Sgt Justin Griffith wants atheists to be given more respect in the armed forces

In a land of faith and flag, Justin Griffith is challenging the US military to abandon its religious ties.

When he was a child growing up in Plano, Texas – a place he describes as the “oversized, goofy buckle on the Bible belt” – he would bring his bible to science class and debate his teachers on the finer points of evolution.

“In my head, I won every time,” says Mr Griffith, now 29.

But somewhere along the way, his penchant for picking ideological fights with the non-religious got him in trouble. He found it harder and harder to argue with the points they were making. At 13, he suffered a crisis of faith.

“It was so painful. I lost my religion before I lost my first girlfriend. Nothing that big had ever happened to me, and I didn’t have any coping skills,” he says.

Mr Griffith found peace with his atheism, but he is not done sparring with the opposite team.

As an active-duty sergeant in the US Army, he’s leading the charge to get atheists more respect in the armed forces. In the process he is earning attention, both positive and negative, from around the world.

Protest rock

Mr Griffith’s most ambitious project is Rock Beyond Belief, a day-long event on the military base Fort Bragg, North Carolina, complete with children’s activities, rock concerts and a lecture by atheism’s most visible proponent, author and scientist Richard Dawkins.

It is an ambitious plan in an organisation still respectful of religious traditions and in a town that holds Christian values dear.

Scheduled for 31 March, Rock Beyond Belief comes two years after another controversial concert at Fort Bragg, “Rock The Fort”.

Sponsored by the Billy Graham Evangelical Association, Rock the Fort was billed as an “evangelical event” with Christian bands, family activities, and an emphasis on spreading the gospel to the entire community.

Despite attracting criticism for hosting the event, the top brass at Fort Bragg said they would be willing do the same for an event thrown by a different religious group.

“So the next day, I raised my hand and said, ‘Fort Bragg, I’ve got an event’,” says Mr Griffith.

The concert was originally scheduled for 2011, but was postponed until his group could secure the same location as Rock The Fort: an outdoor field capable of hosting thousands of people, in view of the Main Post Chapel.

Though the Rock Beyond Belief concert is the most public of Mr Griffith’ s efforts to make the military more accepting of atheists, it is not his only one.

“We have a lot of work to do,” he says.

Military culture is full of religious ideology and symbolism, says Griffith. For instance, he cites the traditional flag-folding ceremony, which cites faith in God in multiple instances.

“These things have been here for years. It’s tradition,” he says. “How do we go about getting them out?”

Prior to planning the concert, he registered his complaints against the army’s spiritual fitness test, a campaign that he continues.

That test, implemented last year as part of a wider resiliency and suicide-prevention program, rates service members on the strength of their spiritual life.

He’s also working to ensure that servicemembers can have “atheist” listed on their official military records.

“It took me a year and a half to get my records changed to atheist. When I told them I was atheist, they put ‘no religious preference’,” he says. “I told them that’s unacceptable. I do have a preference, and that’s atheism.”

These records are important, he says, because of the end-of-life services provided to soldiers who may have been wounded in war.

“I want them to know that I am an atheist: do not pray; do not do last rites; do not do any goofy ceremonies for me,” he says.

Bigger microphone

Mr Griffith counts about 100 members in Fort Bragg’s atheist community, which meets weekly off-base, since it is not yet recognised as a distinctive faith group by the military.

He also works with other atheist groups on military bases across the country.

Through his efforts, Mr Griffith has become a figurehead within the atheist movement. His bloggets around 100,000 hits a month and he says he puts in about 40 hours a week of activism on top of his military duties. In July, he was appointed the military director of American Atheists.

“I definitely have a bigger microphone now,” he says.

But with that bigger voice comes bigger criticism. Because atheists so often fight to keep religion out of public property or government activities, they are perceived as being anti-Christian.

When Fox News reported on Rock Beyond Belief, it focused on a music video by Aiden, one of the bands performing at the concert. That video featured images burning churches and references to burning synagogues and holy books.

Mr Griffith says the band was referring to sectarian violence in the name of religion, not an appeal for atheists to incite violence.

Still, the article resulted in an influx of hate mail and death threats.

Military microcosm

Though the general public is not always receptive to atheism, the military itself offers a promise of acceptance.

Aside from recognised Christian, Jewish and Muslim groups, Fort Bragg has resources for other faiths, including Buddhists and Wiccans, a Pagan religion.

“The army really is a microcosm of the entirety of our nation,” says Benjamin Abel, a spokesman for Fort Bragg. “We serve the people, and we have an incredibly diverse population of people in the United States.”

He notes that there are steps religious groups can go through to gain more visibility on base.

The fight by atheists, he says, reminds him of the struggle the base’s Wiccan members endured years ago.

“Through history, the military has generally been out in front of a lot of social issues. We integrated the military first, we just had the recent change of ‘don’t ask don’t tell’, [and] women have been integrated in the military for a long time.

“We’re not out there as a force for social change, but we certainly don’t shy from it,” says Mr Abel.

While Mr Griffith does not believe in God, he does believe in the military.

A few months ago he re-enlisted for another five-year tour of duty, and plans to make his career in the service.

“I never would have gotten anywhere without the army. It taught me to be a man,” he says.

“The army is so good, it deserves these little corrections – and I do consider them little, in the scale of how great the army is.”

Sen. Joe Haynes announced Friday that he will not seek re-election in 2012, saying a newly redrawn district by Republicans wasn’t necessarily a factor in his decision.

However, the Goodlettsville Democrat, who has served in the Senate for 28 years, did note what he called an “interesting symmetry” in the circumstances surrounding his decision to run in 1984 and the one he would face 2012.

“In 1984, the ruling Democratic majority literally changed the district to exclude my home in an attempt to protect a Democratic incumbent,” said Haynes, whose district includes large parts of Nashville in Davidson County.

“This year, the ruling Republican majority has radically changed my district in an attempt to draw a district more favorable to a Republican candidate.”

He said he still believes he could win.

Haynes, 75, said his “family, a huge stack of unread books and a little-used fishing boat demand my attention now.”

He is the fourth Democratic lawmaker to announce he won’t run for re-election in the fall.

The others are Rep. Harry Tindell of Knoxville, and Sens. Roy Herron of Dresden and Eric Stewart of Belvidere, who is running for Congress.

Congressional Budget Office bean counters are taking a fresh look at President Obama’s national health care law, and will have updated figures on key provisions in March, director Doug Elmendorf testified this week in Congress.

Though he stopped short of saying there would be a full re-scoring of the law.

Several factors could make the health care law significantly more costly than advertised at the time of passage in March 2010. For instance, the law was crafted in a way to delay enactment of the major spending provisions until 2014, to make the legislation appear cheaper under the CBO’s 10-year budget window (then 2010 to 2019).  Now, the budget window has moved up to 2022, meaning it takes into account an extra three years of full enactment.

When Elmendorf testified before the House Budget Committee on Wednesday, Rep. John Campbell, R-Calif., asked him out the cost estimates for Medicaid spending and health insurance exchange subsidies would be effected now that CBO’s long-term unemployment forecast has deteriorated. Campbell noted that at the time of its original estimate, CBO was expecting an unemployment rate of 4.9 percent in 2014, but now that’s projected to be 8.7 percent.

“That piece alone would raise the cost of the Affordable Care Act,” Elmendorf said, referring to the formal name for the legislation. “I don’t know by how much.”

Elmendorf said the CBO would update its estimates of the cost of coverage expansions under the health care law.

On Thursday, Sen. Ron Johnson, R-Wis., also pressed Elmendorf on health care cost estimates, arguing that the number of employers who would be dumping workers on government-run exchanges and simply paying a fine would be higher than originally projected.

Elmendorf responded that in addition to updating the coverage provisions for March, the CBO was working on a separate analysis that would contain a range of estimates about how the cost of the health care law would be affected if certain assumptions were wrong one way or the other.

Taliban supreme leader Mullah Omar and President Barack Obama

Taliban leader Mullah Omar purportedly sent a letter to President Barack Obama last year indicating an interest in peace talks, US officials have claimed.

College president’s commitment to diversity included defending hate-crime hoaxer

Claremont McKenna College, a private liberal arts college in Los Angeles, has earned international infamy for fraudulently misreporting its SAT scores to game the U.S. News & World Report rankings. Richard Vos, dean of admissions since 1987, resigned in disgrace Monday, starting a nationwide debate about the role of SATs in higher education and the integrity of Claremont’s admission process. But absent from any analysis is this: Vos began falsifying SAT scores in 2005, right around the time Claremont began to institutionalize racial preferences. An investigation of the data since released suggests that Claremont manipulated the school’s scores to cover up admittance of under-qualified minority students.

A former employee of one of the world’s largest international banks has provided WND with more than 1,000 pages of documents, including customer account ledgers for dozens of companies through which the financial institution was laundering money each month, according to the whistleblower.

“I found many accounts through which hundreds of thousands of dollars were being flowed as a conduit on a monthly basis,” John Cruz, an account relationship manager who worked in the HSBC southern New York region. told WND.

As WND reported, Cruz has a raft of customer account records he claims are evidence of an international money-laundering scheme involving hundreds of billions of dollars by London-based HSBC, which reportedly is under investigation by a U.S. Senate committee.

To illustrate the point, WND and Cruz selected the bank checking account ledger for a particular HSBC commercial account, called “Company ABC” for the sake of this article, for the months May through August 2009.

In the exhibits below, WND has redacted all information that might be used to identify the account holder, including removing the account number from the bank statements.

Company ABC was identified in HSBC records with the following information:

• “Delivery Service, DHL, office products, packages.”
• Located on West 39th Street in New York City, in operation for four years and organized under New York corporate laws.
• The account was identified as being 100 percent owned by a person from Malaysia who had non-resident status in the United States and a permanent address in West Hempstead, N.Y.
• The account registration was deficient in any meaningful “Know Your Customer” information, expect to list for the owner a New York drivers’ license number.
• The file described the business as: “SHIPPING COMPANY, OFFICE ON THE 9TH FLOOR, EMPLOYEES, DESKS, COMPUTERS, PRESIDENT’S OFFICE, OPERATIONS ON 13TH FLOOR.”
• The file noted that the business was last paid a site visit on March 10, 2009, by the HSBC branch manager in E. Northport, Long Island.
• The file listed the annual revenue of the company as $2 million. But also lists the gross for the 2008 tax return as $2,782,857.

