This is a lie: “Repairs Underway in Barracks, Army Says.”

Another lie is in bold in this excerpt:

A senior Army official voiced regret yesterday for dilapidated conditions at barracks in Fort Bragg, N.C., captured on video by a soldier’s father [see video], and said the Army had launched housing inspections at more than 180 Army installations to correct any other shortfalls.

“We let our soldiers down,” said Brig. Gen. Dennis E. Rogers, deputy director of operations at the Army’s Installation Management Command.

“That’s not how we want America’s sons and daughters to live. There’s no good excuse for what happened,” Rogers said at a news conference at the Pentagon.

The dilapidated conditions came to light when Ed Frawley, the father of Sgt. Jeff Frawley, who returned this month from a 15-month deployment to Afghanistan, posted a video on YouTube.com of mold on the ceiling, peeling paint and a clogged bathroom drain at his son’s barracks.

Rogers said that most of the problems shown in the video, taken nearly two weeks before it was posted, have already been repaired. But he acknowledged that the repairs should have been completed before the soldiers returned.

They are still lying about the problems at Walter Reed. They are lying about health care for military personnel and their dependents.

I asked family members stationed at Fort Bragg to ride by the barracks in the video to see if repairs are underway to a degree sufficient to correct the problems. The answer is a resounding “no.” If the Pentagon wants to deny that statement they can let me know. I live close enough to drive there and see for myself. I’m told that piddling efforts are underway but troops are still living in the barracks and it’s obvious from the video that the interiors must be stripped and rebuilt. No amount of paint can correct the problems shown in the video and the plumbing problems can’t be corrected with Drano or a Plumbers Friend.

Some people say the lie is worse than the offense but in this case they’re equally bad. I can’t find the words to convey my outrage at George Bush, Donald Rumsfeld, John Warner, Duncan Hunter and my own Representative Robin Hayes (NC-8 which includes Fort Bragg) for what they’ve done to these soldiers. Sadly, I’m sure the problem exist in all military services.

It’ll take the GOP a very long time to convince me that they give a shit about military personnel. Bush, Rumsfeld, Gates, Warner, Hunter and Hayes have done irreparable damage.

The headlines this morning in USA TODAY: “Obama breaks with longtime pastor.” The same headline appeared in my news aggregator for an Associated Press story in the Chicago Tribune but when I went to the story, an update had changed the headline to “Obama outraged by Wright.”

Also, I listened to Obama’s “break” speech yesterday and my reaction was quite different from Kathy Kiely’s and David Jackson’s who wrote the USA TODAY story. I heard Obama “break” with Wright over what Wright said to the National Press Club but I didn’t hear any rejection of Wright’s ideology or racist hatred of white people.

We know that Rev. Wright’s replacement at the Trinity United Church of Christ, the Rev. Otis Moss III, teaches ‘black liberation theology’ just like Wright and, although Moss’ delivery is less strident, his sermons are laced with the same hatred of white people that made Wright so popular with the TUCC congregation.

Soooo, if the AP and USA TODAY really believe that Obama is actually “breaking” with Wright, then they must also believe he is breaking with the Trinity United Church of Christ.

I wonder when the name of Obama’s new church will be revealed.

While we’ve occupied our time supporting GWB and the GWOT, he and Congress have been stabbing our military in the back. I’ve been railing on it since June 2006. Now its catching up with them.

Army barrack conditions, 82nd Airborne, Fort Bragg

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H/T: Hot Air

Know thine enemy…

The Rev. Al Sharpton may have felt something like the stoners in the film of that title when he emerged from a meeting in Queens yesterday with Rep. John Conyers (D-Mich.) — and found his 2007 Jaguar missing. Turns out it had been tagged for some $900 in tickets — and towed.

Bawahahahahahahaha…

Thomas Lifson writes about Barack Obama’s tardiness and reluctance to sever relationships with people like racist “preacher” Jeremiah Wright and terrorist William Ayers. Lifson’s point is OBama’s lack of judgement.

He ends his essay with:

… A man who takes the optimistic view of his opponents, and makes best case assumptions only is not someone we want facing down our real enemies in Tehran, Damascus, and Pyongyang.

Why do we assume that Obama would view the leaders in Tehran, Damascus, and Pyongyang as America’s “real enemies?”

As far as I can tell, Obama, his wife Michelle, Ayers, and Wright all believe that America’s real enemies are white people, residing here, in the the United States.

Everybody’s talking about SCOTUS’ latest fiat. In a 6-3 decision, the Court ruled that states may require voters to show a state issued photo ID to vote. I posted on it yesterday and received a couple of emails protesting the decision. They sounded like the ACLU’s complaint in today’s issue of Investor’s Business Daily:

Ken Falk, the organization’s Indiana legal director, said he was “extremely disappointed” by the decision. It is the position of the ACLU that ID laws place a burden on voters, and the right to vote, Falk says, “is the most important right.” [Bold added.]

