Rand Paul: “‘I was barked at: “Do not leave the cubicle!” by the TSA

…and of course, the statist White House sides with the TSA! Hope and Change?!?! Right. 🙄

Just a follow up to a story I wrote on earlier…

Kentucky Republican Sen. Rand Paul told The Daily Caller that being “detained” by the Transportation Security Administration at the Nashville airport Monday was a major ordeal that underscores flaws in TSA’s procedures that affect tens of millions of passengers every year.
“It was a big headache,” Paul said in a phone interview. “I missed my speech here. I was supposed to speak to the Right to Life March, probably the biggest audience I’ll get to speak to, and I missed it.”
The White House, through spokesman Jay Carney, defended the TSA’s actions during Monday’s press briefing by arguing that Paul wasn’t technically “detained.”
“Let’s be clear,” Carney said. “The passenger was not detained. He was escorted out of the area by local law-enforcement.”
But Sen. Paul told TheDC that he certainly felt like he was detained. “If you’re told you can’t leave, does that count as detention?” Paul asked.
“I tried to leave the cubicle to speak to one of the TSA people and I was barked at: ‘Do not leave the cubicle!’ So, that, to me sounds like I’m being asked not to leave the cubicle. It sounds a little bit like I’m being detained.”
The incident started after the scanner Paul walked through sounded its alarm. Current TSA rules would require Paul to undergo a mandatory pat-down before proceeding to his plane. But Paul told TheDC that the TSA agents caved in after a two-hour battle and allowed him to go through the scanner again without additional physical screening.
“For an hour and a half, they said ‘absolutely, I would have to [accept a pat-down],’” Paul said. “And, because I used my cell phone, they told me I would have to do a full body pat down because you’re not allowed to use your cell phone when you’re being detained.”
“It’s like, well, I can’t call my attorney? I can’t call my office to tell them I’m going to miss a speech to 200,000 people?”
“In the end, after two hours of this quarreling,” Sen. Paul explained, “they did let me walk through the screener [machine] and it didn’t go off. So what the TSA is not telling you is the screeners are being used as random devices as well. The [mechanical] screeners will go off randomly, and the [agent] screeners don’t know that it’s a random call but it has nothing to do with what you’ve done.”

Of course, the Statist in chief’s staff is defend the entire thing; over to you The Hill:

The White House is standing by the Transportation Security Administration in its standoff with Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) and his father, Republican presidential candidate Rep. Ron Paul (R-Texas).
The elder Paul called the TSA a “police state” Monday after Rand Paul was reportedly detained by TSA after he refused to take a pat-down from TSA officials at the Nashville International Airport.
White House press secretary Jay Carney said Monday that he didn’t have any reaction to Paul’s “police state” comments.
But Carney sided with the TSA saying, “I think it is absolutely essential that we take necessary actions to ensure that air travel is safe.”
Ron Paul, who is one of four remaining Republican candidates for president, disagreed Monday afternoon. Paul said after he confirmed the incident involving Rand Paul on his Twitter page that it showed why the TSA should be eliminated.
“The police state in this country is growing out of control,” the elder Paul said in a statement released by his presidential campaign.
“One of the ultimate embodiments of this is the TSA that gropes and grabs our children, our seniors, and our loved ones and neighbors with disabilities,” he continued. “The TSA does all of this while doing nothing to keep us safe. That is why my ‘Plan to Restore America,’ in additional to cutting $1 trillion dollars in federal spending in one year, eliminates the TSA.”
TSA has defended its treatment of Rand Paul, saying that its employees in Nashville followed its normal procedure with the senator, who has often sharply criticized the agency’s pat-downs before he refused one Monday morning.

So, there you have it, an out of control organization that is now detaining White Anglo-Saxon Protestants and not the Arab terrorists it was designed to capture. How quaint. 🙄 I have to wonder aloud, if Rand Paul were Jewish or black, would they have done all of this? It is to wonder.

I am also getting tips from readers that were in the area of the time of the incident and they are reporting that Senator Rand Paul grew very angry and used vulgarities at the TSA staff and made some very nasty racist comments at the TSA staff, who just happened to be black. Nice going Senator Paul; make yourself look like a bigger idiot than you already are. 🙄 Of course, I cannot independently verify the reports, so take them for what they are worth.

