marioblog2: 2012

Thursday, March 15, 2012

10 Things Every Gun Owner Must Know About Barack Obama

From the NRA Political Victory Fund:

Hat tips: Conservative Daily News and BadBlue.

Larwyn's Linx: Comparative analysis of the teleprompter president’s oratory

Have a news tip or great story? Drop me an email. Bloggers: you can install a Larwyn's Linx blog widget!

QOTD: "I’m not running for any office, but I’m more than happy to accept the dubious honor of being Barack Obama’s “enemy of the week” if that includes the opportunity to debate him on the issues Americans are actually concerned about. …

Just off the top of my head, a few of these concerning issues include: a debt crisis that has us hurtling towards a Greek-style collapse, entitlement programs going bankrupt, a credit downgrade for the first time in our history, a government takeover of the health care industry that makes care more expensive and puts a rationing panel of faceless bureaucrats between you and your doctor (aka a “death panel”), $4 and $5 gas at the pump exacerbated by an anti-drilling agenda that rejects good paying energy sector jobs and makes us more dependent on dangerous foreign regimes, a war in Afghanistan that seems unfocused and unending, a global presidential apology tour that’s made us look feeble and ridiculous, a housing market in the tank, the longest streak of high unemployment since World War II, private-sector job creators and industry strangled by burdensome regulations and an out-of-control Obama EPA, an attack on the Constitutional protection of religious liberty, an attack on private industry in right-to-work states, crony capitalism run amok in an administration in bed with their favored cronies to the detriment of genuine free market capitalism, green energy pay-to-play kickbacks to Obama campaign donors, and a Justice Department still stonewalling on a bungled operation that armed violent Mexican drug lords and led to the deaths of hundreds of innocent people." --Sarah Palin

Wednesday, March 14, 2012

Diagramming President Obama's Oil Lies

And I call them lies because more diplomatic terms like "misstatements", "fibs" or "fabrications" simply don't apply to agitprop.

When he was running for the Oval Office four years ago amid $4-a-gallon gasoline prices, then-Sen. Barack Obama dismissed the idea of expanded oil production as a way to relieve the pain at the pump.

"Even if you opened up every square inch of our land and our coasts to drilling," he said. "America still has only 3% of the world's oil reserves." Which meant, he said, that the U.S. couldn't affect global oil prices... It's the same rhetoric President Obama is using now, as gas prices hit $4 again, except now he puts the figure at 2%...

But the figure Obama uses — proved oil reserves — vastly undercounts how much oil the U.S. actually contains. In fact, far from being oil-poor, the country is awash in vast quantities — enough to meet all the country's oil needs for hundreds of years...

• ...At least 86 billion barrels of oil in the Outer Continental Shelf yet to be discovered, according to the government's Bureau of Ocean Energy Management.

• ...About 24 billion barrels in shale deposits in the lower 48 states, according to EIA.

• ...Up to 2 billion barrels of oil in shale deposits in Alaska's North Slope, says the U.S. Geological Survey.

• ...Up to 12 billion barrels in ANWR, according to the USGS.

• ...As much as 19 billion barrels in the Utah tar sands, according to the Bureau of Land Management.

• ...Then, there's the massive Green River Formation in Wyoming, which according to the USGS contains a stunning 1.4 trillion barrels of oil shale — a type of oil released from sedimentary rock after it's heated.

• ...A separate Rand Corp. study found that about 800 billion barrels of oil shale in Wyoming and neighboring states is "technically recoverable," which means it could be extracted using existing technology. That's more than triple the known reserves in Saudi Arabia.

All told, the U.S. has access to 400 billion barrels of crude that could be recovered using existing drilling technologies, according to a 2006 Energy Department report... When you include oil shale, the U.S. has 1.4 trillion barrels of technically recoverable oil, according to the Institute for Energy Research, enough to meet all U.S. oil needs for about the next 200 years, without any imports.

And even this number could be low, since such estimates tend to go up over time...

Recent polls show Americans overwhelmingly support expanding offshore drilling and tapping the tiny spit of land in ANWR.

