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Protons have mass? I didn't even know they were Catholic.
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I am neither for nor against apathy.
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All I ask is a chance to prove that money can't make me happy.
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If the world were a logical place, men would be the ones who ride horses sidesaddle.
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They told me I was gullible and I believed them.
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Experience is the thing you have left when everything else is gone.
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One nice thing about egotists ... they don't talk about other people.
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I used to be indecisive. Now, I'm not sure.
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If the Far Right wishes to continue nominating losers and do not learn from this affliction then they deserve what they get.
If Georgia's Republican Party does not understand the nomination of an extreme far right candidate would, in all likelihood, give an equally unqualified and terrible Democrat candidate an undeserved opening then we would all lose!
Yes, Jack Kingston is a conservative and holds some views I may not agree with but he is far better qualified to become Georgia's next Senator than those who have already announced. (See 1 below.)
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Latin America has grown up and is becoming a financial and economic powerhouse and we need to recognize that. (See 2 below.)
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Pipes sees it my way vis a vis Turkey and Israel and the apology. (See 3 below.)
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Closes the White House to Kids but can shoot baskets with them. Mr. Cool!
The video is both hilarious and pathetic.
Then we have this dichotomy. Ben Carson is a danger yet a felon is fine as a professor! (See 4 below.)
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Dick
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1)When Does 'Appropriator' Become a Dirty Word? Perhaps in Georgia's GOP Primary
By Daniel Newhauser
Candidates in the Georgia Republican Senate primary are jostling for the furthest right starting block in what’s likely to be a crowded race. Already the question is: Can a member of the Appropriations Committee, through which all past spending decisions have traveled, prevail in the new GOP era of fiscal restraint?
Rep. Jack Kingston is the case in point. He’s the chairman of the House Appropriations Subcommittee on Labor, Health and Human Services and Education and he’s expected to enter the Senate primary against Reps. Paul Broun and Phil Gingrey. Rep. Tom Price is touted as a potential candidate as well.
The differences among the lawmakers are subtle, so Kingston could be vulnerable to attack from his right flank in a primary that may hinge on who is more fiscally conservative. It’s becoming apparent that the knives will be out should the 1st District representative announce his candidacy. Broun said that what distinguishes him from the field is his fealty to constitutionally limited government.
Kingston, an Appropriations subcommittee chairman, could be vulnerable to an attack from his right in the Georgia Senate primary. “I think Americans want somebody who is going to reduce the spending,” Broun said in an interview. “So anyone who has voted for bigger government, bigger spending, is going to have troubles in a primary race if they’re running against someone who has the record that I have.”
The Appropriations Committee has fallen in stature in the years since Republican leaders banned so-called earmarks, the pet projects that members sought for their districts. Now the panel is focused more on cutting spending than on increasing it.
Now, appropriators have become a reluctant bulwark against some of their more aggressive GOP colleagues’ efforts to cut discretionary spending. Kingston’s Record Even before the mood of the institution turned on the tea party dime, before earmarks became anathema, longtime appropriators had the motive and opportunity to build up a record of earmarks.
Though he is known for his early commitment to reducing earmarks, Kingston was no exception. He amassed nearly $50 million in solo earmark requests from 2008 to 2010, according to records kept by Taxpayers for Common Sense. Appropriators also are known for accepting compromise spending bills in committee solidarity with their Democratic counterparts.
Now compromise has become a dirty word among many conservatives. Rep. Greg Walden of Oregon, chairman of the National Republican Congressional Committee, conceded that the appropriator moniker could be damaging.
“The longer you’re here, the more votes you have, the more of your record you have to be able to defend. So it can be a factor, sure,” Walden said, noting that the party committee will not get involved in the Georgia primary.
“You vote for the appropriations vote because you’re an appropriator. So it might add to it. But they’ve also been doing that in their districts for a long time.”
