Walter Williams: Free Market Morality

Via Astute Bloggers:

Broadwell and Benghazi

Read it all at the link, from James Taranto at the Wall Street Journal.

And from the editors, "The Petraeus Probe":

Senate Intelligence Chairman Dianne Feinstein said Sunday she intends to investigate who knew what and when about l'affaire David Petraeus, and rightly so. The facts that are dribbling out suggest that all sorts of people knew about the CIA director's personal predicament—except the President for whom he worked.

If the leaks are correct, the FBI was investigating Mr. Petraeus for months. The unidentified sources claim that the bureau stumbled across the affair when his paramour, Paula Broadwell, sent a threatening email to another woman. The G-men then pursued the matter out of concern for a national security breach, which they say they never found.

Let's hope so, although it's hardly reassuring that the CIA chief was communicating with Ms. Broadwell via a Gmail account. Our operating assumption is that every Gmail account can be ransacked by hackers from China and elsewhere, no matter Google's GOOG +0.43% best efforts at security. For America's chief spook to leave himself vulnerable in this way is an astonishing lack of judgment for such a disciplined and experienced man.

It's also passing strange, not to say politically convenient, that these sources say the FBI alerted the White House for the first time at 5 p.m. on Election Day. The leakers say the bureau told Director of National Intelligence James Clapper, who then advised Mr. Petraeus he would have to resign.

But why wait weeks to tell the White House if a CIA chief is compromised in a way that might force his resignation? A report of this kind had to have gone up the chain of command to FBI Director Robert Mueller, and probably to Attorney General Eric Holder. Did they not tell anybody at the White House, not even the general counsel? This is odd, if not a dereliction, and the information chain needs to be understood.

All the more so because House Majority Leader Eric Cantor has confirmed a news report that he was told by a whistleblower in late October about the Petraeus affair, and he then had his staff alert the office of FBI Director Mueller. Mr. Cantor deserves credit for showing discretion and good judgment in the middle of an election campaign.

But the same credit should not go to Administration officials if they kept this problem bottled up until President Obama was safely re-elected. No one wants to see Mr. Petraeus or his family further humiliated, but there are security implications that need to be explained.

Still more, "FBI Agent in Petraeus Case Under Scrutiny."

Hot Kyrsten Sinema Elected First Out Bisexual Member of Congress

Well, if folks are visiting from Google, trolling for some nude shots of Kyrsten Sinema, you should at least know that she's a far left-wing radical, so she'll be right at home with the Israel-hating Democrat Caucus in the Jew-bashing Democrat Party of President Barack Obama.

See: "Kyrsten Sinema, Bisexual Israel-Hating Antiwar Radical, is Face of Today's Democrat Party."

And see Weasel Zippers, "Radical Anti-Israel Democrat Declared Winner In Arizona U.S. House Race…" (At Memeorandum.)

Democrat Win Portends Doom of Progressive Statism

From Monty Pelerin, at American Thinker, "Obama's Election Seals Our Fate":

The Obama re-election dooms the country. It ensures that his philosophy will be imposed for another four years. His election ensures the continuing shift away from the Rule of Law, property rights, free men, and free markets. Obama's vision of how the world works ensures a dire economy until an economic collapse resets everything. The rest of the world, apparently bigger Obama supporters than U.S. voters, will not be immune from the consequences.

Read it all, at the link.

IMAGE CREDIT: The People's Cube, "In Progressive America Virtue Has No Value."

Red America Forced to Reconcile the Emerging Democrat-Secular Majority

I've been coping with last week's defeat with equanimity and humor, but it's hard, so I won't beat around the bush. If folks are discounting the thesis of the Democrat partisan realignment, they might find a reality check in the political future of California --- which looks to have a permanent progressive majority until we sink into the sea. Conservatives have to find a way to keep up the fight and not despair. My hunch is that the values of the founders, of liberty, self-government, law and free enterprise, will triumph one way or another, and the country will remain a beacon for those escaping tyranny around the world. But only time will tell, for the progs have got their claws into the system, and deep. A lot of conservatives can only find consolation in faith and family, and if things don't change they'll be an oppressed and persecuted minority whose traditional values are shunned.

