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Headline News

8 Feb 2010 18:12:09 GMT

World: Aid Groups: Agents Want 'Fees' Before Releasing Haiti Aid
Haiti customs agents told those bringing in the donated goods that if they didn't pay $120 that the aid would be held indefinitely, Brett Furlong, executive pastor of the Cape Christian Fellowship said. The demand came despite a sign at the point of entry stating, no fees for humanitarian aid. "Where there isn't customs before, now there is," Furlong said. "This is the third time this week we've been held."

Government: Obama Invites GOP to Healthcare Summit
President Obama made a dramatic attempt to jump-start the stalled health care debate Sunday, inviting Republicans in Congress to a half-day summit on the subject to be televised live later this month. It also comes just weeks after the president received high marks for engaging the House Republicans in a televised, 90-minute discussion at their retreat in Baltimore.

Fifth Column: New Errors in IPCC Climate Change Report
The United Nations panel on climate change is facing fresh criticism today as new factual errors and poor sources of evidence in its influential report to government leaders are revealed. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change's report is supposed to be the world's most authoritative scientific account of the scale of global warming. But a series of new flaws have destroyed the panel's credibility.

USA: Green Waterless Urinals Fill Chicago City Hall with Stench
There's been a stench coming from the second floor of City Hall -- and it has nothing to do with the steady stream of Chicago aldermen convicted on corruption charges. Waterless urinals installed to promote water conservation in the public men's room outside the Chicago City Council chambers have turned into a stinky mess. The odor got so bad that the "green" urinals are now being ripped out and replaced with the old-fashioned kind at a cost City Hall has refused to disclose.

USA: Power Plant Blast Kills 5 in CT; Investigation Planned
State and federal investigators were expected to launch an investigation Monday into an explosion that tore apart a power plant under construction here Sunday, killing at least five people and injuring more than two dozen. Eight people were unaccounted for, Mayor Sebastian Giuliano said. The US Chemical Safety Board said its seven-person investigative team would arrive at the Kleen Energy Plant about noon.

USA: Interception Decides Classic Duel of Super Bowl QBs
The greatest quarterback duel in Super Bowl history ended with 3:24 left, on third and five, and Peyton Manning calling his slot receiver into motion. Manning is an expert at disguising plays, but Saints cornerback Tracy Porter, who described his pre-game preparation as one of "excessive film study," recognized it immediately. "I saw it over and over on film, it's a big third down play for them," he said. "...Once I saw Austin Collie go, I knew..."

Politics: Welfare Back as Campaign Issue for GOP in California
Ronald Reagan singled out what he called a "welfare queen" for abusing government aid. Newt Gingrich pushed welfare reform as part of his Contract With America. Now, Meg Whitman and Steve Poizner, the top Republican candidates for California governor, are bringing back welfare as a key issue in their quest for primary votes.

Politics: New Orleans Elects First White Mayor Since 1978
Frustrated by term-limited Mayor Ray Nagin's leadership of New Orleans since Hurricane Katrina, voters elected Louisiana Lt. Gov. Mitch Landrieu to succeed him Saturday, turning to a political scion to speed up the city's recovery. Mr. Landrieu, 49, became the majority-black city's first white mayor since 1978, the year his father, Maurice Edwin "Moon" Landrieu, left the office. He is the brother of US Sen. Mary L. Landrieu (D-LA).

Culture Wars: UK Passengers Left Stunned After Muslim Bus Driver Pulls Over to Pray
A Muslim bus driver stunned passengers when he pulled over and started praying in the aisle, with the engine still running. The driver parked without warning then rolled out a fluorescent jacket as an improvised prayer mat. He took off his shoes, knelt down facing Mecca, and began to chant. The prayer session held up the bus for more than five minutes with no-one able to get on or off.

World: Iran to Make 'Advanced' Attack Drones
Iran has begun making 'advanced' unmanned drones capable of carrying out "assaults with high precision." Ahmad Vahidi, the Iranian defense minister, opened two production lines for the manufacture of the aircraft, the Fars news agency reported. The drones would be able to carry out "surveillance, detection and even assaults with high precision," the report said.

