The Dept. of Justice, which should be protecting the rights of all Americans and the Constitutionally enumerated equality of all (Fourteenth Amendment), apparently is not fulfilling its mandate. Under Obama and Attorney General Eric Holder, a racist bias has suffused the agency. Their ideology is that some people - blacks in particular and Democratically voting Hispanics - are "more equal" than others, specifically Whites. Some of this also stems from Obama's 20 years attending the vitriolic, racist rants of Rev. Wright in church where he preached black nationalism and supremacy. (Then again, Obama "claimed" to have heard nothing controversial. And Bill Clinton "didn't inhale" or "have sex with that woman".)
This sanctioned and enforced racism of blacks over whites is something that all Americans need to be aware of and react and respond to aggressively. If not, our rights will continue to progressively erode and we will find ourselves in a racially very hostile country that may be balkanized.
The video below which recorded in 2002 captures the leader of the New Black Panther Party, Malik Zulu Shabazz, praising Osama Bin Laden “not bowing down” to America. In it he states:
“Let’s talk about this brother, because he’s a bold man… Usama Bin Laden, Mr. Bin Laden. Gotta give him his respect. He’s not bowing down. He’s not cutting [?] the tap dance… Mr. Bin Laden standing up. There’s a man born in Saudi Arabia bringing reform, Mr. Bin Laden. But you’re not supposed to say these things about him. I thought we had free speech.”
Shabazz is one of the men that Attorney General Eric Holder and the Obama Administration mysteriously and inexplicably dropped charges against in the blatant case (which the government already won) of voter intimidation during the Presidential elections. We would like to know if they were also aware of his strong support of Bin Laden. It would not surprise us and would clearly make the Administration's actions even more egregious.
In the following editorial, David Limbaugh details the unprecedented level of arrogance and condescension spewing from members of the Obama Administration. Their demeanor is one of a ruling elite in an autocracy rather than of a representative government serving at the pleasure of the public.
Then add to this unabashed racism of black on white and unequal justice and what results is a noxious mixture that will be destructive to our country.
Unprecedented Arrogance
David Limbaugh 7/2/2010
The Obama administration grows more arrogant, cavalier and fundamentally dishonest every day. Just in the past few days, we've seen a number of troubling examples. Frankly, sometimes it's hard to keep up.
In a speech in Wisconsin, Obama was bragging about how wonderful the terrible economy is. You'll recall that during both of President George W. Bush's terms, Democrats, including Obama, castigated him for destroying the economy, despite the existence of empirically verifiable robust growth during some seven of those eight years.
Now that Obama has been in office for a year and a half and his economy is failing by all objective measures, he and his Democrats demand, once again, that we ignore the empirical evidence in front of our faces and bow down to them in reverent gratitude for ensuring that things are not worse than they are.
Everyone knows Obama promised -- he was hardly tentative about his prediction -- that if the nation followed him over the cliff with his harebrained "stimulus" scheme, unemployment would not exceed 8 percent. When unemployment soared above 10 percent, he insisted we be patient to allow his plan to work. Now that it stubbornly remains in the high 9s, he tells us that if he hadn't implemented his stimulus bill, the economy would be much worse (12 or 13 or 15 percent), so we not only are forbidden from criticizing him for this disaster but also must genuflect because only three of the four wheels of the economy are teetering over the edge of the cliff.
He said, "There may be some roads that not only were repaired but also were ... linked up to create a new industrial park that would facilitate long-term economic development beyond this immediate crisis."
Can you imagine the reaction of the liberal media had a Republican president uttered such gibberish? There "may be some roads"? How's that for a non-statement? That were linked up to a new industrial park to facilitate long-term growth? How about some facts here, Mr. Intellectual? Then again, how can you blame him for citing nebulous "facts" and failed economic theory when neither the real facts nor the economic evidence substantiates his claims.
He also said that every economist who's looked at it has said that the recovery did its job. Would someone please get this man a link to The Heritage Foundation's website or any other credible conservative think tank or economist? Time and time again, Heritage scholars have not only argued but also demonstrated why Obama's economic policies don't work in theory and haven't worked in practice. As noted many times before, they have not helped avert a crisis, but have exacerbated already bleak conditions. Sure, all economists agree with him, just as all Americans agree with his socialistic policies.
Moving on, in the past few days, we've also heard from former Justice Department attorney J. Christian Adams, who has confirmed -- from the belly of the beast -- our worst suspicions about Obama and Eric Holder's Justice Department's dismissing a slam-dunk case for voter intimidation against New Black Panther Party members for racial reasons. This is an egregious trampling on the rule of law, an outrage that would subject any Republican president to charges of high crimes and misdemeanors, a scandal of the first order for which this administration isn't even bothering to develop "plausible deniability."
Next, we read about Obama's reaction to Sen. Lamar Alexander's reasonable suggestion that any energy discussion between the president and a "bipartisan" group of senators should include a focus on the oil spill and BP. Obama said, "That's just your talking point," and flat-out refused to discuss the subject. Is he king or what?
Finally, we've also witnessed this week another outburst from that paragon of smugness, White House press secretary Robert Gibbs, whom I criticized earlier for mocking members of the press corps for their legitimate questions in lieu of attempting to answer them in good faith.
This time, this little smarmy nerd-thug mocked Sen. Jon Kyl of Arizona for claiming Obama told him in a private meeting he would not secure our borders because it would disincentivize Republicans from supporting his effort to pass "comprehensive immigration reform" (read: amnesty). Gibbs accused Kyl of changing his story and basically arguing with himself on the matter, even though Kyl has not retreated an iota from the only relevant assertion: that Obama made the statement in question. Watch the video in which Gibbs clearly intends to create the false impression Kyl had vacillated on his charge and tell me with a straight face we're not dealing with an entirely unprecedented level of arrogance in this White House.
The following video captures the racist vitriol of one of the individuals charged in the New Black Panther Party voter intimidation case that occurred in Philadelphia during the Presidential elections. He lost the case that the Bush Administration had originally filed but then the Obama Administration dismissed all charges without explanation.
If this had been the KKK or a white supremacy group, you can be most assured that this case would have been prosecuted to the fullest and you would have read about it ad infinitum in the news media.
We have always vehemently felt that the dismissal by the Obama Administration of voter intimidation charges against the New Black Panther Party was evidence of their racist, double-standard ideology and not because of lack of evidence. The U.S. had all but won the case yet when it was dismissed, black Attorney General Eric Holder stonewalled all who sought an explanation for the action.
Finally, we now have an answer provided by an attorney within the Justice Dept. who was directly involved in the case. This attorney, J. Christian Adams, has provided explicit inside information on this particular case as well as the mindset and ideologies of those within the Justice Dept. What he reveals in an excoriating expose is precisely what we expected and what is at the ideological core of Obama and his Administration: anti-White racism and a double-standard of ignoring minority perpetrated acts of lawlessness while prosecuting those where Whites were the violators.
This should come as no surprise to those who have investigated or paid close attention to even parts of Obama’s past. His 20 years in the Black Nationalist, anti-White, anti-American Trinity United Church of Christ in Chicago which was led by Rev. Wright and honored and revered the despicably racist, anti-Semitic and anti-American Nation of Islam leader Louis Farakkhan. (See video as refresher). His associations with many other black racists over much of his life (check the category Reverse Racism for more).
The endemic (reverse) racism in the government fostered, facilitated and condoned by Obama and his appointees MUST NOT BE TOLERATED!
We must widely expose, condemn and attack this corrupt and illegal attitude and behavior which starts at the top: Obama
OBAMA MUST BE REMOVED FROM OFFICE!!
Inside the Black Panther case Anger, ignorance and lies
By J. Christian Adams June 25, 2010
On the day President Obama was elected, armed men wearing the black berets and jackboots of the New Black Panther Party were stationed at the entrance to a polling place in Philadelphia. They brandished a weapon and intimidated voters and poll watchers.
After the election, the Justice Department brought a voter-intimidation case against the New Black Panther Party and those armed thugs. I and other Justice attorneys diligently pursued the case and obtained an entry of default after the defendants ignored the charges. Before a final judgment could be entered in May 2009, our superiors ordered us to dismiss the case.
The New Black Panther case was the simplest and most obvious violation of federal law I saw in my Justice Department career. Because of the corrupt nature of the dismissal, statements falsely characterizing the case and, most of all, indefensible orders for the career attorneys not to comply with lawful subpoenas investigating the dismissal, this month I resigned my position as a Department of Justice (DOJ) attorney.
The federal voter-intimidation statutes we used against the New Black Panthers were enacted because America never realized genuine racial equality in elections. Threats of violence characterized elections from the end of the Civil War until the passage of the Voting Rights Act in 1965. Before the Voting Rights Act, blacks seeking the right to vote, and those aiding them, were victims of violence and intimidation. But unlike the Southern legal system, Southern violence did not discriminate. Black voters were slain, as were the white champions of their cause. Some of the bodies were tossed into bogs and in one case in Philadelphia, Miss., they were buried together in an earthen dam.
Based on my firsthand experiences, I believe the dismissal of the Black Panther case was motivated by a lawless hostility toward equal enforcement of the law. Others still within the department share my assessment. The department abetted wrongdoers and abandoned law-abiding citizens victimized by the New Black Panthers. The dismissal raises serious questions about the department's enforcement neutrality in upcoming midterm elections and the subsequent 2012 presidential election.
