There are some things that are so apparent that they’re not even worth mentioning. What goes up must come down. The earth is round. President Barack Obama is a big spender. But this week, some in the media and in the White House are denying one of these totally obvious truths. It shouldn’t be a big surprise which one it is.

On Tuesday, MarketWatch’s Rex Nutting wrote that claims of Obama’s big spending ways are overblown and that the “Obama spending binge never happened.” In a press gaggle on Wednesday, White House spokesman Jay Carney picked up on the argument and claimed that “this President has been–has demonstrated significant fiscal restraint and acted with great fiscal responsibility.”

But sure as the sun rises in the east, not in the west, claims of Obama’s supposed “fiscal restraint” are just plain wrong. Heritage’s J.D. Foster explains:

Federal spending as a share of the economy will average over 24 percent during Obama’s term, and each and every year of that term will see a higher share than during any year since the Second World War. That apparently qualifies as ‘significant fiscal restraint’ Obama-style.

Fiscal responsibility? Obama has had by far the largest budget deficits, driven in large part by the eruption in spending.

Heritage’s Alison Fraser and Emily Goff thoroughly dismantle of the Nutting-Carney claim and point out that President Obama’s near-trillion-dollar stimulus “drove spending to a record 25.2 percent of the economy in 2009 and deficits topped $1 trillion for the first time in the nation’s history.”

You can see the proof for yourself in Heritage’s 2012 edition of the Federal Budget in Pictures. Of the last ten presidents, going back to John F. Kennedy, president Obama’s budget deficits as a percentage of GDP have exploded. And if you take a look at where spending is headed under President Obama’s budget, you’ll see that the country’s debt crisis just keeps getting worse. The President’s FY 2013 budget would increase the debt to 76.5 percent of GDP by 2022, despite $2 trillion in tax hikes. That’s not “fiscal restraint,” no matter how you slice it.

As bad as spending is today, President Obama wants to spend more, especially on transportation, infrastructure, education and research. He says that more spending, paid for with higher taxes, is the key to getting the U.S. economy back on track — even though that strategy has failed miserably over the past three years. Here’s the president’s problem. The American people don’t want Washington to spend more, they want it to spend less. They don’t want Washington to tax more, they want it to tax less. According to a new Rasmussen Reports poll, 53 percent of voters believe that tax cuts help the economy, and most say that more government spending has a negative impact.

The president wants to have it both ways. He’d like to be viewed as someone who cuts taxes and has demonstrated fiscal restraint, but he also wants to keep on taxing and spending. But sure as apples fall from trees and go down, not up, President Obama is a big spender who has done anything but show fiscal restraint. There are some laws of nature that just can’t be denied.

On orders from Barack Obama’s Department of Justice, officials with the University of Arkansas at Fort Smith have given permission for a 38-year-old man to use the women’s restrooms on campus.

The report comes from Campus Reform.org, which explained that the individual also is seeking to have someone pay for a sex reassignment surgery to change from male to female.

Already living as a female, the individual, identified in the report as Jennifer Braly, started using women’s restrooms on campus, but quickly was the subject of complaints from women who saw him there.

The university had tried to make accommodations, designating gender-neutral restrooms in some buildings.

Not good enough, however.

Several things pop into my mind, the first being….it is NOT a ‘civil right’ for a male who thinks he’s female to use the women’s restroom…..anywhere.  The school made accommodations. But, thanks to the Obama/Holder bunch, who evidently don’t understand what civil rights actually are, women are now being forced to share a restroom with a male.  Who is speaking up for these women?  What about their right to privacy in the toity?  Now, I don’t know about you, but I would find sharing a restroom with a male extremely uncomfortable.

Now, not only has this clown gotten the DoJ involved in something that is none of their flippin’ business, he also wants someone else to pay for an elective surgery?  Here’s a thought dude…..you’re 38 years old…..get a job, save your OWN money, and pay for your OWN snip and tuck!

The fact that the school caved over this absurdity speaks very loudly about just how far our society has sunk into the cesspool.

