Boker tov, Boulder!

Initial Claims for Unemployment up 18,000 to 354,000

 

Tyler Durden

 "... the current week's number of 354K once again broke the "improving" trend, and printed far above consensus estimates of 340K, proving that there is still a substantial amount of "disposable" slack in the economy. If the stock market continues its downward jiggle, and without the Fed that may well be the case, look for the Claims trendline to resume going from the lower left to the upper right, in seasonally adjusted terms. In short: yet another red flag for the economy..."

 

How many red flags do we have now? I've lost count.

Obama Preempts Sovereignty of Kharzai Government & Kharzai Hits Back

 

I thought "The Muslim World" was gonna like us better because Obama had "known Islam on three continents." Funny how it didn't work out that way. 

Apparently, in Obama's rush to surrender Afghanistan to the Taliban he [Ooops] preempted the sovereignty of the Kharzi government which, unlike the U.S., has some preconditions  -- such as, "peace talks cannot begin amid fighting and bloodshed."

KABUL, Afghanistan (AP) — Afghanistan’s president says he will not pursue peace talks with the Taliban unless the United States steps out of the negotiations and the militant group stops its violent attacks on the ground.

Hamid Karzai is upset over a U.S. and Taliban announcement the day before that they would begin preliminary peace talks in Qatar without the Afghan government.

 

Meanwhile, Obama is about to deliver yet another "much anticipated" [it doesn't say by whom] speech at the Brandenburg Gate in Berlin, "to renew his call for a "drastic reduction" in the world's nuclear stockpiles (in the U.S. and Russia).

According to The Guardian, in this "Big Speech," Obama will also "press Congress" to ...[blah blah blah] ... 

 

" I'm telling my government that you've forgotten your place" --Becky Gerritson

 

Consider this an UPDATE to my earlier post, and the IBD editorial about CAIR getting preferential treatment from the IRS (in the wake of "hundreds" of closed door meetings with the Obama administration, including many in the White House):

 

At Breitbart:

Eliana Johnson of National Review Online

reports that

Cincinnati-based IRS agent Gary Muthert

told the House Oversight Committee that

the IRS does, in fact,

subject pro-Israel tax-exempt groups to higher scrutiny

 --by sending their applications to

a special IRS unit

that investigates them for ties to terrorism.

 

 

 

Oh, "Yes We Can"

 

State Department Whistleblower

Now Facing Retaliation

and Intimidation

 

Katie Pavlich: "Camping out in front of her house? Intimidating her kids? Sounds like these tactics follow the Obama administration whistleblower retaliation playbook perfectly. "

 

 

AP Photo /Flashback: Obama Annointment at Invesco Field, August 28, 2008

 

See also StopBullying Dot GOV, a "federal government website managed by the U.S. Department of Health & Human Services."

"Bullying can affect you in many ways. You may lose sleep or feel sick. You may want to skip school. You may even be thinking about suicide. If you are feeling hopeless or helpless or know someone that is, please call the LIFELINE at 1-800-273-TALK (8255)"

 

G8 Photo of the Day

Elan pegged it when he called my attention to this picture of "Obama looking like Mt. Rushmore" at the G8.

 

EXTRA POINTS if you can identify the foreign leader with whom The Won is dis/engaged in conversation.

 

Bill Clinton Speech in Israel

There's been a lot of hullabaloo over the [1.8 million shekels] paid to Bill Clinton for his speech at the Peres Academic Center, but he's made it go away by donating it back. This negates the concluding point of Ari Soffer's summary of the speech - posted by David Ha'ivri at facebook -  but the rest holds. 

 

- Stroke Peres' ego... check

- Urge Israelis to "take risks" with their lives and their children's... check

- "Warn" us that we're destined to lose the conflict, so we'd better compromise fast... check

- Market yourself as a modern liberal whilst warning of "Arab demographics"... check

- Token understated criticism of the Arab leadership (to make us feel better)... check

- Talk about "getting on with your neighbours" as if it's all just a silly little domestic dispute... check

- Go home... check

- Cash Peres' cheque... check

 

"Great leaders live to eliminate or simplify the complex"

 

I can't resist this next bit, as I came across it right after I finished that last post, in which The Won was lecturing on the complexity of the war in Syria.  I can't resist.

 

5 Transitions Great Leaders Make

That Average Leaders Don't

Shun Complexity– Complexity is a leader’s enemy not their friend. Great leaders live to eliminate or simplify the complex, while average leaders allow themselves and those they lead to be consumed by it. Complexity stifles innovation, slows development, gates progress, and adversely impacts culture.

Complexity is expensive, inefficient, and ineffective.

I’m not minimizing the fact we live in a complex world, and I’m not suggesting that profit cannot be found in complexity. But great leaders understand opportunity and profits are extracted from complexity through simplification, not by adding to the complexity. While many think it was Einstein who said, “Simplicity is the ultimate sophistication,” the statement was actually borrowed from Leonardo de Vinci – both gentlemen were correct.

 

 

The "news" is awful. Find something else to do.

9 AM and I'm ready to go back to bed. The news is loathsome.

 

An IBD editorial suggests that HAMAS-in-America, known as CAIR,  got preferential treatment by the IRS because of its cozy relationship with the Obama White House.