The U.S. Commission on Civil Rights has opened an investigation into the dismissal and the DOJ's skewed enforcement priorities. Attorneys who brought the case are under subpoena to testify, but the department ordered us to ignore the subpoena, lawlessly placing us in an unacceptable legal limbo.
The assistant attorney general for civil rights, Tom Perez, has testified repeatedly that the "facts and law" did not support this case. That claim is false. If the actions in Philadelphia do not constitute voter intimidation, it is hard to imagine what would, short of an actual outbreak of violence at the polls. Let's all hope this administration has not invited that outcome through the corrupt dismissal.
Most corrupt of all, the lawyers who ordered the dismissal - Loretta King, the Obama-appointed acting head of the Civil Rights Division, and Steve Rosenbaum - did not even read the internal Justice Department memorandums supporting the case and investigation. Just as Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr. admitted that he did not read the Arizona immigration law before he condemned it, Mr. Rosenbaum admitted that he had not bothered to read the most important department documents detailing the investigative facts and applicable law in the New Black Panther case. Christopher Coates, the former Voting Section chief, was so outraged at this dereliction of responsibility that he actually threw the memos at Mr. Rosenbaum in the meeting where they were discussing the dismissal of the case. The department subsequently removed all of Mr. Coates' responsibilities and sent him to South Carolina.
Mr. Perez also inaccurately testified to the House Judiciary Committee that federal "Rule 11" required the dismissal of the lawsuit. Lawyers know that Rule 11 is an ethical obligation to bring only meritorious claims, and such a charge by Mr. Perez effectively challenges the ethics and professionalism of the five attorneys who commenced the case. Yet the attorneys who brought the case were voting rights experts and would never pursue a frivolous matter. Their experience in election law far surpassed the experience of the officials who ordered the dismissal.
Some have called the actions in Philadelphia an isolated incident, not worthy of federal attention. To the contrary, the Black Panthers in October 2008 announced a nationwide deployment for the election. We had indications that polling-place thugs were deployed elsewhere, not only in November 2008, but also during the Democratic primaries, where they targeted white Hillary Rodham Clinton supporters. In any event, the law clearly prohibits even isolated incidents of voter intimidation.
Others have falsely claimed that no voters were affected. Not only did the evidence rebut this claim, but the law does not require a successful effort to intimidate; it punishes even the attempt.
Most disturbing, the dismissal is part of a creeping lawlessness infusing our government institutions. Citizens would be shocked to learn about the open and pervasive hostility within the Justice Department to bringing civil rights cases against nonwhite defendants on behalf of white victims. Equal enforcement of justice is not a priority of this administration. Open contempt is voiced for these types of cases.
Some of my co-workers argued that the law should not be used against black wrongdoers because of the long history of slavery and segregation. Less charitable individuals called it "payback time." Incredibly, after the case was dismissed, instructions were given that no more cases against racial minorities like the Black Panther case would be brought by the Voting Section.
Refusing to enforce the law equally means some citizens are protected by the law while others are left to be victimized, depending on their race. Core American principles of equality before the law and freedom from racial discrimination are at risk. Hopefully, equal enforcement of the law is still a point of bipartisan, if not universal, agreement. However, after my experience with the New Black Panther dismissal and the attitudes held by officials in the Civil Rights Division, I am beginning to fear the era of agreement over these core American principles has passed.
J. Christian Adams is a lawyer based in Virginia who served as a voting rights attorney at the Justice Department until this month. He blogs at electionlawcenter.com.
Obama has unequivocally displayed a criminal dereliction of his duty as President to appropriately address and assist in the BP oil disaster. As detailed below, he was informed within the first 24 hrs. of the magnitude of the spill and the potential extent of the environmental damage.
What were his responses?
Very little, initially. It took him close to 2 weeks even to visit the area. None of the government’s contingency plans were implemented early one. In fact, his most forceful response within the first several weeks has been to assign Attorney General Holder the task of looking into criminal charges and sending attorneys to the area.
We are betting that these lawyers can actually plug the hole – using all the paper they will generate in their documenting the legal liabilities and constructing a case against BP! May be they can also add the waste produced from Obama’s myriad White House galas during this period of time into the hole.
Even more criminally and just more evidence of why he should be impeached/removed from office:
In this seven week period of time, he has yet to directly talk to the CEO of BP, Tony Hayward. Unbelievably, it was beneath him to talk to the head of this multibillion dollar company in order to strategize and work together for a solution. Obama’s response as to why he hasn’t called the CEO was that words don’t mean anything, action does.
Ironically, Mr. Pretender President, it is YOUR WORDS THAT DON’T MEAN ANYTHING.
YOUR ACTIONS CLEARLY REVEAL WHAT AND WHO YOU ARE.
INCOMPETENT, ARROGANT, NARCISSISTIC, RACIST, HEDONISTIC and ANTI-AMERICAN
AND …
UNFIT TO BE PRESIDENT!
Butt Stops Here
Investors Business Daily 06/08/2010
Leadership: The president says he went to the Gulf to find out whose derriere to kick. After he gets his foot out of his own mouth, perhaps he can talk to us about that Coast Guard memo.
Scapegoating has become a hallmark of this administration. Certainly BP was responsible for the safe operation and maintenance of Deepwater Horizon. But after an accident in federal waters the federal government, which has a plan to save the entire planet from greenhouse gases, had no plan to save the Gulf from a single gushing well, with the possible exception of finger-pointing. In this administration, "BP" stands for "buck-passing."
In an interview with NBC's Matt Lauer on Tuesday, President Obama said: "I was down there a month ago, before most of these talking heads were even paying attention to the Gulf. A month ago, I was meeting with fishermen down there, standing in the rain. ... We talk to these folks because they potentially had the best answers, so I know whose ass to kick."
The talking heads were talking about the Gulf in the two weeks it took the president to make his first appearance there. But Fox News and talk radio had no fire booms to instantly deploy — booms the government was supposed to have, according to a 1994 plan.
The president who has said he would not rest until the hole was plugged has had time to entertain celebrities from Bono to Paul McCartney, get in a few rounds of golf, attend concerts and fundraisers, and even yuk it up at the White House Correspondent's Dinner. He did not have time, apparently, to expedite Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal's request for additional sand berm construction.
The president was quick, however, to send Attorney General Eric Holder to the Gulf to threaten BP oil executives with prosecution. On April 29, Jindal declared a state of emergency and begged federal officials for permission to build a network of sand berms to protect Louisiana marshes and beaches. A month later Jindal got permission to build 2% of the berms requested.
British Petroleum has been accused of lying about or at least of not knowing the true extent of the disaster. But documents obtained by the Center for Public Integrity shed new light on what the president knew, and when.
Rep. Darrell Issa, the top Republican on the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, has released documents indicating that on April 21, less than 24 hours after the BP rig exploded, the administration knew the magnitude of the disaster we were facing in the Gulf of Mexico.
"Potential environmental threat is 700,000 gallons of diesel on board the Deepwater Horizon and estimated potential of 8,000 barrels per day of crude oil, if the well were to completely blow out," the Coast Guard logged in the immediate aftermath.
Documents obtained by the Center for Public Integrity show that within 72 hours, President Obama and his administration knew the BP spill could exceed the environmental damage caused by the Exxon Valdez running aground off Alaska in 1989.
"Americans have a right to be enraged by the spill, by top government officials caught off-guard and by the facts the White House omitted in explaining what it knew and when it knew it," said Issa.
They also have a right to be outraged by an administration that places blame instead of sharing it, and by a president who has time for commencements and fundraisers while passing the buck to a commission.
Arizona Governor Jan Brewer distills the incompetence, arrogance and abdication or the Obama Administration’s responsibilities regarding the immigration problem with a video message that even a child can understand. This can be found on the site www.securetheborder.org which we suggest that you visit.
The following is associated with this site:
Arizona Sing-A-Long: Reading Helps You Know What You’re Talking About
While broken borders are not a laughing matter, Washington’s
failure to read Arizona’s immigration law is laughable
PHOENIX –– Two weeks ago, Governor Jan Brewer took President Obama to task for making Arizona’s unsecured borders and illegal immigration crisis a laughing matter. However, since then, Washington’s comedy of errors has grown far worse, with top cabinet officials admitting that they haven’t even read Arizona’s new immigration law. Broken borders are not a laughing matter, but the failure by Obama’s trusted officials to read Arizona’s law before commenting and condemning it is laughable. As a result, SecuretheBorder.org is using a little bit of humor to remind everyone in Washington of the importance of reading. Watch the latest video below:
“Our message is simple: reading helps you know what you’re talking about. That’s why we put Arizona’s immigration law up on www.SecuretheBorder.org,” said campaign spokesman Doug Cole. “Arizona is trying to do the job that the federal government has failed to do, and members of the president’s cabinet condemn it without even reading it. They have time to apologize to China and give President Calderon a standing ovation, but they don’t have the time to read Arizona’s law. Just more examples of how Washington is broken.”
The video features Attorney General Eric Holder, Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano and Assistant Secretary of State PJ Crowley admitting that they have not read Arizona’s immigration law.
