You’re not being hacked, @SharylAttkisson. You’re being haunted.

How else would you explain computers mysteriously turning on and off? It’s gotta be ghosts:

CBS News announced on Friday that the computer of investigative reporter Sharyl Attkisson’s computer had registered multiple breaches, a disclosure that prompted a great deal of speculation about just who was responsible for the misbehavior. In a short segment today on “CBS This Morning,” Attkisson lent a personal touch to the story.

The primary takeaway? That Attkisson’s hardware sort of “woke up” in the middle of the night. When asked how the hacking manifested itself, she said, “One example was the computers began turning themselves on and then back off again during the night.”

Creepy, huh?

They’re heeeerre!

Okay, so, maybe not ghosts. Probably someone much more mundane, in fact. Someone with some very specific interests:

“The intruders did have access to personal information including passwords to my financial accounts and so on, but didn’t tamper with those, so they weren’t interested in stealing my identity or doing things to my finances. So people can decide on their own what they might have been trying to do in there,” Attkisson said.

These were computers Attkisson used mostly for work. And what was she working on last Fall?

Stories about Benghazi and Operation Fast and Furious. Hmmm…

Back to the WaPo article (first quote), Erik Wemple contacted a former NSA operative who found government intrusion hard to believe:

Cedric Leighton, a former deputy director of training at the National Security Agency (NSA), cautions against reaching too many conclusions on the sophistication of the intruder(s). “It’s sloppy work (1) in the realm of hackerdom,” says Leighton. “If you’re going to do something like that, you try not to leave anything behind. You try to make sure that you don’t do anything different than what the user is doing.”

Noting the time of the intrusion, Leighton speculated about Chinese hackers. But Attkisson works mostly on domestic investigations; why would a Chinese hacker be interested in her work? You’d think they’d be more interested in reporters who cover the military or tech beats, for example. Just some bored kid in Shanghai who saw her on TV and thought it would be cool to hack her machines?

Nah. I don’t think so. And neither does Attkisson, it seems:

ATTKISSON: I have attorneys at CBS who are helping us through this. I also have personal counsel.

O’REILLY: And so, all your counsels are saying, “Don’t say anything.” Just maybe you have the same counsel that the attorney general and Ed Muller has?

No, it’s a joke. Bad joke. Sorry. So, all of your counsels are saying, “Don’t accuse anybody right now.”

ATTKISSON: Well, they’re just telling us what we can say, more than anything right now, which is, you know, what you basically heard, that there has been an intrusion of the computer, this is not phishing, this is not malware.

This is not ordinary, as someone asked me, old boyfriend trying to look through my files. They know it’s not that.

O’REILLY: No. This is big.

ATTKISSON: Yes.

O’REILLY: Yes. But in order to go after somebody, you’ve got to have the suspicion. And I assume you have a suspicion.

You don’t have to tell me. I don’t want to get your lawyers mad. But I assume you have a suspicion.

ATTKISSON: Well, I think I know. But I am just not prepared to go into that. So, we’re continuing our investigation.

In other words, she was working on stories not at all complimentary to the government, her computers are hacked –no financial or other personal data stolen–  and she and her employers think they have a pretty good idea who did it.

And I’ll bet they’re not Chinese.

She and CBS were smart to retain their own counsel; with the government apparently willing to intimidate the children of whistleblowers, they’ll want to have all their legal ducks in a row before going public with any accusations.

Footnote:
(1) The basic idea being that US government couldn’t be this clumsy, could it? Well… Given their inability to ferret out the Tsarnaevs before they bombed the Boston Marathon, or their willful blindness that lead to fatal political correctness regarding Major Hasan, or their mind-boggling incompetence in granting a top security clearance to Edward Snowden, let’s just say it’s not that hard for me to believe they could leave a trail marked by flashing neon signs.

Reminds me in fact of a scene from S*P*Y*S, a 1974 espionage comedy starring Donald Sutherland and Elliot Gould. When someone tries to blow them up, they’re convinced their own employers, the CIA, did it. Their boss denies it, but they won’t have it (going from memory): “No, it wasn’t the KGB! They don’t screw up! This was screwed up! It had to be us!”

Sounds plausible to me.

(Crossposted at Sister Toldjah)

Tales of the #Thugocracy: Oh, so that’s why they raided Gibson Guitar

“Nice business you got here…”

You might recall a bizarre federal raid on legendary guitar manufacturer Gibson Guitar back in 2011: they were accused of importing illegally harvested wood from India and Madagascar under a century-old law. The feds showed up with automatic weapons, seized “evidence,” and generally disrupted operations to Gibson’s great cost. After all that, no criminal charges were filed, but Gibson had to agree to pay a $300,000 fine and toss $50,000 to an environmental group as penance for being “careless.”

Weird, right? Why all this attention to Gibson, when rival Martin & Co. used the very same “illegal” wood, yet wasn’t raided?

And, just like that, a light goes on:

Grossly underreported at the time was the fact that Gibson’s chief executive, Henry Juszkiewicz, contributed to Republican politicians. Recent donations have included $2,000 to Rep. Marsha Blackburn, R-Tenn., and $1,500 to Sen. Lamar Alexander, R-Tenn.

By contrast, Chris Martin IV, the Martin & Co. CEO, is a long-time Democratic supporter, with $35,400 in contributions to Democratic candidates and the Democratic National Committee over the past couple of election cycles.

What would have seemed like a crazy conspiracy theory straight out of the fever swamps just a year ago now looks all too plausible, after the IRS scandal and the news that the Obama people had been targeting conservatives since 2008.

The message here to Mr. Juszkiewicz and people like him is crystal clear: “Thinking about making a political donation? Maybe you should think again.“

“First Amendment?” What’s that?

(Crossposted at Sister Toldjah)

The #IRS should just go ahead and change its name to “The Spanish Inquisition”

“Confess the sin of conservatism! Confess!!”

Because no one expects them, least of all poor Justin Binik-Thomas, an Ohio educator specifically named in IRS “follow-up questions” to an Ohio Tea Party group he had no affiliation with:

At the height of its campaign against President Barack Obama’s opponents, the Internal Revenue Service (IRS), in its audit of an Ohio tea party group, demanded information and materials related to a local Ohio adult education program as well as personal information about a man named Justin Binik-Thomas.

Now Justin Binik-Thomas and the adult educational program, neither of whom have any links to the tea party group, are worried.

The infamous IRS Cincinnati office, which oversaw tax-exempt nonprofit organizations., requested additional information from the Liberty Township Tea Party in a letter dated March 1, 2011.

“Included in that list was question number 26, which said, ‘please explain your relationship with Justin Binik-Thomas,’” Binik-Thomas told The Daily Caller. “That was concerning to me, considering I was not involved with that group.”

