“The Internal Revenue Service’s scrutiny of conservative groups went beyond those with “tea party” or “patriot” in their names—as the agency admitted Friday—to also include ones worried about government spending, debt or taxes, and even ones that lobbied to ‘make America a better place to live,’ according to new details of a government probe,” reports the WSJ.
“The bottom line is [IRS officials] used key words to go after conservatives,” Rep. Darrell Issa (R., Calif.), said Sunday on NBC’s “Meet the Press.” “There has to be accountability for the people who did it. And, quite frankly…there’s got to be accountability for people who were telling lies about it being done.”
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“Making chit-chat while the camera crew were setting up, Governor Sununu said to me that in his view Benghazi mattered because it was ‘a question of character.’ That’s correct. On a question of foreign policy or counterterrorism strategy, men of good faith can make the wrong decisions. But a failure of character corrodes the integrity of the state,” writes Mark Steyn at NRO.
In “A Monstrous Cover-Up” :
“There is no video that justifies an attack on an embassy,” the President of the United States told the United Nations last September 25, one of six “video” references in his speech. A fortnight after the deadly attack on America’s mission in Benghazi, Obama still insisted that Innocence of Muslims, an obscure, anti-Islamic YouTube video, had fueled the mayhem. Presumably, a spontaneous protest spun out of control and unleashed lethal violence.
But, as he addressed the General Assembly, Obama surely knew that an al-Qaeda–propelled assault, not a YouTube video, killed U.S. ambassador J. Christopher Stevens, Foreign Service officer Sean Smith, and former Navy SEALs Glen Doherty and Tyrone Woods.
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My series began with a link to The 72 Best Luxury Hotels in Paris. You will find the great majority of these fabulous hotels are in the 8th arrondissement. Next, to help you plan your trip to Paris, you need an easy-to-read, vest pocket, laminated map. I like the Paris map from Red Maps.
You will see that the River Seine divides Paris into the right and left banks. At the center of the 20 arrondissements is the 1st, with each of the others spiraling outwards in escargot-like fashion. Only six arrondissements are on the left bank (5/6/7/13/14/15), and the remaining 14 are on the right bank. Most of the well-known tourist attractions are located in arrondissements 1 through 8. We know arrondissements 1 through 9 and 16 pretty well. To date, we have not found much reason to venture far into the others. Arrondissements 1 through 4 are clustered one after the other along the Seine. It is here that you find L’Opera, Vendome Square, Jardin des Tuileries, Sainte-Chapelle, Notre Dame Cathedral, Musee Carnavalet (devoted to the history of Paris), and the Louvre. No trip to Paris is complete without a heavy-duty walking tour of the area. It’s absolutely the best way to experience Paris, which means: Make sure you have comfortable shoes! Actually let me amend that: Make sure you have at least two pair of comfortable shoes. Flying, walking, eating can do funky things to feet. (Our French expert Ryland Stacy can arrange the perfect guide for you.) On your first trip to Paris, Debbie and I advise you to book in the St. Germain-des-Pres in the 6th. All of the famous literary bistros are nearby. If your preference is the high-end palace hotels, without question you will find yourself in the magnificent 8th arrondissement. Nightly hotel tabs of $1000 are the norm. And $600/two Michelin starred restaurant tabs accompany dining in these palace hotels. Do you receive value for such staggering prices? If you do your homework, the answer is yes. We have stayed a number of times at Hotel Le Bristol and will do so again. We have also eaten a number of times at Taillevent and will return.
In the next post in my Paris 2013 series, I will begin a detailed discussion of the 6th arrondissement and why Debbie and I stay there most often and why we recommend that you begin your Paris adventure in the 6th.
A bientôt,
Dick
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“Jason Richwine, the young conservative scholar who co-authored the Heritage Foundation report on the long-term costs of the amnesty bill backed by the ‘Gang of Eight,’ is gone from Heritage.
He was purged after The Washington Post unearthed his doctoral dissertation at the JFK School of Government,” writes Pat Buchanan in “The Heretic at Heritage”.
Richwine’s thesis:
IQ tests fairly measure mental ability. The average IQ of immigrants is well below that of white Americans. This difference in IQ is likely to persist through several generations.
And the potential consequences of this?
“A lack of socioeconomic assimilation among low IQ immigrant groups, more underclass behavior, less social trust and an increase in the proportion of unskilled workers in the American labor market.”
Richwine defended his 166-page thesis before Harvard’s George Borjas, Richard Zeckhauser and Christopher Jencks, who once edited The New Republic. But while his thesis was acceptable at Harvard — it earned Richwine a Ph.D. — it has scandalized the Potomac priesthood.
