…speaks for itself.

Covertly taken photos of CIA interrogators that were shown by defense attorneys to al Qaeda inmates at the Guantanamo Bay prison represent a more serious security breach than the 2003 outing of CIA officer Valerie Plame, the agency’s former general counsel said Wednesday.

John Rizzo, who was the agency’s top attorney until December, said in an interview that he initially requested the Justice Department and CIA investigation into the compromise of CIA interrogators’ identities after photographs of the officers were found in the cell of one al Qaeda terrorist in Cuba.

“Well I think this is far more serious than Valerie Plame,” Mr. Rizzo said after a breakfast speech. “That was clearly illegal, outing a covert officer. I am not downplaying that. But this is far more serious.”

I’ll say it is!

Ain’t it grand when your safety and survival and those of all your friends and loved ones hinge completely upon the whims of a portside president and a leftist congressional majority whose political agendas do not even remotely coincide with any concerns for your safety and survival and those of all your loved ones?

Read on.

…from my favorite prominent Democrat, former New York mayor Ed Koch.

Amnesty supporters see themselves as taking the high road and claim that amnesty opponents are opposed to immigration, when nothing could be further from the truth. Many amnesty opponents actually support expanding legal immigration. Currently, the Amnesty supporters see themselves as taking the high road and claim that amnesty U.S. has the highest legal immigration in the world. Every year, we allow 750,000 immigrants to enter the country legally and make them eligible for citizenship within five years. Two hundred and fifty thousand aslyees are also permitted to enter annually. Those legal immigrants have the right to work and earn a living; the asylees are eligible to work six months after applying to work. If we need more immigrants, as many think we do to expand the workforce of our graying population, then we can easily increase the number of legal immigrants.

If we give the current illegals amnesty, you can be sure that 20 or so years from now, there will be a clamor for another amnesty bill as the illegals will continue to pour in. For example, the Simpson-Mazzoli bill, adopted by Congress in 1986, was hailed as the last amnesty bill we would need because the borders of the U.S., then a sieve, would be better protected. However, our borders continued to be porous, and the number of illegals burgeoned, and here we are again with the illegals and their supporters seeking amnesty once more for ever larger numbers.

Now, why is it that Hizzoner’s fellow Democrats aren’t as cranially lucid as he is? Could it be that their political agendas are at odds with the in-your-face facts of the matter?

No country in the world has open borders that foreigners can enter at will, certainly not Mexico. Arizona has an estimated 500,000 illegal aliens living in the state and in 2009, the border patrol agents arrested 241,000 illegal aliens, which is why that state enacted controversial legislation out of frustration. Arizona’s citizens are outraged by the presence of many criminals among the people crossing their border — remember there is an ongoing drug war in Mexico with thousands of Mexicans being killed and wounded south of the border by other Mexicans. Arizona does not want that war to spill over into Arizona. Arizona citizens are also distressed with the demands made by illegals upon medical and educational services.

It would be sound and defensible policy to have the local police examine at the workplace the identity papers of all employees to ascertain whether they are legally allowed to work and, most important, ascertain if employers had intentionally violated current U.S. laws requiring employers to check the immigration status of hired workers. Those employers who intentionally violate the law should be pursued criminally and, if convicted, go to prison. Regrettably, this is not what is happening. If that policy were strictly enforced, illegal aliens would go home, since they are here primarily to get a job and send money home to their families. Recently, I saw an estimate that a million illegals had returned home because of our recession and unemployment in the U.S. which is now at 9.7 percent.

Above emphasis mine.

If we wait until an illegal alien is arrested for a crime or stopped for a moving violation to check the status of his/her citizenship, the odds are that we’d never find 1/10th of the illegal aliens north of the border.

Amnesty supporters refuse to use the term illegal aliens, preferring instead undocumented aliens. They should call them what they are: illegal. Amnesty proponents also should acknowledge that an open border policy is indefensible and irrational and has not been adopted by any other country.

If open borders were such a good idea, why don’t we try on a limited scale simply expanding the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) among Mexico, Canada and the U.S. and allow anyone living in those three countries access to jobs in any of them? Would Canada consent to that? Would Mexico? I doubt it.

