Free Republic

He's not a Jew. At least, that's the latest on the man behind the anti-Islam film, "Innocence of Muslims," that has fueled attacks on U.S. diplomatic installations in Libya, Egypt and Yemen, leaving the U.S. ambassador to Libya, J. Christopher Stevens, dead. The filmmaker appears to be an Egyptian Christian rather than an Israeli Jew, as he had claimed in interviews. The Associated Press tracked down an Egyptian Coptic Christian living in Southern California who admitted to involvement with the film's logistics, and whose middle name and a known alias closely resemble the apparently fake name - Sam Bacile -...

The Smoking Gun has produced court documents telling us that Nakoula Basseley Nakoula, producer of the movie Innocence of Muslims, partnered with Eiad Salameh and that Nakoula was finally caught in 2009 for his role in a check-kiting ring that stole over $870,000 from six financial institutions by using stolen Social Security numbers and identities. In this, we will show how this story is mired in FBI failure and the Eiad connection is crucial in unraveling more facts to this story, since many of his dealings with Nakoula can tell us more about his true motives. After all, Eiad Salameh...

The U.S. diplomatic mission in Benghazi, Libya, actually served as a meeting place to coordinate aid for the rebel-led insurgencies in the Middle East, according to Middle Eastern security officials. Among the tasks performed inside the building was collaborating with Arab countries on the recruitment of fighters – including jihadists – to target Bashar al-Assad’s regime in Syria. The distinction may help explain why there was no major public security presence at what has been described as a “consulate.” Such a presence would draw attention to the shabby, nondescript building that was allegedly used for such sensitive purposes. [snip] The...

Last night, it was revealed that Secretary of State Hillary Clinton had ordered more security at the U.S. mission in Benghazi before it was attacked where four Americans, including U.S. Ambassador Christopher Stevens were murdered by Al-Qaeda but President Obama denied the request. The news broke on TheBlazeTV’s “Wilkow!” hosted by Andrew Wilkow, by best-selling author, Ed Klein who said the legal counsel to Clinton had informed him of this information. Klein also said that those same sources said that former President Bill Clinton has been “urging” his wife [Hillary] to release official State Department documents that prove she called...

Ed Klein: Bill Clinton ‘Urging’ Hillary to Release Benghazi Documents That Would ‘Exonerate’ Her, Destroy Obama’s Re-Election Hopes Posted on October 24, 2012 at 10:48pm by Jason Howerton Secretary of State Hillary Clinton ordered additional security for the U.S. mission in Benghazi ahead of the terrorist attack but the orders were never carried out, according to “legal counsel” to Clinton who spoke to best-selling author Ed Klein. Those same sources also say former President Bill Clinton has been “urging” his wife to release official State Department documents that prove she called for additional security at the compound in Libya,...

Joe Klein on Morning Joe explains why Bibi Netanyahu is a maniac and Iran's leaders are extremists, but not crazy.

Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz (D., Fla.) told the Washington Free Beacon Wednesday evening that she will not be apologizing to Washington Examiner reporter Philip Klein after she falsely accused him of “deliberately misquoting” her. “No, I definitely will not” offer Klein an apology, Wasserman Schultz said with a slight laugh as she was exiting an event meant to honor Center For American Progress founder John Podesta. Asked if she had a message for Klein, Wasserman Schultz bristled. “I don’t,” she said. Klein caught Wasserman Schultz in a lie yesterday after she falsely claimed that Israeli Ambassador Michael Oren had chastised...

Democracy Now! attempted to confront "Fool Me Twice" author Aaron Klein over Sheldon Adelson funding to GOP. Watch what happens when Klein turns the tables and asks about George Soros.

In this episode of the Conscience of Kansas radio program on KRMR The Patriot 105.7FM Dr. Paul A. ibbetson talks about the book Fool Me Twice, in the author interview with Brenda Elliott

Soon after the Aurora mass murder, Washington Post columnist Ezra Klein waded into the fray, citing curious data to “prove” that we need more gun control to make society safer. But what he said and how he said things show he’s just another anti-rights elitist using tragedy to advance his agenda. Klein displayed bias by claiming that not politicizing the Aurora shooting is only to halt discussing gun control: The aftermath of the Aurora, Colorado shootings has been thick with calls to avoid “politicizing” the tragedy. That is code, essentially, for “don’t talk about reforming our gun control laws.” His...