But this sort of obstructionism is just one more example of the Democrats' senseless hatred of the people's will -- as they continually operate without the consent of the governed -- be it energy, health care, forced unionization, national security, and every other issue of national import, etc.

But take heart. November is coming.

Admirer of him though I may be, it's time for Newt Gingrich to step aside

While I wasn't directly in Newt's camp -- he was my second favorite candidate after Rick Santorum -- I agree with Dan Riehl.

Via Reuters, yes, I'd say Newt's campaign is very much in doubt, alright. Now, he'll only hurt his reputation with many in the base if he remains in the race...

"This really was his last chance to show whether he had the ability to win," said Natalie Davis, professor of political science at Birmingham Southern College in Birmingham, Alabama. "If he can't win in Alabama ... he really can't win anywhere. This was his last stand and he lost."

...I backed Newt after Perry dropped and didn't turn on him after he imploded in Florida, while also having a terrible debate. I've been content to watch it play out, not hitting either him, or Santorum. But all Newt can be from here on is a spoiler.

The bottom-line is, whether you back him, or not, Santorum has won himself the right to go one-on-one with Romney and settle things cleanly and once and for all. Not only will Newt begin to lose more and more friends across the conservative base by staying in - they'll see it as his ego and Adelson's money keeping him in - he's likely to begin performing worse and worse, only making it all the worse for him.

By losing as he did last night, he proved he can't win much of anywhere. His candidacy is not viable. The only honorable move left for Newt is to drop out. Do the right thing, Newt. Enough GOP primary voters have spoken that, in my opinion, the best thing Newt can do now is to show some respect for them.

What's been fascinating about Santorum's rise is that he's done it even though Gingrich (and earlier, other conservatives) split the base's vote.

Romney's problem is that he abandoned the base from the start. That doesn't seem to me to be a viable plan to win the primary, much less the general.

Related:
• In defense of Rick Santorum.
• Rick Santorum for President.

Democrats launch next phase of Obama deification iconography: U.S. flag substitutes Obama's face for stars

Think you've become inured to the litany of affronts that this administration has levied upon the American people? Let's just call this the Obama Outrage D'jour.

Saw this over at Ace’s place, where a county Democratic Party headquarters flew a flag with Obama’s face on it.

The story is here and more pictures are here.

Ace suggests we call it "The 57th Star Flag".

I'm settling for "f***ing abomination", but not one that's necessarily unexpected coming from the master of demagogic iconography.

I couldn't help but notice:

Yeah, I know it's a violation of Godwin's Law, but still.

And no, Obama's not Hitler.

But still. Is it just me, or are the similarities somehow there? And don't get me started on Obama's "Truth Teams".

Related: Government is their god.

Crazy Racist Tea-Bagger Attacks Innocent Black Comedian

Oh, my bad. I screwed up the headline. I meant it to read Crazy Racist Comedian Attacks Innocent Tea-Partier.

The New York Times bestselling author of the explosive new book, Hollywood Hypocrites: The Devastating Truth About Obama’s Biggest Backers, Jason Mattera, had his crew’s camera snatched and hurled by comedian Chris Rock when he asked the star why he has called the Tea Party racist.

Mattera's new book is available here. It sounds like a hoot.

Larwyn's Linx: GOP Primary Results: Santorum Wins AL and MS

Have a news tip or great story? Drop me an email. Bloggers: you can install a Larwyn's Linx blog widget!

2012 Elections

GOP Primary Results: Santorum Wins AL and MS: RSM
Is Obama running against Sarah Palin?: Power Line
Palin to Obama: I'll debate you anytime, anywhere: Hot Air

Trump Tells Santorum to “Get Out;” Wins AL and MS Instead: Bruce
Not Closing the Deal: Erickson
Losing, Newt sets new goal: Keep Mitt from 1,144: Exam

Nation

Obamacare Cost Jumps $111B, No One Notices: Power Line
The entire Obama presidency, in one anecdote: Peth
Online, liberals far less tolerant than normal people: IBD

