VoteKansas.org

Lawmakers are investigating whether a top government investigator was involved in producing a report that erroneously suggested certain scientists approved a drilling moratorium in the Gulf of Mexico after the Deepwater Horizon disaster.

The moratorium cost thousands of jobs throughout the region and created a decline in energy production. Seven members of the National Academy of Engineers later rebuffed the action.

The target of the probe, Mary Kendall, the Interior Department’s acting inspector general (IG), told a House oversight panel in 2010 she was not investigating the error because it was the subject of a lawsuit.

“I was not involved in the process of developing that report, and I think it would be inappropriate for me to comment on it,” Kendall told lawmakers.

The IG later revealed that the White House was involved in editing that specific language but blamed it on a drafting error.

Rep. Doc Hastings (R-Wash.), chairman of the House Natural Resources Committee, says newly obtained documents show Kendall actually played a role in developing the report and that she participated in key meetings.

“This apparent involvement also raises new questions about the acting IG’s independence and impartiality in conducting the investigation of the drilling moratorium report, whether it was appropriate for her to oversee this investigation in the first place, and whether she should have disclosed her involvement and recused herself from all matters concerning the investigation,” Hastings said.

Kendall told USA Today she attended the meetings but only as “an active listener.”

“I was not an active participant in these meetings,” Kendall said.

Schedules show Kendall was a “required invitee” to meetings discussing the peer reviews, and in emails she described that work as “enormously impressive.”

While much of the world’s attention is focused on the Assad regime’s appalling assaults against Syrian citizens, with more than a hundred dead in this week’s massacre in Houla alone, another human rights atrocity occurring on a much larger scale garners far less attention.

North Korea’s new leader, Kim Jong-Eun, has done what few expected when he assumed power after his father’s death last December. Instead of loosening control in the most totalitarian nation in the world, Kim Jong-Eun has actually expanded the number of North Koreans subject to forced labor, torture, starvation and death in the totalitarian nation’s prison camps.

The camps, known as kwan-li-so, form a hidden gulag where those accused of crimes against the state are imprisoned. An estimated 200,000 people serve in these camps. The regime imposes sentences, often without even the pretense of a show trial, like those that took place in the Stalinist Soviet Union. Summary executions occur regularly in the camps. Although the sentences may be for ten years or less, most prisoners die in the kwan-li-so before completing their terms.

Prisoners work 12-18 hours a day under inhumane and dangerous conditions in mines, quarries, and factories. Accidents maim and kill many, but more often starvation takes an unimaginable toll. The average prisoner receives only 100-200 grams of food a day — the equivalent of about one cup of white rice — with virtually no protein. But even rice, a staple of the Asian diet, is often unavailable. Corn is the usual substitute, which leads to pellagra, a disease that brings on skin lesions, mental confusion and eventually dementia.

But perhaps the most heinous aspect of the camps is that not only are those accused of “crimes” but their entire families imprisoned. The founder of the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea, Kim Il-Sung, justified the practice by claiming, “The seed of factionalists or class enemies, whoever they are, must be eliminated through three generations.” So, spouses, children, siblings, even elderly parents often serve sentences along with the accused.

Now Kim Jong-Eun, the latest in the Kim dynasty that has ruled the DPRK since 1948, has expanded this barbaric practice. The young Kim has now instructed that both older and younger relatives of anyone caught trying to flee the country will be sent to the kwan-li-so.

Even knowing the horrific consequences, North Koreans will continue to try to leave. Since the devastating famine in the mid-’90s when as many as 2.5 million people starved to death, some 15,000 North Koreans have reached safety in South Korea or third countries.

Many more live secretly in China, where their plight is not much better than in the DPRK. These refugees are under constant threat of being turned over to North Korean authorities by the Chinese government or even being kidnapped and forcibly returned by DPRK agents who cross the border for that purpose.

Yet most people in the West either are unaware of what is going on in North Korea or choose to ignore it. And the U.S. government reserves what little outrage it displays on the rogue nation’s nuclear program.

It may become more difficult to avert our gaze, however, as new information leaks out about exactly how bad conditions are in the kwan-li-so. An updated report of the Committee for Human Rights in Korea, “The Hidden Gulag: The Lives and Voices of Those Who Are Sent to the Mountains,” now includes eyewitness testimony from 60 former prisoners along with 30 pages of satellite images of the camps.

In addition, a new book focuses attention on the plight of those who have survived the terror of the camps. Blaine Hardin’s “Escape from Camp 14″ details the life of Shin Dong-hyuk, a young man born in the camp who escaped, but only after turning in his mother and brother, whom he regarded as traitors and rivals for food, and witnessing their execution. But there have been other books that told similar stories — “The Aquariums of Pyongyang,” by former prisoner Kang Chol-hwan, and “The Long Road Home,” by Kim Yong — yet neither provoked sufficient interest and outrage to mobilize Americans to want to do something.

Unless that changes, North Korea will continue to starve, torture, and kill its people while we look the other way.

Apparently, “tax the billionaires” is a better rallying cry for his reelection campaign than “look at my record.” Here is the list, not for the faint of heart, of Obama’s class warfare attacks.

1. Attacking capitalism

The Obama campaign is trying to make Mitt Romney’s work at Bain Capital an issue in the race, bemoaning how jobs were sometimes lost in the restructuring of its acquisitions. But Mr. Obama, that is how capitalism works, and it is exactly what you did during the bailout of General Motors when unprofitable divisions were shut down in order to save the larger company.

2. Tax the rich

Even as Obama spends the nation to oblivion, he is trying to make the case that taxing the wealthy will solve the country’s budget crisis. Even Nancy Pelosi is breaking with the president, saying the Bush tax cuts should be extended to those making up to $1 million, instead of Obama’s $250,000. When you’ve lost Pelosi, you’ve lost the argument.

3. Demonize corporations

No president has ever gone after the corporate world as Obama has, demonizing the banks, the oil companies, pharmaceuticals, and any entity that could actually create a job. His hypocrisy holds no bounds, as he greedily soaks up campaign donations from the same ventures he attacks.

