medvedev says he wants innovation-based growth. But privately, many sotto voce discussions turn to the question: What is Russia's global strategy?

Over the last few months, Moscow has pushed hard to consolidate.....

Commentary

Insuring Bankruptcy
Richard W. Rahn | Cato Institute:

If you were in debt, would you be more or less likely to increase your liabilities if you knew someone else would pay them off? Many children can quickly figure out the answer to this question, but it seems to be a real stumper for members of the House Financial Services Committee, chaired Rep. Barney Frank, Massachusetts Democrat. They are considering having the federal government reinsure municipal bonds. Such fiscal madness likely would make even citizens of banana republics blush.

Many state and local governments are having difficulty because of the drop-off in tax revenues caused by the recession. Responsibly managed state and local governments established rainy-day funds during the boom of recent years to tide themselves over and also reduced expenditures. Other state and local government leaders foolishly did not put away reserves and are being forced to make deep budget cuts. Some are increasing taxes (a really destructive act, particularly during a recession).

California is the poster child for irresponsible management and, as a result, is about to run out .......

LIBERALS FEARFUL OF SARAH PALIN

Dr. Jack Wheeler writes:

David Letterman certainly settled one thing this week: that the terms "no-class pervert scumbag" and "liberal" are synonymous.

Sarah Palin wrote a classy yet scathing response to his depraved jokes about her 14 year-old daughter, but she shouldn't have restrained her husband Todd from responding how he wanted. Like any father, he wanted to punch Letterman out.

Todd wanted to issue a public statement saying something like:

"Mr. Letterman, you have insulted my daughter in the most grossly perverted way. I am on my way to New York as you read this to see you. We shall settle this man-to-man, with our fists. Prepare to defend yourself. If you choose not to fight, you will have declared to the world that you are the yellow-bellied coward I know you to be."

Letterman would have soiled his metrosexual pink underwear.

***
Yet liberals are not the only folks scared to death of Sarah Palin. So are the old bulls of the Republican Party Establishment - which is why they replaced her with Newt Gingrich at their annual Senate-House fundraising dinner Monday night (6/08).


In a much related manner, Jack Kelly writes:

Barack Hussein Obama is, by far, the most popular politician in America. And there is little doubt who is number two.

The city of Auburn in upstate New York, population 28,574, held its first annual Founder's Day celebration June 6. The most famous of the city's fathers is William Seward, who as secretary of state purchased Alaska from Russia in 1867.

To commemorate the event, the city council invited the current governor of Alaska. The parade featuring Sarah Palin drew more than 20,000 people, according to press reports.

The next day Ms. Palin traveled to Long Island to speak at a fund raiser for a charity which aids the developmentally disabled. Before that, she and her daughter, Willow, attended a New York Yankees game at the invitation of former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani.

The following night (6/08) on his national television show, David Letterman, being the cowardly pervert he is, told two unbelievably disgusting sexual jokes about 14 year-old Willow Palin.

That many liberals found Mr. Letterman's remarks humorous speaks not only to their depravity, but to their fear.

Obama Fiddles with Our Ability to be a 'Rich Man'

Millionaire media stars get their wish as president goes after wealthy CEOs while filling D.C. with his own czars.

By Dan Gainor
The Boone Pickens Free Market Fellow
Business & Media Institute

In “Fiddler on the Roof,” the hero Tevye sang of how he wished he were wealthy. “If I Were a Rich Man” became a Broadway and movie favorite as a catchy tune and even catchier sentiment. As the struggling Russian peasant explained, “It’s no shame to be poor, but it’s no great honor either.”

No, today, the shame is being rich and President Barack Obama seems determined to bestow the “honor” of poverty on as many as possible. Forget the horrendous tax-and-spend policies that gradually impoverish us all. Obama’s new target is a direct one – the evil, greedy CEO. To do so, he is set to appoint Kenneth Feinberg as his new “Pay Czar.” Read more.

The $114 Billion Rusty Lawn Mower; the Dog That Didn't Bark

Obama's invested our money in another dead company.