Obama’s Blockbuster Secrets
The Foundry

Deep in the cover of night in the town of Abbottabad, Pakistan, a team of Navy SEALs descended from helicopters, breached the compound of terrorist mastermind Osama bin Laden and brought him to justice. The story is the stuff that blockbuster movies are made of, but many of the details are largely a closely guarded secret. That was until the Obama White House granted extraordinary access and information to Hollywood filmmakers for their film about the raid, originally slated to be released just before the November presidential elections. As disturbing as that may be, it is not the first time this White House has disclosed confidential information under questionable circumstances.

The news of the information leak comes from Judicial Watch, a conservative organization that seeks transparency in government. Through a Freedom of Information Act request, the organization obtained records from the U.S. Department of Defense and the Central Intelligence Agency regarding meetings and communications between government agencies and director Kathryn Bigelow and screenwriter Mark Boal. Judicial Watch reports that “According to the records, the Obama Defense Department granted Bigelow and Boal access to a ‘planner, Operator and Commander of SEAL Team Six,’ which was responsible for the capture and killing of Osama bin Laden, to assist Bigelow prepare her upcoming feature film.”

Politico reports on a July 2011 meeting between Undersecretary of Defense for Intelligence Mike Vickers and the film makers in which he told them that leaders of the Special Operations Command couldn’t speak to them for appearances’ sake, but that they would make available a Navy SEAL who was involved in planning the raid from its earliest stages. According to Politico, that meeting occurred just weeks after the Pentagon and CIA warned against the dangers of leaked information about the raid. On top of that, Judicial Watch reports on an email exchange in which top officials expressed their desire to “shape the story” and have the filmmakers use “White House talking points,” including calling the raid a “gutsy decision” and that “WH involvement was critical.”

Not to be missed is the political angle. A June 9, 2011, email reveals that the White House was aware the movie was set for a fourth-quarter release date — coinciding with the president’s re-election bid — and that the meeting between the filmmakers and the DOD / CIA was arranged by The Glover Park Group, a Democratic-leaning advocacy firm headed up by a former adviser to Al Gore’s 2000 campaign. And then there’s the fact that Sony Pictures Entertainment, which owns the production house distributing the film, hosted a fundraiser for President Obama on its lot last month, part of a West Coast fundraising tour that raise the campaign more than $4 million.

Though we do not know for certain the full extent of the information revealed, we do know that this is not the first time that the Obama Administration’s handling of classified information has been called into question. Earlier this month, former CIA officials blamed the Obama Administration for leaking details on Britain’s involvement in a covert mission that resulted in the foiling of an underwear bomb plot. The Guardian reported that the leak followed a series of disclosures beginning with a report on an expansion of CIA drone attacks in Yemen, followed by the president’s surprise trip to Afghanistan on the anniversary of the bin Laden mission. Mike Scheuer, the former head of the CIA’s Bin Laden unit, said of the leak, “MI6 should be as angry as hell. This is something that the prime minister should raise with the president… This is really tragic. Any information disclosed is too much information. This does seem to be a tawdry political thing.”

Of course, the protection of classified information is the sole province of the Executive branch, i.e. the President. It’s not unusual for the government to give reporters information about war or to embed journalists with tactical units in certain missions — that has happened in both in Democrat and Republican administrations. However, there is a fundamental difference between that kind of access, which arguably furthers the public’s understanding of the war effort, and disclosures of this nature. The White House knew when the film about the bin Laden raid was slated to be released, and the White House alone decided to release the information. Those facts should raise a red flag for Congress that the White House has come awfully close to the line. It’s up to them to find out how this Administration is handling or mishandling ultra-sensitive national security secrets.

It’s been breaking news all over MSNBC, liberal blogs, newspapers and even The Wall Street Journal: “Federal spending under Obama at historic lows … It’s clear that Obama has been the most fiscally moderate president we’ve had in 60 years.” There’s even a chart!

I’ll pause here to give you a moment to mop up the coffee on your keyboard. Good? OK, moving on …

This shocker led to around-the-clock smirk fests on MSNBC. As with all bogus social science from the left, liberals hide the numbers and proclaim: It’s “science”! This is black and white, inarguable, and why do Republicans refuse to believe facts?

