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March 2015

Posted by William A. Jacobson on March 22, 2015 29 Comments
With Hillary's email and fundraising scandals destined to be a permanent fixture in the 2016 campaign if she runs, and with Clinton fatigue already setting in, the voices calling on Elizabeth Warren to mount a challenge are growing stronger. What started with committed progressives at places like MoveOn.org and Daily Kos, now is going mainstream liberal. The Boston Globe Editorial Board is calling on Warren to challenge Hillary:
DEMOCRATS WOULD be making a big mistake if they let Hillary Clinton coast to the presidential nomination without real opposition, and, as a national leader, Massachusetts Senator Elizabeth Warren can make sure that doesn’t happen. While Warren has repeatedly vowed that she won’t run for president herself, she ought to reconsider.... The clock is ticking: Presidential candidates need to hire staff, raise money, and build a campaign operation. Although Clinton hasn’t officially declared her candidacy, she’s scooping up support from key party bigwigs and donors, who are working to impose a sense of inevitability about her nomination. Unfortunately, the strategy’s working .... Fairly or not, many Americans already view Clinton skeptically, and waltzing to the nomination may actually hurt her in the November election against the Republican nominee..... Unlike Clinton, or any of the prospective Republican candidates, Warren has made closing the economic gaps in America her main political priority, in a career that has included standing up for homeowners facing illegal foreclosures and calling for more bankruptcy protections. If she runs, it’ll ensure that those issues take their rightful place at the center of the national political debate. Some of Warren’s admirers feel she’d be better off fighting for those causes in the Senate — but her opportunities to enact reforms there are shrinking, which should make a presidential run more attractive. As a member of the minority party in the Senate, her effectiveness is now much more limited than when she first won election, since Republicans control the legislative agenda. Democrats face an uphill challenge to reclaim the Senate in 2016 and face even slimmer prospects in the House. For the foreseeable future, the best pathway Warren and other Democrats have for implementing their agenda runs through the White House.
To drive home the point, The Globe today features several Op-Eds also urging Warren to run:

Posted by Amy Miller on March 22, 2015 27 Comments
The day is upon us. This week, Ted Cruz will become the first presidential candidate to officially throw his hat in the ring. Senior advisors with direct knowledge of Cruz's plans said that the junior senator from Texas will make his big announcement at a convocation ceremony at Liberty University this Monday. Theodore Schleifer at the Houston Chronicle broke the story last night:
Over the course of the primary campaign, Cruz will aim to raise between $40 million and $50 million, according to advisers, and dominate with the same tea party voters who supported his underdog Senate campaign in 2012. But the key to victory, Cruz advisers believe, is to be the second choice of enough voters in the party's libertarian and social conservative wings to cobble together a coalition to defeat the chosen candidate of the Republican establishment. ... The firebrand Texan may have few Senate colleagues who will back his White House bid, but his appeal to his party's base who vote disproportionately in Republican primaries could make him competitive in Iowa and beyond. Yet critics of Cruz argue that he will have trouble raising high-dollar donations from traditional contributors, will land few endorsements from the nation's political establishment and be unable to escape comparisons to President Barack Obama, who also ran for president in his first Senate term. And if he advances to a general election, Cruz trails likely Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton solidly in early public opinion polls.
If the Chron's sources are right, Cruz will skip the exploratory committee phase and declare his candidacy outright. Of course, anyone who has been watching Cruz's career saw this coming---or at least, saw the possibility of this coming:

Posted by Kemberlee Kaye on March 22, 2015 4 Comments
C-SPAN gets its fair share of wild calls, but this one has to be one of the best as of late. 'Jack Strickland' called into C-SPAN with a tale reminiscent of one from 90's sitcom, The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air, featuring Will Smith. 'Strickland' has a history of C-SPAN prank calls. See here, here, and here. “Hi, good morning. I'm Jack Strickland. I just want to make it clear I’m calling from Bel Air, California, but I’m originally from Philadelphia, specifically West Philadelphia. But anyway, I was actually discussing this issue with a friend of mine while I was in Philly, uh, it occurred on a basketball court," said Strickland. "At some point during the conversation, a couple of guys who were essentially up to no good starting making trouble in my neighborhood. I got in one little fight and my mom got scared and said, "you're moving with your auntie and uncle in Bel Air."" And that's when C-SPAN cut the call.

