Free Republic

WASHINGTON – A Goldman Sachs executive has been named the first chief operating officer of the Securities and Exchange Commission's enforcement division. The market watchdog says Adam Storch, vice president in Goldman Sachs' Business Intelligence Group, is assuming the new position of managing executive of the SEC division.

Bill Clinton says a vast, right-wing conspiracy that once targeted him is now focusing on President Barack Obama.

I heard a news brief referencing "The Third Way." Let's take a look ON THE INTERNET.

Binyam Mohammed, who planned terrorist attacks on U.S. cities, has been set free. Let’s imagine we’ve captured a highly trained terrorist al-Qaeda was attempting to embed in the United States, à la Mohamed Atta and company, to carry out mass-murder attacks in American cities. For eight years, our national-security debate in the United States has been divided into two camps on these cases. In the first are those who accept the post-9/11 law-of-war paradigm. They would have that enemy combatant detained for intelligence purposes (and to remove him from the battlefield) until he could be tried for war crimes by...

Jim Kessler, a vice president at the nonpartisan Third Way think tank, said that to the public, the health-care debate appears to be a "muddle." But the fierce sparring over the opposition may signal progress on the legislative front. He said: "We always knew this was going to be decided near the end."

Four Democratic senators want to put off the proposed cap & trade legislation. Blanche Lincoln of Arkansas, Ben Nelson of Nebraska and Byron Dorgan and Kent Conrad both of North Dakota are urging the Senate to delay legislation that puts caps on greenhouse gas emissions and instead, pass a narrow bill that sets requirements on the use of renewable energy. Senators Lincoln and Dorgan are up for re-election in 2010 and are from states that would be hurt economically from a cap and trade bill similar to the one passed by the House in June. Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid...

Nothing more immediately spoils the honesty of political debate in America today than the common use of the terms “liberal” and “conservative.” They are too often used anachronistically, in a way maintained in the public mind through narrow relative thinking – and probably more often without thinking at all. It is common for these terms to be used as synonyms for “left” and “right” and for those terms to be automatically associated with the Democratic and Republican parties. No matter how far the two parties shift along the political spectrum together, or where they go, this common semantic error leaves...

Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac were the chief culprits in the housing crisis because they encouraged people who could not afford payments to borrow money, according to a congressional report released Tuesday. The claims in the report have long been advanced by conservatives, who argue that the Community Reinvestment Act and other federal programs fed the housing bubble that burst in 2007 and led to the economic downfall in 2008. But the report explains in detail how Fannie and Freddie -- government sponsored enterprises (GSE) that were not subject to the same oversight as other publicly traded firms -- “privatized...

"They fear that the development and building of People's (community) Organizations is the building of a vast power group which may fall prey to a fascistic demagogue who will seize leadership and control and turn an organization into a Frankenstein's monster against democracy." - Saul Alinsky responding to his critics, Reveille for Radicals; p. 199 When Saul Alinsky began building his community-organization movement in 1930s Chicago, observers were watching Alinsky with one eye, while with the other eye observing the building of communist and fascist movements in Europe. It wasn't hard then to see in Alinsky's programs at home, elements...

Obama: 'I'm not a miracle worker' By: Jonathan Martin April 29, 2009 06:43 PM EST ARNOLD, Mo. – President Barack Obama laced his assessment of his first 100 days in office Wednesday with a healthy bit of hedging, buying himself some more time by reminding Americans of his limitations and the patience he hopes they have. “I’m not a miracle worker,” he said during a town hall meeting here in suburban St. Louis high school. “We’ve got a lot of tough choices and hard decisions and hard work ahead of us.” Weaving in a dose of optimism, as he increasingly...

Earlier this month, the United States Chamber of Commerce handed out its annual "Spirit of Enterprise" awards to those members of Congress who voted with the Chamber 70 percent of the time on its most important legislative initiatives of 2008. The only four Republican senators who did not receive the award were Jon Kyl, Jeff Sessions, Jim Inhofe and me - four of the most conservative members of the Senate. What were the conservative offenses? We opposed the failed bailouts and stimulus. Which explains why many liberal Democrats scored higher, including Barack Obama and Hillary Rodham Clinton. The Republican who...

President Barack Obama firmly resists ideological labels, but at the end of a private meeting with a group of moderate Democrats Tuesday afternoon he offered a statement of solidarity. “I am a New Democrat,” he told the New Democrat Coalition, according to two sources at the White House session. The group is comprised of centrist Democratic members of the House, who support free trade and a muscular foreign policy but are more moderate than the conservative Blue Dog coalition. Obama made his comment in discussing his budget priorities and broader goals, also calling himself a “pro-growth Democrat” during the course...

