Alyssa Miller

For Esquire.

Glitchy #Democrats

Democrat scumbag losers destroying the country.



PREVIOUSLY: "'Glitches' Mar #ObamaCare Rollout."

State Governments Reduced to Lying About #ObamaCare Rollout

Maeve Reston tweets, "MAJOR!"

MAJOR: 5 million hits at Calif's Obamacare exchange? Nope. CA officials are RETRACTING that. Real number: 645,000 http://t.co/fYiiO5tslX
— Maeve Reston (@MaeveReston) October 3, 2013

And more great news for the idiot Dems at London's Daily Mail, "EXCLUSIVE: Less than 1 per cent of Web visitors are signing up for Obamacare on some state health exchange websites."

Charges Dropped Against One Suspect in New York Biker Road Rage Beating

At the New York Post, "DA: Bike assault thug ‘won’t be charged at this time’."

Background here, "Bikers terrorize a family in a high-speed chase on the West Side Highway."

More at Metro, "Police make headway in bike gang assault investigation." And, "Lawrence biker paralyzed in New York road rage incident."

And video at ABC News, "Bikers Attack Driver After Accident: Caught on Tape."

#HeartlessHarry

At Free Beacon, "Reid: ‘Why Would We Want to’ Help One Kid With Cancer?":

DANA BASH: But if you can help one child who has cancer, why wouldn’t you do it?

HARRY REID: Why would we want to do that? I have 1,100 people at Nellis Air Force base that are sitting home. They have a few problems of their own. This is — to have someone of your intelligence to suggest such a thing maybe means you’re irresponsible and reckless –

BASH: I’m just asking a question.

And from the GOP conference, #HeartlessHarry.

Shadow Speaker Jim DeMint

An excellent behind-the-scenes look at the grassroots influence on the GOP congressional agenda.

At Business Week, "Jim DeMint, Congressional Republicans' Shadow Speaker":

When most Americans look at Washington, they see a broken Congress, riven by partisanship and lurching from crisis to crisis. While the hostility between Republicans and Democrats is indeed severe, it isn’t the real reason the engine of government keeps seizing up. What’s causing the malfunction is a battle within the GOP over how to return the party to its former glory after two consecutive losses to Obama and setbacks in the House and Senate. It’s a fight that pits uncompromising, Heritage-style conservatives against more cautious Republican elders. What makes it so contentious is that both sides have radically different—and mutually exclusive—ideas about how to move forward.

This struggle heats up each time a major budget deadline approaches, and two huge ones loom in the days ahead: There’s the Sept. 30 government funding deadline and then, sometime in late October, the Department of the Treasury will reach the limit of its borrowing capacity and default unless Congress raises the debt ceiling. In crises precipitated by similar deadlines, Republican leaders have always managed to keep their party together—or at least keep it from coming apart.

That will be much harder this time. While Boehner and the GOP leadership want mainly to navigate safe passage through the budget deadlines, DeMint and his cohort see the deadlines as crucial tests of party resolve and a key to the Republican resurgence they envision. DeMint views the impulse to avoid confrontation as the root of Republican woes: Only by engineering grand clashes and then standing resolutely on the side of small government can Republicans win this existential struggle.

“If I were speaker, I’d tell the president, ‘Mr. President, we funded the government, but we’re not going to fund your bill,’ ” says DeMint, who likes to make his point by acting out imagined confrontations. “ ‘We are not going to give in—one month, two months, three months. We are never going to give in. It’s just that important.’ And if the president wants to put the country through that to save a law that isn’t ready to go, well, then that’s a battle we have to have.”

When DeMint quit the Senate mid-term, it came as something of a shock in Washington, because a high-profile senator is presumed to have more power than a think tank president. There was plenty of snickering that he was cashing in: Heritage paid his predecessor more than $1 million last year. (The group won’t comment on DeMint’s salary.)