Ed Schultz claimed the chart exposed “the big myth” about Obama’s spending: “This chart — the truth — very clearly shows the truth undoubtedly.” And the truth was, the “growth in spending under President Obama is the slowest out of the last five presidents.”

Note that Schultz also said that the “part of the chart representing President Obama’s term includes a stimulus package, too.” As we shall see, that is a big, fat lie.

Schultz’s guest, Reuters columnist David Cay Johnston confirmed: “And clearly, Obama has been incredibly tight-fisted as a president.”

Everybody’s keyboard OK?

On her show, Rachel Maddow proclaimed: “Factually speaking, spending has leveled off under President Obama. Spending is not skyrocketing under President Obama. Spending is flattening out under President Obama.”

In response, three writers from “The Daily Show” said, “We’ll never top that line,” and quit.

Inasmuch as this is obviously preposterous, I checked with John Lott, one of the nation’s premier economists and author of the magnificent new book with Grover Norquist: “Debacle: Obama’s War on Jobs and Growth and What We Can Do Now to Regain Our Future.” (I’m reviewing it soon, but you should start without me.)

It turns out Rex Nutting, author of the phony Marketwatch chart, attributes all spending during Obama’s entire first year, up to Oct. 1, to President Bush.

That’s not a joke.

That means, for example, the $825 billion stimulus bill, proposed, lobbied for, signed and spent by Obama, goes in … Bush’s column. (And if we attribute all of Bush’s spending for the Iraq and Afghanistan wars and No Child Left Behind to William Howard Taft, Bush didn’t spend much either.)

Nutting’s “analysis” is so dishonest, even The New York Times has ignored it. He includes only the $140 billion of stimulus money spent after Oct. 1, 2009, as Obama’s spending. And he’s testy about that, grudgingly admitting that Obama “is responsible (along with the Congress) for about $140 billion in extra spending in the 2009 fiscal year from the stimulus bill.”

Nutting acts as if it’s the height of magnanimity to “attribute that $140 billion in stimulus to Obama and not to Bush …”

On what possible theory would that be Bush’s spending? Hey — we just found out that Obamacare’s going to cost triple the estimate. Let’s blame it on Calvin Coolidge!

Nutting’s “and not to Bush” line is just a sleight of hand. He’s hoping you won’t notice that he said “$140 billion” and not “$825 billion,” and will be fooled into thinking that he’s counting the entire stimulus bill as Obama’s spending. (He fooled Ed Schultz!)

The theory is that a new president is stuck with the budget of his predecessor, so the entire 2009 fiscal year should be attributed to Bush.

But Obama didn’t come in and live with the budget Bush had approved. He immediately signed off on enormous spending programs that had been specifically rejected by Bush. This included a $410 billion spending bill that Bush had refused to sign before he left office. Obama signed it on March 10, 2009. Bush had been chopping brush in Texas for two months at that point. Marketwatch’s Nutting says that’s Bush’s spending.

Obama also spent the second half of the Troubled Asset Relief Fund (TARP). These were discretionary funds meant to prevent a market meltdown after Lehman Brothers collapsed. By the end of 2008, it was clear the panic had passed, and Bush announced that he wouldn’t need to spend the second half of the TARP money.

But on Jan. 12, 2009, Obama asked Bush to release the remaining TARP funds for Obama to spend as soon as he took office. By Oct. 1, Obama had spent another $200 billion in TARP money. That, too, gets credited to Bush, according to the creative accounting of Rex Nutting.

There are other spending bills that Obama signed in the first quarter of his presidency, bills that would be considered massive under any other president — such as the $40 billion child health care bill, which extended coverage to immigrants as well as millions of additional Americans. These, too, are called Bush’s spending

Frustrated that he can’t shift all of Obama’s spending to Bush, Nutting also lowballs the spending estimates during the later Obama years. For example, although he claims to be using the White House’s numbers, the White House’s estimate for 2012 spending is $3.795 trillion. Nutting helpfully knocks that down to $3.63 trillion.