Of course not. Mexico’s trying to get rid of its poor by sending ‘em all up here, and Canada, while governed mostly from the portside, isn’t stupid. Perhaps we are, however. If we weren’t, we wouldn’t elect the kind of people to office who would do unto us what these reptilian mammals on the Hill do.

During the Bush presidency, amnesty proponents were twice defeated when they tried to shove their self-defined “good policy” down the throats of the voters. Amnesty advocates believed, as they do now, that they know what is best for us, but the American public stood up and said “no.” In an election year, the voters can throw the bums out, and that is why Congress fears to bring the issue up before the November elections.

Again, my emphasis and right on target, Mayor Koch.

…to our micromanaging leftist Obama/Pelosi/Reid government’s intentions for sticking their noses into, and therefore, as liberal politicians are wont to do, stamping out opportunities in the hitherto beneificial, career building concept of internships.

John Stossel’s got it spot-on.

Do you employ unpaid student interns — college students who work in exchange for on-the-job training?

If so, President Obama’s Labor Department says that you’re an exploiter. The government says an internship is OK only if it meets six criteria, among them that the employer must get “no immediate advantage” from the intern’s activities. In fact, the employer’s work “may be impeded.”

Impeded? No immediate advantage?

I’m in trouble, then. I have an intern at Fox Business News, and I’m getting immediate advantages from her work all the time. I’ve had interns my whole career and gotten lots of immediate advantage from them. Occasionally, I’ve been impeded — but the better interns did the research that made my work possible. I’d asked my TV bosses to pay for research help, but they said, “You think we’re made of money?”

The plot thickens…

So I spoke with Village Voice writer Anya Kamenetz, who wrote a column titled “Take This Internship and Shove It” in The New York Times. (http://tinyurl.com/2anss9s)

“We have minimum wage laws in this country for a very good reason,” she replied. “We had them to avoid exploitation like child labor.

But what’s wrong with a free internship if a student learns something about the career he wants to pursue?

I was a little stunned by Kamenetz’s answer: “Employers could say we cannot afford to pay anybody, so why should we be forced to pay the guy who cleans the floors?”

Because they wouldn’t get people to clean floors if they didn’t pay. But I guess I shouldn’t expect a New York writer to understand markets.

“Interns are people that come in and work for below minimum wage,” she said. “They pull the bottom out of the labor market, and it’s less fair for everybody.”

So it should be banned?

“There are a lot of ways to fill in the need for interns and the need for college students to get experience. One way is for colleges to pay stipends.”

But they won’t.

“They will if the law is enforced. Another way is for companies to hire students that are eligible for federal work-study.”

Oh, I see. The taxpayers should pay for my interns.

“Nobody is saying that these interns should go away,” Kamenetz added. “What they’re saying is a company should put money in their budgets to pay people the minimum wage to work for them, and that is just the basic issue of fairness. If you start working for free, where’s it going to end?”

Give me a break. It would end when the interns have the skills to earn market salaries. Minimum-wage law and union rules already killed off apprentice jobs on construction sites. Contractors say: If I must pay high union wages, I’ll hire experienced workers. I’d lose money if I hired a kid and helped him learn on the job.

Emphasis mine.

My interns often told me that working — unpaid — at WCBS or ABC was the best learning experience of their lives: “I learned more from you than at college, and I didn’t have to pay tuition!” It was good for them and good for me.

SNIP! (A little technical blogger talk, there)

What’s happened to the rights of contract and free association? If student and employer come to an agreement, both expect to benefit or it wouldn’t happen. The student is no indentured servant. If the employer “exploits” the student, the student can quit. The contract ought to be nobody’s business but theirs.

Butt out, federal bullies. Grown-ups can take care of ourselves.

Basically, this is another example of liberals who believe that they can “help” society by legislating against human nature. Ain’t happenin’.

…like the supremely unqualified Secretary of “Homeland Security” Janet Napolitano, apparently have no qualms about insulting our intelligence in even the most blatant and offensive manner.

Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano said Tuesday the U.S.-Mexico border is not as secure as it could be, though she contended that the Obama administration has shown an “absolute laserlike focus on that border.”

