Alarm Grows Among Dems About Obama's Chances

Oh my goodness, how could that possibly be?

See Chris Stirewalt at Fox News:

“You can be stylish and powerful, too. That's Michelle’s advice.” -- President Obama telling graduates to temper but preserve their interest in clothing during his commencement address at Barnard College, a women-only college of New York’s Columbia University.

It has taken months of bad news, but Democrats increasingly believe that President Obama might just lose his re-election bid.

The latest wake-up call comes in the form of a New York Times/CBS poll showing Republican Mitt Romney in the lead not just among registered voters overall, but with women and independents.

The Times/CBS survey is unique in that the pollsters called back the same phone numbers they had a month before. In April, Obama and Romney were dead even. Now, Romney leads by 3 points overall. That’s still within the margin of error -- a statistical tie.

But the shifts with women, moderates and independents are all statistically significant. Obama lost 5 points with each of those demographics.

Team Obama has for months been warning Democrats not to be overconfident and warning of a close election, with the president increasingly sounding the alarm for donors and activists in recent campaign appearances.

Since the general election season kicked off in earnest in the last week of March, Obama has had an almost unbroken string of losing weeks, starting with his overheard conversation with former Russian President Dmitry Medvedev.

There was the back-and-forth with the Supreme Court over his health law, the attack by one of Obama’s advisers on Ann Romney, the GSA Vegas scandal, the hookers in Cartagena and then the baffling case of the gay marriage half-reversion.

Some of the problems were just bad luck (hookers), some were just blunders (hot mic) but much of the rest has been about Obama trying to galvanize his base coalition and secure the massive donations he needs to finance the most expensive campaign in history.

His trip to New York on Monday was the best example yet. Obama delivered a groaner of a speech at Barnard College in which he did everything but shout “girl power” at the end.

And then in an appearance on a left-leaning ladies chat show, ABC’s “The View,” Obama rhapsodized about his partial reversion to previous support for gay marriage in advance of attending a fundraiser with his party’s fundraising shop for “gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender” Democrats that featured Ricky Martin, he of Menudo, bikini briefs and “She Bangs.”

You need money to win Ohio, but it may not be worth the price of all this gay pride to get it. As the Times poll showed, a huge majority believe Obama’s rhetorical reversion was about politics, not a personal moral journey. Even those who are fine with gay marriage, may find it unseemly to see Obama waving the rainbow flag so vigorously in pursuit of cash.

More at the link (via Memeorandum).

PREVIOUSLY: "Disastrous New York Times Poll Shows Obama Falling Behind After Coming Out for Gay Marriage."

IMAGE CREDIT: The People's Cube.

Fiscal Cliff May Rattle Economy Before Deadline Arrives Amid Election-Year Gridlock

At IBD, "Fiscal Cliff May Rattle Economy Even Before Deadline":

Regardless of how the year-end "fiscal cliff" of tax hikes and spending cuts is resolved, uncertainty over what lawmakers will do could weaken the economy before the deadline if businesses delay investment and hiring.

Add to that the Supreme Court's ObamaCare ruling and the possibility the debt ceiling will need another lift before the November elections, and the outlook gets even hazier.

Warnings about the fiscal cliff have largely centered on what would happen if all the Bush and payroll tax cuts expire, automatic budget cuts go into effect and ObamaCare tax hikes kick in. Estimates on the hit to 2013 GDP are 4%-5%.

But concerns are turning to the potential harm the uncertainty could inflict this year, especially during an election season.

"It's starting to definitely creep up on the radar," said Michael Hanson, senior economist at Bank of America Merrill Lynch.

Atlanta Fed President Dennis Lockhart recently warned of a "financial shock" if markets don't see enough progress on the fiscal cliff.

In a quarterly conference call on May 2, Boston Properties (BXP) noted problems closing deals with the federal government in the Washington, D.C., area.

"The fiscal cliff that we're all looking at is clearly creating an environment where the procurement process is really, really slow," said Douglas Linde, president and chief financial officer.

But manufacturers aren't voicing any concerns about the coming fiscal cliff, said Bradley Holcomb, chair of ISM's Manufacturing Business Survey Committee. Even worries over the European debt crisis have ebbed.

He attributed their confidence to the nearly three years of uninterrupted manufacturing growth and healthy order books. He sees lawmakers eventually resolving fiscal policy disputes, despite what news headlines might say.

"It's a nonissue at this point," he said. "It's like Europe. It's going to get resolved somehow."

Even if questions about future fiscal policy aren't hitting businesses yet, negative effects will become more real in the second half of the year, Hanson predicts.

Democrats and Republicans will dig deeper into opposing positions on which he doesn't see them compromising soon after the election. Short-term extensions or retroactive changes in early 2013 wouldn't lift today's cloudiness either, he adds.

"People are going to board up the house before the hurricane comes, not after," Hanson said.

See also the New York Times, "Republicans Pledge New Standoff on Debt Limit."

Plus, from the House GOP Conference, "FULL TEXT: Speaker Boehner's Address on the Economy, Debt Limit, and American Jobs" (via Memeorandum).

The Road to Fiscal Hell is Paved With Progressive Intentions

A phenomenal essay, from William McGurn, at the Wall Street Journal, "Jerry Brown vs. Chris Christie":

In his January 2011 inaugural address, California Gov. Jerry Brown declared it a "time to honestly assess our financial condition and make the tough choices." Plainly the choices weren't tough enough: Mr. Brown has just announced that he faces a state budget deficit of $16 billion—nearly twice the $9.2 billion he predicted in January. In Sacramento Monday, he coupled a new round of spending cuts with a call for some hefty new tax hikes.

In his own inaugural address back in January 2010, New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie also spoke of making tough choices for the people of his state. For his first full budget, Mr. Christie faced a deficit of $10.7 billion—one-third of projected revenues. Not only did Mr. Christie close that deficit without raising taxes, he is now plumping for a 10% across-the-board tax cut.

It's not just looks that make Mr. Brown Laurel to Mr. Christie's Hardy. It's also their political choices.

When the Obama administration's Transportation Department called on California to cough up billions for a high-speed bullet train or lose federal dollars, Mr. Brown went along. In sharp contrast, when the feds delivered a similar ultimatum to Mr. Christie over a proposed commuter rail tunnel between New York and New Jersey, he nixed the project, saying his state just couldn't afford it.

On the "millionaire's" tax, Mr. Brown says that California desperately needs to approve one if the state is to recover. The one on California's November ballot kicks in at income of $250,000 and would raise the top rate to 13.3% from 10.3% on incomes above $1 million. Again in sharp contrast, when New Jersey Democrats attempted to embarrass Mr. Christie by sending a millionaire's tax to his desk, he called their bluff and promptly vetoed it.

On public-employee unions, Mr. Brown can talk a good game—at Monday's press conference, he announced a 5% pay cut for state workers, and he has proposed pension reform. Yet for all his pull with unions (the last time he was governor, he gave California's public-sector unions collective-bargaining rights), Gov. Brown, a Democrat, has not been able to accomplish what Republican Gov. Christie has: persuade a Democratic legislature to require government workers to kick in more for their health care and pensions.

Now, no one will confuse New Jersey with free-market Hong Kong. Still, because the challenges facing the Golden and Garden States are so similar, the different paths taken by their respective governors are all the more striking. And these two men are by no means alone.

Continue reading.

It might get so bad in California that the progressive electorate gives up and elects a reformer in the Christie mold. I'm not holding my breath, but one can hope.

VIDEO c/o TigerHawk.

'I can experience my sexuality in different ways: with my boyfriend or girlfriend, with a casual relationship, or with different sexual partners...'

You won't believe this report on "Sex: A Tell-all Exhibition" at the Canada Science and Technology Museum. Or, maybe you will, considering everything else.

See Blazing Cat Fur: "Your tax dollars are funding a graphic sex show developed for 12 year-olds."