Update: Now a huge memeorandum thread.

Update #2: Smitty, who I consider to be a friend; makes some good points.

Mitt Romney fires a shot across Newt Gingrich’s bow

Looks like Mittens is feeling the heat, perhaps from the flip flops and/or because of the recent polls and is firing back.

ORMOND BEACH, Fla. — Mitt Romney landed here Sunday with a simple message: Newt Gingrich is a failure and a fraud. And a disgrace. And a hapless showman.
Standing under a brilliant orange Florida sunset, Romney delivered his longest sustained critique of the South Carolina primary winner to date — ticking through a list as if he were reading off Gingrich’s Wikipedia page, and undercutting each item as he got to it.
“Speaker Gingrich has also been a leader,” the former Massachusetts governor said. “He was a leader for four years as speaker of the House. And at the end of four years, it was proven that he was a failed leader and he had to resign in disgrace. I don’t know whether you knew that, he actually resigned after four years, in disgrace.
Romney continued: “He was investigated over an ethics panel and had to make a payment associated with that and then his fellow Republicans, 88 percent of his Republicans voted to reprimand Speaker Gingrich. He has not had a record of successful leadership.”
Then Romney got into Gingrich’s post-congressional career.
“Over the last 15 years since he left the House, he talks about great bold movements and ideas,” he told the crowd of several hundred people gathered at a building materials company here. “Well, what’s he been doing for 15 years? He’s been working as a lobbyist, yeah, he’s been working as a lobbyist and selling influence around Washington.
via Mitt Romney: Newt Gingrich is a ‘failed leader,’ ‘disgrace’ – Reid J. Epstein – POLITICO.com.

To be clear, Newt Gingrich is not a saint and as Geller put it, “He is a son-of-a-bitch, but he’s our Son-of-a-bitch.” I know that personally I would rather vote for someone like Newt and hold my nose, than to vote for some idiot racist Mormon who worked for a Latin-American financed company that acted as corporate raiders. I am sorry, but that is simply Anti-American; the very idea that an American would sit at a table with Latin Americans to devise a plan to destroy American businesses is absolutely asinine and for this Mitt Romney should be held accountable. However, because Fox News and others are in the tank for that creep, you will not hear a word about it and that my friends is the tragic thing about corporate media.

So, yes, you can put me in the “anyone but Mitt Romney” category.

Zach Edwards loses his job

As he should….

Remember Zack Edwards, the guy arrested for scamming? Well, he’s unemployed.

Jeff Link, president of Link Strategies, confirmed Saturday that Edwards no longer works for the company.
“I am greatly disturbed by the charge brought against Zach, and understand the pending legal action will run its course,” Link said.
He added that within hours “of learning of this situation, I met with Zach and notified him he was no longer employed with Link Strategies effective immediately. After gathering further information it is clear the incident involved in the allegation was related to a personal action taken by Zach and unrelated to his work with Link Strategies. “
Link also said his firm “holds itself to a high bar of ethics and professionalism, and this type of activity is not acceptable and will not be tolerated.”
via Political consultants quickly fire arrested man | The Des Moines Register | DesMoinesRegister.com.

Way I see it, anyone stupid enough to pull off a bone-headed stunt like this; should be unemployed and remain unemployed for a very long time. Hopefully, the justice system runs its course and the only kind of job this guy will be maintaining is the “pivot man” in a circle jerk. (Yeah, I know, it’s nasty, but I needed to make my point in a blunt way…)

Others: The Iowa Republican

Fed official in AZ to plead fifth on “furious”

This ought to be really interesting, as this plays out.

Via Fox News:

The chief of the Criminal Division of the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Arizona is refusing to testify before Congress regarding Operation Fast and Furious, the federal gun-running scandal that sent U.S. weapons to Mexico.
Patrick J. Cunningham informed the House Oversight Committee late Thursday through his attorney that he will use the Fifth Amendment protection.

