The Remarkable Rise of Jan Brewer

By J. R. Dunn

One oddity about the Arizona illegals controversy is how little fallout, positive or negative, has touched the politician who set it off: Governor Jan Brewer.

As women have moved into the forefront of conservative politics, they have become targets for serious assaults from the left. The treatment they receive is far worse than that given male politicians of the same order, as we have clearly seen with Sarah Palin and Michele Bachmann. Families, looks, personality, grooming — every last element of their lives and persons becomes fodder for some of the trashiest elements of the contemporary political scene. No insult is too low, no attack too foul. The gentleman has truly become an extinct species, at least on the left side of the fence.

But nothing of the sort has happened with Jan Brewer. She has encouraged and put her signature to one of the most controversial laws in recent memory, one that has aroused open accusations of Nazism and led to boycotts, media condemnation, and lawsuits. It is a bill that is rapidly setting the grounds of debate for the upcoming midterms, and not at all in the left’s favor. And yet Governor Brewer — much to her own relief, I’m sure — has not yet become a target in the same way as Palin and Bachmann.

At the same time, she has not received the recognition she deserves, either. Brewer is a serious conservative, and one who, unlike many careerists who talk the talk but skitter into the shadows whenever anything more concrete is required, actually is doing things, throwing down the gauntlet not only as regards illegal immigration, but also firearms rights, deficit spending, and most recently, the PC stranglehold on public education. Governor Brewer has, in a matter of weeks, gone from being the accidental governor of a second-tier state to standing as an exemplar of the activist conservative politician.

Perhaps no greater irony in a story full of ironies lies in the fact that Brewer was born in Hollywood, California in 1944. Her father, a civilian employee of the Navy who worked as a supervisor at a Nevada munitions depot, was forced to retire for health reasons due to exposure to chemicals. The family returned to California, where her father died only a year later.

Brewer moved to Arizona after her marriage to Dr. John Brewer. She became involved in politics through a route not unusual for women: concern over her children’s education. Disgusted by what she saw at the school board meetings, Brewer decided to run for a seat on the board in the upcoming election. But when a legislative seat opened up, she ran for that instead, winning the election and taking office in 1983.

Brewer served as a representative for three years before moving on to the state senate, where she served from 1987 to 1996. She was Majority Whip from 1993 to 1996.

Brewer was a conservative reformer of the type that has grown common since the Reagan era, helping to craft and pass laws involving tax relief, budget reform, truth in sentencing, and charter schools. She was the sponsor for the first Living Will statute passed in the U.S.

From 1997 to 2002, Brewer served as chairman of the Maricopa County Board of Supervisors. Maricopa County, which includes Phoenix and Scottsdale, is the fourth-most populous county in the country, with 3 million-plus residents (some of them are even legal). At the time, it was also one of the most ill-run. When Brewer took office, Maricopa was caught in a near-Greek debt spiral, having borrowed $165 million simply to maintain adequate cash flow. Five years later, Brewer had transformed Maricopa into one of the most financially stable counties in the country. Governing magazine went so far as to rate Maricopa as “one of the two best managed large counties in the nation.”

Brewer was elected Secretary of State in 2002. She has never once enjoyed a free ride while campaigning — all of her elections have been contested. Her major order of business on taking office was to deal with a chronic state budget deficit. She updated laws and procedures, removed outdated publication requirements, and trimmed work assignments and eliminated state overtime. Brewer was easily reelected in 2006.

In 2009 she succeeded to the governorship under Arizona’s unusual succession law (the state has no lieutenant governor) after Janet Napolitano was called on to save the country from the militias. Her tenure as governor has been nothing less than spectacular. Brewer expanded firearm rights by signing a gun law allowing the carriage of unloaded guns. She repealed Napolitano’s domestic partner dependents bill, which awarded gay partnerships the same privileges as married couples. Her 2011 budget cut state participation in such federally-sponsored health-care giveaway programs as S-CHIP (State Children’s Health Insurance Program, also known as KidsCare, a kind of kindergarten ObamaCare) and AHCCCS, (Arizona Health Care Cost Containment System) — the state’s version of Medicaid.       

But Brewer’s major impact involves illegal immigration. Arizona is not only a frontline state, but also the current flashpoint of the illegals crisis. Since enforcement in urban areas has improved over the past decade, illegals have been forced to attempt crossings in more remote areas, with Arizona the target of choice. Deterioration of conditions along the border, marked by shootings, assaults, theft, and vandalism, has become insupportable. The Arizona border is today’s equivalent of the urban “combat zones” of the ’70s and ’80s, where, thanks to ideology and lack of will, crime was allowed to run rampant. Politicians on the national level — even native son John McCain — chose to turn their backs. But as the man said, all politics is local. The Arizona border crisis is local politics with a national impact.

Governor Brewer is the first politician to take the type of action the public has demanded. Senate Bill 1070 is no radical measure, as lefties across North America (not to mention within the U.N.) have been quick to assert. It is in large part a reinforcement of current federal immigration law. At the same time, it is not merely a ritual effort passed to placate the public —  many police and sheriff’s departments in Arizona and elsewhere (at least, those not run by Joe Arpaio) have chosen to avoid trouble by ignoring illegals under the pretense that it’s a federal matter. Bill 1070 assures that such departments will actually stir themselves to enforce the law.