Running in a district and running statewide is a major distinction, however, and it’s clear that Kingston is crafting a defense to inoculate himself from just those kind of attacks. He said the Appropriations Committee has been the only panel actually cutting spending. And he noted that amendments from other members, such as Broun, may sound good on paper but do not become law.
“The difference in what an appropriator does and what somebody from the outside does is they may have an appearance of voting purity because a lot of what we do is not scored by outside rating groups,” Kingston said.
“But the reality is a lot of what they’re doing is symbolic and doesn’t even pass the House floor.” Rep. Tom Latham, another appropriations cardinal who briefly flirted with a Senate run in Iowa before demurring to what seems like an inevitable run from Rep. Steve King, echoed Kingston’s defense.
“As an appropriator we’re cutting spending, so that’s the most important thing,” he said. Broun also brings up amendments that do not pass muster with most of his colleagues, though they often serve as bellwethers on the voting scorecards of conservative advocacy groups. In the 112th Congress, Broun had the highest rating of any Georgia candidate with Heritage Action for America, a conservative grass-roots activist group, which gave him a 96 percent score. Kingston scored lowest, at 71 percent.
Ultimately, George primary voters will judge whose argument has more credence. Joel McElhannon, a Peach State political consultant who is not affiliated with any candidate, said Kingston is at a natural disadvantage, but money, advertising and outside group involvement will decide whether the attacks stick. “Is spending and debt and the overall economy going to be the overwhelming issue in this race? Yes,” McElhannon said. “So Jack has something to overcome there. ... This issue of being an appropriator, of your track record of spending in your time in Congress ... that’s really going to come into focus in this race.”
There is evidence that Kingston may have some backup, though. Outside groups have pledged to counter attacks by candidates they perceive as too conservative to win a general election, as was the case last year with the disastrous Senate bids of ex-Rep. Todd Akin in Missouri and state treasurer Richard Mourdock in Indiana.
The Republican Main Street Partnership works to elect center-right candidates to the House. Its president, former Rep. Steven C. LaTourette of Ohio, said he can envision GOP strategist Karl Rove getting involved as well with his political action committee, American Crossroads.
“To attack an appropriator for spending too much money is kind of on the ridiculous side,” said LaTourette, a former appropriator. “In my opinion, it’d be a cheap shot and the way you push back against that is to take them to task.”
That’s also Rep. Tom Cole’s advice. The Oklahoma Republican appropriator, a former NRCC chairman, has often pushed back against those who criticize his panel members on fiscal issues. “People can always distort you, but most earmarks, at least 95 percent of them, are defensible,” he said. “Don’t be afraid to counterattack. If they’ve got something to say about you, you’ve got something to say about them. “I don’t think appropriators live in a special variety of political glass house,” he added.
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2)
Oppenheimer: Latin America should not be an asterisk
BY ANDRES OPPENHEIMER
Presumptive Secretary of State John Kerry’s Senate confirmation hearing on Thursday was a perfect example of what’s wrong with U.S. foreign policy — it was 70 percent about the Middle East and South Central Asia, 25 percent about Russia and China, and 5 percent about Latin America.
As was expected, Kerry didn’t face many hard questions during his nearly four-hour hearing at the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, where he has served for the past 28 years — the last four as its chairman — and most members are his close buddies.
Perhaps the ultimate U.S. foreign policy establishment insider, Kerry gets high marks from both Democrats and Republicans.
And, granted, most of what Kerry said during his testimony was right on the mark.
“More than ever, foreign policy is economic policy,” Kerry said in his opening statement, stressing that the United States must first solve its fiscal crisis at home and become more competitive abroad before giving lessons on good management abroad.
“American foreign policy is not defined by drones and deployments alone,” Kerry added.
“We cannot allow the extraordinary good that we do to save and change lives to be eclipsed entirely by the role that we have had to play since September 11th, a role that was thrust upon us.”
But after Kerry’s opening statement, nearly all of his fellow senators’ questions focused on the Middle East and South Central Asia, and most specifically on Afghanistan, the Taliban movement, Iran’s nuclear weapons program, Syria’s civil war, and the rise of Islamic parties in Egypt, Tunisia, Libya and other parts of North Africa.
