HALF-FULL REPORT 03/20/15

Who knew St. Patrick was Jewish? Tuesday, March 17 was a great day for the Irish, a greater day for Israelis; a bad day for the putz in the White House and for the Lying Swine; a very bad day for the mullahs in Tehran.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu defied pre-election polls and unprecedented interference by the Obama administration to win a Trumanesque come from behind victory. His Likud Party won 30 seats in the Knesset to 24 for the main opposition party, more of the popular vote than in Bibi’s victory in 2013.

Likud is far short of the 61 seats required to form a government. But other right wing parties also did well, so Bibi should have little difficulty assembling a governing coalition.

"The three month election process was heart stopping and melodramatic, like an old Batman episode from the 1960s without the camp – including the startling role played by Special Guest Villain Barack Obama doing everything in his power to take down the man he seems to have chosen as his Enemy No. 1," said John Podhoretz.

Zero responded with his customary grace. Those (like me) who indulge in the guilty pleasure of schadenfreude will enjoy the whines of Obamunist guru David Axelrod and the New York Times. There’s more "Bibifreude" here.

When it became clear Netanyahu had won a stunning victory, National Review’s Jim Geraghty tweeted photos of a smiling Bibi and a frowning Barack. Lagniappe: Congress plans to investigate the illegal interference of the Obamunists in the Israeli election.

There are five lessons U.S. conservatives should learn from Bibi’s big victory, said Ben Shapiro. Among them are "don’t back down from a fight, energize the grassroots," and "call out the opposition." Are you listening, Boehner and McConnell?

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Zero plans to punish Israel for voting for the guy he doesn’t like. "Every single Obama failure… is followed by a Prolonged Snit," says Ace.

There’s been some handwringing about this in conservative circles, but I think it’s better to have Zero’s enmity toward our ally out in the open where even the dimwits CNN polls (see the post on Hillary below) may notice it.

That may stiffen the resolve of a large, bipartisan majority to oppose more vigorously Obama’s capitulation to the mullahs. He’d better not be thinking about bypassing Congress on Iran, said 360 of the 435 Members of the House in a letter to the president Thursday.

Democrats are "clearly worried that an administration looking too eager to strike a deal with a leading terrorism-sponsoring state could find itself resoundingly rejected by the public," said Josh Krausharr of the National Journal.

It’s a moment of truth for American Jews, says John Podhoretz.

Sen. Marco Rubio, R-Fla, summarized and slammed Zero’s hostility toward Israel in an eloquent, impassioned speech on the Senate floor Thursday 3/19:

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That the White House was "doing its damndest to vilify him on the Sunday talk shows" indicates the carpet bombing of Sen. Tom Cotton, R-AR has failed, said William Bigelow of Breitbart News.

Not a single Democrat in the Senate inclined to support sanctions against Iran has changed his or her mind, despite strenuous efforts by the White House to use the Cotton letter to get them to do so. The GOP may be assembling a veto proof majority.

"The infantile and hysterical McCarthyism of the assault reveals, for all to see, the character of today’s left," said Weekly Standard Editor Bill Kristol.

The Cotton letter "is a simple, beautifully written exposition about the American Constitution and its effects," said the Bookworm. "In addition, it’s a wonderful honey pot for calling stupid Progressives out of their dark caves and exposing their ignorance to bright sunlight."

It smoked out a dangerous concession to Iran.

"Anyone seeking evidence that our schools no longer effectively teach the Constitution need look no further than the hair-on-fire response," said Tampa Tribune columnist Tom Jackson.

If leftists thought they could intimidate the former Army Ranger, they were mistaken. Sen. Cotton handled himself well in Sunday talk show appearances. The effort to demonize him bolstered the attention given to his maiden speech in the Senate Monday, which was a doozy. You can watch it here.

"Cotton is a hero," said Dr. John at Flopping Aces. "He’s got balls. I love this guy. I could see him as President one day."

So can others. "Fallout from Sen. Cotton’s Iran letter: Tom Cotton for President?" asked the McClatchy News Service.