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Last week, I finished the fourth and final installment of the Defensive Handgun series at Sig Sauer Academy. Senior instructor Scott Reidy taught us how to survive a deadly-force encounter armed with a handgun. He ran us through the same movement drills he planned on using the following day instructing a Massachusetts State Police team.
Shooting while moving is hard. It’s like taking three pictures with your iPhone of a five-inch object that’s 10–15 yards away—while moving forward and then backward. When you run out of ammo, as Scott not-so quietly reminded us, “You need to keep moving!” as you change your mag. For roughly the same experience with your iPhone, send a text message to Mom between pictures and “Keep moving!”
Self-defense training with a handgun is intimidating, especially if you’re older or if you’re a woman. But one of my classmates was 73. He was able to run through the drills like everyone else. And yes, the classes are mostly full of men (Sig does offer courses for women only), but there was one woman in the last shotgun course I took a couple of weeks ago. We all, men and women alike, took a beating that day, firing off 100 rounds.
But here’s the deal. Whether you’re a man or a woman, I have found that the demand for the courses has increased dramatically. Sig Sauer can thank politicians like Mayor Bloomberg of New York. Mr. Big Gulp himself is a poster boy for how government has increased demand for gun training. The course I just finished is offered 10 more times between now and the end of September—nine are already full. And as an aside, my local gun club has capped membership at a record high.
High demand is often followed by lower quality. My 73-year-old friend said it’s worth travelling the two and a half hours to Sig Sauer. He talked to some other companies over the phone and knew within a few seconds they were not as good as Sig Sauer Academy. Demand for introductory courses is going up. That’s why I want you to beat inertia now and avoid the coming scrum.
As you progress through your training, you’ll find, as I did, that the non-serious students fall by the wayside after the first couple of classes. Then you will find, as I did, that the training courses become exponentially better when you’re with like-minded and serious citizens. Hard work always keeps you ahead of the other boys and girls.
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A special committee with a specific mandate is now required!
“All of that changed last week with the testimony of three courageous State Department employees before the House Oversight Committee. Their statements, along with e-mails leaked from the White House, the State Department, and other agencies, provided damning evidence of an administration cover-up in the months before the 2012 election. No longer able to ignore the obvious, major media organizations now are asking serious questions about the Obama administration’s behavior,” writes former Senator Fred Thompson at National Review.
Thompson so rightly concludes that, “The obstacles are higher than they may look today. All of this can best be overcome with a unified effort, a single strategy, and a specific congressional mandate. That kind of effort has the best chance of reaching the truth. The American people, and especially the relatives of those who lost their lives for our country, deserve nothing less.”
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“I am not a fan of nation-building. We must move away from a forward-deployed military and toward one that projects power focusing not on occupation-style warfare, but rather on strike-operations-oriented warfare.” … Allen West, The Lessons of History, National Review.
I agree 100% with Allen West on nation-building and am delighted Allen is back on the scene with his special brand of common sense.
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 The federal government has long used the IRS as an attack dog. Al Capone, God love him, could have gone down for many the killings and robberies. Instead the feds got him with the IRS. No one should have missed Al, but if the IRS can knock out Capone, it sure as heck can be sicced on you and your business at the whim of the government. And that’s before Obama’s plan for turning over Obamacare monitoring to armed IRS agents. It’s long since time to shutter the IRS.
The Nine Lies of Lois Lerner
By Kevin D. Williamson
Click above to read the article.
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 “That she (Lois Lerner) has a job today is a scandal in itself. She’ll be receiving an award — for public service! — from the Western New England University School of Law on May 18. An orange jumpsuit would suit her better than academic robes,” writes Kevin D. Williamson at National Review.
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 ARLINGTON, Va.—The holy grail of home entertainment systems always has been a master remote control for separate components of differing brands, and the Office of Naval Research (ONR) has developed something similar for military ground, air and undersea unmanned systems that will work across the services, as outlined in a new video released May 1.
This Office of the Secretary of Defense (OSD)-prescribed data model is a piece of software that enabled development of the Common Control System, which is comprised of many different common control services. The Unmanned Aerial Systems (UAS) Control Segment (UCS) software can be added to any unmanned system to make it able to communicate and work with any other. It will run on any type of platform or hardware, and it can overlay existing systems running on propriety software to make them work with any others.
The groundbreaking UCS computer code-based software acts as a gateway that allows the warfighter to control an entire unmanned system, from the vehicle itself to its payload. The various services within the Common Control System are now available for download by all of the military services through an OSD-sponsored online “store.”
