Democrats Drop Eight Anti-Gun People Control Bills On First Day

By William Teach January 5, 2013 – 8:31 am

And most look oh-so-reasonable

(The Hill) Members of the 113th Congress introduced 10 bills on Thursday relating to gun violence, most of which came from Democrats seeking new restrictions on gun ownership.

The flurry of legislative proposals show that members are likely to push the issue in the wake of the December shooting at a Connecticut elementary school that left 20 children dead.

Carolyn McCarthy, an anti-gun zealot, introduced 4

H.R. 137 and 138 from McCarthy would require people prohibited from buying firearms to be listed in a national database, and would prohibit the transfer or possession of large capacity ammunition clips.

McCarthy’s H.R. 141 would require criminal background checks on all firearms transactions at gun shows, which would close the so-called gun-show loophole. Her H.R. 142 would require face-to-face purchases of ammunition, the licensing of ammunition dealers, and the reporting of bulk ammo purchases.

Sounds reasonable. I really do not have a problem with this legislation. Of course, the vast majority of ammo dealers require that people who place orders pick up said orders at licensed firearms stores, just like with gun orders. And the proof is in the details of what the legislation says, and none of them are available to read as of yet on Thomas or at her webpage.

Bobby Rush, Rush Holt, Jim Moran, and Sheila Jackson Lee also submitted legislation. Lee’s would raise the eligibility age to carry a handgun from 18-21. I’m sure the young criminals who break the law regarding murder in Chicago will quickly ignore her.

Two freshman Republicans introduced contrary bills that would end federal law requiring that areas around schools be designated as “gun free zones.” These bills, H.R. 35 from Rep. Steve Stockman (R-Texas) and H.R. 133 from Rep. Thomas Massie (R-Ky.), are a response to findings that violence in and around schools has increased since the gun free zone law took effect in 1990.

I think some Republican should introduce legislation to disarm all federal agents that guard Democrats, since Dems are so anti-gun. Also, legislation that creates a gun free zone around all Democrat offices. Bet they wouldn’t like that!

Read: Democrats Drop Eight Anti-Gun People Control Bills On First Day »

Posted in 2nd Amendment, Democrats | 8 Comments | Trackback URL

CAIR Campaign Attempts To Mislead About Meaning Of Jihad

By William Teach January 5, 2013 – 8:11 am

Back on December 14th I noted that Hamas linked CAIR was launching a program in Chicago designed to mislead people on what jihad means, with this wonderful quote

In contrast, Rehab’s “MyJihad” public-relations campaign portrays jihad as “a concerted and noble effort against injustice, hate, misunderstanding, war, violence, poverty, hunger, abuse or whatever challenge big or small we face in daily life, with the purpose of getting to a better place,” according to the campaign’s website, MyJihad.org.

Funny stuff, where “getting to a better place” seems to involve homicide bombs. Now they’re trying the same in San Francisco, which has long been a hotbed of Islamist support

(ABC San Fran) Buses in San Francisco are carrying messages of jihad, but it’s not what you might think. It’s a campaign to educate residents about the real meaning of the word. It’s a campaign that began in Chicago and has now reached the Bay Area.

One statement on the side of a Muni bus reads: “My jihad is to stay fit despite my busy schedule. What’s yours?”

It’s part of an educational campaign created by CAIR — the Council on American-Islamic Relations. The group has put 35 ads on buses rolling through the streets of San Francisco.

“The intention of the campaign is to educate our fellow Americans about what the word jihad means,” said Zahra Billoo, the executive director of the Bay Area office for the Council on American-Islamic Relations. She said, “A common misconception of the word jihad is that it means armed struggle or holy war and that is something that has been perpetrated by many who’ve made careers out of pushing anti-Muslim sentiment.”

Got that? It’s the fault of people who’ve noticed that Islamists go on jihads to kill each other and non-believers, blow up buildings, kill women and children, behead people, and so on, that the word “jihad” is a dirty one.

This is all part of the on-going and long term program from Hamas linked CAIR to paint the hardcore Islamists as little darlings. And, while Jihad Watch points out that “jihad” does have many, many meanings, not all of them involving violence, it’s primary meaning is violence.

Jihad in Arabic does indeed mean “struggle,” and the Arabic word carries as many connotations as the English one. One may struggle to lose weight or to exercise regularly, and the same word is used for great struggles, such as those against Nazism and Communism. The Islamic Republic of Iran has a Department of Agricultural Jihad, which has nothing to do with blowing up farm implements, but merely concerns itself with the struggle to increase crop yields.

