Fast and Furious

Via Fox News

“The Justice Department has been less than forthcoming since day one, so the revisions here are hardly surprising, and the numbers will likely rise until the more than 1,000 guns that were allowed to fall into the hands of bad guys are recovered — most likely years down the road,” Grassley said in a statement released Thursday.

“What we’re still waiting for are the answers to the other questions the Attorney General failed to answer per our agreement. The cooperation of the Attorney General and his staff is needed if we’re ever going to get to the bottom of this disastrous policy and help the ATF and the department move forward.”

What bothers me the most about Fast and Furious is we know that people have been murdered by weapons involved n this program. We also know that the current administration and Justice department is in hip deep. Even with all this the MSM give the Obama administration a pass when in reality this has the potential of bring the administration down. I thought reporter wanted Pulitzer prizes, instead they want to play lapdog to the Marxist in D.C.
The fast and the furious case will make Watergate look like the third rate burglary it was if only some reporter would grow a pair, Thus goes for Rep Issa and Senotor Grassly

Teleprompter

OMG, I just heard the inventor of the teleprompter passed away today.

The President is at a loss for words.


My thanks to Nash Rambler on this magnificent comment

First Rig Leaves Gulf

As predicted many weeks ago when the one shut down oil drilling in the gulf, the first rig is leaving for Egypt. When these deep water rigs all go so will numerous high paying jobs in the Gulf. More of that hope and change for you.

WASHINGTON — Diamond Offshore announced Friday that its Ocean Endeavor drilling rig will leave the Gulf of Mexico and move to Egyptian waters immediately — making it the first to abandon the United States in the wake of the BP oil spill and a ban on deep-water drilling.

And the Ocean Endeavor's exodus probably won't be the last, according to oil industry officials and Gulf Coast leaders who warn that other companies eager to find work for the now-idled rigs are considering moving them outside the U.S.

Devon Energy Corp. had been leasing the Endeavor to drill in the same region of the Gulf as BP's leaking Macondo well, which has been gushing crude since a lethal blowout April 20.

But Diamond announced Friday it will lease the rig through June 30, 2011, to Cairo-based Burullus Gas Co., which plans to send the Endeavor to Egyptian waters immediately.

Devon is one of three companies that has cited the deep-water drilling ban in trying to ease out of contracts to lease Diamond rigs. Diamond, a drilling company, said it expects to make about $100 million from the deal, including a $31 million early termination fee it recovered from Devon.

Larry Dickerson, CEO of Houston-based Diamond, signaled that other of his company's rigs could be relocated, too.

"As a result of the uncertainties surrounding the offshore drilling moratorium, we are actively seeking international opportunities to keep our rigs fully employed," Dickerson said. "We greatly regret the loss of U.S. jobs that will result from this rig relocation."

It was unclear how many U.S. jobs could leave with the Ocean Endeavor, but typically more than 100 workers are on the rig at any given time, doing everything from drilling to cooking meals. Onshore, a network of businesses supplies the rigs with groceries, equipment, uniforms and drilling materials.

"It's not unusual for an energy service company to have 1,000 vendors that they buy from or purchase services from," noted Rep. Kevin Brady, R-The Woodlands. As a result, Brady said, the economic damage from the moratorium stretches far and wide.

Fearing for investment
Brady and other oil-patch lawmakers have been pressing President Barack Obama to end the six-month moratorium he imposed on 33 deep-water projects May 27 after the explosion of the Deepwater Horizon rig that was drilling a well for BP.

Obama said the ban was needed to allow time for new safety standards to be implemented and a commission to investigate the cause of the April 20 blowout at BP's Macondo well.

Although the administration on Thursday lost its second bid to keep the ban in place while it appeals a federal court's decision to strike down the moratorium, federal regulators plan to try again with a revised version soon.

Dan Pickering, a financial analyst with Tudor, Pickering Holt & Co. Securities, said the legal uncertainties surrounding the ban - and the administration's plan to issue a new, revised moratorium - ensure that no companies will resume deep-water drilling in U.S. waters anytime soon.

"Are you really going to spend $5 million … getting ready to drill a well that someone would then probably block you from drilling?" Pickering said.

Lawmakers complain
Pickering added that prospects are high that a dozen rigs ultimately could leave the Gulf of Mexico because of the ban.

Brady said the rig owners are searching for revenue - even if it means relocating to get it.