World: India Hails Test of Nuclear-Capable Missile
India successfully tested a nuclear-capable missile on Feb. 7, a defense ministry spokesman said, days after the government proposed a resumption of talks with arch-rival Pakistan. The surface-to-surface Agni-III missile with a range of more than 2,000 miles was fired from Wheeler Island, off the coast of the eastern state of Orissa. "It hit the target with pin-point accuracy and met all the mission objectives," a ministry spokesman said.

Editorials

8 Feb 2010 18:10:43 GMT

To Faithfully Execute the Presidency of the United States
by Nancy Salvato, Senior Editor

"History doesn't repeat itself, but it does rhyme." -- Mark Twain

In his column, "Not the first president to break promises" found in The Baltimore Sun, Ron Smith writes:

"There's a video online lasting less than two minutes of a speech candidate Obama made, in which he promised the following things of his presidency: 1) making government open and transparent; 2) making it 'impossible' for congressmen to slip in pork barrel projects; 3) making meetings where laws are written open to the public; 4) promising 'no more secrecy'; 5) that the public would have five days to look at any bill before he signed it into law; and 6) saying 'We will put every pork barrel project online.'"

When studying history, it's not so much a memorization of the details but noticing the emerging patterns that is most important. Any study of the 20th century American presidency would reveal that candidates actively seeking to become the Chief Executive of the United States make campaign promises to the people that cannot be addressed using the powers of the executive office. Once one detects such a pattern playing out in a presidential campaign, one can more realistically assess how successful a presidency might prove; in essence, it is possible to anticipate the next verse in the rhyme...

The Tea Party Movement, The GOP & Making It Work
by Frank Salvato, Managing Editor

Only the most partisan and/or politically ignorant among us would fail to recognize the magnitude, importance and the consequences of the Tea Party Movement. To be certain, it is a force to be reckoned with. But, as with the science of storms, there is a danger when two forces compete to occupy the same space. We of the Right side of the aisle must recognize this danger and insist that actions are taken, definitions are designated and roles are recognized, lest we turn an important moment in time into catastrophic history.

The first thing we have to do is to recognize and understand exactly what the Tea Party Movement is, where it came from and why.

Many in the political world have erroneously identified the Tea Party Movement as a political group not unlike the Democrats, Libertarians or Republicans. In fact, this couldn't be further from the truth. Proof to this reality is in the fact that people who have embraced the Tea Party Movement come from every flavor of politics. When over a million people descended on Washington in the name of the Tea Party Movement last Fall, the crowd was comprised of people from every political party - sans the Progressives, every social background, every religion and every race. To say that it is dominated by any one political party is to make a huge mistake...

NMJ Radio

8 Feb 2010 18:10:41 GMT

NEW! NMJ Radio
Interviews and original programs from The New Media Journal

Tuesdays
The Captain's America
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Wednesdays
The Roth Show
USA Radio Network
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Articles & Analysis

8 Feb 2010 18:10:39 GMT

Time for a Resignation
by Rocky Warren
Attorney General Eric Holder has botched his job time and time again. I've heard some calls for his resignation, but not enough. The voice for his ouster should be nearly unanimous by now. From the time Mr. Holder declared that "Americans are a nation of cowards when it comes to matters of race," everyone should have been put on notice we were in for a rough ride with this man at the helm of Justice.

The Constitution, Nazis & The Corpse Man
by Jim O'Neill
Recently I've noticed several things that the Progressives are having trouble with. Well, actually a lot of things, but this article will focus on just a few of them. First of all, President Obama, like most Progressives, seems to have a problem understanding the US Constitution.

Syria...Seriously
by Gerald A. Honigman
Over the years, the Syrian front in the Arab-Israeli conflict has wound up--due mostly to deadly Syrian shenanigans--being placed on the back burner, as far as American State Department priorities in the region were concerned. Not that the Foggy Folks didn't have "good intentions"--as far as the Syrians were concerned--but the latter were just too darn honest to even provide the facade of cooperation which, for public relations and the American Congress, would have been convenient to have before the squeeze was placed on the Jews once again.