Is his utter incompetence as Attorney General the ultimate result of affirmative action years ago? Or does he represent the political appointment of a consummately incompetent, intellectually challenged, arrogant ideologue with a poor work ethic?
Or all of the above?
Negligent. Dismissive. Incompetent. Not fit to serve.
Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano is yet another member of the Obama Administration (see Attorney General Eric Holder) who should be at the forefront of the immigration debate but could not find the time to read the 10 page Arizona immigration law yet did find the time to make derogatory and inflammatory comments regarding it for media reports. Even more ironic, absurd, unbelievable and evidence of the influence of political considerations, is that she was the Governor of Arizona prior to being selected by Obama to her present position. She was eminently aware of the uncontrolled illegal immigration problem at that time and had even requested federal government help.
So, two of the most important and relevant individuals in the federal government who should be responsible for constructively addressing the immigration problem have not been responsible or relevant. They have negligently abdicated their responsibilities to protect Americans and uphold the law.
Both Janet Napolitano and Eric Holder must be removed from office.
The incompetence, arrogance, demagoguery and general chutzpah that Attorney General Eric Holder displays seems to know no bounds. Neither Obama nor most of the press have criticized him on these – an inexcusable and abominable failing of all these parties.
Holder’s latest transgression involves gratuitous and inflammatory comments regarding Arizona’s immigration law which he has attacked. However, when confronted by Rep. Ted Poe, he admitted that he had not read the legislation. His comments were solely based on media stories and what he heard.
We are not talking about a piece of legislation that exceeds two thousand pages as the Obamacare bill does. This is merely 10 pages long and essentially mirrors the federal law.
You mean to tell us that the Attorney General can’t read a simple 10 page document that has been the cynosure of controversy for several weeks? Boycotts such as by California and other organizations are either being threatened or have been enacted. Even dictator Hugo Chavez of Venezuela has insinuated himself in the conflict. This issue is dangerously expanding not dying down.
Is reading 10 pages of crucial and "controversial" legislation too much to ask of the Attorney General of the United States?
We don’t think so. What we do know is that Eric Holder has recklessly abdicated his responsibilities of this post and yet again has shown general fecklessness, partisanship and divisiveness which make him unfit to continue serving in his present capacity.
We once again are calling for his removal from office.
Holder hasn't read Arizona law he criticized
Stephen Dinan May 13, 2010
Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr., who has been critical of Arizona's new immigration law, said Thursday he hasn't yet read the law and is going by what he's read in newspapers or seen on television.
Mr. Holder is conducting a review of the law, at President Obama's request, to see if the federal government should challenge it in court. He said he expects he will read the law by the time his staff briefs him on their conclusions.
"I've just expressed concerns on the basis of what I've heard about the law. But I'm not in a position to say at this point, not having read the law, not having had the chance to interact with people are doing the review, exactly what my position is," Mr. Holder told the House Judiciary Committee.
This weekend Mr. Holder told NBC's "Meet the Press" program that the Arizona law "has the possibility of leading to racial profiling." He had earlier called the law's passage "unfortunate," and questioned whether the law was unconstitutional because it tried to assume powers that may be reserved for the federal government.
Rep. Ted Poe, who had questioned Mr. Holder about the law, wondered how he could have those opinions if he hadn't yet read the legislation.
"It's hard for me to understand how you would have concerns about something being unconstitutional if you haven't even read the law," the Texas Republican told the attorney general.
The Arizona law's backers argue that it doesn't go beyond what federal law already allows, and they say press reports have distorted the legislation. They point to provisions in the law that specifically rule out racial profiling as proof that it can be implemented without conflicting with civil rights.
But critics said giving police the power to stop those they suspect are in the country illegally is bound to lead to profiling.
Mr. Holder said he expects the Justice and Homeland Security departments will finish their review of the Arizona law soon.
It seems that wherever one looks at in the Obama Administration, there are quixotic ideologues and corrupt, arrogant, contemptuous, radical and inept individuals. Rather than serving the public, they are elitists that see the American public as their servants. Rahm Emanuel and David Axelrod are quintessential examples but unbelievably, may not be the worst offenders. This dubious distinction goes to Attorney General Eric Holder. Not enumerated in the following editorial was his galling and indefensible dropping of voter intimidation charges by the Dept. of Justice against two individuals of the New Black Panther Party who were already prepared to plead guilty. His racism appears to be the only motivation behind this action which he refuses to elaborate on.
The Self-Righteous Haplessness Of Eric Holder
By Michael Gerson 03/18/2010
Attorney General Eric Holder is controversial on the left for preserving much of the Bush administration's legal structure for conducting the war on terror. He is controversial on the right for overturning portions of that structure in ways that seem both clueless and reckless.
But Holder is the most endangered member of the Obama Cabinet for a different reason: Just about everything he has touched has backfired. The list is oddly impressive.
First, there was the decision to release Bush-era interrogation memos and reopen the investigation of CIA interrogators after they already had been cleared by career prosecutors. Holder assumed that these actions would rally public outrage. Instead, he started a national security debate he has pretty much lost.
Seven former CIA directors — serving under Nixon, Reagan, Bush 41, Clinton and Bush 43 — sent Holder a letter warning that his actions could "help al-Qaida elude U.S. intelligence and plan future operations." Holder opened a serious, ongoing rift between the Department of Justice and the intelligence community.
Trial Of The Century
Second, there was Holder's repudiation in the matter of John Yoo and Jay Bybee — the Bush administration lawyers who provided the legal justification for enhanced interrogations. Holder appointees had determined the two lawyers guilty of professional misconduct. But the Justice Department's senior career attorney cleared Yoo and Bybee of the charge, embarrassing Holder in the process.
Third, there was the handling of the underwear bomber case. It is fortunate that Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab eventually resumed cooperation. It is also evident that Holder's decision to Mirandize him after 50 minutes was hasty and based on minimal consultation with intelligence officials. Holder treated a national security judgment as a purely legal one.
Director of National Intelligence Dennis Blair later told Congress: "That unit (the High Value Interrogation Group) was created exactly for this purpose — to make a decision on whether a certain person who's detained should be treated as a case for federal prosecution or for some of the other means. We did not invoke the HIG in this case; we should have."
In fact, Blair was unaware that the High Value Interrogation Group did not yet exist.
Fourth, there is the closing of the prison at Guantanamo Bay and the civilian trial for Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and other 9/11 conspirators in Manhattan. Under Holder's direction, this process has collapsed.
There is no serious plan to close Guantanamo. Holder has been unable to articulate reasons why some terrorism cases are referred to civilian courts while others are tried in military tribunals. And his groundwork for a "trial of the century" was botched in almost every respect.
The White House, having lost faith in Holder's ability to manage terrorism trials, has assumed direct control of the process. Civilian trials for the 9/11 terrorists now seem unlikely anywhere in the U.S.
But backing down on that commitment will have a cost. "If this stunning reversal comes to pass," said Anthony D. Romero, executive director of the American Civil Liberties Union, "President Obama will deal a death blow to his own Justice Department, not to mention American values."
While a military trial for KSM would hardly be a mortal blow to American ideals, Holder's initial announcement has created a political expectation on the left that may be impossible to fulfill.
Finally, there are the Supreme Court briefs filed by Holder that he failed to disclose to Congress during his confirmation — likely to be the focus of a congressional oversight hearing in which Holder will testify on Tuesday.
Public Blunders
Holder's spokesman says this omission was inadvertent. But one of those briefs opposed the detention of Jose Padilla as an enemy combatant, leading Sen. Jon Kyl, R-Ariz., to wonder, "Are we expected to believe that then-nominee Holder, with only a handful of Supreme Court briefs to his name, forgot about his role in one of this country's most publicized terrorism cases?"
Holder's briefs preview his later decisions on the underwear bomber and KSM. Few in Congress or the White House have leapt to defend Holder's convenient omission.
Add to all of this a series of public gaffes. America is a "nation of cowards." The possibility of capturing Osama bin Laden alive "simply does not exist."
Sometimes haplessness can provoke sympathy. But Holder mixes ineptness with self-righteousness. Critics of his questionable choices, he says, "cower." They lack "confidence in the American system of justice."
But there is another possibility. Perhaps Holder's critics — in Congress, in the country and even within the White House — just lack confidence in his judgment.
• Gerson, a syndicated columnist with the Washington Post Writers Group, was head speechwriter and a policy adviser for George W. Bush from 1999 to 2006.
Just when you thought that you heard it all regarding the “hijacking” of our government or “coup” by the Obama Administration that seems to be working for the other side (our enemies), now comes word from Attorney General Holder that nine Obama appointees in the Justice Department have previously represented or advocated for terrorist detainees before joining the Justice Department.
Are you kidding? This is an absolute outrage that should not be tolerated by the American people! Where is the media to expose such blatant, corrupt, and perfidious actions by the Obama Administration? This isn’t the first time that Obama and Holder have acted to protect and aid our enemies while trying to usurp the rights and freedoms of the average American.
And some people wonder why millions of Americans feel that Obama is acting against rather than in support of the United States?
Obama’s mentor for at least 20 years, Reverend Jeremiah Wright, would repetitively proclaim from his pulpit in church: ”Goddamn America!”
