Bachmann Stares Down Heckler in Iowa

AP File

By Kasie Hunt, Politico

Michele Bachmann said again Monday that the American intervention in Libya was a mistake - but this time she had to talk over a heckler who shouted vulgarities at her.

Jenny Watkins, 22, shouted at Bachmann from the back of a large room at the University of Iowa here, while a male companion held a sign that read "Desensitized Homosexual" - a reference to an earlier part of Bachmann's speech, when she said she worried that children in elementary school would be desensitized to homosexuality. The two might have been escorted out with little fanfare, but Bachmann stopped to address them - "If you'd like to ask a question later, I'd be more than happy to have you do that," she said before continuing to talk about Libya.

"I think it was a mistake for the president to get us involved in a third war in Libya," Bachmann said. "There's no viable American national interest in Libya." We don't know what our American military goal is in Libya."

Read more: http://nation.foxnews.com/rep-michele-bachmann/2011/04/11/bachmann-stares-down-heckler-iowa?cmpid=NL_FiredUpFoxNation_20110412#ixzz1JP1R1cg5

Palin: Trump Right on Obama Birth Probe

Former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin says real estate mogul Donald Trump, who is considering a 2012 presidential run, is right in sending investigators to Hawaii to pursue the issue of where President Barack Obama was born, because many Americans want proof he was indeed born in this country.

“I appreciate that 'The Donald' wants to spend his resources in getting to the bottom of something that so interests him and many Americans — you know, more power to him,” Palin said Saturday on Fox News’ “Justice with Judge Jeanine.” “He’s not just throwing stones from the sidelines, he’s digging in there, he’s paying for researchers to find out why President Obama would have spent $2 million to not show his birth certificate.”

Palin said although she believes the president was born in Hawaii, it is “perplexing” why Obama has spent so much money to avoid the issue, and there might be “something there the president doesn’t want people to see” on his birth certificate.

She expressed hope Trump’s investigation will put to rest the issue of why the president is so intent on not providing the requested documentation.
© Newsmax. All rights reserved.


Read more on Newsmax.com: Palin: Trump Right on Obama Birth Probe
Important: Do You Support Pres. Obama's Re-Election? Vote Here Now!

Pelosi Exposed

On a conference call with bloggers, Nancy Pelosi urged Dems to fashion their response to Paul Ryan’s Medicare proposals on the Democratic Party’s successful defeat of Social Security privatization, and made a critical point: Dems succeeded in 2005 because they did not take the GOP’s bait by offering their own plan to “fix”Social Security.

Pelosi — who is widely viewed as the person most responsible for ensuring that Dems drew a hard line against Bush’s privatization proposals — said that so doing would have persuaded people that there must have been something wrong with Social Security that needed fixing. She suggested that Dems should keep that message in mind as they prepare to do battle over Ryan’s Medicare proposals.

“We got criticized for it, but it was the most important thing,” Pelosi said. “We couldn’t have our own proposal on Social Security because it would confuse the public.”

Read more: http://nation.foxnews.com/nancy-pelosi/2011/04/07/pelosi-exposed-fraud-conference-call-bloggers?cmpid=NL_FiredUpFoxNation_20110408#ixzz1J8s6Bknf

The First Amendment, Korans, and personal responsibility

Until now, I haven’t had much of an opportunity to weigh in on Lindsey Graham’s gee-I’d-like-to-ban-Koran-burning-but-I-probably-can’t pas de deux from this weekend.  Allahpundit has done a good job of analyzing the issue, and I thought that the point was self-evident enough that few would seriously argue for government intervention aimed at obscure preachers to silence political protest.  Conversations I have had in the meantime with others convinced me that apparently the need to defend free speech isn’t self-evident, and when a high-ranking politician stokes those passions, it requires more effort.

My column at The Week addresses Graham’s construct, which he posits as both a need to save lives and to somehow honor David Petraeus, but in order to buy either argument, one would have to believe in remote mind control and throw out the concepts of free will and personal responsibility.  That would undermine the argument for freedom entirely:http://hotair.com/archives/2011/04/06/the-first-amendment-korans-and-personal-responsibility/

Federal Workers Union Sues White House Over Possible Government Shutdown

With time running out for congressional leaders to reach a budget deal, the country's biggest federal workers union is taking the Obama administration to court for what it called a failure to explain how federal programs and services would be affected if there's a government shutdown.

The American Federation of Government Employees announced Tuesday that it filed a lawsuit in federal court last week seeking details on the shutdown plans of federal agencies.