This is the sense you get from reading the story of Beth Cox in Tennessee, at the Washington Post, "GOP’s Red America forced to rethink what it knows about the country." (Via Memeorandum.)

And then to get a sense of how vehemently Ms. Cox's values are condemned and ridiculed, read Kaili Joy Gray at the hate-site Daily Kos, "Republicans still having a sad about America's decline into socialism and decay because Obama."

I'm by nature an optimist. The election results are still sinking in for me, although, again, the California example is not all that heartwarming. The demographic divisions will be lasting, and I don't believe that Hispanics are a natural constituency for conservative values. I'll explain why in future posts, but in California the Hispanic demographic is deeply embedded in the welfare state regime and its voters backed Democrats to keep both benefits and taxes high. Political consultants can plug that fact into their magical vote-aggregating prediction machines, and choke on it.

I'll have more later...

Prop. 30 Won't Quench California's Big Government Thirst

At the Los Angeles Times, "Prop. 30 win won't guarantee state's fiscal safety":

SACRAMENTO — The election wasn't even over Tuesday when state Treasurer Bill Lockyer's phone started ringing. Activists of all stripes had the same message for him: With voters apparently poised to approve billions of dollars in tax hikes, it was time to spend more money.

"They had to be reminded the money has already been spent," Lockyer said.

As California tries to shake its national reputation as a financial bungler, policymakers in Sacramento will be managing an estimated $6 billion in annual revenue from Gov. Jerry Brown's newly approved tax plan, Proposition 30. The money is already included in the budget the governor signed last summer.

The bloodletting that has become a ritual part of assembling the state budget is expected to fade. But some of the issues that have made California's financial problems so persistent remain and could still create a budget gap if things don't go as planned.

In essence, analysts say, voters have stabilized the patient, but surgery may still be required.

Brown has long acknowledged that fixing the state's fiscal problems will require more work. He told reporters last week that "there are no cure-alls" and pledged to hold the line against new spending. As the former seminary student often does, he used a biblical allusion to make his point.

"We need the prudence of Joseph," he said.

The governor's plan will increase the state sales tax by a quarter-cent for four years and raise levies on high earners by one to three percentage points for seven years. Passage of Proposition 30 prevents billions of dollars in education cuts and gives the state an opportunity to end the fiscal year without a deficit for the first time in five years.

But California still has the lowest credit rating of any state. Its tax system is unstable. Borrowing costs remain high, and there are signs that the Brown administration's current $91.3-billion budget may be fraying at the seams as savings fail to meet expectations.

"By no means is California out of the woods yet," said Kil Huh, a director at the Pew Center on the States in Washington. "They've built up a set of challenges that are daunting for any state."

For starters, swings in the stock market can have an outsize effect on California's budget because the state relies so heavily on income taxes paid by the wealthy. In 2010, the richest 1% of Californians earned 21.3% of the income in the state and paid 40.9% of the state income taxes, according to the most recent government data available.

Gabriel Petek, an analyst at Standard & Poor's, noted that California has, over time, decreased more reliable sources of revenue, such as fees on motor vehicle registrations, while increasing less dependable ones, such as income taxes.

Revamping the tax base is politically treacherous. Voters approved strict limits on property taxes in 1978 with Proposition 13, which has since been considered the third rail in California politics.

"If I was dictator of the state, I would look at it," said Kim Rueben at the nonpartisan Tax Policy Center in Washington. "I'm not sure it will ever be looked at."

The responsibility for handling state finances now is expected to fall completely to Democrats, who are poised to gain a supermajority in each house of the Legislature. Republicans would no longer be able to block tax increases, which require a two-thirds vote.

Senate President Pro Tem Darrell Steinberg (D-Sacramento) said in an interview Friday that changes in the tax system can bring "political peril" and are not high on his agenda.

California could also face budget gaps when Proposition 30's tax hikes expire. Administration officials are banking on improvements in the economy to make up for the loss of extra tax revenue then.

Some Republicans fear Democrats will increase spending so much that they'll try to make the tax hikes permanent.

Make them permanent?