NEW YORK (MarketWatch) -- General Electric Co. is reading the tea leaves of the troubled global economy and has found a new partner to help it weather the storm: government. In the new economy, the interaction between government and business will be changed forever, with government as a stronger regulator, an industry policy champion, a financier and key partner, GE (GE 7.01, -0.59, -7.8%) Chief Executive Jeff Immelt wrote in a letter to shareholders, published late Monday. ...Another driver is infrastructure work tied to Obama's stimulus package, which seeks to rebuild highways, water systems, electrical grids and make government buildings...

"One of the most far-reaching consequences of the General Education Board's political philosophy was achieved with a mere six million dollar grant to Columbia University in 1917, to set up the "progressive" Lincoln School . >From this school descended the national network of progressive educators and social scientists, whose pernicious influence closely paralleled the goals of the Communist Party, another favorite recipient of the Rockefeller millions . From its outset, the Lincoln School was described frankly as a revolutionary school for the primary and secondary schools of the entire United States . It immediately discarded all theories of education which...

CRAFT is a 527 committee launched by last year by Schwarzenegger donors Larry Dodge and Paul Folino, and former Gov. Pete Wilson to recruit the "next generation" of statewide Republicans candidates. It is run by former California Republican Party Chairman Duf Sundheim. Moderate GOP pundit Tony Quinn opined at the time that CRAFT's formation "...shows the money people in the party have no faith in the California Republican party. This group would not exist if not for the fact that Republicans can't win statewide elections." Judging by CRAFT's financial disclosure, I'm not sure those involved know how to run a...

I hate to hear about "partnerships" between government and business, or between government and other organizations. When there is a partnership between an ant and an elephant, who do you suppose makes the decisions? - Thomas Sowell We'll be hearing a lot about state-business "partnerships" over the months to come. Much of Obama's "stimulus" plan, and virtually the whole of the bank-bailout plan (if I'm deciphering Secretary Geithner's obscure and confusing outline correctly) are based on the concept. In fact, most of the country's financial establishment is already operating under such a compact. That being the case, a close examination...

Former President Bill Clinton told Virginia Democrats Saturday that the party has won America's long-running culture war but has to make sure not to squander it with partisanship. Clinton told more than 3,000 people at a party fundraiser that the nation's natural political base shifted back to Democrats for the first time since 1968, thanks to protracted Republican mistakes and the belief that President Barack Obama represented the solution. He said Obama's election shows Americans at last are welcoming diversity and accepting differences, the opposite of the political dynamic he said Richard Nixon first used in 1968 to lock in...

Hamas must somehow be brought into the Middle East peace process because the policy of isolating Gaza in the quest for a settlement will not work, Tony Blair has told The Times. The former prime minister implicitly criticises the strategy followed by the Bush Administration and Israel of focusing all peace and reconstruction efforts on the West Bank. “It was half of what we needed,” he said.

United Way of Dane County is moving forward on its mission to effect change in the community by announcing expanded programs and initiatives in its Agenda for Change for 2009. The United Way collected more than $17 million in contributions in its 2008 campaign, paving the way to continue investing in programs and initiatives aligned to respond to issues the community identified to have the greatest impact in crucial areas, including schools, early childhood development and safety. "The community responded in a very challenging economic climate, and we are excited to share details of how their investments will solve the...

Left-of-center nonprofits are getting the bailout they wanted from the U.S. government, the Chronicle of Philanthropy reports. The news comes a month after Independent Sector president Diana Aviv demanded it. Our lawmakers are intent on pissing away billions of dollars on utterly useless giveaways to their supporters in the liberal nonprofit establishment. The money will have virtually no positive impact on the economy, except perhaps that it might bolster employment at nonprofit groups. One of the more egregious line items is the $1 billion allocation for community development block grants (CDBG). These are slush funds that liberal groups like La...

Nearly 800 advocates for California's "working families" gathered in downtown Sacramento on Tuesday, and they had plenty to talk about. Deep cuts to programs that fund food and health care and affordable housing for the state's most vulnerable people. Rising unemployment and demand for social services. Alarming school dropout rates. It was enough to tear Senate President Pro Tem Darrell Steinberg away from budget negotiations at the Capitol to rally the group of nonprofit staffers, policymakers and others at the Sacramento Convention Center. Steinberg, six weeks into his new job, admitted that he has not been getting out much lately....