I Was a Teenage President
by Greg Lewis
The Obama administration resembles nothing so much as a big house in the suburbs where the parents are away for the weekend. In the absence of any responsible person to take charge, the Teenager-In-Chief is letting the rest of the adolescents run wild. They've maxed out their parents' credit cards and have begun working on their overdraft lines in earnest, as the T-I-C's budget, which proposes a $1.5 trillion deficit for the coming fiscal year, attests.

I Prefer Local to Global
by Alan Caruba
Perhaps it is just the product of the times in which I grew up and my experience with the events of the world. Or perhaps it is the spin that has been added to the word "global", endowing it with an almost spiritual quality. Mostly, though, I think it is my utter disgust with "global warming", having spent the better part of three decades striving to defeat this plot to enable all forms of governmental intrusion into people's lives and choices.

Message to The Tea Party Movement: Focus on the Goal Line
by Dr. Alan Bates, MD
As one might suspect, the National Tea Party Convention attracted a potpourri of supporters who certainly agree on one thing----that the current political system in Washington is corrupt, irresponsible, well on the road to destruction of our nation and must be replaced. Some well-intentioned members however continue to protest certain issues about which little or nothing is likely to be changed before election time. These may all be important, but to have any chance of attracting enough voters to displace the radical Left of Congress and the Administration, the Tea Party Movement must be clearly focused on the few broad issues which constitute the goal line at the end of the field.

Unsustainable's the New Normal
by Mark Steyn
At the National Prayer Breakfast, Barack Obama singled out for praise Navy Corpsman Christian Bouchard. Or, as the president called him, "Corpseman Bouchard." Twice. Hey, not a big deal. Throughout his life, the commander in chief has had little contact with the military, and less interest. And, when you give as many speeches as this guy does, there's no time to rehearse or read through: You just gotta fire up the prompter and wing it. But it's revealing that nobody around him in the so-called smartest administration of all time thought to spell it out phonetically for him when the speech got typed up and loaded into the machine. Which suggests that either his minders don't know that he doesn't know that kinda stuff, or they don't know it, either. To put it in Rumsfeldian terms, they don't know what they don't know.

Polls

8 Feb 2010 18:09:36 GMT

Pres. Obama
Positive: 48.3% (-0.1)
Negative: 47.5% (+0.7)

Congress
Positive: 22.4% (-1.1)
Negative: 70.2% (+1.9)

Sen. Reid
Positive: 31% (+6.0)
Negative: 51% (+4.0)

US Rep. Pelosi
Positive: 33% (-0.0)
Negative: 57% (-0.0)

US Debt as of Jan. 2010
US National Debt: $12.35 Trillion
US Unfunded Liabilities: $107.2 Trillion

Terrorism

8 Feb 2010 18:08:38 GMT

Explosives Find Raises Fear Portugal Has Become ETA Base
Source: The Times of London
Police have seized half a ton of explosives at a house in Portugal linked to the terrorist group ETA. The discovering of the cache, which also included bomb-making equipment, has raised fears that Basque separatists are using the country as a base for attacks.

Iranian Weapons, Supplies Reach Syria, Hezbollah & Hamas
Source: DEBKAfile
Iranian and military sources report the war threats from Damascus this week were backed by massive Iranian airlifts for boosting Syria's missile arsenal. Fresh supplies also reached the Lebanese Hezbollah and Hamas in Gaza. His message that all four extremist allies had formed a mutual defense pact against Israel raised temperatures to a dangerous level in the region.

Twin Suicide Bombs Kill 25 in Karachi
Source: Sky News
Suicide bombers have rammed into a bus in Karachi then hit a hospital to which casualties were being ferried, killing 25 people in the second round of attacks on Shi'ites in the Pakistani city in weeks. The attacks in a city largely isolated from Islamist insurgent violence highlighted the terrorist threat in Pakistan, which is on the front line of the US war on Al-Qaeda. Militants have killed over 3,000 people in Pakistan since 2007.

