Speaking of blowmehards, Democrat Bill Clinton approved a state flag design that carried a reference to the Confederacy

Reported here:

"As a national debate rages over the symbolism of the Confederate flag, some critics of the Clintons have questioned why as governor of Arkansas Bill Clinton approved a state flag design that carried a reference to the Confederacy.

"In 1987, Mr. Clinton signed Act 116 reaffirming a state flag design that included a star symbolizing the state’s membership in the Confederacy. ...

"These days the star – which sits above the word “Arkansas” on the flag – doesn’t seem to stir up much bitterness."

And according to this story, Clinton routinely presided over the celebration of Confederate Flag Day in Arkansas:

'“The blue star above the word “ARKANSAS” is to commemorate the Confederate States of America,” Clinton’s law reads. 

'The Clintons presided over the annual celebration of “Confederate Flag Day” while they occupied the governor’s mansion, which continues to this day.'

HuffPo here says Clinton never objected to Confederate Flag Day while he was governor:

'Arkansas observes a Confederate Flag Day, which is celebrated together with Arkansas Confederate History and Heritage Month and Confederate Memorial Day. Per state code, it is observed on the Saturday immediately preceding Easter Sunday. In annual gatherings outside the Arkansas Statehouse, participants can "attend and bring examples of the variety of flags used by Arkansas units and of the Confederate government and its army during the War," according to the Log Cabin Democrat, an Arkansas newspaper.

'Clinton did not publicly object to Confederate Flag Day during his time as governor. The holiday is still being observed . . ..'

Damon Linker wants to replace the electorate which likes a vulgar blowhard like Donald Trump

You know, with an electorate like the one that put these two together in the White House.

Here.

Does Maryland still spurn the Northern scum?

James Ryder Randall, Poet Laureate of the Lost Cause

Last stanza of "My Maryland":

I hear the distant thunder-hum,

Maryland!

The Old Line's bugle, fife, and drum,

Maryland!

She is not dead, nor deaf, nor dumb-

Huzza! she spurns the Northern scum!

She breathes! she burns! she'll come! she'll come!

Maryland! My Maryland!

Democrat Fritz Hollings' flag comes down, officially ending racism everywhere in one fell swoop, this morning at 10:00, EDT

In 1962, during Hollings' term as Governor, the Confederate battle flag was flown above the South Carolina Statehouse underneath the U.S. and state flags where it would remain for thirty-eight years. In 2000 the state legislature voted to move the flag from above the Statehouse to a Confederate soldiers' monument in front of the building.

President Trump's Air Force One

So what Bernard-Henri Levy and the EU really want is to tax the bejeebers out of Greek capital and the Greek church

BHL with celebrated child rapist

Venting his deconstructionist spleen, here:

Mr. Tsipras might defend his approach to the referendum by asserting that his goal was not so much to sound out the people as to reinforce his position in the confrontation with Greece’s creditors. But what is the justification for that confrontation? That creditors had the audacity to demand progress toward the rule of law and social justice, as well as efforts to tame Greece’s shipping magnates and its tax-avoiding clergy?

Evidently plank eight of Syriza's 40-point program is just window-dressing to BHL and isn't evidence that the goals of the EU and of Syriza in this regard are quite the same:

"8. Abolition of financial privileges for the Church and shipbuilding industry."

The French Jew and self-identified leftist and critic of the left has a passel of divergent opinions and loyalties, including to Roman Polanski, Dominique Strauss-Kahn and Nicolas Sarkozy, but Tsipras' real offense to Levy is that, so far, he has been insufficiently anti-Christian.

Republicans ruined the Republican brand long before Donald Trump came along

Read my lips, no new taxes

Compromise is not a bad word

I have abandoned free market principles

We have nothing to fear from a President Obama

ObamaCare's not worth getting angry about

The difference between 1776 and 2015

In 1776 Christians resolved to take up arms against their king, but in 2015 that is unthinkable to them.

Guess who wins?

Obama fights ideology with "better" ideology, just like Bush

G. W. B. Obama

And that's why Obama is a failure, too.

Here:

"Ideologies are not defeated with guns, they are defeated by better ideas and more attractive and more compelling vision."

