A Bad End to a Summer of Play and Fund-Raising

"You can save your breath, frantic Obama apologists. There is no way to spin the unmitigated disaster of this hapless President toddling to the podium yesterday and announcing to the world that he doesn’t have a strategy for defeating ISIS yet. The pants-wetting terror that immediately gripped everyone in the White House, and every dead-ender Obama-worshiping pundit, tells the true tale of how epic a blunder this was." -  Human Events   

Fishnet Friday

Feds Look To Install Tracking Software In All Vehicles

Western Journalism

According to recent documents released by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, a plan is under way to implement new rules that would require passenger vehicles on the road in America to “communicate” with each other – and, some worry, the government.

The so-called “vehicle-to-vehicle communication” system detailed in the NHTSA report indicates that “light vehicles” would transmit data across short distances, giving the recipient of such information any pertinent information about the driver and his or her actions behind the wheel.

While the NHTSA is selling the program as a way to provide more accurate and immediate information regarding accidents and other roadway dangers, the potential invasion of privacy it could create is not lost on critics of government intrusion. The Washington Post reports that finalized proposals regarding the technology are expected in 2016. In the meantime, the administration is working to spread the ostensible virtues of such a system. The administration dismissed privacy concerns, concluding that it “is confident that the V2V system both achieves the agency’s safety goals and protects consumer privacy appropriately.”

America and the Islamic State

"America’s basic objective is clear: We must seek to destroy the Islamic State. It is simply not enough to block the group’s threat to the Kurds or other vulnerable minorities in the region. The risks of even a relatively small 'state' (or 'caliphate,' as they proclaim it) are chilling. Leaving the Islamic State in place and in control only of its current turf in Iraq and Syria (including northern-Iraqi hydrocarbon deposits and associated infrastructure) would make it viable economically and a fearsome refuge for terrorists of all sorts. 

Just as Afghanistan’s Taliban gave al-Qaeda a base of operations to launch terrorist attacks culminating in 9/11, a similar result could follow if the Islamic State successfully erased and then redrew existing boundaries."  — John R. Bolton, Former U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations

Gifts Fit for the Queen

From the Obama Family Album 

The President Surprises the First Lady on Arrival at Martha's Vineyard Vacation Residence

A Kindly Old Billionaire and Supreme Hypocrite

by Robert Janicki

Billionaire Warren Buffet, often called the Oracle of Omaha for his business acumen, has, once again, blown his cover as a common man of the Midwest.

Early on, Buffet jumped on President Obama's bandwagon to criticize those companies that relocate their headquarters outside the United States in order to reduce their tax liability.  Obama, with Buffet right behind him, has castigated corporations for moving their headquarters out of the Unites States and characterized them as unpatriotic, although what they are doing is completely legal.

Bear in mind that the corporate tax rate in the U.S. is 35% and advances to over 40% when state and local taxes are included.  The 35% U.S. rate, in comparison, is the highest corporate tax rate in the world.  Also note that those companies that move their company headquarters out of the United States are not avoiding any corporate taxes for their operations in the U.S..  They are simply avoiding taxes on those profits earned outside the U.S., which they are currently obligated to pay to the U.S. Treasury.

Fast forward to the latest Buffet hypocrisy.

"In May, billionaire Warren Buffett blasted the very corporate “tax inversion” schemes his firm Berkshire Hathaway is about to finance as part of Burger King relocating its headquarters to Canada to lower its tax burden."

Buffet is Chairman of the Board of investment goliath Berkshire Hathaway and its largest investor.  It's reported that Berkshire is about to spend $3 billion dollars to buy a significant portion of Burger King, which is moving to Canada, to enjoy their lower corporate tax rate.

Someone please tell me why Warren Buffet is not a hypocrite for supporting and profiting from a corporation seeking to reduce its tax liability in the U. S. by moving it headquarters outside the U.S., all the while joining President Obama in condemning such actions?

North Korea Building Missile Submarine

Fresh from their recent successfully completed Naval spy mission directed at the arrival of the Presidential entourage on Martha's Vineyard, the North Koreans are believed to be developing a new threat to peace.

From the Washington Free Beacon:

U.S. intelligence agencies believe North Korea is building a submarine capable of launching ballistic missiles, potentially increasing the threat posed by the nuclear-armed rogue state.

A missile launch tube on a North Korean submarine was observed recently by U.S. intelligence agencies and is raising new concerns about the missile and nuclear threat from the communist regime in Pyongyang, according to two defense officials familiar with reports of the development.

Pentagon spokesman Lt. Col. Jeffrey Pool declined to comment on the North Korean missile submarine program. “We do not comment on intelligence matters, but we do urge North Korea to become more transparent in their defense sector in order to reduce tensions in the region,” he said in a statement. Details of the missile submarine remain closely held within the government.

Military analysts expressed surprise at the intelligence on the missile submarine program and speculated the submarine could be a modification of one of North Korea’s Russian or Chinese design Romeo-class diesel submarines.

The majority of the North’s submarines, more than two dozen, are small, Sango-class mini-submarines used for covert commando operations to infiltrate South Korea during a conflict. The North Koreans also have four 1940s-design Whiskey-class submarines from Russia.

Until the recent discovery of the modified submarine, there were no intelligence signs North Korea is interested in developing its own submarine-launched missiles.

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