You need closure. Following individual meetings this week with school and district administrators, each family waived their right to a hearing and agreed to one-year suspensions from school and regular bus transportation. The Greece Central School District is legally required to provide all students ages 5 to 16 with an education, therefore, during the 2012-13 school year, the students who have been suspended will be transferred to the district Reengagement Center, located in a non-school facility. This alternative education program keeps middle school students on track academically while providing a structured opportunity for students to take responsibility for their actions...

Not all campaign books are treated equally. Just look at Edward Klein and J.H. Hatfield. Klein, of course, is the author of the new book "The Amateur: Barack Obama in the White House." Hatfield, now dead and forgotten, wrote a book about George W. Bush, "Fortunate Son," during the 2000 presidential contest. Klein's book, which debuted in early May, has been mostly ignored by large media organizations (although not by the book-buying public, which has put it at the top of next week's best-seller list). Hatfield's book, on the other hand, rocked a presidential campaign -- before crashing and burning...

This book is more about the man — his hubris, his arrogance, his naiveté — than it is about his ideology because the author, a member of the insider Council on Foreign Relations, an influential group that promotes the diminishing of our country's constitutional structure and the ceding of U.S. sovereignty to a transnational global government such as the United Nations, no doubt shares that ideology. Klein is a certified member of the establishment elite, having graduated from Columbia University with two degrees and having been a foreign affairs editor at Newsweek magazine and a former editor of the New...

Only four days after former Kansas Attorney General Phill Kline filed a blistering motion asking that two Kansas Supreme Court justices recuse themselves from deciding whether to suspend his law license, the Supremes announced yesterday that FIVE of the seven would be doing so. Their rationale, according to the The Topeka Capital-Journal: The five justices voluntarily stepped aside, citing the Kansas Code of Judicial Conduct rule that requires recusal when a judge “previously presided as a judge over the matter in another court.” Without ever mentioning Kline’s motion, the five stated it “would not be possible” for them to give...

Ed Klein's interview with Sean Hannity. Link to YouTube audio below.

Edward Klein's new book on Barack Obama, The Amateur: Barack Obama in the White House, is a withering portrayal of a radical adrift, in over his head, drowning in his own incompetency -- while being weighed down by a small circle of "advisers" who are compounding the problem of the Amateur in the White House. Klein's book begins with a talisman-like quote uttered by Barack Obama when his recently appointed Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner tried to boost Obama's ego by telling him, "Your legacy is going to be preventing the second Great Depression." To which Barack Obama responded, "That's not...

In a revealing new book, The Amateur, author Edward Klein interviews President Barack Obama’s physician, Dr. David Scheiner, MD, who blasts the president’s health care plan and says that President Obama has an “academic detachment” that he could never break through. The doctor fears that if the health care plan is “the failure” he believes it will be, because of runaway costs and other problems, then any health reform will be set back for years to come. These are only a few of many reveals in Klein’s book, which makes the case that President Obama is not the political machine...

Ezra Klein is a blogger/columnist for the Washington Post and an unabashed liberal. Klein has the good fortune of never having had to work a real day in his life. He is younger than my oldest son and hasn't half my son's brains. Klein is widely quoted by the left and he regularly pontificates broadly on a wide range of subjects with which he has neither familiarity nor experience. In a recent column, Klein made an astonishing assertion: A larger welfare state can mean a lower deficitIn his column he states: Speaking of things that the European crisis is not...

Speaking of things that the European crisis is not about, while I was in Germany, my colleague Robert Samuelson wrote that “Europe’s turmoil is more than a currency crisis and was inevitable, in some form, even if the euro had never been created. It’s ultimately a crisis of the welfare state, which has grown too large to be easily supported economically.” snipIn a broad sense, I don’t think the crisis in Europe is really even about debt. It’s about the interplay of slow growth, heavy debts and weak institutions. But it’s really not about welfare states.

Before the MNSBC-Politico Debate, I wondered why in God’s name the Republican candidates would bother giving press and air time to a bunch of liberals asking snide questions down their noses to the GOP about issues not one person cares about.After that debate it convinced me the GOP candidates should be more discerning in their debates. And now, as Ben Domenech notes and I too can confirm, I think the candidates should boycott the Washington Post Bloomberg debate on October 11th. The debate is billed by the Washington Post as “exclusively” about the economy. I had relished them having this...