The War Can Be Won in Afghanistan

It's the weekend interview, at the Wall Street Journal, "H.R. McMaster: The Warrior's-Eye View of Afghanistan":

One of the general's historical models is Colombia, where a few years ago many people believed the government couldn't stand up to the narco-terrorist FARC insurgency. "What was the problem of Colombia in the late '90s? It was political will to take [the FARC] on," he says, adding that U.S. counternarcotics and other efforts helped lay the groundwork that Álvaro Uribe built on after winning Colombia's presidency in 2002.

We could see such an outcome again, says Gen. McMaster, especially given "the innate weakness of Afghanistan's enemies."

"What do the Taliban have to offer the Afghan people?" he asks. They are "a criminal organization, criminal because they engage in mass murder of innocent people, and criminal because they're also the largest narcotics-trafficking organization in the world. Are these virtuous religious people? No, these are murderous, nihilistic, irreligious people who we're fighting—we along with Afghans who are determined to not allow them to return."

Taliban groups, he adds, are increasingly seen by Afghans "as a tool of hostile foreign intelligence agencies. These are people who live in comfort in Pakistan and send their children to private schools while they destroy schools in Afghanistan." He notes, too, that indigenous Afghan fighters are wondering where their leadership is: "One of the maxims of military leadership is that you share the hardships of your troops, you lead from the front. Well they're leading from comfortable villas in Pakistan. So there's growing resentment, and this could be an opportunity to convince key communities inside of Afghanistan into joining the political process."

More at that top link (via Ahmad Majidyar on Twitter).

Disastrous New York Times Poll Shows Obama Falling Behind After Coming Out for Gay Marriage

I've been thinking about this poll all day.

If Democrat strategists thought Baracky would get a bump after coming out, this ought to be a rude awakening.

See: "Obama’s Switch on Same-Sex Marriage Stirs Skepticism." (Via Memeorandum.)

It's a terrible survey for Obama. Fifty-one percent oppose same-sex marriage, and just 42 percent support it (way below the recent findings at Gallup and elsewhere). But when civil unions are added as an option, support drops to 38 percent. And the Times over-samples Democrats (and more profoundly, under-samples Republicans). See Rasmussen, "Partisan Trends."

Also at Hot Air, "NYT/CBS poll: Romney 46, Obama 43," and The Other McCain, "Distraction Tactic Backfires: Romney Gains in Polls After Obama Gay Shift."

PREVIOUSLY: "Majority of Americans Says Homosexual Relations Morally Acceptable."

Europe on the Brink of Collapse

Actually, it's Greece in the headline at Telegraph UK, "Greece on brink of collapse." But as Greece goes, so goes the European project:

Europe’s financial crisis lurched into a perilous new phase as dire predictions emerged of a collapse in Greece’s economy, with a run on its banks bringing an inevitable end to its membership of the euro.

As leaders in Athens accepted the need for a new general election to end a national stalemate, the International Monetary Fund said Europe’s leaders should prepare for the possibility of a Greek departure from the single currency.

Christine Lagarde, head of the IMF, warned she was “technically prepared for anything” and said the utmost effort must be made to ensure any Greek exit was orderly. The effect was likely to be “quite messy” with risks to growth, trade and financial markets. “It is something that would be extremely expensive and would pose great risks but it is part of options that we must technically consider,” she said.

Raising tensions still further, Germany warned Greek voters that the wrong result in next month’s election will force their country out of the single currency.

Greece’s president warned, perhaps most alarmingly, that its banks risk running out of money, posing a “threat to our national existence”.

The escalating turmoil sharpened fears in financial markets, with European shares and the euro itself falling again. On the stock markets, the Eurostoxx 600 fell 0.7 per cent to a year-low; Germany’s Dax dropped 0.8 per cent and Spain’s Ibex was down 1.6 per cent. In London the FTSE100 slid 0.5 per cent. Following this month’s inconclusive election, Greek parties yesterday failed again to agree a new government. A new election, most likely to be held in mid-June, could see more gains for parties that want to reject the austerity measures that are a condition of international efforts to bail out the debt-crippled state.

More at the link. And about that video up top, "Francois Hollande: we want to work together for the good of Europe." The guy was just sworn in today and you'd think his most important constituent is Angela Merkel!

And from this morning's Wall Street Journal, "Contagion Fears Hit Markets" (via Google):

LONDON — Investors battered European stocks, dumped the bonds of Spain and Italy, and bid the euro down against the dollar Monday after the collapse of weekend coalition talks in Greece edged that country closer to an exit from the euro zone.

The sweeping market action dealt a blow to hopes that the damage of a Greek exit, should it occur, could be comfortably contained.

In the market carnage, Greek stocks fell to two-decade lows, and Spanish bond yields leapt to levels not seen since the panic of last November. Shares of a big Spanish lender dropped 8.9% on the Madrid bourse, pulling the benchmark index down 2.7%. The Italian market also fell 2.7%, and the euro slid to $1.2845 late Monday in London, its lowest level in four months.

The troubles in Greece come at a perilous time for the rest of the currency union. Its policy of restoring financial-market credibility and international competitiveness through tough fiscal austerity is running aground. The grand "firewall" of funds meant to insulate precarious countries from their sinking peers is still modest relative to the potential needs. The vast cleanup of the troubled corners of the banking system has hardly begun. The central bank is reaching the limits of its desire to step in and help—and its injection of €1 trillion ($1.3 trillion) into the banking system seems to have bought only a small measure of calm for its very big price.

"We are more or less in a vacuum," says Jens Nordvig of Nomura in New York. "We are entering a very dangerous phase."

The situation is compounded by a dismal economic picture, which tightens the strains on fraying societies and makes the task of generating growth to repay debts ever harder. Fresh data Monday showed industrial production in the 17-nation euro zone falling 2.2% in March from a year earlier....

For much of the past two years, European officials insisted that a country's departure from the euro zone would be inconceivable. In recent weeks and months, however, that tone has changed to acknowledge the possibility of an exit—with some leaders suggesting it could be withstood by the nations that remain.

Patrick Honohan, Ireland's central bank governor, said at a conference Saturday that a Greek divorce wouldn't necessarily be "fatal" for the currency union and could "technically" be managed. Dutch Finance Minister Jan Kees de Jager said Monday ahead of a meeting of euro-zone finance ministers in Brussels that the "contagion risk would be far, far smaller than one-and-a-half years ago."

Yet German Finance Minister Wolfgang Schäuble acknowledged "the price would be very high" if Greece left the euro, both for the country and for the broader euro zone.

Actually, it's an utter disaster any way you look at it. The system won't work. Greece will go and then the next weakest member will succumb to the markets as well. Spain? Italy? Who knows. It's not as if the European economies are picking up or anything. And Berlin doesn't look in the mood to serve as lender as last resort in any case. Things need to continue to shake out on their own and that will put further strain on the grandest plans of Eurozone planners in Brussels. It's an amazing time to be watching this. And don't forget: The collapse of Europe casts fresh aspersion on the progressive left's statist project here at home. That's why President Obama told Hollande not to fulfill his campaign pledges to soak the rich and stroke the public workers unions. If France falls further, the socialist brand will bear the brunt of popular recrimination.

Glenn Reynolds Interviews Jonah Goldberg

At Instapundit:

And you can pick up Goldberg's new book here: The Tyranny of Cliches: How Liberals Cheat in the War of Ideas.

Terrorists Posing as Students Wreak Havoc in Montreal

PREVIOUSLY: "Quebec Student Protests Wreak Anarchy on Montreal."

Now here's the report from Ezra Levant's show last night, via Blazing Cat Fur, "Stop Me If You've Heard This Before: Cops Cave to Radicals."

And see also Sun News, "Protests Hijacked."

Kristen Stewart and Charlize Theron at World Premiere of 'Snow White and the Huntsman'

At Telegraph UK, "Charlize Theron and Kristen Stewart attend Snow White and the Huntsman premiere in London."

Actresses Charlize Theron and Kristen Stewart did battle on the green carpet as they braved the cold in black gowns at the world premiere of Snow White and the Huntsman.