The only thing remotely resembling a laser in the Obama Administration is aimed at our border defenses and seems to be drilling quite a large hole in them.

Napolitano claimed, we will recall, that the border is as “secure as it has ever been”.

Last week, testifying before the Senate Judiciary Committee, Miss Napolitano said it was an “unfair question” to ask if she could certify that the border was secure.

Thomas Jefferson once said that it was an American’s duty to look over the shoulders of the politicians and keep an eye on what they were doing on We, The People’s behalf.

However, this has been amended by the Obama Administration:

Forget what we say as soon as possible, so that you won’t be confused when we tell you the exact opposite later.

After the Underwear Bomber’s scorcher of a screw-up, Ann Coulter remarked in her column that it is harder to get on the no-fly list than it was to get into Studio 54 back in the 1970s.

Well, while his attempt to head for the tall timber didn’t get off the ground, Faisal of recent Times Square fame did manage to get aboard the airplane.

The no-fly list failed to keep the Times Square suspect off the plane. Faisal Shahzad had boarded a jetliner bound for the United Arab Emirates Monday night before federal authorities pulled him back.

The night’s events, gradually coming to light, underscored the flaws in the nation’s aviation security system, which despite its technologies, lists and information sharing, often comes down to someone making a right call.

Literally.

As federal agents closed in, Faisal Shahzad was aboard Emirates Flight 202. He reserved a ticket on the way to John F. Kennedy International Airport, paid cash on arrival and walked through security without being stopped. By the time Customs and Border Protection officials spotted Shahzad’s name on the passenger list and recognized him as the bombing suspect they were looking for, he was in his seat and the plane was preparing to leave the gate.

The part about his reserving a ticket on the way to the airport, paying cash on arrival and then strolling casually while whistling walking through security is enough to make anyone who has travelled as extensively by air, especially post 9/11, as I have stop and take a few seconds out to be surprised — very surprised.

Unless the system has been severely downgraded under Secretary of Homeland Insecurity Janet Napolitano, travellers who reserve flights at the last minute, and you’ve got to figure that this one was one way — one way flights are pretty much strike two with the last minute bit — and then pay for the ticket with cash are subject to immediate scrutiny. One would think the fine folks at the airline would have checked thoroughly to see if Faisal Shahzad’s name was a no-fly, and in this case definitely checked for new list entries.

Even given that the airline in question was not a U.S. carrier, well…

But it didn’t. At the last minute, the pilot was notified, the jetliner’s door was opened and Shahzad was taken into custody.

After authorities pulled Shahzad off the plane, he admitted he was behind the crude Times Square car bomb, officials said. He also claimed to have been trained at a terror camp in Pakistan’s lawless tribal region of Waziristan, according to court documents.

That raised increased concern that the bombing was an international terror plot.

Shahzad, a Pakistani-born U.S. citizen, was charged Tuesday with terrorism and attempting to use a weapon of mass destruction in Saturday evening’s failed Times Square bombing. According to a federal complaint, he confessed to buying an SUV, rigging it with a homemade bomb and driving it into the busy area where he tried to detonate it.

The Obama administration played down the fact that Shahzad, a U.S. citizen born in Pakistan, had made it aboard the plane. Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano wouldn’t talk about it, other than to say Customs officials prevented the plane from taking off. White House spokesman Robert Gibbs said the security system has fallback procedures in place for times like this, and they worked.

The Obama administration played down the fact….Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano wouldn’t talk about it…White House spokesman…and they worked…

Yes, as Napolitano, in the aftermath of the Underwear Bomber’s debut, tolf us that “the system worked”.

So far, the only thing that’s now averted two disasterous terrorist attacks has been the incompetence of the terrorists themselves, which doesn’t say much for the Obama Administration’s protective efforts.

And these incompetents, such as they were, managed to not only come close to accomplishing their objectives, but also to get aboard two airplanes, one inbound, the other outbound.

Napolitano’s luck has thus far been good, but eventually, one terrorist will come along who actually knows what he’s doing or isn’t packing a dud, and then even the most obtuse American will see and know just how much the Obama Administration is placing the American people at risk in the name of politics.

The rest of the linked article is here.