In other words, most of the hearing centered on issues tied to the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks — the same issues that Kerry said should not “eclipse” other foreign policy priorities.
Regarding Latin America, if it hadn’t been for isolated questions by Sens. Bob Menendez, D-N.J., a Cuban American who is likely to succeed Kerry at the helm of the Foreign Relations Committee; Marco Rubio, R-Fla, and Tom Udall, D-N.M., the region would have gone virtually unnoticed — an asterisk among the world’s most important regions.
Kerry himself has not paid much attention to the region since the mid-1980s, when he led a congressional delegation to Nicaragua and later campaigned to stop U.S. funding for the “contra” rebels. And, let’s face it, neither has the Obama administration, nor the Bush administration before it.
Nobody in his right mind will argue that Iran’s nuclear program, or al-Qaida’s cells in North Africa, should not be at the center of U.S. foreign policy concerns.
But if U.S. foreign policy is increasingly about economic policy, and if the United States needs to increase its declining share of global trade and investment, as Kerry said, it should definitely seek greater economic ties with Mexico, Brazil, Colombia, Peru, Chile and other fast-growing Western Hemisphere neighbors.
Consider:
• Latin America is likely to continue growing at a much faster pace than industrialized countries, according to International Monetary Fund projections. This year, the region will grow at 3.6 percent, compared to a 1.4 percent average for mature industrialized countries, the IMF says.
• The United States already sends about 44 percent of its global exports to Western Hemisphere countries, according to International Trade Commission figures. In 2011, the United States shipped more goods to Mexico ($197 billion a year) than to the United Kingdom, Germany, France, Italy, Spain and Ireland combined, and exported more than three times more to Latin America ($366 billion) than to China ($103 billion), according to ITC figures.
When it comes to energy, you may be surprised to know the United States already relies on Western Hemisphere countries for 52 percent of its oil imports, compared with 22 percent from Persian Gulf countries, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration.
My opinion: The Obama administration has already launched an ambitious Trans-Pacific Partnership free trade plan that, while mainly aimed at Asia, could benefit some countries along Latin America’s Pacific coast.
But it’s about time to launch a similarly ambitious plan for willing countries throughout the Americas.
There is no question that a nuclear Iran and the threat of terrorism will — and should — continue to dominate the U.S. foreign policy agenda.
But if Kerry and the upcoming Senate Foreign Relations Committee leadership could raise Washington’s focus on the Western Hemisphere to, say, a mere 20 percent, they would leave a very positive mark behind them.
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3)On Second Thought . . . Maybe That Israeli Apology to Turkey Was a Good Idea
I was appalled to learn a week ago that the Israeli prime minister had apologized to his Turkish counterpart for his government’s actions during the Mavi Marmara incident, seeing this as feeding the Turkish government’s inflated sense of grandeur and power.
That prediction was borne out well.
The municipal government of Turkey’s capital city, Ankara, put up billboards on city streets reveling in the Israeli apology.
They are not subtle, showing a sad-looking Netanyahu beneath a larger, buoyant Erdogan, separated by the Mavi Marmara itself. Addressing Erdogan, they read: “Israel apologized to Turkey. Dear Prime Minister, we are grateful that you let our country experience this pride.”
Erdogan himself claims not only that the apology has changed the balance of power in the Arab-Israeli conflict but that it obligates Israel to work with Ankara in its diplomacy with the Palestinians. He told the Turkish parliament: “The point we have arrived at as a result of our consultations with all our brothers in Palestine and peripheral countries is increasing our responsibility with regard to solving the Palestinian question and thus is bringing about a new equation,” and went onto claim that Israel agreed to cooperate with Turkey on talks with the Palestinians. Hürriyet Daily News paraphrases Erdogan: “He said all his regional interlocutors, including Khaled Mashaal of the Hamas, admit that a new era has begun in the Middle East what they all call after Turkish victory on Israeli apology.”