Shameless: Barack Obama Slammed John McCain on Immigration in 2008, Flip-Flops in 2012 With Lies Attacking Mitt Romney

Via BuzzFeed, "Obama Hasn't Always Liked John McCain's Immigration Stance":

At a fundraiser tonight, President Barack Obama said his 2008 opponent believes in Immigration reform, as opposed to Mitt Romney. But in 2008, Obama ran this ad attacking McCain on Immigration, tying him to Rush Limbaugh and George W. Bush.

Here's the translation:

"They want us to forget the insults we've put up with, the intolerance," the television ad's announcer says in Spanish as a picture of Rush Limbaugh appears onscreen with quotes of him saying, "Mexicans are stupid and unqualified" and "Shut your mouth or get out."

"They made us feel marginalized in a country we love so much," the ad continues. "John McCain and his Republican friends have two faces. One that says lies just to get our vote and another, even worse, that continues the failed policies of George Bush that put special interests ahead of working families."

And here's more at BuzzFeed, "Obama: Romney Is Worse Than John McCain":

President Barack Obama told an audience in New York tonight that Mitt Romney is worse than his 2008 opponent Sen. John McCain.

“We have a very clear contrast this time. John McCain believed in climate change and believed in immigration reform," Obama told an audience of about 200 donors who paid at least $5000 for a ticket to the event. "What we have this time out a candidate who said he would rubber stamp a Republican Congress that wants us to go backward, not forward.”

Utterly shameless.

It would be mindboggling if it wasn't so unexceptional. Obama will do anything to win. Anything.

RNC Ad: 'Empty Promises: Debt and Deficits'

Via Weasel Zippers:

Duane Lester Confronts Newspaper Publisher Who Shamelessly Stole His Work

This will lift your spirits.

If you're blogging and putting up quality content, I can guarantee you that some of your stuff has been lifted lock, stock and barrel. I've had to put out a few takedown notices to online sources, since my stuff's been aggregated without permission. But I haven't dealt with full-blown professional plagiarism. This is something else, from Duane Lester, at All American Blogger, "How to Assert Copyright Over Your Work When It’s Been Plagiarized (Video)":

HAT TIP: Five Feet of Fury, "Video: blogger confronts newspaper that stole his story."

PJ News Break with Scott Ott: 'Hip Hip, He's Gay!'

Via Theo Spark:

Nigel Farage on the EU Project: 'We Face the Prospect of Mass Civil Unrest, Even Revolution...'

This guy's videos get a lot of play, and it's no wonder why.

Via Small Dead Animals:

Majority of Americans Says Homosexual Relations Morally Acceptable

It's not normal behavior, actually. It's been effectively normalized by a decades-long campaign by the radical left to portray homosexual relations as no different from any other pairing. And it won't stop with redefining marriage. Look for a complete obliteration of gender distinctions as well. Shouldn't take long at the rate we're going.

See the report from Gallup, "U.S. Acceptance of Gay/Lesbian Relations Is the New Normal":

This Gallup trend mirrors the growth in public support for legalizing gay marriage, which has risen from 42% support in 2004 to 50% or greater support in the last two years. Americans' support for gay rights on both questions leveled off in this year's Values and Beliefs poll, conducted May 3-6.

Check the link for the graphics (via Memeorandum).

RELATED: From the New York Times, "Politics Seen in Obama's Same-Sex Marriage Support" (via Memeorandum).

House Democrats Receive Training On How to Attack Republicans for Alleged 'Race Coded' Language

I saw this earlier at Legal Insurrection, "Democrats trained to allege Republicans use racially-coded phrases."

And here's the segment on Sean Hannity's last night:

Luisana Lopilato Ultimo Lingerie Video

A follow up from earlier this year.

And see London's Daily Mail, "Making a splash! Luisana Lopilato unveils Ultimo's new 'curve-creating' swimwear."

Michelle Goldberg's Chutzpah

Michelle Goldberg was rightly and vehemently called for her despicable attack in Ann Romney. The video is here: "Pro-Choice Extremist Michelle Goldberg Smears Ann Romney as Just Like Hitler, Stalin."

Upset by the backlash, Goldberg has written a faux apology, basically doubling down and dissing Ann Romney for her alleged determination to "play up the idea that’s she’s being victimized for being a stay-at-home mom." Boy, that's takes a lot of gall, which Goldberg has in spades. See, "Michelle Goldberg on the Ann Romney Hitler Tempest":

I got into trouble ... by saying that Romney’s closing lines, about how there is “no crown more glorious” than the “crown of motherhood,” reminded me of the pronatalist propaganda of World War II-era totalitarian regimes. That was a mistake. Not because I don’t think it’s true—when I read Romney’s words, I immediately thought of the “Motherhood Glory” medals that Stalin gave to women who had lots of children, and of the Nazi cult of motherhood, which Hitler called women’s “highest exaltation.” To me, bombastic odes to traditional maternity have a sinister ring, especially when they come from people who want to curtail women’s rights. But it was an offhand point, and one that wasn’t worth the aggravation it’s caused. I should have realized that right-wingers were going to pretend that I was saying that Romney is akin to two of the century’s most murderous tyrants.

For the record, I don’t believe that Ann Romney is either Hitleresque or Stalinesque. Rather, I think she is a calculating political wife who once struck me as fairly likeable, but who is now determined to play up the idea that’s she’s being victimized for being a stay-at-home mom. Her op-ed was part of that effort. Unfortunately, if the messages I received on Monday are any indication, it’s an effort I might have assisted.

In addition to missives full of obscenities, critiques of my appearance and expressions of regret that my mother failed to abort me, there have been a bunch of calls for me to apologize to Romney for calling her a Nazi. If I had done that, of course, I would. I’m tempted to anyway, in case my words have been genuinely rather than tendentiously misunderstood. Romney, though, has made it pretty clear that she relishes opportunities to act the martyr. When CNN contributor Hilary Rosen inadvertently launched a new phase in the mommy wars by saying that Ann Romney was unqualified to serve as her husband’s chief adviser on women’s issues because she had “never worked a day in her life,” Mrs. Romney was delighted. “It was my early birthday present for someone to be critical of me as a mother, and that was really a defining moment, and I loved it,” she said at a private fundraiser.

So my apologies aren’t for Ann Romney, but for everyone else...

I wrote about Goldberg late last year, when she wrote a prominent essay foolishly denying anti-Semitism in the Occupy Wall Street movement ("Occupy Wall Street and the Jews"). And see also, "Michelle Goldberg: 'A Feminist With Paranoid Fantasies About Christian Fundamentalists Taking Away Her Sacred Right to Choose'."

HAT TIP: Twitchy, "Michelle Goldberg’s faux-pology to Ann Romney."

LightSquared Files for Chapter 11 Bankruptcy

Bloomberg reports: "LightSquared, Failed Wireless Venture, Files Bankruptcy."

And for the political significance of this, go back and read Michelle's report from last September: "LightSquared: Obama’s Dangerous Broadband Boondoggle."

Pro-Choice Extremist Michelle Goldberg Smears Ann Romney as Just Like Hitler, Stalin

I've written about Michelle Goldberg many times. I was literally sickened when I read her book a few years back, which is a global manifesto for infanticide (The Means of Reproduction: Sex, Power, and the Future of the World). So whenever I see stuff like this I'm not surprised at all:

One would think the left would have learned from the Hillary Rosen debacle that attacks on Ann Romney are bound to backfire on the ranks of Obama cheerleaders. But yesterday on MSNBC, liberal columnist Michelle Goldberg appeared to escalate the attacks on the would-be first lady with a bizarre riff on an inoffensive Mother’s Day op-ed published in USA Today. Mrs. Romney’s memoir of her own mother as well as her experience raising her five boys and becoming a grandmother of 18 is about as controversial as apple pie, but her use of the term “crown of motherhood” — which she said is the “most glorious” of hats that women wear — set Goldberg’s teeth on edge.

As the Daily Caller notes, with “Vagina Monologues” playwright Eve Ensler sitting alongside and nodding at her every word, Goldberg claimed the phrase was redolent of the propaganda used by totalitarian regimes to put women in their place.

“I found that phrase ‘the crown of motherhood’ really kind of creepy, not just because of its, like, somewhat you know, I mean, it’s kind of usually really authoritarian societies that give out like ‘The Cross of Motherhood,’ that give awards for big families. You know, Stalin did it, Hitler did it.”