“I was involved in the Cincinnati tea party, about 30 miles south, as a spokesman” said Binik-Thomas, who works as a contract manager and has a small media relations business on the side. “There are literally tens of thousands of people involved with the tea party in some way. Why was I called out by name?”

The IRS also demanded, in its Question #25 for the Liberty Township Tea Party, one question before asking about Binik-Thomas, that the group hand over any training materials provided by the organization EmpowerU.

EmpowerU is a community education program that offers courses in scary things like cake decorating, marketing via social media, and lowering your taxes (1). Binik-Thomas does teach for them, but, again, neither of them have anything to do with the Liberty Township Tea Party.

Maybe, as Good Citizens(tm), they were supposed to report any rumors they heard. Or just make stuff up.

As you can imagine, being singled out like this by a powerful government agency can be a bit… “worrisome,” shall we say? Who else has been asked about Justin Binik-Thomas, and why is the IRS focused on him, anyway? How many others have been specified by name, and how does any of this have anything to do with an application for tax-exempt status? Should they be hiring lawyers?

I’m telling ya, Obama and the IRS have done more for the cause of tax reform and limited government than all the conservative groups of the last 20 years, combined.

Footnote:
(1) I’ll bet it was that last one that got them on “the list,” or maybe that subversive course on “The Constitution for Kids.”

(Crossposted at Sister Toldjah)

Tyrant Governor of New York will not tolerate dissent from his underling sheriffs

Who does this guy think he is, Mike Bloomberg? Angered by county sheriffs opposed to the draconian gun law the Governor recently rammed through the legislature, Andrew Cuomo has evidently threatened to use a rarely invoked power to remove dissident sheriffs from office:

Opposition to the new law has simmered in upstate areas since Cuomo signed the law in January. Many county sheriffs oppose it, particularly its expanded definition of banned assault weapons, and have spoken out around the state. In January, the New York State Sheriffs’ Association wrote Cuomo with an analysis, and later suggested tweaks.

Cuomo invited its leaders to the Capitol last month, people briefed on the meeting said. The group included Sheriffs’ Association Executive Director Peter Kehoe and Chemung County Sheriff Christopher Moss.
“We didn’t get a response (to the analysis) from him, but we could tell after the budget was passed that none of those recommendations were taken into consideration,” Moss said. “When we got there, we never got to the contents of the letter.”

Instead, Cuomo pushed the sheriffs to stop publicly speaking out against the act, Moss said.

“The governor was of the opinion that the sheriffs around the state should not be interjecting their personal opinions in reference to the law,” Moss said, adding that Cuomo said sheriffs can’t do that and enforce the law.

One person briefed on the meeting said Cuomo threatened to remove sheriffs from office, a little-used power afforded the state’s chief executive under the state constitution. Moss would not confirm this. He did say the meeting was heated at times, but overall he described it as “cordial.”

It’s one thing to use this power to remove a corrupt sheriff, or one unable to continue in his job because of health. But, to use it to bludgeon into silence men sworn to uphold the law and the state and federal constitutions, and who themselves have the right of free speech? I think that’s called “tyranny.” Somewhere, Hugo Chavez nods in approval.

Via Bryan Preston, who’s right: this has a lot in common with the scandals coming out of the Obama administration, for both represent abuses of power and the authoritarian heart of progressivism.

(Crossposted at Sister Toldjah)

Did Eric Holder lie to Congress, a judge, or both?

“Caught in his lies”

I’ve been saying for years that Eric Holder is the worst, most dangerous Attorney General since A. Mitchell Palmer and that he should be removed from office. The list of his offenses against the law and the Constitution over the years reads like an honor roll of shame: the New Black Panther voter intimidation case; the failure to protect the voting rights of Whites in Noxubee county, Mississippi; an overall racialist agenda that sees American civil rights law as a means of “payback,” not an instrument of equal justice for all; Operation Fast and Furious, a gun-running operation run by the DoJ and ATF that resulted in roughly 300 Mexicans dead and at least one US federal agent; the seizure of phone records from the AP that seems to have been nothing more than an act of petulance; tracking reporter James Rosen’s movements and emails in what looks like an effort to criminalize journalism; and… and… Help me out here, folks, I’m sure I’m missing something.

And for all that, Eric Holder has escaped anything worse than the contempt of those who have been paying attention and have a sense of decency and respect for our laws and traditions. He hasn’t resigned, the president hasn’t fired him (presumably because he agrees, let’s be frank), and he’s been able to skate by claiming he didn’t know what was going on, he never read the memos, he recused himself, no one told him, and so on and so forth to the point one wonders what does he do in his office, besides spinning in his chair. But now I can claim vindication.

He’s told a lie too many and finally tripped over one.

In the Rosen case mentioned above, NBC reports that Holder personally signed off on the warrant that gave investigators access to Rosen’s emails:

Attorney General Eric Holder signed off on a controversial search warrant that identified Fox News reporter James Rosen as a “possible co-conspirator” in violations of the Espionage Act and authorized seizure of his private emails, a law enforcement official told NBC News on Thursday.

(…)

Rosen, who has not been charged in the case, was nonetheless the target of a search warrant that enabled Justice Department investigators to secretly seize his private emails after an FBI agent said he had “asked, solicited and encouraged … (a source) to disclose sensitive United States internal documents and intelligence information.”

But, not a week ago, Holder said in sworn testimony before the House Judiciary Committee:

In regard to potential prosecution of the press for the disclosure of material. This is not something I’ve ever been involved in, heard of, or would think would be wise policy.

Holder signed off on that warrant in 2010. It strains credulity, to say the least, that he wouldn’t remember that and could say with a straight face that this was something he’d “never heard of.” So there we have a very strong indication of perjury before Congress.

And he may have lied before a judge, too, observes Jennifer Rubin in the Washington Post:

He is also in potential trouble himself, which necessitates an investigation (obviously not by Justice) beyond his departure. His behavior in the James Rosen and Associated Press matters raise serious questions.

First, the affidavit (paragraph 45) asserts that DOJ exhausted all means available to get the material from Rosen’s e-mails and phone, and “because of [Rosen's] own potential criminal liability in this matter,” asking for the documents voluntarily would compromise the integrity of the investigation. Moreover, the affidavit asserts that the “targets” of the investigation (including Rosen) were a risk to “mask their identity and activity, flee or otherwise obstruct this investigation.” It is highly questionable whether Holder believed any of that to be true. (Really, he imagined a Fox News reporter would flee the country? He thought Rosen would don a disguise?) Was the affidavit a sort of ruse to get Rosen’s records (or later to pressure his cooperation)? Did Holder intentionally mislead a judge when he signed off on the affidavit? That is worth exploring.

Of course, to answer the question in the subject, it’s quite possible he did both.