Obviously, despite his denials, Obama was listening and is a full fledged believer.
Holder admits nine Obama Dept. of Justice officials worked for terrorist detainees, offers no details
by Byron York Chief Political Correspondent 02/19/10
Attorney General Eric Holder says nine Obama appointees in the Justice Department have represented or advocated for terrorist detainees before joining the Justice Department. But he does not reveal any names beyond the two officials whose work has already been publicly reported. And all the lawyers, according to Holder, are eligible to work on general detainee matters, even if there are specific parts of some cases they cannot be involved in.
Holder's admission comes in the form of an answer to a question posed last November by Republican Sen. Charles Grassley. Noting that one Obama appointee, Principal Deputy Solicitor General Neal Katyal, formerly represented Osama bin Laden's driver, and another appointee, Jennifer Daskal, previously advocated for detainees at Human Rights Watch, Grassley asked Holder to give the Senate Judiciary Committee "the names of political appointees in your department who represent detainees or who work for organizations advocating on their behalf&hellipthe cases or projects that these appointees work with respect to detainee prior to joining the Justice Department&hellipand the cases or projects relating to detainees that have worked on since joining the Justice Department."
In his response, Holder has given Grassley almost nothing. He says nine Obama political appointees at the Justice Department have advocated on behalf of detainees, but did not identify any of the nine other than the two, Katyal and Daskal, whose names Grassley already knew. "To the best of our knowledge," Holder writes,
during their employment prior to joining the government, only five of the lawyers who serve as political appointees in those components represented detainees, and four others either contributed to amicus briefs in detainee-related cases or were otherwise involved in advocacy on behalf of detainees.
Holder says other Obama appointees, like Holder himself, came from law firms which represented detainees but did no work on behalf of the terrorist prisoners. But other than Katyal and Daskal, Holder does not reveal any names of any Obama appointees, nor does he mention the cases they worked on.
And what are they recused from, anyway? Very little. Holder writes that Katyal has not worked on any Guantanamo detainee matters but has participated in litigation involving detainees who continue to be detained at Bagram Airfield, Afghanistan and in litigation involving [Ali Saleh Kahlah] al-Marri, who was detained on U.S. soil." As for Daskal, "she has generally worked on policy issues related to detainees," Holder writes. "Her detainee-related work has been fully consistent with advice she received from career department officials regarding her obligations."
As for everyone else, Holder lists no names and no cases, but in a paragraph filled with modifiers, he makes it clear that all the lawyers who had advocated for detainees are free to work on general detainee matters.
The senior Department officials referenced above, like other political appointees who are similarly situated, have recused from particular matters regarding specific detainees in which their former firms represent the detainee or another party and from decisions relating specifically to the dispositions of particular detainees represented by their former firms. These recusals pertain to decisions relating to particular matters involving specific parties who are or have been represented by their former law firms within the relevant time period. However, as noted above, these senior officials have been authorized to participate in policy and legal decisions regarding detainee matters, in particular matters regarding specific detainees whom their prior employer did not represent, and in decisions relating to the disposition of such detainees. [emphasis added]
Finally, it is possible that there are more than nine political appointees who worked for detainees. Holder tells Grassley that he did not survey the Justice Department as a whole but instead canvassed several large offices within the organization.
Bottom line: Holder revealed no names beyond the two already publicly known. He revealed no cases from which Justice political appointees recused themselves. The letter, which will likely be interpreted on Capitol Hill as a thumb-your-nose statement, is sure to anger Republican senators more than satisfy them.
Andrew Bostom, the author of The Legacy of Jihad (Prometheus, 2005) and The Legacy of Islamic Antisemitism (Prometheus, November, 2008), posted the following on his website on September 28, 2008. This is a speech delivered by Geert Wilders who is the chairman of the Party for Freedom in the Netherlands regarding the threat to the world that Islam presents. The Netherlands is one of the main European countries at the forefront of this cancerous Islamization invasion that threatens the freedoms and liberties of peaceful peoples of other religions and cultures.
With the dramatic worldwide rise of terrorism almost exclusively perpetrated by Muslims and a multitude of Islamic attacks of various degrees affecting the United States over more than the last decade, this speech is eminently pertinent, insightful, and significant. There should be no doubt in anyone’s mind that we are dealing with an enemy that is relentlessly intent on destroying non-believers and imposing Sharia law, an enemy that is indoctrinated by a religion founded on violence, hate, intolerance, and total abrogation of human rights and freedoms except for a select few.
Excuses, “politically correct” doctrines, actions and legislation espoused and supported by liberals including their transfer of billions of dollars away from security related issues and intelligence gathering renders us even more vulnerable to attacks, violence and losses of our personal freedoms and rights. Barack Obama, Attorney General Eric Holder, Janet Napolitano and other ideologues of the Democratic party are the main facilitators of this, jeopardizing the security and lives of over three hundred million Americans.
We must understand this metastasizing Islamic enemy and stop it before it obtains world domination.
We must also oust our politicians who are placing this country at far greater risk than necessary.
Geert Wilders: Wisdom and Courage
…liberty is the most precious of gifts. My generation never had to fight for this freedom, it was offered to us on a silver platter, by people who fought for it with their lives. All throughout Europe American cemeteries remind us of the young boys who never made it home, and whose memory we cherish. My generation does not own this freedom; we are merely its custodians. We can only hand over this hard won liberty to Europe’s children in the same state in which it was offered to us. We cannot strike a deal with mullahs and imams. Future generations would never forgive us. We cannot squander our liberties. We simply do not have the right to do so.
Geert Wilders, chairman Party for Freedom, the Netherlands
Speech at the Four Seasons, New York
September 25, 2008
Dear friends,
Thank you very much for inviting me. Great to be at the Four Seasons. I come from a country that has one season only: a rainy season that starts January 1st and ends December 31st. When we have three sunny days in a row, the government declares a national emergency. So Four Seasons, that’s new to me.
It’s great to be in New York. When I see the skyscrapers and office buildings, I think of what Ayn Rand said: “The sky over New York and the will of man made visible.” Of course. Without the Dutch you would have been nowhere, still figuring out how to buy this island from the Indians. But we are glad we did it for you. And, frankly, you did a far better job than we possibly could have done.
I come to America with a mission. All is not well in the old world. There is a tremendous danger looming, and it is very difficult to be optimistic. We might be in the final stages of the Islamization of Europe. This not only is a clear and present danger to the future of Europe itself, it is a threat to America and the sheer survival of the West. The danger I see looming is the scenario of America as the last man standing. The United States as the last bastion of Western civilization, facing an Islamic Europe. In a generation or two, the US will ask itself: who lost Europe? Patriots from around Europe risk their lives every day to prevent precisely this scenario form becoming a reality.
My short lecture consists of 4 parts.
First I will describe the situation on the ground in Europe. Then, I will say a few things about Islam. Thirdly, if you are still here, I will talk a little bit about the movie you just saw. To close I will tell you about a meeting in Jerusalem.
The Europe you know is changing. You have probably seen the landmarks. The Eiffel Tower and Trafalgar Square and Rome’s ancient buildings and maybe the canals of Amsterdam. They are still there. And they still look very much the same as they did a hundred years ago.
But in all of these cities, sometimes a few blocks away from your tourist destination, there is another world, a world very few visitors see – and one that does not appear in your tourist guidebook. It is the world of the parallel society created by Muslim mass-migration. All throughout Europe a new reality is rising: entire Muslim neighbourhoods where very few indigenous people reside or are even seen. And if they are, they might regret it. This goes for the police as well. It’s the world of head scarves, where women walk around in figureless tents, with baby strollers and a group of children. Their husbands, or slaveholders if you prefer, walk three steps ahead. With mosques on many street corner. The shops have signs you and I cannot read. You will be hard-pressed to find any economic activity. These are Muslim ghettos controlled by religious fanatics. These are Muslim neighbourhoods, and they are mushrooming in every city across Europe. These are the building-blocks for territorial control of increasingly larger portions of Europe, street by street, neighbourhood by neighbourhood, city by city.
There are now thousands of mosques throughout Europe. With larger congregations than there are in churches. And in every European city there are plans to build super-mosques that will dwarf every church in the region. Clearly, the signal is: we rule.
Many European cities are already one-quarter Muslim: just take Amsterdam, Marseille and Malmo in Sweden. In many cities the majority of the under-18 population is Muslim. Paris is now surrounded by a ring of Muslim neighbourhoods. Mohammed is the most popular name among boys in many cities. In some elementary schools in Amsterdam the farm can no longer be mentioned, because that would also mean mentioning the pig, and that would be an insult to Muslims. Many state schools in Belgium and Denmark only serve halal food to all pupils. In once-tolerant Amsterdam gays are beaten up almost exclusively by Muslims. Non-Muslim women routinely hear “whore, whore”. Satellite dishes are not pointed to local TV stations, but to stations in the country of origin. In France school teachers are advised to avoid authors deemed offensive to Muslims, including Voltaire and Diderot; the same is increasingly true of Darwin. The history of the Holocaust can in many cases no longer be taught because of Muslim sensitivity. In England sharia courts are now officially part of the British legal system. Many neighbourhoods in France are no-go areas for women without head scarves. Last week a man almost died after being beaten up by Muslims in Brussels, because he was drinking during the Ramadan. Jews are fleeing France in record numbers, on the run for the worst wave of anti-Semitism since World War II. French is now commonly spoken on the streets of Tel Aviv and Netanya, Israel. I could go on forever with stories like this. Stories about Islamization.