“The first words out of my mouth when I first visited Company ABC in person were that this company is bogus,” Cruz said. “There were a few small boxes lying around and a few envelopes – but nothing of value, no large packages or anything else that would justify hundreds of thousands of dollars of business being transacted here on a monthly basis.”

Cruz said he found two women on Company ABC’s 13th floor, but they seemed to be only sitting at desks and talking.

“It turned out that the two women did not speak English,” he said. “So, when I said, ‘Hello,’ they just nodded. There were no managers or other employees around, so I left.”

As seen in Exhibit 1, for the month from May 7, 2009, through June 5, 2009, Company ABC started with an opening balance of $628,081.74 and a closing balance of $328,228.99.

On May 15, 2009, a debit reflects that $300,100 was wired from the account to an unspecified location via a telephone transfer.

Other than to be credited $247.25 on May 28, 2009, the account shows no other activity.

A team of attorneys from the American Freedom Law Center today asked a court in New York for a preliminary injunction that would uphold the principle of free speech in the advertisements on the transit authority’s facilities.

A lawsuit had been filed last fall over the refusal by the New York Metropolitan Transit Authority to accept advertising that calls for support for civilized man and opposition to the savage acts of terrorism the world has known in recent years.

Officials with the AFLC said today they’d asked for a preliminary injunction to protect freedom of speech as the case works its way through the system.

“The MTA’s ‘demeaning speech’ policy is operating here as a viewpoint-based restriction on our clients’ speech,” said David Yerushalmi, senior counsel for the organization. “Viewpoint discrimination is the most egregious form of content discrimination under the First Amendment.”

The organization is working on behalf of the American Freedom Defense Initiative, Pamela Geller and Robert Spencer. The request for an injunction went to the U.S. District Court for the southern district of New York.

“Here, the MTA would rather violate a law-abiding, private citizen’s right to freedom of speech than offend those who support violent jihad against Israel and others,” said Robert Muise, the AFLC’s senior counsel. “The American Freedom Law Center is committed to fighting this pernicious form of civilization jihad that undermines our fundamental rights.”

The ad that was refused by the transit authority, which has carried a wide range of commercial, political and religious messages on its facilities, was the statement, “In Any War Between the Civilized Man and the Savage, Support the Civilized Man. Support Israel.”

The ad was offered as a response to an earlier ad run by a pro-Palestine group.

But it rejected the pro-Israel ad, “claiming that it violated its policy against displaying ‘images or information that demean an individual or group of individuals on account of race, color, religion, national origin, ancestry, gender, age, disability or sexual orientation.’”

According to the papers filed with the federal court, the MTA, by policy and practice, intentionally dedicates its advertising space on vehicles to expressive conduct.

Under that policy, it has allowed the message, “Muslims for Peace, Love for All, Hatred for None … WHY ISLAM.”

It also permitted, “A million New Yorkers are good without God. Are you?”

And it allowed the pro-Palestine, “Be on our side. We are the side of peace and justice. End U.S. military aid to Israel.”

The AFDI submitted its proposed ad to CSB Outdoor, which is an agent for the MTA. It was a political message that responded directly to the pro-Palestine message posted earlier.

“The anti-Israeli advertisement suggests that Israel’s military is the impediment to peace between the Israelis and Palestinians and that U.S. military aid to Israel also acts as an impediment to peace between the Israelis and Palestinians. In other words, the anti-Israel advertisement blames Israel, its military, and U.S. military aid to Israel as the cause of Palestinian terror directed against innocent civilians in Israel and abroad.”

The subsequent ad request from AFDI said there is no comparison or equivalence
between “savage civilian-targeting violence and Israel’s civilized struggle for survival in a part of the world where civilized behavior is overshadowed by terrorism, despotism, and brutality.”

The MTA rejected the ad because of its “demeaning speech” policy.

But the real effect is that a viewpoint that the U.S. foreign policy supporting Israel in the face of savage violence is correct is being censored, officials said.

“The Constitution does not permit the government, in this case the MTA, to take sides on political issues by silencing one side of the debate,” Muise said.

In a commentary about the dispute, Geller wrote that similar issues have come up in Seattle, San Francisco and Washington.

“The ad is actually referring to the Islamic jihadists who are determined to destroy Israel. And they are savage,” she wrote. “Truth is radical. Morality is radical. But a genocidal ideology is not radical or savage.”

Her book, “Stop the Islamization of America: A Practical Guide to the Resistance,” also documents such situations.

“Tell me again why the word ‘savage’ is inaccurate. Everyone is shocked (shocked, I tell ya) by the use of the word savage for savages. As long as the Palestinian Authority continues its savage policy to foment violence and promote hatred, and teaches its children to hate, the number of young Muslims willing to blow themselves up or to slit Israeli throats will continue to increase. That is savage. The Palestinian Authority propaganda of ‘Holocaust denial, racial slurs, anti-Jewish epithets and glorification of terrorists’ is savage,” she wrote.

She cited as savagery: targeting civilians, terrorism against Jews, torture of hostages, the bloody hacking death of a family, Munich, and the “endless demonization of the Jewish people…”

“But we are supposed to tiptoe around the savages, so as not to enflame the savages,” she wrote. .

Israeli facilities in North America — and around the world — are on high alert, according to an internal security document obtained by ABC News that predicted the threat from Iran against Jewish targets will increase.

“We predict that the threat on our sites around the world will increase … on both our guarded sites and ‘soft’ sites,” stated a letter circulated by the head of security for the Consul General for the Mid-Atlantic States. Guarded sites refers to government facilities like embassies and consulates, while ‘soft sites’ means Jewish synagogues, and schools, as well as community centers like the one hit by a terrorist bombing in Buenos Aires in 1994 that killed 85 people.

The head of Shin Bet, Israel’s internal security service, told an audience at a closed forum in Tel Aviv recently that Iran is trying to hit Israeli targetsbecause of what it believes are Israeli attacks on it nuclear scientists. Yoram Cohen said that Iran’s Revolutionary Guard, the same militant wing of the government linked to the recent alleged plot against the Saudi ambassador to the U.S., is working tirelessly to attack Israeli and Jewish targets abroad in order to deter Israel.

Local and regional law enforcement and intelligence officials in U.S. and Canadian cities, including New York, Los Angeles, Philadelphia, and Toronto have been monitoring the situation closely for several weeks, and have stepped up patrols at Israeli government locations and Jewish cultural and religious institutions. They have issued awareness bulletins reminding officers to stay vigilant.

Federal officials in those cities told ABC News that they have also increased their efforts to watch for any threat stream pointing to an imminent attack on either Israeli facilities, Jewish cultural or religious institutions or other “soft targets.”

“When there is posturing like this, we always pay extra attention to any threat streams,” one federal official said.

“The thwarted assassination plot of a Saudi official in Washington, D.C., a couple of months ago was an important data point,” added the official, “in that it showed at least parts of the Iranian establishment were aware of the intended event and were not concerned about inevitable collateral damage to U.S. citizens had they carried out an assassination plot on American soil.”

“That was an eye opener, showing that they did not care about any collateral damage,” the federal official said.

After the disruption of the alleged plot, regional intelligence centers issued bulletins similar to the recent Israeli warning.

“In the past few weeks, there has been an escalation in threats against Israeli and Jewish targets around the world,” one regional document noted. “Open source has reported many demonstrations against Israel are expected to be concentrated on Israeli embassies and consulates. Such demonstrations have occurred internationally as well as domestically. These demonstrations could potentially turn violent at local synagogues, restaurants, the Israeli Embassy and other Israeli sites. … Law enforcement should be vigilant when making periodic checks at all Jewish facilities.

And the Israeli bulletin warned that Israel’s own passports might be used by terrorists intent on carrying out a plot.

“According to our evaluation there is a possibility that the forged passports will be used in order to pass as Israeli citizens at the security checks in Israel and around the world. Israeli security authorities may consider an Israeli citizenship as a [criterion] to proceed with a more lenient security check in secure sites such as airports, etc.,” the letter stated.

Israeli Military Strike Against Iran?

The Israeli security bulletin came in the midst of heated rhetoric on the part of the U.S., Iranian and Israeli political religious and military leadership and follows the recent assassination of a key scientist in Iran’s nuclear enrichment program. If the rhetoric is to be believed, there is a deep concern that Israel might launch a military strike against Iran during the spring of 2012.

The intelligence community assessment of that possibility, based on interviews conducted by ABC News, is considerably more nuanced, taking into account as it does the political will of the United States during an election year, the fragile nature of Great Britain’s coalition government , the willingness of other allies to join in an offensive, the roles of Russia and China and Saudi Arabia in such a confrontation, and whether Israel would really be willing to launch a unilateral strike.

“But in this situation, the political rhetoric is actually quite important,” one official told ABC News. “And that is why the official position — of the U.S, England, France, Canada, Israel and allies — is that nothing is off the table.”

An apparent shift in the Israeli/U.S. relationship has complicated matters, however, said the official. In the past, Israel would probably have given the U.S. a heads up were it to launch a strike. Now that might not be the case. Among the English-speaking allies of the U.S., say multiple intelligence officials, there is currently a very limited expectation of any early warning.

While much of the public attention has focused on Israel and the rifts within its leadership on how to respond to Iran’s nuclear weapons program, the reality for Iran’s leadership is also problematic. After threatening to strangle the world oil supply through the straits of Hormuz, Iran “has boxed itself into a corner,” said one Western intelligence official. “It would be quite humiliating for them to back down.”

The Israeli security letter sums up the resultant risks very clearly.

“In conclusion, we operate according to the information that Iran and Hezbollah are working hard and with great intensity to release a ‘quality’ attack against Israeli/Jewish sites around the world.”

The Obama administration is working to attract more private funding for mortgage markets while winding down government-backed housing giants Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.

U.S. Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner told reporters that administration officials are exploring legislative options for overhauling the nation’s housing finance system with lawmakers on Capitol Hill, as well as with academics and other non-government agencies and advocacy groups.

In a white paper last February, the administration outlined three options for a long-term overhaul of the U.S. housing market. Each of those options proposed the elimination of Fannie and Freddie, though they differed on how or whether to replace the two agencies.

Congressional Republicans have also advocated shutting down the taxpayer-backed mortgage agencies, but on a faster timetable.

“We’re in a much earlier stage on housing reform” than with some other financial regulatory changes, said Geithner, though he add that, “What we’re going to try to do is lay the foundation for consensus.”

Geithner doesn’t expect a consensus any time soon. “It’s going to be a complicated process,” he said. “We don’t expect to legislate this year.”