You think? All that and more, now that California's a one-party state with a permanent Democrat majority. An earthquake couldn't sink us into the as fast as the progressives.

Stacy Peralta's 'Bones Brigade'

Peralta's new documentary is in theaters.

And here's the review at the Los Angeles Times, "Review: 'Bones Brigade' rides a skateboard back to the '80s."

Paula Broadwell Interview With Jon Stewart on The Daily Show (VIDEO)

At London's Daily Mail, "Petraeus mistress Paula Broadwell's awkward interview with Jon Stewart on The Daily Show."

MSNBC, the 'Anti-Fox' Network, Sees Itself as Voice of Obama's America

A wholly unexceptional puff piece at NYT, "MSNBC, Its Ratings Rising, Gains Ground on Fox News" (via Memeorandum):

On Tuesday night, with a minute to go until the polls closed in the battleground state of Virginia, the MSNBC hosts Rachel Maddow and Chris Matthews received word through their earpieces that the state was too close to call, according to the election analysts at MSNBC’s parent, NBC News.

“I think that’s pretty significant,” Mr. Matthews said, optimistically, as a commercial break wrapped up. Virginia, a state that had voted to elect a Democratic presidential candidate only once in 40 years — Barack Obama in 2008 — was not leaning toward Mitt Romney as some Republicans had predicted it would.

Inside the NBC “Sunday Night Football” studio that MSNBC was borrowing for the night, the stage manager loudly called out, “Here we go.” Ms. Maddow softly repeated, “Here we go,” and reported the news to three million viewers.

When President Obama won Virginia and most of the other battleground states on Tuesday night, ensuring himself a second term as president, some at MSNBC felt as if they had won as well.

During Mr. Obama’s first term, MSNBC underwent a metamorphosis from a CNN also-ran to the anti-Fox, and handily beat CNN in the ratings along the way. Now that it is known, at least to those who cannot get enough politics, as the nation’s liberal television network, the challenge in the next four years will be to capitalize on that identity.

MSNBC, a unit of NBCUniversal, has a long way to go to overtake the Fox News Channel, a unit of News Corporation: on most nights this year, Fox had two million more viewers than MSNBC.

But the two channels, which skew toward an audience that is 55 or older, are on average separated by fewer than 300,000 viewers in the 25- to 54-year-old demographic that advertisers desire. On three nights in a row after the election last week, MSNBC — whose hosts reveled in Mr. Obama’s victory — had more viewers than Fox in that demographic.

“We’re closer to Fox than we’ve ever been,” said Phil Griffin, the president of MSNBC, who has been trying to overtake Fox for years. “All of this is great for 2013, 2014 to keep building.”

In some ways MSNBC, which until 2005 was partly owned by Microsoft, is where Fox was a decade ago — in the early stages of profiting from its popularity. The channel receives a per-subscriber fee of 30 cents a month from cable operators; CNN receives twice that, and Fox News at least three times as much.

“When Microsoft was involved with MSNBC, it was viewed as kind of lacking in direction; I don’t think the channel had much leverage raising rates,” said Derek Baine, a senior analyst for SNL Kagan. “Maybe they will have some more leverage on this postelection.”

If Fox sees itself as the voice of the opposition to the president, MSNBC sees itself as the voice of Mr. Obama’s America. Its story resembles that of so many other cable channels. It hit on a winning strategy (antiwar liberalism led by Keith Olbermann at 8 p.m.), added similar shows (like Ms. Maddow’s at 9 p.m., which became the channel’s tent pole when Mr. Olbermann left in 2011) and then sold its audience as something more: a community of passionate, like-minded people.

Many progressives (and conservatives) now view the channel as a megaphone for liberal politicians, ideas and attacks against those who disagree. Such a megaphone — clearly marked, always on — has never existed before on television.

More at the link.

The network's the voice of the socialist elements that are destroying the country's traditional political culture. Whether these changes are permanent remains to be seen, but you can bet your bottom dollar that the Maddow-Matthews cabal will be pulling the levers that bring this nation down.