A total of fifty-four million Muslims now live in Europe. San Diego University recently calculated that a staggering 25 percent of the population in Europe will be Muslim just 12 years from now. Bernhard Lewis has predicted a Muslim majority by the end of this century.
Now these are just numbers. And the numbers would not be threatening if the Muslim-immigrants had a strong desire to assimilate. But there are few signs of that. The Pew Research Center reported that half of French Muslims see their loyalty to Islam as greater than their loyalty to France. One-third of French Muslims do not object to suicide attacks. The British Centre for Social Cohesion reported that one-third of British Muslim students are in favour of a worldwide caliphate. A Dutch study reported that half of Dutch Muslims admit they “understand” the 9/11 attacks.
Muslims demand what they call ‘respect’. And this is how we give them respect. Our elites are willing to give in. To give up. In my own country we have gone from calls by one cabinet member to turn Muslim holidays into official state holidays, to statements by another cabinet member, that Islam is part of Dutch culture, to an affirmation by the Christian-Democratic attorney general that he is willing to accept sharia in the Netherlands if there is a Muslim majority. We have cabinet members with passports from Morocco and Turkey.
Muslim demands are supported by unlawful behaviour, ranging from petty crimes and random violence, for example against ambulance workers and bus drivers, to small-scale riots. Paris has seen its uprising in the low-income suburbs, the banlieus. Some prefer to see these as isolated incidents, but I call it a Muslim intifada. I call the perpetrators “settlers”. Because that is what they are. They do not come to integrate into our societies, they come to integrate our society into their Dar-al-Islam. Therefore, they are settlers.
Much of this street violence I mentioned is directed exclusively against non-Muslims, forcing many native people to leave their neighbourhoods, their cities, their countries.
Politicians shy away from taking a stand against this creeping sharia. They believe in the equality of all cultures. Moreover, on a mundane level, Muslims are now a swing vote not to be ignored.
Our many problems with Islam cannot be explained by poverty, repression or the European colonial past, as the Left claims. Nor does it have anything to do with Palestinians or American troops in Iraq. The problem is Islam itself.
Allow me to give you a brief Islam 101. The first thing you need to know about Islam is the importance of the book of the Quran. The Quran is Allah’s personal word, revealed by an angel to Mohammed, the prophet. This is where the trouble starts. Every word in the Quran is Allah’s word and therefore not open to discussion or interpretation. It is valid for every Muslim and for all times. Therefore, there is no such a thing as moderate Islam. Sure, there are a lot of moderate Muslims. But a moderate Islam is non-existent.
The Quran calls for hatred, violence, submission, murder, and terrorism. The Quran calls for Muslims to kill non-Muslims, to terrorize non-Muslims and to fulfil their duty to wage war: violent jihad. Jihad is a duty for every Muslim, Islam is to rule the world – by the sword. The Quran is clearly anti-Semitic, describing Jews as monkeys and pigs.
The second thing you need to know is the importance of Mohammed the prophet. His behaviour is an example to all Muslims and cannot be criticized. Now, if Mohammed had been a man of peace, let us say like Ghandi and Mother Theresa wrapped in one, there would be no problem. But Mohammed was a warlord, a mass murderer, a pedophile, and had several marriages – at the same time. Islamic tradition tells us how he fought in battles, how he had his enemies murdered and even had prisoners of war executed. Mohammed himself slaughtered the Jewish tribe of Banu Qurayza. He advised on matters of slavery, but never advised to liberate slaves. Islam has no other morality than the advancement of Islam. If it is good for Islam, it is good. If it is bad for Islam, it is bad. There is no gray area or other side.
Quran as Allah’s own word and Mohammed as the perfect man are the two most important facets of Islam. Let no one fool you about Islam being a religion. Sure, it has a god, and a here-after, and 72 virgins. But in its essence Islam is a political ideology. It is a system that lays down detailed rules for society and the life of every person. Islam wants to dictate every aspect of life. Islam means ‘submission’. Islam is not compatible with freedom and democracy, because what it strives for is sharia. If you want to compare Islam to anything, compare it to communism or national-socialism, these are all totalitarian ideologies.
This is what you need to know about Islam, in order to understand what is going on in Europe. For millions of Muslims the Quran and the live of Mohammed are not 14 centuries old, but are an everyday reality, an ideal, that guide every aspect of their lives. Now you know why Winston Churchill called Islam “the most retrograde force in the world”, and why he compared Mein Kampf to the Quran.
Which brings me to my movie, Fitna.
I am a lawmaker, and not a movie maker. But I felt I had the moral duty to educate about Islam. The duty to make clear that the Quran stands at the heart of what some people call terrorism but is in reality jihad. I wanted to show that the problems of Islam are at the core of Islam, and do not belong to its fringes.
Now, from the day the plan for my movie was made public, it caused quite a stir, in the Netherlands and throughout Europe. First, there was a political storm, with government leaders, across the continent in sheer panic. The Netherlands was put under a heightened terror alert, because of possible attacks or a revolt by our Muslim population. The Dutch branch of the Islamic organisation Hizb ut-Tahrir declared that the Netherlands was due for an attack. Internationally, there was a series of incidents. The Taliban threatened to organize additional attacks against Dutch troops in Afghanistan, and a website linked to Al Qaeda published the message that I ought to be killed, while various muftis in the Middle East stated that I would be responsible for all the bloodshed after the screening of the movie. In Afghanistan and Pakistan the Dutch flag was burned on several occasions. Dolls representing me were also burned. The Indonesian President announced that I will never be admitted into Indonesia again, while the UN Secretary General and the European Union issued cowardly statements in the same vein as those made by the Dutch Government. I could go on and on. It was an absolute disgrace, a sell-out.
A plethora of legal troubles also followed, and have not ended yet. Currently the state of Jordan is litigating against me. Only last week there were renewed security agency reports about a heightened terror alert for the Netherlands because of Fitna.
Now, I would like to say a few things about Israel. Because, very soon, we will get together in its capitol. The best way for a politician in Europe to loose votes is to say something positive about Israel. The public has wholeheartedly accepted the Palestinian narrative, and sees Israel as the aggressor. I, however, will continue to speak up for Israel. I see defending Israel as a matter of principle. I have lived in this country and visited it dozens of times. I support Israel. First, because it is the Jewish homeland after two thousand years of exile up to and including Auschwitz, second because it is a democracy, and third because Israel is our first line of defense.
Samuel Huntington writes it so aptly: “Islam has bloody borders”. Israel is located precisely on that border. This tiny country is situated on the fault line of jihad, frustrating Islam’s territorial advance. Israel is facing the front lines of jihad, like Kashmir, Kosovo, the Philippines, Southern Thailand, Darfur in Sudan, Lebanon, and Aceh in Indonesia. Israel is simply in the way. The same way West-Berlin was during the Cold War.
The war against Israel is not a war against Israel. It is a war against the West. It is jihad. Israel is simply receiving the blows that are meant for all of us. If there would have been no Israel, Islamic imperialism would have found other venues to release its energy and its desire for conquest. Thanks to Israeli parents who send their children to the army and lay awake at night, parents in Europe and America can sleep well and dream, unaware of the dangers looming.
Many in Europe argue in favor of abandoning Israel in order to address the grievances of our Muslim minorities. But if Israel were, God forbid, to go down, it would not bring any solace to the West. It would not mean our Muslim minorities would all of a sudden change their behavior, and accept our values. On the contrary, the end of Israel would give enormous encouragement to the forces of Islam. They would, and rightly so, see the demise of Israel as proof that the West is weak, and doomed. The end of Israel would not mean the end of our problems with Islam, but only the beginning. It would mean the start of the final battle for world domination. If they can get Israel, they can get everything. Therefore, it is not that the West has a stake in Israel. It is Israel.
It is very difficult to be an optimist in the face of the growing Islamization of Europe. All the tides are against us. On all fronts we are losing. Demographically the momentum is with Islam. Muslim immigration is even a source of pride within ruling liberal parties. Academia, the arts, the media, trade unions, the churches, the business world, the entire political establishment have all converted to the suicidal theory of multiculturalism. So-called journalists volunteer to label any and all critics of Islamization as a ‘right-wing extremists’ or ‘racists’. The entire establishment has sided with our enemy. Leftists, liberals and Christian-Democrats are now all in bed with Islam.
This is the most painful thing to see: the betrayal by our elites. At this moment in Europe’s history, our elites are supposed to lead us. To stand up for centuries of civilization. To defend our heritage. To honour our eternal Judeo-Christian values that made Europe what it is today. But there are very few signs of hope to be seen at the governmental level. Sarkozy, Merkel, Brown, Berlusconi; in private, they probably know how grave the situation is. But when the little red light goes on, they stare into the camera and tell us that Islam is a religion of peace, and we should all try to get along nicely and sing Kumbaya. They willingly participate in, what President Reagan so aptly called: “the betrayal of our past, the squandering of our freedom.”