Later on Twitter, Goldberg denied that she had meant to compare Romney to those mass murderers; there’s little question she seemed to imply a commonality between Republican attitudes toward women and those of the Nazis and Communists...

Continue reading.

And at Twitchy, "Newsweek’s Michelle Goldberg: Ann Romney is kind of like Hitler and Stalin."

Goldberg is one of those radical progressives who really set my teeth on edge. But she gets hammered at that Twitter thread, so I can't say that's not satisfying.

Police Raid UC Berkeley's Occupy the Farm Encampment (VIDEO)

Freakin' dirtbags.

At the Berkeley Daily Planet, "Flash: UC Berkeley Police Arrest Two Protesters, Order Others Off Gill Tract."

And at the Oakland Tribune, "UC police clear out "Occupy the Farm" protesters in Albany."

ALBANY -- University of California police arrested protesters still occupying the university-owned Gill Tract on Monday morning, ending a standoff of sorts that had stretched out for weeks.

Officers clad in riot gear and brandishing batons began staging early in the morning near the 10-acre site near San Pablo and Marin avenues that is used for research by UC Berkeley's College of Natural Resources.

Nine protesters were arrested and several more left the parcel of land voluntarily a short time after 6:15 a.m., when UCPD officers moved onto the field and issued a dispersal order.

An assembly of police from different UC campuses along with Albany police and the Alameda County Sheriff's Office totaling upwards of 100 officers encountered fewer than 10 protesters on the field, most of whom were still sleeping. By 9 a.m., the remaining encampment was cleared.

All except a young man who is sitting in a tree near the tract and refuses to come down.

Of the nine arrested, two were detained for sleeping overnight on the actual tract and seven were arrested outside the fence line on suspicion of unlawful assembly. They were taken to Santa Rita Jail in Dublin, said UC Berkeley police Lt. Eric Tejada.
University spokesman Dan Mogulof said police gave the protesters "ample warning and notice that if they left voluntarily, they would not be arrested."

RELATED: From Zombie, "Meet the New Farm, Same as the Old Farm? Occupy Seizes Berkeley’s “Gill Tract”."

Quebec Student Protests Wreak Anarchy on Montreal

I feel kinda dumb just now blogging about this. The protests in Quebec are a major event in the ongoing collapse of ordered society in the West.

Blazing Cat Fur has the latest on this, "Stupid Leftist protesters block students trying to get back to school." Following the link takes us to a report from Sun News discussing the months-long strike that has kept at least 300,000 students from attending classes. And the part that struck me is that despite court injunctions ordering college and universities to open their doors, administrators have defied the injunctions, citing the danger of violence from the mobs. Simply astonishing:

More than two-dozen Quebec colleges and universities have opted to defy court injunctions obtained by students this year.

The schools say they want to avoid confrontations with protesters, some of whom have ransacked colleges in the past.

Also on Monday, marching students blocked traffic in the streets of north-end Montreal. A second group of demonstrators blockaded an education department building in Longueuil, on Montreal's south shore.

Police used pepper spray to clear access to the building.

A general, unlimited student strike began on Feb. 14 to protest Premier Jean Charest's decision to increase annual tuition by $1,800 over the next seven years.

As many as 300,000 students have missed all or part of their semester.

Students have held nightly protests in Montreal for nearly a month.

Some of the demonstrations have turned violent, prompting the federal and municipal governments to introduce bans on masks at protests that could take effect later this year.

Yes, the protests have turned violent. It turns out protesters lobbed smoke bombs in the Quebec subway last week, shutting the place down and causing general outrage at the movement with the general public. Here's a report, from the National Post, "Four suspects in Montreal subway smoke-bomb case will remain detained for more than a week," and video from the Montreal Gazette:

And it's no surprise, but here's video from Democracy Now! featuring an interview with Gabriel Nadeau-Dubois, the spokesperson for CLASSE (Coalition large de l’Association pour une solidarité syndicale étudiante). It turns out Nadeau-Dubois is under fire in some quarters for refusing to denounce the violence. See: "Quebec student leader: Gov't apathy worsened dispute."

It's clear that the tuition fee hikes are only the pretext from a massive anarcho-socialist mobilization to bring down the regime. The conservative government of Premier Jean Charest is in fact proposing only mild fee increases, which would be about $200 a year, or $100 a semester. That's hardly the "privatization" of public services that the protesters are decrying. CLASSE obviously doesn't want a deal and instead prefers more anarchy and violence in the streets:

Student leaders said this weekend there was still hope for a resolution, even after the resounding rejection by students last week to the agreement in principle reached between the government and the student federations on May 5.

Nadeau-Dubois said the ball was now in Charest’s court, and they were waiting for a new offer from the government.

He did not think the recent wave of court injunctions giving students the legal right to return to class would be effective, as many protesters are against having the courts being used to break the strike movement.

CLASSE is organizing a mass protest for Tuesday from 11 a.m. to 2 p.m., starting at the corner of Viger Ave. and Bleury St., labelled a “disruption ... aimed at reminding the rich of this world they are rich because they’re keeping us poor.”

Nadeau-Dubois said CLASSE prefers to keep the exact nature of the “disruption” secret until the protest.

Disgusting.

See also Graeme Hamilton, at the National Post, "Hard to claim Montreal violence isn’t tied into wider protest movement."

Obama Slammed for Hypocritical Ties to Wall Street Fat Cats

The Democrat-Obama freaks don't have a prayer on the economy, despite their pathetic smear efforts.

At CNN, "Group's new ad pegs Obama to Wall Street," and Moe Lane, "Barack Obama’s convenient Wall Street hypocrisy." (Via Memeorandum.)


Check the links for the earlier video.

Here's the latest from American Future Fund:

Barack's Bogus Bain Attack

At The Lonely Conservative, "Obama’s New Anti-Capitalism Attack on Romney Already Debunked."

And from W. James Antle, III, at The American Spectator, "The Bain Wars."

And at Memeorandum.

Gay-Marriage Cases Pose Legal Tests for Administration

A report at the Wall Street Journal, "Gay-Marriage Legal Tests Loom":

President Barack Obama last week cast his support for same-sex marriage as a personal view on policy, not a constitutional imperative. But because the Supreme Court long has defined the right to marriage as a "fundamental freedom," legal analysts say his administration is sure to face pressure to weigh in on the marriage question when it reaches the Supreme Court.

That pressure could mount as early as this fall, if the challenge to California's Proposition 8, a voter-approved initiative that barred gay marriage, reaches the final stages.

If that happens, Mr. Obama "will surely be asked by advocates for LGBT [lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender] rights to support a decision upholding a federal constitutional right to same-sex marriage, which would take it out of the hands of the states," said Theodore Olson, the Republican former solicitor general who has helped lead the challenge to the 2008 initiative restricting marriage to a man and a woman.

Mr. Obama said Wednesday that while he now believes same-sex couples should be able to marry, historically the definition of marriage "has not been a federal issue." He said he viewed the battles over same-sex marriage at the state level as a "healthy process."

Thirty states now ban same-sex marriage, while six states and the District of Columbia permit it. Two additional states have passed bills allowing gay-marriage, though it's possible they could be overturned by voter referendums.

Asked if he would request the Justice Department to join the legal fight against state laws banning same-sex marriage, the president said only that he had "helped to prompt" the department's decision to abandon its defense of the Defense of Marriage Act. That 1996 law bans federal recognition of state-authorized same-sex marriages.

"We consider that a violation of the equal protection clause," the president said.

That law and California's Proposition 8 are the two major gay-marriage issues working their way through federal courts.

Chuck Cooper, an attorney representing Proposition 8's backers, declined to comment on the legal implications of the president's remarks. The measure's sponsors have asked the full Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals to reconsider a February opinion that upheld a federal district judge's ruling striking down Proposition 8. Whatever happens in that circuit, the losers are expected to seek review from the U.S. Supreme Court.

That's an excellent summary, and there's lots more at the link.

