Archive for the ‘Politics’ Category
House panel wants $5.3B more for weapons
The extra funds they want include money to:
- Keep Block 30 Global Hawks in service
- Keep C-27J in service
- Install back-up oxygen system on F-22
- Continue C-130 avionics modernization
- 10 extra new UH-60 Black Hawks
- 3 extra new UH-72 Lakotas
- Additional PAC-3 Patriot missiles and launchers
- Keep the M1 tank production line open
- Upgrade M2 Bradleys
- Modernize National Guard Humvees
- 11 extra new F/A-18 Super Hornets
- 1 extra new V-22 Osprey
- 7 extra new Navy/Marine helicopters
- 1 extra new DDG 51 destroyer
- Keep 3 CGs from early retirement and upgrade them for BMD
- 5 extra C-130Js
- 12 extra new MQ-9 Reapers
- $1 billion extra for additional equipment reset
It also cuts over $528 million from F-35 procurement because of unjustified cost growth and delays.
Repeat: The Cleveland 5, the geniuses who tried to blow up a bridge for the 99%, are all Occupiers
ABC News didn’t mention the Occupy movement at all. The USA Today says that they’re anarchists who just wanted to “use the cover of the Occupy Wall Street movement.”
Why didn’t we hear about how the nutjobs crapping in peoples’ front yards during the Tea Party rallies were “just using the Tea Party for cover”? Oh, that’s right. That was during Occupy protests.
Well, none of the reported rapes during Tea Party rallies were blown off as criminals using the rallies to launch attacks of opportunity. Oh, that’s right. That was during the Occupy protests, too.
And I don’t think I heard about how the people tearing up Seattle on May Day during Tea Party rallies were not affiliated with the Tea Party but just using the rallies as cover. Oh, that’s right. Occupy protests again.
Says a commenter on the Daily Caller:
The problem that the Occupy movement has is that 95% of its members make the other 5% look bad.
Meanwhile, seen on Uncle:
So yesterday, OWS tore up a couple of cities, sent fake anthrax to banks, and tried to blow up a bridge… I for one can’t wait for the media expose about racists in the Tea Party.
All via Instapundit.
I know that there are those in the Occupy movement and many among their sympathizers that are not anarchist sons of bitches intent on destroying America. My suggestion for them is to get the hell as far from the Occupiers as they can. They have lost control of their movement.
The thugs and criminals and would-be tyrants have taken over a semi-socialist movement. Like usual.
It’s important to note the anniversary of the raid that killed Osama bin Laden, and it’s important to give credit where credit is due. But this whole narrative about how President Obama somehow stood out from the pack by ordering the raid and that others, particularly Mitt Romney, would not have done the same mystifies Murdoc.
Osama bin Laden was a bad guy. One of the baddest of the bad. Nearly everyone everywhere agreed. He was held up as the poster boy of what the forces of freedom were fighting against. Regardless of their political persuasion or position on the War on Terror or opinion about regime change in Iraq, all US politicians supported the effort to defeat and capture or kill bin Laden.
When the Taliban was overthrown, opponents of President Bush criticized him for letting Osama bin Laden escape. When the campaign in Iraq was being launched and fought and wound down, opponents of President Bush criticized him for diverting resources from the “real war,” the one in Afghanistan against Osama bin Laden and Al Qaeda. When the attempt to build a nation in Afghanistan began to degenerate into the quagmire that it was almost certainly destined to become, the fact that Osama bin Laden was still at large was held up as a symbol of the futility of the war against terror. When terror attacks continued, it was always noted that, while Al Qaeda had been scattered and weakened, they were still a troubling organization and that their spiritual leader was still out there somewhere, lurking in the shadows.
For ten years after 9/11, countless hours had been spent by countless people in countless organizations trying to track down Osama bin Laden and bring him to justice. The combined efforts of international military, intelligence, and law enforcement agencies had continuously struck out against the number one target in the world.
And when a solid lead was finally found, it was some sort of “gutsy call” for President Obama to order the raid.
As if anyone else would have made a different call.
Faith in science? Why skepticism is rising
Study
suggests that it’s the increasing use of science as ammunition for big-government schemes that has led to more skepticism.
Murdoc thinks that the methods used in environmental scaremongering (especially Global Warming) have pretty much torpedoed any hope that a rational scientific approach to the issue is possible.