The administration’s priority “is to repair the damage to homeowners, the housing market, and neighborhoods caused by the crisis,” Geithner said, referencing new measures posed by the president this week that would make it easier for struggling homeowners to refinance at record-low interest rates, thus reducing the size of their monthly mortgage payments.

The Republican presidential campaign of former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney told CNSNews.com today that if elected Romney will rescind in its entirety a regulation finalized last month by the Obama administration that requires all health-care plans in the United States to cover sterilizations and all FDA-approved contraceptives, including those that cause abortions.

The Obama administration’s final version of the regulation effectively exempted only an actual church—such as a Catholic parish—from the regulation, while insisting that it would be fully enforced on individuals, private business owners, non-religious private-sector organizations and insurers.

Romney published an op-ed in the Washington Examiner today in which he said he would eliminate the rule that compels “religious institutions” to purchase health-care plans that cover sterilizations and all FDA-approved contraceptives. Romney did not say in the op-ed, however, whether he would eliminate the rule insofar as it applies to individuals, private-sector businesses, non-religious private-sector organizations and insurers.

“And on day one I will eliminate the Obama administration rule that compels religious institutions to violate the tenets of their own faith,” Romney wrote in the Examiner. “Such rules don’t belong in the America that I believe in.”

Through his campaign press office, CNSNews.com asked Romney today via email about this: “Will Mitt Romney, on day one, rescind this mandate in its entirety—as the Catholic Church has urged the current administration to do—so that individuals, employers and insurers who have a ‘moral or religious objection to contraception or sterilization’ will not be forced to violate the tenets of their own faith or act against their consciences?”

Romney campaign spokesman Ryan Williams responded: “Yes–Governor Romney would rescind the mandate in its entirety.”

Some media reports have erroneously said that the U.S. Catholic bishops have simply asked the Obama administration to expand the religious exemption in the regulation so that it would cover religiously affiliated organizations such as Catholic hospitals, universities, and charitable organizations as well as Catholic parishes. In fact, the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops informed the administration, in writing, in comments submitted to the Department of Health and Human Services, that the bishops believed the regulation in its entirety violated the First Amendment rights of individuals, employers and insurers and must to be rescinded in its entirety.

“First, we comment on the mandate that all health plans cover prescription contraceptives, sterilization, and related patient education and counseling,” the bishops told HHS. “This mandate, we submit, should be rescinded in its entirety.”

“[A]s applied to individuals and organizations with a religious objection to contraceptives, sterilization, and related counseling and education, the HHS mandate violates various protections under the Religion Clauses and Free Speech Clause of the First Amendment, as well as the Religious Freedom Restoration Act (‘RFRA’) and the Administrative Procedure Act (‘APA’),” said the bishops.

“Second, we comment on the regulation’s religious exemption (‘HHS exemption’ or ‘the exemption’),” said the bishops. “The exemption provides no protection at all for individuals or insurers with a moral or religious objection to contraceptives or sterilization, who will experience burdens to conscience under this new mandate. Instead, it provides protection only to employers with similar objections, and even then to a very small subset of religious employers.”

“By failing to protect insurers, individuals, most employers, or any other stakeholders with a religious objection to such items and procedures, the HHS exemption, like the mandate itself, violates the First Amendment and the APA,” said the bishops.

“In sum,” they said, we urge HHS to rescind the mandate in its entirety.”

The United States created jobs at the fastest pace in nine months in January and the unemployment rate unexpectedly dropped to a near three-year low, giving a boost to President Barack Obama.

Nonfarm payrolls jumped 243,000, the Labor Department said on Friday, as factory jobs grew by the most in a year. The jobless rate fell to 8.3 percent – the lowest since February 2009 – from 8.5 percent in December.

The gain in employment was the largest since April and it far outstripped the 150,000 predicted in a Reuters poll of economists. It hinted at underlying economic strength and lessened chances of further stimulus from the Federal Reserve.

“More pistons in the economic engine have begun to fire, pointing to accelerating economic growth. One of the happiest persons reading this job report is President Obama,” said Sung Won Sohn, an economics professor at California State University Channel Islands.

The payroll gains were widespread – from retail to temporary help, and from construction to manufacturing – an indication the recovery was becoming more durable.

A survey of households showed the unemployment rate declined even as new job seekers flooded into the labor force. Economists had expected the jobless rate, which has now fallen 0.8 percentage point since August, to hold steady.

“I think this is a sign that maybe the economy is reaching that holy grail of a self-sustaining economic expansion,” Stuart Hoffman, chief economist at PNC Financial Services in Pittsburgh, told Reuters Insider.

The outlook was further brightened by a separate report showing service sector activity quickened last month to a near one-year high. A gauge of service sector employment touched a six-year high.

Stocks on Wall Street were up more than 1 percent at midday, while U.S. Treasury debt prices fell sharply as investors dialed back expectations on Fed easing. The dollar rose against a basket of currencies.

The employment report contrasted with a fairly glum assessment of the economy offered by the Fed last week.

Officials at the central bank have been debating whether to buy more bonds – a program dubbed QE3 – to drive interest rates lower. It also raised doubts about the Fed’s expectation that it could hold interest rates near zero at least through late 2014.

“At the very least this scales back QE3 (quantitative easing) odds. The surprisingly persistent decline in the unemployment rate also calls into question how firmly wedded the Fed is to the late-2014 rate guidance,” said Michael Feroli, an economist at JPMorgan in New York.

Interest rate futures indicated that at least some traders were beginning to lay bets the Fed could move interest rates up in early 2014.

Fed fund futures were pricing in a 38 percent chance of a January 2014 rate hike, up from 29 percent before the report, and the first better than even chance of a rate hike was in April 2014, according to CME Group, where the contracts are traded.

DON’T MUCK IT UP

Obama welcomed the strong jobs report and urged Congress to extend a payroll tax cut and benefits for long-term unemployed, which expire at the end of this month.

“Now is not is not the time for self-inflicted wounds to our economy. I want to send a clear message for Congress. Do not slow down the recovery that we are on, don’t muck it up,” he said at a firehouse in Arlington, Virginia.

Republicans acknowledged the improvement in the labor market, but said the jobless rate was still too high.

“Our economy still isn’t creating jobs the way it should be and that’s why we need a new approach,” said House Speaker John Boehner.

While employment growth has quickened there are no jobs for three out of every four unemployed people and 19.3 million Americans are either out of work or underemployed. The level of employment is still 5.57 million from its pre-recession level.

But steady progress is being made. The economy added 60,000 more jobs in November and December than previously reported.

In addition, average hourly earnings rose four cents, which should help to support spending. The report suggested that expectations of a slowdown in U.S. economic growth in the first quarter were not yet impacting on companies’ hiring decisions.

Employment in the private sector surged 257,000 – the largest gain since April. Government payrolls fell 14,000, the least since September.

U.S. economic growth accelerated to a 2.8 percent annual rate in the final three months of 2011, but it was widely expected to slow as businesses ease back on efforts to rebuild inventories and exports slip amid a likely recession in Europe.

Some economists cautioned that January’s jobs figures could overstate the pulse of the recovery, citing still lackluster consumer confidence, income and spending growth.

While some said the jobless rate could drop below 8 percent by year end, others warned it would likely move up in the near-term as people who had given up the search for a job re-enter the workforce.

“For this to mark an upturn in the labor market, then businesses will have to continue to hire on this scale throughout the winter,” said Kathy Bostjancic, director of macroeconomic analysis at the Conference Board in New York.

CAUTIOUS OPTIMISM

The unemployment rate has now declined for five straight months, although part of the drop reflects discouraged Americans giving up the hunt for work.

A broad measure of unemployment, which includes people who want to work but have stopped looking and those working only part time but who want more work, slipped to a near three-year low of 15.1 percent in January from 15.2 percent in December.

Revisions to the payrolls figures showed 180,000 more jobs were created last year than previously believed.

Mild winter weather boosted employment last month in construction, which added 21,000 jobs after a 31,000 increase in December. Manufacturing payrolls surged 50,000, the largest gain in a year, after rising 32,000 the prior month.

Overall, the goods-producing sector added 81,000 jobs last month, the most since January 2006.

Transportation and warehousing employment increased 13,100 and courier jobs only fell 1,500. Last month, the Labor Department reported a large increase in courier jobs in December, but revisions showed they actually declined.

Retail employment rose 10,500 after gaining 6,200 in December. Temporary help services jumped 20,100 after rising 8,300, a potentially good sign for future permanent hiring.

Prime Minister David Cameron will make an official visit to the US next month, the White House has said.

Mr Cameron and his wife Samantha will be in the US on 13-14 March.

A spokesman said President Barack Obama would welcome Mr Cameron to “highlight the fundamental importance of the US-UK special relationship”.

The two leaders will discuss the forthcoming Nato and G8 summits, as well as developments in Afghanistan and the Middle East.

‘Liberties and values’

The White House spokesman said: “The visit will highlight the fundamental importance of the US-UK special relationship and the depth of the friendship between the American people and the people of the United Kingdom, as well as the strong personal bond that has developed between the two leaders and their families.

“It will also be an opportunity to recall the valour and sacrifice of the US and British armed forces and their long tradition of standing shoulder to shoulder beside each other in defence of our liberties and shared values.

“The visit will underscore the strength of our economic links, which contribute to millions of jobs on both sides of the Atlantic.”

The White House said issues such as Afghanistan, the Middle East, Iran, human rights and global economic stability and growth would be on the agenda.

“They will also review progress in the implementation of the various initiatives launched during the president’s state visit to the UK last year,” said the spokesman.

Troop withdrawal

Downing Street confirmed on Twitter that Mr Cameron and his wife had accepted the invitation to visit the White House.

A message from the official @Number10gov account said: “The Prime Minister and Mrs Cameron have accepted invitation from @whitehouse for official visit the US on 13th & 14th March.”

Downing Street said on Thursday that British troops would step back from their lead combat role in Afghanistan by the end of 2013.

Mr Cameron’s spokesman said UK and international troops would offer a “supporting combat role” in 2014.

The prime minister had previously said the UK’s military role in Afghanistan would be completed by the end of that year.

Mr Obama became the first US president to address members of both Houses of Parliament in Westminster Hall when he and wife Michelle were on a two-day state visit to the UK in May last year.

Mr Cameron made his first official visit to the US as prime minister in July 2010.