Lots of sites Right and Left are calling for Holder to resign or be fired — even the Huffington Post! But, you know what? I don’t want either, though I think one or the other is just a few days away, at most.

No, I want Holder and his boss to tough it out; they’re friends, after all and, Lord knows, Obama has stuck with him long past the point most presidents would have stuck with a troubled cabinet member. Such loyalty is to be admired, even among crooks.

Besides, it will give me what I really want: the impeachment and trial of Eric Holder. Ladies and Gentlemen (and Occupiers), I give you Article II, Section 4 of the United States Constitution:

The President, Vice President and all civil Officers of the United States, shall be removed from Office on Impeachment for, and Conviction of, Treason, Bribery, or other high Crimes and Misdemeanors.

Emphasis added. Hello, Mr. Attorney General!

The House clearly has the grounds to begin hearings on impeachment, both for lying to Congress and possibly to a judge. And I think, in this case, even a heavily Democratic Senate would be forced to convict: few senators would want to be seen backing an obvious perjurer and none of them, I’m willing to bet, want to endorse the man behind the AP and Rosen warrants and then have to face the press. Not with an election year coming up. No, I’m thinking you could find 67 votes for removal.

What a way to cap off a career; first cabinet officer impeached, convicted, and removed from office. (1)

And Eric Holder richly deserves it.

Footnote:
(1) Grant’s Secretary of War, William Belknap, was impeached, but he resigned and was never convicted.

RELATED: More at Hot Air, still more Hot Air, Matt Vespa, The Right Sphere, and Gateway Pundit.

(Crossposted at Sister Toldjah)

America’s #IRS: the true agent of voter suppression?

Democrats and their Leftist allies in the racial grievance industry have long claimed that efforts to require identification in order to vote, a measure meant to protect the integrity of elections, were really meant to suppress minority voters, even equating them with Jim Crow laws.

We all know this is noxious nonsense, of course, but what if there really was an effort to suppress a particular group’s votes, and what if that effort were carried out not by modern-day descendants of Bull Conner with whips and dogs, but by an arm of the US government using bureaucracy to discourage people from participating in the political process?

And what if it was the IRS?

NRO’s John Fund, who’s written extensively on election integrity matters, explains:

But it now turns out there may have suppression of the vote after all. “It looks like a lot of tea-party groups were less active or never got off the ground because of the IRS actions,” Wisconsin governor Scott Walker told me. “Sure seems like people were discouraged by it.”

Indeed, several conservative groups I talked with said they were directly impacted by having their non-profit status delayed by either IRS inaction or burdensome and intrusive questioning. At least two donors told me they didn’t contribute to True the Vote, a group formed to combat voter fraud, because after three years of waiting the group still didn’t have its status granted at the time of the 2012 election. (While many of the targeted tea-party groups were seeking to become 501(c)(4)s, donations to which are not tax-deductible, True the Vote sought to become a 501(c)(3).) This week, True the Vote sued the IRS in federal court, asking a judge to enjoin the agency from targeting anyone in the future.

Cleta Mitchell, True the Vote’s lawyer, says we’ll never know just how much political activity was curtailed by the IRS targeting. She has one client who wanted to promote reading of the Constitution, but who didn’t even hear back from the IRS for three years – until last Monday, when the IRS informed this client that some questions would be sent.

“I was about to file with the IRS when other tea-party groups started to get harassed,” Pennsylvania activist Jennifer Stefano told Time magazine. “I remember checking with the IRS to see if they wanted the group [Facebook] page or my personal page, and they said ‘All of it.’”

Even if this wasn’t enough to throw the 2012 election Obama’s way (although White voter turnout was way down from 2008 to 2012), Fund makes it clear that many activist groups had their efforts hampered, some to the point of giving up altogether, by the IRS harassment. And the effect of that on get-out-the-vote and voter-education efforts could be substantial.

It’s one of the issues Congress has to address while dealing with this scandal: in addition to targeting Americans for holding “unapproved” political opinions and trampling on their rights of free speech, the IRS’ actions threaten public confidence in the integrity of our elections, themselves.

It’s the Chicago Way taken nationwide.

(Crossposted at Sister Toldjah)

#WarOnJournalism: Who’s been snooping in Sharyl Attkisson’s computers?

Hmmm… Maybe FOX’s James Rosen and the AP aren’t the only targets of the White House’s ire? Here’s a radio interview CBS’ Sharyl Attkisson did with WPHT’s Chris Stigall in which she mentions unknown parties have accessed her home and work computers since February, 2011:

You’ll recall that both my blog-buddy ST and I have mentioned Attkisson several times on our blogs for being one of the few remaining MSM reporters actually willing to hold the administration to account for their actions, Fast & Furious and Benghazi being the most notable. She so got under their skin that, as Allahpundit reminds us, a DoJ official screamed and cursed at her over the phone. Attkisson herself has recently said that she has been shut out by her White House sources. There have been rumors (1) that David Rhodes, president of CBS News  and brother of Ben Rhodes, a would-be fiction writer and now an Obama national security deeply involved in Benghazi, might fire Attkisson for being too aggressive in her coverage of the White House… where his brother works.

Keep in mind that the DoJ got access to James Rosen’s GMail account by affirming to a judge that they believed he was engaged in a criminal conspiracy to violate the Espionage Act, and then got a court order forbidding Google from telling Rosen of the access. And now we hear that somebody has been accessing Attkisson’s computers.

What was going on in February 2011? The Fast and Furious scandal, having been rumored for months, was finally breaking into the mainstream news, and Attkisson was filing stories that weren’t settling for administration spin.

And about that same time, she gets hacked.

What. A. Coincidence.

Footnote:
(1) Attkisson has said there has been no pressure from any CBS News executive regarding her Benghazi reporting.

(Crossposted at Sister Toldjah)

(Video) Bill Whittle: President Peevish makes it hurt

It struck me recently that I hadn’t posted one of Bill’s excellent Afterburner videos in a while, so here’s a good one to get re-started with. In it, Bill looks at the cuts made, so the administration claims, due to the devastating effects of sequestration and asks, “If things are so tough we have to furlough Border Patrol agents, how come the president can spend our tax dollars on his vacations?” (1)

Remember, kiddies: the sequestration is not a cut in spending, but a cut in the rate of increase of spending. Funny, isn’t it? We could afford that aircraft carrier and the White House tours last year, when we were spending less that we are under sequestration….

Footnote:
(1) To ask that question, of course, is racist. Naturally.

(Crossposted at Sister Toldjah)

Peaceful union supporters threaten blood and civil war

Democracy, union-style.

Forget the rule of law. This is rule by fist:

Jimmy Hoffa, president of the International Brotherhood of Teamsters, said Tuesday he expects Michigan unions and lawmakers to break out into “civil war” after the state legislature passed right-to-work bills that would weaken unions’ power.