HHS Finalizes Rules: Obamacare Will Fund Abortions: WZ
"Game Change", Fluke Share Obama-linked PR Firm: Riehl
Granholm Goes Off the Rails: Wolf Howling

Finding out what's in it: Abortion coverage in Obamacare: Pundette
"Catholic Lite Brigade" tries to undermine the bishops: Pundette
TX Planned Parenthood CEO arrested for indecent exposure: Jawa

Economy

Surprise: Obamacare's Price Tag Nearly Doubles: Townhall
Non-shocker of the day: AFL-CIO endorses Obama: Twitchy
2,000+ Page ObamaCare Creates Another 640 Pages On Exchanges: Cove

Economy Actually Lost 2.7 Million Jobs in January: Morris
Obamcare raising costs, forcing workers out of existing plans: AEI
Strategy Memo Details Liberal PR Plan to Promote Obamacare: Foundry

Scandal Central

Highway bill amendment defeated that would have sent billions to Soros, Pickens, Douglas companies: Events
Chu Admits Obama Bundler Pressed to Finalize Solyndra Loan: Beacon
Obama's failed energy policies: WaPo

Climate & Energy

No Warming For 17 Years – Game, Set, Match: Real Science
ABC/WaPo: 65% Disapprove of Obama Handling of Gas Prices; Salazar: President Feels Your Pain: Malkin
Rising gas prices can be directly attributed to Obama’s failed energy policy: Q&O

The real oil production numbers Obama doesn’t want you to see: Q&O
Coming Soon: The Commercials that Obama Fears: AT
Energy Shares Suffer 'Gas' Pangs: WSJ

Media

MSNBC's Goose and Rush's Gander: AmSpec
Media Baffled as Obama’s Approval Among Women Craters: JWF
Ford, Sony, Amex will work with Gawker, but not conservative talk radio: LI

Underexposed President To Talk Basketball On Halftime Show During NCAA Game: WZ
Obama Approval Hits New Low — Turns Out Women Buy Gas Too: Powers
Why the Bell-Obama Connection Matters: Shapiro

Firing at Breitbart when he can’t fire back: Pollak
Bigot Bill Maher dubs Deep South primary “Toothless Tuesday”: Twitchy
AP: None Of Obama’s Problems Are His Fault: S&L

Online, liberals far less tolerant than normal people: IBD
What's the matter with Soledad O'Brien?: Malkin
Vile Twitter account mocking Breitbart’s widow suspended: Twitchy

World

Obama: I’m “Generally Proud” of American Troops…: WZ
Afghan Taliban Vow to Behead U.S. Soldiers, Obama Flies Off to Watch Basketball: JWF
Muslim ‘Skank Lists’ in Dearborn?: Creeping

Pics From the Front: WZ
First Look at the Secret Iranian Site the U.N. Wants to Inspect: AtlWire
Chinese Spies Use Fake Facebook Pages to Gain Intel: DefTech

Obama loses the real war: Surber
Haaretz Wikileaks exclusive / Bahrain King boasted of intelligence ties with Israel: Haaretz
Sarkozy’s cry for help: Marsden

Sci-Tech

New Israeli Machine Gun: Military
Lifelock Dinged $12 Million for Deceptive Business Practices: Wired
A Patent Lie: How Yahoo Weaponized My Work: Wired

Cornucopia

How I Became a Hate Group: Sultan Knish
WWII soldier's diary supports claim Hitler fathered French love child: Fox
Homeless people turned into walking Wi-Fi hotspots in 'charitable experiment': Fox

Image: Weasel Zippers
Today's Larwyn's Linx sponsored by: Rick Santorum for President: a Constitutional Conservative

QOTD: "In November of 1985, the Harvard Law Review published a seminal article of Critical Race Theory, written by Derrick Bell, and edited by a student, Elena Kagan. The same article was cited by Professor Charles Ogletree and by President Obama as support for her nomination to the U.S. Supreme Court in 2010. The article defines the Constitution as a form of “original sin”. A similar view has been expressed by President Obama in referring to the flaws of the Constitution. Most of the article is fiction and meant as a parable. Unfortunately, the parables of a racist are now becoming institutionalized within our legal system." --Skook, Flopping Aces

Tuesday, March 13, 2012

Al Gore Hardest Hit: Most Polar Ice Ever Recorded

Didn't the pudgy grifter named Al Gore claim that the polar ice caps would melt completely "in just a few years?"

