Obama Is Toast

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A Tao te Ching for Christians, Paul Brennan

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GOP In Oklahoma Introduce Resolution To Impeach Obama


It wouldn’t have any force of law over the federal Congress, but they’re hoping to put pressure on their Congress people to raise it there by this action.
Via Reuters:

Republican state lawmakers in Oklahoma have introduced a resolution urging the state’s congressional delegation to start an effort to impeach President Barack Obama over a White House recommendation that schools accommodate transgender students.
The Obama administration told U.S. public schools last week that transgender students must be allowed to use the bathroom of their choice. The recommendation upset Republicans and raised the likelihood of fights over federal funding and legal authority.
The Oklahoma resolution, introduced on Thursday night, calls on the state’s members of the U.S. House of Representatives to file articles of impeachment against Obama, the U.S. attorney general, the U.S. secretary of education and others over the policy. A vote has not yet been scheduled on the resolution.
Keep reading…

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Heartache: Obama To Embark On Last Summer Vacation As POTUS…


Sad…
Via MassLive:

President Obama’s last year in office will indeed include a vacation trip to Martha’s Vineyard.
While the White House hasn’t put out information confirming the visit, the Cape Cod Times reports that the Coast Guard said the president is flying to the island and staying for up to three weeks this summer.
U.S. Coast Guard Capt. Timothy Tobiasz, who serves as the commanding officer of Air Station Cape Cod, talked about the president’s visit at a meeting of the Falmouth board of selectmen.
Obama, a frequent golfer when vacationing, has spent vacations on Martha’s Vineyard six times, according to the Cape Cod Times.
The Washington Post last year called him a “vacationing yeti.” “Many have had near brushes with the leader of the free world, but only a precious few have actually laid eyes on him,” the newspaper wrote.
Keep reading…

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In Third World Dictatorship Of Vietnam, Obama Urges College Kids To Stop Climate Change…


Right after they discover a source of sustainable freedom.
Via USA Today:

President Obama urged young leaders in Vietnam to focus on the threat of climate change, as he concluded his historic three-day trip to the Southeast Asian country Wednesday.
“Economic development and the well-being and the health of your people and everyone around the world is going to depend on how we deal with some of these environmental issues,” said Obama during a town hall meeting here with hundreds of young Vietnamese.
He said Vietnam will be one of the countries most affected by warming temperatures and rising seas.
“That could have a huge impact on Vietnam’s ability to feed its people, on fishermen, on farmers, and it could be a really big problem if we don’t do something about it, so it’s going to be up to you to start,” said Obama.
Keep reading…

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Canadian Officer Says Gun Registry is an Important Symbol of Government Power

Canada passed its long gun registration scheme in 1995. The bureaucratic attempt to require state knowledge and tracking of all legal guns in Canada was a disaster from the beginning. It was plagued with non-compliance, sabotage, corruption, crony-ism and cost overruns. Advertised as costing only 110 million, the costs ballooned into billions, as the ruling party used the program to reward favorites, and paid consultants to lobby to increase registry funds.

The registry was discontinued on April 5, 2012. Quebec fought to keep the registry in courts, but was ruled against in the Canadian Supreme Court a year ago.

There never was any data showing that the registry had any effect on crime. It appears the RCMP, at the minimum, assured that no data was kept that would indicate if the registry was of any use as a crime fighting tool. No instances could be found where the registry was useful in solving crimes.

Now, as the Quebec government fights to create its own, separate, long gun registry, a new, perhaps clearer and more honest reason for the registry has been put forward by a long retired police officer. From news1130.com:

But Brisebois believes the registry is more than just a tool for law enforcement — that it’s a symbol of how a society treats firearms and that it reinforces Canada’s cultural differences from those of the United States.

“Seeing what the registry did for me — spend the money,” Brisebois said.

“The important thing is to show people you are doing something (about guns),” he said. “The American way is that guns represent liberty and rights — do we want this? I don’t. So am I ready to spend that money? Yes.”

Brisebois does not want symbols of liberty and rights. It does not matter that the registry is expensive and ineffective in fighting crime.