But all those errors pale in comparison to Nutting’s counting Obama’s nine-month spending binge as Bush’s spending.

If liberals will attribute Obama’s trillion-dollar stimulus bill to Bush, what won’t they do?

Catholic Institutions Sue to Stop Obamacare’s Religious Liberty Violation
The Foundry

Three years ago, the University of Notre Dame invited President Barack Obama to deliver a commencement address and conferred on him an honorary law degree. But on Monday, the university joined 42 other Catholic institutions in suing the Obama Administration over new Obamacare regulations that force religious institutions to pay for coverage of abortion-inducing drugs, contraception, and sterilization regardless of the employers’ moral or religious objections.

The mandate’s narrow exemption effectively applies only to churches and other houses of worship; religiously affiliated hospitals, colleges, charities and other non-profits don’t qualify for a religious exemption. Cardinal Donald Wuerl, Archbishop of Washington, explained the significance of the Administration’s mandate and its impact on those institutions, remarking that, “For the first time in this country’s history, the government’s new definition of religious institutions suggests that some of the very institutions that put our faith into practice–schools, hospitals, and social service organizations–are not ‘religious enough.’”

In total, 12 lawsuits were filed this week challenging the Administration’s anti-conscience mandate, and the wide range of organizations joining the legal challenge underscores the enormous opposition to the mandate. Heritage’s Sarah Torre explains that the lawsuits span from the Catholic dioceses of Washington, D.C., and Joilet, Illinois, to Catholic Charities of Jackson, Mississippi, and the Michigan Catholic Conference. “The range of the 43 institutions that have joined the dozen suits highlights the variety of Good Samaritan groups harmed by the mandate,” Torre writes. “These ministries serve inner-city children, the elderly, deaf, developmentally disabled, HIV/AIDS patients, and homeless–among many others. Catholic outreach, like many other religious groups in America, seeks to serve those most in need.”

These 43 plaintiffs join a number of others who had filed similar suits in recent weeks, including three evangelical higher education institutions: Colorado Christian University, Louisiana College and Geneva College. As the presidents of these schools explained in a Wall Street Journal op-ed in April:

[T]he Obama administration has passed a rule that will penalize our colleges with faith-based fines merely because we center our beliefs about the sanctity of human life on the Bible, not on the demands of federal bureaucrats. The administration’s mandate that religious employers provide coverage of abortion-inducing drugs for their faculty, staff, and students is a bridge too far in America.

This ‘conscience tax’ is a blatant violation of the freedoms of religion and speech guaranteed by the U.S. Constitution and affirmed by federal laws such as the Religious Freedom Restoration Act. This mandate would be unjust even if it applied only to those who accept government funding, but it does much more than that. It applies to private, religious employers just because they exist in American society, regardless of whether they receive government funding.

Indeed, it is the Obama Administration’s attempt to broadly impose its will on any religious organization in violation of First Amendment protections that brought such a wide variety of institutions to challenge the Obamacare regulations. Notre Dame President Father John Jenkins wrote that his university’s lawsuit goes beyond a debate about contraception and is about the freedom of a religious organization to “live its mission”:

For if one Presidential Administration can override our religious purpose and use religious organizations to advance policies that undercut our values, then surely another Administration will do the same for another very different set of policies, each time invoking some concept of popular will or the public good, with the result these religious organizations become mere tools for the exercise of government power, morally subservient to the state, and not free from its infringements. If that happens, it will be the end of genuinely religious organizations in all but name.

The United States Conference of Catholic Bishops has called the Obamacare mandate an “unprecedented” violation of religious freedom by the federal government. In addition to the lawsuits, Catholic bishops are planning a national campaign for religious freedom in the two weeks leading up to the Fourth of July holiday. Cardinal Timothy Dolan, president of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, explained the urgency behind their actions: “We have tried negotiation with the Administration and legislation with the Congress–and we’ll keep at it–but there’s still no fix. Time is running out, and our valuable ministries and fundamental rights hang in the balance, so we have to resort to the courts now.”