Flashback to 2011, here, when we noted that George W. Bush said the very same thing that Barack Obama is saying today:

"The long-term solution is to promote a better ideology, which is freedom. Freedom is universal," Bush said.

---------------------------------------------

The key to surviving in the future, of course, is to escape the prison of ideology and the "-isms" of what we used to group under the heading of "idealism". Neither president has ever had so much as a clue about what is and is not universal. 

Mitt Romney makes the severe error, calls illegal immigrants criticized by Trump "Mexican-Americans"

Here:

"I think he [Trump] made a severe error in saying what he did about Mexican-Americans, and it was unfortunate."

----------------------------------

Trump didn't say anything about Mexican-Americans.

George Will calls Donald Trump a one-man Todd Akin

And you thought Todd Akin was just one man.

Here:

"The debate gets hijacked [by Trump], the process gets hijacked [by Trump], and at the end of the day he is a one-man Todd Akin."

----------------------------------------------

Makes you wonder if George Will believes Donald Trump's business losses since announcing his candidacy are legitimate, if you know what I mean.

Time to take down the American flag: 9 killed in Chicago in July 4th violence

Hillary prefers pie on the fourth of July . . .

. . . to answering questions.

Gennifer Flowers wouldn't be surprised.

Scott Walker "hires" the wrong guy

Brad Dayspring.

Story here.

The Greek referendum was close in only one place: Conservative Sparta

The vote was less close in Kastoria in the north, with "No" winning 52%-47%.

You'll notice The Guardian got the graphic at the top and the bottom totally backwards, which isn't the first time on this story. Someone reported yesterday, I believe, that Varoufakis would resign if the vote were NO when in actuality he said he would resign if Greece voted Yes.

The artists are smoking something at The Grauniad. 

Jonathan Turley call your office, Sally Kohn has already decided Christians deserve no dignity

Professor of Law Jonathan Turley, here:

'But if we are to protect the dignity of all citizens, we need to be careful that dignity is not simply a new way for the majority to decide who belongs and who does not in our “Nation’s social order.”'

Lesbian activist Sally Kohn, here:

'Will anti-gay Christians be politically and socially ostracized? I sure hope so. Just as those orthodox Christians who still believe in strict, traditional gender roles have been increasingly mocked as absurd.'

Sally Kohn affects traditionalism by residing in Brooklyn, New York, with a partner Sarah Hansen and "their" daughter Willa.

Hey Steve Chapman: Crossing over illegally ALREADY MAKES YOU A CRIMINAL, not a "newcomer"

Free to love whoever you want, and live wherever you want as well.

Leave it to another fanatical open-borders libertarian to ignore the lawlessness of illegal border crossing.

Namely Steve Chapman of The Chicago Tribune, here:

"In the first place, these newcomers are generally less prone to break the law than native Americans."

Commenter Crazy Hungarian is having none of it:

"[I]f you are honest about it, those that crossed our borders illegally show a crime rate of 100% starting with the illegal trespassing into our country."

Republican politicians Mitt Romney, Jeb Bush and Marco Rubio are attacking the truth about illegal immigrants

So says Matthew Boyle for Breitbart, here:

What’s odd about this situation is that objective evidence proves that Trump is correct, and there seems to be a politically correct machine pushing all these politicians to attack the truth. For instance, in May, 27-year-old Ramiro Ajualip, an illegal alien, “was charged with first-degree rape and first-degree sodomy, which are both Class A felonies in Alabama,” according to the Daily Caller.

Just a month ago, according to the Dallas Morning News, El Salvadoran illegal immigrant Mauricio Hernandez was sentenced to 50 years in prison after raping a 13-year-old. ...

Then there is Bernabe Flores, an illegal alien from Mexico, who admitted earlier this year in a New York court that he raped a 12-year-old girl. ...

[Ann] Coulter’s new book, Adios America, cites several examples as well of illegal aliens enaging in rapes and murders.

Donald Trump says murder of beautiful American woman by an illegal was totally preventable

Donald Trump, quoted here:

"This senseless and totally preventable act of violence committed by an illegal immigrant is yet another example of why we must secure our border immediately," Trump said in a statement.

"This is an absolutely disgraceful situation and I am the only one that can fix it. Nobody else has the guts to even talk about it," the billionaire developer and television personality said.