However, the principal meaning of jihad throughout Islamic history and in Islamic law is armed struggle against unbelievers to subjugate them as inferiors under the rule of Sharia. The four schools of Sunni Muslim jurisprudence are clear about jihad:

I think we cal also add in “unarmed struggle”, since much of what the Muslim Brotherhood and groups like CAIR are attempting to do is slowly and peacefully integrate hardcore Islamist values into the society, government, courts, and legislation in countries around the world, with the intention of creating a subjugated population ripe for switchover to a Sharia complaint country.

Crossed at Right Wing News and Stop The ACLU.

Read: CAIR Campaign Attempts To Mislead About Meaning Of Jihad »

Posted in Islamification, RoP | 1 Comment | Trackback URL

Federal Judge Says EPA Overstepped Legal Authority On Water

By William Teach January 4, 2013 – 7:33 pm

Well, hey, the EPA already thinks that CO2, a trace gas necessary for life is a pollutant, why not deem water a pollutant?

(Fox News) Virginia officials scored a key victory Thursday in their battle with the Environmental Protection Agency over what EPA critics describe as a land takeover.

U.S. District Judge Liam O’Grady in Alexandria ruled late Thursday that the EPA exceeded its authority by attempting to regulate stormwater runoff into a Fairfax County creek as a pollutant. O’Grady sided with the Virginia Department of Transportation and the Fairfax County Board of Supervisors, which challenged EPA’s stormwater restrictions

“Stormwater runoff is not a pollutant, so EPA is not authorized to regulate it,” O’Grady said.

Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli says the ruling could ultimately save Virginia taxpayers more than $300 million.

The lunatics at the EPA had deemed, and argued in court, that water was a pollutant if there was “too much of it”. Seriously. And that all this water was daring to *gasp* change the landscape of creeks and rivers, because before it rained creeks and rivers never ever changed. And this could have caused home and business owners their property, or at least seen it heavily regulated.

Read: Federal Judge Says EPA Overstepped Legal Authority On Water »

Posted in Barking Moonbats, Enviroweenies | 1 Comment | Trackback URL

If All You See…

By William Teach January 4, 2013 – 1:00 pm

…is a wasteland created because Someone (else) refused to give up their fossil fueled travel, you might just be a Warmist

The blog of the day is The Daley Gator, with a post on squeamish leftists hating cops with guns.

Pic suggested by Gumball Brains.

Read: If All You See… »

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We’re Saved! Concord Bans Planet Killing Water Bottles

By William Teach January 4, 2013 – 11:12 am

I heard this one on the news yesterday or Wednesday, but, had completely forgotten about it during my morning news perusal. Fortunately, Tom Nelson is there to point the way

(Globe and Mail) Concord, Mass., has banned the sale of single-serving plastic water bottles, the Boston Herald reports. The bylaw, posted on the Town of Concord’s website, states: “It shall be unlawful to sell non-sparkling, unflavored drinking water in single-serving polyethylene terephthalate (PET) bottles of 1 litre (34 ounces) or less in the Town of Concord on or after Jan. 1, 2013.”

Violators face up to a $50 (U.S.) fine, with Concord’s Health Division responsible for enforcing the ban.

It’s not like someone could simply go to another town, say Maynard or Bedford, to purchase the evil water bottles. Or, that drinks like Pepsi, Coke, Ginger Ale, orange soda, tea, etc, come in….plastic bottles (I often reuse soda or tea bottles by putting water in them).

Interestingly, Henry David Thoreau wrote Civil Disobedience (free on Kindle) after being jailed in Concord for refusing to pay taxes which he felt were meant to show allegiance to The Government (it was also about his disgust over slavery and the Mexican-American war). It was much about resisting to unjust laws, not just attempting to change them through the political process.

“Must the citizen ever for a moment, or in the least degree, resign his conscience to the legislator? Why has every man a conscience then? I think that we should be men first, and subjects afterward. It is not desirable to cultivate a respect for the law, so much as for the right. The only obligation which I have a right to assume is to do at any time what I think right.”

Planet killing bottle of water.