By Dan Kennedy
Business & Media Institute

General Motors is worth approximately minus $90 billion. That’s a negative net worth of $90 billion. Into which the president has put about $60-billion total, for 60 percent ownership on our behalf. We have traded plus-$60-billion for minus $54-billion, a net loss of $114-billion. We as investors are upside down by even more than the bankrupt carcass we’ve invested in is upside down.

To do this magical deal, Obama had to commit massive financial fraud (by lying to us and GM stockholders about the company’s certain bankruptcy while engineering it), trash federal bankruptcy law, conspire to steal bondholders’ property and rights (making it insane for anyone to invest in any corporate bonds), create ownership nearly for free for the UAW, and extort the nation of Canada. He did this all in the name of saving jobs – while the result is, in fact, massive job losses, closure of thousands of small businesses (car dealerships) and by domino effect, thousands more. Well, Obama never claimed to be a capitalist, now, did he? Read more.

Cuba: Friends in High Places

STRATFOR

By Scott Stewart and Fred Burton

On June 4, 2009, Walter Kendall Myers and his wife, Gwendolyn Steingraber Myers, were arrested by the FBI and charged with spying for the government of Cuba. According to court documents filed in the case, the Myers allegedly were recruited by the Cuban intelligence service in 1979 and worked for them as agents until 2007. On June 10, 2009, a U.S. Magistrate Judge ruled that the couple posed a flight risk and ordered them held without bond. Read more.

Medical errors kill over 100,000 every year

Dr. William Douglass writes:

By now, you know that hospitals are some of the most dangerous places on earth. The diseases you can catch there are scary enough, but they're not the only thing to be afraid of. No, there's something much more deadly lurking in the halls.

In 1999, a report by the Institute of Medicine (IOM) claimed that nearly 98,000 people die each year as a result of completely preventable medical errors. Ten years later, things have only gotten worse. The latest report by the Consumers Union claims that medical errors are causing more preventable deaths than ever -- over 100,000 each year.

That makes over a million preventable deaths in the last 10 years.

These types of gruesome statistics aren't the least bit surprising. The huge, impersonal health care system is capable of swallowing patients whole and losing them in an increasingly vast shuffle.

The worst part about this whole thing is that these medical errors are usually not the grandiose kinds that make the headlines, such as surgeons removing or transplanting the wrong organs. It's easily preventable things like wrong prescriptions, improper dosages, and poorly administered treatments.

Not long ago, I wrote about a study published in the medical journal Quality and Safety in Health Care that detailed deadly medical errors that occurred in doctor's offices -- before patients even made it to the hospital! The study showed that 82 percent of the errors were caused by so-called "system malfunctions." One patient died because a message was not delivered on time.

As disturbing as this is, I shudder to think about how much worse they're likely to get when the health care system is hijacked by Obama's bureaucrats.

Try to name just one thing that's run better after it's been taking over by a government bureaucracy.

Besides, the Obama Administration has bungled the takeover of the U.S. auto industry. Why should we trust them to do any better with health care?

The government has already poured a staggering $19 billion into health care information technologies like electronic prescription systems. The theory is that such systems will help to eliminate all medical errors which stem from unintentional drug interactions -- even to clear up the confusion that can be caused by illegibly written prescriptions.

In the end, no matter what precaution Uncle Sam puts in place, the best way to keep yourself as safe as possible from these kinds of errors is to take more control of your own health care. If it's at all possible, choose a small family practice as your primary care provider instead of a medical mega-plex. You're much less likely to get lost in the shuffle that way. Don't be afraid to ask questions or get a second opinion -- or even a third, for that matter. You can't be too careful these days.

All you have to do is look right here at home, at the V.A., and Medicaid, and at Massachusetts's failed attempt to reform and provide health care with government involvement, you will see one big failure.

We do need to fix the problem but, we do not need more of this.

"One single object ... [will merit] the endless gratitude of the society: that of restraining the judges from usurping legislation."

--Thomas Jefferson

WE GO LEFT, EU GOES RIGHT

Conservatives score wins in EU parliament voting - Yahoo! News

BRUSSELS – Conservatives scored victories in some of Europe's largest economies Sunday as voters punished left-leaning parties in European parliament elections in France, Germany and other nations.