A new state commission says the Alaska governor ought to get a $25,000 a year raise. Asked to figure out how much Alaska should pay its top officials, the group recommends pay hikes for the lieutenant governor, department heads and legislators too. “We need the best people we can get to do some pretty tough jobs against some often incredibility well-financed, single-minded corporate and individual interests,” said Rick Halford, a former legislator and chairman of the new State Officers Compensation Commission. Deciding how much to pay themselves is always a thorny proposition for politicians who answer to an ever-skeptical public....

Obama Praised Daschle's Federal Health Board Idea By Philip Klein on 11.25.08 @ 10:52AM Barack Obama said earlier this year that Tom Daschle's idea of creating a Federal Health Board (modeled after the Federal Reserve) to manage the nation's medical system showed "great promise." "The American health care system is in crisis, and workable solutions have been blocked for years by deeply entrenched ideological divisions," Obama wrote in a blurb on the back of Daschle's book, Critical: What We Can Do About the Health-Care Crisis. "Sen. Daschle brings fresh thinking to this problem, and his Federal Reserve for Health concept...

Former Assembly Speaker Fabian Núñez, who served as both Democratic foil and dealmaker with Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, has joined the high-powered public relations firm whose California office is currently occupied by Schwarzenegger's former campaign manager and communications director. Núñez, a Los Angeles Democrat, will be the newest partner and co-chair of Mercury Public Affairs, LLC, a political firm with offices in seven cities across the country, according to a letter he has sent to supporters. Steve Schmidt, who was the architect of Schwarzenegger's reelection campaign, and Adam Mendelsohn, the governor's former communications director and deputy chief of staff, are the...

Advocates for a United Nations treaty on children’s rights blamed American arrogance for it not being ratified by the United States, but critics charge signing onto the Convention on the Rights of the Child could mean international law trumping U.S. state and federal laws and the rights of parents to make decisions about raising and educating their children. The treaty, adopted by the United Nations on Nov. 20, 1989, has been ratified by 193 countries. The United States and Somalia are the two countries that have not ratified it, groups that support ratification said at a press conference at the...

A new conservative movement that takes libertarian ideas seriously could use the inertia created by the nation's new progressivism to slingshot itself into the future on a platform of reduced government, lower taxes, and limited interventionism, while also respecting climate change (adjusting the tax code to encourage green reform without any expense to taxpayers) and reforming the immigration system (opening the borders as the market demands labor without sacrificing security). The Republican Party has a chance to transform itself into something it has never been: a party of small government based on classical liberal principles. It doesn't have to be...

SAN FRANCISCO (AP) — Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, a Republican who has challenged many members of his party to take climate change seriously, said Friday that he plans to invite lawmakers and governmental executives from around the globe to California this fall to address solutions to the problem. The governor said he will invite officials from Europe, as well as from Australia, China, India and other countries, in the hope of forming an international alliance of community and regional leaders. He is planning the conference for November, a month before the United Nations holds its next round of international climate talks...

NEW YORK -- The morning after he declared he would suspend his presidential campaigning and return to Washington to deal with the U.S. economic crisis, Sen. John McCain made one last campaign stop, speaking at a conference on global issues organized by former president Bill Clinton. Addressing his dramatic call for a pause in the intense presidential campaign, McCain said he intends to "join" the debate in Washington over how to address the meltdown in the country's financial institutions. "I cannot carry on a campaign as though this dangerous situation had not occurred, or as though a solution were at...

WASHINGTON (CNN) — Lynn Forester de Rothschild, a prominent Hillary Clinton supporter and member of the Democratic National Committee’s Platform Committee, will endorse John McCain for president on Wednesday, her spokesman tells CNN. “This is a hard decision for me personally because frankly I don't like him,” she said of Obama in an interview with CNN’s Joe Johns. “I feel like he is an elitist. I feel like he has not given me reason to trust him.”

WASHINGTON -- For a generation, most people accepted the idea that the core of what makes America tick was an economy governed by free markets. And whatever combination of goods, services and jobs the market cooked up was presumed to be fine for the nation and for its citizens -- certainly better than government meddling. No longer. Spurred by the continued housing crisis, turmoil in financial markets, spiking oil prices, disappearing jobs and shrinking retirement savings, the nation and its political leaders have begun to sour on the notion that the current market system is the key to a fair,...

Toll road opponents today will ask the Sunset Advisory Committee of the Texas Legislature to abolish the Texas Department of Transportation, saying the agency has become too corrupt and too dysfunctional to fix, 1200 WOAI news reports. "We want to see elected leadership at the helm of Tex-DOT," says long time toll road opponent Terri Hall, the founder of the citizen action group Texans Uniting for Reform and Freedom. "We are done with this unelected beaurocracy that is just an arm of private road building companies and the lackeys of this governor." The idea of eliminating TexDOT and establishing a...