Read: We’re Saved! Concord Bans Planet Killing Water Bottles »

Posted in AGW Idiocy, Global Warming, Liberal World | 10 Comments | Trackback URL

House To Vote On Partial Sandy Relief Bill Friday

By William Teach January 4, 2013 – 9:10 am

Most in the Legacy Media are referring to this as some sort of capitulation from John Boehner, instead of an understanding that the Senate porked up the Sandy bill

(US News) Cowing to bipartisan pressure, House Speaker John Boehner is bringing to the House floor Friday a measure to help fund recovery efforts for Hurricane Sandy, the superstorm that wreaked havoc in the Northeast, particularly ravaging New York and New Jersey.

Boehner had sought to delay passage of the $60 billion Senate-passed bill, which some in his party say is larded with unnecessary spending. But the speaker was pilloried by members of his own caucus—including a particularly scathing speech by New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie Wednesday—and promised to bring the spending measure to the floor in two steps: a vote Friday on a $9 billion infusion of cash to the National Flood Insurance Program and a vote January 15 on the remaining $51 billion proposal.

Christie and Peter King (R-NY) need to look within themselves, but, like many supposed fiscal conservatives, they abandon principles when they themselves want the money. Either of them could have said “pull the pork, give us a clean bill.” One NY politician took a principled stand. Too bad Christie and King didn’t.

Let’s look at a bit of that pork

The pork-barrel feast includes more than $8 million to buy cars and equipment for the Homeland Security and Justice departments. It also includes a whopping $150 million for the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration to dole out to fisheries in Alaska and $2 million for the Smithsonian Institution to repair museum roofs in DC.

An eye-popping $13 billion would go to “mitigation” projects to prepare for future storms.

Other big-ticket items in the bill include $207 million for the VA Manhattan Medical Center; $41 million to fix up eight military bases along the storm’s path, including Guantanamo Bay, Cuba; $4 million for repairs at Kennedy Space Center in Florida; $3.3 million for the Plum Island Animal Disease Center and $1.1 million to repair national cemeteries.

And

  • $58.8 million for forest restoration on private land.
  • $197 million “to… protect coastal ecosystems and habitat impacted by Hurricane Sandy.”
  • $10.78 billion for public transportation, most of which is allocated to future construction and improvements, not disaster relief.
  • $17 billion for wasteful Community Development Block Grants (CDBG), a program that has become notorious for its use as a backdoor earmark program.

And

  • $199 million in tax breaks for rum makers.
  • $188 million for upgrading, not repairing, Amtrak rail lines.
  • $57 million for tracking debris from the 2011 Japanese tsunami.
  • $20 million for a national “water priorities” study.

So, almost half the bill is stuffed full of lard, which, yes, does have something to do with the effects of Sandy, but not in the NY/NJ area. Many of the projects were meant for Republican votes

Why, you might ask, would the Senate be packing billions of taxpayer dollars for these areas of the country that are nowhere near the devastation brought about by superstorm Sandy into a bill designed to bring relief to those suffering from the storm that ripped the northeastern part of the nation?

The answer can be found in a quick review of the states that are set to benefit from the Senate’s extra-special benevolence—states including Alabama, Mississippi, Texas and Louisiana.

The Senate bill was buying off Republicans, who voted for the bill. Now, it’s up to Boehner to strip the bill for the January 15th vote.

Read: House To Vote On Partial Sandy Relief Bill Friday »

Posted in Current Affairs, Democrats, GOP, Politics | 6 Comments | Trackback URL

Surprise! FTC Drops Google Anti-Trust Case

By William Teach January 4, 2013 – 8:42 am

I’m wondering if Liberals and Occupiers will protest against what appears to be yet another Big Company involved in a pay for play scheme to avoid punishment? Anyhow, there are two big stories over at Politico about how Google beat the feds, the first linked by Drudge, more about the nuts and bolts of the deal, and the other

(Politico) Google escaped from a nearly two-year federal antitrust probe with only a few scratches by proving that the best defense is a good offense.

Instead of ignoring Washington — as rival Microsoft did before its costly monopolization trial in the 1990s — Google spent about $25 million in lobbying, made an effort to cozy up to the Obama administration and hired influential Republicans and former regulators. The company even consulted with the late Robert Bork and The Heritage Foundation and met with senators like John Kerry to make its case. In other words, these traditional outsiders worked the system from the inside.