Turns out that Climategate was only the beginning. The United Nations' global warming scam (which is the term they prefer, I hear) is unraveling faster than a pair of Michael Moore's spandex bike shorts.

Exhibit 4,035? March 6, 2012 represented the "Most polar ice ever recorded":

So much for an ice-free Arctic. Henry Hudson’s long-ago dream of a Northwest Passage that would link England to the Orient by sea will have to wait another century as Mother Earth gives him the cold shoulder. Again.

From Real Science: “1979 was the peak year for Arctic ice, yet 2012 has more ice around Greenland and Alaska than 1979 did.”

Same date satellite data seems to show that Iceland and everywhere else is iced over this year when they were feeling a little green 33 years ago.

Of course, our moral and intellectual superiors elsewhere in the press keep banging the drums of Man Caused Global Warming.

Don Surber has the rest.

Related: "This was the moment when the rise of the oceans began to slow..."

Great News: CBO Reconsiders Obamacare, Decides Country Is Headed for Collapse Under President Subprime McDowngrade

Pity they couldn't have told the American people before the passage of the Patient Destruction Act.

CBO Report: Spending Is Driving Debt to “Unsupportable” Level

...CBO’s “alternative” projections ... make clear once again that too much spending—not too little tax revenue—is the biggest threat to the country’s fiscal and economic health. Among other things, the alternative figures show that:

Federal spending will consume record levels of resources as a share of the economy, reaching nearly one-quarter of gross domestic product (GDP) in 2022.

Without tax increases, tax revenue would still reach its historical average, but uncontrolled spending would outpace revenue. This would push federal debt to levels that the CBO calls “unsupportable.”

CBO’s conventional baseline (defined by statute) projects spending, tax revenue, and deficits assuming current law—including scheduled changes in law. This includes an expiration of the “doc fix,” which has prevented a plunge in Medicare physician reimbursements every year since 2003, and the expiration of the Bush-era tax policies, as well as a number of other tax provisions. These would result in a tax increase of about $4 trillion over the next 10 years. These assumptions represent what CBO calls “a significant departure from recent policies.” That is, no one expects these changes to happen...

Oh, and as for Obamacare itself -- guess what?

CBO: New 10-year projected cost of ObamaCare is … $1.76 trillion

...The original 10-year price tag, the one that made it “safe” (but not really safe) for Democrats to drop this fiscal atomic bomb, was $940 billion. What happened, you ask? Well, see for yourself:

Remember, they gamed this thing so that it wouldn’t take effect until 2014, which means that the cost of the first four years of implementation was essentially zero. That $940 billion figure really represented just six years of cost, not 10, but it was politically invaluable to Democratic messaging in letting them tout the bill as costing less than a trillion dollars. Now that we’re nearing 2014 and the 10-year window of cost projections has slid forward, you can see what this leviathan boondoggle really costs: $1.76 trillion, soon to top $2 trillion when the window slides forward another year in 2013 and the new projection reaches into 2023.

But wait. More good news: "Four million Americans can expect to lose their employer-provided healthcare by 2016, according to the revised figures, far more than the 1 million people estimated last year..."

Thanks to the economy, we’re going to end up with a lot fewer people getting health insurance through the workplace than previously estimated and a lot more people getting it through Medicaid, which, as Klein notes, inches us a little closer to that government takeover of health care that the left insists is a conservative myth...

This represents another all-too-predictable failure by the Utopian Statists -- also known as Democrats -- who are bent on dominating our lives.

Epic fail juxtaposition o' the day

James Pethokoukis calls this item "The entire Obama presidency, in one anecdote."