What’s also important, but not evident, on this chart is that Obama’s major expenses were temporary — the stimulus is over now — while Bush’s were, effectively, recurring. The Bush tax cuts didn’t just lower revenue for 10 years. It’s clear now that they lowered it indefinitely, which means this chart is understating their true cost. Similarly, the Medicare drug benefit is costing money on perpetuity, not just for two or three years. And Boehner, Ryan and others voted for these laws and, in some cases, helped to craft and pass them. To relate this specifically to the debt-ceiling...

Senator Lori Klein, our Irresponsible Gun Owner of the Day today, took the time to call me back to give TTAG her version of what happened when azcentral.com writer Richard Ruelas and a photographer interviewed her recently. You probably won’t be surprised that the Senator told me that what was portrayed in the story wasn’t an entirely accurate description of what happened… First, the Senator is, in her own words, “mortified” by what happened. She describes herself as a life-long gun owner and 2A supporter. Her father started teaching her how to safely use a gun at age five. And...

Time magazine's Joe Klein this weekend claimed President Obama has a better relationship with the military than George W. Bush did when he was Commander-in-Chief. Such hypocritically was said on "The Chris Matthews Show" just moments before Klein noted that the military were "very much opposed" to attacking Libya (snip) JOE KLEIN, TIME MAGAZINE: The other thing is there’s still tension between [President Obama] and Petraeus about what exactly, how exactly to close out Afghanistan. I'd say the relationship is pretty good, very, better than it was with Bush

Ezra Klein, the founder of journolist, proves yet again why whatever the Washington Post is paying him is much too much: Here’s your out-of-the-box policy idea for the day: America should implement weighted voting to make voting more objective and fair, and give the young more power, because the consequences of political decisions will affect them the longest.

Jones, of course, killed no one. Suicide bombers kill as many people as they can for Allah. But Joe Klein is by no means alone in assuming that Muslims cannot control themselves and respond to insult with anything but threats and murder, and thus cannot be held responsible for their own actions. He thus reveals again the multicultural Left's bigotry and ethnocentrism. "Joe Klein Reserves Spot in Hell for Koran-burning Pastor Who's As 'Murderous' As 'Suicide Bombers,'" by Ken Shepherd for NewsBusters, April 4 (thanks to James): Burning a copy of the Koran is morally equivalent to flying a plane...

The reason these top-down solutions don’t work is simple. The people up top don’t know as much as the folks down below. In the case of health care, the people down below are physicians, nurses, hospital administrators and other medical personnel. Most have advanced degrees in medicine or health care management and have years of experience. They know far more about health care than the up-top people such as politicians, HHS bureaucrats and precocious Washington Post policy wonks. It doesn’t take the down-below people long to figure out how to “game the system” after the up-top people “reform” the system.

On the January 23 World News Sunday, ABC News Senior Washington Editor Rick Klein used President Obama’s euphemism for spending as "investments" as he and anchor Dan Harris discussed how Republicans will likely respond to Tuesday’s State of the Union Address. Although the setup piece by correspondent David Kerley did allude to Obama’s word choice to call his plan "cut and invest" as having significance, noting that it "worries Republicans," after the piece had ended, Klein used the term "investments" as if it were straight, nonpartisan terminology. Klein: But when you get down to the policy, the President talking about

ALBANY — The chaos-plagued State Senate faced fresh tumult on Wednesday as four Democrats announced they would split from their party’s leadership and start their own, independent caucus. The move does not change the balance of power in the Senate, which the Republicans captured in November and now hold with a razor-thin, two-seat majority, 32 to 30... --snip-- The departure of the four senators, announced a few hours before Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo delivered his State of the State address, brought into the open the simmering anger among some Senate Democrats, especially from outside New York City, who have borne...

The worst part of this clip isn’t that the liberal fellow says the Constitution is confusing because “it’s more than 100 years old.”  It’s not as if it was written in Middle English, of the sort that schoolkids are or were once required to study in order to grapple with the Canterbury Tales. Whan that Auerylle with his shoures sooteThe droghte of March / hath perced to the rooteEtc and so forth.  The Constitution is terse and straightforward, in relatively modern English.  But no, though saying it’s confusing because it’s old is bad, that’s not the worst part.The worst...

