Displaying posts published in

January 2016

NATIONAL NEWS & OPINION Comments turned off

FEDS SPENDING MILLIONS TO ARM AGENCIES THAT DON’T NEED GUNS By KELLAN HOWELL

By on January 9th, 2016

Do the ‘zoo police’ under the Smithsonian Institution, Washington, DC
really need body armor?

VA, EPA, FDA among those nabbing heavy armaments
Read ‘Golden Hammer’ story click here:http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2016/jan/7/golden-hammer-feds-spending-millions-to-arm-agenci/#disqus_thread

Many federal agencies are now empowered with increasing police weaponry and technologies.

In our next study – coming soon – entitled OpenTheBooks Oversight Report – Arming of the Federal Agencies, we will quantify the purchases of guns, ammo and military-style equipment since 2006.

Today, Washington Times investigative reporter Kellan Howell uses OpenTheBooks data and awards the “Golden Hammer” award to 44 traditionally administrative federal agencies for spending $77.1 million on body armor since 2006.

According to our data at OpenTheBooks.com, $400 million across all federal agencies outside of the Department of Defense was spent on body armor which includes $330 million spent by the traditional law-enforcement agencies such as FBI, Secret Service, U.S. Marshals, and Homeland Security.

Read the Washington Times Golden Hammer story on federal agencies purchase of $400 million in body armor.

Here’s a snapshot of what was purchased by the administrative agencies as ‘body armor’:

1. Small Business Administration spent $13,119 on ‘ballistic vests’ in 2010.

2. Smithsonian Institution purchased $28,474 on body armor for its ‘zoo police and security officers’ in FY2012.

3. Over $200,000 by Environmental Protection Agency purchasing body armor during the Obama administration and only $30,000 during the previous three years.

4. Over $300,000 by Food and Drug Administration in ‘ballistic vests and carriers’ during FY2014.

5. $2 million spent by Veterans Administration on riot helmets, defender shields, body armor, Milo return fire cannon system, armored mobile shields, Kevlar blankets, tactical gear, tactical equipment for crowd control, and much more.

Read the Washington Times Golden Hammer story on federal agencies purchase of $400 million in body armor.

Stay tuned… 2016 is going to be a ground-breaking year.

Continue reading →
WORLD NEWS Comments turned off

Surprise! 18 Suspects in Cologne Sexual Assaults are Asylum Seekers By Stephen Kruiser (Ach du lieber!!!)

By on January 9th, 2016

Via CNN:

German authorities have identified 31 people, including 18 asylum-seekers, as suspects in mob sex attacks and muggings in Cologne on New Year’s Eve — one of several such incidents in Europe.

In Cologne, where most of the attacks took place, a police spokesman confirmed Chief Wolfgang Albers was fired Friday. Albers’ dismissal comes amid criticism of his department’s handling of the violence.

One victim of the Cologne violence told CNN there were too few police on the streets to prevent attacks.

“We ran to the police. But we saw the police were so understaffed,” the victim said. “They couldn’t take care of us and we as women suffered the price.”

Spiegel Online reported that groups of men prevented officers from reaching those crying out for help.

Continue reading →
WORLD NEWS Comments turned off

Europe finally waking up to the reality of Islamic sexual predation By Carol Brown

By on January 9th, 2016

Despite intense official efforts at denial, the European public is beginning to understand that widespread sexual assault and rape are the corollary of mass immigration of young Muslim males. Rotherham, where 1400 children were abused by organized Muslim gangs as police conspired to deny the horror for a decade and a half, is finally sinking in. Sweden, which welcomed Muslim “refugees” with extraordinary social benefits, is now the rape capital of Europe.

January 1st signifies new beginnings, while December 31st signifies the end of old things. Multicultural fantasies are long overdue for discarding, and the wave of sexual assaults across Europe may be the beginning of the end for the illusions that have gripped Europe’s political elites, media, and progressives.

The New Year’s Eve attacks by Muslim “migrants” in Cologne were originally covered up by the police and the media. But then news began to leak out about the devastating chaos that unfolded in and around the Cologne Cathedral. (See here, here, here, and here for prior coverage.) New information continues to emerge, as Pamela Geller reports on cell phones stolen from women who were attacked in Cologne showing up at refugee centers. Meanwhile women continue to come forward to report rapes (often gang rape) and a handful of Syrians were arrested, including Syrian males as young as 14 who raped adolescent girls.

