I believe Hillarious has an established pattern of shaking down contributors for their foundation while serving as Sec. of State and we know her husband has a pattern of misdeeds involving self enrichment, pardoning a crook etc. but I doubt the new Attorney general will investigate the Clinton's.
After all, they are Democrats, and liberal ones at that, and that places them beyond the bounds of law and our corrupt IRS.
In fact, it apparently makes Hillarious believe she is qualified to run our nation.
After Pelosi, Reid, Holder and Obama she may be correct.
When all else fails, lower your standards and the "Dims" seem to be scraping the bottom of the barrel.
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Obama continues to lie so he can radically alter the world scene as he said he would. (See 1 below.)
Dr. Carson gets it. However, no more prayer breakfast at The White House for you, Ben! (See 1a below.)
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I was asked to write something pertaining to Foreign Policy. This is what I wrote. (See 2 below.)
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What difference does it make they are only veterans. (See 3 below.)
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Dick
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1)Iran is Lying and We Know It!
If the White House doesn’t pull the plug on negotiations, Congress must.
By Harold Rhode & Joseph Raskas
National Review
National Review
The most frustrating part for a rational observer of the P5+1 negotiations with Iran is this: There is little doubt that Iran is lying, and will continue to lie, but that doesn’t seem to matter to those negotiating with it.
Rather than cause Tehran to capitulate by ratcheting up the pressure, the White House and its negotiating partners first eased the sanctions that had been compelling Tehran to negotiate and then effectively tabled the military option. Since then, they have made a seemingly unending catalog of tangible and irreversible concessions, to which the Iranians have responded with increased hostility. Yet, still the talks go on.
Last month, in just a week’s time, the P5+1 reportedly relented on three key demands: that Iran must come clean on its past nuclear-weapons work, that it must dismantle its plutonium-production plant, and that it must cease its uranium-enrichment activities. Not only has the White House folded on these important criteria, it is also employing an array of experts to cook up more schemes to keep the talks alive. The White House has signaled added flexibility by moving to offer sanctions relief immediately after a deal is signed, rather than waiting until Iran meets its obligations. Given that Iran has for decades refused to come into compliance with its international obligations, has sought to destabilize the Middle East, and has waged a deadly war against America and its allies when pressure was in place, it stands to reason that when that pressure is removed Iran will ramp up its illicit nuclear activity, tighten its grip on the Middle East, and intensify its attacks against Western targets.
Negotiating does not mean accepting the opponent’s position as your own, particularly when it comes to serious matters of statecraft. In the lead-up to Operation Desert Storm, President George H. W. Bush gave a careful lesson in diplomacy when, on January 9, 1991, he dispatched his secretary of state, James Baker, to meet with Saddam Hussein’s foreign minister, Tariq Aziz.
Baker handed Aziz a letter, in which Bush bluntly offered Hussein two options: Either he must comply with a dozen U.N. Security Council resolutions demanding the peaceful withdrawal of Iraqi troops from Kuwait, or those troops would be expelled by force. As Baker’s assistant secretary of state, John Kelly, later reported, “the tension was visible in Tariq Aziz.” Although he was a tremendously accomplished diplomat, “his hands trembled slightly as he held the letter. I remember seeing a small trough of perspiration running down his temple.” It was precisely because President Bush defended the integrity of the United States and of the U.N. Security Council that he was able to present a united domestic and international front and restore the balance of power and global order.
In contrast to Bush’s ironclad dictates to Saddam, the secret correspondence from Obama to Khomeini constitutes a humiliating concession. Rather than confront Iranian aggression across the region, President Obama rewarded the leading terrorist sponsor by raising the specter of effective cooperation with Tehran. It is commendable that the Obama White House is applying creative thinking to a complex problem that has bedeviled many successive administrations. And it is understandable that it has sought to bridge gaps with operational adjustments that the Iranian negotiators could spin politically in order to satisfy their leadership’s domestic constraints. But it is unacceptable that the Iranians have been allowed to outmaneuver the West simply by wielding against us our willingness to negotiate. The White House has become captive to its own desire to achieve a deal, and that has caused Iran to make even greater demands.