No less notable is Erdogan’s petty put down of the Israeli side:
Erdoğan said his conversation with Netanyahu took place under the witness of Obama but he wanted first to talk with the US President as he missed his voice. “I talked to him and we have reviewed the text and confirmed the [apology] process. we have therefore accomplished this process under Obama’s witness,” Erdoğan said, adding this phone conversation has also been recorded alongside with written statements issued from all three sides.
Ryan Mauro sums up Turkish actions over the past week:
Erdoğan is extending his time in the spotlight by demanding that Israel pay $1 million to each of the nine casualties’ families, ten times the amount Israel has offered. He isn’t yet dropping his case against the Israeli generals involved in the raid, nor is he fully restoring diplomatic ties with Israel. And he’s announced that he will visit the Hamas-controlled Gaza Strip in what is a thinly-concealed victory lap.
Indeed, the Turkish gloating has been so conspicuous and extended that it may have prompted to a healthy sense of reality. So long as the Mavi Marmara incident hung over their relations with Ankara, Israelis and others could believe that an apology for the incident would magically undo the past decade. The illusion could persist that the Turks, however unreasonably, just needed to put this Mavi Marmara unpleasantness aside and things would revert to the good old days.
Now that Israelis humiliated themselves and Erdogan is rampaging on, some are awakening to the fact that this apology only made matters worse. Naftali Bennett, Israel’s minister of economy and trade, slammed the Turkish response: “Since the apology was made public, it appears Erdogan is doing everything he can to make Israel regret it, while conducting a personal and vitriolic campaign at the expense of Israel-Turkey relations. Let there be no doubt — no nation is doing Israel a favor by renewing ties with it. It should also be clear to Erdoğan that if Israel encounters in the future any terrorism directed against us, our response will be no less severe.”
Boaz Bismuth of Israel Hayom colorfully notes that Israelis “didn’t expect to feel that only several days after Israel’s apology, Erdoğan would already be making us feel that we had eaten a frog along with our matzah this year.”
Perhaps, after all, the apology was a good thing. For a relatively inexpensive price — some words — Israelis and others have gained a better insight into the Turkish leadership’s mentality. They don’t suffer from mere injured pride; they are Islamist ideologues with an ambitious agenda. If the misguided apology makes this evident to more observers, the results possibly could make this into a net plus.
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4)
Bizarre: Former Felony Murderer Is Now a Professor at Columbia;
Meanwhile, Pediatric Neurosurgeon with No Criminal Record is a "Monster"
A strange juxtaposition of stories from Hot Air. Convicted felony murderer Kathy Boudin is an adjunct professor at Columbia.
But Ben Carson is, according to the left, a "monster."
He saved lives while Kathy Boudin was ending them. Obviously he's a monster and she's a Distinguished Intellectual. Nice leftwing people on Twitter said so.
Recovering former "brain-dead liberal" Evan Sayet has some thoughts that may partly explain this mysterious method of "thought" of the left. He's written a book called Kindergarden of Eden: How the Modern Liberal Thinks, which he talks about with the Daily Caller.
His thesis is that America, since WWII, and until 9/11, has been pretty idyllic. Not much bad has happened -- at least not compared to the rest of the world, and the rest of history. This has created a perverse situation in which stupid thinking is sort of permitted to live, protected from hard consequences -- stupid thinking will not lead you do death any longer, as it once did.* It might just lead you to a professorship at Columbia.
* You know how aristocrats showed themselves to be such by wearing clothes with little practical utility? If you wore those flouncy tufts into a smithy, you'd catch fire. But this was the point: To advertise the fact that the aristocrat was not a laboring man. He was elevated above the plane of utility.
It seems to me there's a certain ostentatiousness about liberal thinking that is calculatedly non-functional and flouncy itself. By advocating a pattern of thinking that is dismissive of practical consequences, the advocate of such thoughts announces himself as someone so advanced and so well-off that he does not have to consider practical considerations.
Hm. Maybe.
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