Come now Ezra Klein, economic and domestic columnist and blogger for the Post and master of … well … nothing. Your argument is that the Constitution is too hard to understand so we should just ignore it? When people actually start reading this founding document and figure out it is being blatantly ignored by leadership, Klein does what any good socialist blogger would do – inform his readers the document is irrelevant and not worthy of our time. Klein argues the founders could not comprehend what the United States would look like or need hundreds of years from now, so...

Apart from the sheer mass of the Clintons’ earnings, perhaps the most intriguing revelation contained in the release of the Clinton tax data last week was that Bill Clinton received a whopping $15 million advance in 2001 for what would become his autobiography, My Life. As even the New York Times noticed, this was significantly “larger than previously thought” — or, more exactly, than previously reported. For example, an August 7, 2001 article in the Times puts the figure vaguely at “over $10 million.” A Wall Street Journal report from the following day cites a more concrete figure of “close...

Republican Allen West narrowly leads U.S. Rep. Ron Klein in a bruising battle for South Florida's 22nd Congressional District, a new Sunshine State News Poll shows. West leads Klein 47-44 in the survey of likely voters conducted Oct. 17-19. Nine percent of respondents are undecided. West, a retired Army lieutenant colonel, lost by 10 points to Klein in 2008, a strong year for Democrats. But with Republicans surging this fall, West is picking up more independents, along with solid tea party support. "West has to be the slight favorite here simply because of the turnout differential," said Jim Lee, president...

All right... all you guys... listen up! I just got off the phone with Sarah Palin. She is coming to Orlando for a big Victory 2010 rally.... and she has invited all vets to attend for free! That's right, she wants all us current and former Grunts, Squids, Blue suiters, Marines, and Coasties to be her special guests this Saturday, October 23d. The event is at the Marriott World Center near Walt Disney World. Admission is normally as much as $90 for this Victory 2010 fundraiser, with all the profits going to ensure a strong Conservative victory this year! If...

Endorsements from the Veterans of Foreign Wars Political Action Committee have so enraged many VFW members that its elected leaders have asked the PAC to immediately rescind all endorsements for next month's election. Hundreds of VFW members have been calling the national headquarters in recent days to complain about some of the endorsements, particularly about two races — both featuring Democratic incumbents. In one race, Sen. Barbara Boxer of California got the PAC's endorsement over Republican Carly Fiorina. In the other, Rep. Ron Klein of Florida got the endorsement over Republican and Iraq war veteran Allen West.

Jonathan Klein, president of CNN's US network, leaves his post today after a sudden announcement that he has been replaced by Ken Jautz, the head of CNN's downmarket but more popular sister channel HLN. Klein's departure comes after a disastrous year for CNN, as its daily ratings slumped by 36% to an average of 640,000 weekday viewers, putting it in third place behind Fox News and MSNBC among cable news channels. Fox News averages 2.4m viewers while MSNBC has nearly 850,000. HLN averages around 550,000 on weekdays.

[From CNN CEO memo making the announcement]: Ultimately, the goal is that the kind of front-page reporting and analysis that captures a news event, translates its meaning and shapes the dialogue about the story will continue to emerge in even more prominent and more accessible ways to CNN’s audiences. The search for this person is currently underway.

Des Moines, Iowa Event: Sarah Palin speaks to the Republican Party Traveling Companion: Victoria Klein "What's the big deal?" Victoria said after we listened to Mama Grizzly. "She sounds like a PTA president." And it was true. I expected, at the very least, to be entertained by Sarah Palin--she has been known to give a good speech--but last night's performance was weird and underwhelming, especially given an atmosphere dripping with presidentiality. Iowa. Two years out. A large crowd, itching to be blown away. But no. There seemed no purpose to Palin's speech, unless the point was to lacerate members of...

WEST PALM BEACH — An attorney trying to persuade city and county leaders to back his plans for a $1.5 billion development that would transform the downtown area masterminded a plot to cheat two elderly widows out of tens of millions of dollars, according to a lawsuit filed in Palm Beach County Circuit Court. In the lawsuit, attorney Michael Masanoff is accused of working both sides of a real estate deal to help steal a problem-plagued mausoleum in Boca Raton from the widows. Further, the widows' attorney claims, Masanoff lied under oath about his misdeeds. If he can persuade a...

For the past two years, several hundred left-leaning bloggers, political reporters, magazine writers, policy wonks and academics have talked stories and compared notes in an off-the-record online meeting space called JournoList. Proof of a vast liberal media conspiracy? Not at all, says Ezra Klein, the 24-year-old American Prospect blogging wunderkind who formed JournoList in February 2007. “Basically,” he says, “it’s just a list where journalists and policy wonks can discuss issues freely.” ... But a handful of JList members agreed to talk for this story — if only to push back against the perception that the group is some sort...