Posted by Amy Miller on March 22, 2015 12 Comments
Today the UN Security Council will hold an emergency meeting to discuss the devolving situation in Yemen. The council will meet in a closed session at 3 p.m. EDT. Earlier this year the UN condemned the Houthi siege on Sana'a and the subsequent attack on the sitting government. Deposed President Abed Rabbo Mansour Hadi called for UN action yesterday:
Hadi sounded a defiant note from his base in the south on Saturday, threatening action against the Houthis’ northern stronghold. “We shall deliver the country to safety and raise Yemen’s flag on Mount Marran in Saadeh instead of the Iranian flag,” he said in a televised speech, his first since reaching Aden. Iran is an ally of the Houthis, who belong to a Shia Muslim sect. The Houthis, in a statement from their Supreme Revolutionary Committee, did not directly respond to the speech but called for a “general mobilisation” of the armed forces against a “dirty war” they said was being waged by militias loyal to Hadi.

Posted by Amy Miller on March 21, 2015 19 Comments
ISIS has posted the names, addresses, units, and headshots of 100 U.S. military personnel they claim have participated in airstrikes against the terror group's activities in Iraq, Syria, and other areas in the Middle East. In a message posted to the self-styled "Islamic State Hacking Division," the terror group urges its members and sympathizers in the United States to target these military members using the same brutal tactics we've seen ISIS use against its captives overseas. I chose not to go looking for the "terrorist Wikileaks," but the New York Daily News describes what it found:
“These Kuffar that drop bombs over Syria, Iraq, Yemen, Khurasan and Somalia are from the same lands that you reside in, so when will you take action?” the group asks. “Know that it is wajib for you to kill these kuffar! and now we have made it easy for you by giving you addresses, all you need to do is take the final step, so what are you waiting for? Kill them in their own lands, behead them in their own homes, stab them to death as they walk their streets thinking they are safe…” The black flag entry is a self-styled terrorist WikiLeaks titled “Target: United States Military.” It lists the name, unit and address of 100 U.S. Air Force, Navy and Marines – many of them pilots – along with headshots of each. One of the targeted is a Navy aviator from upstate New York. “You crusaders that fight the Islamic State, we say to you: ‘Die in your rage!’” the ISIS post said.

Posted by Mike LaChance on March 21, 2015 14 Comments
Since Netanyahu's victory last week, the Obama administration has offered little more than a cold shoulder to Israel, and seems more interested in talking to Iran. The fact that Israel is our best ally in the region is overlooked while Obama continues working on his so-called "non-binding agreement." This morning on FOX and Friends, Tucker Carlson discussed the issue with Ann Coulter: Obama and others on the left seem to harbor a belief that things would be different if someone other than Netanyahu was the prime minister of Israel.

Posted by Mike LaChance on March 21, 2015 8 Comments
The story of Hillary Clinton's email server is already getting lost in spin and talking points. It's easy to forget the fundamental fact at the center of the issue. Hilary Clinton violated the law. Bill Whittle gets right to the heart of it in the new edition of Firewall and frankly calls it criminal. Via Truth Revolt:
Hillary Rodham Clinton decided to conduct, for four years, the office of Secretary of State using her own private email server. Because these emails were not transacted and recorded through the official State Department servers, Mrs. Clinton “willfully concealed and removed” these critical documents from the records and archives of the United States Government. You can further argue that by electing to not have these records placed onto government servers – which are secure, routinely backed up, and most importantly subject to Freedom Of Information Act requests, that she has, by any reasonable interpretation, “mutilated, obliterated and destroyed” these essential records, which belong not to Hillary Rodham Clinton but rather to the Secretary of State of the United States of America, and her employers, the people of that nation. The penalty for this is a fine or up to three years imprisonment, or both. That’s paragraph (a) of the law.
Watch it all below:

Posted by Amy Miller on March 21, 2015 6 Comments
Things just keep getting worse for the US military in Yemen. What was remaining of the US military presence in Yemen has been---or is in the process of---evacuating the region after attacks by both Shiite Houthi rebels and al-Qaeda forces caused a breakdown in security.
In their statement, the rebels described their coming offensive against security and military institutions loyal to President Abed Rabbo Mansour Hadi as a battle against extremists. Their appeal came just minutes after Hadi gave a defiant speech challenging the Houthis, his first address broadcast to the public since fleeing Sanaa last month. He described the rebels' rule in Sanaa and elsewhere as "a coup against constitutional legitimacy." The U.S. troops, including Special Forces commandos, were leaving the al-Annad air base near the southern city of al-Houta, Yemeni military and security officials said. Speaking on condition of anonymity as they weren't authorized to discuss troop movements, the officials did not say whether the troops had left the country. Some 100 American troops and Special Forces commandos are believed to be stationed there. U.S. officials declined immediate comment Saturday.
Fox News has more:

Posted by Amy Miller on March 21, 2015 0 Comments
Since 2008, the federal government has finalized over 2500 regulations. Those regulations required over 500 million hours of paperwork hours, and ring in to the tune of almost 734 billion dollars in total cost. That's a lot of agency-based lawmaking. How is the average American supposed to navigate all that? A new tool just released by the American Action Forum is here to help! AAF's "Regulation Rodeo" is a searchable, customizable, and interactive tool that lets you locate, evaluate, and learn more about all rulemakings (that means regulations that impose a private-sector burden, intergovernmental cost, or paperwork burden) published in the Federal Register since 2008. Results are displayed in colorful "infographic" form, and contain links to the Federal Register if you want more information about a specific rule. How does it work? Glad you asked. I decided to find out how much of our money the Department of Defense has spent via rulemaking since 2008. I plug and chug, and the first thing that pops up is a basic overview telling me that, while the DoD hasn't passed that many regulations, they've spent quite a bit of my money: DOD main data

Posted by Amy Miller on March 21, 2015 27 Comments
Back in February, a federal judge in Texas enjoined the Obama Administration from rolling out its immigration overhaul via executive action. In the injunction, the court said that the Administration could not claim prosecutorial discretion (as it applies to illegal aliens covered under the proposed amnesty) because their plan confers benefits on those aliens not currently available under law. Instead, the court said that the Administration was effectively changing the law. Earlier this month, the same court that issued the injunction demanded that DoJ attorneys respond to allegations that the Administration was going ahead with its plans by granting expanded DACA benefits to more than 100,000 illegal aliens. Administration lawyers had asked the court to reconsider its decision to enjoin the executive amnesty, but the court refused to do so pending a hearing on the DACA issue. That hearing happened this past week, and by all accounts, U.S. District Judge Andrew Hanen---the same judge who handled the injunction---was not amused by what he heard (emphasis mine):
U.S. District Judge Andrew S. Hanen, visibly annoyed, confronted a U.S. deputy assistant attorney general over previous government assurances on the timing of the program. He asked why he shouldn’t grant a discovery request for internal federal immigration documents — a request filed Thursday by 26 states that are suing over Obama’s executive actions on immigration. At a one-hour hearing in Brownsville, Hanen gave the Justice Department 48 hours to file a motion in response. He said he would then rule promptly on whether to require the government to produce documents concerning applications under Obama’s deferred action program. The judge said that if he decided to impose sanctions, “the taxpayers of the [26] states would end up paying their own damages.” Hanen’s barbed comments left little doubt that he sympathized with lawyers for the 26 states, who said they suffered “irreparable harm” when federal officials granted more than 100,000 applications for deferred action after Obama announced the program Nov. 20. He said government lawyers had assured him that “nothing was happening” regarding the applications.

Posted by Amy Miller on March 20, 2015 30 Comments
Right now, lurking in your radio, is something so...so hideous...so backward....that it threatens to destroy gender equality as we know it. We've known for a long time that some feminists have a problem with women who choose to become housewives, and an even bigger problem with women who embrace their feminine roles and wiles to their advantage. Those same feminists are on the warpath again, this time against a 20-something pop star who chose to make a cheeky video about what she would like to see in her future partner. Watch and listen (no, actually watch and listen---the rest of the article depends on this) to the unspeakable bane: "Dear Future Husband," by Meghan Trainor. The shock. The horror. PURGE IT BEFORE THE CHILDREN SEE.