So yet again, Obamacare’s overreach will come before the courts, this time because its centrally driven health care policy is conflicting with conscience and poses a direct threat to the nation’s religious institutions. Regardless of the outcome, there is one thing Congress can do to stop the federal government’s vast overreach into American life — repeal Obamacare now, and then replace it with market-based reforms that respect religious liberty.

In a sermon that was posted on YouTube in March, Rev Jesse Lee Peterson said women are leading the United States down a path of wickedness because they have too much political power.

Fox News host Sean Hannity has invited Rev Peterson on his show several times, including after the video was posted, and sits on the board of the conservative activist’s organization.

Rev Peterson’s fiery statement had drawn immense criticism.

‘I think that one of the greatest mistakes America made was to allow women the opportunity to vote,’ Peterson said in the sermon.

‘We should’ve never turned this over to women. It was a big mistake… And these women are voting in the wrong people. They’re voting in people who are evil who agrees (sic) with them who’re gonna take us down this pathway of destruction.

‘And this probably was the reason that they didn’t allow women to vote when men were men. Because men, in the good old days, understood the nature of the woman. They were not afraid to deal with it and they understood that if they let them take over, this is what would happen.’

Ok, I might get some flak for this, but I happen to agree with Rev Peterson.  To a degree.  A large number of females ARE voting for the wrong people, based solely on emotion.  I know a few of ‘em.    Perhaps if our education system hadn’t failed to teach our kids right from wrong, personal responsible, and TRUE history, we wouldn’t be in the mess we’re in?  We’ve had a lot of outside influence, infiltration from agitators into the public school system, and apparently, it’s a requirement now to be a Marxist to get tenure in those so called institutions of higher learning. Is it any wonder that weak minded women have been drawn down that path of destruction?

Those who have criticized Rev Peterson are evidently unfamiliar with Biblical teachings.  Men USE to be men!  Oh, there are still some around, but not many who hold public office.  Why?  Because back when, males were so busy trying to get back in where they came from, they allowed women to gain control.  That is not Biblical.  Women do have a place in this world, and yes, some women DO have the good sense to turn their backs on the path of destruction.  Sadly, many do not.

There was a line in My Big Fat Greek Wedding that went something like “Men are the head of the household.  Women are the neck.”  Sadly, we have lost that power to influence in a positive manner, and organizations like NOW and ACLU, etc., have totally wussified the male of our species.

No, it’s not ok casually accept the slaughter preborn babies.  There is a reason for every child conceived, and who are we, as a society to make it a normal fact of life?  No, it’s not ok to accept what God calls an ‘abomination’, for ‘preachers’ to condone such acts is to deny God.  Not a real good idea.  No, it’s not ok for young males to hop from bed to bed, creating children they have no intention of care for, to be a positive role model, to raise up to walk with God.  No, it’s not ok, for young girls to crawl into the sack with some ass clown who says “I love you” but has no intention of putting a ring on her finger, making a commitment for a lifetime.  No, it’s not ok to condone such behavior, and glorify it through television and movies.  No, it’s not ok to commit adultery.  No, it’s not ok to steal, and destroy, and make it look like a ‘cool’ way to live.  No, it’s not ok to covet, demand what others have worked their entire lives for, to give their own families a better life.

These are just a few of the issues women have taken into the voting booth with them.  They have taken away the power, for want of a better word, from the head of the household, removed God from their lives, from their children’s lives, and gloried, not God, but themselves.  So, yes, to a degree, I agree with Rev Peterson.

It’s time to bring back shame, past time, to wean ourselves from so called entertainment that is highly offensive, that promotes negative behavior.  It’s time to put those Ten Commandments BACK in the classrooms.  It’s way past time to bring God back into public square.

On the other hand, I have to 100% disagree with one statement!  I don’t think men have EVER truly understood the nature of women. 

It’s time for men to return to be men, not metrosexuals, or whatever the hell they call themselves.  Women need to take back the true power they had before a few women started marching around like lunatics, acting like sluts, and let them know…

Julia. NOT Julia.