Some right-leaning parties said the results vindicated their reluctance to spend more on company bailouts and fiscal stimulus to combat the global economic crisis.

MORE EVIDENCE OF GLOBAL WARMING?

Green Bay breaks 1943 cold record...

North Dakota city sees first June snowfall in 60 years...

Suspicions link Chavez to Peru revolt

Amazon activists aim to thwart energy decrees - Washington Times

TRYING TO 'BLOODY HER UP'

Palin fends off ethics charges - Washington Times

The accusations made news, but with another dismissal of an ethics charge last week against Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin, the former Republican vice-presidential nominee has quietly been cleared of every ethics complaint filed since the torrent of allegations began in 2008.

Mrs. Palin, who became a target of such complaints after being named Sen. John McCain's running mate, is 14-for-14 in fighting off the complaints. She's been cleared of 13 charges by the independent State Personnel Board and of another complaint by the Federal Election Commission (FEC).

After the latest complaint in Alaska was dismissed last week, Mrs. Palin's team said that having to fend off the pile of accusations was wasting state money. Read more.

Yes, she has been cleared of all 14 charges. But the left obviously fears what she represents and is apparently trying to make her damaged goods before 2012 rolls around. Will it work?

OPINION

By ANDREW BREITBART: Know thy enemy: This is not your mother's Democratic Party - Washington Times

The Democratic Party's attitude to elections is admirable: Win. And recent history has shown it will do anything to do so.

When, if not now, will Republicans develop such a fighting spirit?

Democrats invest - with taxpayer money, mind you - in groups like ACORN that, among other sordid tactics, seek out Skid Row bodies and wheel them to polling places. All the Democratic National Committee needs are vans and smelling salts. Pop culture and the "education system" have done the rest, making "D" the default choice on Election Day.

Democrats brazenly take policy positions - think government services and even amnesty for illegal immigrants - not because they are the right thing to do, but because they are time-tested demographic bribes. Forget....

By LAWRENCE KUDLOW: Time to roll back the stimulus - Washington Times

Testifying before the House Budget Committee this week, Federal Reserve Board Chairman Ben S. Bernanke said that when the time comes, the Fed will raise interest rates in order to stop inflation from building in the next recovery.

He also asked for "fiscal balance" to sustain financial stability. On the surface - in terms of keeping prices stable and restoring value to the softening U.S. dollar - this is positive. Surely Mr. Bernanke wants to do right for America, and he is giving it his best shot.

But when you talk to traders and economists, the whispered story is that Mr. Bernanke and the Fed are no longer truly independent of the Obama White House and Treasury.

By VICTOR DAVIS HANSON: The diversity mess - Washington Times

U.S. Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr. has scolded Americans for being "cowards" and not talking more about race. Now Mr. Holder is getting that "dialogue" with the recent controversy surrounding President Obama's Supreme Court nominee, Judge Sonia Sotomayor.

Most of the furor surrounds statements on race by Judge Sotomayor herself: "I would hope that a wise Latina woman with the richness of her experiences would more often than not reach a better conclusion than a white male who hasn't lived that life."

Judge Sotomayor was clear enough. In a broad discussion about sex/race discrimination cases and their history, she said judges' ethnicity and gender make them better or worse at what they do.

Couple charged with spying for Cuba

Washington Times

State Department veteran, wife plead not guilty

They wouldn't have looked out of place at a yacht club with him dressed in a blue blazer and khakis and her sporting a soft tan but federal authorities say the appearance of Walter Kendall Myers and his wife, Gwendolyn Myers, belied a darker truth: For three decades, the couple spied for the Cuban government.

Another Korean war?

By JEFFREY KUHNER:  - Washington Times

North Korea threatens to engulf the Korean Peninsula in an all-out war. Pyongyang's recent test of a nuclear bomb poses a serious threat to international security and regional stability.

Dictator Kim Jong-il continues to thumb his nose at global leaders, especially President Obama. The ailing strongman has denuded Mr. Obama on the world stage, revealing his soft-power strategy to be ineffective and reckless.