4.Biden, the hit-man

Gaffe-machine Joe Biden apparently doesn’t have much to do as the nation’s vice president, so why not trot him out as the administration’s hit-man, where he can sharpen his boss’s anti-wealth attacks. Last Labor Day, he called Obama’s  opponents barbarians, and more recently, at a rally in Ohio, Biden ranted, “They don’t get who we are.” Oh yes we do, Mr. Vice President, and that’s why we are on the other side.

5. Unleash the unions

Big Labor provides the foot soldiers for Obama’s reelection bid and he returns the favor through appointments and policies beneficial to their interests. Union bosses have virtually set up an office in the White House, making hundreds of visits for meetings with top officials. And don’t forget the Service Employees International Union (SEIU), which deploys an army of thugs to attend left-wing rallies and are not adverse to forcibly bullying its opponents.

6. Promote the Occupy movement

The president has lent his moral support to the Occupy Wall Street movement, even as the protests turned violent and the group became infested with criminal activity. He hitched his ride with the motley activists early on, saying last October the movement was a reflection of a “broad-based frustration about how our financial system works.” Spoken like the Alinsky-styled community organizer that he remains at heart.

7. Spread the wealth around

As candidate Obama famously told Joe the Plumber in 2008, he is all about wealth redistribution and since taking office his budgets have piled up trillions of dollars in deficits trying to do just that. Given a second term, this president will increase taxes every which way in order to pay for more social programs for the downtrodden, keeping an increasing number of Americans on the government dole.

8. ObamaCare’s ‘fairness’

The president’s healthcare initiative is one big class warfare gambit as he loads up on tax increases in order to subsidize the uninsured. The problem is that it just won’t work. Costs continue to rise, businesses will begin to shed their health plans, and longer waits will become normal at the doctor’s office. All out of the misguided notion of “fairness.”

9. Double-down

Even as his policies have slowed the economic recovery, created few jobs, added trillions to the national debt, put in roadblocks that curtail U.S. energy production, and destroyed the healthcare system, President Obama continues the same misguided efforts. A true revolutionary never loses sight of the ultimate goal, with the ends justifying the means, and two steps forward, one step back. Look at his annual budget request which is such a joke with its big spending, big government approach that he can’t get a single Democrat to vote for it.

10. Overheated rhetoric

No class warfare attack could be complete without resorting to over-the-top rhetoric meant to inflame passions rather than to reach a consensus. President Obama has become a master of that art, blaming “millionaires and billionaires” for all the nation’s woes in nearly every speech he gives. He reached his rhetorical zenith when he tried to portray President Reagan as a “wild-eyed, socialist, tax-hiking class warrior.”

In this corner, weighing 110 pounds and standing 5-feet 7-inches tall, 18-year-old pop star Justin Bieber. In the other corner, some guy who was aggressively taking his picture in a California shopping mall.

Los Angeles County police are investigating accusations that Justin struck a photographer, which, if true, would violate California Penal Code 242 even if the striking blow was, well, glancing. Detectives want you to call them if you saw the brawl or if Justin attacked you, as well.

So far Bieber is not talking.

Apparently, the photographer called the Malibu-Lost Hills Sheriff’s department last Sunday afternoon. The victim says he was “battered” by the singer, who was accompanied by his girlfriend, Selena Gomez. The victim complained of “pain” and was transported to a local hospital where he was treated and released into the custody of a lawyer who immediately contacted the media.

Now, I am certain being attacked by Justin Bieber is no laughing matter. If the guy ever got a haircut and a neck tattoo, he could look menacing. Perhaps Justin knows kung fu.

But the odds are that this is yet another shakedown generated by a loser and his sleazy attorney who will game the system hoping Bieber will throw some money at them in order to make the annoyance go away.

There are now legions of lawyers who will file lawsuits against famous and rich people for just about anything. Lawsuits cost money to defend, and the media are overjoyed to publicize any and all alleged “transgressions.” No evidence has to be provided to the press; a lurid accusation is enough. This is now an industry: Fleecing the Rich and Famous. In fact, it could be a reality show. Paging Robin Leach.

But if you really look at what’s happening, it’s despicable. Legalized extortion and blackmail are now epidemics in America. Famous people are routinely slandered, libeled, followed and menaced in public. And there’s little they can do about it. If you are a public figure and/or have money, you are a huge target and will get little sympathy from the court or from the court of public opinion.

Recently, I took three young teenagers to see the play “Jesus Christ Superstar.” Upon leaving the theater, a guy who identified himself as an “Occupy protester” was waiting for me with a camera and recorder. He began screaming nonsense. I told the guy to knock it off because he was scaring the kids. He actually yelled louder and even chased my car down the street. The girls were unnerved.

I truly wish Bieber had been with me that night so he could have smacked down that guy. I guess I could have done it, but the line of attorneys responding would have stretched from Broadway to Michigan.

We absolutely need tort reform in this country, and we need to adopt a brand-new slogan, as well: “Free Justin Bieber.”

With four days to go – Walker leads by 7!

Governor Scott Walker leads by 7 points in the latest poll going into Tuesday’s recall election.
MSNBC reported:

Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker (R) enjoys a 7-point advantage over Democratic challenger Tom Barrett among likely voters in Tuesday’s recall election.

Fifty-two percent of likely voters said they would vote to retain Walker, according to a Marquette Law School poll released Wednesday; 45 percent of likely voters said they would support Barrett, the mayor of Milwaukee.

The poll suggests that Walker is heading toward victory on Tuesday, which would deliver a stinging rebuke to Democrats and members of the labor community who had sought the first-term governor’s removal after he pushed a controversial bill curbing collective bargaining rights for many public employees through the Wisconsin state legislature.

Also…
The Racine Tea Party PAC is hosting a rally on Saturday, June 2nd from 10:00am to noon at Gorney Park in Racine County. This rally will be the last big protest in Racine before the recall election.