Obama Administration Knew of Petraeus Infidelity in Late-Summer 2012

It wasn't just the FBI that was aware of Petraeus's affair last summer, but top officials in the administration. The Wall Street Journal reports, "FBI Scrutinized on Petraeus: Complaints by Female Social Planner Led to Email Trail That Undid CIA Chief":

A social planner's complaints about email stalking launched the monthslong criminal inquiry that led to a woman romantically linked to former Gen. David Petraeus and to his abrupt resignation Friday as Central Intelligence Agency chief.

The emails began arriving in Jill Kelley's inbox in May, U.S. officials familiar with the probe said. Ms. Kelley, who helped organize social events at MacDill Air Force Base in Tampa, Fla., told the Federal Bureau of Investigation about the emails, which she viewed as harassing, the U.S. officials said.

That FBI investigation into who sent the emails led over a period of months to Paula Broadwell, Mr. Petraeus's biographer, with whom he was having an extramarital affair, according to the U.S. officials.

FBI agents were pursuing what they thought was a potential cybercrime, or a breach of classified information.

Instead, the trail led to what officials said were sexually explicit emails between two lovers, from an account Mr. Petraeus used a pseudonym to establish, and to the destruction of Mr. Petraeus's painstakingly crafted image as a storied Army general.

Mr. Petraeus admitted to an affair in a letter to CIA employees announcing his resignation.

In the aftermath of the investigation, some lawmakers are aiming criticism at the FBI and the Obama administration, including Attorney General Eric Holder, who knew about the email link to Mr. Petraeus as far back as late summer. A House Republican leader also learned of the matter in October. Some argue that Mr. Petraeus shouldn't have resigned; others said that the FBI should have formally notified Congress earlier.

The top Senate Democrat on intelligence issues said Sunday she would investigate the FBI's handling of the inquiry, and why the matter wasn't shared earlier with Congress.

"It was like a lightning bolt," said Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D., Calif.) on "Fox News Sunday." "This is something that could have had an effect on national security. I think we should have been told."

Read it all at the link.

And listen that Fox News report and interview with Rep. Peter King at the clip.

It's simply astonishing the number of questions that are being raised. And the White House doesn't want Petraeus testifying? The whole thing's obscene.

Lots more at Memeorandum.

Heidi Klum Leaves Little to the Imagination in Skimpy Gown at MTV Europe Music Awards

Amazing.

At Londons' Daily Mail, "Frock horror: Heidi Klum shocks in revealing tie-up blue and gold dress as she arrives to host the MTV EMAs."

Lots of pictures at the link.

Remembering California's More Than 700 Who Made the Ultimate Sacrifice in Iraq and Afghanistan

At the Los Angeles Times, "California's Iraq and Afghanistan war dead remembered."

A Progressive Surge

The editors at The Nation spike the football:

A country reeling from one disaster has dodged another. While President Obama’s re-election inspires varying degrees of hope among progressives, it has evoked one common sentiment: relief. Democracy may not be reborn, but a living symbol of plutocracy was defeated by the voters on November 6.


It’s worth remembering, before Mitt Romney settles into a comfortable 1 percent retirement from politics, that his victory would have imperiled the security of all but those insulated by extreme wealth from concerns like being able to find safe, warm housing in the wake of a hurricane. A Romney/Ryan win would have been viewed as a validation of a radical individualist worldview that runs counter to every value progressives hold dear. It would have collapsed the space the left needs to gain strength, and it would have empowered social forces—from the religious right to the Tea Party voter-suppression machine to Wall Street and corporate elites—that form an intractable bloc of opposition to progress for all those struggling for equality and opportunity in today’s United States.

This right-wing coalition was defeated at the polls by a “rising American electorate,” a coalition of women, African-Americans, Latinos, the young and unionized blue-collar workers in Midwestern battleground states. These voters not only provided Obama with his margin of victory but carried several stalwart progressives in high-profile Senate races to exhilarating wins: Massachusetts’ Elizabeth Warren, the Harvard Law School professor who emerged as a champion in the fight to regulate the financial sector, took Scott Brown’s seat despite a furious effort by Wall Streeters to stop her; Ohio’s Sherrod Brown, who despite a deluge of negative Super PAC ads, costing upward of $31 million, overcame his Republican rival with his populist labor-based campaign; and Wisconsin’s Tammy Baldwin, who prevented a vulnerable Democratic seat from being snatched by former Governor Tommy Thompson and will become the first out gay or lesbian to serve in the Senate, where she will join the ranks of a record number of women senators. Thank you, voters, for that fitting response to the Republican war on women.