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The Bill Kristol article referenced above, "The Party of the Furrowed Brow," was a slam on the handful of Establishment Republicans who didn’t sign the Cotton letter:

They doubted the wisdom of investigating Benghazi, of inviting Bibi Netanyahu to address a joint session of Congress, of the Cotton letter, Kristol noted.

 "If brow-furrowing were thinking, the Republican establishment would be geniuses," he said. "If hand-wringing were prudence, GOP politicians would be exemplars of Aristotelian virtue. If tongue-clucking were eloquence, conservative elites would be orators for the ages."

"Judging by the vitriol," Cotton, Netanyahu and Rep. Trey Gowdy, R-SC, chairman of the Benghazi committee, are who scares the left, Kristol said.

 Why? Because they’re tough, they fight on important issues rather than trivial ones, they fight intelligently and strategically, and they fight to win, he said.

Jay Cost explains why "GOP insiders" thwart conservative reform.

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The Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals rejected Monday the administration’s request to lift the injunction issued by District Judge Andrew Hanen barring implementation of Zero’s executive orders providing amnesty for illegal aliens.

Hanen is peeved about having been lied to; may impose sanctions on the Justice Department.

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House Republicans have drafted a budget for the fiscal year that begins Oct. 1. It would repeal Obamacare, raise spending for defense a little, cut (the growth of) spending a little for just about everything else.

Investors Business Daily and Stephen Moore like it. It places too much emphasis on deficit reduction, not enough on economic growth, says James Pethokoukis of AEI. It doesn’t spend enough on defense, say the Weekly Standard and Jen Rubin.

It should be bolder. A Republican budget should zero out funding for the EPA, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, and the FCC, which is trying to seize control of the Internet that has made it obsolete.

But Democrats, special interest groups, and the Lying Swine howled like stuck pigs, which suggests the GOP budget may be worth maybe two cheers.

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The EPA wants to regulate backyard barbecues; monitor how long hotel guests spend in the shower.  The EPA is "burning the Constitution" to advance Zero’s environmental agenda, said liberal Harvard law professor Laurence Tribe.

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Attorney General nominee Loretta Lynch might be toast.

Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz, ripped sleazy Dem Whip Dick Durbin, D-Ill, for attributing opposition to Lynch to racism. Democrats as well as Republicans are "pretty angry" about his snide "back of the bus" crack Wednesday, noted CNN anchor Brooke Baldwin.

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"Why are so many Seattle restaurants closing recently?" wondered Sara Jones of Seattle Magazine. The answer was in her 12^th paragraph. The Seattle City Council has raised the minimum wage to $15 an hour.

The typical Seattle restaurant spends 36 percent of its budget for labor; 30 percent for food, 30 percent for everything else, leaving a profit margin of 4 percent, Anthony Anton of the Washington Restaurant Association told Ms. Jones. The minimum wage hike will raise labor costs in fast food restaurants to 42 percent, to 47 percent in full service restaurants, he said.

Restaurants which survive will do so by raising prices, cutting staff, spending less on food and amenities.

Blacks will be disproportionately hurt by the job losses.

Fewer people will have jobs; fewer businesses will pay taxes; Seattle residents will pay more to eat out, have fewer choices. Liberals call this "compassion."

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Penn State University has suspended the Kappa Delta Rho fraternity for posting nude and semi-nude photos of students on its Facebook page.

But Karen Halnon, a sociology professor at PSU-Abdington, still has her job. Ms. Halnon was arrested at Miami International Airport after subjecting passengers on a flight from Nicaragua to a loud lecture on foreign policy. Ms. Halnon lit up during her rant, "to show solidarity with her idol, Fidel Castro."

Her rant was recorded by a fellow passenger, who posted it on Youtube:

"I teach about U.S. imperialism in Latin America. And the U.S. has declared war against Venezuela," Prof. Halnon told Philly magazine. "That means military aggression. They tried to take out Hugo with a coup, and then they took him out with cancer."

"The FBI and TSA tortured me," she said. "They made me wet my pants."

She lit a cigarette because "it was identifying with the revolutionary cause," Ms. Halnon said.  "Every revolutionary I know smokes. "Beyond that, it is a symbol that the United States is a smoking gun."