Massive Anti-Austerity Protests in Spain

It doesn't look good over there.

At the New York Times, "Tens of Thousands Protest Austerity in 80 Spanish Cities":

MADRID — Tens of thousands of Spaniards took to the streets during the weekend to protest austerity budget cuts and commemorate the anniversary on Tuesday of a movement that inspired other groups on Wall Street and across the Western world.

Over all, protesters gathered in about 80 Spanish cities, but again, one of the biggest turnouts was in Puerta del Sol, the Madrid square that almost a year ago became the center of a nationwide, youth-led movement seeking to overhaul Spain’s political parties and other traditional institutions. About 40,000 people gathered in the square on Saturday evening, while a similar number of protesters rallied in a square in Barcelona.

This time, however, the authorities had decreed that protesters would not be allowed to turn Puerta del Sol into an encampment and that any gathering there would have to end by 10 p.m. Instead, to reduce the risk that a standoff could turn more violent, the police waited until 5 a.m. Sunday to clear the square, arresting 18 people. Two police officers were injured during the operation. The protesters — known as the indignants — are vowing to make further attempts to seize control of the square before Tuesday. The movement is known in Spain as 15-M because of its starting date last year.

Underlining the extent to which Spain is fighting the economic crisis, the national government in Madrid warned during the weekend that it might need to take over the finances of Asturias, a northern region, because of concerns that the government there cannot meet deficit-cutting targets. Spain also announced further measures to shore up the banking sector, just days after seizing control of Bankia, the largest and most troubled mortgage lender.

Continue reading.

Michael Kinsley Has Wrong Premise About Capitalism

An awesome letter to the editor at the Los Angeles Times, "Kinsley's views on capitalism."

I'm surprised this one saw the light of day:

Re "Overvaluing the free market," Opinion, May 8

Michael Kinsley has a wrong premise about capitalism. Its justification is not that it makes a contribution to society (though it does that) but that it respects each individual's right to his own life and the fruits of his efforts.

Anyone, rich or poor, who earns his money honestly has the right to use it as he wishes. No on else has a moral claim on it. No one has a right to say how much another person should earn if the money is earned through voluntary trade.

Seizing or limiting another person's wealth because he is judged to have too much is not social justice but exploitation.

 Edwin A. Locke 
 Westlake Village

Top-Heavy Administration at Long Beach Community College

From the letters to editor, at last Thursday's Long Beach Press-Telegram:

Re "It's the government's fault" (Letters, May 3):

Taylor Ramsey notes it's the elected officials' fault, not just students and faculty. I couldn't agree more. In 1986, Long Beach Community College had approximately 25,000 students and one president, three vice presidents, nine deans and six associate deans. Today it has 26,729 students, one president, one executive vice president, four vice presidents, three associate vice presidents, 10 deans, three interim deans and 14 directors -- more than double the amount of administrators. Each of these administrators makes more than $140,000 a year (over $4 million in administrative payroll alone). Next time you hear about layoffs of classified staff, loss of teachers, students who can't get financial aid, can't get classes to graduate, or can't get in to college, remember that the LBCC Board of Trustees approved these huge salaries and the cuts to staff, teachers and classes that're now hurting students.

-- Michael Smith, Long Beach

Smith is responding to the letters from May 3rd, here.

And see the report on the recent campus protest: "Students proclaim death of education at Long Beach City College."

The faculty union has put the latest contract negotiations to a vote, and there's a lot of grumbling among the rank and file. The contract might be voted down and then the negotiations would require some kind of outside mediation. I'll update if there's local news coverage.

Until then...

Femen Activists Get Naked to Raise Political Awareness

At Der Spiegel, "The Body Politic: Getting Naked to Change the World":

The Ukrainian activist group Femen has made headlines around the world by baring their breasts to protest against prostitution, exploitation and corruption. But can their naked stunts change anything, or are they just providing images for a sex-obsessed media?

Oksana Shachko, a girl with a doll-like face, is supposed to go to prison for five years.

It's a cool spring Thursday in Ukraine as the 24-year-old walks through the streets of Kiev with her attorney. She is wearing a leather jacket and black boots, and dangling an almost-finished cigarette between her fingers. Five years, because she bared her breasts in public once again.

The hearing at the Interior Ministry is at 5 p.m., and they are in a hurry. They walk past tall, brown and gray buildings from the Stalin era. They discuss ways to put a positive spin on the expression "kiss my ass," which is what Oksana said to the Indian ambassador. "It was a happy protest. A happy protest for the rights of Ukrainian women," Oksana finally says. She's decided it's what she will say in the hearing at the Interior Ministry.

Shachko is a Ukrainian women's rights activist, and her weapons are attached to her pale, petite body like the two halves of an apple.

Her weapons are the symbol of femininity, motherhood and sexuality, and filmmakers and marketers have used them millions of times to sell everything under the sun, from yogurt to vacuum cleaners. They have put Oksana and her fight onto cover pages around the world, and they've made her and her fellow activists into the cover girls of an international protest movement -- the icons of a naked rebellion.

Their supporters believe that by using these weapons, the women have invented a new feminism. Their critics say that they are turning themselves into pornography with these weapons.....

Oksana is a professional icon painter and lives in a run-down studio apartment in Kiev with greenish mold on the ceiling. In other words, she has a profession and is living an ordinary Ukrainian life of poverty and turmoil. But her apartment is full of protest signs, and she has drawn a picture of a Femen activist, with flowing hair and bare breasts, on the wall. It's a self-portrait of a woman who is causing a lot of trouble.

She was released from a Moscow prison a few days ago, after having tried -- topless -- to steal the ballot box containing Russian leader Vladimir Putin's ballot during the March 4 presidential election. The stunt got her two weeks in a prison cell.

Now she stands accused of hooliganism and occupying the Indian Embassy to protest a claim by the Indian Foreign Ministry that women from post-Soviet countries are going to India to work as prostitutes.

Although the Indian Embassy denied the claim, this didn't stop Oksana and three other women from storming the building. They waved the Indian flag and banged it against windows and doors, shouting: "Ukrainian women are no prostitutes" and "kiss my ass."

There's lots more at the link.

Plus, from Saturday's Toronto Sun, "Topless activists protest Euro tournament."

VIDEO: "More Topless Ukrainian Protest Ladies!"

Arsala Rahmani, Top Afghan Peace Negotiator, Shot Dead in Kabul

At the Los Angeles Times, "Afghan assassination casts more gloom over peace efforts."

KABUL, Afghanistan — A brazen daytime assassination on Sunday offered a grim reminder of stymied progress in a key part of NATO's effort to wind down the Afghan war: peace talks with the Taliban.

Arsala Rahmani, a senior member of the Afghan government body set up to conduct negotiations with the militant group, was shot and killed while traveling by car through the Afghan capital, police said. Coming less than nine months after the assassination of the head of the High Peace Council, the killing cast yet more gloom over Western-backed efforts to bring the insurgents to the bargaining table.

The Obama administration had hoped to have substantive progress on the negotiating front to cite when a NATO summit convenes next week in Chicago. Instead, preliminary contacts appear to have broken down.

Continue reading.

Doctors for the Family 'Risk to Kids' Statement on Gay Marriage Roils Australian Politics

Okay, here's bringing you a comparative and international perspective on the radical left's gay marriage agenda.

See the report at The Australian, "Gay unions a 'risk to kids', claims Victoria's deputy chief psychiatrist":

ONE of Australia's leading psychiatrists has joined forces with 150 doctors lobbying the Federal Government to ban same-sex marriage.

Professor Kuravilla George, who is Victoria's deputy chief psychiatrist and the State Government's equal opportunities champion, claims that gay marriage poses a health risk to society.

In a letter to the Senate's inquiry into marriage equality, the group of doctors wrote that it was "important for the future health of our nation" to retain the definition of marriage as being between a man and woman.

"We submit the evidence is clear that children who grow up in a family with a mother and father do better in all parameters than children without," they wrote.

News of the letter, revealed in today's Sunday Herald Sun, follows Attorney-General Nicola Roxon's announcement yesterday that she would vote for gay marriage when the chance came later this year.