“This is just the first round of a battle that’s going to divide this state. We’re going to have a civil war,” Hoffa said on CNN’s “Newsroom.”

The Republican-controlled state House passed two bills that had already been approved by the GOP-dominated state Senate. Gov. Rick Snyder, also a Republican, is poised to sign the bill, which would allow workers at union-represented employers to forgo paying dues.

As thousands of protestors gathered at the state capitol on Tuesday, Hoffa called the legislation a “tremendous mistake” and “a monumental decision to make” by outgoing lawmakers in a lame duck session.

“What they’re doing is basically betraying democracy,” he told CNN’s Brooke Baldwin. “If there’s any question here, let’s put it on the ballot and let the people of Michigan decide what’s good for Michigan.”

Proponents of the legislation say it gives workers more freedom, while opponents say a less robust union presence will negatively affect workers’ rights. Hoffa also argued that those who don’t pay union dues will be considered “free riders,” as they’re getting the same benefits from union representation without the cost.

Hoffa pointed to Michigan’s recovering auto industry, saying the Wolverine State has bounced back from the recession without being a “right to work” state.

“This is basically a step backward,” he argued.

(CNN via Zero Hedge)

And if anyone knows about thuggery and violence, it’s a Hoffa.

What Jimmy Junior is saying here is, in a nutshell, that the duly-elected representatives of the people of Michigan, acting in accordance with their state’s constitution, have no right to amend the state’s labor laws. Even though there is strong evidence that the people have already spoken. Under the Hoffa theory of democracy, the mob has the vote and the veto, and he who has the biggest, most violent mob wins. The only debate that counts is “me” outshouting “you,” which means I win.

So, shut up or I’ll kill you.

Now, you’d think this attack on constitutionalism, the rule of law, and representative democracy would draw the united condemnation of the state’s legislators, who are sworn to uphold the US and Michigan constitutions.

Think again:

“There will be blood,” State Representative Douglas Geiss threatened from the floor of the Michigan House of Representatives today as the body debated legislation that would make Michigan the nation’s 24th right to work state.

“I really wish we had not gone here,” Geiss continued. “It is the leadership in this house that has led us here. The same leadership that tried to throw a bomb right on election day, leading to a member switching parties, and came in at the 11th hour with a gotcha bill. For that, I do not see solace, I do not see peace.”

This isn’t democracy or republicanism: it’s mob rule. It’s extortion — “Nice state you have there. Shame if something happened to it.” It’s intimidation, using the threat of violence to impose their will. Now, where have I seen this before?

We know why they’re doing this, of course. It’s not because the union leadership and their Democratic allies are worried about workers’ wages and working conditions: right to work states have been shown to have slightly higher wages and better job choices. And most if not all states have workplace safety and worker’s compensation laws on the books. It’s not as if right-to-work will mean a return to a dime-a-day and child labor. They would still have the right, as every worker should, to form a union and press for collective bargaining. And they still would have the right to withhold their labor should conditions not be satisfactory.

No, what the union bosses and their politician allies are frightened of is the prospect of losing the millions they collected in forced exactions (dues) from their members, money which is then funneled to pliant politicians in the form of campaign contributions and other political spending, in return for laws benefiting the unions at the expense of the taxpayers and regardless of the economic consequences to the state.

They fear the end of their kickback racket.

Whatever the noble origins and ends of trade unionism, we’re seeing now the true face of the corruption that’s overtaken it. Faced with long-term decline, perhaps irreversible if left to the free market, they can only maintain their power in places where law compels membership and tribute.

Threaten that, and they promise blood.

RELATED: What is it with union goons and their hatred for Black small businessmen? First it was Kenneth Gladney, beaten by an SEIU mob in Missouri a few years ago, and now they’ve wrecked the business of Clint Tarver, who ran a hot dog cart outside the state capitol in Lansing. Shouldn’t be surprised I guess; unions have a long history (PDF) of racism. If you want to help Mr. Tarver rebuild his business, click here.

ALSO: Patterico on the Stalinist effort by the online Left to whitewash the violence in Lansing and blame the victim.

(Crossposted at Sister Toldjah)

Two photos that should cost Barack Obama his job

The first from the ruins of our consulate in Benghazi:

(Click the image for a larger version)

Those are the bloody hand prints of an American, desperately fleeing for his life. They are the fruits of the Obama-Clinton policy of “smart power” and speak more loudly than any words can of the administration’s utter failure. (Courtesy of the Daily Mail via QandO)

Then there’s the home front:

(Courtesy LA Times. Click the image for a larger version)

That is a free man being taken away by police under pressure from an administration desperate to blame anyone but itself for the collapse of its Mideast policy. While he may have violated his parole, he was investigated because his speech made the government uncomfortable. My blog-buddy ST has already vented her outrage; my own feelings are a burning contempt for this open display of Chicago-style thugocracy — Benito nods in approval. And Glenn Reynolds, the Instapundit, is livid:

When taking office, the President does not swear to create jobs. He does not swear to “grow the economy.” He does not swear to institute “fairness.” The only oath the President takes is this one:

“I do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will faithfully execute the Office of President of the United States, and will to the best of my ability, preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States.”

By sending — literally — brownshirted enforcers to engage in — literally — a midnight knock at the door of a man for the non-crime of embarrassing the President of the United States and his administration, President Obama violated that oath. You can try to pretty this up (It’s just about possible probation violations! Sure.), or make excuses or draw distinctions, but that’s what’s happened. It is a betrayal of his duties as President, and a disgrace.

He won’t resign, of course. First, the President has the appreciation of free speech that one would expect from a Chicago Machine politician, which is to say, none. Second, he’s not getting any pressure. Indeed, the very press that went crazy over Ari Fleischer’s misrepresented remarks seems far less interested in the actions of an administration that I repeat, literally sent brown-shirted enforcers to launch a midnight knock on a filmmaker’s door.

But Obama’s behavior — and that of his enablers in the press — has laid down a marker for those who are paying attention. By these actions he is, I repeat, unfit to hold office. I hope and expect that the voters will agree in November.

Read it all. (h/t Blue Crab Boulevard)

If we weren’t so close to the election, I’d be calling for President Obama’s impeachment for dangerous incompetence and gross abuse of power.

But we don’t need Congress to clean house for us. As Glenn points out, we have an election in less than two months. Send these photos and the linked articles to anyone you know who’s still undecided. Make them aware of what’s happening.

A vote for Obama is a vote for American decline and to entrench “gangster government,” the thugocracy, and liberal fascism.

It’s up to us to put a stop to it.