The bill is already having a dramatic impact, despite the fact that it does not go effect until the end of July. Illegals are fleeing the state for more comfortable milieus. Politicians across the west are calling for similar legislation. The left is throwing fits, always a useful development. The messiah himself has been forced to lower his gaze from the vision of national redemption to the mundane matter of border security. The issue will be central to the midterm elections, adding even more heat to already hissing tea kettles.

Not bad for a politician that most observers considered a placeholder who would be out of office in short order.

Governor Brewer is running for a full term this fall. There’s little doubt that she will get it. She is the rare politician who has seldom made a false move (apart from being an Abba fan, which we can forgive this one time. Fleetwood Mac would be a deal-breaker, though.). Even a successful effort to raise the state sales tax through Proposition 100 is excusable as a one-time means of closing the state’s budget gap. Brewer has promised that the new tax will be temporary and considering her record as a fiscal hawk, there is no reason to doubt it. Much more to the point is Arizona’s decision, announced last week, to join twenty other states in the lawsuit against the implementation of ObamaCare.

Feminism has backfired on the left. The heralded “Year of the Woman” (was it 1992?) was supposed to introduce a new breed of female politician that would inevitably steer the country in a progressive direction. Instead, the best and most effective female politicians have been conservative, many entering the public sphere after raising families, clear evidence that the traditional way of life is in no way as stultifying as the radfems insisted. Palin, Bachmann, and now Brewer are setting the political standard for millennial America. We are fortunate to have them.

Now if only we can get some of the males to try whatever it is they’re drinking.

J.R. Dunn is consulting editor of American Thinker and editor of the forthcoming Military Thinker.

One Nation against the Obama’s Chicago Machine

by Cedra Crenshaw

Last week, I reported how the Chicago Democrat machine had injected itself into neighboring Will County in attempt to knock me on the ballot. My candidacy against a legacy politician, the specially appointed AJ Wilhelmi, was too much of a threat to the status quo in Illinois. Today, the Will County Board of Elections is expected to decide whether I can stay on the ballot; whether the voters of my district will face a competition or a coronation this November.

A few short weeks ago, I was a former accountant, auditor, and stay at home mom.  The trifecta of mortgage, marriage, and motherhood catapulted me into the conservative I am today.  A few Republican reformers noticed my local activism.  They asked me to fill an empty ballot spot against a Democratic incumbent State Senator who is a rubber stamp for the same Chicago Machine that put Obama in the White House.

Despite the fact that the district is 2-1 Democratic, my opponent’s party has hired one of the premier elections attorneys to attempt to knock me off the ballot on technicalities.  These same technicalities have been rejected in court wherever they have been tried.  This attorney has worked for the likes of Obama, Bill Clinton, Rahm Emanuel, etc. The Democratic board deciding the case has simply stalled.  They are attempting to run out the clock.  They have waited six weeks to merely decide if my opponent’s case has any merit.  For six weeks our campaign has been in limbo not knowing how they are going to decide on two simple points.  Time is of the essence in a campaign.  While I always knew that politics was an ugly sport, I was not prepared for the lengths the Democrats would go through to try and sabotage my campaign.  I was One Mom versus the Chicago Machine!

I say, “was” because that has all changed.

I am truly humbled by the ground swell of support, since my article was published.  This started with other moms, volunteers, and frustrated citizens.  The local tea parties have organized several protests.  National radio shows, blogs, and political news sites started covering the story and now we are receiving support from around the nation.  This campaign has become One Nation Against The Chicago Machine!

People have died defending the right to vote.  Soldiers are dying right now is the sands of Iraq and the hills of Afghanistan.  Yet the Chicago Machine would rather engage in tyranny, than have to win an election based on their record!  If we do not protect our freedoms at home, why are we dying for them abroad?  Rests assure America, we will not back down.  With your help, we will defeat the Chicago Machine in the 43rd Illinois State Senate district, and in Washington DC.

LOL: Despite Promises Of Cooperation, Most Of Israel Maintains That Obama Is “Still Evil”

July 7th, 2010 Posted By Pat Dollard.

Jerusalem Post:

US President Barack Obama’s attempts to portray himself as pro-Israel in his press conference with Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu at the White House on Tuesday failed to persuade right-wing MKs, who warned that Obama is “still evil.”

The MKs questioned the president’s motives and suggested that he was putting on a show for American Jews ahead of the crucial November mid-term elections, in which the Democrats may lose control of Congress.

“He doesn’t sound evil now because he needs Jewish votes and money,” said Deputy Negev and Galilee Development Minister Ayoub Kara.

“But I won’t forget the pressure he put on Netanyahu and the stress I saw in the prime minister the last time he came back from Washington. He is acting the way he is for political reasons.

I hope he will stay this way but I doubt it, because he hasn’t changed.”

Likud MK Danny Danon said he believes Obama learned his lesson that pressuring Israel does not work. He said he hopes Obama will also learn that the Likud would not allow Netanyahu to continue the 10- month construction moratorium in Judea and Samaria beyond September.