If there is hope in Europe, it comes from the people, not from the elites. Change can only come from a grass-roots level. It has to come from the citizens themselves. Yet these patriots will have to take on the entire political, legal and media establishment.
Over the past years there have been some small, but encouraging, signs of a rebirth of the original European spirit. Maybe the elites turn their backs on freedom, the public does not. In my country, the Netherlands, 60 percent of the population now sees the mass immigration of Muslims as the number one policy mistake since World War II. And another 60 percent sees Islam as the biggest threat to our national identity. I don’t think the public opinion in Holland is very different from other European countries.
Patriotic parties that oppose jihad are growing, against all odds. My own party debuted two years ago, with five percent of the vote. Now it stands at ten percent in the polls. The same is true of all smililary-minded parties in Europe. They are fighting the liberal establishment, and are gaining footholds on the political arena, one voter at the time.
Now, for the first time, these patriotic parties will come together and exchange experiences. It may be the start of something big. Something that might change the map of Europe for decades to come. It might also be Europe’s last chance.
This December a conference will take place in Jerusalem. Thanks to Professor Aryeh Eldad, a member of Knesset, we will be able to watch Fitna in the Knesset building and discuss the jihad. We are organizing this event in Israel to emphasize the fact that we are all in the same boat together, and that Israel is part of our common heritage. Those attending will be a select audience. No racist organizations will be allowed. And we will only admit parties that are solidly democratic.
This conference will be the start of an Alliance of European patriots. This Alliance will serve as the backbone for all organizations and political parties that oppose jihad and Islamization. For this Alliance I seek your support.
This endeavor may be crucial to America and to the West. America may hold fast to the dream that, thanks tot its location, it is safe from jihad and shaira. But seven years ago to the day, there was still smoke rising from ground zero, following the attacks that forever shattered that dream. Yet there is a danger even greater danger than terrorist attacks, the scenario of America as the last man standing. The lights may go out in Europe faster than you can imagine. An Islamic Europe means a Europe without freedom and democracy, an economic wasteland, an intellectual nightmare, and a loss of military might for America – as its allies will turn into enemies, enemies with atomic bombs. With an Islamic Europe, it would be up to America alone to preserve the heritage of Rome, Athens and Jerusalem.
Dear friends, liberty is the most precious of gifts. My generation never had to fight for this freedom, it was offered to us on a silver platter, by people who fought for it with their lives. All throughout Europe American cemeteries remind us of the young boys who never made it home, and whose memory we cherish. My generation does not own this freedom; we are merely its custodians. We can only hand over this hard won liberty to Europe’s children in the same state in which it was offered to us. We cannot strike a deal with mullahs and imams. Future generations would never forgive us. We cannot squander our liberties. We simply do not have the right to do so.
This is not the first time our civilization is under threat. We have seen dangers before. We have been betrayed by our elites before. They have sided with our enemies before. And yet, then, freedom prevailed.
These are not times in which to take lessons from appeasement, capitulation, giving away, giving up or giving in. These are not times in which to draw lessons from Mr. Chamberlain. These are times calling us to draw lessons from Mr. Churchill and the words he spoke in 1942:
“Never give in, never, never, never, never, in nothing great or small, large or petty, never give in except to convictions of honour and good sense. Never yield to force; never yield to the apparently overwhelming might of the enemy”.
The following list formulated by Judicial Watch is one that no politician wants to appear on: the ten most corrupt Washington politicians of 2009. Nine of the ten are Democrats with three being part of the Obama Administration. Fortunately for these latter three (President Obama, Sec. of Treasury Tim Geithner and Atty. General Eric Holder), there is not a list for the ten most incompetent Washington politicians because they would also populate this one as well!
Judicial Watch Announces List of Washington’s “Ten Most Wanted Corrupt Politicians” for 2009
Judicial Watch, the public interest group that investigates and prosecutes government corruption, today released its 2009 list of Washington’s “Ten Most Wanted Corrupt Politicians.” The list, in alphabetical order, includes:
1. Senator Christopher Dodd (D-CT): This marks two years in a row for Senator Dodd, who made the 2008 “Ten Most Corrupt” list for his corrupt relationship with Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac and for accepting preferential treatment and loan terms from Countrywide Financial, a scandal which still dogs him. In 2009, the scandals kept coming for the Connecticut Democrat. In 2009, Judicial Watch filed a Senate ethics complaint against Dodd for undervaluing a property he owns in Ireland on his Senate Financial Disclosure forms. Judicial Watch's complaint forced Dodd to amend the forms. However, press reports suggest the property to this day remains undervalued. Judicial Watch also alleges in the complaint that Dodd obtained a sweetheart deal for the property in exchange for his assistance in obtaining a presidential pardon (during the Clinton administration) and other favors for a long-time friend and business associate. The false financial disclosure forms were part of the cover-up. Dodd remains the head the Senate Banking Committee.
2. Senator John Ensign (R-NV): A number of scandals popped up in 2009 involving public officials who conducted illicit affairs, and then attempted to cover them up with hush payments and favors, an obvious abuse of power. The year’s worst offender might just be Nevada Republican Senator John Ensign. Ensign admitted in June to an extramarital affair with the wife of one of his staff members, who then allegedly obtained special favors from the Nevada Republican in exchange for his silence. According to The New York Times: “The Justice Department and the Senate Ethics Committee are expected to conduct preliminary inquiries into whether Senator John Ensign violated federal law or ethics rules as part of an effort to conceal an affair with the wife of an aide…” The former staffer, Douglas Hampton, began to lobby Mr. Ensign's office immediately upon leaving his congressional job, despite the fact that he was subject to a one-year lobbying ban. Ensign seems to have ignored the law and allowed Hampton lobbying access to his office as a payment for his silence about the affair. (These are potentially criminal offenses.) It looks as if Ensign misused his public office (and taxpayer resources) to cover up his sexual shenanigans.
3. Rep. Barney Frank (D-MA): Judicial Watch is investigating a $12 million TARP cash injection provided to the Boston-based OneUnited Bank at the urging of Massachusetts Rep. Barney Frank. As reported in the January 22, 2009, edition of the Wall Street Journal, the Treasury Department indicated it would only provide funds to healthy banks to jump-start lending. Not only was OneUnited Bank in massive financial turmoil, but it was also "under attack from its regulators for allegations of poor lending practices and executive-pay abuses, including owning a Porsche for its executives' use." Rep. Frank admitted he spoke to a "federal regulator," and Treasury granted the funds. (The bank continues to flounder despite Frank’s intervention for federal dollars.) Moreover, Judicial Watch uncovered documents in 2009 that showed that members of Congress for years were aware that Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac were playing fast and loose with accounting issues, risk assessment issues and executive compensation issues, even as liberals led by Rep. Frank continued to block attempts to rein in the two Government Sponsored Enterprises (GSEs). For example, during a hearing on September 10, 2003, before the House Committee on Financial Services considering a Bush administration proposal to further regulate Fannie and Freddie, Rep. Frank stated: "I want to begin by saying that I am glad to consider the legislation, but I do not think we are facing any kind of a crisis. That is, in my view, the two Government Sponsored Enterprises we are talking about here, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, are not in a crisis. We have recently had an accounting problem with Freddie Mac that has led to people being dismissed, as appears to be appropriate. I do not think at this point there is a problem with a threat to the Treasury." Frank received $42,350 in campaign contributions from Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac between 1989 and 2008. Frank also engaged in a relationship with a Fannie Mae Executive while serving on the House Banking Committee, which has jurisdiction over Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.
4. Secretary of Treasury Timothy Geithner: In 2009, Obama Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner admitted that he failed to pay $34,000 in Social Security and Medicare taxes from 2001-2004 on his lucrative salary at the International Monetary Fund (IMF), an organization with 185 member countries that oversees the global financial system. (Did we mention Geithner now runs the IRS?) It wasn’t until President Obama tapped Geithner to head the Treasury Department that he paid back most of the money, although the IRS kindly waived the hefty penalties. In March 2009, Geithner also came under fire for his handling of the AIG bonus scandal, where the company used $165 million of its bailout funds to pay out executive bonuses, resulting in a massive public backlash. Of course as head of the New York Federal Reserve, Geithner helped craft the AIG deal in September 2008. However, when the AIG scandal broke, Geithner claimed he knew nothing of the bonuses until March 10, 2009. The timing is important. According to CNN: “Although Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner told congressional leaders on Tuesday that he learned of AIG's impending $160 million bonus payments to members of its troubled financial-products unit on March 10, sources tell TIME that the New York Federal Reserve informed Treasury staff that the payments were imminent on Feb. 28. That is ten days before Treasury staffers say they first learned ‘full details’ of the bonus plan, and three days before the [Obama] Administration launched a new $30 billion infusion of cash for AIG.” Throw in another embarrassing disclosure in 2009 that Geithner employed “household help” ineligible to work in the United States, and it becomes clear why the Treasury Secretary has earned a spot on the “Ten Most Corrupt Politicians in Washington” list.