Hillary the Mendacious altered her emails, making everything she has turned over suspect

Kim Strassel for The Wall Street Journal, here:

Nothing Mrs. Clinton has supplied to the State Department can now be trusted as legitimate. The real bombshell news was the State Department’s admission that, in at least six instances, the Clinton team altered the emails before handing them over. Sentences or entire paragraphs—which, by the way, were work-related—were removed. State was able to confirm this because it could double-check against Mr. Blumenthal’s documents.

If you think the prisons are overcrowded, there's an easy solution!

47.7% of the prison population,

721,200 souls in 2012, is there for committing violent crimes.

Hillary Clinton's greatest achievement: Creating the birther movement

Flashback to 2011 and Politico, here:

Obama’s controversial but emphatically Christian pastor emerged as a campaign issue and the belief that he was a Muslim seemed to lose traction.

Then, as Obama marched toward the presidency, a new suggestion emerged: That he was not eligible to serve.

That theory first emerged in the spring of 2008, as Clinton supporters circulated an anonymous email questioning Obama’s citizenship.

“Barack Obama’s mother was living in Kenya with his Arab-African father late in her pregnancy. She was not allowed to travel by plane then, so Barack Obama was born there and his mother then took him to Hawaii to register his birth,” asserted one chain email that surfaced on the urban legend site Snopes.com in April 2008.

Macy's drops Trump's menswear line over comments, keeps line from convicted felon Martha Stewart

New York Magazine's "definitive American woman of our time" in 1995 was convicted of four felonies in 2004. She spent five months in a Federal prison camp and five months in home confinement.

It's a good thing.

June 2015 temperature anomaly for Grand Rapids, MI: 1.7 degrees F below normal

The total cumulative anomaly for 2015 rises to 19.7 degrees F below normal through June, from 18 degrees below normal through May.

Obama lives in his own world, but Chris Christie lives in the long-dead NE liberal Republican world of compromise

Here:

“If Washington and Jefferson and Adams had believed compromise is a dirty word, we’d still be under the crown of England,” he said, promising to work with Democrats who had good ideas to fix America.

Last time I checked, Jefferson and Adams supported the General, George Washington, whom they appointed to SHOOT at the crown's representatives in America, the Redcoats, not to compromise with them.

You can blame The Greatest Generation for same sex marriage

From Joel Miller, here:

'The values changed all the way back in the forties and fifties. In that sense, the gay marriage battle was already over when Eisenhower was in the White House. How so?

'[Historian Alan] Petigny describes what he calls the Permissive Turn, a liberalization of values that happened following World War II. Some of it came down to a “renunciation of renunciation.” The war had demanded a great deal of austerity and self-sacrifice. But with Germany and Japan subdued, it was time to live it up. Americans plowed their prosperity into material self-gratification. But there was more.

'At the same time, the culture witnessed a shift in the way we viewed human nature. We swapped the traditional American view, grounded in a certain pessimism inherited from the Protestant understanding of original sin, for the newly refurbished and Americanized psychotherapy. ... Religion, morality, even reality were now questions of self-fulfillment—making truth subjective and traditional truth claims irrelevant and meaningless.'

President signs Trade Promotion Authority (Fast Track) knocked off the news by Supreme Court decisions

The Senate passed TPA last Wednesday, on the 24th, 60-38, but the next day ObamaCare was upheld by the Supremes and the following day Same Sex Marriage, both of which sensational developments obliterated the trade story from the news cycle. The trade vote story from last Wednesday is here. The roll call vote is here. Once again just five Republicans in the Senate voted against the job-destroying measure: Collins, Cruz, Paul, Sessions and Shelby. The same five who voted against bringing the measure to the floor.

The signing story from today is here.

They do what they want to do. We have no say in the matter. But if we vote for any of the principals, we are complicit in the deed.

The country is shell-shocked by it all, walking about in a daze, the part of it that cares anyway.

Obama has had a huge week, winning everything consequential, with Republican help in the Congress and the Court, meaning Speaker Boehner, Majority Leader McConnell and Reagan appointee Justice Kennedy.

The only thing Obama lost and the people won was the Supremes' rebuke of the EPA on coal. Your electric bill will go up later rather than sooner.