LINKS: Twitchy — “This is not America.”  In 2008, I and others wrote about Obama’s contempt for free speech. Hey, my fellow citizens, we tried to tell ya…

(Crossposted at Sister Toldjah)

No more “Mr. Nice Mitt”

And it’s about time:

Standing before hundreds of roaring partisans in this sweltering Pittsburgh suburb Tuesday, Mitt Romney delivered a 30-minute speech that sounded, at times, like a greatest hits compilation of his favorite Obama-knocking stump speech lines. The president was, Romney said, “out of ideas,” and “looking for someone to blame,” and a “crony capitalist.”

One thing he was not: “A nice guy.”

In speeches from Des Moines to Dallas, Romney has always been careful to hedge his tough digs at Obama with a civil nod toward the president’s moral character: “He’s a nice guy,” the Republican has often said. “He just has no idea how the private economy works.” But Tuesday’s speech included no such hedge — and one campaign adviser said there’s a reason for that.

“[Romney] has said Obama’s a nice fellow, he’s just in over his head,” the adviser said. “But I think the governor himself believes this latest round of attacks that have impugned his integrity and accused him of being a felon go so far beyond that pale that he’s really disappointed. He believes it’s time to vet the president. He really hasn’t been vetted; McCain didn’t do it.”

Indeed, facing what the candidate and his aides believe to be a series of surprisingly ruthless, unfounded, and unfair attacks from the Obama campaign on Romney’s finances and business record, the Republican’s campaign is now prepared to go eye for an eye in an intense, no-holds-barred act of political reprisal, said two Romney advisers who spoke on condition of anonymity. In the next chapter of Boston’s pushback — which began last week when they began labeling Obama a “liar” — very little will be off-limits, from the president’s youthful drug habit, to his ties to disgraced Chicago politicians.

“I mean, this is a guy who admitted to cocaine use, had a sweetheart deal with his house in Chicago, and was associated and worked with Rod Blagojevich to get Valerie Jarrett appointed to the Senate,” the adviser said. “The bottom line is there’ll be counterattacks.”

The Obama campaign thugocracy has been trying to make hay with scurrilous class-warfare attacks on Romney’s record at Bain, his wealth, and even his integrity, flat-out saying he’s either a liar or a felon. They’ve desperately released another squirrel to distract people with by calling for Romney to release far more of his tax returns than required by law, implying there must be something shady in them, otherwise, why would Romney be so “secretive?” (Sadly, some conservatives are helping. (1)) Playing nice and trying to be a gentleman in response just won’t work. (See: McCain campaign, 2008)

The proper reply is to strike back, not with whiny anger, but to forcefully speak the truth about not only your own record, not only the other guy’s record, but the truth about his beliefs and character — why that makes him unfit and you fit for high office. Romney’s surrogates started this a bit on Sunday and Monday, but, yesterday, the candidate himself laid into Obama in a speech (no teleprompter) that had conservatives cheering as he attacked Obama for saying about successful business owners “you didn’t build that:“

The idea to say that Steve Jobs didn’t build Apple, that Henry Ford didn’t build Ford Motor, that Papa John didn’t build Papa John Pizza, that Ray Kroc didn’t build McDonald’s, that Bill Gates didn’t build Microsoft, you go on the list, that Joe and his colleagues didn’t build this enterprise, to say something like that is not just foolishness, it is insulting to every entrepreneur, every innovator in America and it’s wrong. [Applause]

And by the way, the President’s logic doesn’t just extend to the entrepreneurs that start a barber shop or a taxi operation or an oil field service business like this and a gas service business like this, it also extends to everybody in America that wants to lift themself up a little further, that goes back to school to get a degree and see if they can get a little better job, to somebody who wants to get some new skills and get a little higher income, to somebody who have, may have dropped out that decides to get back in school and go for it. People who reach to try and lift themself up. The President would say, well you didn’t do that. You couldn’t have gotten to school without the roads that government built for you. You couldn’t have gone to school without teachers. So you didn’t, you are not responsible for that success. President Obama attacks success and therefore under President Obama we have less success and I will change that. [Applause]

I’ve got to be honest, I don’t think anyone could have said what he said who had actually started a business or been in a business. And my own view is that what the President said was both startling and revealing. I find it extraordinary that a philosophy of that nature would be spoken by a President of the United States.  It goes to something that I have spoken about from the beginning of the campaign.  That this election is, to a great degree, about the soul of America. Do we believe in an America that is great because of government or do we believe in an America that is great because of free people allowed to pursue their dreams and build our future?

(Transcript courtesy of Ed Morrissey)

Emphasis added. That is the necessary ingredient when fighting back against Chicago-style gutter politics. The whole speech is at The Right Scoop. It’s well-worth the 30 minutes of your time it takes to watch; for once Romney is speaking with passion and conviction, seemingly off the cuff. Want to know how good it was? Even Michelle Malkin was near-ecstatic:

I believed in what he was selling: A vision for restoring American greatness and defending success.

Obama’s inability to hide his ideological contempt for entrepreneurs & individual success has helped Romney self-actualize.

If he gives this speech with the same zeal and optimism from now until November — offering a clear, unapologetic contrast to Barack Obama’s bitter politics of resentment, class warfare, and entitlement, Mitt Romney will win.

And there’s the key: this can’t just be a one-time or one-week strategy. Every speech he makes from now on, whether from a small-town bandstand before a dozen people or the podium of the Republican convention in front of the nation, has to strike these same themes. He can’t be afraid to call Obama out for what he is, nor to show proudly who he himself is. It’s what America wants to hear and wants to see in him — and not the defeatist, dependent, decline-is-our-choice crap Obama is pushing.

Do that, and I guarantee a Republican landslide in November.

Footnote:
(1) The whole tax return kerfuffle is just a lame distraction. Even if Romney turned over every single tax return he ever filed, Obama and the Democrats would demand more: Bain corporate minutes, Romney emails, his credit card records — anything they can use to fish for the least little thing they can spin as possibly suspicious, and just to plant the idea in the public’s mind that Romney is hiding something by simply making the demands. Instead, Romney should say he’ll release the returns — when Obama turns over his college transcripts, state senate papers, and the Fast and Furious documents. And then see how fast the Democrats drop this line of attack.

RELATED: The Tatler previews Romney’s next attack: Obama “has given up on job creation.” From Gateway Pundit, you know those infamous Bain layoffs? It seems the main in charge of Bain at the time was not Mitt Romney, but one of Obama’s most important donors. Ooops.

(Crossposted at Sister Toldjah)

Richard Milhous Obama? Barack McCarthy?

Imagine government singling out private citizens for attack and innuendo, to serve as whipping boys in order to distract the public from the president’s failings and boost his reelection chances. Imagine having your tax returns publicly questioned by government officials, thus planting the idea of wrongdoing in the public’s mind whether you’ve done anything or not. Imagine being turned into a focus for a national “two minutes hate” by desperate politicos.