ON EDUCATION

"The teaching establishment and politicians have hoodwinked taxpayers into believing that more money is needed to improve education. The Washington, D.C., school budget is about the nation's costliest, spending about $15,000 per pupil. Its student/teacher ratio, at 15.2 to 1, is lower than the nation's average. Yet student achievement is just about the lowest in the nation. What's so callous about the Washington situation is about 1,700 children in kindergarten through 12th grade receive the $7,500 annual scholarships in order to escape rotten D.C. public schools, and four times as many apply for the scholarships, yet Congress, beholden to the education establishment, will end funding the school voucher program. Any long-term solution to our education problems requires the decentralization that can come from competition. Centralization has been massive. In 1930, there were 119,000 school districts across the U.S; today, there are less than 15,000. Control has moved from local communities to the school district, to the state, and to the federal government. Public education has become a highly centralized government-backed monopoly and we shouldn't be surprised by the results." --Walter E. Williams, Mason University economics professor.

"In the end, the explanation for this long, long war -- which grows longer -- doesn't lie in anything we've done but in who we are: a nation dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal and endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights. Has there ever been a doctrine more subversive to the despotisms of the world? What we in the West do, right or wrong or neither, is but an excuse for the war being waged against our civilization by a rapacious enemy. It is what we are that threatens them: a beacon. Ideas have consequences; they can spread of their own accord. That is why we are such a threat to their closed societies. It is what we represent: freedom. And freedom attracts by its very existence. Eternal vigilance, it turns out, isn't just the price of liberty but of our existence." --Paul Greenerg, editor of the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette.

"Obama the Humble declares there will be no more 'dictating' to other countries. We should 'forge partnerships as opposed to simply dictating solutions,' he told the G-20 summit. In Middle East negotiations, he told al-Arabiya, America will henceforth 'start by listening, because all too often the United States starts by dictating.' An admirable sentiment. It applies to everyone -- Iran, Russia, Cuba, Syria, even Venezuela. Except Israel. Israel is ordered to freeze all settlement activity. As Secretary of State Clinton imperiously explained the diktat: 'a stop to settlements -- not some settlements, not outposts, not natural-growth exceptions.' What's the issue? No 'natural growth' means strangling to death the thriving towns close to the 1949 armistice line, many of them suburbs of Jerusalem, that every negotiation over the past decade has envisioned Israel retaining. It means no increase in population. Which means no babies. Or if you have babies, no housing for them -- not even within the existing town boundaries. Which means for every child born, someone has to move out. No community can survive like that. The obvious objective is to undermine and destroy these towns -- even before negotiations. ... Blaming Israel and picking a fight over 'natural growth' may curry favor with the Muslim 'street.' But it will only induce the Arab states to do like [Mahmoud] Abbas: sit and wait for America to deliver Israel on a platter. Which makes the Obama strategy not just dishonorable but self-defeating." --columnist Charles Krauthammer

... In short, Obama's 'straight talk' to the Arab world, which began with his disingenuous claim that like America, Islam is committed to 'justice and progress; tolerance and the dignity of all human beings,' was consciously and fundamentally fraudulent. And this fraud was advanced to facilitate his goal of placing the Islamic world on equal moral footing with the free world." -- Caroline Glick, columnist, editor and senior Middle East fellow, Center for Security Policy.

COMMENTARY

Weather Malarkey
By Alan Caruba
I can't figure out why people who know that the local weather forecast is likely to be wrong by the afternoon of the same day can still believe that the U.N. Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change can accurately predict what the weather will be 10, 20, or even 50 years from now…

CNSNews.com - House GOP Leader Challenges Pelosi to Provide Justice with Evidence CIA Lied to Her

House Minority Leader John Boehner (R-Ohio) yesterday challenged House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D.-Calif.) to provide the Justice Department with any evidence she has to prove her claim that officials of the Central Intelligence Agency committed the crime of lying to Congress.

Pelosi’s press spokesman, meanwhile, told CNSNews.com it was not a legitimate question to ask him if Pelosi intended to make a criminal referral of the matter to the Justice Department

CNSNews.com - Sotomayor Failed to Disclose to Senate Memo in Which She Argued Death Penalty Is 'Racist'

The Judicial Confirmation Network (JCN) says Judge Sonia Sotomayor failed to disclose to the Senate Judiciary Committee a controversial document arguing that the death penalty is “racist” and a violation of the present “humanist” thinking of society.