I read this item in today’s Wall Street Journal’s Best of the Web Today, published daily as part of the Opinion Journal by James Taranto, and having been to many demonstrations in my time during which I had the opportunity to observe “peaceful” liberals in action, couldn’t resist putting in my two cents.

“In a blunt caution to political friend and foe, President Barack Obama said Saturday that partisan rants and name-calling under the guise of legitimate discourse pose a serious danger to America’s democracy, and may incite ‘extreme elements’ to violence,” the Associated Press reports from Ann Arbor, Mich.

Two thousand miles away, another AP dispatch reports, there occurred an example of exactly what the president was warning about:

Close to 20 businesses were damaged after what started as a peaceful immigrants’ rights march in downtown Santa Cruz [Calif.] turned violent, requiring police to call other agencies for help, authorities said.

Police spokesman Zach Friend said an estimated 250 people started marching through the city around 10:30 p.m. Saturday.

It was a harmonious but “unpermitted and unsanctioned event,” he said, until some in the crowd started breaking windows and spraying paint on retail shops that line the downtown corridor.

Friend said he wasn’t sure if the damage was caused by people marching in support of immigrants’ rights, or if the group was “infiltrated by anarchists.”

Anarchy signs were spray-painted on some of the buildings.

“They’re a group of people who seem to fancy themselves as revolutionaries, but what they really are are a group of morons,” Friend said.

You’ve got to love the way the AP describes this: It started as a peaceful march but “turned violent.” It was totally harmonious “until some in the crowd started breaking windows.” And the window breakers might have just been infiltrators!

At “peaceful” liberal demonstrations during which I was part of the conservative counter-demonstration assemblages (usually, what we have is the lefties on one side of the street, the conservatives on the other), I have uniformly, not just occasionally observed one constant, other than that while conservatives arrive on our own as individuals or in small groups, a large number of the liberals and entourage are bussed in from all points in order to bolster the size of their crowd for media exposure purposes, and that is that when everybody has gone:

1. The conservative side of the street is immaculate, no trash or property damage to be seen, whereas,

2. The liberal side of the street is utterly trashed, garbage all over the sidewalk, newspaper vending machines and other non-bolted-down artifacts overturned and/or tossed into the actual street, also a none-too-rare garnish of graffiti and/or broken windows.

Moving right along to complete WSJ Editorial Editor Taranto’s actual topic, which compares the biased treatment liberals receive in such situations over conservatives…

Compare this with the lead paragraph of the AP’s March 20 dispatch on the anti-ObamaCare tea-party protests:

House Democrats heard it all Saturday–words of inspiration from President Barack Obama and raucous chants of protests from demonstrators. And at times it was flat-out ugly, including some racial epithets aimed at black members of Congress.

The claims of racial epithets have since been disputed and were never substantiated, but let’s give the AP the benefit of the doubt and assume that at the time, the reporter knew of no reason to doubt the word of the congressmen making the claims.

Even so, had the tea-party protesters gotten the Santa Cruz treatment, the AP would have noted that the rally was completely nonviolent, even if it featured some ugly words; that there was no ugliness at all until the protest “turned ugly”; and that the people who (allegedly) shouted the ugly words might well have been infiltrators.

If the Santa Cruz protesters had gotten the tea-party treatment, by contrast, the AP would have described the event simply as a riot and would not have distinguished between the peaceful protesters and the violent few who might be infiltrators anyway.

What’s more, conservative politicians and commentators would be sounding a constant refrain–echoed by the mainstream media–that politicians are inciting the violence with “antigovernment” statements like this one, reported April 23 by CBS News:

President Obama suggested today that the immigration bill expected to be signed into law in Arizona is a “misguided” piece of legislation that “threatened to undermine basic notions of fairness that we cherish as Americans, as well as the trust between police and their communities that is so crucial to keeping us safe.”

We don’t think that journalists should give the Santa Cruz protesters the tea-party treatment or the tea partiers the Santa Cruz treatment. Both sides ought to get the same treatment–fair treatment–from those whose job is to cover the news impartially.

As for Obama, his efforts to demonize the opposition are unseemly and unpresidential.

Given the breadth of his policies’ unpopularity, they amount to an attack on the majority of Americans. That seems likely they will prove politically unwise as well.

