Policia de Catalunya

In today's Sunday's Best, I recommend this outstanding piece, "Washington Can Hear You Now," by Senator Jim DeMint.These men and women are coming to Washington to join the fight, not the club. Their principles are clear: free-enterprise economics, limited government and individual liberty. These views are based on 200 years of American history and written into our founding documents.
Democrats have desperately called these new leaders "radical," but Americans know what "radical" means after watching the Democrats run Washington.
Creating an entitlement program while the nation is $13 trillion in debt is radical. So is raising taxes while millions of Americans struggle to pay bills and find work. So is taking over the banks, auto companies, mortgage companies, the health-care system and the financial sector.
Americans have rallied against out-of-control government for two years. "Can you hear me now?" they yelled. Thankfully, a crop of common-sense conservative Republican candidates listened.
Next, it takes the UK Telegraph to tell us what our own media won't: the "tea party" movement is not some insane, marginal tempest in a tea pot.For all the talk of how the Tea Party will help the Democrats by splitting the Republican vote, the first five of those states are highly likely to result in Republican/Tea Party wins, Nevada is in the balance and only Delaware looks like an uphill struggle. Increased conservative turnout and the energy generated by the Tea Party is likely to punish Democrats disproportionately.
The reaction to O'Donnell's win may yet lift her close to victory. No candidate since Palin has been ridiculed and lampooned as she has, mainly for Christian conservative views she expressed a decade or more ago. She has also been castigated for having been in debt and taking years to pay university bills.
This patronising condescension sits uneasily with ordinary Americans, one in seven of whom are now officially poor and most of whom have at one time or another struggled to pay the bills. Populism is a key strain in the Tea Party. Republican elites beware.
At least Peggy Noonan gets it. Finally.Everyone has an explanation for the tea party that is actually not an explanation but a description. They're "angry." They're "antiestablishment," "populist," "anti-elite." All to varying degrees true. But as a network television executive said this week, "They should be fed up. Our institutions have failed."
* * *
For conservatives on the ground, it has often felt as if Democrats (and moderate Republicans) were always saying, "We should spend a trillion dollars," and the Republican Party would respond, "No, too costly. How about $700 billion?" Conservatives on the ground are thinking, "How about nothing? How about we don't spend more money but finally start cutting."
And Ira Stolls's decimation of the New York Times O'Donnell smear piece is downright delicious.The Times also reports, "she told a reporter for The News Journal of Wilmington last March that her campaign had paid half the rent on her town house there because it doubled as her headquarters, one of several financial oddities enumerated in an article in that paper....She said that while she participated in the cap-and-gown ceremony nearly two decades ago, she was unable to formally graduate because of unpaid tuition."
This is all outrageously unfair treatment from the Times. One of its reporters defaulted on his mortgage � after all, when people who aren't Republican Senate candidates default on their mortgages, the Times tells us it is the fault of predatory subprime lenders, not of individual borrowers. If you can default on your mortgage and be an economics reporter for the New York Times, why can't you be the senator from Delaware?
Finally, James Taranto's "There is No More Molly" is not to be missed.Here's another question: Where is President Obama? Last month, speaking to a mostly Muslim audience at the White House, the president strongly defended the right of another imam held up as a moderate to build a mosque adjacent to Ground Zero. The next day, and again at a press conference last week, Obama said he was merely standing up for the First Amendment. As far as we recall, it's the only time Barack Obama has ever stood up for anybody's First Amendment rights.
Now Molly Norris, an American citizen, is forced into hiding because she exercised her right to free speech. Will President Obama say a word on her behalf? Does he believe in the First Amendment for anyone other than Muslims?

Labels: Angle, Demint, Molly Norris, ODonnell, Rubio, Tea Party

Today the Senate Subcommittee for TSA Oversight held a hearing. John Pistole showed up to answer questions. I watched it live on a webcast.
Take-aways: Pistole Democratic Senator Claire McCaskill referred to the pat-downs as "love pats" (here's an independent link if you don't believe me). The TSA is going to leave John Tyner alone and they're sure as hell not going to change their screening procedures. Children 12 and under can be exempted from groping. (No word on whether they are also exempted from the radiation machines).
Highlights, in chronological order:
Pistole says in opening statement that the new "adjustments" to the pat-down" challenge social norms." Do ya' think?
This is a partnership "with the traveling public."
Removing your shoes and taking stuff out of your pockets is called "divestment."
There is a mobile screening program being used in NYC.
Pistole and Janet were patted down before they foisted it on the public. Oh, and any senator in the committee is welcome to get a pat down from "an experienced TSO officer" so they can see what it's like. (There were no takers)
Gee, the naked people pictures on the internet might have been photo-shopped. They're just so graphic.
Functions are disabled for retention, storage or transmission of naked pictures and no cell phones are allowed in naked people viewing rooms.
A new day may dawn with "automated target recognition." It only shows a stick figure and any weird object shows up as a square. Only that part of the body where the square shows up gets patted down. Alas, there are too many "false positives" with "ATR" but boy will it be great when we get it. Right now we're in "an interim period."
The FLRA ordered TSA to hold an election on "exclusive union representation" but not collective bargaining. This makes no sense to Kay Bailey Hutchison or Pistole.
Senator Johanns wants to know why he had to go through the naked people machine and get a pat-down when he didn't set off any alarms. He even showed his Senate ID! What the hell, man! Pistole has no idea. Maybe it was "random." He will "look into it." But wait! The images aren't stored!
Why are crew passes taking so damn long? TSA has been testing a crew pass for two years. Pistole: I just got here in July. We are making progress.
Isakson says Napolitano was insensitive when she said "don't fly if you don't like our screening." Enters a 3-page letter from one of his Diamond-flyer constituents into the record. Pistole: children 12 and under don't have to be groped. (He never says children can skip the radiation machine).
McCaskill is upset because some countries have no screening for cargo. Pistole agrees and says private shippers may boycott those countries and refuse to ship their stuff.
Pistole says reasonable people can differ whether TSA has "struck the right balance" with the naked people machines and the groin-groping pat downs. Alrighty then. Public outrage might be "reasonable."
Profiling is the elephant in the living room.
Jim DeMint was pathetic.
Should the flying public feel threats have increased or decreased since 9/11? Pistole speaks words but doesn't answer the question. Says maybe the bad guys are so scared of TSA now that they'll go for "softer targets." Nice.
Kay Bailey asks if TSA is really going to fine this "high profile man" Tyner and anyone else who says no thanks to the screening and goes home. Pistole hedges a bit. Kay Bailey presses on. Pistole capitulates and basically says nothing will come of the Tyner investigation. Fines are for people who try smuggle stuff.
All agree a classified hearing is needed and the meeting is adjourned.

Labels: Automated Target Recognition, Children Exempt From Pat-Downs, Claire Mccaskill, Demint, Isakson, Kay Bailey Hutchison, Love Pats, Pistole, Tsa Oversight Hearing