The union's national president, John Gage, said he filed the lawsuit after the White House Office of Management and Budget failed to respond to a Freedom of Information Act request sent early last month.

Unreal World

Company: Qwest Communication International (NYSE: Q - News)
Perk recipient: Edward Mueller

Executives are often given the right to use the company jet for pleasure travel, but their spouses, children and friends are usually only allowed to use the plane when they're accompanying the employee. But Edward Mueller demanded an exception to that rule when he became CEO of Denver-based Qwest in 2007.

His employment agreement gave his wife and daughter the right to use the company jet to commute to and from California, where his daughter was still in high school. The phone company expensed $281,182 that year for Mueller family joy rides on the jet and ended up buying his California home for a $1.8 million premium to its resale price, too

Obama to Launch Re-election With Video

President Barack Obama will formally announce his re-election campaign with an online video that aides will post on his new campaign website, Democratic insiders tell National Journal.
The exact date and time of the announcement will be kept under wraps until Obama’s team alerts supporters with text messages and email. By that time, Obama will have opened his campaign account with the Federal Election Commission.
But Democratic donors are being told that the announcement will coincide with a Democratic National Committee fundraiser set for April 14 in Chicago, which Obama will attend.
The campaign could use the video to begin soliciting donations, according to National Journal.
President George W. Bush didn’t announce his re-election campaign until May of 2003. But Democrats close to the president are concerned that independent opposition groups will soon begin airing their television ads.
One of those groups, American Crossroads — with former Bush staffer Karl Rove as an adviser — is seeking to raise at least $130 million for the election cycle, on top of money allocated by the Chamber of Commerce and other Republican-leaning groups.

Administration Approves Bailout Pay Packages

WASHINGTON (AP) — The four companies still receiving government bailout aid won't be able to raise the amount of cash they pay out to their top executives this year, the administration's pay czar has ruled.
The decisions, released late Friday, cover 2011 compensation for the top 25 executives at General Motors Co., Chrysler, American International Group Inc. and Ally Financial Inc., the former financing arm of GM. The rulings clear the way for millions of dollars in salary and bonuses to be paid out by companies that are still repay the billions in aid they received during the financial crisis from the government's $700 billion Troubled Asset Relief Program.
While the companies can't give cash raises, they are being allowed to boost the value of deferred stock awards to their executives. The Treasury Department defended that decision, saying it is in line with pay guidelines that it used to make compensation decisions in 2009 and 2010.
The government's findings do not identify the executives by name but only by salary rankings.
The highest-paid executive at insurance giant AIG will total compensation of $10.5 million in 2011, including a $3 million salary, the largest of any of the pay packages approved Friday by the pay czar. AIG confirmed in a filing with regulators Friday that President and CEO Robert Benmosche's pay will stand at $10.5 million this year, the same package he received in 2010.
GM's highest-paid executive will receive $1.7 million in salary for 2011 and performance-based stock awards that will bring total compensation to $9 million. The highest-paid executive at Ally Financial will receive no cash salary in 2011 but can be granted performance-based stock awards worth $9.5 million. GM is headed by Chairman and CEO Dan Akerson, and Ally's CEO is Michael Carpenter.
AIG nearly went under during the 2008 financial crisis. It had written insurance on the value of hundreds of billions in mortgage investments held by financial institutions. When the investments lost value, AIG could not afford to make good on its contracts. It took government help to stay out of bankruptcy and received a bailout package with a total value of $182 billion. The government got a 92 percent stake in the company and hopes to start selling the shares soon to help recoup its money. The company also has been selling off assets to repay the aid.
Taxpayers provided a total of $49.5 billion to GM as it went through a bankruptcy reorganization in 2009. The Treasury Department has trimmed its stake in GM to 26.5 percent of the company from 61 percent, when it sold $23.1 billion of GM stock at an initial public offering in November. Treasury will need to sell its remaining GM shares at an average price of $53 to break even on the bailout.


Read more on Newsmax.com: Administration Approves Bailout Pay Packages
Important: Do You Support Pres. Obama's Re-Election? Vote Here Now!

Donald Trump's Birth Certificate

Donald Trump, who has been making television appearances calling for President Barack Obama to release his official birth documents, released his birth certificate exclusively to Newsmax on Monday.

“It took me one hour to get my birth certificate. It’s inconceivable that, after four years of questioning,  the president still hasn’t produced his birth certificate. I’m just asking President Obama to show the public his birth certificate. Why’s he making an issue out of this?"

Trump was skeptical that so few people have stepped forward to verify Obama's birth.

