Monthly Archives: April 2015

Assault on Conservatives

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…by the Obama administration is continuing in spades. This time, it’s a naked assault on a conservative Congressman, Jason Chaffetz (R, UT). The Secret Service “leaked” information concerning a decade old application for work with the SS submitted by Chaffetz and which was rejected by the SS. This sort of thing is confidential, which SS employees know full well.

Supposedly, Homeland Security Secretary Jeh Johnson personally called Chaffetz after the release of that confidential information, as did Secret Service Director Joseph Clancy.

However.

Chaffetz is Chairman of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, and he’s

been relentless in his scrutiny of the [Secret Service], particularly in the wake of a March incident where agents returning from a party drove into an active bomb investigation scene. Chaffetz earlier this week subpoenaed the two agents in question—a step Johnson called “unprecedented and unnecessary.”

He’s also been an ardent critic of Obama administration policies all across the board.

Now, it’s certainly true that, in the larger scheme of things, this is a relatively minor matter. But regarding that larger scheme of things, this is a part of that larger scheme.

In light of that, what’s the value of these…apologies?

How do they make Chaffetz, the victim of this assault on privacy, whole?

How do they give any material assurance that this miscreancy won’t be repeated?

What’s really needed is a wholesale replacement of management (I won’t say leadership) of DHS and of the Secret Service.

Remember this in the fall of 2016.

Bailouts

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The Inspector General for the Federal Housing Finance Agency (FHFA) recently reported that Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac might need more government bailouts if housing markets decline. The problem: lack of capital reserves to serve as a buffer against future losses.

That lack of capital, says Fannie Mae boss, Tim Mayopoulos,

increases the likelihood that Fannie Mae will need additional capital from Treasury at some point.

William Isaac, FTI Consulting Senior Managing Director (and former FDIC Chairman), and author of the piece at the link, has a solution: Treasury should stop sweeping Fannie’s and Freddie’s profits into the Federal government’s piggy bank. He’s right that this is illegal, but it’s the wrong solution.

The correct answer to the problems with Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac is not to bail them out in any way shape or form. The correct answer is to disband them completely, erase them from government, and replace them with…nothing. Full stop.

Liberals and Unions

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In December 2014, the NLRB passed a final rule on a partisan 3-2 vote that greatly shortens the time for a workplace union-organizing election. … Mr. Obama issued a “memorandum of disapproval”—essentially a veto—to kill the Congressional measure [to overturn the rule] and preserve the NLRB rule.

From now on unions will have unlimited time to prepare their campaigns to organize a workplace, springing the election paperwork on an employer when they figure they have the best chance to prevail. By reducing the time before an election to as little as two weeks from the current average of 38 days, unions will be able to lobby workers and make their case before a company can counter with its own argument.

Because with Liberals and unions, there’s only one side to a story. No need to hear from anyone else.

Integrity, Take Two

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The House Oversight Committee issued the subpoenas to two agents who are familiar with the March 4 episode, which occurred as authorities were investigating a possible bomb threat while President Obama was in the residence. During the investigation, two agents, who were reportedly drinking that night, nearly drove over the object in question, which turned out to be a book.

One of the subpoenaed agents was on the ground at the White House that night, sources said.

The subpoenas became necessary when Secret Service Director Joseph Clancy refused to allow them to testify voluntarily.

Naturally, Jeh Johnson, Homeland Security Secretary, and whose department owns the Secret Service, is objecting.

Director Clancy and I must fight to protect [the agents] against the visibility, public glare, and inevitable second-guessing, of a congressional hearing.

Sure. Because everything Johnson, Clancy, and the Homeland Security generally do is entirely above board, while Congress cannot be trusted. Neither can the American people be trusted. Far more importantly, the Secret Service must never be questioned, must never be second-guessed.

Johnson went on:

I, too, want to know what happened on the night of March 4. This is why the Department’s Inspector General is conducting a thorough investigation into the matter.

Of course, we can’t know there’s an internal investigation. Johnson and Clancy are zealously keeping whatever it is they’re doing—or not doing—secret. Even from our elected representatives.

Friends, Enemies, and Party Discipline

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The Obama administration, through its Eric Holder DoJ, has decided to prosecute Senator Robert Menendez (D, NJ) on various charges of misbehavior, charges which the administration and the NLMSM have been bruiting about for roughly three years. Why bring the charges now? Because we’re in the end game of the Obama “negotiations” with Iran over the latter’s nuclear weapons program, and the deal being talked about will codify Iran’s ability to build nuclear weapons. Menendez is a powerful Democrat, and he’s been a vocal critic of Obama and his Iran “negotiations.”

The attack on Menendez already has borne fruit: he’s stepped down from his position as Ranking Member of the Senate’s Foreign Relations Committee. This committee will have a strong input on pending legislation that will give Congress an oversight say on that pending deal with Iran (or force Obama’s veto of oversight of him and his actions); the prosecution and Menendez’ withdrawal from the committee dilute Democrats’ participation in that legislation.

On the other hand (just across the street, as it were), the Obama administration, through its Eric Holder DoJ, has declined to prosecute the administration’s IRS’ Lois Lerner on the contempt of Congress charges brought by Congress. Lerner is a friend of the administration; she’s the one who headed up the IRS’ attacks on conservative political organizations, “lost” emails regarding those attacks, and then refused to cooperate with Congress’ investigation.

I often say at this point, and I say now: this is the level of integrity of the Democratic Party; remember this in 2016.

Some might say, though, that there are honest Democrats in the party. For instance, isn’t Menendez, a target of Party persecution [sic] one such? Of course, there may well be. But where is their integrity when they associate themselves with a fundamentally dishonest organization? What does their silence on this sort of thing say about them?

Those honest Democrats in the Party can show themselves in one of two ways. One is to end their shameful silence, even in the face of the present Chicago-style Party discipline. The other, more powerful, way (especially since, honest or not, they’re badly tainted by their association with this Party) would be to leave the Democratic Party and form their own political party to compete against the Republicans and Democrats from a platform built explicitly on integrity.

Certainly, third parties generally don’t do well in American elections. The Republican Party began as a third party, and the Bull Moose Party was a third party with a powerful impact on our national elections. However, since then third party attempts since have failed (Nader’s and Perrot’s attempts, while famous, were ephemeral). The difference between those failures and the prior successes, though, is not an evolved political environment. The difference is that the lately third party attempts did not have established politicians as members or in their leadership, and aside from an ability to self-fund, they didn’t have the finances.

The honest members of the Democratic Party, however, both are well-known and established politicians, and they have effective and stable fund-raising capacity. A New Democracy Party, formed of these honest, now ex-, Democrats would be in an excellent position immediately to compete on the local and State level, and in just a few election cycles (see the Republican Party) to compete on the national level.

It’s not at all an insurmountable problem. If those honest Democrats are willing fight Party discipline and to show themselves.

Remember this, too, in 2016.