Horrified by what they perceive as deepening acquiescence to Iran’s demands, America’s traditional Arab allies — Muslim and otherwise — are taking matters into their own hands, most notably in Yemen, where a coalition of Sunni states is countering Iranian efforts to reinforce the rebels. The Iranian patrol boat’s seizing of a cargo ship that was under U.S. protection last week in the Persian Gulf is merely the latest in a steady stream of indicators that American concessions have only bolstered the determination of the clerical regime in Tehran to pursue anti-American policies. When President Obama originally presented his plan to the American public, he said its purpose was to prevent a nuclear-armed Iran, not to contain it. Yet now the world stands on the brink of a deal that would, at best, legitimize an industrial-sized Iranian nuclear-weapons program and, at worst, spark a nuclear-arms race across the Middle East.
For members of Congress weighing the issue, it is time to honestly confront this question: Has the White House truly done everything possible to stop Iranian aggression, or has it given Iran — and other enemies — reason to underestimate American resolve? If the latter is the case, Congress must do its utmost to kill the deal before an already corrosive Middle East, and other conflict-stricken areas around the world, descend further into chaos. — Harold Rhode served for 28 years as an analyst covering Iranian and Middle Eastern affairs at the Office of the Secretary of Defense. Joseph Raskas is a combat veteran of the Israel Defense Forces and a consultant for the Friends of Israel Initiative, founded by former prime minister of Spain José Aznar.
1a)Ben Carson Defends Comments Comparing Obama to 'Psychopath'
By Melanie Batley
Conservative presidential candidate Ben Carson has unapologetically defended his comments comparing President Barack Obama to a psychopath.
In an interview with CNBC's online series "Speakeasy with John Harwood," the retired pediatric neurosurgeon said the description was justified because the president appears to brazenly lie to the American people about the unemployment rate.
"I said he reminds you of a psychopath," Carson corrected.
"And tell me how," Harwood pressed.
"Because they tend to be extremely smooth, charming people, who can tell a lie to your face with complete — it looks like sincerity, even though they know it's a lie," Carson replied.
"Do you think he's a liar?" Harwood asked.
"Well, I think he knows full well the unemployment rate is not 5.5 percent," Carson said. "He knows that. He knows that people who are not well-informed will swallow it hook, line, and sinker, even though they're sitting there in the city and can't find a job."
In the wide-ranging interview, Carson also talked about his political philosophy and adjusting to life in the public eye.
"I have come to understand that if you say something that keeps people from being able to hear your actual message, then there's no point in saying it," said Carson, who has been a vocal opponent of what he says is political correctness in politics and the media.
He stressed his commitment to the constitutional conservatism.
"We think the only people who can handle the kinds of decisions that need to be made ... are people who are steeped in politics," he told Harwood.
"When I go back and look at the Constitution and I look at the writings of the people who put all this together, they never thought there should be this political class or this political pedigree that was necessary. I think what they felt was necessary was wisdom and a love for our Constitution and a love for our country and common sense."
1a)Ben Carson Defends Comments Comparing Obama to 'Psychopath'
By Melanie Batley
Conservative presidential candidate Ben Carson has unapologetically defended his comments comparing President Barack Obama to a psychopath.
In an interview with CNBC's online series "Speakeasy with John Harwood," the retired pediatric neurosurgeon said the description was justified because the president appears to brazenly lie to the American people about the unemployment rate.
"Obama, you referred to him as a psychopath," Harwood said. "What did you mean by that?"
"And tell me how," Harwood pressed.
"Because they tend to be extremely smooth, charming people, who can tell a lie to your face with complete — it looks like sincerity, even though they know it's a lie," Carson replied.
"Do you think he's a liar?" Harwood asked.