Meanwhile: EPA Backpedals on Fracking Contamination
The Environmental Protection Agency has dropped its claim that an energy company contaminated drinking water in Texas, the third time in recent months that the agency has backtracked on high-profile local allegations linking natural-gas drilling and water pollution.
Gallup: Americans Favor Keystone XL Pipeline
A solid majority of Americans think the U.S. government should approve of building the Keystone XL pipeline, while 29% think it should not. Republicans are almost twice as likely as Democrats to want the government to approve the oil pipeline. About half of independents also approve…
The pipeline would travel through the Midwest and the South, and Americans in those two regions are the most likely to approve of the project. Nearly 7 in 10 Midwesterners want the government to approve the building of the pipeline and 61% of those in the South do as well…
Americans who say they are very closely following news about the Keystone XL pipeline overwhelmingly think the government should approve the building of it, 78% to 22%. About a quarter of those who are not following news of it closely don’t have an opinion on the issue. But among those who do, more think the government should approve (44%) than disapprove (29%) it.
It’s almost like those opposing it are in the minority.
Via Instapundit.
Anyone who’s worried about possible drug gang-related violence in Mexico just needs to take 25 Secret Service agents with when they go on spring break vacations. Like Malia Obama.
And don’t worry. The White House will try to cover it up.
We are paying for this. Tell everyone.
Via Instapundit.
Drug runners would cut across Mexican Highway 2 through Organ Pipe’s dirt roads in a car and then quickly hop onto U.S. Highway 85, which shoots up to Phoenix or Tucson. The vehicles blazed more than 200 miles of unauthorized roads through the park, and rangers found themselves in dangerous, high-speed chases nearly every day. An $18 million, 23-mile vehicle fence put up after Eggle’s murder by the Department of the Interior cut down on this vehicle traffic. Now, cartels have had to get smarter, sometimes cutting into the fence, removing it, driving through, and then putting it back together again. Drug runners also started coming more on foot, dropping their packages in designated spots on the highway for someone else to pick up.
So first, it’s clear that the fence helped. All these people against fences keep trying to argue that putting up fences won’t make a difference. Which is pretty stupid.
Still, Murdoc would argue for a second fence a hundred yards inside the first one, with a ten foot ditch between them. He’d also shoot any living thing that was spotted between the two fences, but that’s just him.
For what it’s worth, National Park Rangers should not be tasked with this. I’d say that National Guard troops should be guarding the nation. With crew-served weaponry and liberal ROE.
County Official Caught Speeding, Gets Off With Warning
A county official driving a county government issued vehicle was arrested after being clocked for allegedly going more than 100 miles an hour in a 55 mile an hour zone.
Prince George’s County police pulled County Councilwoman Karen Toles over along the Capital Beltway near Branch Avenue last week.
Tax dollars bought the vehicle and paid the councilwoman to speed. They paid the officer to let her get away with it.
The penalty: Fined $90 for an improper lane change.
Murdoc’s proposed penalty: Fire Karen Toles, fire the officer who stopped her, and demote officer’s direct superior.
Via Instapundit.
Tea Party and OWS Protest Side-By-Side Against Obama in San Francisco
The unthinkable finally happened last night in San Francisco: the Tea Party shared a protest with the Occupiers, both groups angry with the same person.
And who was this unifier, the only man who can bridge the divide and bring together all sides of the political spectrum? Why, President Obama, of course.
Via Instapundit.
New LCS named for Gabrielle Giffords
In yet another break with tradition, Navy Secretary Ray Mabus announced Friday that a new Littoral Combat Ship would be named for Gabrielle Giffords, the Arizona congresswoman who survived a January 2011 assassination attempt.
“The selection of Gabrielle Giffords, designated LCS 10, honors the former Congresswoman from Tucson, Arizona, who is known for supporting the military and veterans, advocating for renewable energy and championing border security,” the Navy said in a statement accompanying the announcement.
No disrespect intended, but what sense does that make?
Naming of Navy ships has gone way downhill, and the fact that there are so darn few of them coupled with the fact that a lot of them seem to be getting substandard names means that a lot of good traditional names are going to go unused in order to suck up to someone politically.
LCS 10 is one of the General Dynamics trimaran designs.