That’s what’s going on with the Koch brothers, libertarian-leaning billionaires who oppose President Obama’s policies, and their representative, former Solicitor General Ted Olson, has had enough: Obama’s Enemies List.

What Messrs. Koch do, in fact, is manage businesses that provide employment to more than 50,000 people in North America in legitimate, productive industries. They also give millions of dollars to medical researchers, hospitals and cultural institutions. Their biggest offense, apparently, is that they also contribute generously to nonprofit organizations that promote personal liberty and free enterprise, and some of those organizations oppose policies advocated by the president.

Richard Nixon maintained an”enemies list” that singled out private citizens for investigation and abuse by agencies of government, including the Internal Revenue Service. When that was revealed, the press and public were outraged. That conduct will forever remain one of the indelible stains on Nixon’s presidency and legacy.

When Joseph McCarthy engaged in comparable bullying, oppression and slander from his powerful position in the Senate, he was censured by his colleagues and died in disgrace.”McCarthyism,” defined by Webster’s as the “use of unfair investigative and accusatory methods to suppress opposition,” will forever be synonymous with un-Americanism. Army counsel Joseph Welch’s “Have you no sense of decency?” are words that evoke the McCarthy era and diminish the reputations of his colleagues who did nothing to stand up to him.

He then explains the larger problem this presents to civil society and the rule of law, beyond its inherent injustice toward the Koch brothers:

In this country, we regard the use of official power to oppress or intimidate private citizens as a despicable abuse of authority and entirely alien to our system of a government of laws. The architects of our Constitution meticulously erected a system of separated powers, and checks and balances, precisely in order to inhibit the exercise of tyrannical power by governmental officials.

Our Constitution even explicitly prohibits bills of attainder so that Congress may not single out individual citizens or groups for disfavored treatment or unequal application of the force of government. Prosecutorial power is rigidly constrained and judicially supervised so that government may not accuse private citizens of crimes or investigate them without good cause.

Whoever may be the victim of such abuse of governmental authority, the press and public almost invariably unify with indignation against it. If a journalist, labor-union leader or community organizer on the left can be targeted today, an academic or business person on the right can be the target tomorrow. If we fail to stand up against oppression from one direction, we abdicate the moral authority to challenge it when it comes from another.

So, for freely expressing their opinions, as is the right of every American, Charles and David Koch become Obama’s Emmanuel Goldstein. Lucky them.

Of course, as Conn Carroll points out, Obama and the Democrats have to resort to these cheap, vile tactics because they cannot run on their record: ObamaCare is hated and the administration’s economic record is nothing short of miserable. All that’s left is class warfare and the personal vilification of American citizens.

This isn’t anything new, however; targeting individuals is a habit for them, an instinct. Early in the administration, Obama went after FOX News and Rush Limbaugh, and his allies in the media spent years demonizing and harassing Sarah Palin, even after she had resigned her office. Their main political strategy comes from Saul Alinsky’s Rule 13:

Pick the target, freeze it, personalize it, and polarize it.

Once this line of attack has played out in a few weeks or months, you can bet Obama will find another target, and another, and another.

Again, he has nothing else to run on, save hate.

Be sure to read the whole thing.

(Crossposted at Sister Toldjah)

Occupy Oakland: never bring uptwinkles to a gunfight

I think Oakland has just met its next mayor, who knows how to handle rioters:

“We had people who attempted to break into our building,” the landmark Rotunda Building on Frank Ogawa Plaza outside City Hall, [Oakland developer Phil] Tagami said Thursday. He grabbed a shotgun that he usually keeps at home, went down to the ground floor and “discouraged them,” he said.

“I was standing there and they saw me there, and I lifted it – I didn’t point it – I just held it in my hands,” Tagami said. “And I just racked it, and they ran.“

Clint would be proud:

Compare Tagami’s action to the pusillanimous whines of appeasement coming from Oakland’s elected “leaders:”

City Administrator Deanna Santana apologized to business owners for the “chaotic events” that enveloped the city. Mayor Jean Quan called the rioters “a small and isolated group.”

“It shouldn’t mar the overall impact of the demonstration and the fact that people in the 99 percent movement demonstrated peacefully and, for the most part, were productive and very peaceful,” Quan said.

Neville Chamberlain is alive and well in Oakland’s city hall.

Citizen Tagami, however, isn’t buying it:

Tagami disagreed, calling the Occupy Oakland encampment “basically concealment and cover for anarchists who are doing this to our city.”

“We’re very concerned that a group of people can be allowed to do this type of destruction to our town and to our image without any repercussions,” Tagami said. “They need to be held accountable.”

Exactly.

In all seriousness, this is what happens when muddleheaded governments break the social contract and fail to protect the rights of all people equally, as they are supposed to.  The right to have one’s livelihood and possessions secure from violence is as fundamental and natural to liberty under the rule of law as freedom of speech. When government officials such as Mayor Quan vacillate and refuse to do the job for which they were elected, it is left to citizens such as Frank Tagami to defend their rights themselves in a state of nature.

Again, no one is saying the Occupiers don’t have a right to protest — they most certainly do. But our very open, very tolerant society provides wide-open avenues for protest that don’t require the logic of violence that lies at the heart of the Occupy movement.

In contrast, witness the myriad, often huge rallies held by the Tea Party: all done within the law, everyone’s rights respected, and the movement’s point forcefully and effectively made through freedom of speech and association.

And not a broken window in sight.

Meanwhile, it’s time for the mayors of the various “Occupy” cities to do their duty by their residents and taxpayers and put an end to the camps, with their lawlessness and their squalor.

Enough is enough.

PS: Tagami for Mayor in 2014!

LINKS: More from Hot Air.

(Crossposted at Sister Toldjah)

Life under gangster government: Obama’s $20 billion bank heist

And a bunch of states’ attorney generals looking to pander for votes are in on the job. Karl Rove blows the whistle:

At last Wednesday’s “CBS Town Hall,” President Obama said he was “trying to . . . figure out how we can get the banks to do more” on modifying mortgage loan payments. Perhaps, he said, people whose mortgages are underwater should get a “principal reduction, which will be good for the person who owns . . . the home.”

Mr. Obama has decided that taxpayers have no appetite for bailing out homeowners who don’t make their payments, or for rescuing those whose homes are worth less than their mortgages. Instead, he’s backing a proposal by his Department of Justice and state attorneys general to force major banks to cough up the dough.

The money would come from a settlement with JP Morgan Chase, Citibank, Bank of America, Wells Fargo and other banks accused of “robo-signing,” in which foreclosure documents were signed by bank employees or agents without properly certifying all the papers. The attorneys general admit that virtually no one was erroneously foreclosed upon because of robo-signing. The banks foreclosed on people who were on average 18 months delinquent, and after multiple attempts to modify the loan had been tried and failed.