"Well, I think he knows full well the unemployment rate is not 5.5 percent," Carson said. "He knows that. He knows that people who are not well-informed will swallow it hook, line, and sinker, even though they're sitting there in the city and can't find a job."
In the wide-ranging interview, Carson also talked about his political philosophy and adjusting to life in the public eye.
"I have come to understand that if you say something that keeps people from being able to hear your actual message, then there's no point in saying it," said Carson, who has been a vocal opponent of what he says is political correctness in politics and the media.
He stressed his commitment to the constitutional conservatism.
"We think the only people who can handle the kinds of decisions that need to be made ... are people who are steeped in politics," he told Harwood.
"When I go back and look at the Constitution and I look at the writings of the people who put all this together, they never thought there should be this political class or this political pedigree that was necessary. I think what they felt was necessary was wisdom and a love for our Constitution and a love for our country and common sense."
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2)The time is fast approaching for the final showdown with Iran and, from all indications, three things are increasingly apparent:
1) Obama, as usual, is not telling the truth about Iranian violations nor should we expect otherwise.
2) Senators have overwhelmingly passed a resolution that has little teeth but at least gives those who voted for the overview political cover.
3) Obama said he wanted to change the world and he has been as good as his word in that regard. By allowing the modification of sanctions he has given a boost to both Iran's nuclear ambitions and economic capability of fulfilling them. The Middle East will never be the same as a result of America's retreat.
Consequently, we now are hearing from the new Saudi leadership they, as predicted, will be seeking nuclear status.
The recent stitching together of another Netanyahu government leaves Israel in a more precarious position in terms of stability because Netanyahu only has a one or two vote majority. That said, Israelis do not trust Obama and will rally around the flag should Obama try and apply pressure on Netanyahu who still knows how to play a better game of chess than our president who does not even understand the strength and value of pawns.
Putin remains a thorn in NATO's side and there is growing evidence Russian planes and subs continue to probe, most particularly in territorial waters surrounding Sweden, Norway and Finland. Their governments have not been inattentive to these probes and have responded in kind by sending planes and patrol boats to monitor Russian intrusions.
A new Chief of Staff will soon replace Gen. Dempsey, whose thinking reflected the president he dutifully served, ie. avoid any appearance of a display of strength, simply continue the training of ineffective Iraqi and Afghanistan troops, fly sorties that drop bombs which fuse desert sand, and allow ISIS to pretty much roam at will achieving their territorial acquisitions in furtherance of their desire to rebuild a radical Islamic Caliphate.
Should the Republicans recapture The White House, the incoming president, after succeeding years of Democrat administrations, will find himself (doubt Fiorina will win) circumscribed by excessive expenditures spent on ineffective entitlements and other outrageous commitments to pacify Greens and other assorted voter constituencies, leaving little for rebuilding our depleted military.
There is also that pesky deficit Obama will have more than tripled and all of this in the face of rising interest rates as The Fed begins grappling with de-leveraging.
Why anyone wants to be president validates my belief they should be subjected to a Ror-schach Test giving voters grater insight.
Have a pleasant summer and pray.
Off to Litchfield tomorrow. Weather not looking good, back on 16th then off again on 20th for two month cross country drive around.
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Dick
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3)
The Scandals We Don’t Know About
Ten posts for inspectors general—including at the CIA and Export-Import Bank—stand vacant. One can’t help but wonder why.
The Veterans Affairs medical facility in Tomah, Wis. PHOTO: ASSOCIATED PRESS
We’re about a year out from the uproar over Department of Veterans Affairs patient waiting lists, and a few months into a new VA scandal. The new scandal is that we don’t know what other scandals there are.
Congress is trying to find out, teeing up an unprecedented battle between the Senate and an investigator who in theory exists to help the Senate: the VA’s inspector general. At issue are thousands of pages of documents that may well reveal significant new areas of department dysfunction, but which the current acting inspector general is point-blank refusing to turn over to congressional overseers. The moment ought to be inspiring a debate over President Obama’s willful obstruction of rigorous IG oversight.