Continue reading →
BOOKS Comments turned off

The Islamic State’s statistics and a tragedy By Ethel C. Fenig

By on January 9th, 2016

Ah, parental love for children and the reciprocal, deep love the children have for their parents. And for many of the children of the Islamic State, IS not just a government, but their devoted parent, more important than the biological parents who bore them, raised them. This was gruesomely proven when an ISIS member turned against his mother and cemented his bloody bond to IS by publicly killing her at their command.

And what of those “hundreds of people who witnessed the event?

Communist dictator Joseph Stalin reputedly stated that “a single death is a tragedy; a million deaths is a statistic.” That might explain why so many have become indifferent to this ongoing bloodletting by so many or shockingly why President Barack Hussein Obama (D) initially labelled them “”jv”, junior varsity and led the BBC to note

It’s the macabre twist of having Lena al-Qasem’s son kill her that’s captured the world’s attention.

Continue reading →
ANTI-SEMITISM Comments turned off

The Next Stage of the War By Shoshana Bryen

By on January 9th, 2016

The Obama administration appears surprised by the sudden eruption of Saudi-Iranian hostility after the Saudi government executed Shiite cleric Sheikh Nimr al-Nimr and the Iranians responded by organizing/sponsoring/approving an attack on the Saudi Embassy in Tehran. Both sides have walked the rhetoric back just a bit in the last day or two.

The U.S. administration remonstrated both sides, but its most public worry appears to be that events would get in the way of brokering a peace agreement in Syria. State Department Spokesman John Kirby said, “What we want to see is tensions caused by these executions reduced, diplomatic relations restored, so that the leadership in the region can focus on other pressing issues… We have consistently urged everyone to deescalate tensions.”

“The secretary is very concerned with the direction this thing is going,” said another one senior official. “It’s very unsettling to him that so many nations are choosing not to engage. With so much turmoil in the region, the last thing we need is for people not to be having conversations.”

A former Obama White House Middle East adviser told Al-Monitor. “To the degree that people hopefully wanted to see the Vienna process succeed, it required that Iran and Saudi Arabia be willing to sit at the same table and talk about a cease-fire and political process… Our approach to the region has depended on a Saudi-Iran modus vivendi. That is all blown out of the water, at least for now.”

Continue reading →
NATIONAL NEWS & OPINION Comments turned off

The Lamest Duck By Matthew Continetti

By on January 9th, 2016

President Obama spent the week defending his proposals to curb gun violence, culminating in a CNN town hall. Think about that. What else happened during the last few days that might warrant a presidential town hall?

Oh, nothing much:

Iranian protesters stormed the Saudi embassy in Tehran after the House of Saud executed a Shiite cleric, escalating sectarian warfare in the Middle East

The stock market tumbled on fears of a global economic slowdown

A U.S. soldier was killed in action in Afghanistan, where the Taliban controls more ground than at any time since 2001

Iran revealed the existence of an underground ballistic-missile launch site

North Korea detonated a nuclear device

A terrorist was foiled in Paris on the anniversary of the Charlie Hebdo massacre

Continue reading →
POLITICS Comments turned off

How Bill Quickly Went from Asset to Liability for Hillary’s Campaign By Jonah Goldberg

By on January 9th, 2016

For those of us who toiled in the fetid swamplands of the 1990s culture wars, particularly the boggy tributaries fed by Bill Clinton’s pants, this is a moment of effulgent wonder.

Let’s back up a moment.

That ’90s Show

There’s a lot of talk these days about how feminist attitudes towards sexual assault have evolved in recent years. And that’s true as it far as it goes. What it leaves out is that we’ve been here before. Starting in the late 1980s, “awareness” about sexual harassment and sexual assault became a huge issue. There was the nomination fight over Senator John Tower to become Papa Bush’s Defense Secretary, and allegations about his drinking and “womanizing.”