The real interesting part of this story, is right here:

The letter from Cunningham’s Washington DC attorney stunned congressional staff. Last week, Cunningham, the second highest ranking U.S. Attorney in Arizona, was scheduled to appear before Issa‘s committee voluntarily. Then, he declined and Issa issued a subpoena.
Cunningham is represented by Tobin Romero of Williams and Connolly who is a specialist in white collar crime. In the letter, he suggests witnesses from the Department of Justice in Washington, who have spoken in support of Attorney General Eric Holder, are wrong or lying.
“Department of Justice officials have reported to the Committee that my client relayed inaccurate information to the Department upon which it relied in preparing its initial response to Congress. If, as you claim, Department officials have blamed my client, they have blamed him unfairly,” the letter to Issa says.
Romero claims Cunningham did nothing wrong and acted in good faith, but the Department of Justice in Washington is making him the fall guy, claiming he failed to accurately provide the Oversight Committee with information on the execution of Fast and Furious.
“To avoid needless preparation by the Committee and its staff for a deposition next week, I am writing to advise you that my client is going to assert his constitutional privilege not to be compelled to be a witness against himself.” Romero told Issa.

Hmmmmmmmmm….. Thinking Obviously, this guy is trying to cover his own backside; and it could be that Holder and his cohorts are looking for a fall guy, and this guy is not interested in being that fall guy.

As I wrote last night; this is not what Obama’s supporters voted for in 2008. I am hoping that they do see what they were sold, and what they ultimately ended up with, this, was not what Obama campaigned for, that is for sure; this continuing story is proof of that. However, as long as the media and the Democratic Party professional liars continue to spin and cover; this is what you will get — corruption. It is the Chicago way. Big Grin

Update: Ed Morrissey, of whom I tipped off to this story, but didn’t get credit 🙄 — has some very interesting analysis on this story too and adds:

One point is pretty clear, though. Officials at the DoJ involved in this operation are fearing criminal prosecution, which means that this scandal just went prime time.

Indeed.

Update #2 Others: Power Line, Big Government, Wake up America, PJ Media, The Volokh Conspiracy and The Lonely Conservative

Obama to Left: You are not going to like this budget

This is not too shocking:

Via The Hill:

Top White House officials are warning liberal and labor leaders to brace themselves for President Obama’s budget proposal.
Gene Sperling, director of the National Economic Council, sought in meetings last week to lift the left’s gloom about Washington’s crackdown on spending by promising that the president this year will focus on job creation rather than deficit cutting.
Obama staffers sought to present their budget plan as a glass half full. According to sources familiar with the briefings, they promised that the president will focus on jobs and the economy, instead of deficit-cutting, which dominated last year’s debate on Capitol Hill.
Obama has signaled in recent weeks that he plans to run a populist reelection campaign. He will need to keep liberal activist and labor groups — important parts of the Democratic base — energized for his strategy to work.
In his first three years, Obama had a free hand to suggest spending levels for government programs in his annual budget blueprint. But that is not the case this year because the administration is constrained by the budget deal reached in August to raise the debt limit.
He must stick to the $1.047 trillion spending cap he agreed to with GOP leaders, which means he will call for less discretionary spending than he did last year.

I agree with William Teach, it will never, in a million year pass a Democrat-controlled Congress. I can also tell you this, if President Obama tries to push this through, he support base on the left will dry up and dry up badly. Which for those of us, who want that idiot out of the White House; is a very good thing.

Either way, it should be very interesting to watch. Popcorn anyone? 😉

Two Instances of Republicans kissing up to black voters

Both of these idiots must be really desperate. 🙄

Instance one, Newt Gingrich sucks up to a black Church in SC:

GOP presidential candidate Newt Gingrich faced a round of tough questions in a campaign event before an African-American church in South Carolina on Saturday.
Gingrich spoke with members of the Jones Memorial A.M.E. Zion Church in Columbia, S.C. for an hour according to media reports.
Many of the questions focused on a statement from the former House Speaker in December that “really poor children” have bad work habits, a remark which attracted criticism from civil rights groups.
“Really poor children in really poor neighborhoods have no habits of working and have nobody around them who works, so they literally have no habit of showing up on Monday,” Gingrich had said at a campaign event.

