RedState Morning Briefing
For November 24, 2009

Go to www.RedStateMB.com to get
the Morning Briefing every morning at no charge.

Read More →

Charlie Crist just hurts himself more and more every time he opens his mouth. In January, when he decides to quit the Senate primary (you heard it hear first) and get back in the Florida Governor’s race, he’s going to be doing some scrambling to douse the flames on all the bridges he is burning.

In the latest rant against Marco Rubio Crist attacks Rubio for voting for tax increases in Florida, which were actually unanimously endorsed and Jeb Bush sponsored refusals to roll back property taxes for education initiatives. Crist is also attacking Rubio for wanting to get rid of property taxes by raising sales taxes, a measure that Crist had actually suggested in the first place.

It that wasn’t bad enough, Crist called himself pro-life, ignoring that until recently he called himself pro-choice and called himself “anti-tax” despite proposing and signing into law several recent tax hikes on Florida citizens.

But it gets even better.

Crist also attacked conservatives generally. He pointed out a left wing Daily Kos poll that shows people who question Barack Obama’s citizenship support Marco Rubio. He called conservatives supporting Rubio “angry.” Then he said something peculiar.

“There are a lot of Republicans that don’t have the inclination to go to executive committee meetings,” he said. “There is wide swath of republican voters out there that don’t necessarily listen to cable tv all the time.”

Now, I don’t know if he means that as a good thing or a bad thing. My suspicion is Crist views people who show up at GOP meetings and watch cable news as bad for him. Why? Because all of the county GOP executive committee’s in Florida are backing Marco Rubio and the cable channels are documenting Crist’s flip-flops with great diligence. In other words, Crist is hoping a lot of ignorant voters show up to vote for him on election day.

The Wall Street Journal reports Joe Lieberman is digging in his heels. He will filibuster any health care legislation that contains a public option, even if the legislation allows states to opt-out.

Lieberman has been a thorn in the side of the left ever since they decided to challenge him back in 2006. In that year, the left beat Lieberman in the Connecticut Democrat Primary. Lieberman decided to stay in as an independent in the general election and won. With a number of his long time Senate friends endorsing the Democrat in 2006 because the man had a “D” next to his name, Lieberman has been his own man ever since.

Lieberman retains his Senate committee chairmanship and the privileges of being a Democrat member of the Senate. That may change soon as Harry Reid is staking his reputation on passage of the health care legislation.

I don’t think the GOP is going to pick up enough to take back Congress next year, which I actually think is a very good thing. It increases the odds of Obama being Carter, not Clinton, and will force the GOP to reconsider whether it has the right leadership in place to win — it does not.

But more stories like this one mean the GOP gains in 2010 are going to be significant.

Rep. Dennis Moore (D-Kan.) is reportedly going to announce today that he won’t seek re-election, making him the first Member of Congress this cycle to announce an outright retirement from the House.

The six-term Democrat’s departure, which was reported first by the Kansas City Star Monday morning, will leave his Republican-leaning district up for grabs in 2010.

Jed Babbin has the top story today at Human Events.

Many of President Obama’s critics argue that he and Democratic congressional leaders are out of touch with America.  That judgment is both too harsh and too kind.

It’s too harsh because President Obama congressional Democrats are already reacting to the Tea Partyers’ rebellion against his massive increases in government spending. It’s too kind because the president, Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid are undeterred. They will do whatever is necessary to convince voters that their relentless pursuit of their hyperliberal agenda will reduce the deficit in the hope that voters won’t stop them until it is too late.

Back in May, Obama’s administration was projecting a deficit of $7.1 trillion for the years 2010-2019 on top of the $1.8 trillion deficit in 2009.  Those projections would result in a 2019 deficit that amounted to 82% of the GDP. At that level, America would be a bad credit risk, and the deficit would either result in huge tax increases or an America that would, simply, be bankrupt.

From: John Borowski
Subject: climate change
Date: November 22, 2009 11:06:00 PM EST
To: contact@redstate.com

Dear Redstate,

I am a long time environmental/marine science teacher who lives in a state where climate change is making its mark. Our ocean’s pH is dropping? Glacial ice in the Cascades is receding? Bird migrations have been altered? We are watching invertebrate migration off the coast change? The carbon dioxide levels are 387 ppm? And because of hacked email…now, climate change is definitely a fraud? How sad that you put politics above all us. It is transparent and pathetic. I was…a registered Republican. A Ted Roosevelt/fiscal conservative/God fearing conservative for years and years: now I see my party taken over by fools and corporate shills. Shame on you!
John F. Borowski

Here’s the funny bit — if you google this guy you will find that he is anything but a conservative, let alone a “God fearing” conservative.

Why do lefties always feel the need to lie to establish some level of credibility with their hate?

RedState Morning Briefing
For November 23, 2009

Go to www.RedStateMB.com to get
the Morning Briefing every morning at no charge.

Read More →

Back in the old days, people would at least look ashamed when caught being bribed, but not Mary Landrieu. It’s being called the Louisiana Purchase. Senator Harry Reid put a provision on the health care plan that originally called for $100 million to be funneled to Louisiana exclusively.

Mary Landrieu refused to vote for cloture on the motion to proceed to the health care debate. Reid raised the offer to $300 million and Mary proved she wasn’t a cheap date after all — she took the increase, voted for cloture, and then bragged about the $300 million bribe.