That, as they (whoever they are) say, is for sure!

But first, Obama’s National Debt.

Ahem.

That out of the way, what have we here?

Remember when the Democrats and the mainstream media raked the Bush Administration over the coals over the government’s response to Hurricane Katrina and her tragic aftermath?

When Dubya obeyed The Law and allowed then Louisiana Governor Blanco to put him off, which is within the authority of a governor to do in the event that the federal government offers or requests permission to act when a disaster befalls a state? When the Democrats and the liberal propagandists in the media, for purely political reasons, ignored that little tidbit of The Law in order to accuse Bush of sitting on his hands while Nawlins “drowned”, even going so far as to make a racist incident out of it (the left never loses the chance to milk every last political point out of an event, whether it be flood, fire, famine or any other disaster)?

Well…

There were some odds things in Saturday’s New York Times. Not only was President Obama criticized over his administration’s failure to react faster to the massive oil spill in the Gulf caused by a BP America drilling rig, the paper even compared his dilatory response to…that of George Bush and Hurricane Katrina.

My first thought was that while Katrina was sort of an unprecedented action on the part of nature, one that took an unexpected toll on the levy system down yonder, there have been oil spills before and it’s “kinda’ funky” that this being the case, the Obama Administration has a lot less ammunition with which to fire up a ready excuse, if any excuse for that matter, for the spill’s being neglected, from a government point of view, for so long, only to have the government’s response, late but evident, come along with what can only be termed a paucity of rapidity.

There’s a world of difference between the impact of an oil spill and a deadly hurricane. And the White House hopes it stays that way.

As President Obama, who will visit the Gulf region on Sunday morning, has stepped up his administration’s response to the oil leak in the Gulf of Mexico, ordering a moratorium on new offshore drilling leases and dispatching cabinet secretaries and cargo planes to the region, the White House is also trying to avert the kind of political damage inflicted on former President George W. Bush by his administration’s slow response to Hurricane Katrina.

The shoe, as they say, is now on the other foot.

A Saturday editorial, “Unanswered Questions on the Oil Spill,” made the same Bush-Obama comparison:

There are many avenues to pursue. Here are two: the oil company’s response, and Mr. Obama’s. The company, BP, seems to have been slow to ask for help, and, on Friday, both federal and state officials accused it of not moving aggressively or swiftly enough. Yet the administration should not have waited, and should have intervened much more quickly on its own initiative.

A White House as politically attuned as this one should have been conscious of two obvious historical lessons. One was the Exxon Valdez, where a late and lame response by both industry and the federal government all but destroyed one of the country’s richest fishing grounds and ended up costing billions of dollars. The other was President George W. Bush’s hapless response to Hurricane Katrina.

Now we have another disaster in more or less the same neck of the woods, and it takes the administration more than a week to really get moving.

So where are the leftie members of the Fourth Estate, asking “tough questions” and filling the papers and evening newscasts? Where are the environmentalists to substitute, during the oil spill festivities, a “nature-hating president” for the “racists” at Katrina’s media dog and pony show?

Guess there is none, since as we know, it’s a one way street.

…by way of a hypocrisy by the lying, corrupt scumball Mexican president.

Mexican President Felipe Calderon denounced as “racial discrimination” an Arizona law giving state and local police the authority to arrest suspected illegal immigrants and vowed to use all means at his disposal to defend Mexican nationals against a law he called a “violation of human rights.”

But the legislation, signed April 23 by Arizona Gov. Jan Brewer, is similar to Reglamento de la Ley General de Poblacion — the General Law on Population enacted in Mexico in April 2000, which mandates that federal, local and municipal police cooperate with federal immigration authorities in that country in the arrests of illegal immigrants.

Under the Mexican law, illegal immigration is a felony, punishable by up to two years in prison. Immigrants who are deported and attempt to re-enter can be imprisoned for 10 years. Visa violators can be sentenced to six-year terms. Mexicans who help illegal immigrants are considered criminals.

The law also says Mexico can deport foreigners who are deemed detrimental to “economic or national interests,” violate Mexican law, are not “physically or mentally healthy” or lack the “necessary funds for their sustenance” and for their dependents.