Ending a week that began with consensus but fractured into contention, the Senate voted Thursday to strengthen insider-trading bans for its members, and in the process agreed to ban bonuses for Fannie Mae and Freddie Macexecutives.

After spending the afternoon voting on a score of amendments that had hampered negotiations earlier in the week, the Senate overwhelmingly passed on a 96-3 vote the Stop Trading On Congressional Knowledge (STOCK) Act. Only Sens. Tom Coburn of Oklahoma and Richard Burr of North Carolina, both Republicans, and Sen. Jeff Bingaman, New Mexico Democrat, were opposed.

Sen. John McCain, Arizona Republican, scored a win with his amendment to ban Fannie and Freddie bonuses, after sponsors of the legislation had urged their colleagues to avoid proposing unrelated pet projects — a request that was promptly ignored by members of both parties.

The legislation, which President Obama called for in his State of the Union address, specifies that members of Congress are subject to an existing 1934 law banning trading based on insider information.

Hopes had been high that it would sail smoothly to passage, after theSenate overwhelmingly voted Monday to begin debating it, creating a moment of rare bipartisan harmony. But by the next day, lawmakers had proposed more than a dozen amendments, prompting threats by Majority Leader Harry Reid, Nevada Democrat, to shut down debate.

After two days of closed-door negotiations, lawmakers reached a deal, easing fears by the sponsoring senators — Republicans Scott P. Brownof Massachusetts and Susan M. Collins of Maine, and Kirsten E. Gillibrand, New York New York, and Joe Lieberman, Connecticut independent — that even a bipartisan bill would end in gridlock.

Mr. Obama applauded the passage and promised a prompt signature.

“No one should be able to trade stocks based on nonpublic information gleaned on Capitol Hill,” Mr. Obama said. “So I’m pleased the Senatetook bipartisan action to pass the STOCK Act. I urge the House of Representatives to pass this bill, and I will sign it right away.”

House Majority Leader Eric Cantor, Virginia Republican, indicated he will call for a vote in his chamber in the next few weeks.

“We will quickly review the entire bill and the amendments that were added [Thursday] to ensure that public servants, whether in the legislative or executive branch, do not personally profit from insider information,” Mr. Cantor said.

Focused on transparency, the STOCK Act also mandates stricter disclosure requirements for members of Congress, requiring them to reveal their sales and purchases of stocks within 30 days instead of once a year.

Over a period of four hours Thursday, the Senate voted on some 20 amendments, rejecting some and accepting others.

The upper chamber extended the 30-day requirement to federal employees and exempted mutual funds from the requirement, because owners don’t control those trades. Senators also agreed by voice vote to broaden mortgage disclosure requirements for members of Congressand some executive employees and to expand the possibility for members of Congress to lose their federal pension if convicted of a felony.

But the Senate also defeated a number of amendments, voting down a bipartisan amendment offered by Sens. Patrick J. Toomey, Pennsylvania Republican, and Claire McCaskill, Missouri Democrat, that would have permanently banned all earmarks, a measure they have been pushing for the past few months.

Lawmakers also rejected an amendment offered by Mr. Coburn that would have required that, before the Senate considers legislation, the Congressional Research Service must determine whether it would duplicate existing programs. They also roundly defeated two amendments expressing an intent to limit Senate terms and require members of the Senate to divest themselves of individual company stock.

Conservatives are asking a reasonable question: Will a Mitt Romney candidacy turn into another debacle like Sen. John McCain’s in 2008? The Arizona maverick was said to be the most “electable” of the Republican nominees. ManyGOP voters held their noses and supported Mr. McCain. Yet he was defeated – convincingly – byBarack Obama. Following Mr. Romney’s crushing victory in Florida’s Republican primary this week, many rank-and-file activists are wondering whether history is about to repeat itself.

The emergence of Newt Gingrich isn’t being driven by a love for the former House speaker. Rather, many conservatives are rallying behind him because he is the only viable alternative to Mr. Romney. Unlike the former Massachusetts governor,Mr. Gingrich is willing to wage a frontal assault on President Obama’s leftist policies. He is not afraid to attack Mr. Obama relentlessly – and with passion, emotion and courage. Gingrich Republicans argue that Mr. Romney possesses no ideological core, that he lacks any fundamental conservative convictions.

Moreover, Gingrich supporters think Mr. Romney is simply another moderate Republican in the mold of Bob Dole and Mr. McCain. Just as those men crashed and burned, so will Mr. Romney, in their view. In their eyes, the Republican Party is about to commit suicide: By abandoning its principles in favor of power, the GOP will lose both. Hence, Mr. Romneymust be stopped – even if it means backing a flawed candidate like Mr. Gingrich. This is why his followers are urging him to fight on in the remaining 46 states.

There are similarities between Mr. Romney and Mr. McCain. Both are establishment Republicans. Both are distrusted and disliked by large segments of the conservative movement – especially talk radio. Both have signature issues – Romneycare, McCain-Feingold – that constitute major political liabilities. And both lack personality and charisma. Yet that is where it ends.

In fact, the two men could not be more different. Mr. Romney is a much stronger candidate. He is more articulate, telegenic and disciplined and possesses a considerably deeper grasp of the issues. Mr. Romneywould be the first GOP nominee since President Reagan to be able to defend Republican positions effectively. The Bushes, Mr. Dole and Mr. McCain were all dismal failures regarding a key aspect of politics: communication. This alone makes Mr. Romney a serious threat to Mr. Obama’s re-election.

Most important, there is one overriding difference between Mr. Romneyand Mr. McCain: The former venture capitalist is not a creature of Washington. The Arizona senator had spent decades on Capitol Hill. He was and still is the consummate insider. During the 2008 campaign, he came across – like Mr. Dole in 1996 – as a career politician, someone obsessed with process and Senate wheeling and dealing.

Mr. Romney is the exact opposite. He has spent most of his life in the private sector, running a successful business and turning around troubled corporations. He has what Mr. McCain never had: genuine executive experience. Also, unlike Mr. McCain, Mr. Romney understands free-market capitalism. He is a pro-business Republican who will repeal Obamacare, slash burdensome regulations, cut government spending and unleash the economy’s animal spirits. The divergent perspectives of the two men can be seen on illegal immigration. Mr. McCain has championed amnesty; Mr. Romney staunchly opposes it. Mr. McCainembodies Beltway Republicanism, while Mr. Romney adheres to more traditional GOP beliefs such as states’ rights, market-driven growth and a thriving entrepreneurial class. Mr. Romney is running to loosen Washington’s suffocating grip on national life; Mr. McCain cannot imagine life without Washington’s daily involvement. This was Mr. McCain’s Achilles’ heel in 2008.

The great irony is that it was Tea Party conservatives – running on a platform of limited government, low taxes and balanced budgets – who propelled the GOP to make historic gains in the 2010 election. Yet the two leading candidates for the movement’s presidential nomination come from the establishment. The right is understandably demoralized.

His rhetoric notwithstanding, Mr. Gingrich is not an insurgent. In fact, he is less electable and less conservative than Mr. Romney. The former House speaker’s record is littered with betrayals on a wide range of issues – he supports massive ethanol subsidies, something even Al Gore concedes is a clean-energy boondoggle; he championed a health care individual mandate for more than a decade, including publicly praising Romneycare in 2006; he backed caps on carbon emissions and demanded government action to combat climate change, including filming a TV ad with then-House Speaker Nancy Pelosi; he voted to create the Department of Education; he believes in some form of amnesty; he took $1.6 million from Freddie Mac; and he wants to spend hundreds of billions of dollars in massive projects, such as building a space colony on the moon, establishing a huge power-grid corridor across the Northeast and modernizing ports in Charleston. S.C., and Jacksonville, Fla. In short, Mr. Gingrich is a big-government corporatist masquerading as a conservative populist.

Mr. Romney has serious weaknesses. He is certainly not a Reagan nationalist – my kind of Republican. But he has several indispensable qualities: He can beat Mr. Obama. He can stop America’s decline into a second-rate power. He can reverse our slide toward socialism and economic ruin. He can turn around the bankrupt corporation that is America. “The perfect is the enemy of the good,” wrote the French philosopher Voltaire. Mr. Romney is far from perfect. He is, however, good enough. He is not the second coming of John McCain. He can win in November. For that alone, he deserves conservative support.

A petulant, angry, and defiant Attorney General Eric Holder refused yesterday to take any responsibility for the growing scandal surrounding Operation Fast and Furious, the ill-conceived and incompetently managed program in which federal agents allowed thousands of guns to be purchased in the United States by known suppliers to Mexican drug cartels. The hope was to be able to use the weapons to link drug bosses to particular crimes, making it easier to prosecute them. But federal officials lost track of more than 1,400 of the weapons, two of which were used in the slaying of U.S. Border Patrol Agent Brian Terry just before Christmas in December 2010.

In testimony last year before the House Oversight and Government Operations Committee chaired by Rep. Darrell Issa of California, Holder said he first learned about Fast and Furious only after media reports began appearing about the congressional investigation started in the wake of Terry’s slaying. He subsequently recanted that statement and acknowledged being told about the program by aides a few months before the media reports. He has since strenuously denied intentionally misleading Congress about when he first learned of Fast and Furious, and has accused congressional Republicans of using the program to concoct a partisan witch hunt.

But at yesterday’s hearing, Issa and Sen. Charles Grassley, R-Iowa, who has also been probing the Fast and Furious program, released a detailed report about their investigation, saying new documents they obtained demonstrate Holder’s department “had much greater knowledge of, and involvement in, Fast and Furious than it has previously acknowledged.” Despite the widespread knowledge within the department, however, the report said “senior Department officials showed a serious lack of inquisitiveness when it came to discovering details about Operation Fast and Furious. They knew as early as April 2010 that ATF’s Phoenix Field Division … had previously used this same tactic of gunwalking. Still, these officials failed to ascertain the true scope of the program. Later, when whistleblowers came forward with information and supporting documents, these same officials provided false information to Congress and refused to get to the bottom of the matter.”

Holder’s attitude before the committee yesterday could only be described as contemptuous. At one point, Rep. Raul Labrador read a dozen quotes from Holder over a period of more than a decade in which he had claimed his staff did not inform him about assorted matters. The attorney general disdainfully replied, “maybe this is the way you do things in Idaho or wherever you are from.” Labrador was born in Puerto Rico and represents an Idaho congressional district.