The Canadian Supreme Court even refused to hear a case put forward by leftist feminists, claiming that doing away with the registry violated their rights. The reason the court did this? Because there was no evidence that the registry had reduced crime one iota.

Interestingly, this is a very similar reason given for the great forced Australian gun "buy back". Prime Minister Howard said that he hated guns and did not want Australia to go "the American way".

The long gun registry was never popular in Canada. It was put forward as a way to punish cultural conservatives, to show rural and western Canadians who was in charge, and it was not them.

Canadians educated themselves. They lobbied. They voted. They rid themselves of the registry. Similar situations are occurring in many American states. The compliance with long gun registration schemes in New York, Connecticut, and California are at 4-10%. Whether that resistance will result in political changes is uncertain.

©2016 by Dean Weingarten: Permission to share is granted when this notice and link are included.
Link to Gun Watch

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OFA Running Contest For Obamabots To Tell Dear Leader Which Of His “Accomplishments” They’re “Most Thankful For”… Accomplishments?
Obama Foundation Donors Attended Private White House Events With The President









Submitted by Andrew Perez on May 17, 2016


Glowimages/Getty
May 17, 2016 -- In January 2015, President Barack Obama held a small, private gathering at the White House residence with Hollywood actress Julia Roberts and major Democratic donors. The night’s guest list included two couples who had recently made six-figure donations to the foundation raising money to build Obama’s presidential library in Chicago.
The exclusive event drew scant public attention. For one, it wasn’t on the president’s public schedule: a White House advisory simply said he had “no public events scheduled” that day. And the White House visitor log, released three months later, didn’t highlight Roberts’ attendance. She visited under her married name, along with her husband, cinematographer Danny Moder.
Some of the other visitors to the White House residence that evening were titans in their own industries. One couple in attendance, private equity executive Mark Gallogly and his wife Lise Strickler, had recently contributed $340,000 to the Barack Obama Foundation. Tom Campion, founder of the surf wear clothing chain Zumiez, and his wife, Sonya, donated $500,000 to the foundation in the months before the event.
Obama has frequently opened the White House doors to the wealthy donors who have financed his political campaigns, the Democratic National Committee (DNC), and Organizing for Action, a nonprofit the president created to mobilize grassroots supporters to advocate for his agenda. Those doors have also been opened to those making substantial contributions to Obama’s private foundation, as it seeks funding for the construction of a monument to his presidency.
Altogether, 15 of the 39 named donors to the Obama Foundation have been invited to small meetings with the president at the White House, according to a MapLight review of visitor logs, the foundation’s website, and its tax returns to the IRS. Four of those people were first invited to small meetings with Obama at the White House following their foundation donations. Nearly three-quarters of the contributors the foundation has disclosed have been invited to the White House for events with Obama, including every donor whose family or foundation has contributed more than $100,000.
The White House says Obama’s private events with donors were not for the purpose of fundraising for the foundation, and that the president isn’t raising money for the foundation while he’s in office.
“The 2.2 million visitor records released thus far demonstrate the broad range of individuals who have visited the White House. The fact is, being a supporter of the president does not secure you a visit to the White House, nor does it preclude you from one,” Jennifer Friedman, a White House deputy press secretary, said in a statement provided to MapLight.
“The president has been committed since his first day in office to reducing the corrosive influence of money in politics, starting when he signed an executive order instituting unprecedented reforms, and doing more since then to close the revolving door of special interest influence than any president before him,” she added.
The Obama Foundation did not respond to a request for comment from MapLight.
Gallogly, who co-founded the private equity firm Centerbridge Partners, has been invited to the White House grounds 122 times since 2009. Of those invitations, a dozen were for small gatherings with the president and fewer than 30 attendees at the White House. Gallogly has served on two of the president’s economic advisory councils, and has been invited to several meetings with top administration officials, including White House chief of staff Denis McDonough, former chief of staff Pete Rouse and former Obama economic advisor Gene Sperling.
A vocal booster of the president on Wall Street, Gallogly and his wife have contributed $14,600 to Obama’s presidential campaigns and $294,000 to the DNC since 2007, according to Federal Election Commission filings. Gallogly and Strickler donated another $330,000 to the Obama Foundation in 2015.
Campion and his wife have donated about $270,000 to the DNC since 2007, but they do not appear to have been to a small gathering with Obama in the White House before the one with Julia Roberts in January 2015. One day before that event, the Campion family met with John Podesta, who served as a senior advisor to Obama before joining Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign.
Jim Simons, founder of the private equity firm Renaissance Technologies, and his wife gave $340,000 to the Obama Foundation in 2014. Visitor logs show the Simons family was invited to a smaller event with Obama at the White House for the first time in March 2015 -- a dinner with Tesla Motors CEO Elon Musk, Google parent company chairman Eric Schmidt, and a handful of prominent scientists and mathematicians.
Marilyn Simons had not been invited to the White House before March 2015, visitor logs show. She leads the Simons Foundation, a nonprofit organization whose website says its mission is to “advance the frontiers of research in mathematics and the basic sciences.” In April 2015, Simons met with Meredith Drosback, the assistant director for education and physical sciences in the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy. The Simons family contributed an additional $330,000 to the Obama Foundation last year.
While the Obama Foundation discloses the exact amount a person donates in its annual tax returns, it does not do so on its website. The foundation discloses contributions online quarterly, but only lists donations in certain ranges: $500,000 to $1 million; $250,001 to $500,000; $100,001 to $250,000; and $200 to $100,000.
The Obama Foundation raised $5.4 million in 2014, the year it was formed, and another $1.9 million last year. The New York Times has reported that Obama and his supporters are hoping to raise $800 million for the foundation.
Methodology: MapLight analysis of White House Visitor Records, Federal Election Commission filings, and the Barack Obama Foundation’s tax returns for 2014 and 2015, based on the latest available data as of May 16, 2016.
About MapLight
MapLight is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit, nonpartisan research organization that tracks money in politics. More information about MapLight can be found here.