The last days of this administration are dark indeed.

John Kasich is a cheese-eating surrender monkey just like Paul Ryan

Trump: NBC stands behind lyin' Brian Williams, but not behind me

From the story here:

After NBCUniversal severed its relationships with Donald Trump on Monday, the billionaire businessman and presidential candidate responded by invoking suspended NBC anchorman Brian Williams and threatening to meet NBC in court. ...

"If NBC is so weak and so foolish to not understand the serious illegal immigration problem in the United States, coupled with the horrendous and unfair trade deals we are making with Mexico, then their contract violating closure of Miss Universe/Miss USA will be determined in court. Furthermore, they will stand behind lying Brian Williams, but won't stand behind people that tell it like it is, as unpleasant as that may be."

ObamaCare is a problem created by Congress: Congress should have fixed it, not the Supremes

Deb Saunders, here:

'As a conservative, I think it serves the country best if elected officials, not judges, repair what's wrong in Obamacare. Former Texas Gov. Rick Perry, a 2016 GOP presidential hopeful, hit the right note when he said he did not agree with the ruling. "It was never up to the Supreme Court to save us from Obamacare," he said in a statement issued Thursday.

'Because the Democratic Congress wrote a heavy-handed provision that the Obama White House determined it was best to ignore, the Supreme Court got handed a live grenade. With all the Democratic justices on board, Roberts jumped on the grenade -- leading with a bogus argument.'

Obstruction of justice: Hillary Clinton caught lying about turning over "all" emails to State Department

From The New York Times report, here:

The State Department said on Thursday that 15 emails sent or received by Hillary Rodham Clinton were missing from records that she has turned over, raising new questions about whether she deleted work-related emails from the private account she used exclusively while in office. ... State Department officials then crosschecked the emails from Mr. Blumenthal with the ones Mrs. Clinton had handed over and discovered that she had not provided nine of them and portions of six others. Nick Merrill, a spokesman for Mrs. Clinton, who is running for president, said that she had given the State Department “over 55,000 pages of materials,” including “all emails in her possession from Mr. Blumenthal.”

The Cars crash: You're all I've got tonight!

Senate Republicans reach peak stupidity, receive praise from liberals Bob Dole and Trent Lott

Run for the barf bag. Americans elected Republicans to stop Obama, but instead they are helping him, and liberal Republicans Bob Dole and Trent Lott are tickled pink that Mitch McConnell is making it happen.

Here.

Trump understands that JOBS are Americans' main concern

So says John Crudele, here:

'I think Donald Trump — if he can stop himself from saying crazy things about his wealth, immigration and such — will be a very important factor in the 2016 election. Why? Because he understands that the main concern in this country today is the economy — which is another way of saying “jobs.” That was the chief thing on people’s minds in 2012 and during the last congressional election in 2014. It still is today and will be throughout the primaries and right up to the 2016 election. “I will be the greatest job president God ever created,” Trump said last week. People are worried about immigration because the newcomers will take the scant jobs available. China is bothersome because its manufacturing might is sapping jobs from the US. One group in this country doesn’t like another group because we are all fighting for the same jobs. Jobs, jobs, jobs!'

Ann Coulter: No greater army ever took the field than the Confederate Army

Ann Coulter, here:

"The Confederate flag we're talking about never flew over an official Confederate building. It was a battle flag. It is to honor Robert E. Lee. And anyone who knows the first thing about military history, knows that there is no greater army that ever took the field than the Confederate Army."

Retire your own damn flag: This one stands for murdering the unborn and for faggotry

Just 5 Senate Republicans voted against advancing TPA to a vote, which succeeded 60-37

Collins of Maine

Cruz of Texas

Paul of Kentucky

Sessions of Alabama

Shelby of Alabama

Corker of Tennessee and Lee of Utah didn't bother to vote.

Make no mistake: 47 Republicans made this happen, with the cooperation of 13 Democrats.

Did Americans elect Republicans to help Obama, or stop him? If it were to help him, wouldn't it have been easier to elect Democrats?

The Roll Call is here.