One of my favorite moments from the new book The Escape Artists: How Obama’s Team Fumbled the Recovery:

Energy was a particular obsession of the president-elect’s, and therefore a particular source of frustration. Week after week, [White House economic adviser Christina] Romer would march in with an estimate of the jobs all the investments in clean energy would produce; week after week, Obama would send her back to check the numbers. “I don’t get it,” he’d say. “We make these large-scale investments in infrastructure. What do you mean, there are no jobs?” But the numbers rarely budged.

[Ed: gee, what a surprise!]

Now let’s fast forward to this past September:

A $38.6 billion loan guarantee program that the Obama administration promised would create or save 65,000 jobs has created just a few thousand jobs two years after it began, government records show. The program — designed to jump-start the nation’s clean technology industry by giving energy companies access to low-cost, government-backed loans — has directly created 3,545 new, permanent jobs after giving out almost half the allocated amount, according to Energy Department tallies.

So where are the new jobs coming from, at least the good-paying ones? From the industry Obama wants to replace as much as possible with “clean” energy: oil and gas.

Fast forward this week to President Obama's ~~spastic, poll-driven reaction~~ considered policy positions on, eh, energy.

To purportedly tame the progressive rise in gas prices, President Obama visited a North Carolina truck manufacturer on Wednesday to unveil a new $1 billion plan to advocate electric and alternative vehicles through consumer incentives and federal grants for states.

The "green" initiative, tagged the "National Community Deployment Challenge," provides a $10,000 tax credit — up from the current $7,500 incentive — to consumers purchasing "advanced cars and trucks." The grant program includes a "Race to the Top" contest that would award money to states with "model communities" that agree to fund infrastructure such as charging stations or natural gas corridors "where alternative fuel trucks can transport goods without using a drop of oil," according to the White House Press Fact Sheet.

Yes, that's right. He wants to funnel more money to his campaign contributors, bundlers, and other fat-cats and claim it's for "green jobs".

What's the definition of insanity again?

Looking for a conservative news portal? BadBlue is "like Lucianne or Drudge but more comprehensive"

That's a direct quote from Ace of Spades' Maetenloch, describing the new conservative news aggregator BadBlue.com.

BadBlue automatically monitors over 500 blogs, news sites and web periodicals and ranks each of their stories based upon social media mentions and other factors. Stories are exhaustively reviewed in near real-time, 24 hours a day, to determine which make the front page:

Especially fast-moving stories are highlighted in color. Let's take a closer look at a couple of examples:

Here we've highlighted two stories. The top story ("Just posted: The #Sharptontapes: MSNBC's hate-monger lets loose...") is blue, which means it's rising quickly in popularity on the social networks. The source of the story ("Malkin") is Michelle Malkin's popular site and is followed by its popularity (53) and the number of clicks (in this case, the story is brand new and hasn't received any clicks). The second story ("Is Obama Running Against Sarah Palin?") comes from the Power Line blog and also has a popularity ranking of 53. It's received 21 click-throughs.

You can chart the popularity of each story by clicking on the story's permalink icon (the small ∞ symbol) or any of the popularity numbers. Here's the popularity of a story from the award-winning Shark Tank blog.

The permalink page also has a comments section.

By clicking on the site name (e.g., "Malkin" or "Power" in the above examples), you can get a list of the most popular stories from each site. Here's an example using the blog Creeping Sharia:

The executive summary?

It's news for conservatives. Always fresh. Always relevant. 24 by 7, 365. Or 366, in this case. It's BadBlue.

Larwyn's Linx: Carney: Newt Gingrich “Lying” About $2.50 Gas

Have a news tip or great story? Drop me an email. Bloggers: you can install a Larwyn's Linx blog widget!

Nation

Carney: Newt Gingrich “Lying” About $2.50 Gas: Dossier
President Signs Law Placing Prior Restraint on Free Speech: NewAm
Rep. Joe Walsh: We've go one election to save this country: Scoop

Jon Bruning: The Eric Holder Republican: RS
Are We Better Off Than We Were 4 Years Ago? Uh, No.: Bruce
Justice Department rejects Texas voter ID law: Politico