Rather than the country bumpkin Holder appears to consider him, Labrador is a lawyer and the former managing partner of a law firm. More important, he is an elected member of Congress tasked by the Constitution to ask whatever questions he deems appropriate in in a congressional oversight hearing probing executive branch law enforcement activities. As much as he clearly chafes under such oversight, Holder should be relieved of his duties.

The Susan G. Komen for the Cure breast cancer charity has reversed its decision to halt fundingof breast-screening grants to Planned Parenthood, the organization announced Friday.

In a statement, Komen for the Cure Founder and CEO Nancy Brinker apologized for “recent decisions” and said the organization would continue to fund Planned Parenthood. Brinker’s full statement is below, via the Dallas Morning News, which first broke the story:

We want to apologize to the American public for recent decisions that cast doubt upon our commitment to our mission of saving women’s lives.

The events of this week have been deeply unsettling for our supporters, partners and friends and all of us at Susan G. Komen. We have been distressed at the presumption that the changes made to our funding criteria were done for political reasons or to specifically penalize Planned Parenthood. They were not.

Our original desire was to fulfill our fiduciary duty to our donors by not funding grant applications made by organizations under investigation. We will amend the criteria to make clear that disqualifying investigations must be criminal and conclusive in nature and not political. That is what is right and fair.

Our only goal for our granting process is to support women and families in the fight against breast cancer. Amending our criteria will ensure that politics has no place in our grant process. We will continue to fund existing grants, including those of Planned Parenthood, and preserve their eligibility to apply for future grants, while maintaining the ability of our affiliates to make funding decisions that meet the needs of their communities.

It is our hope and we believe it is time for everyone involved to pause, slow down and reflect on how grants can most effectively and directly be administered without controversies that hurt the cause of women. We urge everyone who has participated in this conversation across the country over the last few days to help us move past this issue. We do not want our mission marred or affected by politics – anyone’s politics.

Starting this afternoon, we will have calls with our network and key supporters to refocus our attention on our mission and get back to doing our work. We ask for the public’s understanding and patience as we gather our Komen affiliates from around the country to determine how to move forward in the best interests of the women and people we serve.

We extend our deepest thanks for the outpouring of support we have received from so many in the past few days and we sincerely hope that these changes will be welcomed by those who have expressed their concern.

The reversal comes after days of intense backlash over Komen’s initial decision Tuesday. As The Blaze previously reported, the charity was accused of caving to anti-abortion activists opposed to funding Planned Parenthood because of the abortion services it provides.

According to the Associated Press, the grants that Planned Parenthood affiliates used for breast exams and related services totaled $680,000 last year. At least one top Komen official quit over the decision to halt funding, and 26 U.S. senators signed a letter urging the charity to reconsider.

House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D.-Calif.) vowed today that she will join with the Obama administration in standing up against the Catholic Church in defending a new regulation that will require Catholic individuals to buy, and Catholic institutions to provide, health insurance plans that cover sterilizations and artificial contraceptives, including those that induce abortions.

The Catholic church teaches that sterilization, artificial contraception and abortion are morally wrong and the Catholic bishops of the United States have argued that forcing a Catholic individual to purchase a health insurance plan that covers these things–or forcing a Catholic institution to provide such a plan–forces Catholics to act against their consciences and is a violation of the First Amendment right to free exercise of religion.

In letters being read from the pulpit in Catholic parishes across the nation, Catholic bishops are saying: “We cannot—we will not—comply with this unjust law.”

At her Wednesday press briefing, CNSNews.com asked Pelosi: “The administration has issued a regulation that will require all health-care plans to cover sterilization and all FDA-approved contraceptives, including those that induce abortions. This would force Catholic individuals and institutions to act against their consciences. All across the nation, Catholic bishops are saying:–

Pelosi responded: “Is this a speech, or do we have a question in disguise as a speech?”

CNSNews.com continued: “‘We cannot–we will not—comply with this law.’ Catholic bishops are saying they will not comply with this law. Will you stand with your fellow Catholics in resisting this law or will you stick by the administration?”

Pelosi: “First of all, I am going to stick with my fellow Catholics in supporting the administration on this. I think it was a very courageous decision that they made, and I support it.”

Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius first announced the proposed regulation in August as part of the initial implementation of Obamacare. The regulation, as proposed, was set to take effect on Aug. 1 of this year. In September, the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops sent public comments on the regulation to HHS. In these comments, the bishops called the regulation an “unprecedented attack on religious freedom” and urged that it be rescinded.

In November, Archbishop Timothy Dolan of New York, the president of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, met with President Obama and personally explained to him the Catholic Church’s objections to the regulation.

On Jan. 20, Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius announced that the regulations would go forward and will take effect for most health care plans as of Aug. 1. However, Sebelius gave religiously affiliated non-profit organizations—such as Catholic hospitals, universities, and charitable organizations—an additional year to “adapt” to the mandate. For them, it now set to take effect on Aug. 1, 2013.

Following Sebelius announcement, the Catholic bishops put out a statement calling the regulation “literally unconscionable.” Meanwhile, Catholic bishops around the country have been calling on Catholics to oppose the regulation.

Many of the bishops have published letters that priests are reading to their congregations. The letters explain the Catholic objections to the regulation and call for Catholics to resist it.  Many of these letter include the following passage from the letter Bishop Paul Loverde of Arlington, Va., and Bishop Francis DiLorenzo of Richmond, Va., have asked their priests to read at Mass this coming Sunday:

“In so ruling, the Administration has cast aside the First Amendment to the Constitution of the United States, denying to Catholics our Nation’s first and most fundamental freedom, that of religious liberty. And as a result, unless the rule is overturned, we Catholics will be compelled either to violate our consciences, or to drop health coverage for our employees (and suffer the penalties for doing do). The Administration’s sole concession was to give our institutions one year to comply.

“We cannot—we will not—comply with this unjust law.”

The US economy created 243,000 jobs in December, the highest total for nine months, official figures show.

The rise was much more than expected. Analysts had forecast an increase of about 150,000 jobs.

The unemployment rate dropped to 8.3%, which was the lowest rate in nearly three years, and down from a revised rate of 8.5% in December.

News of the jobs growth boosted share prices, with the Dow Jones index rising almost 1% on opening.

In Europe, the FTSE 100 index rose 1.2% while Germany’s Dax rose 1.4%. The Cac 40 in France was 0.6% higher.

Employment boost

Job growth was widespread, with large gains in business services, leisure and hospitality, and manufacturing.

Leisure and hospitality, which includes restaurants and hotels, added 44,000 jobs.

Retailers added nearly 11,000 jobs, and professional and business services, which includes higher paying jobs in accounting, architecture and engineering, gained 70,000 – the most in 10 months.

Factories added 50,000 workers, much more than expected and a one-year high.

Retailers added 10,500 workers and construction employment rose by 21,000. Analysts believe the figure was helped by a mild US winter, which boosted employment in those sectors.

The report was also buoyed by revisions to November and December data, which showed 60,000 more jobs created across the two months than previously reported.

Upbeat data

Lindsey Piegza, economist at FTN Financial, said: “It was a better-than-expected report, the strongest report that we’ve seen in quite some time.

“The big question is whether the reason we’re seeing the unemployment rate drop is because more and more people are dropping out of the labour force.

“I know the market wants to rally on this number but remember we need a minimum of 250,000 just to cover demographic change.”

The figures add to a range of data pointing to a gradual US economic recovery.

Last week, it was announced that the US economy expanded at a 2.8% annual pace in the October-December quarter, a full percentage point higher than in the previous quarter.

Earlier this week, a survey from the Institute for Supply Management (ISM) indicated that the US manufacturing sector expanded at its fastest pace in seven months in January.

The recovery remains “frustrating slow” in the United States, and now Europe’s debt crisis is posing additional challenges, Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke told Congress Thursday.

“Risks remain that developments in Europe or elsewhere may unfold unfavorably and could worsen economic prospects here at home,” Bernanke told the House Budget Committee.

But he also assured lawmakers that the Fed is doing everything in its power to prevent an economic slowdown in the U.S.

“We are in frequent contact with European authorities, and we will continue to monitor the situation closely and take every available step to protect the U.S. financial system and the economy,” Bernanke said.

Europe’s debt problems started in Greece more than two years ago, and the situation there has yet to be fully resolved.

Repeating points he has made before Congress in prior appearances, Bernanke told the committee members that while cutting the national debt should be a priority over the long term, they should also take great care not to impede the current economic recovery.

“Do no harm is an important piece of advice I would offer you,” Bernanke said.

Fed to keep rates low until 2014

Rep. Scott Garrett, a Republican from New Jersey, slammed Bernanke for giving Congress advice on how to fix the struggling housing market. The Fed is in charge of monetary policy, and Republicans have critiqued Bernanke for overstepping his bounds by giving its opinion on fiscal matters.

“I was truly taken aback when just recently, as you know, the Fed issued in an unsolicited white paper on housing policy where if you didn’t advocate for, you certainly mirrored much of the positions of this administration,” Garrett said.

“Well, Congressman, first the Fed has a lot of interest in housing. It’s important for the economy. It’s important for monetary policy,” Bernanke said.

“We were trying to provide pros and cons, analysis, background. I’m sorry if you think we went too far,” he added.

The House hearing comes a week after the Fed said it intends to keep interest rates low until the end of 2014, a move that signals the central bank fears the economy will not recover fully for another three years. The Fed also laid out a goal to keep inflation around 2% each year, while it also tries to bring down the unemployment rate.

Fed forecasting breaks new ground

Many Republicans, including Rep. Paul Ryan, oppose the move, fearing it could trigger rapid inflation later on.

“I think this policy runs the great risk of fueling asset bubbles, destabilizing prices and eventually eroding the value of the dollar,” Ryan said. “The prospect of all three is adding to uncertainty and holding our economy back, in many of our judgments.”

While Ryan commended Bernanke for the Fed’s recent efforts to increase its transparency, he also pressed him on the inflation question.

Bernanke responded, “We are not seeking higher inflation. We do not want higher inflation and we’re not tolerating higher inflation.”

The Fed forecasts the unemployment rate will remain high in 2012, ending the year between 8.2% and 8.5%. It also cut its predictions for growth, forecasting U.S. gross domestic product will expand by only 2.2% to 2.7% this year.

Attorney General Eric Holder vigorously denied a “cover-up” by the Justice Department over “Operation Fast and Furious,” telling a House panel investigating the botched gun-running program that he has nothing to hide and suggesting the probe is a “political” effort to embarrass the administration.