Posted by Kemberlee Kaye on March 20, 2015 19 Comments
Feminists found a new target for their incessant outrage -- Nike's new spring clothing line. Nike's latest fashion endeavor looks runway ready, and probably not meant for kickboxing, spinning, or anything else athletic. But then most runway fare isn't designed for anything but the runway. Even the promo photos look like the glossy ads that fill Marie Claire and not typical adverts placed in weekly circulars. Nike x sacai feminist outrage nike clothing line 1Nike x sacai feminist outrage nike clothing line Which seems to be the point. Partnering with Japanese fashion studio Sacai, Nike hopes to make their mark in the rapidly expanding world of fitness fashion. So Nike decides to create what is obviously a fashion couture line. No big deal, right? It shouldn't be. Except that Nike committed the unforgivable sin of describing the line as feminine. As described by Nike:
Renowned for her disruptive aesthetic, sacai’s founder Chitose Abe began the design journey by mining the Nike archives and pulling references from running, tennis and American football, reinterpreting Nike’s heritage sportswear silhouettes through a feminine and modern lens. The resulting eight-piece capsule collection seamlessly blends the iconic look of sport with a feminine and modern edge. New fabric innovations include a special mesh lace hem that was specifically developed by Nike and Abe to adorn the trim of graphic Nike T-shirts. The detail pays homage to sacai’s cool and subversive take on femininity. Abe also applied her signature paneling to several of the garments. Through technical innovation, the partners were able to achieve this effect by pleating the classic ripstop fabric for the first time. Bonded zippers that are attached without any stitching are another example of advanced design.
Cue faux feminist drama.

Posted by Kemberlee Kaye on March 20, 2015 26 Comments
While writers like Ben White are encouraging Hillary to kickstart her 2016 bid immediately, the House Select Committee on Benghazi is still looking for answers. Today, Gowdy sent a letter to Hillary Clinton's counsel confirming the extension of subpoena deadline to March 27, and formally requesting the former Secretary of State surrender her email servers to a mutually agreed upon third party for forensic examination. Gowdy explained Hillary's unusual and likely unprecedented email arrangement, an arrangement that made her the sole arbiter of relevant documentation. Making note that Mrs. Clinton deleted emails, Gowdy wrote, "the deletion of emails is not normal practice once any investigation, let alone litigation, commences. The fact that she apparently deleted some emails after Congress initially requested documents raises serious concerns." The House of Representatives issued the following statement this afternoon:
Washington, DC-- Select Committee on Benghazi Chairman Trey Gowdy today sent a letter requesting former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton turn over the server she used for official State Department business to the State Department inspector general or a neutral third party for independent analysis of what records should be in the public domain. “Though Secretary Clinton alone is responsible for causing this issue, she alone does not get to determine its outcome,” said Gowdy, R-S.C. “That is why in the interest of transparency for the American people, I am formally requesting she turn the server over to the State Department’s inspector general or a mutually agreeable third party. “An independent analysis of the private server Secretary Clinton used for the official conduct of U.S. government business is the best way to remove politics and personal consideration from the equation. Having a neutral, third-party arbiter such as the State Department IG do a forensic analysis and document review is an eminently fair and reasonable means to determine what should be made public.

Posted by New Neo on March 20, 2015 42 Comments
It would be so very transformative, you know. Hope and change:
"If everybody voted, then it would completely change the political map in this country," Obama said, calling it "potentially transformative." Not only that, Obama said, but universal voting would "counteract money more than anything."... Obama said he thought it would be "fun" for the U.S. to consider amending the Constitution to change the role that money plays in the electoral system. But don't hold your breath. "Realistically, given the requirements of that process, that would be a long-term proposition," he said.
I'm surprised he's even mentioning something as old-fashioned as an amendment. Surely he can think of something more creative, so we can join the following countries with mandatory voting laws that they actually enforce: Argentina, Australia, Brazil, Cyprus, Ecuador, Liechtenstein, Luxembourg, Nauru, Peru, Singapore, Uruguay, and Schaffhausen canton in Switzerland. I've noticed four things about mandatory voting laws. The first is that only half the places that have them bother to enforce them. The second is that with the exception of Australia, the ones that do aren't places you'd especially wish to emulate (although that canton in Switzerland might be nice). The third is that it seems to be a real vogue in Latin America, especially if you count the countries that have such laws but don't enforce them. And the fourth is that they often contain exceptions for illiterate voters and the elderly, and I doubt Obama would want to allow that.
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