More at that top link.

And see also iOWNTHEWORLD, "U.S. Communist Party Crows Over Obama Victory."

PHOTO CREDIT: The White House on Flickr, "President Barack Obama and First Lady Michelle Obama embrace Vice President Joe Biden and Dr. Jill Biden moments after the television networks called the election in their favor, while watching election returns at the Fairmont Chicago Millennium Park in Chicago, Ill., Nov. 6, 2012. (Official White House Photo by Pete Souza)."

Looks like Obama's about to start bawling again. Sheesh.

'Cloak and Shag Her'

At Director Blue, "BEST PETRAEUS AFFAIR HEADLINE: It's the New York Post Hands Down, No Contest."

I've got additional scandal coverage going live overnight, so check Bad Blue in the meanwhile, and Instapundit.

Petraeus Benghazi Scandal: 'Social Liaison Officer' Jill Kelley Identified as Second Woman

Boy, the weaves of this tangled web are being unraveled, and it just sordid and spiteful.

At the New York Post, "Petraeus' mistress sent harassing e-mails to military liaison: official."

And at London's Daily Mail, "Revealed: The glamorous social liaison officer who complained to FBI about emails from Petraeus's 'jealous' biographer mistress."

Lots of photos at that second link, and more at Memeorandum.

And check this out, from Israel National News, "Broadwell: Petraeus Knew of Benghazi Plea for Help":

Military expert Paula Broadwell, who was allegedly improperly involved with resigned CIA Director Gen. David Petraeus, confirmed in October that the CIA annex in Benghazi asked for reinforcements when the consulate came under attack on September 11. She also acknowledged that "there was a failure in the system."

Broadwell was speaking at her alma mater, the University of Denver, on October 26. Her lecture, which is on YouTube under the title "Alumni Symposium 2012 Paula Broadwell," now has added value, because based on the recent disclosures, it can now be assumed that she indeed knew exactly what it was that Petraeus knew about the attack.

Broadwell confirmed the reports on Fox News that the CIA annex asked for a special unit, the Commander in Chief's In Extremis Force, to come and assist it. She also said that the force could indeed have reinforced the consulate, and that Petraeus knew all of this, but was not allowed to talk to the press because of his position in the CIA.

"The challenge has been the fog of war, and the greater challenge is that it's political hunting season, and so this whole thing has been turned into a very political sort of arena, if you will," she said. "The fact that came out today is that the ground forces there at the CIA annex, which is different from the consulate, were requesting reinforcements.

The alumni video is here.

Lots more at Memeorandum.

This story's just now getting rolling. Broadwell had all kinds of inside information, drawn apparently from her access to Petraeus. When added all together, dating back to September 11, 2012, the Benghazi scandal truly is of the magnitude of Watergate, and graver still, for Americans were killed and the causes of their deaths covered up.

I'll have more...

Sunday Cartoons

At Reaganite Republican, "Reaganite's Sunday Funnies."

And at Jill Stanek's, "Stanek Sunday funnies: “Forward” edition."

CARTOON CREDIT: Net Right Daily.

Forward! Canada Lures Energy Workers from U.S.

Well shoot, it's not like it's a tight labor market in the U.S. energy sector, or anything.

At the Los Angeles Times, "Canada looks to lure energy workers from the U.S.":

EDMONTON, Canada — With a daughter to feed, no job and $200 in the bank, Detroit pipe fitter Scott Zarembski boarded a plane on a one-way ticket to this industrial capital city.

He'd heard there was work in western Canada. Turns out he'd heard right. Within days he was wearing a hard hat at a Shell oil refinery 15 miles away in Fort Saskatchewan. Within six months he had earned almost $50,000. That was 2009. And he's still there.

"If you want to work, you can work," said Zarembski, 45. "And it's just getting started."