Neanderthal US General Stephen Wilson should know about raising rhetoric, compares Vladimir Putin to Adolph Hitler

You should be very afraid when a man with his finger on the nuclear trigger like General Wilson exposes himself as a demonizing thinker. The man is at the top of US Global Air Strike Command but has the intellectual subtlety of an anvil.

Here:

Lieutenant General Stephen Wilson, commander of US Global Air Strike Command, said: “I don’t think we’ve ever seen so much power put in one person in Russia, and some of the things happening there are troubling and concerning for everybody.” He added: “[They’ve] annexed a country, changing international borders, raising rhetoric unlike we’ve heard since the cold war times, and so lots of people are trying to figure out what is the strategic intent of Russia. Some of the actions by Russia recently we haven’t seen since the 1930s, when whole countries were annexed and borders were changed by decree.”

Europe's being invaded by Muslims and all you care about is Kim Kardashian's big butt

Taki here:

"First we had the suicide of two world wars, then a de-Christianized Europe led by the crooks in Brussels conning everyone about the need for cheap labor and letting in millions upon millions of Muslims. Charles Martel stopped them in Tours, Don John in Lepanto, and John Sobieski at the Vienna gates, but now they’re in and they’re staying. ... The fourth and final African invasion is taking place as I write this, but most of the media are busy covering Jay Z, the Kardashians, and the odd white policeman who handcuffs a black criminal."

Republican establishment already wants to exclude Trump from televised debates because he naturally overshadows everyone else

featured in the story

The Wall Street Journal eagerly reports here, deliberately featuring a ridiculous photograph of Trump:

Some in the GOP are counseling that Mr. Trump be kept out of candidate forums and debates. “His involvement in any televised debate will be damaging,” said Matt Mackowiak, a Republican strategist based in Texas. “It is my sincere hope that he is blocked from participating.” “He’s a very toxic addition to the field,’’ said Katie Packer Gage, deputy campaign manager of Mitt Romney’s 2012 presidential campaign. Mr. Trump so far has been invited to a number of GOP candidate forums, including one sponsored by the conservative website RedState slated for early August in Atlanta. Erick Erickson, the editor in chief of RedState, said he had concerns about including Mr. Trump but extended an invitation. “We invited him yesterday,” Mr. Erickson said. “I like him. … There is a level of the conservative base who like him. My concern is that I don’t want the other candidates to be overshadowed by Trump.”

Desperate Hillary Clinton blames church violence on Donald Trump, must be really afraid of his candidacy

ABCNews' story is here.

Minus TAA, Fastrack Trade Authority passes the House 218-208 thanks to 28 Democrats

The measure faces an uncertain future in the Senate, where TAA is critical for Democrat support.

Just 50 Republicans voted against the so-called free-trade measure both times (the latest Roll Call vote is here), vs. 54 previously (Gosar, Jolly and Young of Alaska didn't vote this time, and Yoho switched to "Aye", while previous "Aye" votes Byrne, Rodney Davis, and Kelly of Mississippi didn't vote this time):

Aderholt Amash Brat Bridenstine Brooks (AL) Buck Burgess Clawson (FL) Collins (GA) Collins (NY) Cook Donovan Duncan (SC) Duncan (TN) Farenthold Fleming Garrett

Gibson Gohmert Griffith Harris Hunter Jenkins (WV) Jones Jordan Joyce Katko Labrador LoBiondo Lummis MacArthur Massie McKinley Meadows Mooney (WV) Mulvaney

Nugent Palmer Pearce Perry Poliquin Posey Rohrabacher Rothfus Russell Smith (NJ) Webster (FL) Westmoreland Wittman Zeldin

P. J. O'Rourke is a know nothing, about the dress of Donald Trump and of George Washington

Here:

Show me one candidate who has the dignity of Washington . . ..

[T]ypical of modern Americans is Trump’s bad taste. ... He puts his own individual stamp on gaucherie. And we like it. We’re a country that cherishes being individuals as much as we cherish being gauche.

Trump’s suits have a cut and sheen as if they came from the trunk sale of a visiting Bombay tailor staying in a cheap hotel in Trump’s native Queens and taking a nip between fittings. Trump wears neckties in Outer Borough colors. And, Donald, the end of your necktie belongs up around your belt buckle, not between your knees and your nuts. Trump’s haircut makes Kim Jong Un laugh.