“Obama restrained himself and didn’t attack our prime minister this time, but he still set unrealistic expectations for the peace process,” Danon said.

“He is wrong if he thinks the freeze must continue for direct talks to begin. He instead must pressure the Palestinians to come to the negotiating table, regardless of the freeze. He sounds nice now but after November, I am worried that he will sound different.”

National Union MK Arye Eldad, who heads the Knesset’s Land of Israel caucus, said Obama was delaying pressure on Israel for tactical reasons. He said Obama realized that Netanyahu would not agree now to extend the freeze, so the president will instead try to initiate direct talks with the Palestinians in order to put Netanyahu in a position in September where he would not be able to resume construction.

“Obama doesn’t sound wicked now, but he was merely buying time,” Eldad said.

“Obama is betting on getting the entire pot. Our job in the [caucus] will be to put pressure on Netanyahu so he won’t make concessions that threaten Israel’s future.”

Meretz leader Haim Oron said he was not impressed by the gestures made by either leader. He expressed hope that Obama would not stop pressuring Netanyahu.

“Bibi is trying to escape the peace process,” Oron said. “If he succeeds, it is bad for Israel.

I hope they put advancing peace above the goal of just getting along.”

Sarah may not be a viable presidential candidate in 2012, but she’s a gutsy lady with a lot of common sense . . . . . .THE MOST INTERESTING PART IS AT THE END!!!!!

Sarah may not be a viable presidential candidate in 2012, but she’s a gutsy lady with a lot of common sense . . . . . .