5. Attorney General Eric Holder: Tim Geithner can be sure he won’t be hounded about his tax-dodging by his colleague Eric Holder, US Attorney General. Judicial Watch strongly opposed Holder because of his terrible ethics record, which includes: obstructing an FBI investigation of the theft of nuclear secrets from Los Alamos Nuclear Laboratory; rejecting multiple requests for an independent counsel to investigate alleged fundraising abuses by then-Vice President Al Gore in the Clinton White House; undermining the criminal investigation of President Clinton by Kenneth Starr in the midst of the Lewinsky investigation; and planning the violent raid to seize then-six-year-old Elian Gonzalez at gunpoint in order to return him to Castro’s Cuba. Moreover, there is his soft record on terrorism. Holder bypassed Justice Department procedures to push through Bill Clinton’s scandalous presidential pardons and commutations, including for 16 members of FALN, a violent Puerto Rican terrorist group that orchestrated approximately 120 bombings in the United States, killing at least six people and permanently maiming dozens of others, including law enforcement officers. His record in the current administration is no better. As he did during the Clinton administration, Holder continues to ignore serious incidents of corruption that could impact his political bosses at the White House. For example, Holder has refused to investigate charges that the Obama political machine traded VIP access to the White House in exchange for campaign contributions – a scheme eerily similar to one hatched by Holder’s former boss, Bill Clinton in the 1990s. The Holder Justice Department also came under fire for dropping a voter intimidation case against the New Black Panther Party. On Election Day 2008, Black Panthers dressed in paramilitary garb threatened voters as they approached polling stations. Holder has also failed to initiate a comprehensive Justice investigation of the notorious organization ACORN (Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now), which is closely tied to President Obama. There were allegedly more than 400,000 fraudulent ACORN voter registrations in the 2008 campaign. And then there were the journalist videos catching ACORN Housing workers advising undercover reporters on how to evade tax, immigration, and child prostitution laws. Holder’s controversial decisions on new rights for terrorists and his attacks on previous efforts to combat terrorism remind many of the fact that his former law firm has provided and continues to provide pro bono representation to terrorists at Guantanamo Bay. Holder’s politicization of the Justice Department makes one long for the days of Alberto Gonzales.
6. Rep. Jesse Jackson, Jr. (D-IL)/ Senator Roland Burris (D-IL): One of the most serious scandals of 2009 involved a scheme by former Illinois Governor Rod Blagojevich to sell President Obama’s then-vacant Senate seat to the highest bidder. Two men caught smack dab in the middle of the scandal: Senator Roland Burris, who ultimately got the job, and Rep. Jesse Jackson, Jr. According to the Chicago Sun-Times, emissaries for Jesse Jackson Jr., named "Senate Candidate A" in the Blagojevich indictment, reportedly offered $1.5 million to Blagojevich during a fundraiser if he named Jackson Jr. to Obama's seat. Three days later federal authorities arrested Blagojevich. Burris, for his part, apparently lied about his contacts with Blagojevich, who was arrested in December 2008 for trying to sell Obama’s Senate seat. According to Reuters: “Roland Burris came under fresh scrutiny…after disclosing he tried to raise money for the disgraced former Illinois governor who named him to the U.S. Senate seat once held by President Barack Obama…In the latest of those admissions, Burris said he looked into mounting a fundraiser for Rod Blagojevich -- later charged with trying to sell Obama's Senate seat -- at the same time he was expressing interest to the then-governor's aides about his desire to be appointed.” Burris changed his story five times regarding his contacts with Blagojevich prior to the Illinois governor appointing him to the U.S. Senate. Three of those changing explanations came under oath.
7. President Barack Obama: During his presidential campaign, President Obama promised to run an ethical and transparent administration. However, in his first year in office, the President has delivered corruption and secrecy, bringing Chicago-style political corruption to the White House. Consider just a few Obama administration “lowlights” from year one: Even before President Obama was sworn into office, he was interviewed by the FBI for a criminal investigation of former Illinois Governor Rod Blagojevich’s scheme to sell the President’s former Senate seat to the highest bidder. (Obama’s Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel and slumlord Valerie Jarrett, both from Chicago, are also tangled up in the Blagojevich scandal.) Moreover, the Obama administration made the startling claim that the Privacy Act does not apply to the White House. The Obama White House believes it can violate the privacy rights of American citizens without any legal consequences or accountability. President Obama boldly proclaimed that "transparency and the rule of law will be the touchstones of this presidency," but his administration is addicted to secrecy, stonewalling far too many of Judicial Watch's Freedom of Information Act requests and is refusing to make public White House visitor logs as federal law requires. The Obama administration turned the National Endowment of the Arts (as well as the agency that runs the AmeriCorps program) into propaganda machines, using tax dollars to persuade "artists" to promote the Obama agenda. According to documents uncovered by Judicial Watch, the idea emerged as a direct result of the Obama campaign and enjoyed White House approval and participation. President Obama has installed a record number of "czars" in positions of power. Too many of these individuals are leftist radicals who answer to no one but the president. And too many of the czars are not subject to Senate confirmation (which raises serious constitutional questions). Under the President’s bailout schemes, the federal government continues to appropriate or control -- through fiat and threats -- large sectors of the private economy, prompting conservative columnist George Will to write: “The administration's central activity -- the political allocation of wealth and opportunity -- is not merely susceptible to corruption, it is corruption.” Government-run healthcare and car companies, White House coercion, uninvestigated ACORN corruption, debasing his office to help Chicago cronies, attacks on conservative media and the private sector, unprecedented and dangerous new rights for terrorists, perks for campaign donors – this is Obama’s “ethics” record -- and we haven't even gotten through the first year of his presidency.
8. Rep. Nancy Pelosi (D-CA): At the heart of the corruption problem in Washington is a sense of entitlement. Politicians believe laws and rules (even the U.S. Constitution) apply to the rest of us but not to them. Case in point: House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and her excessive and boorish demands for military travel. Judicial Watch obtained documents from the Pentagon in 2008 that suggest Pelosi has been treating the Air Force like her own personal airline. These documents, obtained through the Freedom of Information Act, include internal Pentagon email correspondence detailing attempts by Pentagon staff to accommodate Pelosi's numerous requests for military escorts and military aircraft as well as the speaker's 11th hour cancellations and changes. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi also came under fire in April 2009, when she claimed she was never briefed about the CIA's use of the waterboarding technique during terrorism investigations. The CIA produced a report documenting a briefing with Pelosi on September 4, 2002, that suggests otherwise. Judicial Watch also obtained documents, including a CIA Inspector General report, which further confirmed that Congress was fully briefed on the enhanced interrogation techniques. Aside from her own personal transgressions, Nancy Pelosi has ignored serious incidents of corruption within her own party, including many of the individuals on this list. (See Rangel, Murtha, Jesse Jackson, Jr., etc.)
9. Rep. John Murtha (D-PA) and the rest of the PMA Seven: Rep. John Murtha made headlines in 2009 for all the wrong reasons. The Pennsylvania congressman is under federal investigation for his corrupt relationship with the now-defunct defense lobbyist PMA Group. PMA, founded by a former Murtha associate, has been the congressman's largest campaign contributor. Since 2002, Murtha has raised $1.7 million from PMA and its clients. And what did PMA and its clients receive from Murtha in return for their generosity? Earmarks -- tens of millions of dollars in earmarks. In fact, even with all of the attention surrounding his alleged influence peddling, Murtha kept at it. Following an FBI raid of PMA's offices earlier in 2009, Murtha continued to seek congressional earmarks for PMA clients, while also hitting them up for campaign contributions. According to The Hill, in April, "Murtha reported receiving contributions from three former PMA clients for whom he requested earmarks in the pending appropriations bills." When it comes to the PMA scandal, Murtha is not alone. As many as six other Members of Congress are currently under scrutiny according to The Washington Post. They include: Peter J. Visclosky (D-IN.), James P. Moran Jr. (D-VA), Norm Dicks (D-WA.), Marcy Kaptur (D-OH), C.W. Bill Young (R-FL.) and Todd Tiahrt (R-KS.). Of course rather than investigate this serious scandal, according to Roll Call House Democrats circled the wagons, "cobbling together a defense to offer political cover to their rank and file.” The Washington Post also reported in 2009 that Murtha’s nephew received $4 million in Defense Department no-bid contracts: "Newly obtained documents…show Robert Murtha mentioning his influential family connection as leverage in his business dealings and holding unusual power with the military.”
10. Rep. Charles Rangel (D-NY): Rangel, the man in charge of writing tax policy for the entire country, has yet to adequately explain how he could possibly "forget" to pay taxes on $75,000 in rental income he earned from his off-shore rental property. He also faces allegations that he improperly used his influence to maintain ownership of highly coveted rent-controlled apartments in Harlem, and misused his congressional office to fundraise for his private Rangel Center by preserving a tax loophole for an oil drilling company in exchange for funding. On top of all that, Rangel recently amended his financial disclosure reports, which doubled his reported wealth. (He somehow “forgot” about $1 million in assets.) And what did he do when the House Ethics Committee started looking into all of this? He apparently resorted to making "campaign contributions" to dig his way out of trouble. According to WCBS TV, a New York CBS affiliate: “The reigning member of Congress' top tax committee is apparently ‘wrangling’ other politicos to get him out of his own financial and tax troubles...Since ethics probes began last year the 79-year-old congressman has given campaign donations to 119 members of Congress, including three of the five Democrats on the House Ethics Committee who are charged with investigating him.” Charlie Rangel should not be allowed to remain in Congress, let alone serve as Chairman of the powerful House Ways and Means Committee, and he knows it. That’s why he felt the need to disburse campaign contributions to Ethics Committee members and other congressional
What previously was thought to be unreachable levels of arrant incompetence, imprudence, recklessness and arrogance by Obama and his administration seems to be superseded on a frighteningly regular basis to new highs (and therefore, lows). His radical and destructive ideology is not only causing irreparable harm to our freedoms and rights but is also compromising our security, placing all Americans at risk, as seen with his plan to try terrorists in civil trials in Federal Courts.