-------------------------------------------------------------------

Washington abandoned the parodied powdered wig of custom and tied and powdered his own long hair, and to his first inauguration as president he deliberately wore a suit made from brown broadcloth from Connecticut instead of the formal black imported from Britain in order to drive home his Americanism.

To say one likes Trump's gaucherie is completely disingenuous while pivoting to correct it. It shows that P. J. O'Rourke's libertarianism is short on the Americanism and long on the snobbery of cosmopolitan liberalism, the readership of The Daily Beast.

The Wall Street Journal decides to ignore Donald Trump on trade

That way, maybe he'll just go away.

Here, where the easy mark is Huckabee:

"Candidates who oppose free trade don’t belong in the Oval Office."

Donald Trump when no one is watching

Erick Erickson, here:

There is one more thing I want you to know about Donald Trump. I’ve met him and interviewed him before. When the camera was not on and the interview was not going, he was not The Donald. He was a guy who cared deeply for his staff and the people who merely walked in the front door of his building. I want you to know that the Donald Trump I’ve seen in private is not the Donald Trump you see on stage because I think we are not going to see that Trump. It’s our loss and it will be his own loss. The person, a separate entity from the personality, is a good man.

The reason I don’t much care for Rick Santorum is that I’ve seen him, off camera and behind the scenes when no one was supposed to be watching, behave like a spoiled and entitled rich kid snapping at people in a lower position than himself when he did not need to. It’s also why I have a soft spot for Trump. From the same vantage point, I’ve seen him behave kindly to people far lower on the rung of life than him when he did not have to. Character when the camera isn’t rolling counts in my book.

National Review libertarian wastes no time expressing his fear of what Donald Trump will do to the 2016 race

Kevin Williamson, here, goes first in the politics of personal destruction (a National Review specialty):

"Witless ape rides escalator down"

"the ridiculous buffoon with the worst taste since Caligula"

"grunting like a baboon" (I'll leave out what he said about his wife)

"Trump is an ass of exceptionally intense asininity"

"a billionaire dope"

"The problem with messiah complexes is that there’s no way to know whether you are going to rise on the third day unless somebody crucifies you. Trump has announced, and I say we get started on that." 

-----------------------------------------------------------------

Get started? There's more?

Hillary Clinton was for the TransPacificPartnership only 45 times before she was against it

John F. Kerry was a piker by comparison.

CNN reports:

'But as members of the Obama administration can attest, Clinton was one of the leading drivers of the TPP when Secretary of State. Here are 45 instances when she approvingly invoked the trade bill about which she is now expressing concerns:'

The rest is here.

Welcome to the new age of belief: credo ergo sum

I believe therefore I am . . .

a woman

an African-American

skinny and conservative!

part Cherokee

a climate expert

a success!

Trump pulls the trigger, runs for president as a Republican

[H]e said he'll be "the greatest jobs-president that God ever created" . . ..

He said he will: "repeal and replace the Big Lie, Obamacare";

"build a great, great wall on our southern border, and I will have Mexico pay for that wall" ("nobody builds walls better than me");

and "find the General Patton or … General MacArthur" in the U.S. military to fight the Islamic State.

More here.

Glengariff poll in Michigan obviously skewed by opinions of Lansing elites, designed to get the results it wanted

The socially liberal results of the Glengariff poll reported here were skewed by polling "Lansing leaders" and "Michigan residents". What counts is voters, and a decent sample size of same.

From the story:

"The 600-person representative sample of state voters, Lansing leaders and Michigan residents found that participants have different views on gay rights."

Parsing the meaning of Libya email: Oh we thought you just wanted the BENGHAZI email, you want the Libya too?

Hillary better hope the State Dept. has all the same email Sidney Blumenthal has just turned over.

From the Politico story here:

'House GOP Benghazi investigators have discovered additional Libya communications between Sidney Blumenthal and former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, a congressional source told POLITICO — suggesting that either the State Department or the 2016 Democratic presidential contender withheld correspondence the panel had requested. ...

'At the crux of the back and fourth is whether the committee specifically asked State for all Clinton’s Libya emails or only Benghazi-related emails. State says the panel initially asked for Benghazi material and only recently expanded that request to include all correspondence on the Middle Eastern nation. But the initial requests for information from Clinton did include all Libya correspondence, according to the congressional source.'

