Heidi Klum 'Best Mother's Day Ever'

Well, she's definitely enjoying herself:

Via Twitter.

Associated Press Phone Records Siezed by Department of Justice

It comes it threes.

From Erika Johnsen, at Hot Air, "Breaking: DOJ secretly seized two months of Associated Press phone records?"

More at the Hill, "Justice Department secretly seized AP reporters’ phone records" (via Memeorandum).

Astronaut Chris Hadfield Sings David Bowie's 'Space Oddity' in Space

A wonderful video:

Background at the Next Web, "Commander Chris Hadfield signs off from space with epic cover of David Bowie’s ‘Space Oddity’."

Obama Scandals Invoke Comparisons to Watergate

At Instapundit, "THE BOSTON HERALD GOES ALL IN ON THE OBAMA SCANDALS."

Lots of links at the post.

And I love this: " Barack Milhous Obamixon."

Sick: Salon's Irin Carmon Dismisses #Gosnell Conviction as 'Local Story'

At Twitchy, "Salon’s Irin Carmon: Lone outlaw Kermit Gosnell really was just a local crime story."

.@irincarmon It's a national story in virtually all respects. Amazing that you would even pen such a despicable piece. @davidspjm #ProLife
— Donald Douglas (@AmPowerBlog) May 14, 2013

And following the links takes us to David Steinberg's essay at Pajamas, "Gosnell and ‘Pro-Choice’: Fleeing From Reason?":

Take the emotion out of it. After Gosnell, is it possible for an impartial observer to offer a logical argument proving abortion is not murder?

Kermit #Gosnell Convicted on Three Counts of First-Degree Murder

At the Philadelphia Inquirer, "Abortion doctor Gosnell found guilty on 3 counts of 1st-degree murder":

Kermit Barron Gosnell - the West Philadelphia doctor whose career in urban medicine began during the "war on poverty" and ended 40 years later as a hated symbol of the antiabortion movement - was found guilty of three counts of first-degree murder Monday by a Philadelphia jury.

The jury acquitted Gosnell of one count of first-degree murder involving an infant prosecutors said was born alive and killed during an abortion.

In Pennsylvania, first-degree murder - the premeditated, malicious killing of a person - is punishable by death by lethal injection or life in prison without chance of parole.

Continue reading.

More the Other McCain, "#Gosnell Convicted: Quick Reactions" (via Memeorandum).

Expect updates...

Glenn Greenwald Gets His Blowback On

This was getting some attention on Twitter yesterday, at RCP, "Bill Maher vs. Glenn Greenwald on Islam's History of Violence & U.S. Aggression":

And in a hilarious surprise development, David Atkins, at Hullabaloo, took both Greenwald and Maher to task, "Greenwald and Maher are both wrong." (It's all about "fundamentalism," I guess.) And that elicited a blowback against the blowback from Digby, "No sorry David, Glenn Greenwald is not wrong."

Actually, they're both wrong themselves, and as I always say, as much as I dislike Glenn Greenwald, at least he's consistent. See, "Debating Bill Maher on Muslims, Islam and US foreign policy."

More from Barry Eisler, "Don't Worry, US Imperialism is Cost-Free."

I Picked Up Some Moose Drool

After beer tasting last week, I decided to quit procrastinating on diversifying my repertoire.

Here's the Moose Drool six-pack below. I haven't tried it yet. I also picked up a pack of the Rasputin Stout. Had some with dinner last night. Oh boy, is that good beer!

I'll update when I sample these puppies. The alcohol content much higher than domestic light beers (the Rasputin's at 9% ABV), so it might be next weekend until I have some more. Otherwise, I'll fall asleep too early in the evening.

Republicans Push for More Information on #Benghazi

At the New York Times, "G.O.P. Pushes for More Details of Benghazi Attack":

WASHINGTON — A House committee chairman vowed Sunday to seek additional testimony on the Obama administration’s handling of last year’s deadly attack on the American diplomatic post in Libya as another prominent Republican lawmaker called for a special committee to investigate.

The dispute over the assault in Benghazi, Libya, in September that killed four Americans dominated the network talk shows on Sunday. Leaders of both parties debated whether the administration had paid enough attention to security before the attack, did enough to respond once the violence began and tried to deceive the public afterward in the midst of an election campaign.

