Some good links to munch on:

Some cool scenes from the Turkish uprising.

Rush: This is a non-military coup d'etat.

Tech Companies claim they didn't participate in PRISM, but note all the loophole language they do to say so. Why clutter a hull with so many escape hatches, unless those hatches might be used? In addition, there is some question about whether that WaPo PRISM story was fully legit.

Ted Cruz: Given this Administration's history, how can they ask for trust?

Hollywood PI says he recorded audio of JFK having sex with Marilyn Monroe, and also a big fight between RFK, JFK, and Marilyn, in which she objected to being "passed around" by JFK and offered as sexual favors to his friends.

Porn stars... before their makeup. Though "stars" might be overstating the celebrity of most of these ladies.

Posted by: Ace at 03:49 PM | Comments (342)
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If the news weren't so saturated with scandals right now, the broadcast evening newscasts would have had a different segment each night this week on the EPA. As we were doing the podcast last night, Drew, Andy and I tried to recount them all and actually came up short on the first try. There's just that many.

I'd really like to keep the EPA scandals in the spotlight because they run the gamut from basic bureaucratic waste, to malicious politically-motivated abuse, to direct malfeasance by the EPA's highest appointee. Here they are:
more...

Posted by: Gabriel Malor at 02:18 PM | Comments (166)
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Democracy Alliance is a group which funnels major, major cash -- "dark money" -- to various liberal groups. (Note how you never hear about this from the media... first time I've heard of it myself.)

One company is put off.

A wireless provider with ties to the secret dark money group the Democracy Alliance is pushing back against the Obama administration’s surveillance of customers. CREDO Mobile cofounder Michael Kieschnick said on Thursday he was “deeply disturbed” by the administration’s invasion of individual’s civil liberties.

...

Kieschnick is a member of the invite-only progressive Democracy Alliance. The exclusive group since 2005 has funneled more than $500 million into liberal organizations such as the pro-Obama Super PAC Priorities USA Action and the Center for American Progress, the influential liberal think tank.

...

CREDO has contributed $73 million to progressive causes since its inception in 1985. The nonprofit is funded through Working Assets Funding Service, which generates revenue from a 1 percent donation from all CREDO Mobile service charges.

The telecommunications CEO now plans to use his group as a vehicle to protest the administrationÂ’s wiretapping surveillance activities.

Meanwhile, Rasmussen says 56% of the public now finds the federal government a threat to citizen rights.

More: Joe Machin, a Democrat, says that Eric Holder should consider resigning.

Posted by: Ace at 01:42 PM | Comments (125)
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Congress has been fully briefed and has fully blessed this program, Obama vowed.

You will not be surprised to find out that he lied. (Link fixed.)

He lies easily, he lies fluidly, he lies thoughtlessly, he lies constantly.

If I can suggest a brief psychological diagnosis: I think Obama's narcisssism is such -- that his belief in his Untainted Goodness and Wisdom is so strong -- that whatever imaginary "fact" reinforces his opinion of himself, he believes wholeheartedly to be true.

So I don't even think he's "lying," per se.

As George Costanza said, "It's not lying if you believe it."*

Or, as Barack Obama himself put it (for real), "You know, I actually believe my own bullshit."

* I also believe this of Hillary Clinton. Her genuine rage at the suggestion that she might have erred convinces me that she is constitutionally incapable of even conceiving of her having a fault. The merest suggestion of such sets off her ego-protecting defenses and focuses her into a rage against her (in her mind) lying persecutors.

BTW: Google's all like "I'm innocent, you've got to beeeelieeeeve me, blah blah blah." more...

Posted by: Ace at 12:48 PM | Comments (257)
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On today's episode Gabe, Drew M. and I discuss the current Obama scandal roster and openings they might make for the GOP. Then we follow up with a discussion of Rand Paul, Marco Rubio and the early moves being made for 2016.

The Rand Paul piece includes discussion of the following related articles:
@RobertCostaNRO: Rand Paul, the Crunchy Con
@BDomenech: The Libertarian Populist Agenda

Also related but published after the podcast was recorded - @TPCarney: Conservative reformers should fix the rigged game

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Posted by: andy at 12:00 PM | Comments (159)
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Reset button?

This announcement all but says they intend that Russian missiles should be used to kill American pilots. Or British or French ones.

Note I'm not arguing there should be such overflights-- but Russia is now arming Assad expressly to kill our people?