The Danger of Article 82 and Obama’s Latest Treaty
The Foundry

Back in 1982, President Ronald Reagan decided not to sign a treaty known as “Law of the Sea” (LOST), a United Nations convention that would raid America’s treasury for billions of dollars, then redistribute that wealth to the rest of the world by an international bureaucracy headquartered in Kingston, Jamaica. But today, the Obama Administration has revived that treaty, and tomorrow Senator John Kerry (D-MA) will hold hearings designed to illustrate its supposed benefits and generate support for its ratification. Without a doubt, Reagan’s decision should stand, and LOST should remain relegated to the trash bin of history.

The rationale for LOST is that it supposedly brings order to the world’s oceans, defines the rights and responsibilities of nations as they navigate and conduct business across the seas, protects the marine environment, and allows for the development of natural resources of the deep seabed. On the surface, these all sound like worthwhile goals. The thing is, the United States doesn’t need to join another United Nations treaty to make it happen.

For more than 200 years before LOST was adopted in 1982 and for 30 years since then, the U.S. Navy has successfully protected America’s maritime interests regardless of the fact that the United States has not signed on to the treaty. The United States’ navigational rights and freedoms have been secure, and they are best guaranteed by a strong Navy.

LOST is not without consequences, either. One of the more nefarious and insidious of its provisions is Article 82, which requires the United States to forfeit royalties generated from oil and gas development on the continental shelf beyond 200 nautical miles – an area known as the “extended continental shelf.” That money, which one estimate says could be worth many billions, if not trillions of dollars, would go to the International Seabed Authority, a new international bureaucracy created by the treaty and based in Jamaica. Heritage’s Steven Groves explains that from there, America’s money could be shipped to the Middle East, Africa, China, and even state sponsors of terror:

LOST directs that the revenue be distributed to “developing States” (such as Somalia, Burma … you get the picture) and “peoples who have not attained full independence” (such as the Palestinian Liberation Organization … hey, don’t they sponsor terrorism?). The assembly – the “supreme organ” of the International Seabed Authority in which the United States has a single vote to cast – has the final say regarding the distribution of America’s transmogrified “international” royalties.

The assembly may vote to distribute royalties to undemocratic, despotic or brutal governments in Belarus, China or Zimbabwe – all members of LOST. Perhaps those dollars will go to regimes that are merely corrupt; 13 of the world’s 20 most corrupt nations, according to Transparency International, are parties to LOST. Even Cuba and Sudan, both considered state sponsors of terrorism, could receive dollars fresh from the U.S. Treasury.

In addition to shipping America’s money overseas to unsavory recipients, LOST could have other negative consequences, as well, by exposing U.S. industry and manufacturing to baseless international lawsuits. In fact, environmental activists and international legal academics are actively exploring the potential of using international litigation against the United States to advance their agendas. And for those who say LOST is a tool for mediating international disputes, take a look at the Philippines, which signed on to the treaty and yet today is finding itself browbeaten by China and its claims in the South China Sea.

If America truly wants to preserve its rights on the sea, then it needs to bolster the one tool that has guaranteed those rights throughout history — a strong U.S. Navy. Unfortunately, under President Obama’s watch, the United States is seeing its fleet diminished in size and ability. A lone piece of paper will not defend America’s interests on the sea, and neither will transferring billions of dollars to an international authority in Jamaica for redistribution the world over. LOST should not be ratified and signed, and instead Washington should turn its attention to ensuring that the U.S. Navy has the resources it needs to protect America’s interests on the high seas.

A Force for Liberty from China to Cuba
The Foundry

On Saturday night, blind Chinese legal activist Chen Guangcheng arrived in Newark, N.J., after escaping seven years of persecution in China. With the sweet land of liberty under his feet, Chen breathed the free air and remarked, “We should link our arms to continue in the fight for the goodness in the world and to fight against injustice.” Chen’s newfound freedom is a cause for celebration, but it is also a reminder that America must continue to be a force for liberty in the world, whether on the other side of the world or 90 miles off the shores of Florida.