Ms Roxon was speaking as thousands of Australians held protest marches across the country calling on Ms Gillard to change her stance after US President Barack Obama said that same sex couples should be able to wed.

Australia passed an amendment to its laws in 2004 explicitly defining marriage as between a man and woman, but there are several bills before the parliament calling for the right to be extended to same-sex couples.

Also at the Australian Broadcasting Corporation, "Doctors' group says heterosexual marriage better for kids."

But here's gay radical Jeremy Sear at Crikey, "Herald Sun falsely implies that “doctors” think gay marriage “a risk to kids”":

Any unprotected sexual behaviour comes with the risk of HIV and syphilis, not just homosexuality. What’s wrong with homosexual behaviour being treated as normal? On what basis do they claim it isn’t and shouldn’t be? And as for the headline assertion that kids grow up better in families “with a mother and father” – unless Prof George has commissioned a brand-new study which genuinely would be actual news ( which the Herald Sun doesn’t claim that he has), then that long-discredited claim will without doubt be based on old studies comparing two parent families with one parent families, rather than comparing the the kids of homosexual parents with the kids of heterosexual parents. (You’ll note how George and his mates fudge the claim a little so it implies the latter but is sort of within the ambit of the former. That’s the level of honesty you get from anti-equality advocates.)

Sear's Twitter feed is here.

RELATED: At the Sydney Morning Herald, "Push for Gillard to review gay marriage":

ARGENTINA'S President Cristina Kirchner will write to Prime Minister Julia Gillard to encourage her to support same-sex marriage, after an Australian pair became the first foreign same-sex couple to marry in the South American country.

Prominent same-sex marriage campaigner Alex Greenwich, the national convener of Australian Marriage Equality, married his long-term partner Victor Hoeld in a ceremony in Buenos Aires on the weekend. Same-sex marriage has been legal in Argentina, where more than 90 per cent of citizens identify as Catholic, since July 2010.

Mr Greenwich, of Sydney, was jubilant yesterday about his wedding, but expressed regret that he had needed to leave Australia to marry.

''Our wedding has been the happiest day of my life, and I will return to Australia more energised than ever before to achieve marriage equality,'' he said.

''As special as our wedding was, it is a shame that we had to travel to a foreign country that affords us more rights than the country we live in and love.''

Until recently, Buenos Aires limited marriage to residents of Argentina. But this requirement was dropped after Greens Senator Sarah Hanson-Young wrote to Buenos Aires mayor Mauricio Macri, asking him to make an exception on ''compassionate grounds'' for couples from countries that do not allow same-sex marriage.

Ms Gillard and Opposition Leader Tony Abbott, who both oppose same-sex marriage, were last week accused of being out of step with their international counterparts after US President Barack Obama endorsed gay marriage and New Zealand Prime Minister John Key said he did not oppose it. British Prime Minister David Cameron has previously expressed support for same-sex marriage, and same-sex marriage has been legal in Canada since 2005.

Quite the globalized campaign, you think?

Atlantic Boulevard Leads Shift Away from L.A.'s Car Culture

I'm up on Atlantic Boulevard in Long Beach pretty regularly. My buddy Greg lives in Bixby Knolls and we have lunch over there.

See the Los Angeles Times, "Atlantic Boulevard's New Stride Reflects Shifting L.A. Street Scene":

The 5600 block of Atlantic Avenue doesn't look like much at first glance, especially if you're zipping through at 45 mph. A dry cleaner, a pupuseria, a T-shirt shop and a medical marijuana dispensary line the low-rise street in the North Village Annex section of Long Beach. About a third of the storefronts are vacant.

But if you climb out of the car, you'll notice that this classic commercial strip — convenient for drivers, charmless and alienating for everybody else — is in the midst of a remarkable evolution.

A crosswalk cuts across the boulevard at mid-block, complete with a flashing signal for pedestrians. Orange and blue bike racks dot the sidewalks. Silk floss trees, lined up in a neat row along the median, frame a piece of tiled public art.

And the Brandon Bike Shop, which opened earlier this year behind a nondescript storefront at 5634 Atlantic, buzzes with activity. On a recent afternoon, Rodolfo Alcantara, a 19-year-old with a white stud in his lip, was working the counter while "Faded," by the rapper Tyga, thumped from speakers behind him.

He said the store caters to the growing number of teenagers and twentysomethings in the neighborhood, including him, who've become obsessed with riding and detailing their bikes.

"It's the new style," Alcantara said.

The changes along Atlantic are emblematic of the way urban planners, architects, shopkeepers and neighborhood activists are remaking the boulevards of Southern California, reversing decades of neglect.

The boulevard, in fact, is where the Los Angeles of the immediate future is taking shape. No longer a mere corridor to move cars, it is where L.A. is trying on a fully post-suburban identity for the first time, building denser residential neighborhoods and adding new amenities for cyclists and pedestrians.

In the process, the city is beginning to shed its reputation as a place where the automobile is king — or at least where its reign goes unchallenged. Cities across the U.S. followed L.A.'s car-crazy lead in the postwar era. This time around we might provide a more enlightened example: how to retrofit a massive region for a future that is less auto-centric.

Continue reading.

Obama Campaign Tried to Pay Jeremiah Wright to Keep Silent

At the New York Post, "The ‘bribe’ to silence Wright."

Also at Lonely Con, "Rev. Wright Claims He Was Offered Bribe to Shut Up During 2008 Campaign."

Duke of Cambridge and Prince Harry Play Charity Polo in Ascot

At Telegraph UK, "Princes take part in charity polo match."

Also, at London's Daily Mail, "Athletic Kate cuts a dash in her heels: Duchess tries to run in her towering wedges as she takes Lupo the dog to watch William and Harry play polo at Ascot."

Ann Romney Praises Michelle Obama: 'I Think She's Lovely'

Mrs. Romney's very gracious herself.

At London's Daily Mail, "'I think she's lovely': Ann Romney praises Michelle Obama for her grace under pressure":

Ann Romney, the wife of the presumptive Republican presidential nominee, has offered unexpected praise for Michelle Obama, saying that the first lady is 'lovely' and speaking positively of the way she has been handling her responsibilities.

In an interview with Fox News on Friday, Mrs Romney said that first lady's role – one that she hopes to assume if her husband wins the 2012 election – ‘is a very difficult position to be in,’ one in which the husband faces ‘enormous scrutiny all the time.’

Mrs Romney praised the first lady for keeping her calm and having ‘composure.’

And the clip's at RealClearPolitics, "Ann Romney On Michelle Obama: "I Think She's Lovely"."

David Mamet on GBTV

Via Blazing Cat Fur:

And get the book here: The Secret Knowledge: On the Dismantling of American Culture.

Greek Elections Loom as Key Bailout Opponent Defies Unity

A report from Business Week:

Greece’s political deadlock looked set to continue for a second week as President Karolos Papoulias failed to secure agreement on a unity government and avert new elections with the country heading toward a possible exit from the euro area.

Greece’s biggest anti-bailout party, Syriza, defied overtures to join the government yesterday, deepening the impasse. Leader Alexis Tsipras won’t attend a new meeting called by Papoulias today for 7:30 p.m., state-run NET TV reported, without saying how it got the information.

“Syriza won’t betray the Greek people,” Tsipras said in statements televised on NET TV after the meeting with Papoulias and the leaders of the New Democracy and Pasok parties. “We are being asked to agree to the destruction of Greek society.”

Papoulias spent the day trying to coax the country’s three biggest parties into a coalition after a week of talks failed to deliver on mandates to form a government. If Papoulias’s efforts fail, new elections will need to be called. Today’s meeting will be with the leaders of two of the three biggest parties, and the head of the smaller Democratic Left party, NET said.

Greece’s political impasse since the inconclusive May 6 election has raised the possibility another vote will have to be held as early as next month, with polls showing that could boost anti-bailout Syriza to the top spot. The standoff has reignited concern the country will renege on pledges to cut spending as required by the terms of its two bailouts negotiated since May 2010, and, ultimately, leave the euro area.

Also at the BBC: "Greece crisis: Far left Syriza pulls out of talks."