"There are two types of rigs in the deep-water Gulf today: those that are leaving the country and those that want to, because with this moratorium hanging over their heads, they simply can't go back to work," Brady said. "I'm afraid this is the first of many rigs and many American jobs to leave the Gulf."

Once the rigs relocate, it could be a minimum of five to 10 years before they return, predicted Rep. Pete Olson, R-Sugar Land.

"We cannot afford to lose these jobs or the energy they provide," Olson said. "President Obama should allow this moratorium to remain lifted and let Americans get back to work."

During trading Friday, Diamond Offshore stock fell 86 cents - or 1.32 percent - to close at $64.40. It has fallen 29 percent from its closing price of $91.20 on April 20, the day the Deepwater Horizon exploded.

jennifer.dlouhy@chron.com

A real first pitch

This is how a first pitch should be thrown, not the rainbow that the one threw, soon after he threw our Nuclear deterrent under the bus.

No US flag flying in Hati

The latest BS from the Obama administration. As a vet this just blows my mind, this needs to be spread around.

Via Waeseal Zippers


The many nations helping Haiti recover from the devastating earthquake that struck there have set up their own military compounds and fly their flags at the entrances. France's tricolor, Britain's Union Jack and even Croatia's coat of arms flap in the breeze.


But the country whose contributions dwarf the rest of the world's — the United States — has no flag at its main installation near the Port-au-Prince airport.

The lack of the Stars and Stripes does not sit well with some veterans and servicemembers who say the U.S. government should be proud to fly the flag in Haiti, given the amount of money and manpower the U.S. is donating to help the country recover from the Jan. 12 quake.

The Obama administration says flying the flag could give Haiti the wrong idea.

"We are not here as an occupation force, but as an international partner committed to supporting the government of Haiti on the road to recovery," the U.S. government's Haiti Joint Information Center said in response to a query about the flag.

The absence of the American flag bothers Navy veteran Arthur Herriford, national president of the Pearl Harbor Survivors Association.

"It's very improper," Herriford said. "Our military people always engage and function under the American colors — always have and always will."

Cadet Has Right Idea

A West Point Cadet has the right idea reading a good book while the one pontificates.
This Cadet is not like the rest with his decorations including the Comabat Ifantrymans Badge he has been there and done that already as an enlisted man.
REUTERS/Shannon Stapleton

Obama To Sit Out Berlin Wall Anniversary

When I was stationed in the Netherlands at Soesterberg AB during the late 80’s we used to practice and train constantly for what we thought was inevitable, the Warsaw Pact coming west. I for one was riveted by the scenes streaming into my Dutch home of the Berlin wall coming down. My then High School aged daughter made a class trip to Berlin and has a chunk of this monstrosity. I guess it’s too much to ask the President of the United States the world’s light of freedom to attend the ceremony. I’m sure its because he wants us to have a society like the paradise the East Germans had, what a joke and parody this administration is.

Via Fox News

President Obama squeezed in a trip to Copenhagen last month to lobby, unsuccessfully, for Chicago to host the 2016 Summer Olympics. He plans to travel to Oslo next month to accept the Nobel Peace Prize, an award that even Obama has said he does not deserve. And this coming week, he sets out on a weeklong tour of Asia.
But the president does not plan to travel to Germany to attend the 20th anniversary celebration Monday of the fall of the Berlin Wall, drawing heated criticism from those who say he's ignoring a shining triumph of American-inspired democracy. Click the title for the full article

More Obama B.S. at Jacksonville NAS.

In a speech Monday at Jacksonville NAS, The President made the following remark, he told the troops today that he won’t risk their lives unless necessary and then,“If it is necessary, we will back you up to the hilt.”

I guess he forgot about Afghanistan and the Generals request for more troops.

On a side note, is this guy ever in D.C or is his administration still in perpetual campaign mode?

Great signs from SF

Some of the signs that greeted the president in the normally leftist enclave of San Fransisco.

Dalai Lama Snubbed By The One

Obama slaps the face of The Dalai Lama by saying he will not meet with him this week. Funny in this town I see Free Tibet stickers on the bumper next to the Obama/Biden or Hope and Change. The one is a joke and the leftists that still support this train wreck must not be paying attention to what is going on
Hat Tip Gateway Pundit

From the Indian Express

In an attempt to gain favour with China, for the first time since 1991 the US President will not meet Tibetan spiritual leader Dalai Lama when he visits Washington this week.