Moscow said it was being forced to send the S-300 system to Syria's president to prevent Western "hotheads" from intervening in the country's civil war.

It came after Britain succeeded in persuading the European Union not to renew an embargo on supplying weapons to Syria's opposition forces. William Hague, the Foreign Secretary, said the late night deal meant Britain could begin arming the rebels from now.

However, the move sparked fury in Russia, which has been implacably opposed to Western efforts to unseat Mr Assad.

In further Russian Empire news, Russia, which of course desperately wants to keep its Syrian pawn, has sweetly offered to send its own troops as "peacekeepers" patrolling the Golan Heights, which stand on the border of its dear ally Syria and Israel, were lots of Russian Jews fled to to escape Russian Jew-hatred.

Russian troops in Syria! What could go wrong.

President Vladimir Putin said on Thursday that Russia is ready to send peacekeepers to the Golan Heights to replace Austrian forces after Vienna said it would recall its troops from a UN monitoring force due to worsening fighting in Syria.

"We could replace the leaving Austrian contingent in this region on the border between Israeli troops and the Syrian army," Putin told the RIA Novosti news agency.

What a lovely offer.

Posted by: Ace at 11:32 AM | Comments (173)
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From NRO. more...

Posted by: JohnE. at 10:49 AM | Comments (278)
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A helmet studded with electroencephalographic sensors picks up electrical activity in the brain for natural sorts of motive thoughts -- move right hand, move left hand, move arms, and so on.

The miniature helicopter, a very basic hobbyists' four-rotor toy, follows those mental commands.

In theory.

Even though this sounds like a military project the test was conducted for medical reasons.

Previously, researchers showed that subjects could control a virtual helicopter with their thoughts. The latest demo--using a real, live helicopter--is just another step toward more practical applications, with the ultimate goal being to help people with disabilities and neurdegenerative dieseases regain mobility, says researcher Bin He, a professor of biomedicial engineering at the University of Michigan.

Learning how to control a helicopter with the power of thought is an intermediate step towards learning how to control a prosthetic arm, maybe even a hand by mental command. Perhaps even mentally-controlled prosthetic legs.

Though, of course, one can still foresee military uses down the line. The more intuitive a control system is, the more machinery has been made to adapt to man rather than man to machine, the better, I think.

Posted by: Ace at 10:12 AM | Comments (196)
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Baby I'm sorry I got so mad at you. Words were said, and they can't be taken back, but they can be softened.

As you probably know by now, the New York Times decided they had indeed overplayed their hand, and decided to refund most of Obama's credibility by stealth-editing their harsh judgment into "The administration has now lost all credibility on this issue."

Apparently they still think he's entirely credible when he says things like, "If you like your health-care plan, you can keep your plan."

...

I think you and John are right about the pantomime nature of all this - I call it "Fifty Shades of Grey Lady" - but it's somewhat significant that Obama's loyal lapdogs feel the need to stage this little snit at all.

I'm not sure it's significant at all. Christopher Hitchens noted that after 9/11, terrorist-apologists would say things like, "Of course what happened on 9/11 was bad, but we can't get all emotional about this."

He called this practice "rhetorical throat-clearing," a meaningless amuse bouche before the actual meal.

I had written at the Conversation:

So don't think that this is "The moment the New York Times turns." It's not. This is a marriage between Obama and the media and it's too wonderful a marriage to toss away just because the media caught Obama hanging out late at night with Warrants of Ill Repute.

It's a pantomime, it's a show. They want Obama to call him to his offices and personally -- off the record -- assure them they're still his One and Only, and of course he'll do just that.

But for now, we can hear a bit of the lover's spat through the thin wall to the adjoining apartment. Let's turn up the music because we'll hear giggling and lover's cooing soon enough again.

But I didn't expect the New York Times would stealth-edit its apologies into its original Show of Hurt! That shows just how unserious they are, or, rather, how seriously, passionately in love with Obama they are and will always be.

He is their sun and their sky, their moon and their stars.

Posted by: Ace at 09:20 AM | Comments (156)
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Obama: If you canÂ’t trust government, weÂ’re going to have some problems

Yes, you've made that abundantly clear.

He also kept going back to the "no one is listening to your phone calls" straw man. None of these reports on the NSA programs ever claimed they were, of course.

Video below. more...

Posted by: JohnE. at 09:42 AM | Comments (248)
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