In a statement sure to be repeated by Republicans endlessly over the coming weeks of Senate health care debate, the senator flaunted the inclusion of the provision. “I will correct something. It’s not $100 million, it’s $300 million, and I’m proud of it and will keep fighting for it,” Landrieu told reporters after her floor speech. “But that is not why I started this health care debate; I started this health care debate for all the reasons I just mentioned in my statement” on the floor.

It should not be surprising to learn, though it may make your blood pressure go up. The terrorists who orchestrated 9/11 and masterminded the deaths of thousands of Americans will plead not guilty. They will use their case to try American foreign policy.

Fox News has the details.

Scott Fenstermaker, the lawyer for accused terrorist Ali Abd al-Aziz Ali, said the men would not deny their role in the 2001 attacks but “would explain what happened and why they did it.”

The trial of Zacarius Moussaoui tied up the federal courts for six years and he had pled guilty. How long will the American court system be tied up with pleas of not guilty and claims that America made them do it?

Late last week, servers at Britain’s Climate Research Unit, a part of the University of East Anglia, were hacked and over 172 megabytes of data dumped onto the internet for public access.

The data paints an ugly picture of scientists operating as political hacks orchestrating smear campaigns against global warming dissidents, deleting files rather than make their data publicly available, and manufacturing data to prove their case when the actual data does nothing of the sort.

The University of East Anglia has confirmed the authenticity of the documents. With that confirmation, we see global warming for what it is — a scam perpetuated by scientists intent on gaining access to money.

Even the Washington Post has felt the need to cover this story. The Australian Herald Sun was one of the first to cover the story. They note:

Read More →

Sixty Senators voted to proceed to debate health care. There will be another shot at stopping it through filibuster.

Mary Landrieu, after getting $300 million in the bill for Louisiana, voted for it.

Blanche Lincoln of Arkansas not only voted for it, but now favors a public option.

Voters will remember.

Along the way, there seems to be divisions shaping up within the Democratic Party. Amendments will be offered to try to patch up differences.

Republicans should exploit this. Drag out consideration of the bill as those divisions grow, then offer amendments to exploit the divisions.

As I have said before, if Republicans work to improve the legislation, they presuppose its passage. Instead, the GOP should plan for the destruction of the bill by offering amendments designed to divide and fracture the Democrat coalition.

• Animation of the rise of unemployment since 2007
  Very interesting to watch. And yes, it has only gotten worse since Obama got elected.

It was this past week in which Barack Obama said that deficit spending could cause a double dip recession. Nonetheless, a “New Consensus Views Stimulus as Worthy Step.” That, at least, is the headline in the New York Times as it tries, on its front page above the fold, to push for a second stimulus.

But things are not as they seem.

Remember, Obama says more deficit spending is bad. Then there is this:

Now that unemployment has topped 10 percent, some liberal-leaning economists see confirmation of their warnings that the $787 billion stimulus package President Obama signed into law last February was way too small. The economy needs a second big infusion, they say.

No, some conservative-leaning economists counter, we were right: The package has been wasteful, ineffectual and even harmful to the extent that it adds to the nation’s debt and crowds out private-sector borrowing.

The Times goes on to say that “more dispassionate analysts [have] reach[ed] a consensus that the stimulus package, messy as it is, is working.” But concedes that only “a quarter of the stimulus money [has gone] out the door after nine months.”

If all of this is above the fold in the New York Times, particularly the last bit, why the heck do we need a second stimulus? Only one quarter of the first stimulus has been used and unemployment continues to rise.

Go here and enter your zipcode. You’ll get a quick talking point and the local office number of your United States Senators.

Tell them to vote NO on cloture.

I’ll be on Sean Hannity’s Great American Panel tonight at 9:30 with Gov. Bob Ehrlich and Rev. Jacques DeGraff.

It’s going to be a really good panel tonight, so I hope you’ll tune in to it.

Consider this an open thread.

Got this from a high level source:

I just came from dinner and recognized the voices beside me. It was Earl Blumenauer (D-OR) and three other Democrats. I knew the other faces but names escape me.

They were strategizing on how to raise the gas tax. Congressman Blumenauer said he knew a way to get at least 20 Republicans on board a gas tax increase. The place was loud and that’s about all I could make out. They talked about other times when they manages to split us. It was not fun nor easy to hold back.

Call your Senator right now. Use this link to bypass the congressional switchboard.

Tell your Senator to vote NO on cloture for the motion to proceed to debate.

If the health care legislation goes to debate, Harry Reid will start offering amendments to pick off votes.

Call your Senator right now. Tell them both that a yes vote on cloture is a vote for the health care bill. The Congressional Research Service’s latest study proves that.

Roger Hedgecock has the top story at Human Events today.

Though private fraud gets the bigger headline (think Bernie Madoff), fraud in federal government programs is now so pervasive that even the Obama press is taking notice. The scope of fraud in all federal programs dwarfs the corruption in the private sector the media loves to sensationalize.

Consider the fraud in the Wall Street bailout. Here’s just one example.

This past week, the Inspector General for the TARP $700 billion bailout reported that taxpayers will “almost certainly” lose money on their investments in the “too big to fail” financial institutions.  One reason, it’s safe to say, is contained in Neil Barofsky’s revelation that he is conducting 65 separate investigations of possible fraud involving TARP funds.

• Olympus BioScapes Competition Winners (9 Images)
  Fascinating.

RedState Morning Briefing
For November 20, 2009

Go to www.RedStateMB.com to get
the Morning Briefing every morning at no charge.

Read More →