Anyone familiar with the threat posed by the advancing American Fifth Column understands all too clearly that our Constitution is under attack. Whether it is the insistence that the Constitution is a living document meant to conform to the will of the times or the institution of political correctness – a shadow set of laws effectively usurping the laws of our Constitutional Republic – the American Fifth Column is slowly, incrementally, systematically, chipping away at the wisdom as set forth by our Founders and Framers. With news that a non-governmentally charged commission is introducing a measure that would impose “group...

The Shrinking Influence of the US Federal Reserve By Gabor Steingart in Washington Humiliation for Mr. Dollar: Ben Bernanke, the chairman of the United States Federal Reserve Bank, faces a general investigation by the International Monetary Fund. Just one more example of the Fed losing its power. The United States Federal Reserve Bank, or Fed, seems as much a part of America as Coca-Cola or Pizza Hut. But at least one difference has become apparent in recent days. While the pizza chain and soft-drink maker are likely to expand their scope of influence in the age of globalization, the US...

John McCain is America's favorite kind of candidate. With his record of extraordinary patriotism and his distinctive Senate tenure, McCain is a nominee whom voters from both parties — and independents, too — could easily support. But he has been dealt a terrible hand: a tanking economy, an unpopular war, a Republican incumbent whose approval ratings are at their all-time low and a gloomy national mood, with 82 percent of Americans saying in a Washington Post-ABC News poll last week that the country is on the wrong track. Political scientists add all that up and predict that the Democrats are...

Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger has now abandoned his goal of fixing the problem that led to his historic election in 2003. With the revised budget proposal he released Wednesday, the governor has effectively conceded that California's era of perpetual budget deficits will not end on his watch. --snip-- His trouble started early, when he proposed spending cuts that were politically unpalatable while failing to follow through on a fundamental, top-to-bottom rethinking of the way the state does business. When the economy briefly surged and brought in billions of dollars in unexpected tax revenue, Schwarzenegger lost his zeal for fiscal discipline and...

AND NOW . . . amidst billowing clouds of fragrant, aromatic first- and second-hand premium cigar smoke. . . it is time for . . . that harmless, lovable little fuzz ball, the highly-trained broadcast specialist, having more fun than a human being should be allowed to have, from behind the golden EIB microphone, firmly ensconced in the prestigious Attila-the-Hun chair at the Limbaugh Institute of Advanced Conservative Studies, with talent on loan from G-d, at the cutting-edge of societal evolution, with half his brain tied behind his back — just to make it fair, the all-knowing, all-caring, all-sensing, all-feeling,...

Calling state government dysfunctional, a bipartisan group launched a reform effort Wednesday that it said would be backed by its own political action committee. The group, called California Forward, will push for passage of a proposed November ballot initiative supported by Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger to take away the Legislature's power to draw political districts and give it instead to an independent panel. Advocates say this will help moderates get elected. The reform group also plans to address the state budgeting process. Leon Panetta, a former Democratic congressman from Monterey and chief of staff to former President Bill Clinton, is leading...

MIAMI (FBW) – Former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush could barely contain his amusement at the Democrat Party’s Florida and Michigan delegate dilemma in its tightly contested presidential race, saying it’s “ironic beyond belief” that the party which accused him and other Republicans of suppressing the vote in the 2000 Florida presidential election re-count now “got themselves in a hole” of “their own doing.” “My thoughts are filled with irony that every vote should count,” Bush said with a broad smile. “I mean this brings back memories of hyperbole and anger, mock anger …. It was a political circus for several...

I'm an elitist. Eighty percent of the critical decisions affecting Israel are shaped by maybe 100 or 200 people, 300. These are my clients. Thus spaketh Prof. Yehezkel Dror, the resident blabbermouth in the Winograd Commission, which Prime Minister Ehud Olmert appointed in the wake of the 2006 war with Hizbullah. Dror made this statement in his interview with the Jerusalem Post last week. In a separate op-ed in Haaretz, Dror expanded on his theme. He explained that of these 300 decision makers who make life and death decisions in Israel, "less than thirty" are elected officials. So as Dror...

He says he's not running for president, but New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg traveled to the delegate-rich state of California Saturday deliver a scorching attack on Washington for failing to keep up with the need for new airports, roads, water systems and bridges across America. While China and other nations are investing heavily in ports and high-speed trains "Washington doesn't have a plan" to address crumbling U.S. infrastructure, Bloomberg said. In remarks clearly aimed at a national audience, the mayor said politics trumps common sense in Congress, where pork-barrel spending takes priority. Washington "spends money to win votes," Bloomberg said....