The 1981 memo, they say, should have been disclosed as required under Question 12 (b) of the questionnaire that the Supreme Court nominee turned in Thursday.

Hezbollah, Allies Defeated in Lebanon Poll But Outlook Still Troubling
(CNSNews.com) – Lebanon’s pro-Western coalition declared victory over Hezbollah and its allies in Sunday’s parliamentary election but the result looks set to leave Lebanon essentially where it was before, with the powerful Shi’ite terrorist group posing a threat to political stability and refusing to disarm…

American Legion Critical of Obama for Apologizing to Muslim World for U.S. Actions in Aftermath of 9/11
(CNSNews.com) – The nation’s largest veterans’ organization, the American Legion, criticized President Obama for apologizing for to the Muslim world for U.S. behavior in the in aftermath of the 9/11 attacks during his address from Cairo last week…

Top Obama Adviser: Congress Will Approve Government-Owned Health-Care This Summer(CNSNews.com) - Senior White House Adviser David Axelrod said on CBS’s “Face the Nation” Sunday that President Obama intends to promote a health-care reform plan that will include creating a government-owned health-care company. He predicted that Congress will enact such a plan by the end of the summer. Axelrod said that a government-owned health-care company would “give consumers a better deal."…

Obama Calls for Government-Owned Healthcare Company
(CNSNews.com) - President Barack Obama reaffirmed his desire for the government to create and run a national health insurance company in a letter he sent to Sens. Edward Kennedy (D-Mass.) and Max Baucus (D-Mont.), leaders of the Democrats’ efforts to transform the nation’s healthcare system from a largely private one into one dominated by Washington. A leading conservative critic described the plan as little more than a massive Medicare system, complete with all the problems and multi-trillion-dollar debt of the current Medicare program…

CALIFORNIA'S BUDGET TROUBLES

By William Shughart
Senior Fellow at The Independent Institute

"The fundamental problem here is that governments at every level overspent when economic times were good. Now that the recession has brought the chickens home to roost, all are engaged in desperate attempts to shift the burden of paying for past extravagances onto others' shoulders. A more principled response – although not one which should be expected from self-serving politicians – would be to cut government down to a size that taxpayers can afford and to supply the public goods and services for which they are willing to pay." Read more.

The Rich Pay More Taxes: Top 20 Percent Pay Record Share of Income Taxes

Since the passage of the 2001 and 2003 tax cuts, critics have claimed incessantly that they disproportionately benefited the rich while burdening the poor. Now that the data is in, these claims have been shown to be unquestionably false. Read more.

ON CAP AND TRADE

From The Heritage Foundation:

Our Center for Data Analysis is finishing a study on the economic impacts of the proposed energy tax currently being considered by Congress, aka “Cap and Trade” legislation, and the preliminary results are in:

• It would shrink the national economy by $7.4 trillion by 2035.
• It would eliminate millions of jobs without replacing them with so-called “green jobs.”
• It would increase your electricity bill by 90% and your gasoline prices by 74%, so that the average household energy bill would increase by $1,500 per year.
• And, even if you accept all the science from the International Panel on Climate Change, the legislation would only lower the temperature by .1-.2 degrees C by 2100. Put another way, this legislation is all economic pain for NO environmental gain.

The Economic Impact of Waxman-Markey

Representatives Henry Waxman (D-CA) and Ed Markey (D-MA) proposed yet another global warming bill following the tradition of McCain-Lieberman, Lieberman-Warner, Dingell-Boucher, and others. Though the proposed legislation would have little impact on world temperatures, it is a massive energy tax in disguise that promises job losses, income cuts, and a sharp left turn toward big government.

'Cap and Trade Is A Tax and It's a Great Big One'

IMMIGRATION AND ENVIRONMENTALISM

Roy Beck, founder of Numbers USA spoke before the Senate Judiciary Committee on June 3, 2009 on immigration and its' impact on the environment.

Apparently he was ridiculed by many on the left, like the Daily Kos (which I don't follow) for example.

Mr. Beck responds to this criticism here.