The event will feature Congressman Paul Ryan, All Patriots Media – Tony Katz, Breibart.com and CNN contributor Dana Loesch the “rock star of radio” Wisconsin’s own – Vicki McKenna, PA Tea Party Activist & Fox News Contributor – Jenn Stefano State Senator – Van Wanggaard and more. Invited guests include Lt Governor Rebecca Kleefisch and several big surprise guests.
If you are in the area please plan on attending!

With four days to go – Walker leads by 7!

Governor Scott Walker leads by 7 points in the latest poll going into Tuesday’s recall election.
MSNBC reported:

Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker (R) enjoys a 7-point advantage over Democratic challenger Tom Barrett among likely voters in Tuesday’s recall election.

Fifty-two percent of likely voters said they would vote to retain Walker, according to a Marquette Law School poll released Wednesday; 45 percent of likely voters said they would support Barrett, the mayor of Milwaukee.

The poll suggests that Walker is heading toward victory on Tuesday, which would deliver a stinging rebuke to Democrats and members of the labor community who had sought the first-term governor’s removal after he pushed a controversial bill curbing collective bargaining rights for many public employees through the Wisconsin state legislature.

Also…
The Racine Tea Party PAC is hosting a rally on Saturday, June 2nd from 10:00am to noon at Gorney Park in Racine County. This rally will be the last big protest in Racine before the recall election.

The event will feature Congressman Paul Ryan, All Patriots Media – Tony Katz, Breibart.com and CNN contributor Dana Loesch the “rock star of radio” Wisconsin’s own – Vicki McKenna, PA Tea Party Activist & Fox News Contributor – Jenn Stefano State Senator – Van Wanggaard and more. Invited guests include Lt Governor Rebecca Kleefisch and several big surprise guests.
If you are in the area please plan on attending!

It’s an Obama world…
A pro-Walker Marine vet got into a few confrontations at Democrat Tom Barrett’s rally today with Bill Clinton in Wisconsin.
The Franklin Center has video.

They couldn’t handle the truth.
So, union cops were called in and dragged him out of the rally and arrested him.
They didn’t like what he was saying.

The Marine is predicting a 10 point win for Scott Walker.
I second that.

It’s an Obama world…
A pro-Walker Marine vet got into a few confrontations at Democrat Tom Barrett’s rally today with Bill Clinton in Wisconsin.
The Franklin Center has video.

They couldn’t handle the truth.
So, union cops were called in and dragged him out of the rally and arrested him.
They didn’t like what he was saying.

The Marine is predicting a 10 point win for Scott Walker.
I second that.

Tune into WMAL Saturday morning at 7 a.m. EST as Political Editor John Gizzi goes on the air to discuss the upcoming recall election in Wisconsin and its impact on the national elections this November.

Click here to listen!

Tune into WMAL Saturday morning at 7 a.m. EST as Political Editor John Gizzi goes on the air to discuss the upcoming recall election in Wisconsin and its impact on the national elections this November.

Click here to listen!

Democrats in Massachusetts are holding their convention this weekend, and they’ve got to decide if they’re ready to roll the dice on woman who either doesn’t know when to stop pushing a transparent lie, or is out of her mind.

Elizabeth Warren, who is zero percent Native American but has been making false claims of Cherokee ancestry for decades, finally snapped under the pressure of having the liberal Boston Globe frown at her, even as demands for an apology from the actual Cherokee grow more insistent.

In a phone interview with a Globe reporter on Thursday, Fauxcahontas doubled down:

“In the 1930s, when my parents got married, these were hard issues,’’ Warren said. “My father’s family so objected to my mother’s Native American heritage that my mother told me they had to elope.

“As kids, my brothers and I knew about that. We knew about the differences between our two families. And we knew how important my mother’s heritage was to her. This was real in my life. I can’t deny my heritage. I can’t and I won’t. That would be denying who my mother was, who my family was, how we lived, and I won’t do it.’’

Asked what made her mother’s family distinctly Native American, Warren laughed and replied, “It was exactly what I said.’’ Asked again, she responded, “One side was Cherokee and the other side was Delaware. I never had any reason to doubt them. I never asked for any documentation. It’s who we were.’’

(Emphasis mine.)  This tale is so deeply seared into her memory that she has never mentioned it before, just like she didn’t say a blessed word about her alleged Native American roots when the Globe interviewed her for a 3,000-word biography last February.

Michael Patrick Leahy, who has been doggedly following the Warren saga for Breitbart.com, quickly published the 1932 marriage certificate for Warren’s parents, Donald J. Herring and Pauline Reed.  It was originally posted last week at the “Polly’s Granddaughter” blog run by actual Cherokee genealogist Twila Barnes.  It turns out Warren’s parents were married about 14 miles from their listed place of residence in Oklahoma, which was in the same county where Reed’s parents resided.  The wedding was performed by the pastor of a Methodist Episcopal Church.

Reed is identified as “white” on 1920 and 1930 U.S. Census records.  Barnes dug considerably deeper into Warren’s family tree, and found not the slightest evidence of Cherokee ancestry.  Even if Elizabeth Warren’s fanciful claims of “1/32 Cherokee ancestry” were true, she’s now claiming her mother was driven to flee 14 miles so she could marry a white man, due to unbearable prejudice leveled against her for being 1/16 Native American.  Furthermore, in her Globe interview, she claimed her Indian heritage changed “how we lived,” which implies the hardships endured long after that arduous half-hour journey… but, according to her own timeline, she forgot about all of this until well after she was hired by Harvard, and began advertising herself as Native American “in the hopes that it might mean that I would be invited to a luncheon, a group something that might happen with people who are like I am.”

Somehow, I doubt the real Cherokee are going to be delighted with these new developments.

Democrats in Massachusetts are holding their convention this weekend, and they’ve got to decide if they’re ready to roll the dice on woman who either doesn’t know when to stop pushing a transparent lie, or is out of her mind.

Elizabeth Warren, who is zero percent Native American but has been making false claims of Cherokee ancestry for decades, finally snapped under the pressure of having the liberal Boston Globe frown at her, even as demands for an apology from the actual Cherokee grow more insistent.