* * * *

"Late Night" host Seth Meyers tried to ambush Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Tex, Tuesday on "climate change." It did not go as planned.

His "left-leaning audience, which was fully primed and ready to cheer for yet another sermon on climate change, was disappointed when they discovered that there were cogent counter arguments that had the capacity to dispel their faith," said Noah Rothman.

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The Obama administration has shut down walk-in tax preparation centers where the IRS provided, for free, assistance in filling out their income tax forms to the poor and elderly, diverted the money to left wing nonprofits with ties to the administration.

Ostensibly, the nonprofits will offer the same help the walk-in service centers did. But an audit by the IRS inspector general found they had a 49 percent error rate.

Closing the walk in centers "imposes significant burdens on taxpayers," said the IRS Taxpayer Advocate.

More liberal compassion at work.

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If you want to see why Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky, is one of the Republican Party’s greatest assets, watch this video of his speech at Bowie State University last week, and how students at this historically black college responded to it.  Breitbart has a lengthy summary here.

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The State Department has no record of Hillary Clinton having signed Form OF-109. Departing State Department employees are required to sign the form, in which the employee testifies that all official records have been turned over. Bad things happen to the little people who don’t sign it, said a State Department whistleblower. 

If Hillary had signed Form OF-109, that would have been a clear cut case of perjury, unspinnable even by Clintons. The question now is whether Hillary "willfully" broke the law, says Shannen Coffin, a former Justice Department attorney. She sure did, said Charles Krauthammer.

Rep. Elijah Cummings, D-MD, ranking Dem on the Benghazi Committee (and a total tool), used to say it was a witch hunt. Now he says there are reasons for continuing the inquiry, Ann Althouse noted.

 "It would appear that Cummings is alluding to some very unpleasant revelations are about to come out," said Cuban Bob in a comment on Ann’s blog post.

Rep. Adam Schiff, D-CA, also serves on the Benghazi Committee. His strenuous efforts to duck questions about the email controversy lend credence to Cuban Bob’s surmise. Gowdy has subpoenaed the emails of nearly a dozen of Hillary’s State Dept. aides.

It’s a virtual certainty foreign intelligence services hacked Hillary’s server, more intelligence and security experts said this week. Monica Crowley wonders if the PIAPs was running a rogue intel op thru sleazeball Sid Blumenthal.

The Clinton Foundation hasn’t disclosed its donors, as the Clintons promised they would. Haitians protested outside Hillary’s office in New York this week to protest "billions stolen" by the Clinton Foundation.

The next big act in this drama will be either the "very unpleasant revelations" to which Rep. Cummings may have been alluding, or how Hillary responds to a subpoena for her email server.

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None of this may matter, if a CNN/ORC poll Wednesday (3/18) is accurate. It indicated Hillary has a double digit lead over every likely GOP candidate.

I doubt it is. The CNN poll shows Jeb Bush leading the GOP field, which is contrary to just about every other poll in the last six weeks, including this one and this one and this one and this one and this one.

Jeb is running as the news media’s favorite Republican, which is not the way to win the hearts and minds of rank and file GOP primary voters. The bloom has faded so much from Jeb’s rose "Washington insiders" who touted him last month have begun to talk up Marco Rubio.

A Reuters tracking poll released Thursday showed support for Hillary below 50 percent – among Democrats. A Rasmussen poll also released Thursday indicated 54 percent of Americans want Democrats to nominate "a fresh face."

A focus group of strong Hillary supporters in New Hampshire is "really concerned" about the email scandal, Mark Halperin said on MSNBC Thursday. Clinton backers are "really, really unhappy" with her response, CNN agreed.

 If this is how Team Hillary plans to win friends and influence people, they should be terrified. The boom in speculation this week about Al Gore indicates many Democrats are.

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Heroes of the Week are the Israelis who re-elected Bibi Netanyahu. There’s no doubt about who the Putz of the Week is.

Harder times are coming. But in any week in which Zero gets slapped around the way he was this week by the Israelis, Tom Cotton  and Marco Rubio – and gets razzed by the coach of a basketball team he picked against in the NCAA tournament, the glass is more than half full.

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