A 40-year-old self-taught lawyer, Chen was imprisoned for four years, placed under house arrest and suffered beatings after voicing opposition to communist China’s one-child policy, which brings with it government-forced abortions, coerced sterilizations, and fines or physical abuse for neighbors and family members of women with unauthorized pregnancies. Last month, he escaped the grip of Chinese authorities and found refuge in the U.S. Embassy. After a series of negotiations, Chen and his immediate family won their freedom — he is now a legal fellow at New York University Law School.

Chen’s case brings to light the reality of modern-day China — a country that has been radically transformed over the last 30 years thanks to economic development. But as much as the country has changed, much remains the same. Heritage’s Walter Lohman explains:

China is a place that has not changed since the Tiananmen Square Massacre in 1989 when it comes to respect for the fundamental rights of its people. This is sometimes hard for the diplomats, scholars, businessmen, and tourists who spend time there to believe. Likewise, there are many privileged, worldly Chinese who fail to see it.

The People’s Republic of China is an authoritarian, yes, ‘communist’ nation. This China is Chen’s day-to-day reality. And it is a brutal reality for many hundreds of millions more. U.S.-China relations will never be normal as long as the Chinese regime is what it is.

Chen sees the Chinese government for the authoritarian beast that it is, and he has won international acclaim for his activism. “I am not a hero,” he said. “I’m just doing what my conscience asks me to do. I cannot be silent when facing these evils against women and children.” The United States should not be silent, either.

China, though, is not the only communist government standing in the way of freedom. Just off the Florida Keys, the Castro regime continues to hold an iron grip on the Cuban people. Yesterday marked the 110th year of Cuba’s independence, but sadly 53 of those years have been spent under the Castros’ dictatorship. Political opposition is not tolerated, those who stand against the regime are harassed and persecuted, all forms of media and communications are under government control, and freedoms of speech and association are suppressed.

There is hope for Cuba. In a new paper, Heritage’s Ray Walser writes that the Castro regime is on the verge of extinction but is working to ensure the country’s communist system continues. He advises that the United States should stand for freedom and press for genuine democracy in Cuba. That means not appeasing the dictatorial regime, backing genuine economic transformation, challenging Cuba’s information blockade, and establishing clear yardsticks for democratic change, including independent political parties, free and fair elections, freedom of information, expression, and association, and respect for human rights.

“Failure to stand with the advocates of genuine economic and political change in Cuba and to press for a policy of true transition and genuine democracy could condemn yet another generation of Cubans to lives without freedom, opportunity, or hope,” Walser writes. Indeed, the United States can be a powerful force for freedom — whether it’s for one Chinese activist standing up in a country of one billion, or if it’s for one tiny island surrounded by a vast ocean. But America must choose to stand up for the light of liberty, not turn away from the darkness.

Although some NATO Summit protesters said there was nothing more incriminating than home brewing equipment in the Bridgeport apartment where they were staying, three of them have now been charged with possessing explosives to commit terrorist acts.

I guess it’s no secret I don’t much care for folks who make their ‘living’ going around the world, protesting whatever comes down the pike, but seriously?  Now, I suppose if these folks used bottles for their home brewed beer, someone might be able to misconstrue the purpose, but then again…

Ok, here’s your very basic beer brewing set up, bare bones type stuff.  They do get more elaborate, and expensive, but this is an example.

If all they were doing was making home brewed beer, then police over reacted. IF, on the other hand, as anarchists types are wont to do, they were preparing to create chaos, cause mayhem, and destroy anything in their path, then throw ‘em under the jail. I’m pretty fed up with those who have NO respect for other peoples property. If they made an effort to earn anything on their own, they just MIGHT understand.

There was also accusations of mistreatment, and ‘violation of civil rights’ by the police. Called me shocked! There always seem to be such accusations coming from the left, the anarchists, and generally anyone who has an issue about anything.  Isn’t it odd that they never mind violating someone else’s REAL rights, but when it comes to themselves, EVERYTHING is a “right”, and they are always being violated.  Did the guy actually WALK all the way from Philadelphia to Chicago just to stand around with some stupid sign, and shout vulgarities?  I have my doubts about that walking business.