“There’s no attempt at any kind of cover-up,” Holder told lawmakers well into a hearing about whether he had been forthright in responding to requests of the House Oversight and Government Relations Committee led by Chairman Darrell Issa, R-Calif.

“We’re not going to be hiding behind any kind of privileges or anything,” he said.

The hearing came after Issa and Sen. Charles Grassley, R-Iowa, his Senate partner in the probe, asserted that top Justice officials are covering up events surrounding the flawed gun-smuggling probe.

Issa made the accusation in a letter threatening to seek a contempt of Congress ruling against Holder for failing to turn over congressionally subpoenaed documents that were created after problems with Fast and Furious came to light.

Republicans also released a report in the hours ahead of the hearing claiming that Justice Department officials “had much greater knowledge of, and involvement in, Fast and Furious than it has previously acknowledged.”

Asked whether his assistants, Deputy Attorney General Gary Grindler or Assistant Attorney Lanny Breuer, head of the department’s Criminal Division, ever authorized gunwalking or the tactics employed in Fast and Furious, Holder responded not to his knowledge.

“Not only did I not authorize those tactics, when I found out about them I told the field and everybody in the United States Department of Justice that those tactics had to stop. That they were not acceptable and that gunwalking was to stop. That was what my reaction [was] to my finding out about the use of that technique,” he added.

He added that he doesn’t think that the situation warranted the kind of response Republicans were giving after his department provided thousands of documents, and planned to deliver more.

Holder also rejected arguments that his handling of the case had lost him any support for the effort he was putting forth as attorney general.

“I don’t think the American people have lost trust in me. … This has become political, I get that,” he said.

But Holder also said no one has been punished “yet” in the case, despite the fact that lost guns from the operation ended up at the crime scene where U.S. Border Patrol Agent Brian Terry was murdered in December 2010.

Terry’s family has informed the U.S. government that it has six months to respond to its inquiry into Terry’s death or face a $25 million lawsuit.

In the botched operation, more than 1,400 weapons sold to low-level straw purchasers believed to be supplying Mexican drug gangs and other criminals were lost during tracking by Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives agents. Another 700 firearms connected to suspects in the investigation have been recovered, some from crime scenes in Mexico and the U.S., including in Nogales, Ariz., where Terry was killed.

Holder said he didn’t learn about Terry’s murder until 24 hours after his death, and at the time did not hear that weapons tied to Fast and Furious were at the scene.

“I didn’t know about Operation Fast and Furious until the beginning parts of 2011 after I received that letter from Senator Grassley, I guess at the end of January and then that was about Operation Gun Runner. I actually learned about the Fast and Furious operation in February of that year.”

Holder told the committee, “I’m not sure exactly how I found out about the term, ‘Fast and Furious.’” He testified repeatedly that he never authorized the controversial tactics employed in the operation.

“There is no attempt at any kind of cover-up,” Holder said. “We have shared huge amounts of information” and will continue to do so, he said.

But Holder said under questioning that he has not disciplined anyone for his role in the controversial operation.

“No I have not as yet — as yet,” Holder said when questioned by Issa on the matter. “There have been personnel changes made at ATF. We obviously have a new U.S. attorney in Arizona. We have made personnel switches at ATF. People have been moved out of positions.”

Holder’s statements on the Justice Department’s role in the operation did not sit well with Republican lawmakers on the committee, who accused the attorney general of intentionally withholding key documents in the case.

“The conclusion that I come to is there are some things in there that’s being hidden that you don’t want us to see,” said Rep. Dan Burton, R-Ind. “We have every right under the Constitution to check on what you’re doing… So for you to deny this committee anything like that is just dead wrong and I don’t think you’re going to find any way that you can do it.”

Burton went on to say that 93,000 documents related to the operation are being withheld by the Justice Department even though they’ve been turned over internally to the department’s inspector general, a political appointee, Burton said.

“And you’re saying, well, the separation of powers prohibits you from (delivering them to Congress). That’s baloney. That is just baloney,” Burton said.

Rep. Jason Chaffetz, R-Utah, also questioned Holder’s having not discussed the case with Secretary of State Hillary Clinton or Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano.

“When people know that I’m going to be the subject of these kinds of hearings, you know six times and all that, nobody necessarily wants to get involved in these kinds of things or get dragged into it,” Holder responded.

Issa told Holder the committee will do what is necessary to obtain the information, “If you do not find a legitimate basis to deny us the material we’ve asked for.”

Holder said earlier during testimony that he would release additional materials “to the extent that I can.”

In Holder’s defense, Rep. Edolphus Towns, D-N.Y., claimed the committee has “not obtained one shred of evidence that would contradict your testimony.”

“Not one witness, not one document, not one e-mail, and still some continue to suggest that you did personally authorize gunwalking and the tactics in Operation Fast and Furious.”

Real estate mogul Donald Trump re-injected himself and his wealth into the Republican presidential race by endorsing Mitt Romney on Thursday, a day after the front-runner stumbled with remarks suggesting he was indifferent to America’s poor.

Trump, himself an on-again/off-again Republican presidential candidate and former member of the party, said he would back Romney in the race for the nomination to oppose President Barack Obama in the November 6 election.

Trump told reporters he got to know the former Massachusetts governor during several recent conversations and was impressed with his tough talk on China and said he was won over by Romney’s strong performance campaigning in Florida.

“I was very impressed by the last two debates,” he said in Las Vegas.

Trump, who announced he was leaving the party two months ago, seems an unlikely choice for Republican kingmaker. But the casino owner and reality television star is popular in Nevada, and from the Romney team’s perspective it is better to have him with them than against them.

Nevada’s caucuses on Saturday are the next contest in the state-by-state process of choosing a Republican nominee.

Romney has won two of the first four contests, taking primaries in New Hampshire and Florida by healthy margins. Former House of Representatives Speaker Newt Gingrich won South Carolina’s primary, and former U.S. Senator Rick Santorum won Iowa’s caucuses by a narrow margin over Romney.

Romney seemed to snatch Trump’s backing from his main rival, Gingrich. U.S. media had reported late on Wednesday that Trump would support the former House speaker, whose presidential campaign has been struggling since his upset victory over Romney in South Carolina on January 21.

But Trump’s support could backfire on Romney, a day after the wealthy former private equity executive gave a clumsy reminder of the challenges he faces winning over voters hit by the economic downturn and convincing them he can relate to their problems.

“I’m not concerned about the very poor, we have a safety net there,” Romney said Wednesday on CNN, adding, “If it needs repair, I’ll fix it.”

Trump, who cultivates an aura of glitz and glamour, estimated last year that his personal net worth could be as high as $7 billion. He was derided as he mulled entering the 2012 presidential race last year for pushing a discredited charge that Obama was not born in the United States.

“This signifies a further consolidation of the Republican base,” Republican strategist Ford O’Connell said. “But, given Romney’s comments yesterday, I could see (Obama’s campaign) would like to tie this as a way to portray Mitt Romney as someone who is not in touch with the plight of the average American.”

The Democratic National Committee quickly seized the opportunity to release a video titled, “Mitt Romney and Donald Trump: They both like firing People,” referring to the tagline of Trump’s TV reality show and an earlier Romney gaffe, “I like being able to fire people.”

ROMNEY HAS STRONG LEAD IN NEVADA

A Fox News poll in January suggested support from Trump could do a candidate more harm than good. Only 10 percent of those surveyed said Trump’s support would make them more likely to vote for a candidate.

Twenty-seven percent said his endorsement would make them less likely to vote for a candidate, and the rest said it would make no difference.

“It doesn’t change my vote,” said Sue Mathis, 52, of Las Vegas, who backs Gingrich. “It means absolutely nothing. Trump is a good businessman, but a Steve Wynn endorsement would influence me more,” she said, referring to the billionaire Las Vegas casino magnate.

Gingrich hit Romney for his comments, but also jabbed at Obama. “I really believe that we should care about the very poor, unlike Governor Romney. But I believe we should care differently from President Obama,” he said while campaigning at a Las Vegas manufacturing plant.

“What the poor need is a trampoline so they can spring up. I’m for replacing the safety net with a trampoline.”

Trump announced he was leaving the party after most of the Republican White House hopefuls declined to participate in a debate he wanted to host on December 27. He has flirted with mounting his own candidacy, possibly as a third-party candidate, but now says he does not plan to run.

Polls show Gingrich trailing far behind Romney in Nevada, a state Romney won easily during the 2008 campaign, thanks largely to strong support from a large community of his fellow Mormons.

Romney has also made the case that his business experience makes him the best candidate to fix the struggling U.S. economy, a message that would resonate in Nevada, which has the nation’s highest unemployment and home foreclosure rates.

A poll by the Cannon Survey Center at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas, found Romney backed by 45 percent of likely Nevada caucus-goers, compared with 25 percent for Gingrich.

Two other contenders, Santorum and Texas congressman Ron Paul, were at 11 percent and 9 percent, respectively.

The council for Baltimore County, Md., is working on a plan that would prevent “discrimination” cases that primarily involve men who dress as women and portray themselves as being female.

The idea gained notoriety as the “coed shower” plan when it was adopted several years ago in Montgomery County, Md., because of provisions that would allow men who dress as women to access women’s locker rooms, showers and restrooms.

Critics continue to call the formal adoption of such policies dangerous.

Bill 3-12 in Baltimore County, introduced and sponsored by four of the seven council members, takes aim at preventing discrimination against a person on the basis of sexual orientation, gender identity or expression.

According to the bill, “gender identity or expression means a gender-related identity or appearance of an individual regardless of the individual’s assigned sex at birth.”

Ruth Jacobs, president of Maryland Citizens for a Responsible Government, which maintains detailed information on the issue at notmyshower.com, says the bill’s definition amounts to “gender identity theft.”

“Many people believe that transgender people have had surgery to change their sex, but in most cases they haven’t,” she told WND. “I call them a fake female.”

According to the MCRG website, such bills “legally protect cross-dressers and transvestite behavior by forbidding discrimination against men who self-identify as women.”

“This dangerous Peeping Tom bill will allow cross-dressing men to enter women’s bathrooms and dressing rooms even if they are sexually attracted to women.”

MCRG says that a similar bill in the city of Baltimore at least has exemptions for “religious, educational and toilet facility settings,” but the Baltimore County bill it has dubbed the “Dangerous Peeping Tom Law” does not.

WND left messages with Baltimore County officials without response.

MCRG noted that since Montgomery County, Md., adopted the change, women have been raped in the restrooms at Montgomery Community College, Asbury nursing home, Pelican restaurant and the Bethesda Hyatt.