Read more on Newsmax.com: Exclusive to Newsmax: Donald Trump's Birth Certificate
Important: Do You Support Pres. Obama's Re-Election? Vote Here Now!

Secret Earmarks Remain in Federal Budget

USA Today reported this week that billions in earmarks remain tucked into the funding measure that keeps the federal government running for the remainder of the fiscal year.  Congress is debating right now how much to cut from the measure, yet these secret earmarks are not being openly discussed by members of Congress.

That’s unfortunate. Earmarks should be low hanging fruit for the cost-conscious legislator. They are special interests projects requested by individual members of Congress.

The USA Today story indicates that the House-passed short term funding measure fully funds $5 billion in existing earmarks.  Senator Tom Coburn (R-OK) has submitted legislation, in the form of an amendment to a “small business jobs bill,” to remove these projects.

According to USA Today, (Half of ‘earmark’ spending untouched in GOP bills,) $4.8 billion in earmarks are hidden in the defense, military construction and veterans affairs were left untouched by the Continuing Resolution (CR) that funds the government until April 8th:

House Republicans who crafted two short-term spending bills made $5.3 billion in cuts by going after some of Washington’s least popular spending: those congressional pet projects known as “earmarks.”  Even so, a congressional report shows they left $4.8 billion in earmarks untouched — and critics of congressional pork say they should go after it.  “Many in Congress promised taxpayers a full earmark moratorium, not a half moratorium,” says Sen. Tom Coburn, R-Okla., an earmark opponent who requested the report from the non-partisan Congressional Research Service. “Protecting nearly $5 billion in earmarks from cuts sends the wrong message to taxpayers.”

Much of the information comes from a March 17 report from the Congressional Research Service (CRS). According to that report, “funding that was made available to accounts for earmarks in FY2010 would still be available to the agency for obligations in FY 2011.”  Uh-oh. The CR that states that “all of the earmark disclosure lists from the FY 2010 appropriations ‘shall have no legal effect’ for FY2011.”  This leads one to conclude that all of these apparent reductions in earmarks are fake spending cuts.

If the Congress were to delete the approximately $10 billion in earmarks from the FY2010 process, one could make an argument that those funds never would have been expended (because of the “no legal effect” language) and that the American people should not believe that $10 billion in the final number of cuts are real cuts to spending for this fiscal year.

Sen. Coburn’s legislation would eliminate all of these old earmarks and other special interest earmarks from the federal budget.  One earmark Coburn would repeal is a tax credit for “Volumetric Ethanol.”  That move alone would save $6 billion in taxpayer money.

Another Coburn legislative item would bar federal unemployment benefits to those earning over $1 million a year.  The senator’s office says this amendment would save taxpayers $20 million:

According to the U.S. Internal Revenue Service, as many as 2,840 households who have reported an income of $1 million or more on their tax returns were paid a total of $18.6 million in unemployment benefits in 2008. This included more than 800 earning over $2 million and 17 with incomes exceeding $10 million.

Coburn also defunds earmarks in the FY 2010 defense appropriations bill. One example: a $20 million earmark for the Edward M. Kennedy Institute for the United States Senate in Massachusetts.  Elsewhere, highway and mass transit earmarks call for nearly $700 million in extra spending.

A major obstruction to Coburn’s efforts to pull the plug on earmarks is Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV).  Coburn has been offering this legislation as amendments to pending bills. Leader Reid has refused to let the Oklahoman call up any of his amendments to the small business jobs bill preventing a vote. The President also shares some blame for not calling for the CRs to eliminate all earmarks. Nor do House Republicans win any plaudits here; they have yet to pass a short term CR without earmark funding.

Trump Won't Back Off Obama's Birth Papers

Donald Trump is not backing down from his demand that President Barack Obama produce his birth certificate and stepped up his criticism by questioning why he has not released other personal records, including college transcripts and legislative papers.

The billionaire real estate tycoon and star of “The Apprentice” created a stir on Wednesday when he said on “The View” that Obama must release his birth certificate.

Now Trump has reiterated his call in an exclusive interview with Newsmax.TV, with this simple message for Obama: Why don’t you produce your birth certificate and put to rest all speculation that you were born outside the United States?

He says Obama’s birth certificate controversy is a “strange situation” — there are conflicting reports as to what Honolulu hospital he was born at, and the governor of Hawaii claims he somehow remembers Obama being born 50 years ago.

Read more on Newsmax.com: Trump Won't Back Off Obama's Birth Papers
Important: Do You Support Pres. Obama's Re-Election? Vote Here Now!