THE MOST INTERESTING PART IS AT THE END!!!!!   From the canadian free press. Not published by our media READ TO THE VERY END!   VERY ENLIGHTENING!!!  AND VERY DISTURBING!!!  By Dewie Whetsell,  Alaskan Fisherman.  As posted in comments on Greta’s article referencing the MOVEON ad about Sarah Palin. The last 45 of my 66 years I’ve spent in a commercial fishing town in Alaska .  I understand Alaska politics but never understood national politics well until this last year.  Here’s the breaking point: Neither side of the Palin controversy gets it.  It’s not about persona, style, rhetoric, it’s about doing things.  Even Palin supporters never mention the things that I’m about to mention here. 1. Democrats forget when Palin was the Darling of the Democrats, because as soon as Palin took the Governor’s office away from a fellow Republican and tough SOB, Frank Murkowski, she tore into the Republican’s “Corrupt Bastards Club” (CBC) and sent them packing. Many of them are now residing in State housing and wearing orange jump suits The Democrats reacted by skipping around the yard, throwing confetti and singing, “la la la la” (well, you know how they are). Name another governor in this country that has ever done anything similar.  2. Now with the CBC gone, there were fewer Alaskan politicians to protect the huge, giant oil companies here. So she constructed and enacted a new system of splitting the oil profits called “ACES.” Exxon (the biggest corporation in the world) protested and Sarah told them, “don’t let the door hit you in the stern on your way out.” They stayed, and Alaska residents went from being merely wealthy to being filthy rich. Of course, the other huge international oil companies meekly fell in line. Again, give me the name of any other governor in the country that has done anything similar. 3. The other thing she did when she walked into the governor’s office is she got the list of State requests for federal funding for projects, known as “pork.” She went through the list, took 85% of the m and placed them in the “when-hell-freezes-over” stack. She let locals know that if we need something built, we’ll pay for it ourselves. Maybe she figured she could use the money she got from selling the previous governor’s jet because it was extravagant.     Maybe she could use the money she saved by dismissing the governor’s cook (remarking that she could cook for her own family), giving back the State vehicle issued to her, maintaining that she already had a car, and dismissing her State provided security force (never mentioning – I imagine – that she’s packing heat herself). I’m still waiting to hear the names of those other governors. 4. Now, even with her much-ridiculed “gosh and golly” mannerism, she also managed to put together a totally new approach to getting a natural gas pipeline built which will be the biggest private construction project in the history of North America. No one else could do it although they tried. If that doesn’t impress you, then you’re trying too hard to be unimpressed while watching her do things like this while baking up a batch of brownies with her other hand. 5. For 30 years, Exxon held a lease to do exploratory drilling at a place called Point Thompson. They made excuses the entire time why they couldn’t start drilling. In truth they were holding it like an investment. No governor for 30 years could make them get started. Then, she told them she was revoking their lease and kicking them out. They protested and threatened court action. She shrugged and reminded them that she knew the way to the court house.   Alaska won again. 6. President Obama wants the nation to be on 25% renewable resources for electricity by 2025. Sarah went to the legislature and submitted her plan for Alaska to be at 50% renewables by 2025. We are already at 25%. I can give you more specifics about things done, as opposed to style and persona. Everybody wants to be cool, sound cool, look cool. But that’s just a cover-up. I’m still waiting to hear from liberals the names of other governors who can match what mine has done in two and a half years. I won’t be holding my breath. By the way, she was content to return to AK after the national election and go to work, but the haters wouldn’t let her. Now these adolescent screechers are obviously not scuba divers. And no one ever told them what happens when you continually jab and pester a barracuda. Without warning, it will spin around and tear your face off. Shoulda known better. You have just read the truth about Sarah Palin that sends the media, along with the democrat party, into a wild uncontrolled frenzy to discredit her. I guess they are only interested in skirt chasers, dishonesty, immoral people, liars, womanizers, murderers, and bitter ex-presidents’ wives. So “You go, Girl.” I only wish the men in Washington had your guts, determination, honesty, and morals.      I rest my case. Only FOOLS listen to the biased media.   If you’ve read this far ………………………………………..  First Lady Michelle Obama’s Servant List and Pay Scale First Lady Requires More Than Twenty Attendants 1. $172,2000 – Sher, Susan (Chief Of Staff)  2. $140,000 – Frye, Jocelyn C. (Deputy Assistant to the President and Director of Policy And Projects For The First Lady) 3. $113,000 – Rogers, Desiree G.  (Special Assistant to the President and White House Social Secretary)  4. $102,000 – Johnston, Camille Y. (Special Assistant to the President and Director of Communications for the First Lady)  5. $100,000 – Winter, Melissa E. (Special Assistant to the President and Deputy Chief Of Staff to the First Lady)  6. $90,000 –   Medina  , David S. (Deputy Chief Of Staff to the First Lady)  7. $84,000 – Lelyveld, Catherine M. (Director and Press Secretary to the First Lady)  8. $75,000 – Starkey, Frances M. (Director of Scheduling and Advance for the First Lady)  9. $70,000 – Sanders, Trooper (Deputy Director of Policy and Projects for the First Lady)  10. $65,000 – Burnough, Erinn J. (Deputy Director and Deputy Social Secretary)  11. $64,000 – Reinstein, Joseph B. (Deputy Director and Deputy Social Secretary)  12. $62,000 – Goodman, Jennifer R. (Deputy Director of Scheduling and Events Coordinator For The First Lady)  13. $60,000 – Fitts, Alan O. (Deputy Dir ector of Advance and Trip Director for the First Lady)  14. $57,500 – Lewis, Dana M. (Special Assistant and Personal Aide to the First Lady)  15. $52,500 – Mustaphi, Semonti M. (Associate Director and Deputy Press Secretary to The First Lady)  16. $50,000 – Jarvis, Kristen E. (Special=2 0Assistant for Scheduling and Traveling Aide to The First Lady)  17. $45,000 – Lechtenberg, Tyler A. (Associate Director of Correspondence For The First Lady)  18. $43,000 – Tubman, Samantha (Deputy Associate Director, Social Office)  19. $40,000 – Boswell, Joseph J. (Executive Assistant to the Chief Of Staff to the First Lady)  20. $36,000 – Armbruster, Sally M. (Staff Assistant to the Social Secretary)  21. $35,000 – Bookey, Natalie (Staff Assistant)  22. $35,000 – Jackson, Deilia A. (Deputy Associate Director of Correspondence for the First Lady)     (This is community organizing at it’s finest.) There has NEVER been anyone in the White House at any time who has created such an army of staffers whose sole duties are the facilitation of the First Lady’s social life. One wonders why she needs so much help, at taxpayer expense, when even Hillary, only had three; Jackie Kennedy one; Laura Bushone; and prior to Mamie Eisenhower social help came from the President’s own pocket.  Note: This does not include makeup artist Ingrid Grimes-Miles, 49, and “First Hairstylist” Johnny Wright, 31, both of whom traveled aboard Air Force One to Europe  .  FRIENDS…..THESE SALARIES ADD UP TO SIX MILLION, THREE HUNDRED SIXTY FOUR THOUSAND DOLLARS ($6,364,000) FOR THE 4 YEARS OF OFFICE?????   AND WE ARE IN A RECESSION?????  WELL….MOST OF US ARE.  I GUESS IT’S OK TO SPEND WILDLY WHEN IT’S NOT YOUR OWN MONEY?????  Copyright 2009 Canada FreePress.Com   Yes, I know, The Canadian Free Press has to publish this because the USA  media is too scared they might be considered racist.  Sorry USA !

Open-borders DOJ vs. America

By Michelle Malkin  •  July 7, 2010 09:43 AM

My column today looks at one of the champions of illegal immigration inside the DOJ: Civil Rights Division chief/assistant attorney general Thomas E. Perez. Related read: Doug Ross spotlights another member of the Sue Arizona team – Tony West. Know your enemies.

Open-borders DOJ vs. America
by Michelle Malkin
Creators Syndicate
Copyright 2010

The Obama administration’s lawsuit against Arizona, officially unveiled on Tuesday, is an affront to all law-abiding Americans. It is a threatening salvo aimed at all local, county, or state governments that dare to take care control of the immigration chaos in their own backyards. And it is being driven by open-borders extremists who have dedicated their political careers to subverting homeland security policies in the name of compassion and diversity.

The Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division, headed by Assistant Attorney General Thomas E. Perez, took the lead in prepping the legal brief against Arizona. The son of immigrants from the Dominican Republic, Perez is a far Left lawyer and activist who worked for the late mass illegal alien amnesty champion Teddy Kennedy and served in the Clinton administration DOJ. While holding down a key government position there in which he was entrusted to abide by the rule of law, Perez volunteered for Casa de Maryland – a notorious illegal alien advocacy group funded through a combination of taxpayer-subsidized grants and radical liberal philanthropy, including billionaire George Soros’s Open Society Institute (not to mention more than $1 million showered on the group by Venezuelan thug Hugo Chavez’s regime-owned oil company, CITGO).

Perez rose from Casa de Maryland volunteer to president of the group’s board of directors. Under the guise of enhancing the “multicultural” experience, he crusaded for an ever-expanding set of illegal alien
benefits from in-state tuition discounts for illegal alien students to driver’s licenses. Casa de Maryland opposes enforcement of deportation orders, has protested post-9/11 coordination of local, state, and
national criminal databases, and produced a “know your rights” propaganda pamphlet for illegal alien depicting federal immigration agents as armed bullies making babies cry.

In 2006, Casa de Maryland threatened to protest at the schools of children whose parents belonged to the pro-immigration enforcement group, the Minutemen – and then headed into the Montgomery County,
Md., public schools to recruit junior amnesty protesters who were offered school credits for traveling with Casa de Maryland to march on Washington.

As a former Maryland resident, I got to see Perez’s militant friends and colleagues in action. I watched Casa de Maryland president Gustavo Torres (who met with President Obama last week) complain that motor
vehicle administration officials have “absolutely no right to ask for people’s Social Security number or immigration status to get a driver’s license.” I stood among Casa de Maryland grievance-mongers
who shouted “No license, no justice! No justice, no peace!” while playing the race card against naturalized Americans and legal immigrants who opposed the illegal alien welfare state.

Perez himself derided secure-borders citizen activists as “xenophobes,” but denied painting the grass-roots immigration enforcement movement as racist. Questioned by GOP Sen. Jeff Sessions during his Obama DOJ confirmation hearing last year about the illegal alien rights guide produced by Casa de Maryland, Perez grudgingly stated that “the Civil Rights Division must not act in contravention to valid enforcement actions of our federal immigration laws.”

But “act[ing] in contravention” is exactly, of course, what the Civil Rights Division is doing in spearheading the challenge to Arizona’s valid enforcement actions of our federal immigration law.

Perez, Attorney General Eric Holder, and the rest of the open-borders DOJ team have invoked “preemption” doctrine based on the U.S. Constitution’s supremacy clause to attack Arizona’s anti-illegal
immigration measure and oppose local and state enforcement of federal immigration laws. Never mind that the Arizona law was drafted scrupulously to comply with all federal statutes and the Constitution.

You gotta love Obama’s fair-weather friends of the Constitution. When a state acts to do the job the feds won’t do, Obama’s legal eagles run to the Founding Fathers for protection. When, on the other hand,
left-wing cities across the country pass illegal alien sanctuary policies that flagrantly defy national immigration laws and hamper cross-jurisdiction enforcement, the newfound federal preemption advocates are nowhere in sight.

The Obama DOJ’s lawsuit against Arizona is sabotage of the people’s will and the government’s fundamental responsibility to provide for the common defense.

No border enforcement, no security. No security,
no peace.

Morning Bell: The Rationer-in-Chief

Morning Bell: The Rationer-in-Chief

Posted By Conn Carroll On July 7, 2010 @ 9:29 am In Health Care | No Comments

When Linda O’Boyle was diagnosed with bowel cancer, her doctors told her she could boost her chances of survival by adding the drug cetuximab to her regimen. But the rationing body for Britain’s National Health Service, the National Institute of Health and Clinical Excellence (NICE), had previously ruled that the drug was not cost-effective and therefore would not be paid for by the government. So O’Boyle liquidated her savings and paid for the drug herself. But this is not allowed under NHS rules. When government bureaucrats found out that O’Boyle had purchased the drug with her own money, she was denied NHS treatment and died within months ^[1].

Defenders of Britain’s health care rationing system may try to claim that this tragic death is an outlier in an otherwise acceptable government run health care system. They are wrong. It is the point of the system. As socialized medicine and infanticide advocate Peter Singer has argued in The New York Times ^[2], the NICE bureaucrats must ration care or else free government health care would bankrupt the British economy. “NICE had set a general limit of £30,000, or about $49,000, on the cost of extending life for a year,” Singer writes. Following this logic, Singer supported NICE’s decision not to allow British citizens the kidney cancer fighting drug Sutent ^[3]. As a result of this, and many other rationing decisions Britain, has one of the lowest cancer survival rates in the Western world. While 60.3% of men and 61.7% of women in Sweden survive a cancer diagnosis, in Britain the figure ranges between 40.2% to 48.1% for men and 48% to 54.1% for women ^[4]. And NICE’s rationing has not just hit cancer patients. Doctors have warned that patients with terminal illnesses are being made to die prematurely under the NHS rationing scheme ^[5]. And according to the Patients Association ^[6], one million NHS patients have been the victims of appalling care in hospitals across Britain.