Since when does a white man, running as a Republican go down to SC and grovel before a bunch of blacks, who will most likely not vote for him anyhow? This reeks of nothing more than USDA choice desperation. I personally do not believe that Newt owes these idiots a thing at all. Gingrich spoke the truth, and if they do not like it — screw em. 😡

Instance number two, Mitt Romney is trying to buy the black vote in SC, I guess:

SUMTER, S.C. — Amid shaking hands and signing campaign posters, Mitt Romney did something he has never done before on the ropeline: He took out his wallet and handed a wad of cash to a woman waiting to shake his hand.
The woman, 55-year-old Ruth Williams, says she has been following the Romney campaign since he arrived in the state on Jan. 11, when she said she received a message from God to track him down.
“I was on the highway praying and said, ‘God just show me how to get [my] lights on,’ and I pulled up to a stop sign and his bus was there,” said Williams, who has been unemployed since last October. “And then God said, ‘Follow the bus,’ and I followed the bus to the airport.”
According to Williams, she followed the campaign bus to the Columbia airport on Wednesday, the same day Romney was arriving from New Hampshire. When Romney wasn’t on the bus, aides told her to go to the rally scheduled in Columbia later that day. When she showed up, Romney found her to say hello and pulled over South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley to say “hello” too.
“He was kind to me and he made Gov. Haley come see about me,” Williams said. “He stopped doing everything.”

I have a shiny twenty-dollar bill that says that the only thing this woman was thinking is, “I found me a stupid honky that will give me money!” Nice going Mittens. Try to buy the black vote; modern-day slavery, all that is. I figure Mittens does not own a plantation for her to work on and that stuff is illegal now, so he figures he will just buy her vote. 🙄 Smart, real smart Mittens.

In short: We….are….so…..screwed. 🙁

What’s next? Perry allows some black man to wash his car? 🙄

Others: Michelle Malkin, Hot Air, The Strata-Sphere, Outside the Beltway, Mediaite, Taylor Marsh, Washington Post, The Lonely Conservative, The Hinterland Gazette and CNN — CNN, The Politico and The Hinterland Gazette

Cross-Posted to Alexandria

Speaking of Israel and not real smart

Man, Israel must not be feeling the whole idea of, “we need to be careful, we do not have a friend in the White House,” at all.

The Story via the WSJ:

WASHINGTON—U.S. defense leaders are increasingly concerned that Israel is preparing to take military action against Iran, over U.S. objections, and have stepped up contingency planning to safeguard U.S. facilities in the region in case of a conflict.
Iranians on Friday carried the flag-draped coffin of Mostafa Ahmadi Roshan, a scientist working in Iran’s nuclear sector assassinated in Tehran.
President Barack Obama, Defense Secretary Leon Panetta and other top officials have delivered a string of private messages to Israeli leaders warning about the dire consequences of a strike. The U.S. wants Israel to give more time for the effects of sanctions and other measures intended to force Iran to abandon its perceived efforts to build nuclear weapons.
Stepping up the pressure, Mr. Obama spoke by telephone on Thursday with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, and U.S. Gen. Martin Dempsey, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, will meet with Israeli military officials in Tel Aviv next week.
The high-stakes planning and diplomacy comes as U.S. officials warn Tehran, including through what administration officials described Friday as direct messages to Iran’s leaders, against provocative actions.

Again, I am sure some will disagree; but this just does not strike me as being overly smart. At least, not right now. I would be able to understand, if there was a Republican in the White House; but there is not, and Democrats abandoned Israel years ago. Choose wisely Israel — choose very wisely.

Five European Nations to Be Downgraded by S&P

The fallout from the housing market bust here in America continues:

The Story:

Standard & Poor’s will cut the credit ratings of Italy, Spain and Portugal by two notches and downgrade France and Austria by one notch, a French newspaper said Friday, without citing its sources.
The newspaper, Les Echos, said that S&P would spare Germany, the Netherlands, Finland and Luxembourg in its long-awaited adjustment of euro zone sovereign ratings.
It said the announcement would come at around 4:30 pm ET, after the US stock market has closed.
“Remain alert tonight when U.S. markets close,” one euro zone source told Reuters.
US stocks slumped in reaction, though were well off their lows, while European shares closed lower.
In December, S&P placed the ratings of 15 euro zone countries on credit watch negative— including those of top-rated Germany and France, the region’s two biggest economies—and said “systemic stresses” were building up as credit conditions tighten in the 17-nation bloc.
Since then, the European Central Bank has flooded the banking system with cheap three-year money to avert a credit crunch. At the time, the U.S.-based ratings agency said it could also downgrade the euro zone’s current bailout fund, the EFSF.
Five European Nations to Be Downgraded by S&P: Report – Business News – CNBC.