Media Contact
Alec Saslow
c: 720-319-4948
e: alec@maplight.org

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Obama-Brokered Ceasefire In Syria A Recruitment Boon For Al-Nusra Front, 3000 New Recruits Since March….


Take a bow, John Kerry.

BEIRUT — Al-Qaida’s branch in Syria has recruited thousands of fighters, including teenagers, and taken territory from government forces in a successful offensive in the north, illustrating how the cease-fire put in place by Russia and the United States to weaken the militants has in many ways backfired.
The branch, known as the Nusra Front, has churned out a flood of videos — slickly produced in the style of its rival, the Islamic State group — that show off its recruitment drive. In one, young men line up for combat training. In another, a bearded al-Qaida fighter in a mosque urges a crowd of men to join jihad. A third shows an al-Qaida-linked cleric leading a graduation ceremony, handing out weapons to young men.
Since March, the group recruited 3,000 new fighters, including teenagers, in comparison to an average of 200 to 300 a month before, according to Rami Abdurrahman, head of the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, an activist group monitoring the conflict. He cited contacts within the Nusra Front. Other activists said hundreds living in camps for displaced people in the north have joined the al-Qaida branch.
But battlefield success and the push for new recruits have brought to the surface tensions within the Nusra Front over the group’s future path, observers say. […]
The Nusra Front has long been one of the strongest factions in Syria’s opposition. It and other Syrian rebels, including some allied to it, hold most of the northwestern province of Idlib and parts of neighboring Aleppo province. When Russia and the United States brokered a cease-fire between Assad and opposition forces in February, the Nusra Front and IS were excluded, allowing Assad’s troops and Russian and American airstrikes to continue to hit them. The hope in Washington and Moscow was that other rebel factions would shun both extremist groups.
Instead, the cease-fire faltered within weeks as Assad’s forces fought rebels around the opposition-held part of Aleppo, and peace talks in Geneva stalemated. That boosted the Nusra Front’s credibility as the force that kept up the fight against Assad and stood against any compromise leaving him in power.
Far from being shunned by other factions, the Nusra Front instead has attracted a coalition. Their alliance, known as the Jaish al-Fatah, or Army of Conquest, has recently waged a counter-offensive around Aleppo, retaking ground from Assad’s military and its allies and inflicting heavy casualties, including killing more than a dozen members of Iran’s elite Revolutionary Guard and some 30 Lebanese Hezbollah fighters, allied to Assad.

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