“Women are easily victimized and ladies’ bathrooms can be risky places when men have access,” Jacobs noted.

She also pointed out the outrage when a 48-year-old man went into a women’s locker room and was changing his clothes with little girls present.

Proponents of the Baltimore County bill appeared at a public hearing recently to affirm that men who portray themselves as women need protections regarding housing, employment, education, public accommodation and financing.

Ann Miller, a concerned citizen who attended the meeting and wrote several editorials on the topic, says that opponents to the bill expressed concerns over safety and privacy, and argued that “gender” is already a class protected from discrimination.

“The new bill creating a ‘gender identity’ class of people could potentially endanger one group (women) while seeking to protect another group,” Miller wrote.

Jacobs told WND that women “are extremely vulnerable under this proposed law.”

“Law enforcement will not be able to keep men out of changing rooms,” she said. “I can see women in a bathroom thinking, ‘There’s someone in here with a big Adam’s apple and hairy legs, and I’m scared. But if I say something, they’ll call me a bigot.’”

Another concerned citizen, Anita Shatz, told WND she fears that the bill is “open to interpretation.”

She said that supporters of the bill have tried to tell her that the it is mostly meant to protect cross-dressing on the job.

“I’ve called all the council members. One of them tried to win me over, by persuading me that transgender people are ‘very nurturing people,’” she said. “She actually told me I should be glad my granddaughters will be alone in the bathroom with these ‘nurturing’ people.’

“Nurturing sounds like a nice word, but if you look up the definition, it means educate, influence, win-over,” Shatz said.

WND reported in the Montgomery County, Md., case that the county’s policies now include a statement regarding gender that reads: “Gender identity means an individual’s actual or perceived gender including a person’s gender-related appearance, expression, image, identity or behavior, whether or not those gender-related characteristics differ from the characteristics customarily associated with the person’s assigned sex at birth.”

The amended laws initiated a backlash because they allowed individuals with alleged “identity issues” the choice of whether to use men’s or women’s public facilities such as lockers and bathrooms, regardless of their gender. That means a woman who thinks she’s a man could use the men’s public restroom and vice versa.

MCRG also opposed that bill and wanted voters to have a say. It attempted to get the issue on a ballot through a petition drive.

As WND reported, the petition drive fell short when Maryland’s highest court allowed officials to raise the required number of petition signatures for a ballot issue – after the deadline for submitting names had passed – from 25,001 to 27,001.

Jacobs told WND, “We’re always told that we can’t discriminate. The bill in Baltimore County is one huge discrimination against women, against children, and against employers.

“Transgender persons need compassion and treatment, not laws sanctioning their illness.”

The website notmyshower.com says, “Gender Identity Disorder is a treatable mental illness.”

The Baltimore County Council has another public meeting regarding the bill Feb. 14, and then the council votes on it a week later. If it passes, it will become law 45 days later.

Opponents are already concerned that a similar bill will be pushed through the Maryland legislature this year.

Shatz told WND that the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force Foundation held a conference in Baltimore last weekend called “Creating Change.”

The website claims that it is the nation’s premier organizing and skills building event for the lesbian, “gay,” bi-sexual and transgender community.

MCRG urges lawmakers to use caution when creating transgender laws.

“They open the door to teaching our children that gender is all in the mind, and depends on one’s perception,” MCRG states.

The Department of Justice gun-tracing operation known as “Fast and Furious” originated in the first year of the Obama administration, when Mexico began complaining that its drug war was the responsibility of the United States.

Mexico calculated the U.S. could be blamed for the drug war because U.S. citizens create a market for the drug cartels by consuming drugs.

But even more ingeniously, Mexico began asserting that U.S. citizens were supplying the gun cartels with the weapons needed to fight the Mexican government in the drug war.

The gun-running, the Obama administration quickly realized, would be an excellent pretense under which to push for serious Second Amendment restrictions.

The only problem was there was no proof Mexico was right. How could the Department of Justice under the political direction of Attorney General Eric Holder prove that the guns the Mexican cartels used to kill thousands of Mexicans in the drug war were sold to the Mexican cartels by American gun dealers?

Under Fast and Furious, the Obama administration allowed weapons to be sold to suspected Mexican drug operatives so they could be traced to the higher echelons of the cartels. But the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, which ran the operation, lost track of hundreds of weapons and many have been linked to crimes, including the murder of Border Patrol Agent Brian Terry.

Mexico blames the U.S.

On March 25, 2009, Mexico’s Foreign Minister Patricia Espinosa gave an interview to Fox News in which she repeated Mexico’s claim:”It is a fact that 90 percent of the arms seized in Mexico come from the United States.”

She further to specified that the only way Mexico could control its drug war was if the U.S. limited gun exports to Mexico.

She continued, saying: “So, for that reason, we see this as an effort to help strengthen the application of the U.S. legislation that provides for the prohibitions of arms exports to a country in which those arms are prohibited.”

February 2009 appears to be the month in which the Obama administration decided Holder should be the point man championing Mexico’s argument.

On Feb. 26, 2006, Brent Lang writing in the “Political Hot Sheet blog on CBSNews.com reported that Holder in announcing the capture of more than 50 alleged members of the notorious Sinaloa Cartel told reporters he was in favor of reinstituting the ban on the sale of assault weapons to help Mexico fight its drug war.

Responding to a reporter’s question on gun regulations, Holder said, “Well, as President Obama indicated during the campaign, there are just a few gun-related charges that we would like to make, and among them would be to reinstitute the ban on the sale of assault weapons. I think that will have a positive impact in Mexico, at a minimum.”

Holder had frequently called for restoring the Clinton administration-era ban on semi-automatic weapons.

According to Stephen Halbrook, a Ph.D. and a lawyer at the Independent Institute, Holder joined a friend-of-the-court brief in the Supreme Court case District of Columbia v. Heller, arguing that the Second Amendment does not guarantee individual rights to bear arms.

In that 2008 case, the Supreme Court disagreed, deciding to overturn the District of Columbia handgun ban on Second Amendment grounds that reaffirmed an individual’s right to possess firearms for private use not related to a state militia.

Holder gets the ball rolling

Other administration officials and prominent Democrats in Congress immediately picked up Holder’s assertion about U.S. guns being used in the Mexico gun war.

On her first trip to Mexico as secretary of state, Hillary Clinton told reporters accompanying her that the U.S. has “co-responsibility” for fueling an alarming spike in violence along the U.S. border with Mexico.

“Our insatiable demand for illegal drugs fuels the drug trade,” Clinton said. “Our inability to prevent weapons from being illegally smuggled across the border to arm these criminals causes the deaths of police officers, soldiers and civilians.”

The assertion was repeated by Sen. Dick Durbin, D-Ill., the chairman of the Senate Judiciary Subcommittee on Crime and Drugs.

“The drugs are coming north, and we’re sending money and guns south,” Durbin said. “As a result, these cartels have gained extraordinary power.”

Durbin claimed statistics from the federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives proved 90 percent of guns seized in Mexican raids could be traced back to the United States.

Durbin further claimed Brookings Institute statistics demonstrated about 2,000 firearms cross the U.S. border into Mexico every day, as reported by CNN.

In his one-on-one interview with President Obama, broadcast on the CBS television “Meet the Press” show on March 29, 2009, correspondent Bob Schieffer repeated the claim, asking the president: “It’s my understanding that 90 percent of the guns that they’re getting down in Mexico are coming from the United States. We don’t seem to be doing a very good job of cutting off the gun flow. Do you need any kind of legislative help on that front? Have you, for example, thought about asking Congress to reinstate the ban on assault weapons?”

President Obama said the main thing needed was better law enforcement, backing away from the opportunity to ask for new federal legislation to limit the Second Amendment.

Where’s the proof?

Holder’s claim evidently was based on testimony given by William Hoover, an ATF assistant director for field operations.

Yet, a close examination of Hoover’s written statement to Congress shows that he argued “there is more than enough evidence to indicate that over 90 percent of the firearms that have either been recovered in, or interdicted in transport to Mexico, originated from various sources within the United States.”

That is very different from claiming that 90 percent of all the weapons used by the Mexican drug cartels come from the U.S.

Fox News pointed out that a large percentage of the guns recovered in Mexico do not get sent back to the U.S. for tracing because it is obvious from their markings that they did not come from the U.S.

“Not every weapon seized in Mexico has a serial number on it that would make it traceable, and the U.S. effort to trace weapons really only extends to weapons that have been in the U.S. market,” Matt Allen, a special agent of the U.S. Immigrations and Customs Enforcement, told Fox News.

The claim that 90 percent of all the weapons used by the Mexican drug cartels come from the U.S. is now largely discredited> It’s even disavowed by the Obama administration, especially after William Newell, the head of the ATF bureau in Phoenix during Operation Fast and Furious, admitted making mistakes in investigations and giving testimony to Congress that “lacked clarity.”

Why bother with U.S. guns?

Mexican drug cartels have billions of dollars each year to buy weapons, including fragmentation grenades from South Korea, AK-47s from China and shoulder-fired rocket launchers from Spain, Israel and former Soviet bloc manufacturers. Fox News pointed out that Interpol documents Russian Mafia groups are actively trafficking drugs and arms in Mexico.

Moreover, more than 150,000 soldiers have deserted the Mexican army in the last six years to join the drug cartels, with many taking their weapons with them. They include the standard issue M-16 assault rifle made in Belgium. The Mexican government has seized 2,239 grenades in the last two years that are unavailable in U.S. gun stores.

“So why would the Mexican drug cartels, which last year grossed between $17 billion and $38 billion, bother buying single-shot rifles, and force thousands of unknown ‘straw’ buyers in the U.S. through a government background check, when they can buy boatloads of fully automatic M-16s and assault rifles from China, Israel or South Africa?” reporters William La Jeunesse and Maxim Lott of Fox News asked in an article published on FoxNews.com April 2, 2009.

An organization that helped craft President Obama’s environmental policies has recommended the reinstatement of the Fairness Doctrine, purportedly as a method of silencing critics of the theory of global warming.

The Presidential Climate Action Project, or PCAP, last year released an extensive list of recommendations for the White House in a 75-page paper titled “Building the Obama Administration’s Climate Legacy.”

Primary among the PCAP’s recommendations is that the Department of Energy should join the Department of Housing and Urban Development, the Department of Transportation and the Environmental Protection Agency in what is known as the Partnership for Sustainable Communities.

