Tag: Barack Obama

Russell Fry Among Politicians Banned from Russia

S. C. 7th Congressional District Rep. Russell Fry was among a list released Friday of 500 Americans as being banned from visiting Russia.
On his Twitter feed, @RepRussellFry, the Congressman quickly bragged about his banning:
“Russia just banned me from going to their country which candidly I had no intention of visiting.”
and
“For what reason, I haven’t any idea but if @RusEmbUSA thinks I’m offended, they are mistaken. This just made my night.”
It might have been wise for Fry to take a moment’s pause for consideration before being so quick to take to Twitter to brag about his banning. Fry might have taken pause to consider other politicians in the same banned company as himself. For example, included on the list were President Joe Biden, Vice President Kamala Harris and former president Barack Obama. Former Democratic House Speaker Nancy Pelosi was included on a previous list of Americans banned from visiting Russia.
(click on headline above to read more)

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Select Committee on Benghazi Releases Damning Report

Washington, D.C. – Select Committee on Benghazi Chairman Trey Gowdy (SC-04) released the following statement after the committee’s Majority released a mark of its investigative report:

“Chris Stevens, Sean Smith, Glen Doherty and Tyrone Woods were heroes who gave their lives in service to our country. Their bravery and the courageous actions of so many others on the ground that night should be honored.

“When the Select Committee was formed, I promised to conduct this investigation in a manner worthy of the American people’s respect, and worthy of the memory of those who died. That is exactly what my colleagues and I have done.

“Now, I simply ask the American people to read this report for themselves, look at the evidence we have collected, and reach their own conclusions. You can read this report in less time than our fellow citizens were taking fire and fighting for their lives on the rooftops and in the streets of Benghazi.”

The committee’s proposed report is just over 800 pages long and is comprised of five primary sections and 12 appendices. It details relevant events in 2011 and 2012.

Rep. Mike Pompeo (KS-04) released the following statement regarding these findings:

“We expect our government to make every effort to save the lives of Americans who serve in harm’s way. That did not happen in Benghazi. Politics were put ahead of the lives of Americans, and while the administration had made excuses and blamed the challenges posed by time and distance, the truth is that they did not try.”

Rep. Martha Roby (AL-02) released the following statement regarding these findings:

“Our committee’s insistence on additional information about the military’s response to the Benghazi attacks was met with strong opposition from the Defense Department, and now we know why. Instead of attempting to hide deficiencies in our posture and performance, it’s my hope our report will help ensure we fix what went wrong so that a tragedy like this never happens again

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Our police departments are looking like armies

“The linked article from the Charleston City Paper is an SC Hotline must read for anyone who cares about our freedoms.

The author hits the nail on the head about the militarization of police forces that may be heading to a “domestic army who are as heavily armed as the military and can act with complete impunity.”

As he correctly points out, “America has allowed itself to become protected,… by heavily armed men and women in large vehicles with questionable amounts of training who follow bad policies.” ~Paul Gable

By Mat Catastrophe

Last week, President Barack Obama announced that he would end the federal government’s policy of giving some kinds of used military equipment to local police forces. This move was in response to criticism that law enforcement officers had used military equipment to quiet civil unrest in several American cities, most notably Baltimore, Md.

Sadly, Obama’s actions are just another example of the president’s too-little-too-late approach to governance. The truth is, Obama is not the wild-eyed radical the hard right paints him as. In reality, he’s about as radical as a cup of warm water.

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The Media Education of Chris Christie

New Jersey governor Chris Christie discovered the real meaning of the political microscope in the last couple of days when a scandal that had been brewing around his administration broke into the national spotlight Wednesday.

Whether Christie knew about it or not, closing a couple of traffic lanes to cause massive traffic congestion into the George Washington Bridge for a couple of days as retribution for failing to get the endorsement of a small time New Jersey mayor is peanuts as far as political scandals go.

However, when you are thought of as a leading candidate for the 2016 Republican presidential nomination, it takes over national news.