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Obstructing justice. The Hillary gift that keeps on . . . er . . . not giving.

British newspaper and David Cameron government try to smear Edward Snowden

The Guardian reports on the story, here:

'Downing Street and the Home Office are being challenged to answer in public claims that Russia and China have broken into the secret cache of Edward Snowden files and that British agents have had to be withdrawn from live operations as a consequence.

'The reports first appeared in the Sunday Times, which quoted anonymous senior officials in No 10, the Home Office and security services. The BBC also quoted an anonymous senior government source, who said agents had to be moved because Moscow gained access to classified information that reveals how they operate. ...

'[Eric King of Privacy International] added that if Downing Street and the Home Office believed that Russia and China had gained access to the Snowden documents, then why was the government not putting this out through official channels.

'He added: “Given Snowden is facing espionage charges in the US, you would have thought the British government would have provided them with this information.”'

The Guardian destroyed the Snowden hard drives in front of British security in July 2013 after the British government threatened to shut down the newspaper, as reported here:

'New video footage has been released for the first time of the moment Guardian editors destroyed computers used to store top-secret documents leaked by the NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden.

'Under the watchful gaze of two technicians from the British government spy agency GCHQ, the journalists took angle-grinders and drills to the internal components, rendering them useless and the information on them obliterated.'

The Guardian acknowledged at the time that the Snowden files exist in other jurisdictions:

'[The Guardian's] Rusbridger told government officials that destruction of the Snowden files would not stop the flow of intelligence-related stories since the documents existed in several jurisdictions. He explained that Glenn Greenwald, the Guardian US columnist who met Snowden in Hong Kong, had leaked material in Rio de Janeiro. There were further copies in America, he said.'

So . . . who in the United States would want the twofer of smearing Snowden by outing British operatives?

The 86 Republicans who voted for TAA/the 54 who voted against TPP: Just five appear in both lists

Aderholt Barletta Barr Barton Benishek Bishop (MI) Blum Bost Boustany Brady (TX) Brooks (IN) Calvert Coffman Cole Comstock Costello (PA) Crenshaw Curbelo (FL) Davis, Rodney Dent Dold Donovan Emmer (MN) Fitzpatrick Fortenberry

Frelinghuysen Graves (MO) Grothman Guinta Guthrie Hanna Herrera Beutler Huizenga (MI) Hurt (VA) Issa Johnson (OH) Jolly Katko Kelly (PA) King (NY) Kinzinger (IL) Kline Luetkemeyer Marino McCarthy McHenry McKinley McMorris Rodgers Meehan Messer Mica Miller (MI) Moolenaar Murphy (PA) Nunes

Paulsen Pitts Reed Reichert Rigell Rogers (AL) Rogers (KY) Rokita Roskam Royce Ryan (WI) Scalise Shimkus Shuster Simpson Stefanik Stivers Thompson (PA) Thornberry Tiberi Trott Turner Upton Valadao Wagner Walberg Walden Walters, Mimi Whitfield Wilson (SC) Young (IA)

The roll call vote for the TAA is here. John Boehner notably voted "No" with Nancy Pelosi and the Democrats to defeat TAA in order to be able to say at election time that he has street-cred as a conservative. Typically the Speaker doesn't vote unless the outcome the Speaker supports is in doubt. This was obviously a throw-away vote for him.

Failing 126-302, the bill was one half of a binary bill passed by the Senate which would have provided assistance to US workers displaced by the trade agreement. Its defeat meant the whole bill including the free trade half of the bill, TPP, would not advance to the president's desk for a signature.

A symbolic vote (roll call here) for the free trade half of the bill, TPP, passed 219-211, with these 54 Republicans voting "No" (note the five in blue, who appeared in both lists and voted in this instance ostensibly for the worker and against free trade):

Aderholt Amash Brat Bridenstine Brooks (AL) Buck Burgess Clawson (FL) Collins (GA) Collins (NY) Cook Donovan Duncan (SC) Duncan (TN) Farenthold Fleming Garrett

Gibson Gohmert Gosar Griffith Harris Hunter Jenkins (WV) Jolly Jones Jordan Joyce Katko Labrador LoBiondo Lummis MacArthur Massie McKinley Meadows Mooney (WV) Mulvaney

Nugent Palmer Pearce Perry Poliquin Posey Rohrabacher Rothfus Russell Smith (NJ) Webster (FL) Westmoreland Wittman Yoho Young (AK) Zeldin

Democrats who voted for TAA and against TPP were similarly few in number, just thirteen: Bass, Carney, Clyburn, Eshoo, Foster, Heck (WA), Hoyer, Israel, Larson (CT), Perlmutter, Price (NC), Richmond, and Smith (WA).