This saga begins in 2011, when the Veterans Affairs’ IG was alerted by members of Congress and whistleblowers to the potential of dangerous overprescription of opiates at the VA’s Tomah facility in Wisconsin. The IG’s office commenced a plodding, three-year investigation. Today’s acting IG, Richard J. Griffin (who took over in 2013), closed that investigation in March 2014, but he did not alert Congress to the fact or make the report public. Wisconsin Sen. Ron Johnson, who runs the Committee on Homeland Security and Government Affairs, didn’t even find out about the existence of the report until this January, and only to discover it was a mere 11 pages and said claims of wrongdoing could not be substantiated.
This finding was mind-boggling given an account in January from the Center for Investigative Reporting showing that the number of Tomah opiate prescriptions had quintupled over eight years, despite fewer patients. Veterans refer to the facility as “Candyland.” Mr. Johnson at a field hearing in March heard from Marvin Simcakoski,whose 35-year-old son died of an overdose there in August 2014. The hearing revealed three additional deaths and included testimony by Tomah employees who had been fired after raising concerns about—or refusing to fill—narcotics prescriptions. One psychologist committed suicide after being terminated.
Even the VA was more critical of itself than was the IG. The department released its own internal investigation of Tomah in March, finding opiate prescription rates 2.5 times the national average, higher average doses, “unsafe clinical practices” and “patient harm” as the result of over prescription.
Mr. Johnson, determined to get to the bottom of Tomah, asked the IG in February to turn over its broader investigative file. The IG’s office has to this day refused to do so, initially (and belligerently) claiming Congress has no “legitimate oversight purpose” for the file, and throwing up all kinds of excuses about statutory bars (including privacy laws) to its release. This is all nonsense, given that inspectors general exist to aid Congress in oversight and that the laws in question therefore have express exemptions for disclosing information to legislators.
Then again, nondisclosure seems to be a habit with this IG office—ranging across years and different officials. USA Today reported in March that the office has conducted 140 health investigations since 2006 that had never been made public. Under growing pressure, the IG finally released them late last week, and the newspaper ran a follow-up noting that the cases ranged from “missed diagnoses” to “failures during surgery” to “misuse of funds” to “personnel issues” to yet more facilities that may be giving “questionable amounts or combinations of narcotics.” In many cases, said the newspaper, “the department’s chief watchdog trusted the VA to correct problems on its own.” Really?
The devotion to secrecy suggests a jarring problem in the entire culture of the Veterans Affairs’ IG office, one that is a little too cozy with the object of its investigative mandate. The whole point of an IG is to blow the whistle on executive-branch failings. Most inspectors general border on fanatic in their oversight, are big into transparency, and have strong working relationships with congressional investigators. By contrast, Mr. Johnson last week was forced to take the extraordinary (and potentially unprecedented) step of issuing a subpoena for IG documents.
The episode is also raising questions about whether President Obama perhaps likes it this way. Mr. Griffin has been the supposedly temporary acting IG at Veterans for more than two years, an uncertainty that may in itself be feeding into office problems. He’s still there because Mr. Obama has failed to appoint a permanent head. In March, all 16 members of Mr. Johnson’s committee—Republicans and Democrats—wrote to Mr. Obama noting that there were 10 IG vacancies, including for such not-so-minor posts as Interior, the CIA and Export-Import Bank. They noted that there were nominations pending for only two of the 10, and requested he move quickly to fill the rest.
Then again, if you are the president, wracked by scandals and mismanagement in your administration, it might be convenient to put IG nominations on the back burner. The conduct of the VA is one of those big scandals, and the cursory evidence suggests the department could still harbor a lot of secrets.
The next time Democrats complain that a GOP Senate isn’t acting on an Obama nomination, Republicans might point out the more important nominations that they are still waiting for.