“I’d call it a cover-up,” Senator John McCain, Republican of Arizona, said on the ABC News program “This Week.”. “I would call it a cover-up in the extent that there was willful removal of information, which was obvious.”

Mr. McCain called for a select committee to investigate, saying that “there are so many questions that are unanswered.” Last week, several House Republicans called for a special investigation in that chamber as well.

Representative Darrell Issa, Republican of California and chairman of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, also referred to a cover-up as he charged that the administration scrubbed talking points to falsely blame an incendiary anti-Muslim video rather than specific terrorist groups.

“The American people were effectively lied to for a period of about a month,” he said on the NBC News program “Meet the Press.” “They were in fact covering up an easy attack that succeeded, that was from the get-go really about a terrorist attack. It was never about a video.”

Mr. Issa said he would deliver requests for testimony on Monday to former Ambassador Thomas R. Pickering and Adm. Mike Mullen, the retired chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, who led a State Department review of the episode that critics considered inadequate. Mr. Issa, whose committee has been leading the latest investigation in the House, said he did not believe a special investigation would be necessary.

Continue reading.

EARLIER: "George Will Hammers White House on #Benghazi."

Don't Miss This Don't-Miss Essay From Michelle Malkin on Harvard-Trained Immigration Expert Jason Richwine

See, "The crucifixion of Jason Richwine; Update: Richwine resigns."

I guess John McCain's former Hispanic National co-chair Ana Navarro fanned the flames. She dissed Michelle on Twitter, although I've yet to hear back from her:

.@ananavarro 'Talk to the hand, little girl?' Seriously? You should be getting the back of the hand. Disgrace. #Amnesty @michellemalkin
— Donald Douglas (@AmPowerBlog) May 13, 2013

I must say, though. I'm not sure how Richwine thought that "IQ and Immigration Policy" would make for an enduring (non-controversial) dissertation topic. If folks recall the "Bell Curve" wars, clearly there's precedent for avoiding this kind of thing. Anyway, Professor Daniel Drezner has some additional comments, "Regarding Richwine..."

In the end it doesn't matter. Richwine clearly pushed some buttons with his Heritage immigration study. The left will settle for nothing less that blood.

George Will Hammers White House on #Benghazi

At ABC News, "George Will: Nation ‘Systematically Misled’ on Benghazi."

And from Daniel Foster at NRO, "George Will: White House Painted Benghazi As 'a Movie Review Conducted with Rocket Propelled Grenades'."

More at IBD, "Benghazi Talking Points: A Lie Hillary Agreed Upon."

And from Mandy Nagy, at Legal Insurrection, "Weekend Wrap-up of Benghazi Coverage – Notable Quotes."

Plus, an excellent post from Ed Driscoll, "Jay Carney’s Corruption Occurred a Long Time Ago."

Sunday Cartoons

At Flopping Aces, "Sunday Funnies."

More at Legal Insurrection, "Branco Cartoon – Grab A Mop," and Reaganite Republican, "Reaganite's SUNDAY FUNNIES."

Still more at Randy's Roundtable, "Friday Nite Funnies," and Theo Spark, "Cartoon Round Up..."

CARTOON CREDIT: William Warren, "Cinco de Blameo."

Paulina Porizkova's Still Got It! '80s Supermodel Rocks Skimpy String Bikini at Iceland Spa

She's got two kids, so let's give it up for Ms. Porizkova on Mother's Day!

At London's Daily Mail, "Paulina Porizkova, 48, proves she STILL has a supermodel body in bikini shot at Iceland spa."

Will Obama Suffer the 'Second-Term Curse'?

Well, jeez, let's hope so.

At the Washington Post:

Recent events suggest that the 44th president may not be immune to the phenomenon that historians call the “second-term curse.”

Not four months after his ambitious inaugural address, President Obama finds himself struggling to move his legislative agenda through an unbudging Congress.

And over the past week, two flaring controversies — one over his administration’s handling of the killing of the U.S. ambassador and three other Americans in Libya, the other over Internal Revenue Service employees targeting tea party groups for special scrutiny — have dominated the discussion in Washington.

It is far from clear how big a political liability either will turn out to be.

At a minimum, they represent diversions working against a president who is keenly aware of how little time he has left to achieve big things. And they are a test of the insular Obama team’s skill at keeping its footing in an environment of hyperpartisan politics and hair-trigger media.