President Barack Obama who is scheduled to undertake his first visit to China next month has apparently decided not to meet the Dalai Lama son as not to annoy Beijing.

"The US pressured Tibetan representatives to postpone a meeting between the Dalai Lama and President Obama until after Obama's summit with his Chinese counterpart, Hu Jintao, scheduled for next month," Washington Post reported.

The Dalai Lama has met every sitting US president since George Bush senior in 1991. China accuses the Dalai Lama of being a ‘splittist’ aiming to separate Tibet from it.

The last time Dalai Lama was here, in 2007, however, George W Bush became the first sitting President to meet with him publicly, at a ceremony at the Capitol in which he was awarded the Congressional Gold Medal, Congress's highest civilian award.

Border Patrol

Can someone explain to me that as the Federal government is adding jobs at a terrific rate, why is the Obama administration is planning on cutting 300 Border Patrol Agents?

Big Brother And The Internet

Just when you think the Obama administration has done enough check out the Senate Bill proposed by reliable leftist Jay Rockefeller D WV. How does this man get reelected by the fine people of this state is a wonder. Click the title for the CNET article

“Bill would give president emergency control of Internet. They’re not much happier about a revised version that aides to Sen. Jay Rockefeller, a West Virginia Democrat, have spent months drafting behind closed doors. CNET News has obtained a copy of the 55-page draft of S.773 (excerpt), which still appears to permit the president to seize temporary control of private-sector networks during a so-called cyber security “emergency.

Democrats and Car Dealerships

The Democrats in congress have finally realized that closing ache thousands of combined GM and Chrysler dealers and causing all of the job losses that will happen is not a good idea. Of course this may effect some of the Obat dealers who somehow kept their franchise when the original closing list came out at the expense of dealers who were actually making more money and sales.
From the Detnews.com, click the title for the complete article


"A majority of the U.S. House of Representatives, an astonishing 222 members, and a quickly growing number in the Senate, from both parties, now fully recognize what is clear to the American people: The leadership of GM and Chrysler made a horrible mistake by their arbitrary termination of profitable dealerships," the statement said. "Detroit and the (White House's) auto task force's flawed business plan will lead to the direct loss of more than 169,000 good jobs and cripple the U.S. auto industry's ability to come back from bankruptcy."

G8 Photo Fury

Here is the world famous photo of the POTUS ogling a 17-year-old Brazilian girl at the G8 conference; I notice the Frenchman is checking her out too.
Here are the quotes from the girl’s family

"If I were there, I would have boxed their ears," said Lucia Rodrigues, 37. "They should be ashamed of themselves."

Patriarch Eduardo Tavares, after finally getting around to seeing the famous photo of his daughter from behind, quickly changed his tune from proud papa to furious father.

"My daughter is not a model and she is not a sex symbol," he told The Post. "That photograph has ruined my whole family."

Now depending on who you believe this shot is a photo capture from a longer video. Lefty's say there is nothing here but the comments from the family make me think different. You would think that the POTUS would have a little more class or at least discretion. But I guess that’s to much to ask of A Chicago street pol

Obama Care

This poster is pretty good, to bad it's probably very close to being right. The last thing we need now is more goverment intervention.

Hat Tip. The Jawa Report

Obama, Chrysler and The UAW

Obama and his minions spinning away on the Chrysler bankrubptcy amazed me.
The bottom line is the Money managers who held the secured senior debt of Chrysler are in fact the firs in line to be paid and in all likelihood recover more of their investor’s money by forcing a liquidation of assets than the 20 cents an a dollar deal offered by the Obama administration
The administration and the lame stream media are trying to paint this as greedy wall street guru’s when in fact these managers are just trying to protect their client investors which by law they have to. Allowing the unsecured debt holders in this case the UAW to be paid off first and then getting to the secured bondholders is completely upside-down.
In other words Obama favored the union hacks of the UAW at the expense of the secured bondholders. Shoot the only reason most of the banks went along with the travesty of the Obama plan was because they took the TARP money and are being told what to do by the administration.
I worked for Chrysler for 15 months in 02 and 03 as a maintenance supervisor at the Warren truck assembly plant also known as Dodge City. I could right a book and the malfeasance and abject laziness of both the UAW work force and the absolute poor management and leadership exhibited by my superiors. If you saw what was actually being done day by day, plus the job pool, the lack of spares and other issues you would be amazed that we built any Rams and Dakota’s at all. On the one side I laughed and smiled when Chrysler went down the tubes because of what I had experienced, what is a shame is what will happen to some of the fine men I had on my crew who did not fit the stereotypical auto union mentality and work ethic and did a great job for me and the company day by day. Unfortunately the bad deals worked out over the years by management and the UAW couple with a poor product line crippled all of the big three, there is know way for Chrysler to survive with the built in legacy costs. A real chapter 11 process will allow them to shed all of this and whatever is left can be organized into a new company. Some will say this is not fair but nothing in life is guaranteed. Only the current administration can seriously think that pouring billions of more dollars into this endless black hole is a good thing. But Obama knows he owes his election to these unions and he is trying to use we the peoples money to bail them out of a situation that the UAW helped foster and create.
If the administration plan had been allowed to go forward with the union getting majority control and the bondholders getting shafted the likelihood going forward of companies that are unionized getting secured bondholder financing in the future would be non existent..