U.S. workers, Canada wants you.

Here in the western province of Alberta, energy companies are racing to tap the region's vast deposits of oil sands. Canada is looking to double production by the end of the decade. To do so it will have to lure more workers — tens of thousands of them — to this cold and sparsely populated place. The weak U.S. recovery is giving them a big assist.

Canadian employers are swarming U.S. job fairs, advertising on radio and YouTube and using headhunters to lure out-of-work Americans north. California, with its 10.2% unemployment rate, has become a prime target. Canadian recruiters are headed to a job fair in the Coachella Valley next month to woo construction workers idled by the housing meltdown.

The Great White North might seem a tough sell with winter coming on. But the Canadians have honed their sales pitch: free universal healthcare, good pay, quality schools, retention bonuses and steady work.

"California has a lot of workers and we hope they come up," said Mike Wo, executive director of the Edmonton Economic Development Corp.

The U.S. isn't the only place Canada is looking for labor. In Alberta, which is expecting a shortage of 114,000 skilled workers by 2021, provincial officials have been courting English-speaking tradespeople from Ireland, Scotland and other European nations. Immigrants from the Philippines, India and Africa have found work in services. But some employers prefer Americans because they adapt quickly, come from a similar culture and can visit their homes more easily.

Right.

The Canadians need workers to power their energy sector. The Obama regime wants immigration reform to power our Democrat welfare sector.

Nope, America's not relinquishing global economic leadership to our competitors. No sir. Everything's fine and dandy. Just move along. Nothing to see here.

IMAGE CREDIT: iOWNTHEWORLD, "Running On Empty."

UPDATE: Linked at Blazing Cat Fur and Lonely Conservative. Thanks!

Progressives Launch Revenge on Applebee's as Company Downsizes in Response to ObamaCare

Look, I wrote about this yesterday.

The business community's had the writing on the wall for sometime. The election simply cleared up the uncertainty in the decision-making environment. Gateway Pundit has the video, "NY Applebee’s CEO Zane Tankel Says He Won’t Hire Because of Obamacare (Video)."

And taking their go-ahead from the Thug-in-Chief, the progressives have launched retaliatory attacks. At London's Daily Mail, "Calls to boycott Applebee's after CEO threatens hiring freeze and layoffs over Obamacare."

More at Twitchy, "Applebee’s targeted after franchisee mulls hiring freeze in response to Obamacare," and "Libs call for boycott of Papa John’s as CEO anticipates cut in workers’ hours."

Plus, "Insanity: Papa John’s, Olive Garden, others attacked as racist for anticipated responses to Obamacare."

Boeing Veterans Day Video: 'Their Story'

This is running on television. Saw it earlier today:

BONUS: From Bruce Kesler, at Maggie's Farm, "Veterans Day: We Don't Know What the Future Holds, But We Know Who Holds the Future."

Image Problem: Cathy McMorris Rodgers Says GOP Needs to Become 'More Modern'

This is interesting.

McMorris Rodgers is making the case for better salesmanship, or "saleswomanship," as the case may be.

At The Hill, "McMorris Rodgers: GOP needs to be more ‘modern’ not ‘moderate’":

Rep. Cathy McMorris Rodgers (R-Wash.) on Sunday said the GOP didn’t need to adopt “more moderate” positions, but rather needed to become “more modern” by being better inclusive of women and minorities.

“I don't think it's about the Republican Party needing to become more moderate. I really believe it's the Republican Party becoming more modern,” said McMorris Rodgers, during an interview on CNN’s “State of the Union.”

More at the link.

Former Commerce Secretary Carlos Gutierrez, seen at the longer clip at the link, is having none of it. He blusters about how moderate vs. modern is "a distinction without a difference."

Right.

My sense is that McMorris Rodgers is hesitant to sell out conservative values --- she's been a leader on fiscal conservatism in Congress --- and wants to make the case for the better articulation of conservative principles. I don't know if the "modern" argument is the winner, but ether way, adopting "moderate" positions will only strengthen progressivism. This is the left's meme since the election, that the GOP is extremist, although it's just more of the same "Operation Demoralize," only of the post-campaign variety.