Most Americans would find this harrowing. But not President Barack Obama. Yesterday he bypassed the Senate confirmation process and used a recess appointment to install Dr. Donald Berwick to be the administrator of the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS is the agency that runs the Medicare and Medicaid programs). Dr. Berwick said ^[7] of Britain’s health care system: “Cynics beware, I am romantic about the National Health Service; I love it.” And his love for Britain’s health care system is not in spite of its rationing, but because of it ^[8]. In 2009 Dr. Berwick told Biotechnology Healthcare ^[9]: “NICE is extremely effective and a conscientious and valuable knowledge-building system. … The decision is not whether or not we will ration care – the decision is whether we will ration with our eyes open.”

The fact that the White House chose to empower Dr. Berwick by recess appointment is particularly audacious. The recess appointment power was intended to be used for occasions when the Senate is out for moths at a time ^[10]. The Senate is currently out of session for just 11 days. Worse, the Senate majority has never even scheduled a hearing ^[11] so that Dr. Berwick’s rationing views could be given an “open” forum. In fact, Dr. Berwick has not even returned Senators’ written questionnaires ^[11]. The White House defends ^[12] the move by claiming “there’s no time to waste with Washington game-playing.” But then why did the Obama administration wait until April 2010 ^[13], a full 15 months after President Obama was sworn into office, to nominate Dr. Berwick? Is it because they did not want Dr. Berwick’s well known and public support for rationing health care to affect the debate over Obamacare?

In a 2005 interview with Health Affairs ^[14], Dr. Berwick said: “(G)overnment is an extraordinarily important player in the American health care scene, and it has inescapable duties with respect to improvement of care, or we’re not going to get improved care. Government remains a major purchaser. … So as CMS goes and as Medicaid goes, so goes the system.” And that was before Obamacare gave far reaching new powers to government bureaucrats.

In June of 2009, President Obama told ^[15] the American Medical Association that “identifying what works is not about dictating what kind of care should be provided.” Moreover, the president has assured the public time and again that the government will not get between patients and their doctors.  His nomination of Don Berwick for Director of CMS, however, tells a different story ^[8].

Quick Hits:

• Arizona Democrats who have to face voters this year are lining up against the Obama administration’s suit ^[16] aimed at stopping states new immigration enforcement law.
• According to a new study ^[17] by the Federation for American Immigration Reform (FAIR), the cost of harboring illegal immigrants in the United States is a staggering $113 billion a year.
• According to Gallup ^[18] a majority of Americans believe the government’s main focus should be on halting the flow of illegal immigrants coming into the U.S., not developing a plan to deal with those already here.
• The Obama EPA proposed new regulations for coal-burning power plants yesterday that would cost consumers nearly $3 billion ^[19] a year.
• Also according to Gallup ^[20], only 38% of independents approve of the job Barack Obama is doing as president, the first time independent approval of Obama has dropped below 40%.

Immigration Injustice

Immigration Injustice

Posted By B.J. Bethel On July 7, 2010 @ 12:47 am In FrontPage | 15 Comments

To be further disappointed with the leadership in Washington is a daily occurrence, but even the Obama administration’s callous realpolitik with regard to the immigration lawsuit against the state of Arizona sets a new standard.

The Justice Department made the decision Tuesday to file the suit based on several factors; racial profiling, surprisingly, was not among them. The administration claims ^[1] the law hampers the ability of the federal government and federal immigration authorities to perform their duties – a claim that puts into perspective the audacity and twisted vision that now prevail within the administration.

The timing of the suit comes on the heels of Sunday’s Mexican elections, which were marred by violence throughout the country. While drug lords gunned down one candidate for governor in an assassination, another was photographed with a drug kingpin ^[2] in a bit of P.R. usually reserved for the most anarchic of third-world states. Another was arrested for using his influence to protect two drug cartels.

Since the election of Mexican president Felipe Calderon in 2006, over 20,000 deaths have been attributed to the drug war. According to war reporter Michael Yon, this is more than in Thailand, a country in a state of civil war. The Mexican drug war has been bleeding over to the U.S. for years, with an 80-mile stretch of parkland along the border deemed no man’s land.

With such pressing issues to the south, one would think Washington would be in a mode to deal with the problem. Instead, the administration is suing the state of Arizona for enforcing federal laws – laws that the federal government has decided not to enforce on its own accord. This decision has led to a political and social crisis among the border states. Under such circumstances, the government would ordinarily feel compelled to act. That is, if there weren’t electoral needs and identity politics to consider.

By attacking the new immigration law, the administration is flying in the face of a 70-percent approval for the measure, according to most recent polling. The suit comes a week after Labor Secretary Hilda Solis made a taped statement promising fair wages to illegals. This at a time when Americans are struggling through record unemployment and are facing greater tax burdens heading into the next year.

This new suit coincides with the administration’s talk of immigration reform – reform that doesn’t seal the border, or deal with the influx of unskilled migrants overloading civil services, or the deplorable criminal element that is passing in, but of blanket amnesty and no enforcement. Without proper security measures, such reform would cause a catastrophic wave of humanity to overcome the Southwest. Democrats hope this results in a wave at the polls.

The situation in Mexico, as well as the immigration issue, are examples of the new and unenviable position the American electorate finds itself in, where the average private citizen is no longer a constituent, but treated as an adversary by some legislators. The immigration battle is an example of how the designs of the progressive platform aren’t coextensive with the wishes of the average American voter.