This is what happens when progressives game a system and it comes all crashing down around them. Now you would think that they would learn from this little idiotic mistake; well, you would be wrong. They honestly believe the way to recover from this, is by spending their way out of a recession. Idiots, all of them. 🙄

Hannity to Perry: You sound like the #OWS crowd!

I have to hand it to Hannity, when he is right, he is right. I wrote the same thing. Which means I actually agree with Sean Hannity! Horrors! 😯

Video: (Via Mediaite) (H/T to HotAir Headlines)

Money quote:

Perry began the segment attacking President Obama, but Hannity quickly shifted gears to the “very harsh words” Perry has had for Romney. “It almost sounds like Occupy Wall Street,” he noted, “it doesn’t sound like someone who is governing Texas as a conservative.”
“There is a real difference between venture capitalism and vulture capitalism,” Perry replied, adding that “venture capitalism we like; vulture capitalism, no.” He justified his attacks saying that “the fact of the matter is he’s going to have to face up to this at some time or another.” Hannity wasn’t satisfied with this answer, asking Perry whether he was saying “that Mitt Romney is a vulture capitalist, that he is unethical.” Perry specified that he thought what happened with two specific companies bought by Bain was “irresponsible,” and that “the folks in South Carolina agree with that.” Hannity replied that it was still “as severe as they can get” as far as attacks go, though Perry insisted there were places where Bain had “destroyed people’s lives.

Rick Perry, making the Democrats arguments for them. Nice Ricky….real nice… 🙄

Obama’s World? — Fines for Bio fuel that does not exist is stupid, says… The New York Times?!?!

When the Obama lead Government loses the New York Times, something is horribly wrong:

WASHINGTON — When the companies that supply motor fuel close the books on 2011, they will pay about $6.8 million in penalties to the Treasury because they failed to mix a special type of biofuel into their gasoline and diesel as required by law.
But there was none to be had. Outside a handful of laboratories and workshops, the ingredient, cellulosic biofuel, does not exist.
In 2012, the oil companies expect to pay even higher penalties for failing to blend in the fuel, which is made from wood chips or the inedible parts of plants like corncobs. Refiners were required to blend 6.6 million gallons into gasoline and diesel in 2011 and face a quota of 8.65 million gallons this year.
“It belies logic,” Charles T. Drevna, the president of the National Petrochemicals and Refiners Association, said of the 2011 quota. And raising the quota for 2012 when there is no production makes even less sense, he said.
Penalizing the fuel suppliers demonstrates what happens when the federal government really, really wants something that technology is not ready to provide. In fact, while it may seem harsh that the Environmental Protection Agency is penalizing them for failing to do the impossible, the agency is being lenient by the standards of the law, the 2007 Energy Independence and Security Act.
The law, aimed at reducing the nation’s greenhouse gas emissions, its reliance on oil imported from hostile places and the export of dollars to pay for it, includes provisions to increase the efficiency of vehicles as well as incorporate renewable energy sources into gasoline and diesel.
It requires the use of three alternative fuels: car and truck fuel made from cellulose, diesel fuel made from biomass and fuel made from biological materials but with a 50 percent reduction in greenhouse gases. Only the cellulosic fuel is commercially unavailable. As for meeting the quotas in the other categories, the refiners will not close their books until February and are not sure what will happen.
The goal set by the law for vehicle fuel from cellulose was 250 million gallons for 2011 and 500 million gallons for 2012. (These are small numbers relative to the American fuel market; the E.P.A. estimates that gasoline sales in 2012 will amount to about 135 billion gallons, and highway diesel, about 51 billion gallons.)
Even advocates of renewable fuel acknowledge that the refiners are at least partly correct in complaining about the penalties — Via NYT: Companies Face Fines for Not Using Unavailable Biofuel – NYTimes.com

It is very obvious that the attempt to inject politics into our economy has failed. This means vote different in 2012.

Others: National Review, The Enterprise Blog, Weasel Zippers, The Volokh Conspiracy, Doug Ross and The Jawa Report