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National Security Agency Spying and the Constitution

Seven months after the Edward Snowden leaks about National Security Agency spying started becoming public, President Barack Obama is now saying some changes in programs may have to be made.

A Blue Ribbon panel appointed by the president, Review Group on Intelligence and Communication Technologies, recently published a 309 page report.

One of the conclusions in that report were that the NSA program of vacuuming information about phone calls and other electronic transmissions within, into and out of the U.S. was, from all available evidence, worthless as a tool to fight terrorism.

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The Questionable Legacy of Barack Obama

There is no question that President Barack Obama is thinking about what his legacy will be when he leaves the Oval Office at the end of his second term.

However, is he doing so by playing games and making threats against Syria and jeopardizing U.S. foreign policy?

Is President Obama thinking about his legacy at the cost of alienating America’s biggest ally in the region – Israel – and our biggest ally in the world – Britain?

President Obama has already said that if Syrian President Bashar-al-Assad used poison gas on the rebels, America would act. After all, there was a “red line in the sand,” which Obama had drawn.

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IRS Story Unravels; Liberty Lost

IRS Story Unravels; Liberty Lost

The initial story from the IRS regarding alleged targeting of conservative groups has fallen apart. These actions go well beyond one or several low level employees acting on their own.

According to a report from the IRS Inspector General’s office, senior officials at the IRS knew about the targeting of conservative groups for over a year without doing anything about it.

Every new revelation makes this whole caper seem more and more politically motivated regardless of what the Obama administration says.

Yesterday we heard that at least one organization in South Carolina, the Laurens County Tea Party, was one of the many organizations having problems with the IRS. The group applied for tax-exempt status in 2010 and still has received no answer.

Yesterday we also heard that the Justice Department had begun an investigation into the actions of the IRS. This would be the same Justice Department that performed warrantless searches on the phone records of several reporters at the Associated Press.

If government officials don’t respect the laws of the United States and the provisions of the Constitution, who will?

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We now know that at least three IRS offices were involved in the targeting of conservative groups seeking tax-exempt status.

Investigating the IRS partie deux

We now know that at least three IRS offices were involved in the targeting of conservative groups seeking tax-exempt status.

The Washington Post reported today the IRS Washington, D.C. headquarters sent questionnaires to conservative groups asking about their donors and other areas of their operations while the El Monte and Laguna Miguel offices in California did the same with tea party affiliated groups.

This takes the investigation of IRS activities well beyond the initial claim that some low level functionaries in the Cincinnati office were to blame.

According to the article, an employee in the Cincinnati office told a lawyer representing one of the targeted groups that its application was “under review” in Washington.

Interestingly, it was George W. Bush appointed IRS Commissioner Douglas Shulman who told a Congressional committee in spring 2012 that no targeting was occurring. Shulman resigned in November 2012.

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It’s a Bird, It’s a Plane, It’s a Drone

“People simply disappeared, always during the night. Your name was removed from the registers, every record of everything you had ever done was wiped out. Your one-time existence was denied and then forgotten. You were abolished, annihilated: vaporized was the usual word.” – George Orwell, 1984.

Just when you thought things could not get any worse for Americans, news surfaced Tuesday morning that the U.S. government can now order the killing of American citizens. Weapon of choice – drone.

If these citizens are ‘believed’ to be “senior operational leaders” of al-Qaeda or “an associated force”, even if there is no intelligence indicating they are engaged in an active plot to attack the United States, they are fair game.

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The No Debt Limit Congress

When is a debt limit not a debt limit? When it’s in Congress.

You have to give those 535 people we send to Washington every couple of years to run the federal government credit. They find more creative ways every year not to do their job.

The latest is a debt limit that is not a limit because it will be suspended until May 18th while the Treasury continues borrowing to pay the nation’s immediate bills.

When we (as a nation) reach May 18th, we will have exceeded the statutory $16.4 trillion national debt limit without having a big Democrat/Republican showdown over fiscal policy. Actually, we reached the $16.4 trillion debt limit in the last days of 2012. The Treasury has been juggling the books since then to make it seem like we didn’t.

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