US Believes Pakistani Taliban Leader Is Dead
Source: AP/FOX News
US counterterrorism officials believe Pakistani Taliban leader Hakimullah Mehsud is dead following a missile attack last month, a senior intelligence official said Wednesday in the strongest signal that Washington has offered about the militant's fate. Mehsud's death would be the latest successful strike against suspected terrorists by the US and its allies.

Pakistani Female Scientist Guilty of US Murder Attempt
Source: BBC News
A US court has found a female Pakistani scientist guilty of attempting to murder US agents while she was detained for questioning in Afghanistan. The jury in Manhattan found her guilty of attempted murder, armed assault and using and carrying a firearm. She faces a maximum term of life in prison. Sentencing is due on 6 May.

Education

8 Feb 2010 18:08:35 GMT

North Carolina Schools May Cut Chunk Out of US History Lessons
Source: FOX News
He may be the president who governed during the Civil War, freeing the slaves, but under a new curriculum proposal for North Carolina high schools, US history would begin years after President Lincoln, with the presidency of Rutherford B. Hayes in 1877.

Obama's Organizing for America Organizing in High Schools
Source: The New Media Journal
The popular web publication Atlas Shrugs, reveals that an Ohio reader, with a student in the eleventh grade, is reporting that the progressive Group Organizing for America (formerly MyBarackObama.com) is attempting to recruit high school students to "community organize." Required reading includes Rules for Radicals by Progressive-Marxist icon Saul Alinsky.

US Judge Grants German Homeschooling Family Asylum
Source: DW-World.de
An American judge on Tuesday granted asylum to a German couple who wanted to homeschool their children, bringing international attention to the debate in Germany over the rights of parents to freely educate their children. Immigration judge Lawrence O. Burman said the German government violated Uwe and Hannelore Romeike's "basic human rights."

AFL-CIO Creates Online College for Union Families
The New York Times
The AFL-CIO, the main umbrella group for the nation's labor unions, announced on Thursday that it was joining with the National Labor College and the Princeton Review to create an online college for the federation's 11.5 million members and their families. The new college, tentatively named the College for Working Families, will seek to "expand job opportunities for its members by providing education and retraining in a way that's affordable and accessible," the founders said.

Rich Students Will Get More College Acceptance Letters in 2010
US News & World Report/Yahoo! News
College applicants in 2010 will get a lesson in the real-world version of the golden rule: the one in which the person with the gold gets to rule. Admissions officers and counselors say that hundreds of colleges are so desperate for cash this year that they will be reserving more spots for students who can afford to pay full tuition and don't need financial aid.

Quote of the Day & This Day in US History

8 Feb 2010 18:07:38 GMT

Quote of the Day
"Wherever they burn books they will also, in the end, burn human beings." -- Heinrich Heine

This Week in US History
February 7, 1904: In Baltimore, Maryland, a small fire in the business district is wind-whipped into an uncontrollable conflagration that engulfs a large portion of the city by evening.

February 8, 1862: Union General Ambrose Burnside scores a major victory when he captures Roanoke Island in North Carolina. The victory was one of the first major Union victories of the war.

February 9, 1825: As no presidential candidate received a majority of electoral votes, the US House of Representatives votes to elect John Quincy Adams, who won fewer votes than Andrew Jackson in the popular election, as president.

February 10, 1965: Viet Cong guerrillas blow up the US barracks at Qui Nhon, 75 miles east of Pleiku on the central coast, with a 100-pound explosive charge under the building. A total of 23 US personnel were killed

February 11, 1861: President-elect Abraham Lincoln leaves home in Springfield, Illinois, as he embarks on his journey to Washington.

February 12, 1999: The five-week impeachment trial of Bill Clinton comes to an end, with the Senate voting to acquit the president on both articles of impeachment: perjury and obstruction of justice.

February 13, 1861: The earliest military action to be revered with a Medal of Honor award is performed by Colonel Bernard J.D. Irwin, an assistant army surgeon serving in the first major US-Apache conflict.