In a phone interview with a Globe reporter on Thursday, Fauxcahontas doubled down:

“In the 1930s, when my parents got married, these were hard issues,’’ Warren said. “My father’s family so objected to my mother’s Native American heritage that my mother told me they had to elope.

“As kids, my brothers and I knew about that. We knew about the differences between our two families. And we knew how important my mother’s heritage was to her. This was real in my life. I can’t deny my heritage. I can’t and I won’t. That would be denying who my mother was, who my family was, how we lived, and I won’t do it.’’

Asked what made her mother’s family distinctly Native American, Warren laughed and replied, “It was exactly what I said.’’ Asked again, she responded, “One side was Cherokee and the other side was Delaware. I never had any reason to doubt them. I never asked for any documentation. It’s who we were.’’

(Emphasis mine.)  This tale is so deeply seared into her memory that she has never mentioned it before, just like she didn’t say a blessed word about her alleged Native American roots when the Globe interviewed her for a 3,000-word biography last February.

Michael Patrick Leahy, who has been doggedly following the Warren saga for Breitbart.com, quickly published the 1932 marriage certificate for Warren’s parents, Donald J. Herring and Pauline Reed.  It was originally posted last week at the “Polly’s Granddaughter” blog run by actual Cherokee genealogist Twila Barnes.  It turns out Warren’s parents were married about 14 miles from their listed place of residence in Oklahoma, which was in the same county where Reed’s parents resided.  The wedding was performed by the pastor of a Methodist Episcopal Church.

Reed is identified as “white” on 1920 and 1930 U.S. Census records.  Barnes dug considerably deeper into Warren’s family tree, and found not the slightest evidence of Cherokee ancestry.  Even if Elizabeth Warren’s fanciful claims of “1/32 Cherokee ancestry” were true, she’s now claiming her mother was driven to flee 14 miles so she could marry a white man, due to unbearable prejudice leveled against her for being 1/16 Native American.  Furthermore, in her Globe interview, she claimed her Indian heritage changed “how we lived,” which implies the hardships endured long after that arduous half-hour journey… but, according to her own timeline, she forgot about all of this until well after she was hired by Harvard, and began advertising herself as Native American “in the hopes that it might mean that I would be invited to a luncheon, a group something that might happen with people who are like I am.”

Somehow, I doubt the real Cherokee are going to be delighted with these new developments.

There’s no way for President Obama or his media allies to spin the apocalyptic May jobs report, released Friday by the Bureau of Labor Statistics, as even the heavily massaged “official” unemployment rate rose to 8.2%.  That brings us to forty straight months of adjusted unemployment above 8 percent.

The only tiny glimmer of hope in this report is the one thing the media never wanted to report until now: the overall workforce participation rate nudged up a bit, showing a 0.2 percent gain, widely thought to represent students entering the workforce in search of summer jobs.  This leaves the American workforce considerably smaller than it was on the day Barack Obama took office.  For this reason, it would be extremely uncomfortable for the White House to suddenly discover the workforce participation rate it has been studiously ignoring for the past three years, and attempt to cite the May gain as a spot of good news.

Only 69,000 jobs were created in May.  That’s far, far below the rate needed to keep pace with population growth, and an astonishing failure to meet expectations of 150,000 jobs created – which would have given us a stagnant job market.

Furthermore, the already anemic April numbers were revised down by 38,000 jobs, which is a huge “adjustment.”  The old number was only 115,000 jobs created!  Now it’s down to 77,000, and even March was revised down by 11,000 jobs to 143,000.  Well north of 150,000 jobs are needed to keep up with population growth.

Think about the magnitude of those “adjustments” for a moment.  The three-month average just dropped from 113,000 per month to 96,000… and 113,000 was awful.  Construction took a big hit, losing 28,000 jobs in May.  It has long been known that the warm winter moved a lot of construction jobs ahead.  Also, those notorious “seasonal adjustments” are always positive during the winter, but they start becoming negative in May.  The bottom line is that the situation has always been worse than casual news consumers were led to believe.  The fudge is getting fire-hosed from these numbers.

Long-term unemployment is up, from 5.1 million to 5.4 million, making them 42.8 percent of the unemployed population.  The average duration of unemployment rose from 19.4 weeks to 20.1 weeks.  Part-time work is up, as the BLS finds people “working part time because their hours had been cut back, or because they were unable to find a full-time job.”  Average hourly earnings grew by an extremely weak 0.7 percent – another sign of the transition to an economy dominated by part-time and temporary jobs.

The population of discouraged workers, the “unemployables,” has held steady at 830,000 for a year.  The BLS defines discouraged workers as “persons not currently looking for work because they believe no jobs are available for them.”  Just what America needs!  Let’s have four more years of it!

Among key voting demographics, Hispanic employment is up, while women, young people, and blacks remain hopelessly stagnant.

This awful jobs report comes in tandem with the downward revision of America’s GDP growth forecast, which the Commerce Department now estimates at a perilously weak 1.9 percent for the year.  Former Federal Reserve chairman Alan Greenspan told CNBC on Friday that he attributes this sluggish growth to “a fear of the future” among investors and executives.  Taxmageddon, the largest tax increase ever to hit American businesses and families, is a thundercloud rumbling on the horizon, ready to rain almost half a trillion dollars in new taxes on the weak Obama economy in January 2013.  As the Heritage Foundation points out, Barack Obama is utterly silent about stopping this disaster, and actively opposed to efforts at stimulating the U.S. economy by increasing our energy reserves or trimming onerous regulations.

This is an apocalyptic disaster for the Obama re-election campaign – which, you may recall, was recently trying to criticize Mitt Romney for achieving a 4.7 percent unemployment rate in Massachusetts.  That’s a level this failed President cannot even dream of.  Nevertheless, Obama promptly jetted off to an incredible six fundraisers in one day.  (Hat tip: Jammie Wearing Fool.)  Just think of all the jobs that could be created if people invested that money instead of pouring it into Barack Obama’s pointless re-election effort.