On Friday, for instance, news of the IRS admission and developments surrounding the Benghazi attack turned White House press secretary Jay Carney’s daily briefing into a feeding frenzy and drowned out coverage of a speech that Obama was giving that day on the implementation of the health-care law that stands as his biggest achievement.

“After the election, the president said he was familiar with the literature on second-term difficulties,” said presidential historian Michael Beschloss. “We scholars may be about to see whether knowledge of that history can help a president when they begin to strike.”

“What we’ve seen in the past week reignites the question scholars ask about problematic second terms,” Beschloss added. “Is it mainly a coincidence that every president of the past 80 years has had a hard time after getting reelected? Or is it somehow baked into the structure of a second-term presidency that some combination of serious troubles is going to happen?”

White House officials acknowledge that the history of modern second-term presidencies is a sobering one, replete with scandal and failure.

But they insist that they have seen nothing to suggest that Obama will fall into the traps that have ensnared so many of his predecessors: nothing that rivals the Watergate investigation that drove Richard M. Nixon out of office in 1974, the Iran-contra scandal that nearly derailed Ronald Reagan’s presidency in 1986,or the impeachment of Bill Clinton in 1998.

Well, at least the media itself is beginning, ever so slightly, to shed it's protective attack dog role and actually report on this clusterf-k administration's endless corruption, scandal, and incompetence. 2016 can't come too soon.

More at that top link.

Russia Withheld Tamerlan Tsarnaev Text Messages, U.S. Officials Say

At the Wall Street Journal, "U.S.: Russia Withheld Intel on Boston Bomb Suspect":

Russia withheld a crucial piece of information from the U.S. before the Boston bombings, U.S. officials say, bolstering a concern that distrust between the two governments erased an opportunity to avert the disaster.

In 2011, Russia sent an alert to the Federal Bureau of Investigation about alleged bomber Tamerlan Tsarnaev, prompted in part by text messages between his mother and a Russian relative. The texts suggested Mr. Tsarnaev was interested in joining militant groups that Russia blames for attacks in the Caucasus region, according to U.S. officials briefed on the investigations.

U.S. officials call these text messages the most important in a series of missed signals between the two countries. One U.S. official characterized at least one of the text messages as generally discussing jihad, but without any specific mention of terrorism plans.

The U.S. officials say they learned about them roughly a week after the April 15 bombings. Several officials say such precise information would have led to a deeper examination of Mr. Tsarnaev, who died a few days after the bombing in a police confrontation. His brother and alleged accomplice remains in custody.

The information Russia withheld "would have allowed the bureau to open an investigation where you could track [Mr. Tsarnaev's] communications," said House Intelligence Committee chairman Mike Rogers (R., Mich.). "To me, that's where the ball really got dropped."

Previous terror plots in the U.S. exposed lapses in data-sharing among U.S. agencies, and the official Boston review could still uncover such instances. But so far in the Boston bombing, U.S. officials say, it appears that intelligence-sharing went most awry between the U.S. and Russia. After the Russian government made its 2011 query on Mr. Tsarnaev, the FBI three times requested more information and received none, U.S. officials say. Mr. Tsarnaev was a legal resident of the U.S. and a citizen of Kyrgyzstan.

The Kremlin said Russian security services gathered little information on Mr. Tsarnaev, but officials in the province of Dagestan said they tracked him during a six-month trip there in 2012. Russia never reported such details to the U.S. While in Dagestan, Mr. Tsarnaev met with a known militant, officials in Dagestan said.

U.S. officials say they don't know why the text messages weren't provided earlier. They surmised Russia didn't provide other information because they wanted to protect their sources or because they didn't give the information much credibility themselves.

Continue reading.

Cleveland Suspect Ariel Castro Is Registered Democrat

A great post a couple of days back, at the Other McCain, "Hope and Chains: #WarOnWomen Kidnapper Is Cuyahoga County Democrat."

IMAGE CREDIT: The People's Cube, "Ariel Castro, Cleveland Kidnapper, is a Registered Democrat."

Former Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif Claims Victory in Pakistan Election

At the Wall Street Journal, "Former PM Declares Victory in Pakistan: Voters Stream to Polls, but Twin Bombings Underscore the Dangers":

LAHORE, Pakistan—A conservative former Pakistani prime minister ousted in a 1999 military coup, Nawaz Sharif, appeared headed to victory Saturday in a closely fought election that also turned populist cricket legend Imran Khan into a major political force, according to early results.