“Some day in the near future you’ll have a Sailor controlling an Air Force unit’s unmanned system, or an Airman sitting at a desk controlling a naval unmanned system or a Marine controlling an Army platform,” said Chief of Naval Research Rear Adm. Matthew Klunder. “That’s the kind of ability we will have with this new Common Control System—that’s our future.”
Historically, unmanned systems have been developed and fielded as individual items built by different vendors, which has led to increased spending, from $284 million in 2002 to more than $3 billion in fiscal year 2010. They are all uniquely controlled by proprietary software created by numerous vendors, and the data they provide is sent out in unique formats, making it very difficult to control various systems with one master control or sift through all of the information being transmitted.
The common controller will change this and allow systems to work with one another. Getting rid of custom-built components and systems will simplify the systems themselves, as well as purchasing and training processes, thereby reducing costs.
“This opens the aperture for a much wider and more rapid generation of newer technologies and capabilities and for all vendors, including small businesses, to be able to compete for those capabilities,” said Dr. Bobby Junker, who heads ONR’s Command, Control, Communications, Computers, Intelligence, Surveillance and Reconnaissance department. “This is bringing back that entrepreneurial spirit that used to be there with unmanned systems.”
Additionally, all of the data captured by the systems will be saved in a cloud environment that is transparent across the military and easily accessible to and quickly navigable by all service members.
“This is all about transparency of data and services across all networks—making data available as transparently as possible to warfighters,” said Junker.
Making data available quickly is crucial for faster information gathering.
“In the future battle space, I think we’re going to see a lot of unmanned systems in all domains—air, ground, sea and undersea—being used to feed the intelligence community, provide information to the tactical warfighter and act as a virtual wingman,” Klunder said.
ONR is working with the OSD’s Office of Strategic and Tactical Systems, Naval Air Systems Command, Naval Undersea Warfare Center, Program Executive Office (PEO) Integrated Warfare Systems and PEO Unmanned Aviation and Strike Weapons on this software.
Testing and experimentation were conducted in 2012. ONR validated that UCS can be used to develop common control services that provide total functionality for a particular Common Control System, the Bi-Directional Remote Video Terminal (BDRVT). As a result, ONR was able to provide OSD with a blueprint for all military services to be able to build a BDRVT using UCS-developed common control services.
Source: Office of Naval Research
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“We are in the midst of the worst Washington scandal since Watergate. The reputation of the Obama White House has, among conservatives, gone from sketchy to sinister, and, among liberals, from unsatisfying to dangerous. No one likes what they’re seeing. The Justice Department assault on the Associated Press and the ugly politicization of the Internal Revenue Service have left the administration’s credibility deeply, probably irretrievably damaged. They don’t look jerky now, they look dirty,” writes Peggy Noonan at The Wall Street Journal.
Noonan continues, “It is not even remotely possible that all this was an accident, a mistake. Again, only conservative groups were targeted, not liberal. It is not even remotely possible that only one IRS office was involved.”
And Kimberley Strassel at The Wall Street Journal points out, “Mr. VanderSloot is the Obama target who in 2011 made a sizable donation to a group supporting Mitt Romney. In April 2012, an Obama campaign website named and slurred eight Romney donors. It tarred Mr. VanderSloot as a ‘wealthy individual’ with a ‘less-than-reputable record.’ Other donors were described as having been ‘on the wrong side of the law.’”
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You’ll want to check-out this behind the scenes look at the recording of “Look Out Now!” by the Gaddabouts. Steve Gadd formed the band and produced their debut album “The Gaddabouts” in 2011. “Look Out Now!” was released last Fall.
Pino Palladino plays bass and some guitar. Andy Fairweather Low plays electric and acoustic guitar and sings background vocals. Edie Brickell sings and plays a little guitar. Guest artist is Ronnie Cuber.
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The American Conservative asks the question and answers “Success!… The conservative critique of the liberal welfare-warfare state was so powerful that special interests (such as those that President Eisenhower called the Military-Industrial Complex) and opportunistic politicians began to adopt the label and offer fame, money, and power to conservatives who would admit them to the fellowship.”
The American Conservative magazine was founded in 2002 by Pat Buchanan, Scott McConnell, and Taki Theodoracopulos, in response to the distinctly un-conservative policies of the Bush administration (the Iraq war, chief among them). The goal was to provide an intellectual home for serious, independent-minded conservatives.
The American Conservative & Richardcyoung.com are on the same team with a common cause of minding our own business in terms of military adventurism and recapturing the constitutional federal republic spirit intended by our Founders.
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