Update: Corrected a typo on the April job numbers, which should have said “revised down to 77,00 jobs,” not “revised down by 77,000 jobs.”  Since I had the 77k figure later in the paragraph, I thought it would be most efficient to edit the line to read “revised down by 38,000 jobs.”

There’s no way for President Obama or his media allies to spin the apocalyptic May jobs report, released Friday by the Bureau of Labor Statistics, as even the heavily massaged “official” unemployment rate rose to 8.2%.  That brings us to forty straight months of adjusted unemployment above 8 percent.

The only tiny glimmer of hope in this report is the one thing the media never wanted to report until now: the overall workforce participation rate nudged up a bit, showing a 0.2 percent gain, widely thought to represent students entering the workforce in search of summer jobs.  This leaves the American workforce considerably smaller than it was on the day Barack Obama took office.  For this reason, it would be extremely uncomfortable for the White House to suddenly discover the workforce participation rate it has been studiously ignoring for the past three years, and attempt to cite the May gain as a spot of good news.

Only 69,000 jobs were created in May.  That’s far, far below the rate needed to keep pace with population growth, and an astonishing failure to meet expectations of 150,000 jobs created – which would have given us a stagnant job market.

Furthermore, the already anemic April numbers were revised down by 38,000 jobs, which is a huge “adjustment.”  The old number was only 115,000 jobs created!  Now it’s down to 77,000, and even March was revised down by 11,000 jobs to 143,000.  Well north of 150,000 jobs are needed to keep up with population growth.

Think about the magnitude of those “adjustments” for a moment.  The three-month average just dropped from 113,000 per month to 96,000… and 113,000 was awful.  Construction took a big hit, losing 28,000 jobs in May.  It has long been known that the warm winter moved a lot of construction jobs ahead.  Also, those notorious “seasonal adjustments” are always positive during the winter, but they start becoming negative in May.  The bottom line is that the situation has always been worse than casual news consumers were led to believe.  The fudge is getting fire-hosed from these numbers.

Long-term unemployment is up, from 5.1 million to 5.4 million, making them 42.8 percent of the unemployed population.  The average duration of unemployment rose from 19.4 weeks to 20.1 weeks.  Part-time work is up, as the BLS finds people “working part time because their hours had been cut back, or because they were unable to find a full-time job.”  Average hourly earnings grew by an extremely weak 0.7 percent – another sign of the transition to an economy dominated by part-time and temporary jobs.

The population of discouraged workers, the “unemployables,” has held steady at 830,000 for a year.  The BLS defines discouraged workers as “persons not currently looking for work because they believe no jobs are available for them.”  Just what America needs!  Let’s have four more years of it!

Among key voting demographics, Hispanic employment is up, while women, young people, and blacks remain hopelessly stagnant.

This awful jobs report comes in tandem with the downward revision of America’s GDP growth forecast, which the Commerce Department now estimates at a perilously weak 1.9 percent for the year.  Former Federal Reserve chairman Alan Greenspan told CNBC on Friday that he attributes this sluggish growth to “a fear of the future” among investors and executives.  Taxmageddon, the largest tax increase ever to hit American businesses and families, is a thundercloud rumbling on the horizon, ready to rain almost half a trillion dollars in new taxes on the weak Obama economy in January 2013.  As the Heritage Foundation points out, Barack Obama is utterly silent about stopping this disaster, and actively opposed to efforts at stimulating the U.S. economy by increasing our energy reserves or trimming onerous regulations.

This is an apocalyptic disaster for the Obama re-election campaign – which, you may recall, was recently trying to criticize Mitt Romney for achieving a 4.7 percent unemployment rate in Massachusetts.  That’s a level this failed President cannot even dream of.  Nevertheless, Obama promptly jetted off to an incredible six fundraisers in one day.  (Hat tip: Jammie Wearing Fool.)  Just think of all the jobs that could be created if people invested that money instead of pouring it into Barack Obama’s pointless re-election effort.

Update: Corrected a typo on the April job numbers, which should have said “revised down to 77,00 jobs,” not “revised down by 77,000 jobs.”  Since I had the 77k figure later in the paragraph, I thought it would be most efficient to edit the line to read “revised down by 38,000 jobs.”

This week, New York Mayor Mike Bloomberg announced that he will outlaw the sale of sodas, sports drinks and other sugary beverages that exceed 16 ounces. Don’t worry. There are numerous exemptions to this petty interference. Feel free to indulge in high-caloric milkshakes, fruit juices or just head to the convenience store and grab a Big Gulp, a Slurpee, or buy large bottles of Diet Coke.

When you act like a petty tyrant, making arbitrary decisions with absolutely no basis in science or common sense is your prerogative. In the Bloomberg’s vernacular this is referred to as “leadership.” “I think that’s what the public wants the mayor to do,” he explained. The public’s loathing for large-sized soda is so high, evidently, that they need a billionaire technocrat to force them to stop buying more of it.

This is nothing new in New York. Bloomberg, who embodies C.S. Lewis’ observation that “those who torment us for our own good torment us without end,” has banned smoking in bars and restaurants, public parks and on private terraces. He has gone after salt and he has banned trans fats in restaurants. He is America’s leading proponent of using punitive measures to dictate perfectly legal habits. “We’re not taking away anybody’s right to do things,” the mayor explains, “we’re simply forcing you to understand that you have to make the conscious decision to go from one cup to another cup.”

One might wonder what business a mayor has forcing free citizens to “understand” what the mayor thinks about sugary drink or what quantities he thinks we should drink it in? Or you may wonder who in New York – or the world, for that matter — doesn’t understand that gulping down a 16 oz soda every day is insalubrious? If you don’t, you’re beyond the help of Nanny State regulations. And if you do know, an intrusive new law won’t stop you from continuing your bad habits. Study after study says so.