Gerald Warner Write An Interesting Piece In The Telegraph

Click the title to go to the Telegraph online

What I love is the comments when the true leftist calls Gerald a fascist when in fact fascists are the worst case of state control leftists.

If al-Qaeda, the Taliban and the rest of the Looney Tunes brigade want to kick America to death, they had better move in quickly and grab a piece of the action before Barack Obama finishes the job himself. Never in the history of the United States has a president worked so actively against the interests of his own people - not even Jimmy Carter.
Obama's problem is that he does not know who the enemy is. To him, the enemy does not squat in caves in Waziristan, clutching automatic weapons and reciting the more militant verses from the Koran: instead, it sits around at tea parties in Kentucky quoting from the US Constitution. Obama is not at war with terrorists, but with his Republican fellow citizens. He has never abandoned the campaign trail.
That is why he opened Pandora's Box by publishing the Justice Department's legal opinions on waterboarding and other hardline interrogation techniques. He cynically subordinated the national interest to his partisan desire to embarrass the Republicans. Then he had to rush to Langley, Virginia to try to reassure a demoralised CIA that had just discovered the President of the United States was an even more formidable foe than al-Qaeda.
"Don't be discouraged by what's happened the last few weeks," he told intelligence officers. Is he kidding? Thanks to him, al-Qaeda knows the private interrogation techniques available to the US intelligence agencies and can train its operatives to withstand them - or would do so, if they had not already been outlawed.
So, next time a senior al-Qaeda hood is captured, all the CIA can do is ask him nicely if he would care to reveal when a major population centre is due to be hit by a terror spectacular, or which American city is about to be irradiated by a dirty bomb. Your view of this situation will be dictated by one simple criterion: whether or not you watched the people jumping from the twin towers.
Obama promised his CIA audience that nobody would be prosecuted for past actions. That has already been contradicted by leftist groups with a revanchist ambition to put Republicans, headed if possible by Condoleezza Rice, in the dock. Talk about playing party politics with national security. Martin Scheinin, the United Nations special investigator for human rights, claims that senior figures, including former vice president Dick Cheney, could face prosecution overseas. Ponder that - once you have got over the difficulty of locating the United Nations and human rights within the same dimension.
President Pantywaist Obama should have thought twice before sitting down to play poker with Dick Cheney. The former vice president believes documents have been selectively published and that releasing more will prove how effective the interrogation techniques were. Under Dubya's administration, there was no further atrocity on American soil after 9/11.
President Pantywaist's recent world tour, cosying up to all the bad guys, excited the ambitions of America's enemies. Here, they realised, is a sucker they can really take to the cleaners. His only enemies are fellow Americans. Which prompts the question: why does President Pantywaist hate America so badly?

Obama Finds New Language

I don’t know is I should laugh or cry at Obama’s latest gaffe from the NATO summit.
And to think the left and the bots say he is a genius. When are we going to see his college transcripts? Oh, that’s right never, just like the vault copy of his birth certificate.

Via Bloomberg

At a news conference afterward, Obama said his debut on the international stage had convinced him that “political interaction in Europe is not that different from the United States Senate,” where he served before entering the White House.
“There’s a lot of -- I don’t know what the term is in Austrian -- wheeling and dealing, and people are pursuing their interests, and everybody has their own particular issues and their own particular politics,” he said in response to an Austrian reporter’s question.