DeMint says he was just fed up. When he was first elected to Congress in 1998, insurrection wasn’t his goal. “I came to Washington as a businessman,” he says, “served six years in the House as a team player. Didn’t cause trouble. I was a policy nerd, introduced Social Security reform, tax reforms, all kinds of health-care reforms.” In 2005 he moved up to the Senate, where he began to lose patience with what he viewed as his party’s lack of commitment to first principles. “We had a lot of people who were great pretenders, talked real big about being conservatives,” he says. “But behind closed doors, they were driving the ball in the opposite direction.”

Continue reading.

Barry-cades Hurting Democrats

William Jacobson's covering the WWII memorial shutdown, "WWII and Lincoln Memorial Barricade Showdowns – Live Updates."

@SenatorReid Wrong, jerkoff. It's yours and Obama's. Own it, you evil little man
— JWF (@JammieWF) October 2, 2013

Even Clinton didn't cut off veterans care and barricade unstaffed memorials in the hopes of creating pain. Democrats are curbstomping vets.

— Rep. Steve Stockman (@SteveWorks4You) October 2, 2013

More, "Obama Orders WWII Memorial Blocked."

Obama Orders WWII Memorial Blocked

He's ruthless.

At Twitchy, "Barry-cades confirmed: Park Service says Obama admin ordered closure of World War II Memorial."

Republicans More Insulated Against Backlash

From Ronald Brownstein, at National Journal:

Resolving the serial showdowns over the federal budget and debt ceiling may be more difficult now than during the last shutdown under Bill Clinton and Newt Gingrich because so many more House Republicans today represent safely GOP districts, a National Journal analysis has found.

This suggests that even if a public backlash develops against a shutdown or potential government default, Republican members may be far more insulated against those gales than their counterparts were during the two shutdowns in the winter of 1995 and 1996. Today's GOP legislators, for the same reason, also may be less sensitive to shifts in public attitudes that could threaten their party's national image or standing in more closely contested parts of the country.

Comparing today's 232-seat Republican majority with the 236 seats Republicans ultimately held after special elections and party switches from 1995-96 underscores the extent to which GOP legislators have succeeded in fortifying themselves into homogeneously conservative districts. On every measure, Republicans today represent constituencies that lean more lopsidedly toward their party.

On average, Clinton in 1992 won 46.6 percent of the two-party presidential vote in the districts held by congressional Republicans during the 104th Congress from 1995-96. (That two-party calculation excludes the share carried by Ross Perot in his independent bid that year.) President Obama last year carried only an average of 40.4 percent of the two-party presidential vote in the districts held by the current Republican majority.

Back in 1995, 79 House Republicans represented districts that backed Clinton in the previous presidential election; just 17 House Republicans now represent districts that Obama won. Fewer Republicans now hold districts that fall into an even broader definition of competitiveness:  In 1992, Republican President George H.W. Bush won 55 percent or less of the two-party presidential vote in 141 of the 236 House Republican districts. Now, only 71 House Republicans, roughly half as many, represent districts where 2012 nominee Mitt Romney won only 55 percent or less.

All of this means that the personal electoral incentives for most House Republicans would encourage more—not less—confrontation as the standoffs proceed, notes Gary C. Jacobson, an expert on Congress at the University of California (San Diego). "The electoral threat of them angering anybody outside of their base is pretty low," he says.

Republicans should stay firm, although I'm inclined to agree with Laura Ingraham.

Countdown to Cave-In

It's only a matter of time 'till Republicans cave, argues Laura Ingraham, on yesterday morning's Fox & Friends:

'Glitches' Mar #ObamaCare Rollout

At Time, "Obamacare Exchanges Riddled With Glitches."

And at Politico, "President Obama: Expect months of 'glitches'."



IMAGE CREDIT: CLASH DAILY, "PRESIDENT GLITCH: Obama Says “Expect months of ‘glitches’ with Obamacare”."