Bloomberg and others argue that obesity costs society a lot of money so we all have a stake. In New York City, supposedly half of all adults are obese or overweight. According to Dr. Thomas Farley, Bloomberg’s health commissioner, sweetened drinks are responsible for “up to” half of the increase in obesity in the city over the last 30 years. There is no way to quantify this sort of thing, of course, no matter what scaremongering bureaucrats tell you. But even if it were true, there is an array of costly externalities associated with behavior – take promiscuity, for instance. Using Bloomberg’s logic everything we do can come under the purview of government’s paternalistic guidance.

Moreover, New York’s Big Soda law is collective punishment. First, those who aren’t obese may occasionally enjoy a gigantic Mountain Dew or — who knows? — a couple might want to share a big drink in a movie theatre. Second, companies that would lose money from laws will certainly pass along the cost to you. If you’ve followed the leading lights of Nanny State policy, you already understand that driving up the cost of unhealthy products is the very point of regulation. So those who drink responsibly — as it were — are punished with those who don’t.

In the end, Bloomberg shows a deep ignorance about human nature, as well. The vast majority of Americans understand that portion control is one of the only ways to lose weight. But if we don’t choose to be healthy, no regulation can coerce us into good health.

This week, New York Mayor Mike Bloomberg announced that he will outlaw the sale of sodas, sports drinks and other sugary beverages that exceed 16 ounces. Don’t worry. There are numerous exemptions to this petty interference. Feel free to indulge in high-caloric milkshakes, fruit juices or just head to the convenience store and grab a Big Gulp, a Slurpee, or buy large bottles of Diet Coke.

When you act like a petty tyrant, making arbitrary decisions with absolutely no basis in science or common sense is your prerogative. In the Bloomberg’s vernacular this is referred to as “leadership.” “I think that’s what the public wants the mayor to do,” he explained. The public’s loathing for large-sized soda is so high, evidently, that they need a billionaire technocrat to force them to stop buying more of it.

This is nothing new in New York. Bloomberg, who embodies C.S. Lewis’ observation that “those who torment us for our own good torment us without end,” has banned smoking in bars and restaurants, public parks and on private terraces. He has gone after salt and he has banned trans fats in restaurants. He is America’s leading proponent of using punitive measures to dictate perfectly legal habits. “We’re not taking away anybody’s right to do things,” the mayor explains, “we’re simply forcing you to understand that you have to make the conscious decision to go from one cup to another cup.”

One might wonder what business a mayor has forcing free citizens to “understand” what the mayor thinks about sugary drink or what quantities he thinks we should drink it in? Or you may wonder who in New York – or the world, for that matter — doesn’t understand that gulping down a 16 oz soda every day is insalubrious? If you don’t, you’re beyond the help of Nanny State regulations. And if you do know, an intrusive new law won’t stop you from continuing your bad habits. Study after study says so.

Bloomberg and others argue that obesity costs society a lot of money so we all have a stake. In New York City, supposedly half of all adults are obese or overweight. According to Dr. Thomas Farley, Bloomberg’s health commissioner, sweetened drinks are responsible for “up to” half of the increase in obesity in the city over the last 30 years. There is no way to quantify this sort of thing, of course, no matter what scaremongering bureaucrats tell you. But even if it were true, there is an array of costly externalities associated with behavior – take promiscuity, for instance. Using Bloomberg’s logic everything we do can come under the purview of government’s paternalistic guidance.

Moreover, New York’s Big Soda law is collective punishment. First, those who aren’t obese may occasionally enjoy a gigantic Mountain Dew or — who knows? — a couple might want to share a big drink in a movie theatre. Second, companies that would lose money from laws will certainly pass along the cost to you. If you’ve followed the leading lights of Nanny State policy, you already understand that driving up the cost of unhealthy products is the very point of regulation. So those who drink responsibly — as it were — are punished with those who don’t.

In the end, Bloomberg shows a deep ignorance about human nature, as well. The vast majority of Americans understand that portion control is one of the only ways to lose weight. But if we don’t choose to be healthy, no regulation can coerce us into good health.

After pointlessly and needlessly dragging out an international crisis for three days, presumably to install sufficient padding around his ego to absorb the shock, President Obama finally got around to apologizing to Poland for his thoughtless comment about “Polish death camps.”

He made this “gaffe” while reading a prepared speech from a teleprompter to honor Polish hero Jan Karski, who risked life and limb to infiltrate Nazi death camps built on Polish soil by German occupiers during World War II, helping expose the horror of the Holocaust to the world.

It is absolutely incomprehensible that the President waited three days to issue a simple apology for this.  Poland was furious, as were Polish-Americans.  Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk said, as far back as Wednesday, that “we always react in the same way when ignorance, lack of knowledge, or bad intentions lead to such a distortion of history, so painful for us here in Poland, which suffered like no other in Europe during World War II.”

The whole crisis could have been instantly defused with a simple apology, tendered by the President himself, in either verbal or written form.  It would have been the work of moments.  Instead, the Obama Administration tried sending out a spokesman to clarify the comments: “The President was referring to Nazi death camps operated in Poland.  The President has demonstrated in word and deed his rock-solid commitment to our close alliance with Poland.”

That is most certainly not an “apology.”  It’s not difficult to construe it as an insult.  The Poles were told it was silly for them to become upset, because they should have understood the magnificent Barack Obama is incapable of malice or error.  Just check his record, and try not to think about the way he canceled your missile shield, or all that “transmission to Vladimir” stuff.

The actual apology was finally extracted by Polish president Bronislaw Komorowski, who wrote to Obama and got a reply on Friday.  As reported by the Associated Press:

“In referring to ‘a Polish death camp’ rather than ‘a Nazi death camp in German-occupied Poland,’ I inadvertently used a phrase that has caused many Poles anguish over the years and that Poland has rightly campaigned to eliminate from public discourse around the world,” Obama wrote. “I regret the error and agree that this moment is an opportunity to ensure that this and future generations know the truth.”

[…] In his response, Obama noted that “the Polish people suffered terribly under the brutal Nazi occupation during World War II.”

“In pursuit of their goals of destroying the Polish nation and Polish culture and exterminating European Jewry, the Nazis killed some six million Polish citizens, including three million Polish Jews during the Holocaust,” Obama wrote. “The bravery of Poles in the underground resistance is one of history’s great stories of heroism and courage.”