Celebrity Shout Outs for U.S. Navy at Battleship Movie Premiere

I think I told my kid I was taking him to see this one, but with Mother's Day and such, I'm a bit behind on my movie outings. It opens to general release next week, but we need also to see "Avengers" so we'll see.

Andrew Sullivan at Newsweek: Obama's Evolution on Homosexual Marriage

Sully's gushing encomium is up at Newsweek, "The First Gay President":

For gay Americans and their families, the emotional darkness of Tuesday night became a canvas on which Obama could paint a widening dawn. But I didn’t expect it. Like many others, I braced myself for disappointment. And yet when I watched the interview, the tears came flooding down. The moment reminded me of my own wedding day. I had figured it out in my head, but not my heart. And I was utterly unprepared for how psychologically transformative the moment would be. To have the president of the United States affirm my humanity—and the humanity of all gay Americans—was, unexpectedly, a watershed. He shifted the mainstream in one interview. And last week, a range of Democratic leaders—from Harry Reid to Steny Hoyer—backed the president, who moved an entire party behind a position that only a few years ago was regarded as simply preposterous. And in response, Mitt Romney could only stutter.

And here's the heroic take on Obama's cheap political money grubbing:

Barack Obama had to come out of a different closet. He had to discover his black identity and then reconcile it with his white family, just as gays discover their homosexual identity and then have to reconcile it with their heterosexual family. The America he grew up in had no space for a boy like him: black yet enveloped by loving whiteness, estranged from a father he longed for (another common gay experience), hurtling between being a Barry and a Barack, needing an American racial identity as he grew older but chafing also against it and over-embracing it at times.

This is the gay experience: the discovery in adulthood of a community not like your own home and the struggle to belong in both places, without displacement, without alienation. It is easier today than ever. But it is never truly without emotional scar tissue. Obama learned to be black the way gays learn to be gay. And in Obama’s marriage to a professional, determined, charismatic black woman, he created a kind of family he never had before, without ever leaving his real family behind. He did the hard work of integration and managed to create a space in America for people who did not have the space to be themselves before. And then as president, he constitutionally represented us all.

I have always sensed that he intuitively understands gays and our predicament—because it so mirrors his own. And he knows how the love and sacrifice of marriage can heal, integrate, and rebuild a soul. The point of the gay-rights movement, after all, is not about helping people be gay. It is about creating the space for people to be themselves. This has been Obama’s life’s work. And he just enlarged the space in this world for so many others, trapped in different cages of identity, yearning to be released and returned to the families they love and the dignity they deserve.

See my previous entries: "Precious Moments: Andrew 'Milky Loads' Sullivan Tells Chris 'Tingles' Matthews He's Moved by Obama's Statement, 'We Are Equal Human Beings'," and "Barebackers for Barack, UPDATED! — Andrew 'Milky Loads' Sullivan Cover Story at Newsweek, 'The First Gay President'."

Al-Nusra Front Jihadists Claim Damascus Suicide Bombs

A report from Telegraph UK (via Memeorandum):

A little-known jihadist group has claimed responsibility for a double suicide bombing in the Syrian capital Damascus which killed 55 people and wounded nearly 400.

Many of the casualties were burnt alive in their cars as they waited in rush hour traffic on Friday near offices of a government intelligence organisation, the intended target.

In the video, a group calling itself the Al-Nusra Front says the bombing was in response to attacks on residential areas by the regime of President Bashar Assad.

"We fulfilled our promise to respond with strikes and explosions," a distorted voice said, reading black text that rolled across a white screen while Islamic chanting was heard in the background.

The attack was frighteningly similar to al-Qaeda bombings in next-door Iraq, which have killed thousands of people since the US and British invasion in 2003.

The Al-Nusra Front has claimed past attacks through statements posted on militant websites. Western intelligence officials have suggested it could be a front for an al-Qaeda branch operating in Iraq.

Also at Jawa Report, "Jabhah Al-Nusra Claims Damascus Bombing."

Los Angeles Times Runs Interference for Obama Administration on Health Care Reform

On the heels of the Washington Post's sordid hit piece attacking Mitt Romney as an alleged "anti-gay bully," here's comes a new series from the Los Angeles Times lionizing countries making "investments" in nationalized healthcare and warning against possible disruptions to the purported healthcare "jobs revival" if ObamaCare is struck down by the Supreme Court in June.

Yesterday's report is here, "Global push to guarantee health coverage leaves U.S. behind." And at today's paper, "Healthcare jobs fuel revival in Pittsburgh":

Nationwide, healthcare services have added some 770,000 to their payrolls since the start of the economic recovery in June 2009 — about a third of all new jobs, according to the U.S. Labor Department.

Absent the hiring related to healthcare, the country's unemployment rate would be 9.8% today instead of 8.1%, said economist Charles Roehrig of the Altarum Institute, a healthcare policy group in Ann Arbor, Mich. Pittsburgh's latest jobless figure is 7.1%.

Even though healthcare's growth remains solid — the industry added 19,000 jobs nationwide in April — Roehrig and other experts see an inevitable retrenchment.

Spending for medical care is nearing one-fifth of the American economy, much more than in other developed nations and beyond what governments, businesses and consumers can afford.

Uncertainties hang over President Obama's healthcare overhaul while theU.S. Supreme Court weighs the constitutionality of the law — a law that is likely to accelerate the already fast pace of consolidation in the industry.

"We're reaching this odd era where the growth rate of resources [is] rapidly declining at the same time the needs for healthcare are going up," Roehrig said.

Healthcare has fueled job growth for a generation. When Pittsburgh's steel industry began its collapse in the early 1980s, healthcare employment was a third of manufacturing's and the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center was little more than an operator of a single psychiatric hospital.

Today, from his suite on the 62nd floor of downtown's tallest building, once owned by U.S. Steel Corp., UPMC Chief Executive Jeffrey A. Romoff has a wide view of the city's cleaner skies and rivers — and of much of his $10-billion empire.

Notice how ObamaCare is accelerating "the already fast pace of consolidation in the industry," and by implication, if ObamaCare is struck down, this healthcare jobs boom will wither on the vine.

How typical.

Check back tomorrow for an update on the gloom!!

Precious Moments: Andrew 'Milky Loads' Sullivan Tells Chris 'Tingles' Matthews He's Moved by Obama's Statement, 'We Are Equal Human Beings'

I don't think you could find better progressive optics. I mean, seriously, Sully's emoting to Chris Matthews, who in 2008 confessed that, "I have to tell you, you know, it's part of reporting this case, this election ... the feeling most people get when they hear Barack Obama's speech. My, I felt this thrill going up my leg..."

Really.

You gotta watch this, via Weasel Zippers, "Video: Trig Truther Andrew Sullivan Tears Up Talking About “Father Figure” Obama’s Support of Gay Marriage…":

PREVIOUSLY: "Barebackers for Barack, UPDATED! — Andrew 'Milky Loads' Sullivan Cover Story at Newsweek, 'The First Gay President'."

Hot Rule 5 Sunday!

Via Theo Spark:

Also at Pirate's Cove, "If All You See…are a bunch of little carbon footprints who may bring more little carbon footprints into the world, you might just be a Warmist." And Reaganite, "You Need to Check-Out Miss Peru, Son: The Name is Natalie Vertiz."

And at Daley Gator, "DaleyGator DaleyBabe Britney Palmer."

BONUS: At Camp of the Saints, "Offend a Feminist: Jayne Mansfield Knew Her Place."

RNC Chair Reince Priebus: Homosexual Marriage Not a Civil Right (VIDEO)

Politico is reporting, "RNC chairman: Gays deserve 'dignity and respect,' but not marriage" (via Memeorandum):

Republican National Committee Chairman Reince Priebus said Sunday that while he supports “dignity and respect” for all Americans, including gays and lesbians, that doesn’t mean gay marriage should be legalized.

“People in this country, no matter straight or gay deserve dignity and respect. However, that doesn’t mean it carries on to marriage. I think that most Americans agree that in this country, the legal and historic and the religious union, marriage has to have the definition of one man and one woman,” Priebus said on NBC's "Meet the Press."