The President's Shutdown

From Fred Barnes, at WSJ:

President Obama is sitting out one of the most important policy struggles since he entered the White House. With the government shutdown, it has reached the crisis stage. His statement about the shutdown on Tuesday from the White House Rose Garden was more a case of kibitzing than leading. He still refuses to take charge. He won't negotiate with Republicans, though the fate of ObamaCare, funding of the government and the future of the economic recovery are at stake. He insists on staying on the sidelines—well, almost.

Mr. Obama has rejected conciliation and compromise with Republicans. Instead, he attacks them in sharp, partisan language in speech after speech. His approach—dealing with a deadlock by not dealing with it—is unprecedented. He has gone where no president has gone before.

Can anyone imagine an American president—from Lyndon Johnson to Ronald Reagan, from Harry Truman to Bill Clinton—doing this? Of course not. They didn't see presidential leadership as optional. For them and nearly every other president, it was mandatory. It was part of the job, the biggest part.

LBJ kept in touch daily with Everett Dirksen, the Republican leader in the Senate, and never missed an opportunity to engage him in reaching agreement on civil rights, taxes, school construction and other contentious issues. Mr. Obama didn't meet one-on-one with Mitch McConnell, the Senate GOP leader, until 18 months into his presidency and doesn't call on him now to collaborate.

Presidents have two roles. In the current impasse, Mr. Obama emphasizes his partisan role as leader of the Democratic Party. It's a legitimate role. But as president, he's the only national leader elected by the entire nation. He alone represents all the people. And this second, nonpartisan role takes precedence in times of trouble, division or dangerous stalemate. A president is expected to take command. Mr. Obama hasn't done that.

The extent to which he has abdicated this role shows up in his speeches. On the eve of the shutdown, he warned that a government closure "will have a very real economic impact on real people, right away." Defunding or delaying his health-care program—the goal of Republicans—would have even worse consequences, he suggested. "Tens of thousands of Americans die every single year because they don't have access to affordable health care," Mr. Obama said.

In an appearance in the White House pressroom, he said that "military personnel—including those risking their lives overseas for us right now—will not get paid on time" should Republicans force a shutdown. At an appearance in Largo, Md., the president accused Republicans of "threatening steps that would actually badly hurt our economy . . . Even if you believe that ObamaCare somehow was going to hurt the economy, it won't hurt the economy as bad as a government shutdown."

Yet as he was predicting widespread suffering, Mr. Obama steadfastly refused to negotiate with Republicans. He told House Speaker John Boehner in a phone call that he wouldn't be talking to him anymore. With the shutdown hours away, he called Mr. Boehner again. He still didn't negotiate and said he wouldn't on the debt limit either.

Mr. Obama has made Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid his surrogate in the conflict with Republicans. Mr. Reid has also declined to negotiate. In fact, Politico reported that when the president considered meeting with Mr. Boehner and Mr. McConnell, along with the two Democratic congressional leaders, Mr. Reid said he wouldn't attend and urged Mr. Obama to abandon the idea. The president did just that....

Continue reading.

Complete abdication --- of basic decency, much less presidential leadership.

Barack Hussein Obama: Worst. President. Ever.

Veterans Visit World War II Memorial Despite Shutdown

At WaPo, "Visiting veterans storm closed war memorials."

And at Twitchy, "World War II veterans knock down police barriers to attend memorial on the National Mall; Update: Did a congressman lead the vets through the barricade?; Update: Congressman says Obama administration knew about veterans’ request and rejected it."



More, at Legal Insurrection, "Obama and Dems declare political war on Veterans."

And from AoSHQ, "Obama Adminstration Specifically Denied Exception to Permit Veterans to Attend WWII Memorial."

Just 17 Percent Say #ObamaCare Will Help Them Personally

According to a new poll, "CNN Poll: Will Obamacare help you?"

Naturally CNN tries to spin the positives in this survey, but the fact remains that only 37 percent of respondents say ObamaCare will help them, and 52 percent say that "the health insurance system created by Obamacare is a disaster waiting to happen..."

Yep, it's a majority clusterf-k alright.



IMAGE CREDIT: Heritage.

Climate of Uncertainty

A fabulous editorial just eviscerating the IPCC, at the Wall Street Journal.