The Polish government graciously accepted the apology.  Komorowski said, “The events of the past few days and the U.S. president’s reply may, in my opinion, mark a very important moment in the struggle for historical truth.”

Foreign Minister Radek Sikorski added via Twitter, “Thank you, President Obama. Truth, honor and the legacy of Karski satisfied. Please feel free to send us your staffers for re-education.”  Sorry, Mr. Sikorski, but we’re flat broke after financing wild parties in Las Vegas for government bureaucrats, to reward them for helping to rack up a $16 trilion national debt, so I don’t think we can afford to send Obama’s gigantic staff to Poland for training.

Besides, no one with even the most cursory knowledge of Poland, or interest in the sensibilities of the Polish people, would ever speak of “Polish death camps.”  The true history of those camps can be learned in the same amount of time it would have taken to issue a simple, heartfelt apology for an honest mistake.

After pointlessly and needlessly dragging out an international crisis for three days, presumably to install sufficient padding around his ego to absorb the shock, President Obama finally got around to apologizing to Poland for his thoughtless comment about “Polish death camps.”

He made this “gaffe” while reading a prepared speech from a teleprompter to honor Polish hero Jan Karski, who risked life and limb to infiltrate Nazi death camps built on Polish soil by German occupiers during World War II, helping expose the horror of the Holocaust to the world.

It is absolutely incomprehensible that the President waited three days to issue a simple apology for this.  Poland was furious, as were Polish-Americans.  Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk said, as far back as Wednesday, that “we always react in the same way when ignorance, lack of knowledge, or bad intentions lead to such a distortion of history, so painful for us here in Poland, which suffered like no other in Europe during World War II.”

The whole crisis could have been instantly defused with a simple apology, tendered by the President himself, in either verbal or written form.  It would have been the work of moments.  Instead, the Obama Administration tried sending out a spokesman to clarify the comments: “The President was referring to Nazi death camps operated in Poland.  The President has demonstrated in word and deed his rock-solid commitment to our close alliance with Poland.”

That is most certainly not an “apology.”  It’s not difficult to construe it as an insult.  The Poles were told it was silly for them to become upset, because they should have understood the magnificent Barack Obama is incapable of malice or error.  Just check his record, and try not to think about the way he canceled your missile shield, or all that “transmission to Vladimir” stuff.

The actual apology was finally extracted by Polish president Bronislaw Komorowski, who wrote to Obama and got a reply on Friday.  As reported by the Associated Press:

“In referring to ‘a Polish death camp’ rather than ‘a Nazi death camp in German-occupied Poland,’ I inadvertently used a phrase that has caused many Poles anguish over the years and that Poland has rightly campaigned to eliminate from public discourse around the world,” Obama wrote. “I regret the error and agree that this moment is an opportunity to ensure that this and future generations know the truth.”

[…] In his response, Obama noted that “the Polish people suffered terribly under the brutal Nazi occupation during World War II.”

“In pursuit of their goals of destroying the Polish nation and Polish culture and exterminating European Jewry, the Nazis killed some six million Polish citizens, including three million Polish Jews during the Holocaust,” Obama wrote. “The bravery of Poles in the underground resistance is one of history’s great stories of heroism and courage.”

The Polish government graciously accepted the apology.  Komorowski said, “The events of the past few days and the U.S. president’s reply may, in my opinion, mark a very important moment in the struggle for historical truth.”

Foreign Minister Radek Sikorski added via Twitter, “Thank you, President Obama. Truth, honor and the legacy of Karski satisfied. Please feel free to send us your staffers for re-education.”  Sorry, Mr. Sikorski, but we’re flat broke after financing wild parties in Las Vegas for government bureaucrats, to reward them for helping to rack up a $16 trilion national debt, so I don’t think we can afford to send Obama’s gigantic staff to Poland for training.

Besides, no one with even the most cursory knowledge of Poland, or interest in the sensibilities of the Polish people, would ever speak of “Polish death camps.”  The true history of those camps can be learned in the same amount of time it would have taken to issue a simple, heartfelt apology for an honest mistake.

The gubernatorial recall election in Wisconsin next week is important as an imperfect test case to indicate how Democratic propaganda will work against facts this election year.
   
Liberals are usually the ones who arrogantly throw around the charge that Republicans and conservatives are fact- and science-challenged and averse to reality. But their claim itself is based on nothing but their generic, nonfactual presuppositions, whether on “climate change” or same-sex unions.
   
What I’m suggesting is different. I’m saying that Democrats in Wisconsin are basing their case against Republican Gov. Scott Walker on anything but facts; they are distorting his policy actions, his motives for undertaking them and the effect of those actions. Coupled with their distortions, they are seeking to make the election about anything but Walker’s impressive record.
   
Their strategy has been to pour an enormous amount of money — much of it from outside the state, the national Democratic Party recognizing the national implications of the election — to inflame the passions of their constituencies and boost voter turnout enough to overcome the comparative unpopularity of their positions.
   
What’s going on is so patently obvious that it surprises me the big-labor-based Democratic Party isn’t further behind in the polls. The unions’ position is so manifestly selfish and the Democratic Party’s support for it so obviously opportunistic — as opposed to what is in the best interest of the state — that it’s amazing they don’t do a better job of masking their symbiotic corruption.
   
New York State AFL-CIO President Mario Cilento said his state’s labor leaders are throwing everything they can into the election to oust Walker, recognizing that Walker’s success would embolden other state governors to follow in his footsteps to take on their unions when necessary.
   
How does Cilento frame his appeal to his fellow unionists? He says, “What Gov. Walker has done is reprehensible, to try to silence the voice of working people.”
   
Silence the voice of working people? How about the voice of all the people (many of whom “work” even though they are not in public-sector unions, thank you)? Walker wanted people to have a voice as to whether they would have to join unions. As to silencing them, Walker’s reforms curbed the unions’ collective bargaining rights, but not — as others have noted — concerning their wages.
   