More at Memeorandum.

Barebackers for Barack, UPDATED! — Andrew 'Milky Loads' Sullivan Cover Story at Newsweek, 'The First Gay President'

You can't make this stuff up.

As I reported previously, Andrew Sullivan really got off on Barack's coming out: "Barebackers for Barack!"

So now here comes the news that this week's cover story at Newsweek features the cover headline, "The First Gay President."

Politico has an excerpt from Sully's report, via Memeorandum:

It’s easy to write off President Obama’s announcement of his support for gay marriage as a political ploy during an election year. But don’t believe the cynics. Andrew Sullivan argues that this announcement has been in the making for years. “When you step back a little and assess the record of Obama on gay rights, you see, in fact, that this was not an aberration. It was an inevitable culmination of three years of work.” And President Obama has much in common with the gay community. “He had to discover his black identity and then reconcile it with his white family, just as gays discover their homosexual identity and then have to reconcile it with their heterosexual family,” Sullivan writes.

And don't forget about Sully's response when he first heard the news:

I do not know how orchestrated this was; and I do not know how calculated it is. What I know is that, absorbing the news, I was uncharacteristically at a loss for words for a while, didn't know what to write, and, like many Dish readers, there are tears in my eyes.

Yay, RAWMUSLGLUTES!

Get that dude a tissue! Gotta clean up those milky loads!

And hey, Vanderleun nailed it as well:

Gee whiz. I wonder if Obama will come out or not. He could of course avoid taking a "position" simply giving Andrew Sullivan one hot evening in the Lincoln Bedroom and leaking the photographs to Blueboy.com, but some things are just too revolting to evolve into.

Well Baracky's out and proud now.

More at Gateway Pundit, "Fabulous!… Newsweek Obama Cover: “The First Gay President”."

UPDATE: See Bookworm Room, "Another formerly major American magazine goes off the tracks *UPDATED*."

Also at Blazing Cat Fur, "Milky Loads is at it again."

Happy #MothersDay From the Romneys

In the mail, from Ann Romney:

On this day, I always remember my mother. I remember she was a wonderful cook. I remember how much she loved my dad. Ours was a loving home, where I knew the light was always on. I wish I could tell her again how much I love her.

Cherish your mothers. The ones who wiped your tears, who attended all those ball games or ballet recitals. The ones who believed in you, even when nobody else did, even when maybe you didn't believe in yourself.

Women wear many hats in their lives. Daughter, sister, student, breadwinner. But no matter where we are or what we're doing, one hat that moms never take off is the crown of motherhood.

There is no crown more glorious.

Happy Mother's Day.

Ann Romney

Sunday Cartoons

At Flopping Aces, "Sunday Funnies."

Also at Reaganite Republican, "Reaganite's Sunday Funnies," and Theo Sparks, "Cartoon Round Up..."

BONUS: At Jill Stanek's, "Stanek Sunday funnies 5-13-12."

'Earned Success' and American Values

From Arthur Brooks, at the Wall Street Journal, "America and the Value of 'Earned Success'."

And Brooks' new book is here: The Road to Freedom: How to Win the Fight for Free Enterprise.

Surfer Garrett McNamara Sets World Record for Surviving Biggest Wave

This is pretty much obligatory. I've been seeing this clip all around the web.

And you don't just "ride" these waves --- you survive them.

At Guinness World Records, "VIDEO: 78-FOOT WAVE SURFED BY GARRETT MCNAMARA CONFIRMED AS LARGEST EVER RIDDEN."

See also USA Today, "Surfer sets Guinness record riding 78-foot wave."

What Would You Say if Your Child Said He or She Was Gay?

This clip is just the first five minutes or so from a fifteen minute segment on MSNBC earlier this week. The full link is here, uploading by a radical leftist. Chris Matthews gets visibly angry and berates Tony Perkins for his views and Barney Frank spits out the gay extremist talking points which make absolutely no rational sense and are designed only to make conservatives look uncaring and bigoted. This is the only way progressives can win the argument. They can't win on the merits. And again, the threat of being attacked and demonized is the main factor that explains the shift in support toward acceptance of gay marriage nationwide. Every single time it's been put to a vote at the state level --- 32 times --- gay marriage backers have lost. Perhaps the culture itself is changing along with the younger demographic. But up to the moment the left has only won through lies and intimidation, in legislatures or the courts.

And to answer the question at top: If my boys came out as gay I'd love them just as much as I always do, although it wouldn't change my opinion on what is the best family relationship for family stability, social and economic well-being, and the regeneration of values.

Police Release Astonishing Hit-and-Run Videotape — Teenager Survives After Being Thrown Through the Air, Flipping Head-Over-Heels

Unreal.

Sometimes you just have to see things to believe them. I'm shocked this kid is still alive.

At New York Daily News, "Buffalo cops release surveillance video of wild hit-and-run accident; teen flipped head-over-heels by speeding madman (VIDEO)."

Victoria's Secret Beach Towel

That's Doutzen Kroes in the bikini.

A Fascinating Look at How Trojan Condoms Are Made

An amazingly interesting report, at Business Insider, "Inside Trojan's Factory, Where They Make More Than 1 Million Condoms Every Day." (Via Right Wing News.)

Dr. Zuhdi Jasser Slams Best Buy's Financial Support for Council on Islamic American Relations

Via Bare Naked Islam:

And see Ryan Mauro, "‘Boycott Best Buy’ Movement Takes Off."

London Considers Rooftop Missile Deployment During Olympics

The Astute Bloggers has the story, "IT'S COME TO THIS: TO DEFEND AGAINST ISLAMO-TERROR DURING OLYMPICS, LONDON IS GETTING MISSILE BATTERIES ON ROOFTOPS."

It's an amazing scenario, in any case. The Brits are really preparing for all possibilities. Reminds me of an earlier era, like the Cold War.

Welcome Sign in Las Vegas an Attraction in its Own Right

We always head south on the Las Vegas Boulevard to stop for gas and drinks before getting on the freeway. And I always notice the busloads of tourists who're stopped at that darned sign. I think, "One of these days we'll stop to take some souvenir photos," but we never do.

In any case, the Los Angeles Times reports on the "Welcome to Fabulous Las Vegas Nevada" sign.

See, "Vegas sign a tourist attraction in its own right":

LAS VEGAS — It sits along a stretch of median on the less-glamorous south end of this city's glitzy gambling Strip, a stubborn holdover from another era. Yet, as the days turn to night and back into day, it beckons as many tourists, human tumbleweeds and adventure-seekers as any newfangled casino.

They come to see, touch and photograph the iconic "Welcome to Fabulous Las Vegas Nevada" sign, a 1959 scramble of colors, typefaces and flashing light bulbs. They come in droves, as if on some obligatory Vegas pilgrimage, arriving in taxis, rental cars, stretch limos, golf carts, pickup trucks, motorcycles, double-decker tour buses. One woman even arrived on foot, pulling a suitcase — a wanderer defying the scorching desert heat.

The reason: There's just something, well, fabulous, about this sign.

For one thing, it's survived 53 years in a town with a penchant for bulldozers, wrecking balls and spectacular building implosions, where a 20-year-old resort is considered as ancient as the pyramids.

Designed by sign-maker Betty Willis, who never sought a copyright for her work and instead donated it to her beloved city, the 25-foot-tall kitschy cartoon has become a full-flush symbol of this gambling mecca, listed on the National Register of Historic Places.

"I just think it's cool. Who knows if those Rat Pack guys once stood here," Utah resident Marsha Hatch, 48, said on a recent Saturday evening. "It's like the Hollywood Walk of Stars, but it's ours. This sign belongs to Vegas."

Willis, now long retired, doesn't speak to reporters anymore. But in past interviews she said that back in 1959 — when Wayne Newton was a teenager and Frank Sinatra joined Dean Martin for the first time on stage at the Sands — the sign's diamond shape was unlike anything on the Strip. She added "fabulous" as the most fitting word to describe this 24-hour resort town.

More at the link.

PHOTO CREDIT: Wikipedia.