At first thought many may question why this is such a big deal. The answer to this is cogently delineated in the following scathing editorial written by Thomas Sowell.
What can we do? Write your Senators and Representative requesting that they block funding for the trial(s) so that they will no be able to proceed in Federal Court and must, therefore, be adjudicated by military courts.
Deepest Bow Is Reserved For World Opinion
By Thomas Sowell
In the string of amazing decisions made during the first year of the Obama administration, nothing seems more like sheer insanity than the decision to try foreign terrorists, who have committed acts of war against the United States, in federal court, as if they were American citizens accused of crimes.
Terrorists are not even entitled to the protection of the Geneva Conventions, much less the Constitution of the United States. Terrorists have never observed, nor even claimed to have observed, the Geneva Conventions, nor are they among those covered by it.
But over and above the utter inconsistency of what is being done is the utter recklessness it represents.
The last time an attack on the World Trade Center was treated as a matter of domestic criminal justice was after a bomb was exploded there in 1993. Under the rules of American criminal law, the prosecution had to turn over all sorts of information to the defense — information that told the al-Qaida international terrorist network what we knew about them and how we knew it.
This was nothing more and nothing less than giving away military secrets to an enemy in wartime — something for which people have been executed, as they should have been.
Secrecy in warfare is a matter of life and death. Lives were risked and lost during World War II to prevent Nazi Germany from discovering that Britain had broken its supposedly unbreakable Enigma code and could read their military plans that were being radioed in that code.
"Loose lips sink ships" was the World War II motto in the United States. But loose lips are mandated under the rules of criminal prosecutions.
Tragically, this administration seems hell-bent to avoid seeing acts of terrorism against the United States as acts of war. The very phrase "war on terrorism" is avoided, as if that will stop the terrorists' war on us.
The mind-set of the left behind such thinking was spelled out in a San Francisco Chronicle editorial, which said that "Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, the professed mastermind of the 9/11 terrorist attacks, will be tried the right way — the American way, in a federal courtroom where the world will see both his guilt and the nation's adherence to the rule of law."
This is not the rule of law, but the application of laws to situations for which they were not designed.
How many Americans may pay with their lives for the intelligence secrets and methods that can be forced to be disclosed to al-Qaida was not mentioned. Nor was there mention of how many foreign nations and individuals whose cooperation with us in the war on terror has been involved in countering al-Qaida — nor how many foreign nations and individuals will have to think twice now, before cooperating with us again, when their role can be revealed in court to our enemies, who can exact revenge on them.
Behind this decision and others is the notion that we have to demonstrate our good faith to other nations, sometimes called "world opinion." Just who are these saintly nations whose favor we must curry, at the risk of American lives and the national security of the United States?
Internationally, the law of the jungle ultimately prevails, despite pious talk about "the international community" and "world opinion," or the pompous and corrupt farce of the United Nations. Yet this is the gallery to which Barack Obama has been playing, both before and after becoming president of the United States.
In the wake of the obscenity of a trial of terrorists in federal court for an act of war — and the worldwide propaganda platform it will give them — it may seem to be a small thing that President Obama has been photographed yet again bowing deeply to a foreign ruler. But how large or small an act is depends on its actual consequences, not on whether the politically correct intelligentsia think it is no big deal.
As a private citizen, Barack Obama has a right to make as big a jackass of himself as he wants to. But as president of the United States, his actions not only denigrate a nation that other nations rely on for survival, but raise questions about how reliable our judgment and resolve are — which in turn raises questions about whether those nations will consider themselves better off to make the best deal they can with our enemies.
We reported on July 1st that the Justice Department dropped its voter intimidation case against the New Black Panther Party without a substantive reason. The civil suit originally was filed in January of this year while Bush was still President and was in response to voter intimidation perpetrated by two members of this Black group wearing paramilitary garb and threatening voters at the entrance to a Philadelphia voting station. In this lawsuit, it was asserted that the New Black Panther Party and three of its members violated the 1965 Voting Rights Act by threatening and intimidating voters with the weapon, uniforms and racial slurs.
Obama’s Attorney General, Eric Holder who is black, inexplicably dropped the case in May despite the fact that none of the three defendants filed a response to the complaint or even appeared in federal district court in Philadelphia to respond to the suit. Essentially, the case could have been won by the Government by default. Unbelievably, one of the individuals who had charges dismissed against him was a member of Philadelphia's 14th Ward Democratic Committee and a credentialed poll watcher for the Democratic Party.
There has been outrage from many in the community as well as by several Republicans yet Obama and Eric Holder continue to stonewall. Most of the news media never even reported the flagrant intimidation on Election Day and, of course, did not report the dismissal of the case. Not surprising! The ACLU is nowhere to be found. Again, not surprising. They would rather defend the criminals and terrorists.
You don’t imagine that this is reverse racism and that this was dropped because these individuals were black, do you? Nah!! Not Obama and Eric Holder. You can be absolutely sure that if two (White) members of the KKK had perpetrated this intimidation, there would have been a feeding frenzy in the liberal press for months, the scum at the ACLU would have been lining up “poor disenfranchised” black citizens to use as victims of the ruthless “Plantation mentality” subjugation, and Holder’s Justice Department would have sought the most severe penalties possible.
Americans are venting their anger and disapproval of Obama’s policies and rhetoric and it is having a significant effect on the political debate, politicians and on other citizens who are beginning to express their concerns. Many voters in the middle of the political spectrum who were not impressed with McCain or were inspired with the aura, vigor and the ostensible freshness of Obama and his promises of “change that you can believe in” and therefore voted for him now feel more than betrayed and duped.Instead of the refreshing, inspired, positive, constructive and “post-racial” President, they now see a narcissistic, condescending, arrogant, hypocritical, elitist and dismissive one who adheres to outdated racial victimization demagoguery, class warfare envy, irresponsible and disingenuous fiscal policies, and immutable radical ideologies.
These inimical personal characteristics and his radical left persuasion should surprise nobody. Despite his outrageous denials of hearing anything offensive in the incendiary, racist, hateful sermons of Reverend Wright, we all know that he heard them and concurred. You don’t attend church weekly for 20 years, have him marry you and your wife, baptize your children, refer to him as an uncle like figure and donate thousands of dollars if you disagreed with his rhetoric. Any person of character and integrity would have picked themselves up and walked right out of that church and never returned after hearing one of those vile sermons . He didn’t! His overtly race based selections (Sotomayor, Eric Holder, Regina Benjamin, czars, etc.) and unwarranted involvement in local “racial” issues (Cambridge police and Afro-American Harvard professor of black studies) patently substantiate his racial bigotry and adherence to such policies.
People are very angry now with what they have seen in less than seven months and feel that it is too important to remain silent. It is imperative that all of us are very vocal in our dissent, using our freedom of free speech to effect the changes that we want, preserve our liberties as well as our hard earned incomes. We must make sure that the government answers to us rather than it impose its will and dictates on us!
You may remember pictures and video from the Presidential Election Day where armed, imposing brawny members of the New Black Panther Party for Self-Defense illegally were positioned within 8 to 15 feet of a polling place with the explicit purpose of voter intimidation. They had menacingly pointed their weapons at some individuals and overtly emphasized their firepower to others. These two individuals who you might expect to see at a large drug deal in South Chicago or Gary, Indiana were part of a plan for widespread voter intimidation by this group.
The New Black Panther Party for Self-Defense is a supremacist, militant, racist hate-mongering group comprised of blacks. Although the media won’t call them on it, they are essentially a domestic terrorist group of blacks. Furthermore, you probably weren’t even aware of this voter intimidation unless you were watching FOX News. The rest of the news media ignored this egregious occurrence because it involved members of its “protected” constituency – blacks.
As a consequence of this illegal intimidation, charges were filed by the Bush Administration. Without any explanation whatsoever and with the blessing of President Obama, the radical far-left Attorney General Eric Holder who also happens to be black and the Justice Department shockingly elected to drop civil charges and not pursue a criminal indictment against these individuals or the hate group itself.
Imagine the outrage that we would have heard for weeks or months if, instead, intimidation at these voting centers were perpetrated by fully uniformed and armed white supremacists or even some lesser white hate groups. You could be sure that there would be several extremely thorough investigations which would be covered relentlessly by the news media. There would be frequent sound bites from Obama and Eric Holder, as well as by Jesse Jackson, Al Sharpton, Reverend Wright and others of that hateful ilk.
Who is protecting the rights and the well-being of the average American? Surely not Obama or his Attorney General, Eric Holder!
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