Side-note: It was a long time ago, but I remember thinking at the time that, given the charges against him, at the last minute the kids from Scooby-Doo would step up, rip off the John Tower mask and exclaim, “Why it’s Ted Kennedy!”

Continue reading →
NATIONAL NEWS & OPINION Comments turned off

Mass Muslim Immigration Will Bring Islam’s Problems Here By David French

By on January 9th, 2016

To hear the Left tell it, the debate over mass Muslim immigration — especially from conflict zones — is a simple contest between compassionate tolerance and cowardly xenophobia. They claim their opponents are cowards because the percentage of refugees or immigrants who are terrorists is very small (your bathtub is more dangerous than a Muslim immigrant), and they’re xenophobes because they have no understanding or appreciation for the blessings and benefits of diversity. Conservatives are all fear and no heart.

According to the rules of this debate, there are but two kinds of Muslim immigrants — the tiny few terrorists and the overwhelmingly deserving, suffering majority. Question this narrative, or call attention to the vast cultural gaps between the refugees and the Western nations they’re fleeing to, and you’re a racist. After all, our cultural elite understands the Muslim world better than you do. They went to Harvard with Muslims, and the Muslims they know have great accents, cool customs, and — most importantly — tales of imperialist oppression that turn the leftist heart to mush. What’s not to love?

The recent events in Cologne and other German and Austrian cities represent a necessary, reality-based corrective to this absurd binary thinking. On New Year’s Eve, German women faced attacks from roaming gangs of North African and Middle Eastern immigrants, including asylum-seekers. According to German officials, “sexual crimes took place on a huge scale.” More than 100 women were victimized in a single evening, with up to 1,000 attackers involved.

Continue reading →
WORLD NEWS Comments turned off

When Worlds Collide: Unassimilable Muslim Migrants Crash Europe’s Fantasy Islam By Andrew C. McCarthy

By on January 9th, 2016

What happens when the West’s fantasy Islam collides with the reality of an imported critical mass of unassimilated — and defiantly unassimilable — Muslims?

Cologne happens.

Nor is it only Cologne. That was just Ground Zero of the New Year’s Eve rape jihad in Germany. As National Review’s Ian Tuttle notes in an alarming column about the predictable — and, if I may say, predicted — surge of sexual assault in a Europe overrun by “migrants,” the jihad included similar episodes, albeit on a smaller scale, in Stuttgart, Hamburg, and even astride the Brandenburg gate in Berlin.

We are finally learning about the magnitude and harrowing details of the attack after days of Stasi-like information suppression. Chancellor Angela Merkel may not be big on German security, but she is a bulwark when it comes to fantasy Islam.

First there was no news; then, a few disturbing hints of gropings and robberies by gangs of “Middle Eastern or North African” men. Now, we know it was a mass atrocity — the only remaining question being: How massive?

Upward of a thousand men, overwhelmingly Muslim, executed a coordinated series of attacks on an obvious target of opportunity: street celebrations in the major cities of a reviled Western state, where they were certain to find throngs of young women and a police presence grossly inadequate to provide security — certainly not against a critical mass of Islamic supremacists.

Continue reading →
NATIONAL NEWS & OPINION Comments turned off

Philadelphia police release chilling images of alleged ISIS-inspired attack on officer

By on January 9th, 2016

Police Commissioner Richard Ross said the attacker claimed to have been inspired by the Islamic State terror group, also known as ISIS. Ross said the targeted officer was shot three times and that it was something of a miracle that he survived such a direct attack.
“I don’t know how this officer survived,” Ross said.
The alleged attacker was identified as Edward Archer.
The still images appear to show him approaching a police-car window as he fired his gun, and then hurrying away. They can be seen below:

PHILADELPHIA, PA – JANUARY 8: A headshot of Police Officer Jesse Hartnett, 33, who was ambushed and allegedly shot at 13 times by Edward Archer, 30, last night on January 8, 2016 in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Surveillance footage reveals the suspect was dressed in Muslim clothing and wearing a mask. Following his arrest, suspect Edward Archer stated, ‘I follow Allah and pledge allegiance to the Islamic State and that is the reason I did what I did.’ (Photo by Mark Makela/Getty Images)

Continue reading →