A new book released today uncovers for the first time where and how President Obama first met Weather Underground terrorist-group founder William Ayers – and it is much earlier than previously believed. The book reveals the two were brought together by a student of radical community organizer Saul Alinsky, whose name, it has emerged, was obscured in Obama's autobiography "Dreams from My Father." The new book, "The Manchurian President: Barack Obama's Ties to Communists, Socialists and other Anti-American Extremists," charges Obama has deep ties to an anti-American extremist nexus that has been instrumental not only in building his political career...

Do the speech and actions of Glenn Beck and Sarah Palin rise to the level of sedition? Total Votes = 505

In late January, President Obama dazzled political reporters when he addressed a gathering of House Republicans in Baltimore. The press marveled at Obama's intelligence, command of the facts, and ability to swat down GOP arguments effortlessly during the 90-minute exchange. But at one point, Obama took a question from Wisconsin Rep. Paul Ryan, the Republicans' resident policy whiz, and clearly met his match. In his State of the Union address just two days earlier, Obama had vowed to "freeze" non-security-related discretionary spending as part of a new White House campaign to create the appearance that the administration was doing something...

"How's that hopey-changey stuff workin' out for ya?" Sarah Palin asked the anti-élitist Tea Party élites — those who could pay $549 for a ticket — gathered in suffocating self-righteousness at the Opryland Hotel on the first weekend of February. It was classic Palin, a brilliant line, brilliantly delivered: she does folksy far better than George W. Bush or any of the other Republican focus-group populists ever did. It was the signature line of her speech, which rocked the joint — and then, slowly, began to rock the national political community. The speech was inspired drivel, a series of distortions...

Take a course in learning what the left talking heads are saying about this "stimulus". OK. It’s Joe Klein. But it’s still a little window into the minds of the liberal elite. Andrea Mitchell kinda gives herself away with the question too. Joe Klein is just stunned that most of America thinks the stimulus is just a total waste of money, which of course it is. The good comes at 44 … but watch it all. My favorite line in this one comes at the end … people get $60 extra in their paycheck. “Most people aren’t even aware of...

"My dog ate our ratings." Okay, that wasn't one of the lame excuses that CNN president Jon Klein came up with to explain away that network's drastic plunge in the ratings but the ones he did dream up were equally hilarious. Try this one on for size...their low ratings can be explained away because they don't run cartoons during slow periods. The CNN hilarious excuse entertainment was provided courtesy of this Matea Gold Los Angeles Times story which first listed the ratings woes facing that network: ...the network has lost much of the gains it made during the political boom...

The blogosphere was abuzz today with reports that Barack Obama's undergraduate thesis from Columbia University – in which he allegedly called free market capitalism "tyranny" and slammed the Constitution for fitting Americans with "shackles of hypocrisy" – has been revealed. Only, the reported source of the document, Joe Klein of Time magazine, has publicly declared the whole thing a hoax. "A report is circulating among the wingnuts that I had a peek at Barack Obama's senior thesis," Klein writes on Time's Swampland blog site. "It is completely false. I've never seen Obama's thesis. I have no idea where this report...

Ed Klein, former editor for Newsweek and New York Times Magazine, was a close personal friend of Ted Kennedy and decided to share some memories of the late Senator on The Diane Rehm Show. KLEIN: I don't know if you know this or not, but one of his favorite topics of humor was indeed Chappaquiddick itself. And he would ask people, "Have you heard any new jokes about Chappaquiddick?" That is just the most amazing thing. It's not that he didn't feel remorse about the death of Mary Jo Kopechne, but that he still always saw the other side of...

Sorry....Ted Kennedy is a monster, no other way to describe him. Here is one of his close friends, former editor of Newsweek and New York Times Magazine Ed Klein describing one of the favorite kind of jokes Mr. Kennedy enjoyed: [VIDEO AT SITE] I don’t know if you know this or not, but one of his favorite topics of humor was indeed Chappaquiddick itself. And he would ask people, “have you heard any new jokes about Chappaquiddick?” That is just the most amazing thing. It’s not that he didn’t feel remorse about the death of Mary Jo Kopechne, but that...