Mr. Sharif's Pakistan Muslim League-N was leading in 125 constituencies out of 272, according to partial and initial results. Mr. Khan's Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf, which boycotted the previous election in 2008, was leading in 35 races, while the Pakistan Peoples Party that controlled the previous government was projected to win 32 seats. With independents and small parties leading in many remaining races, these results, if they hold, could allow Mr. Sharif to form the next government of the world's fifth largest democracy.

The election would mark the first time in Pakistan's coup-ridden history that a civilian government served a full five-year term and transferred power to another elected administration. Turnout was close to 60 percent, according the country's election commission, much higher than the 44% in the previous vote, despite Taliban threats and scattered violence that killed at least 19 people.

"Pakistan needs a strong government that can take strong decisions," Mr. Sharif said as he watched the results stream in on TV in his Lahore headquarters, with cheers by supporters outside growing louder with every new projection. As his lead solidified, he came out to make a victory speech, urging supporters to pray for an outright PML-N majority by the end of the count, so that a future government could be established "without crutches."

Mr. Sharif, in an interview with The Wall Street Journal after the vote, said he foresaw no new problems with the country's powerful military establishment, saying that the 1999 coup against him was the personal initiative of then-army chief Gen. Pervez Musharraf, and not the military as a whole.

He also said he would work for improved relations with the U.S., India and Afghanistan....

The Pakistani Taliban have focused their campaign of violence and intimidation that killed more than 100 people in the run-up to Saturday's vote on the PPP and its two secular allies, the Awami National Party and the Muttahida Qaumi Movement.

In the biggest attack on election day, 11 people were killed Saturday morning in twin bombings targeting an ANP office in the southern city of Karachi, a police official said. ANP, according to initial results, would have no seats in the new federal parliament, in part because Taliban violence made it nearly impossible for its candidates to campaign.

Continue reading.

Car Bombings Near Syrian Border Kill at Least Forty in Turkey

At the New York Times, "Car Bombings Kill Dozens in Center of Turkish Town Near the Syrian Border":

REYHANLI, Turkey — Two powerful car bombs killed at least 43 people in this town near Turkey’s border with Syria on Saturday, transforming downtown office blocks into smoldering husks in one of the deadliest attacks on Turkish soil in at least a decade.

There were no immediate claims of responsibility for the attacks, which came 15 minutes and barely a mile apart. Hours later, officials with Turkey’s government, which has backed the rebels fighting President Bashar al-Assad of Syria, said they had identified the suspects in the bombing. The attackers, officials said, belonged to an organization linked to Mr. Assad’s intelligence services, though they did not name the organization or the suspects, or provide a detailed explanation of how they reached that conclusion.

Turkey’s swift accusation raised the possibility of an escalating conflict with Syria and the broadening of the war. A senior Turkish Foreign Ministry official said the government had not reached the point where it was considering a military retaliation, but added, “No crime will be left without a response.”

In blaming Mr. Assad’s government, Turkish officials seemed anxious to stave off any possible backlash against thousands of Syrian refugees in Reyhanli or its allies in the Syrian opposition for the bombing. The town is in a region of southern Turkey where some Turks have bristled at their government’s willingness to make Turkey a party to the war, putting it at risk.

After the bombings on Saturday, angry residents smashed the windows of cars from Syria, and a Turkish newspaper reported that protests against Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan later erupted in Reyhanli’s streets.

If connected to the Syrian war, the attack on Saturday would be the deadliest spillover since the beginning of the uprising against Mr. Assad in March 2011. In October, shells fired from Syria killed five people in Turkey, and the Turkish government blamed Mr. Assad’s forces. At least 14 people died in a separate episode when a car bomb exploded at a border crossing.

Continue reading.

Obama Officials 'Redacted the Truth' From Benghazi

Via Blazing Cat Fur, "Heads should roll!":

No Legal Concerns Here...

Not with this Newcastle:

Enjoying a Newcastle. twitter.com/AmPowerBlog/st…
— Donald Douglas (@AmPowerBlog) May 11, 2013

But see Blazing Cat Fur, "Iron Maiden beer stopped over skull label concerns."