John Crace of The Guardian Gets It

Check out the op ed by Johb Crace of the The Guardian, he says the truth about the great orator that our own sorry MSM won't. Our media will cheer this clown up until they go to the re-education camps.

Barack Obama the World's Greatest Orator (™all news organisations), didn't exactly cover himself in glory when the BBC's political editor Nick Robinson asked him a question about who was to blame for the financial crisis. Normally word perfect, Obama ummed, ahed and waffled for the best part of two and a half minutes. Here, John Crace decodes what he was really thinking ...

Nick Robinson: "A question for you both, if I may. The prime minister has repeatedly blamed the United States of America for causing this crisis. France and Germany both blame Britain and America for causing this crisis. Who is right? And isn't the debate about that at the heart of the debate about what to do now?" Brown immediately swivels to leave Obama in pole position. There is a four-second delay before Obama starts speaking [THANKS FOR NOTHING, GORDY BABY. REMIND ME TO HANG YOU OUT TO DRY ONE DAY.] Barack Obama: "I, I, would say that, er ... pause [I HAVEN'T A CLUE] ... if you look at ... pause [WHO IS THIS NICK ROBINSON JERK?] ... the, the sources of this crisis ... pause [JUST KEEP GOING, BUDDY] ... the United States certainly has some accounting to do with respect to . . . pause [I'M IN WAY TOO DEEP HERE] ... a regulatory system that was inadequate to the massive changes that have taken place in the global financial system ... pause, close eyes [THIS IS GOING TO GO DOWN LIKE A CROCK OF SHIT BACK HOME. HELP]. I think what is also true is that ... pause [I WANT NICK ROBINSON TO DISAPPEAR] ... here in Great Britain ... pause [SHIT, GORDY'S THE HOST, DON'T LAND HIM IN IT] ... here in continental Europe ... pause [DAMN IT, BLAME EVERYONE.] ... around the world. We were seeing the same mismatch between the regulatory regimes that were in place and er ... pause [I'VE LOST MY TRAIN OF THOUGHT AGAIN] ... the highly integrated, er, global capital markets that have emerged ... pause [I'M REALLY WINGING IT NOW]. So at this point, I'm less interested in ... pause [YOU] ... identifying blame than fixing the problem. I think we've taken some very aggressive steps in the United States to do so, not just responding to the immediate crisis, ensuring banks are adequately capitalised, er, dealing with the enormous, er ... pause [WHY DIDN'T I QUIT WHILE I WAS AHEAD?] ... drop-off in demand and contraction that has taken place. More importantly, for the long term, making sure that we've got a set of, er, er, regulations that are up to the task, er, and that includes, er, a number that will be discussed at this summit. I think there's a lot of convergence between all the parties involved about the need, for example, to focus not on the legal form that a particular financial product takes or the institution it emerges from, but rather what's the risk involved, what's the function of this product and how do we regulate that adequately, much more effective coordination, er, between countries so we can, er, anticipate the risks that are involved there. Dealing with the, er, problem of derivatives markets, making sure we have set up systems, er, that can reduce some of the risks there. So, I actually think ... pause [FANTASTIC. I'VE LOST EVERYONE, INCLUDING MYSELF] ... there's enormous consensus that has emerged in terms of what we need to do now and, er ... pause [I'M OUTTA HERE. TIME FOR THE USUAL CLOSING BOLLOCKS] ... I'm a great believer in looking forwards than looking backwards.

Obama Blow Off Salute To Hero’s Ball

While the MSM had a tingling sensation down their leg on inauguration night in another snub to the military President Obama became the first Chief executive in 56 years to not attend “Salute to Heroes Inaugural Ball. The American Legion sponsors the ball, which recognizes recipients of Medal of Honor, the nation’s highest military award. It started in 1953 for President Dwight D. Eisenhower’s first inauguration. Event co-sponsors include 13 other veterans’ service organizations, among them the Military Order of the Purple Heart and the Paralyzed Veterans of America.
This is the man who is now CINC of the Armed Forces. What a joke but we already knew this. Leftists as a rule loathe the military. This is the same man who in one breath say’s that we must maintain and increase our industrial base while at the same time calling for cuts in military spending. Were does he and his Democrat buddies think that the planes, tanks trucks and armaments come from, France? This is going to be on long 4 years. I just hope that I can still recognize the USA and that we haven’t become some clone of the European Union cradle to grave society.