It was all an old-school play for a company that long rejected the notion of lobbying in Washington. In February 2012, the company snapped up former Rep. Susan Molinari, a Republican insider, to lead its Washington team. She proved to be the political complement to Schmidt, who during the investigation donated for a second time to the Obama administration and much later appeared with top aide Jim Messina at the president’s reelection headquarters. The company grabbed headlines when it hired up Suzanne Michel, one of the FTC’s top patent experts, much earlier in the agency’s investigation.

What they really do not delve into is

  • Google contributed $736,554 to Obama’s 2012 re-election (only $30k to Romney)
  • Donated $128,517 to Obama’s first coronation, er, inauguration
  • Executive Chairman Eric Schmidt donated $25k to the inauguration
  • CEO Larry Page gave $25k to inauguration
  • Senior VP David Drummond gave $25k
  • Others in the senior management team donated smaller sums
  • Larry Page was involved with multiple big money fundraisers for Obama during the 2012 cycle

Must be nice.

Crossed at Right Wing News and Stop The ACLU.

Read: Surprise! FTC Drops Google Anti-Trust Case »

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Obligatory Al Jazeera Buys Al Gore’s Current TV

By William Teach January 3, 2013 – 3:24 pm

Too be honest, I wasn’t going to really bother until I ran across this NY Times piece

Al Jazeera on Wednesday announced a deal to take over Current TV, the low-rated cable channel that was founded by Al Gore, a former vice president, and his business partners seven years ago. Al Jazeera plans to shut Current and start an English-language channel, which will be available in more than 40 million homes, with newscasts emanating from both New York and Doha, Qatar.

Gore stands to make about 100 million dollars. Current TV employees stand to join unemployment lines.

For Al Jazeera, which is financed by the government of Qatar, the acquisition is a coming of age moment. A decade ago, Al Jazeera’s flagship Arabic-language channel was reviled by American politicians for showing videotapes from Al Qaeda members and sympathizers. Now the news operation is buying an American channel, having convinced Mr. Gore and the other owners of Current that it has the journalistic muscle and the money to compete head-to-head with CNN and other news channels in the United States.

The entire wealth of Qatar is built on oil. It’s “carbon footprint” is 55.4 tons per person per year. Only the US Virgin Islands and Gibraltar have higher footprints world wide. So, not only has Gore sold out to Islamic terrorist sympathizers, protectors, and enablers, he has sold out to the Evil Fossil Fuel Industry.

So, next time some Warmist starts yammering on about how great Gore is when it comes to “Climate change”, remember who he sold out to.

Al Jazeera did not disclose the purchase price, but people with direct knowledge of the deal pegged it at around $500 million, indicating a $100 million payout for Mr. Gore, who owned 20 percent of Current. Mr. Gore and his partners were eager to complete the deal by Dec. 31, lest it be subject to higher tax rates that took effect on Jan. 1, according to several people who insisted on anonymity because they were not authorized to speak publicly. But the deal was not signed until Wednesday.

Oh, and he’s a hypocrite on taxes, too.

Read: Obligatory Al Jazeera Buys Al Gore’s Current TV »

Posted in Climahypocrites, Global Warming, War On Terrorism | 2 Comments | Trackback URL

If All You See…

By William Teach January 3, 2013 – 1:00 pm

…is a field that would be perfect for a wind farm (as long as it is not visible to themselves), you might just be a Warmist

The blog of the day is This ain’t Hell…., with a post on a hand wringing liberal.

Read: If All You See… »

Posted in If All You See | 3 Comments | Trackback URL

Say Goodbye To 75 Watt Incandescent Bulbs

By William Teach January 3, 2013 – 12:11 pm

In this case, we can actually Blame Bush for signing the stupid legislation

(Fox Salt Lake) The incandescent light bulbs that have been in homes for decades are being phased out in favor of higher-efficiency bulbs, and the older bulbs took another big step towards obscurity this week.

Last year 100-watt incandescent light bulbs disappeared. This year, it’s 75-watt. Next year, 60- and 40-watt bulbs will get the ax.

That doesn’t mean it’s illegal to use the older incandescent bulbs. They’re still around, but not being manufactured anymore.

They aren’t technically banned, but, in order to meet the strict guidelines, incandescents would necessarily be much more expensive. But, hey, we’re keeping the world from boiling or something.

Read: Say Goodbye To 75 Watt Incandescent Bulbs »

Posted in AGW Idiocy, Energy, Enviroweenies | 4 Comments | Trackback URL
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