The right to vote cannot be found in the Constitution, so we’re not sure from what source Falk is drawing his legal opinion. Best we can tell, voting is a privilege. Important, yes, but it’s far more important that our elections are free — or as free as possible — of fraud.

That reminds me of some essays I wrote in Dec. 2000, during the Bush-Gore debacle in Florida. The essays generated a flood of protest because I pointed out that there’s no “right to vote” for President in the Constitution and there’s no “right” reserved to the state or to the people for such a vote.

Voting for President (and V.P.) is a privilege controlled by the states, just like Driver’s Licenses. IF states hold popular elections to choose Electors, then the Constitution kicks in to preserve fair and equal individual rights, but there’s no Constitutional mandate that Electors for President and V.P. be selected by popular vote. The “method” for selecting Electors is reserved to state legislatures.

This is a right…

This is a privilege…

This is asinine.

Here’s what I said in 2000:

The U.S. Constitution was ratified in 1789. Article II, Section 1, (second clause) confers upon the legislatures of the states the right and responsibility — without limitation — of determining the method for selection of Presidential Electors (the people who cast the votes for the election of the President).

In the election of 1876 Rutherford B. Hayes ran against Samuel Tilden and several states made changes to the process after the votes were cast. Consequently, congress passed a new law. Title 3 United States Code (U.S.C.), Section 5 says that no changes to the process can be made after votes have been cast. Title 3 does not say that an election must be held to select the President. It says that no changes can be made after votes have been cast.

If a state legislature opts to name the electors themselves (without a popular election) they may do so, and Title 3 (re: voter eligibility) would not apply. Why didn’t congress specify that an election MUST be held? Congress cannot say that because Article II of the constitution says that it’s up to the state legislatures to decide the METHOD for selection of Electors.

Since the Constitution was ratified, Congress has passed many federal election laws. Also, several amendments to the Constitution have been ratified. However, none of those laws or amendments have modified the process and responsibilities of state legislatures. For example constitutional amendments have been made to guarantee blacks, women, and 18-years-old, the right to vote (if the state holds an election) but none of those amendments have altered Article II, Sec I, Cl 2. The amendments give the right to vote IF the state holds an election. The amendments do not say that states MUST hold elections and the amendments do not say that states MUST adhere to election results. States could opt to hold elections but treat the results as advisory only, BUT, because of Title 3, that would have to be on the books BEFORE the election is conducted.

Title 3, U.S.C. contains a provision that if the process, as delegated by the state legislature, does not produce a clear and settled slate of Electors by a date** certain, generally referred to as “safe harbor,” the legislature may depart from the “no change” provision and name their own slate, notwithstanding the fact that state election laws were in place prior to the date of the election.

** December 12 for Election 2000. The date varies, based on the election date.

The danger in Florida in 2000 was that the drawn out legal process was running up against the “safe harbor” date. Had Dec. 12 arrived without a “clear and settled slate of Electors” the Republican controlled Florida Legislature would have been obligated to name a slate of Electors.

That would have drove Chris Matthews and Dan Abrams even nuttier than they are over SCOTUS ending the squinting for dimples.

Frank’s Law: Unintended consequences are proportionate to the righteousness of the solution.

Charles Kigar doesn’t think twice when he has a choice of buying a gallon of conventional gasoline or a gallon of gas that contains ethanol at the same price.

He buys the gas without ethanol.

The reason is a simple matter of science. Conventional gas delivers more energy than a gallon that contains ethanol.

If it’s a gallon of E-10, which is a blend of 10 percent ethanol and conventional gas now widely available in the Kansas City area, there’s an energy difference of about 3.4 percent.

Now that may not seem like much when you’re topping off the tank this week. But over the course of a year of normal driving, it would take an additional 40 gallons of E-10 to go the same distance as conventional gas. If they were both priced the same, it would mean an extra $120.

If it’s E-85, a blend containing 85 percent ethanol that can be used in specially equipped vehicles, the energy loss soars and more than offsets its lower cost, even though E-85 is about 60 cents per gallon less at retail than conventional gas.

Mileage can suffer by about 25 percent with E-85, according to AAA. Over the course of a year, that amounts to an extra 300 gallons of E-85 to go the same distance as when using conventional gas. That means an average household, when the total cost of conventional gas and E-85 are compared, would spend nearly $100 more per year for E-85.

UPDATED: (scroll down)
Supreme Court upholds Indiana’s law requiring voters to present a photo ID before voting.

Excerpts from Monday’s 6-3 Supreme Court decision upholding Indiana’s law requiring voters to present a picture ID before they vote:

Justice John Paul Stevens, writing to uphold the law: “Indiana’s own experience with fraudulent voting in the 2003 Democratic primary for East Chicago mayor — though perpetrated using absentee ballots and not in-person fraud — demonstrate that not only is the risk of voter fraud real but that it could affect the outcome of a close election.”