But Justice and the state attorneys general are demanding $20 billion for sloppiness, which they will then be able to hand out to voters—and potential supporters. The money won’t come from the banks; it will come from their customers, millions of whom will pay more in fees and interest and will, in some cases, be denied credit.

This stinks. It’s not only corrupt, it’s bad policy.

As Rove points out, only a few people were hurt in the robo-signing “scandal,” and the proper solution would have been to make them whole with some additional compensation, including returning them to their homes.  Instead, Ali Obama and his 40 Thieves President Obama and the state AGs are abusing the law to extort billions from the banks –at the customers’ ultimate cost– that can then be used to plug state budget gaps or as bait for votes. Far from doing justice, the robo-signing problem has been an excuse to do a great injustice, both to the banks and to the original victims, whose cause has been forgotten.

Michael Barone called this “gangster government” and “thugocracy;” we know it as “The Chicago Way.”

It sure isn’t the Rule of Law.

(Crossposted at Sister Toldjah)

When Texas burns, the Fed rushes into action… in Mexico??

In case you missed it, much of Texas is burned up, literally; according to Kevin Williamson at NRO, about 3400 square miles have gone up in flames, an area the size of Puerto Rico. Williamson uses this fact to excoriate President Obama for coming to Texas to raise money and sell his non-starter of an immigration plan while refusing to even tour devastated areas, let alone declaring a federal disaster area.

But he saves the cherry on the sundae for last:

To its credit, the Obama administration has dispatched aircraft to help with the firefighting . . . in Mexico.

MEXICO??

Following Williamson’s link, we find that he really did:

Two specially equipped U.S. Air Force cargo planes left Colorado on Saturday to help battle wildfires in northern Mexico.

The C-130s were requested by the Mexican government and the U.S. State Department, a U.S. Northern Command spokesman said.

The planes can spray about 3,000 gallons of fire retardant in a matter of seconds from a system of pressurized tanks called Modular Aerial Fire Fighting System or MAFFS.

The fires have burned 386 square miles in Mexico — one-ninth of what’s been destroyed in Texas — and yet the Obama administration won’t send help to Texas but will to Mexico? Mr. President… Barry… WTF??

Oh, and you want to know the best part? The planes will be flying from a base… in Texas.

That sound you heard was the sound of the back of Obama’s hand meeting Governor Perry’s face.

Look, I have no problem helping Mexico, per se; we have plenty of resources in the Western states. But it seems to me that you take care of your own people, first, and then lend what you can spare to help the neighbors. This looks like nothing more than the administration taking out its petty anger at Texas and its governor for not voting for Obama and for not supporting his policies. President Peevish apparently only helps those who help him, regardless of the duties of his job.

So, let’s consider. On the one hand:

• He seemed indifferent to the  flooding that devastated Nashville in 2010.
• He is ignoring fires that are ravaging Texas in 2011.
• He is wrecking the Gulf Coast economy with his permitorium, in defiance of a federal court order.

On the other:

• He did visit Alabama after the tornadoes.

Three-to-one. I’d say it’s pretty clear his natural instincts are to go with the “gangster government” approach to governance: “If you play nice, you get help. But if you cross me, you can burn for all I care.”

Literally.

via Jim Geraghty’s Morning Jolt

CLARIFICATION: The linked article discussing planes sent to help Mexico is from April 16th, nearly a month ago. I should have noted that and apologize for any confusion. However, as an article from the Christian Science Monitor, dated just two days later, shows, Governor Perry was asking for help way back then. So, why the hold up?

(Crossposted at Sister Toldjah)

To be Black and a Tea Partier…

Makes one doubleplusungood, apparently:

It seems these exemplars of Our Betters on the Left (all bow) didn’t get the memo about the new, more civil tone their leaders demanded of us all* in the wake of the Giffords shooting. I’m sure they’re sorry and won’t ever let it happen again.†

via Legal Insurrection

LINKS: My blog-buddy ST has further examples of New Tone Patriotism in action.

*Actually, no they didn’t. Those sanctimonious hypocrites such as Pelosi, Dean, and Matthews really only demanded conservatives shut up. Because that’s the only argument they have left.

†And if you believe that one…

Wisconsin has the real “Governator”

California’s Governator turned out to be mostly a bad joke, but Wisconsin’s Scott Walker looks like the real deal for sticking to his principles to reform abusive collective bargaining procedures for government employee unions. And the Wisconsin state senate Republican caucus deserves a lot of credit for at last realizing the Democratic minority had no intention of acting in good faith and finally passing those collective bargaining reforms:

Wisconsin’s Senate has been paralyzed on dealing with its budget because it requires a 20-vote quorum to address budget issues. And tied into the governor’s budget bill was the provision that caused all of the Democrats in the Senate to flee the state — a provision diminishing collective bargaining rights for state workers too wages only, leaving benefits and work rules for most state employees to be determined by the legislative process instead.

But Wisconsin’s Senate does not require 20 members to be present to pass non-budget legislation, and some people have asked why the Republicans haven’t simply passed the union provision separately. Well, tonight, they did just that.

The state assembly is scheduled to vote tomorrow. Passage is all but assured, and Governor Iron Man Walker should sign it soon thereafter. Unions are already talking about a general strike, so things should be quite… interesting, tomorrow.

Meanwhile, let me pose an Allahpundit-style exit question: Minority-party legislators have fled the state to prevent a democratically elected legislature from doing its job and instead are trying to impose its own will on the majority — in effect, attempting to overturn the results of the last election. Meanwhile, union members are using extremist language, vile insults, and inciting violence to intimidate those same elected official and, by extension, the voters who put them in office. Now, riddle me this: Who are the anti-democratic fascists here?

Public employee unions show their true face

Forget the overheated rhetoric and signs comparing democratically elected governors and legislators to Hitler and rapists. Forget the spoiled-brat demands and Athens-style protests for the unquestioned continuation of gold-plated benefits that most private-sector workers would give their eye teeth for.  You want to know just how much of a threat to democracy, representative government, and the general safety public-employee unions can be when threatened?

Try to take away their goodies, and they’ll go after your mother:

Idaho has a “superintendent of public instruction,” and his name is Tom Luna. He has proposed some measures that the teachers’ union doesn’t like, at all. And his opponents have made sure that he feels good and threatened.

Someone went to his mother’s house — his mother’s. Someone slashed his tires and spray-painted a threat onto the door. As reported in this article, Luna has said, “Family and personal property are off-limits. You don’t cross that line . . .”

Oh, yes, you do. At least some do. I will repeat what I have already said this morning: I don’t want to hear from the Left about “civility” for the rest of my life.

Neither “civility” nor “democracy.” And this is in deep-Red Idaho!