Reprehensible? Before Walker implemented his plan, most state employees who were part of the Wisconsin Retirement System contributed a minute fraction of their wage compensation — 0.2 percent — to their pension plans and 6.2 percent toward their health care premiums. Now they are contributing 5.8 percent and 12.6 percent, respectively. Taxpayers are still contributing the lion’s share.
   
Have Walker’s reforms worked? The Heritage Foundation reports that prior to Walker’s reforms, Wisconsin’s state workers received health benefits 2.3 times as valuable and pension benefits 5.7 times as valuable as those received by employees in large private firms. After the reforms, their health benefits are still twice as valuable, and their pension benefits are 4.5 times as valuable. Their total compensation was 29 percent higher than private-sector employees before the reforms and is now 22 percent higher. After the reforms, the average public-sector employee’s total compensation is $81,637, whereas the similarly skilled private worker’s is $67,068.
   
How about the reform’s impact on Wisconsin’s fiscal health? Walker inherited a $3.6 billion budget deficit, enormous overspending and the fourth-highest tax burden among states. Walker implemented structural reforms without raising taxes, without major layoffs and without cuts in Medicaid. Walker reports that for the first time in 12 years, his state’s property taxes are going down on medium-value homes, and the state has a $154 million surplus.
   
Those are the facts. But if Democrats succeed in their propaganda effort in Wisconsin, it will be a setback for the Republicans’ prospects in 2012, about which I am now very optimistic. But I would feel more sanguine if Republicans treated the Wisconsin election with the same urgency as Democrats do and demonstrated they are willing to take the gloves off in the 2012 campaigns. For though the facts are on their side, those facts do not ensure electoral victory against Democratic money, distortions and election chicanery.
   
President Obama has a miserable record by every measure I believe most Americans care about, which is why his propaganda team has already begun fraudulently sanitizing his record, such as the risible claim that he has not been a big spender, and demonizing Mitt Romney. I know Team Romney is equipped to respond factually and promptly, but I am not sure it has the political will and courage to go after Obama in ways that John McCain wouldn’t. We shall see.

The gubernatorial recall election in Wisconsin next week is important as an imperfect test case to indicate how Democratic propaganda will work against facts this election year.
   
Liberals are usually the ones who arrogantly throw around the charge that Republicans and conservatives are fact- and science-challenged and averse to reality. But their claim itself is based on nothing but their generic, nonfactual presuppositions, whether on “climate change” or same-sex unions.
   
What I’m suggesting is different. I’m saying that Democrats in Wisconsin are basing their case against Republican Gov. Scott Walker on anything but facts; they are distorting his policy actions, his motives for undertaking them and the effect of those actions. Coupled with their distortions, they are seeking to make the election about anything but Walker’s impressive record.
   
Their strategy has been to pour an enormous amount of money — much of it from outside the state, the national Democratic Party recognizing the national implications of the election — to inflame the passions of their constituencies and boost voter turnout enough to overcome the comparative unpopularity of their positions.
   
What’s going on is so patently obvious that it surprises me the big-labor-based Democratic Party isn’t further behind in the polls. The unions’ position is so manifestly selfish and the Democratic Party’s support for it so obviously opportunistic — as opposed to what is in the best interest of the state — that it’s amazing they don’t do a better job of masking their symbiotic corruption.
   
New York State AFL-CIO President Mario Cilento said his state’s labor leaders are throwing everything they can into the election to oust Walker, recognizing that Walker’s success would embolden other state governors to follow in his footsteps to take on their unions when necessary.
   
How does Cilento frame his appeal to his fellow unionists? He says, “What Gov. Walker has done is reprehensible, to try to silence the voice of working people.”
   
Silence the voice of working people? How about the voice of all the people (many of whom “work” even though they are not in public-sector unions, thank you)? Walker wanted people to have a voice as to whether they would have to join unions. As to silencing them, Walker’s reforms curbed the unions’ collective bargaining rights, but not — as others have noted — concerning their wages.
   
Reprehensible? Before Walker implemented his plan, most state employees who were part of the Wisconsin Retirement System contributed a minute fraction of their wage compensation — 0.2 percent — to their pension plans and 6.2 percent toward their health care premiums. Now they are contributing 5.8 percent and 12.6 percent, respectively. Taxpayers are still contributing the lion’s share.
   
Have Walker’s reforms worked? The Heritage Foundation reports that prior to Walker’s reforms, Wisconsin’s state workers received health benefits 2.3 times as valuable and pension benefits 5.7 times as valuable as those received by employees in large private firms. After the reforms, their health benefits are still twice as valuable, and their pension benefits are 4.5 times as valuable. Their total compensation was 29 percent higher than private-sector employees before the reforms and is now 22 percent higher. After the reforms, the average public-sector employee’s total compensation is $81,637, whereas the similarly skilled private worker’s is $67,068.
   
How about the reform’s impact on Wisconsin’s fiscal health? Walker inherited a $3.6 billion budget deficit, enormous overspending and the fourth-highest tax burden among states. Walker implemented structural reforms without raising taxes, without major layoffs and without cuts in Medicaid. Walker reports that for the first time in 12 years, his state’s property taxes are going down on medium-value homes, and the state has a $154 million surplus.
   
Those are the facts. But if Democrats succeed in their propaganda effort in Wisconsin, it will be a setback for the Republicans’ prospects in 2012, about which I am now very optimistic. But I would feel more sanguine if Republicans treated the Wisconsin election with the same urgency as Democrats do and demonstrated they are willing to take the gloves off in the 2012 campaigns. For though the facts are on their side, those facts do not ensure electoral victory against Democratic money, distortions and election chicanery.
   
President Obama has a miserable record by every measure I believe most Americans care about, which is why his propaganda team has already begun fraudulently sanitizing his record, such as the risible claim that he has not been a big spender, and demonizing Mitt Romney. I know Team Romney is equipped to respond factually and promptly, but I am not sure it has the political will and courage to go after Obama in ways that John McCain wouldn’t. We shall see.