“The record says virtually nothing about the difficulties faced by either indigent voters or voters with religious objections to being photographed. … In sum, on the basis of the record that has been made in this litigation, we cannot conclude that the statute imposes ‘excessively burdensome requirements’ on any class of voters.”

Now we can move ahead to put a stop to the massive fraudulent registrations of Motor-Voter laws, the fraud through absentee ballots, the fraud that would result from the new push to allow voting by email, and all the other ways the Democrats keep dreaming up under the guise of helping the “poor, the elderly and the disabled.”

However, it does no good to require voters to show photo ID but then allow illegal immigrants to get IDs with photos in the form of Driver’s Licenses.

The procedure in most states is to automatically register newly licensed drivers to vote. That’s done under the authority of Jesse Jackson’s Motor-Voter law. You remember that one don’t you? That’s the law that the states didn’t claim was an “unfunded mandate” because it was intended to throw open the gates of illegal access and illegal voting instead of clamping down on fraud like the Real ID Act will do. — And, by the way, the Real ID Act was passed by Republicans.

UPDATE, via WaPo:

The Supreme Court ruled today that states may require voters to present photo identification before casting ballots, upholding a Republican-backed measure that proponents say combats voter fraud and opponents believe discourages voter participation. [Emphasis added.]

I can guarantee it will discourage “voter” participation… Illegal voters will stay away from the polls.

ALSO, Jason @ Wizbang nailed it: “Supreme Court Upholds Anti-Fraud Voter Law, colossal defeat for Democrats”

I hope this is not going to last til election day…

Yesterday, most of the cable news channels were out of service. I’m thankful that the NFL Draft was under way so I could take refuge watching ESPN.

I don’t mean the cable channels were off the air… They were just unavailable for normal people to watch because they devoted a large part of the day to the despicable, vile, nasty, nauseous, hate-filled, anti-American Rev Jeremiah Wright as he spouted anti-white rhetoric to a like-minded NAACP.**

Unfortunately today the channels feel obliged to continue featuring Wright as though he has something to offer as enlightenment to us. Actually, all he’s doing is confirming his racism of hating whitey.

** UPDATE:

Hotair: — In front of 30 television cameras, Wright’s audience cheered him on as the minister mocked the media and, at one point, did a little victory dance on the podium. It seemed as if Wright, jokingly offering himself as Obama’s vice president, was actually trying to doom Obama; a member of the head table, American Urban Radio’s April Ryan, confirmed that Wright’s security was provided by bodyguards from Farrakhan’s Nation of Islam. [Emphasis added]

When I was a boy, Doc Blanchard and Glenn Davis were my football heroes.

I also idolized Bobby Layne, Johnny Lujack, Doak Walker and a few others [update and, oh my, as a North Carolinian, how could I have forgotten Charlie "Choo Choo" Justice?] but they weren’t Army. Doc Blanchard and Glenn Davis of West Point always remained at the top of my list.

Yesterday was the second day of the annual NFL draft and we were treated to something not heard in a long time. The Detroit Lions used pick number 218 to select Caleb Campbell, a defensive back from West Point.

It was obvious that the possibility of Campbell being drafted had been anticipated because he was present at draft-central (NYC’s Radio City Music Hall) and that inspired fans to show approval as Campbell walked down to join the ESPN pundits at the anchor desk. Campbell seemed to inspire his own cheering section as a line of young men wearing football jerseys stood and applauded as he meandered down the aisles.

ESPN then began the speculation that DOD may allow Campbell to defer his active duty commitment while he pursues the opportunity with the Lions.

Today, Mike and Mike (Greenberg and Golic) on ESPN asked their audience for comments on the idea of a military cadet getting out of a long term commitment to pursue a professional sports career. While the response was very positive in Campbell’s favor some listeners were critical that the Army might allow such a deferral.

IMHO, it’s ridiculous to criticize the military for policies that allow cadets the same opportunities that students in other universities have. Why handicap the academies even more than they are already?

DOD spends millions each year on recruiting. Why not have incentives at the academies to enhance that recruiting effort? And we ought to go further: If a youngster is a star athlete in H.S., let the academies go after him/her with the same aggressiveness that Notre Dame or Ohio State uses. That should include letting them know they can commit to a military academy and still keep open the option for a professional career in sports before they become too old to take advantage of such an opportunity.

In WW II the men that raised the flag on Iwo Jima were soon pulled out of combat and returned home to campaign for War Bonds to support the war. That’s just one instance in the long history of active duty military personnel used for public relations purposes. Star athletes from the military academies could and should perform similar duties while fulfilling their service commitments. There’s more than one way to fight a war.

BTW: I tip my hat… It was good to see the NFL and ESPN extending courtesy and good manners to Campbell and the U.S. military.