Just read it all at the link.

Fast Approaching the Stage of Rule by Brute Force

Via Zion's Trumpet, "Brute. Force. Rule. O’Hellno. Now. From D.C."

And see Ayn Rand, "The Nature of Government":

The proper functions of a government fall into three broad categories, all of them involving the issues of physical force and the protection of men’s rights: the police, to protect men from criminals—the armed services, to protect men from foreign invaders—the law courts, to settle disputes among men according to objective laws.

These three categories involve many corollary and derivative issues—and their implementation in practice, in the form of specific legislation, is enormously complex. It belongs to the field of a special science: the philosophy of law. Many errors and many disagreements are possible in the field of implementation, but what is essential here is the principle to be implemented: the principle that the purpose of law and of government is the protection of individual rights.

Today, this principle is forgotten, ignored and evaded. The result is the present state of the world, with mankind’s retrogression to the lawlessness of absolutist tyranny, to the primitive savagery of rule by brute force.

Unmanned U.S. Commercial Cargo Ship Flies to International Space Station

At Reuters, "Commercial cargo ship reaches International Space Station."

And CSM, "Are we entering the age of private spaceflight?":

Two private American companies – SpaceX and Orbital Sciences – are now responsible for restocking the International Space Station.

Candice Swanepoel Close Up

From Victoria's Secret.



And a little late with this announcement, but it's good, "2013 Victoria’s Secret Fashion Show to Air on December 10!"

It's a major cultural event these days. I'll have lots more...

The Pro-Democracy Case for Shutdowns

From James Poulos, at Forbes, "More Shutdowns, Please":

Elected representatives from both parties ought to break the shackles of fear-soaked propriety more often. So what if, most of the time, their push to defund will be dead on arrival? Establishment types will realize that shutdowns aren’t the horrorshows they dread. And Members of Congress will begin to understand that slavish devotion to party and budget orthodoxy serves neither their conscience nor their constituents.

The best way to shake up our calcified government and two-party system is for individual Members to band together ad hoc — or alone, if need be — to try applying the power of the purse to legislation they truly, madly, and deeply cannot abide.

And yes: if our reps can’t tell the difference between budgetary resistance born of expediency and scheming instead of a sense of prudence and principle, there’s a strong pro-democracy case for throwing them out of office at the first available chance.

RTWT.

Wave of Car Bombings Across Iraq

Terrorists are emboldened by this administration's cowardly retreat from global leadership and resolve.

At CSM, "Bombings across Iraq now touch on formerly safe havens":

A rash of car bombs killed dozens across Baghdad on Monday, the latest in a series of deadly bombings that have racked Iraq over the past several days. The violence has brought the country's civilian death toll to its worst level since 2008.

Al Jazeera reports that nine car bombs killed at least 24 people and wounded scores more, largely in the Iraqi capital's Shiite neighborhoods.

The bombs hit eight different areas on Monday, the deadliest blast tore through a small vegetable market and its car park, killing seven people including two soldiers and wounding sixteen others, a police officer said.

That was followed by four parked car bombs, which went off in quick succession in the neighbourhoods of New Baghdad, Habibiya, Sabaa al-Bour and Kazimiyah - all striking outdoor markets or car parks.

Media reports put the casualty figures at a minimum of 24 dead and 75 wounded to at least 40 killed and more than 170 injured.

Monday's bombings follow several attacks over the weekend in Baghdad. On Sunday, a suicide bombing at a Shiite mosque in the city of Musayyib, about 50 miles south of Baghdad, left 47 dead. And the Kurdish city of Erbil, which had largely been devoid of the violence affecting the rest of the country, saw a series of bombings on Sunday that killed six security officers, according to Kurd news outlet Rudaw.

Although no one has claimed responsibility for the attacks in Baghdad, BBC News reports that "Sunni Muslim insurgents have been blamed for much of the most recent violence."

More at WaPo, "Wave of bombings mainly in Shiite neighborhoods of Baghdad kills at least 55."