Political talk from 2006 until Scott Brown’s staggering senatorial upset was of how the Republican Party had essentially pigeonholed itself geographically. No longer a factor on the coasts, or the Northeast, the Republican Party consisted of middle and rural America in “flyover country,” as the media forewarned. Limiting oneself to such a base was akin to political suicide.

But demographic polarity goes both ways. Sick of high taxes, being demonized in the media, film and television, and of broken promises with Medicare and Social Security, the middle class of the Midwest and South has left the Democratic party in droves. To survive its political death in “flyover country,” Democrats are poised to allow amnesty for millions of illegals to insure the party’s sustainability.

The people most affected by this and stand the most to lose are blue-collar workers, those in construction and in service areas, who routinely have their wages undercut by businesses hiring illegals. These workers were the former base of the Democratic Party. The Democratic strategy is doubly nefarious given that illegals, who can not yet vote, are promised wages and benefits that can not be delivered — not by state governments on the verge of bankruptcy in the west, or by a free market that can’t support such a glut of unskilled labor at a livable wage. To decry these types of politics is to be called a racist, whether referring to the immigration debate, or any of the innumerable issues in Washington DC.

This brand of terse discourse isn’t limited to politicians in the U.S. Mexico has threatened to sue Arizona as well, and drew its own racial implications. While the U.S. has provided an influx of jobs and trade to Mexico through NAFTA, as well as money provided by illegals who send cash back to relatives, Mexican politicians continue to lecture Americans about their own border and immigration policies, despite Mexico’s southern border being nearly militarized. What’s worse, politicians in both parties have acquiesced to this madness through the years. George W. Bush supported amnesty, then attempted through the court to have 50 illegals removed from death row in Texas at the request of former Mexican president Vicente Fox.

The Obama administration’s hand in border security has been unserious at best. The President has pledged just over a 1,000 National Guard troops for border security, without any arresting powers. It is short of the 6,000 delivered by Bush, a number that dwarfed the actual need. Securing the border should be first priority, followed by streamlining legal immigration measures and cleaning up the war-like conditions on the border.

If politicians on either side want to get serious about the Mexican diaspora, they should begin taking the host country to task. Mexico is one of the richest oil countries, yet the government takes over 70-percent of the industry’s profits. Corruption in government exists on all levels. We can offer help, but we should demand that Mexico clean up its mess, and do something to support and employ the lower classes it wishes to push off onto its northern neighbor

NASA logo makeovers: New Arabic Sensitivity Administration

Michelle Malkin 

Lead Story

NASA logo makeovers: New Arabic Sensitivity Administration

By Michelle Malkin  •  July 7, 2010 12:01 AM

MichelleMalkin.com readers have answered the call of duty! Last night, inspired by reader Duke, I put out a call for NASA logo redesign Photoshops to mock Team Obama’s Muslim-pandering makeover of the space program.

Entries are pouring in to my mailbox. Had to share some of the best and most pointed images with you right away. Pick your favorites:

From reader B. at The Snake on the Flag:

From Andrew Thomas at Dark Angel Politics:

From reader Igneus Ferreus, who writes that his design was “inspired by the existing logo, simplified Arabic, and Islamic symbols…For sharp-eyed star gazers (people actually interested in NASA performing scientific study), I have even included a depiction of Mohammad, in an homage to Lars Vilks. [Hint: think of a canine constellation and look to the right].”

Marooned in Marin also had a similar take, as did several other readers. Joel Munn of Washington is Broke offered the Muslim Aeronautics and Space Administration:

And reader Connor offered another star-and-crescent angle:

Another popular theme: Black burqa backgrounds. Sissy Willis’s take:

From reader Fred Fry:

Reader Sam came up with a sharia-compliant shuttle:

Reader Ken added the must-have accessory — the keffiyeh, of course:

J.R. at The Mock Box put Mo on the Moon:

Reader Yo Yo also re-purposed Kurt Westergaard’s Mo cartoon:

From reader @asilisart, a call to prayer:

An intergalactic message from reader Fin:

A related commentary from reader John G. on Obama’s downsizing of the space program: “Space flight on a budget!”

And from reader Paul C., a warm-and-fuzzy Obama Islamicized space logo:

I am sure the Nobel Prize committee is already preparing a science award for President Obama as we speak…

Thanks to all the entrants! No doubt they’ll all be on Janet Napolitano’s unacceptable “controversial opinion” master list before sunrise.

Insurgents Seize Key Towns Around Nogales

July 6th, 2010 Posted By Pat Dollard.

Related: Insurgency Now In US: Mexican Mafia Orders Hit On Arizona Sheriff – With Video

The sooner Petraeus wraps up Afghanistan, the sooner he can lead the invasion of Mexico. As Obama won’t finish his first term, it’ll be soon.

It’s going to become impossible for the US to do anything but seize control of a buffer area in Northern Mexico.

Mexicans are not going to be too happy when they realize the Reconquista has in fact become a New Conquista of Mexican land.