This isn’t just (or at all) a fight over benefits or economics; this is a struggle over who has power — the elected representatives of the people or union bosses and their paid-for allies in the Democratic Party. Right now it’s just Idaho, Wisconsin, Ohio, and Indiana, but the battles here and, inevitably, in other states will determine who has that power. The Left has drawn such hard lines already against any reform that the governors can’t afford to back down, lest they let Labor know the elected representatives of the people  can be intimidated through intransigence and thuggery. It’s a sad thing for decent union members who would likely have accepted reasonable compromise if the situation had been honestly explained to them, but their leaders have lead them into a battle that forces the governors to break the unions in order to keep faith with their voters — the taxpayers who are the public employees’ real bosses.

More than being about fiscal soundness, this is a battle between representative democracy and corporatism.

Regarding the President shameful insertion of himself into what is purely a matter for state governments, Matt Welch at Reason cuts through the bull and asks “Is this how a President should act?“

I have written in the past about how libertarians are pretty lonely in the political scheme of things in terms of constantly being challenged to defend themselves against the “logical conclusion” of their philosophy. But I think it’s time to amend that. We are witnessing the logical conclusion of the Democratic Party’s philosophy, and it is this: Your tax dollars exist to make public sector unions happy. When we run out of other people’s money to pay for those contracts and promises (most of which are negotiated outside of public view, often between union officials and the politicians that union officials helped elect), then we just need to raise taxes to cover a shortfall that is obviously Wall Street’s fault. Anyone who doesn’t agree is a bully, and might just bear an uncanny resemblance to Hitler.

The president’s heavy-handed involvement, along with House Republicans’ refusal to sign off on any new bailout of the states, means that this may very well be America’s biggest and most widespread political fight in 2011. It’s a cage match to determine first dibs on a shrinking pie. A clarifying moment.

And that clarity will not work to the unions’ benefit. The public is on to their racket.

Break them.

(Crossposted at Sister Toldjah)

Because, you know, secret ballots are bad things

From the Department of Government Stupidity: the federal government has threatened to sue four states should they dare to guarantee secret ballots in union elections:

The National Labor Relations Board on Friday threatened to sue Arizona, South Carolina, South Dakota and Utah over constitutional amendments guaranteeing workers the right to a secret ballot in union elections.

The agency’s acting general counsel, Lafe Solomon, said the amendments conflict with federal law, which gives employers the option of recognizing a union if a majority of workers sign cards that support unionizing.

The amendments, approved Nov. 2, have taken effect in South Dakota and Utah, and will do so soon in Arizona and South Carolina.

Business and anti-union groups sought the amendments, arguing that such secrecy is necessary to protect workers against union intimidation. They are concerned that Congress might enact legislation requiring employers to allow the “card check” process for forming unions instead of secret ballot elections.

In letters to the attorney general of each state, Solomon says the amendments are pre-empted by the supremacy clause of the Constitution because they conflict with employee rights laid out in the National Labor Relations Act. That clause says that when state and federal laws are at odds, federal law prevails.

Solomon is asking the attorneys general in South Dakota and Utah for official statements agreeing that their amendments are unconstitutional “to conserve state and federal resources.”

In other words, “play along and we won’t bankrupt you in court.”

I’m no expert in the Supremacy Clause, but labor relations have traditionally fallen under a state’s police powers, though that’s been eroded over at least the last 80 years, since the New Deal, as the Fed has claimed a greater role.

But, really, does anyone seriously think this is anything other than an attempt force card-check through via regulation, instead of legislation, where it’s dead in the water? This is another case of arrogance on the part of unelected bureaucrats against the elected representatives of the peoples of four states, and I hope these states fight it tooth-and-nail.

When your name is “Palin,” you have no right to defend yourself

I was going to go off on another rant‡ about Democratic politicians, mainstream journalists, and leftist activists (but I repeat myself) and their blood libel against the Right and Sarah Palin, but then I watched this episode of PJTV’s Trifecta and realized that Greene, Ott, and Whittle said everything I could. And did it better. Just watch;  I’ll wait here.

Take away line from Whittle: “I have to count to ten.”

Of the many odd, even outrageous, things I’ve read and heard over the last few days since the shooting spree and, especially,  since her address two days ago, the corker has to be that Sarah Palin should have stayed out of the fray, kept herself above it all, let others handle it for her. In other words, she should have shut up.

To which I reply: Horse manure.

This was no garden-variety criticism from the Left that one could reasonably shrug off and let others handle. This was a monstrous accusation of inciting mass-murder, including the killing of a child, and of encouraging the attempted murder of a congresswoman. No human being could or should stay silent when slandered in that way. Sure as the sun rises in the East, someone would twist that silence into an admission of guilt, and others would believe him. To say that she had no right to defend herself is either cynical or idiotic, take your pick.

And to say she had been wronged but should have done the “politically smart thing” and stayed out of it shows monumental blindness to what’s been happening: a desperate attempt by the left-liberal establishment to destroy the one potential candidate who truly scares them and to delegitimize the movement of average Americans she symbolizes — and even free speech itself. Not only did she have to speak to defend herself, she had to fight back to defend the right of the Right to say anything other than “Yes, master*.”

This was not a case where Sarah Palin could sit back, eat moose dogs, and let others fight her battle. Besides, outside of talk radio and Center-Right blogs, just who the Hell has been defending her? Where are all these people she should let take up sword and shield in her name? I didn’t see a rush from the Republican “leadership” or the political experts on the talk-show carousel. Governor Palin gets carpet-bombed by the perpetually outraged Left, and all we hear is the sound of crickets from the Republicans and mealy-mouthed tongue-clucking from the talk-show panels. Thanks a lot, guys and gals. It’s nice to know you’ve got her back. Try not to stick a knife in it, okay?

We all saw the ABC news clip in the video above. Like Greene said, millions did. Millions who don’t read Center-Right blogs or listen to talk-radio, but who still get their news from the MSM — and they were just told Sarah Palin was to blame for Tucson. And yet she was supposed to stay silent in the face of garbage like that, day after day?

No. Forget it. Not this time. I’ll even stipulate that there have been instances she’s fired back at more ordinary criticisms when she shouldn’t have, because she’s a fighter.

But not now.

Governor Palin had to respond to these slanders; it was her right and she was right to do it.

LINKS: Allahpundit has an assignment for budding speechwriters: “Try to write an address titled ‘I Didn’t Kill Anyone’ without sounding aggrieved.” Daniel Blatt thinks Sarah Palin made a mistake. I disagree in the comments. Power Line has a superb quote from President Lincoln about an earlier Democratic blood libel. Lori Ziganto calls her speech thoughtful and on-target, while accusing the Left of losing it’s grip on reality.

(Crossposted at Sister Toldjah)

 

*Any bets on how long it will take some hypersensitive Lefty to accuse me of racist rhetoric?

‡Guess I did, anyway.