Hey, liberals, how come we aren’t hearing any cries of “racist!” against the Mexican government? Is their law fairer than Arizona’s (which only actually mimics the federal law the U.S. Government was supposed to enforce but didn’t/hasn’t)? Or is your only true motivation your craving for the majority Mexican vote, and the American people be damned?

“This sounds like the kind of law that a rational nation would have to protect itself against illegal immigrants — that would stop and punish the very people who are violating the law,” said Rep. Steve King of Iowa, ranking Republican on the House Judiciary subcommittee on immigration, citizenship, refugees, border security and international law.

“Why would Mr. Calderon have any objections to an Arizona law that is less draconian than his own, one he has pledged to enforce?” Mr. King said.

Sen. Jon Kyl of Arizona, the ranking Republican on the Senate Judiciary subcommittee on terrorism and homeland security, described Mr. Calderon’s comments as “hypocritical to say the least.”

Hey, liberals! Look that up in your Funk & Wagnalls!

…Law officers backed by helicopters hunted gunmen in Arizona’s desert early Saturday after a sheriff’s deputy was wounded by suspected illegal immigrants believed to be smuggling marijuana, officials said. The violent episode came amid nationwide debate over the state’s tough new immigration law.

You mean, the old federal law they haven’t been enforcing?

Pinal County Deputy Louie Puroll was patrolling alone Friday afternoon in a rugged area near Interstate 8, about 50 miles south of Phoenix, when he came upon a band of suspected smugglers, authorities said.

At least one of five suspects opened fire on the 53-year-old lawman, tearing a chunk of skin from just above his left kidney. The officer was found after a frantic hour long search, Pinal County sheriff’s Lt. Tamatha Villar said.

Under Obama and Napolitano, it is possible for Americans to actually die of politics.

The shooting was likely to add fuel to an already fiery national debate sparked last week when Gov. Jan Brewer signed a law cracking down on illegal immigration in the state.

{snip!}

The new law’s passage came amid increasing anger in Arizona about violence, drug smugglers, illegal immigration drop houses and other problems that some say are caused by poor border security. The issue gained focus a month ago when a southern Arizona rancher was shot and killed by a suspected illegal border crosser.

But the Obama Administration, along with Napolitano, could care less about protecting the American people, their families and their property when more important politics is afoot.

One wonders when these people who refuse to do their necessary jobs will stop trying to interfere with those who want to do it.

Now the federal government, under the inspired leadership of Obama tool/Attorney General Eric Holder, is discussing legally challenging Arizona’s new anti-illegal alien law.

U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder Tuesday said he would not rule out a legal challenge to Arizona’s new immigration law.

Speaking with reporters in Washington, Holder said no decision had been made but the Department of Justice was coordinating with the Department of Homeland Security on how Washington should respond to passage of legislation that would punish people who are detained in Arizona and are unable to prove they are in the United States legally.

“We are considering all possibilities, including the possibility of a court challenge,” he said.

Holder said the Arizona law was “unfortunate.”

“I think that it is, I fear, subject to potential abuse,” he said. “And I’m very concerned about the wedge that it could draw between communities that law enforcement is supposed to serve and those of us in law enforcement.”

Unfortunate? Potential abuse?

There is a reason these people are called illegal aliens, and that is because federal law makes it so, yet here we have a federal government that is not only failing, by design, to enforce its own laws, but is preparing to dispute the enforcement of those same laws by a state that is suffering greatly from this failure on the part of the federal government to enforce those laws, in effect treating the state of Arizona like some band of vigilantes and ignoring Arizona’s sovereignty as a state.

The reason for the Democrats and O pretending that illegal doesn’t mean illegal is simple: They hope someday to enact an amnesty bill, and then each amnestied alien would equal one Democrat vote, and to hell with the American people or what’s best for them. This should be obvious to anyone who can pick up a newspaper or get on the internet.

Obama called the new law “misguided” and ordered the Justice Department to investigate whether it would violate civil rights.

These criminal aliens do not have American civil rights, they are neither Americans nor even legally here.

Check ‘em, cuff ‘em, stuff ‘em and send ‘em off!