.... Despite being blackballed by the FBI, which still suspects it's fronting for Hamas, and despite failing to file annual tax reports as required by federal law, CAIR apparently has found friends in high places at the nation's powerful taxing authority.

Last year, in the middle of the national election season, the IRS quietly agreed to reinstate CAIR's tax-exempt status, allowing it to resume raising tax-free donations just in time for Ramadan, a key time for Muslim charitable giving. According to the Religion News Service, the IRS in June 2012 sent CAIR's national office a letter stating the nonprofit had regained its exemption after losing it the previous year.

Several GOP lawmakers had asked for an audit of CAIR after a book exposing its internal operations, "Muslim Mafia," reported the Islamist outfit had skipped filing IRS Form 990s for at least three years in a row. This was concerning since the same book revealed the bulk of CAIR's funding comes from foreign donors, including Islamic states hostile to the U.S.

Why the sudden IRS reversal? Did CAIR make good on its delinquencies? That's still a mystery.

[....]

By law, the nonprofit group must make copies of its tax returns available to the public. Several news outlets, including Politico.com and USA Today, have asked for copies of CAIR's missing 2007-10 returns, and CAIR has been unable to produce them. Curiouser still, CAIR's latest tax return is only a partial filing — covering the period from Aug. 9, 2011, to Dec. 31, 2011.

You would think the IRS would make an outfit as sketchy as CAIR jump through hoop after hoop, especially in light of the third degree it gave Tea Party groups. But it turns out CAIR's also found favor in the White House. Administration officials in 2012 met inside the White House with CAIR officials, according to Secret Service visitors logs.

In the months leading up to the IRS decision, in fact, the Obama administration held "hundreds" of closed-door meetings with CAIR — including many in the White House, according to an article in the Daily Caller posted in early June 2012 — the same month the IRS reversed its decision.

Also, Obama taped an interview with Charlie Rose before leaving for Europe, which was broadcast late last night. Maybe his team was worried that someone might read Stephen Hayes' piece on Our Disappearing President ("...the president wants a debate, but he doesn’t want to participate.").

The Won apparently told Charlie Rose that (1) he's no Dick Cheney, (2) the NSA surveillance program "is transparent," and (3) on Syria, "if you haven't been in the Situation Room" you can't possibly understand how complex it all is.

 

Let's see now... what else?

Did you know the U.S. Treasury can make the country's (accumulated) DEBT go down even as the (monthly) DEFICIT goes up?  That's Extraordinary Accounting -- and according to some of the comments, reminiscent of former president Clinton's budget "surpluses."

Thanks to the investigative reporting of Keith Koffler at White House Dossier, we learn that FLOTUS and the First Daughters are having lunch today with Bono... in Ireland. I do hope he picks up the tab.

Joan Walsh, the disgusting leftist writer at Salon, spends her time trashing conservatives. Of late she's noticed that Sarah Palin matters, but only as the "smiley face of white backlash." (There is nothing in this world that a committed leftist can't see in racialist terms.)

Oh, and this just in: America begins surrender of Afghanistan to the Taliban.

NBC News ~ by way of Weasel Zippers:

U.S. and Taliban representatives will meet soon for the first time to begin what are expected to be long and complex negotiations for a peaceful settlement to the war in Afghanistan, senior Obama administration officials said Tuesday.

 

Just remember, if you haven't been in the Situation Room you won't understand the complexities. So don't even try. 

Fundamental Transformation Nearly Complete

 

October 2008:

 

 

Glenn Reynolds at USA Today:

.... Over the weekend, the Associated Press reported that the spying goes well beyond the Prism program reported by whistleblower Edward Snowden. As AP notes, "while Prism has attracted the recent attention, the program actually is a relatively small part of a much more expansive and intrusive eavesdropping effort. . . . documents show it is one of the major sources for what ends up in the president's daily briefing." From the descriptions available, it appears that the NSA basically just copies everything going over the Internet, and can look at it either in real time or later.

Meanwhile, according to a report from CNET, the National Security Administration has admitted, despite earlier denials, that it's listening to American phone calls without warrants. The calls are stored, but there's no warrant application. Instead, it appears -- though as I write this there's enough back-and-forth that it isn't certain -- that all that is needed is a decision by an analyst. So, in essence, the NSA may be writing its own warrants.

Is this true? Who do we believe? Despite denials, security expert Bruce Schneier saysthat the best assumption is that government just collects everything. "Everyone is playing word games. No one is telling the truth."

 

Vus titzuch?

President Obama calls the head of the CIA and asks,  "How come the Jews know everything before we do?"

The CIA chief says, "The Jews have this expression, 'Vus titzuch?' 

The President asks, "What's that mean?"

"Well, Mr. President," replies the CIA chief, "It's a Yiddish expression which roughly translates to 'what's happening?'  They just go around asking each other 'vus titzuch?' and they end up knowing everything."

The President decides to go undercover to determine if this is true.

He gets dressed up as an Orthodox Jew and is secretly flown in an unmarked plane to New York, picked up in an unmarked car and dropped off in Brooklyn's most Jewish, orthodox neighborhood.

Soon, a little old man in black garb and hat comes shuffling along.  The President stops him and whispers, "Vus titzuch?"

The old man whispers back, "Obama's in Brooklyn!" 

 

h/t DeDo