Romney's apt description of Secretary of State Hillary Clinton

"Secretary of Schlep".

Here.

Apparently WaPo doesn't read Foreign Policy.

Completed foreclosures in April 2015 reported by Corelogic still running 90% above normal

The level has not budged much from October 2014 when there were 41,000 completed foreclosures.

Seen here:

There were 40,000 completed foreclosures nationwide in April 2015, down from 50,000 in April 2014. ... 

Completed foreclosures are an indication of the total number of homes actually lost to foreclosure. Since the financial crisis began in September 2008, there have been approximately 5.7 million completed foreclosures across the country, and since homeownership rates peaked in the second quarter of 2004, there have been approximately 7.8 million homes lost to foreclosure. ...

As a basis of comparison, before the decline in the housing market in 2007, completed foreclosures averaged 21,000 per month nationwide between 2000 and 2006.

George Will appears content with judicial tyranny, the price we pay for stymieing the legislative and executive

Here:

With the composition of the Supreme Court likely to change substantially during the next president’s tenure, conservatives must decide: Is majority rule or liberty — these are not synonyms, and the former can menace the latter — America’s fundamental purpose?

A healthy housing market would have 1-2% underwater, but we still have 15% with negative equity

Mostly in the lowest third of valuation.

From the Bloomberg story, here:

"A decade after U.S. home sales peaked, 15.4 percent of owners in the first quarter owed more on their mortgages than their properties were worth, according to a report Friday by Zillow Inc. While that’s down from a high of 31.4 percent in 2012, it’s still alarmingly above the 1 or 2 percent that marks a healthy market, said [Stan] Humphries, the chief economist at the Seattle-based real-estate data provider. Worse yet: The pace of healing is losing steam. ... While 25.5 percent of homes valued in the lowest third are underwater, just 14.1 percent of those in the middle have negative equity. For the top group, the figure is even lower -- 8.3 percent."

Underwater mortgages still number 8 million, down from 25.5 million in 2011

From the story here:

"Nearly eight million borrowers, or 15.4 percent of homeowners with a mortgage, still owe more than their homes are worth, according to Zillow. While the numbers continue to improve, about half of those borrowers owe the bank at least 20 percent more than their homes are worth."

Once conservative National Review magazine is all-in on free trade bill written by the corporate oligarchy

Here:

"Republicans should side with free trade".

Poverty thresholds for 2014

The thresholds are used for statistical purposes in the estimation of the number of people actually in poverty on a yearly basis, while the guidelines are a simplified form used to determine current eligibility for government assistance.

Poverty guidelines for 2015

I just got the call from the fraudsters posing as the IRS trying to shake-down the sheeple

The call originates from Bainbridge Island, Washington, and the number is 206-201-2799.

The voice is female, obviously a computer.

Presidents ranked by average monthly additions to total nonfarm employment in the post war, not seasonally adjusted

Clinton: 235,000

Carter: 215,000

Reagan: 166,000

JFK/LBJ: 164,000

Obama to date: 136,000 (77 months 1-1-09 to 5-1-15)

Nixon/Ford: 115,000

Truman: 111,000 (1949-1952/drops to 87,000 going back to April 1945 when FDR died)

GHW Bush: 49,000

Eisenhower: 34,500

GW Bush: 13,500

John Crudele isn't running for president

But he has some good ideas and some not so good ideas, just like those who are:

"When there are plenty of jobs, immigrants are no longer as unwelcome."

"[A]ll you have to do is change the rules regarding how people can use their trillions in retirement savings, and you’ll give a big boost to the economy that neither spendthrift politicians nor the Federal Reserve can accomplish now."

Read the rest, here.