ALTAR, Sonora (AP) – Very few residents dare to drive on one of the roads out of this watering hole for migrants, fearing they will be stopped at gunpoint. They worry they will be told to turn around after their gas tanks are drained or, worse, be kidnapped or killed.

A shootout that left 21 people dead and six wounded on the road last week is the most gruesome sign that a relatively tranquil pocket of northern Mexico quickly is turning into a hotbed of drug-fueled violence on Arizona’s doorstep. The violence in recent months is grist for supporters of the state’s tough new law against illegal immigration. They are eager to portray the border as a lawless battlefield of smugglers both of drugs and humans.

Nogales, the main city in the region, which shares a border with the Arizona city of the same name, has had 131 murders so far this year, nearly surpassing 135 for all of 2009, according to a tally by the newspaper Diario de Sonora. That includes two heads found Thursday stuffed side-by-side between the bars of a cemetery fence.

The carnage still pales compared with other Mexican border cities, most notably Juarez, which lies across from El Paso, which had 2,600 murders last year. But the increase shows that some small cattle-grazing towns near Nogales are in the grip of drug traffickers who terrorize residents.

The violence is concentrated in a few villages in the mountainous desert area of Rio Altar, which, until recently, drew tourists for its handsome churches, its river, a tilapia-filled lake and cooler temperatures. The roads wind through mountains of mesquite trees and saguaro cactus.

That’s where Thursday’s pre-dawn shootout occurred, just 12 miles south of the border, on a deserted stretch between the villages of Tubutama and Saric. Eight vehicles and numerous weapons were found in what authorities described as a confrontation between rival gangs competing for drug and immigration routes into the U.S.

The windows and panels of some vehicles were painted with X’s in white shoe polish, said Fernando Pompa, a police officer in Altar who visited the scene. Bullet casings littered the pavement.

The territory is disputed between Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzman, who heads the Sinaloa cartel, and the Beltran Leyva cartel, whose leader, Arturo Beltran Leyva, was killed in a shootout last December with Mexican marines in Cuernavaca.

Locals trace the wave of violence to the arrest in February of Jose Vazquez Villagrana, nicknamed “El Jaibil,” or “The Wild Boar.” Vazquez, reported to be an ally of Guzman, was captured in nearby Santa Ana.

Many people have fled in the past few months, said one resident whose family has roots in a village near the shootings. He asked that only his first name, Luis, be published because he fears for his safety. His relatives abandoned their homes this spring to join him in a larger city where he lives.

“This began like a cancer in the finger and now it is spreading to other parts of the body,” he said, adding that it seems as if the government has no power to stop it.

Luis said schools closed early this year without explanation. Soft-drink vendors and electricity meter readers refuse to come.

Tubutama, a village of about 1,500 people with no hotel, restaurant or gas station, canceled its annual town fair last month for the first time in memory. The move came after the town’s comptroller and director of public works were murdered.

“If no one puts a stop to this, these will become ghost towns,” said Jose Martin Mayoral, editor of Diario del Desierto, the newspaper in Caborca.

Despite its size, motorists used to pass through Tubutama because it is a hub for local roads. Now they drive longer distances on a toll road.

Altar, a town of about 10,000 people with a yellow-domed Roman Catholic church in its central square, has been spared the violence but is only about 15 miles from Tubutama. The town’s economy was booming a few years ago with taxi drivers, restaurants and lodging houses that catered to migrants preparing to cross the U.S. border illegally in the Arizona desert.

Now, a scarcity of jobs because of the U.S. economic downturn is keeping illegal immigrants away, causing Altar to fall on hard times as well.

Ana Maria Velasquez, a church volunteer, said there used to be 50 candles on an altar to the Virgin of Guadalupe, each left by a migrant as a good-luck ritual before crossing the border. On Sunday, there was only one.

More than 23,000 people have been killed in Mexico’s drug violence since President Felipe Calderon launched an offensive on cartels in 2006.

Santa Cruz County Sheriff Tony Estrada said last week’s shootout unnerved some people in his jurisdiction, which includes Nogales, Ariz.

Estrada believes the violence will continue until one cartel assumes control or the warring factions broker a truce.

“These groups are battling for this area and you know it’s going to continue,” he said. “There’s going to be retaliation for this.”

Not Natural Born — TRUTH MATTERS

Not Natural Born — TRUTH MATTERS

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MwhKuunp8D8&feature=player_embedded

The video starts out with some content from obamasnippets.com, which, of course is contrived. And yet, there seems to be a synthetic truth about what the president says. Is he “natural born” according to the Constitution? No. The requirement is that BOTH parents need to be U. S. Citizens. Two U. S. Citizen parents produce a “natural born” citizen. It’s likely that Mr. Obama was REGISTERED in Hawaii, therefore he has a COLB from Hawaii. The truth may well be he was born in Kenya; that is where we believe his “long-form” birth certificate was issued. Nevertheless, “natural born” indicates, and speaks to the fact that BOTH parents have to be U. S. Citizens. His father WAS NEVER a U. S. Citizen, therefore, Barack Hussein Obama is NOT a “natural born” Citizen of the United States, thus he is in violation of Amendment 14, and Article II, Section 1, Paragraph 5 of the United States Constitution.