Welcome to the Monday Edition of the Limbaugh Institute of Advanced Conservative Studies! Filling in for Chuck today.

SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) - California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger called on lawmakers on Wednesday to pass legislation to allow the private sector to have a bigger role in building, operating and maintaining the state's public works. The Republican governor, who has often spoken in favor of public-private partnerships to improve and expand state infrastructure, urged the state's Democrat-led legislature to approve bills that would expand the types of projects, services and government entities that could enter into such tie-ups. Schwarzenegger and top lawmakers rallied voters last year to support ballot measures authorizing more than $40 billion in general obligation debt to...

AUSTRALIAN scientists are trying to give kangaroo-style stomachs to cattle and sheep in a bid to cut the emission of greenhouse gases blamed for global warming, researchers say. Thanks to special bacteria in their stomachs, kangaroo flatulence contains no methane and scientists want to transfer that bacteria to cattle and sheep who emit large quantities of the harmful gas. -snip- Even farmers who laugh at the idea of environmentally friendly kangaroo farts say that's nothing to joke about, particularly given the devastating drought Australia is suffering. -snip-

We all want progress. We may disagree whether gay marriage or drug legalization constitutes progress or not. But we all want better things for the world -- better food, better health and well-being, scientific and technical advances, wiser political systems, more peace and freedom,  more happy children, more humane treatment of animals, more tolerance, more prosperity for the world, you name it. That's called being a decent person. So what kind of person has to label himself "Progressive?" Obviously somebody who believes he (or she) understands real progress better than the rest of us. Because if you are a Progressive...

For Wayne Logan, a single father of two, being selected for the city's experimental cash-rewards program for the poor was like hitting the lottery. "I'm happy. I'm grateful," he declared, sounding somewhat amazed at his good fortune. "To get paid to do things I'm doing anyway is a welcome feeling." Logan, 49, was among the first enrollees in a daring $50 million pilot project launched by Mayor Bloomberg with private funds to pay poor families as much as $5,000 a year simply to do the right thing. A child getting a library card is worth $50. A student who passes...

It was the breaking-news headline last Friday that three construction workers had died in a coal-mine accident in Princeton, Ind., and maybe the markets melting down too, that congealed in my mind a thought I'd been kicking around for a while now: Our country is having an "Atlas Shrugged" moment. Trapped coal miners in Utah, smashed levees in New Orleans, busted steam pipes and flooded subways in New York City, a collapsed bridge over the Mississippi River in Minnesota, an air-traffic-control system stressed to its break point. Could this really be a description of the most prosperous country on the...

The past two years witnessed a welcome sensitization of the Russian public towards skinhead attacks and ultra-nationalist propaganda. In view of escalating violent attacks and other actions against foreigners, the debate on Russian fascism is currently experiencing a new high in the Russian media. There was a similar debate in the mid-1990s, when the confrontation between President Boris Yeltsin and the “intransigent opposition,” a state of near-civil war in Moscow, the ascent of Vladimir Zhirinovsky, the appearance of neo-Nazi parties, and the first Chechen war, gave rise to the notion of a “Weimar Russia.” Even though this construct has made...

Progressivism was the reform movement that ran from the late 19th century through the first decades of the 20th century, during which leading intellectuals and social reformers in the United States sought to address the economic, political, and cultural questions that had arisen in the context of the rapid changes brought with the Industrial Revolution and the growth of modern capitalism in America. The Progressives believed that these changes marked the end of the old order and required the creation of a new order appropriate for the new industrial age. There are, of course, many different representations of Progressivism: the...

Over the past decade, the expression public-private partnership has crept into our publiclexicon. What is a public-private partnership? What purposes were they supposedlycreated to serve? What, on the other hand, is free enterprise? Are the two compatible?In answering these questions we shall see that although advocates of public-privatepartnerships frequently speak of economic development, public-private partnershipsreally amount to economic control—they are just one of the key components of thecollectivist edifice being built up around the idea of sustainable development. Within theeconomic arena of sustainable development is the emergence of what we might call softfascism: a system that fits the dictionary definitions...

What is a "unipolar" world? by Mike Whitney What is a "unipolar" world? It is a world in which there is one master, one sovereign--- one center of authority, one center of force, one center of decision-making. And at the end of the day this is pernicious not only for all those within this system, but also for the sovereign itself because it destroys itself from within. It has nothing in common with democracy, which is the power of the majority in respect to the interests and opinions of the minority. In Russia , we are constantly being lectured about...