The Partnership, which distributes over $1 billion in grants, says it aims to“help communities nationwide improve access to affordable housing, increase transportation options and lower transportation costs while protecting the environment.”

Another key recommendation in the report is the reinstatement of the Fairness Doctrine, a former policy of the Federal Communications Commission that required the holders of broadcast licenses to give equal time to opposing viewpoints, which effectively made political talk radio unsustainable for any local station.

Reads the PCAP report: “National discourse today is tainted – and in some cases poisoned – by unbalanced ideological use of the public airwaves… To improve and better inform public discourse, it is time for the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) to reinstate the Fairness Doctrine.”

Critics charge the Fairness Doctrine is as an attempt to regulate news and talk radio that violates First Amendment rights.

The University of Colorado-based PCAP draws up climate-policy recommendations for the White House and has been working with members of the Obama administration.

Following Obama’s victory in 2008, the PCAP began working with John Podesta, co-chairman of Obama’s transition team, to help the incoming president formulate an initial 100-day environmental agenda. Podesta is president and CEO of the highly influential Center for American Progress.

William S. Becker, the PCAP’s executive director, confirmed to WND in a November 2009 interview that his group’s initial proposals received a “very positive reception from the moment we delivered (the 100-day proposal) last November to John Podesta, co-chair of Obama’s transition team.”

“We continue to work with some colleagues inside the (Obama) administration, as well as continuing to push for bold action from the outside,” he said at the time.

Becker said the White House “adopted quite a few of our recommendations or variations of them.”

He cited a few examples of the influence of the PCAP and other environmental groups on Obama’s policies:

The PCAP recommended that the U.S. reach a bilateral climate deal with China prior to the U.N. Climate Change Conference in Copenhagen. The U.S. has since signed several agreements with China to share technology that reduces greenhouse-gas emissions.

The PCAP recommended an executive order that removed the gags from federal climate scientists. It became one of Obama’s first actions on environmental policy.

The PCAP recommended an overhaul of federal energy management to beef up efficiency requirements for federal agencies and to restore absolute carbon reduction targets that had been rescinded by the Bush administration. The Obama administration issued a new federal energy management order in October, including a requirement that agencies develop absolute targets for greenhouse-gas reductions.

The PCAP recommended, as did many others, that the Environmental Protection Agency embrace California’s vehicle emission standards and begin the process of regulating greenhouse gases under the Clean Air Act. The EPA is doing both.

The PCAP recommended major budget increases for states and communities to engage in energy and climate actions and to weatherize the homes of low-income families. The recommendations were implemented in Obama’s stimulus package.

The PCAP describes itself as seeking to engage the “best thinking of America’s leaders in government, science and civil society to identify actions that will empower all elements of society to meet the challenges of energy security and climate change.”

The group actively promotes the theory of man-made global warming.

While the PCAP coordinates with the White House, WND previously exposed how Obama’s controversial former “green jobs” czar, Van Jones, is one of 20 members of the PCAP’s advisory board.

Jones’ name appeared on the group’s most recent recommendation paper.

Jones resigned in September 2009 after it was exposed he founded a communist revolutionary organization and signed a statement that accused the Bush administration of possible involvement in the 9/11 attacks.

Meanwhile, the PCAP is not alone in calling for the silencing of the critics of global warming theory.

As WND was first to report, just prior to his appointment as Obama’s so-called regulatory czar in 2009, Cass Sunstein wrote a lengthy academic paper suggesting the government should “infiltrate” social network websites, chat rooms and message boards.

Such “cognitive infiltration,” Sunstein argued, should be used to enforce a U.S. government ban on “conspiracy theorizing.”

Sunstein’s official title is administrator of the White House Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs.

Among the beliefs Sunstein classified in his paper as a “conspiracy theory” is that man-made global warming is a deliberate fraud.

A Georgia resident contending Barack Obama is ineligible for the state’s 2012 presidential election ballot is asking that a court cite him with contempt.

In a motion filed in the case pending before Georgia Administrative Law Judge Michael Malihi, attorney Van Irion, representing David P. Weldon, urged the court not to overlook the fact that Obama had been subpoenaed for last week’s hearing. Obama’s attorney, he pointed out, acknowledged the subpoena by asking that it be quashed. But when the judge refused his request, he  but told a state elections official he would not participate.

“Plaintiff Weldon moves this court to refer an order for contempt to the Superior Court for confirmation that defendant Obama is in contempt of court,” the motions says. “Grounds for this motion are that defendant Obama willfully defied this court’s order to appear and testify during this court’s hearing of January 26.”

The motion explains that when Malihi refused to quash the subpoena, Obama and his attorney, Michael Jablonski, “requested that the Secretary of State [Brian Kemp] halt the proceedings. … The letter ended with a statement that the defendant and his attorney would suspend all further participation in the proceedings of this court pending response.”

But after Kemp confirmed later that day that the hearing would continue and said that failing to participate “would be at the defendant’s peril,” Obama and his lawyer still refused to attend.

The letter from Obama’s lawyer to the state official, “coupled with the defendant’s willful refusal to comply with an order of this court, represent a direct threat to the rule of law,” the motion says. “The … actions represent a direct threat to the entire judicial branch and the separation of powers.”

Willfully ignoring a court subpoena is “unprecedented,” Irion writes. “While past presidents have litigated against subpoenas, in every case those presidents acknowledged and respected the authority of the judicial branch. … In the instant case the defendant did not appeal to a higher court, and instead instructed the Secretary of State that he would not participate. … When the Secretary of State refused to act in an unlawful manner the defendant ignored the Secretary of State, violated an order of this court, and apparently instructed his attorney to act in a manner that violates the professional rules of conduct of this state.”

Obama’s action, he says, “amounts to no less than a declaration of total dictatorial authority. Such declaration cannot go without response from this court. Failure to respond to the defendant’s contumacious conduct would amount to an admission that this court and the judicial branch as a whole do not have the authority granted to them under articles III and IV of the Constitution.”

Irion, representing Weldon, and several other attorneys argued before Malihi last week to have Obama’s name stricken from the Georgia state ballot.

The hearing was held on concerns raised by citizens of Georgia under a state law that allows voters to challenge the eligibility of candidates on the state’s ballot. It is the states that run elections in the U.S., and national elections are just a compilation of the results of the 50 state elections.

The state law requires “every candidate for federal” office who is certified by the state executive committees of a political party or who files a notice of candidacy “shall meet the constitutional and statutory qualifications for holding the office being sought.”

State law also grants the secretary of state and any “elector who is eligible to vote for a candidate” in the state the authority to raise a challenge to a candidate’s qualifications, the judge determined.

Citizens raising concerns include David Farrar, Leah Lax, Thomas Malaren and Laurie Roth, represented by Orly Taitz; David Weldon represented by attorney Van R. Irion of Liberty Legal Foundation; and Carl Swensson and Kevin Richard Powell, represented by J. Mark Hatfield. Cody Judy is raising a challenge because he also wants to be on the ballot.

The controversy over Obama’s eligibility dates to before his election in 2008. Some contend he was not born in Hawaii and that the birth documentation the White House released in April is a forgery.

Others say it doesn’t matter where he was born, as his father never was a U.S. citizen.

The Constitution requires presidents to be “natural-born citizens,” and experts say that the Founders regarded it as the offspring of two U.S. citizens.

Jablonski had asked Malihi to quash the subpoena, requested by Taitz. When the judge refused, Jablonski wrote to Kemp.

The attorney told Kemp that “serious problems” had developed in the hearings “pending before the Office of State Administration Hearings.”

Jablonski said, “At issue in these hearings are challenges that allege that President Obama is not eligible to hold or run for re-election to his office, on the now wholly discredited theory that he does not meet the citizenship requirements.”

He said the judge had “exercised no control” over the proceeding.

“It threatens to degenerate into a pure forum for political posturing to the detriment of the reputation of the state and your office. Rather than bring this matter to a rapid conclusion, the ALJ has insisted on agreeing to a day of hearings, and on the full participation of the president in his capacity as a candidate,” Jablonski wrote.

Kemp said the hearing, however, was in line with Georgia law, and he would be reviewing Malihi’s recommendations in the case.

He also had a warning about the cost of not showing up for a court hearing.

“Anything you and your client place in the record in response to the challenge will be beneficial to my review of the initial decision; however, if you and your client choose to suspend your participation in the OSAH proceedings, please understand that you do so at your own peril.”

Top constitutional expert Herb Titus contends that a “natural-born citizen” is born of parents who were U.S. citizens at the time of the birth. The argument also is supported by a 19th-century U.S. Supreme Court decision, Minor vs. Happersett in 1875. The case includes one of very few references in the nation’s archives that addresses the definition of “natural-born citizen.”

That case states: “The Constitution does not in words say who shall be natural-born citizens. Resort must be had elsewhere to ascertain that. At common law, with the nomenclature of which the framers of the Constitution were familiar, it was never doubted that all children born in a country of parents who were its citizens became themselves, upon their birth, citizens also. These were natives or natural-born citizens, as distinguished from aliens or foreigners.”

An extensive analysis of the issue was conducted by Titus, who has taught constitutional law, common law and other subjects for 30 years at five different American Bar Association-approved law schools. He also was the founding dean of the College of Law at Regent University, a trial attorney and special assistant U.S. attorney in the Department of Justice.

“‘Natural born citizen’ in relation to the office of president, and whether someone is eligible, was in the Constitution from the very beginning,” he said. “Another way of putting it; there is a law of the nature of citizenship. If you are a natural born citizen, you are a citizen according to the law of nature, not according to any positive statement in a Constitution or in a statute, but because of the very nature of your birth and the very nature of nations.”

If you “go back and look at what the law of nature would be or would require … that’s precisely what a natural born citizen is …. is one who is born to a father and mother each of whom is a citizen of the U.S. or whatever other country,” he said.

“Now what we’ve learned from the Hawaii birth certificate is that Mr. Obama’s father was not a citizen of the United States. His mother was, but he doesn’t qualify as a natural born citizen for the office of president.”

In an extensive proposal regarding what the judge’s determination should include, Irion wrote that because of Obama’s failure to meet the understood meaning of “natural born citizen,” and the fact he “presented no argument on the substance of the issue at hand,” he should be determined to be ineligible.

Irion’s proposal said Obama should have had the entire burden of proof in the case, because “the Supreme Court of Georgia has clearly established that it is the affirmative obligation of a candidate to establish his qualifications for office, and that the burden is not upon the challenger.”

His suggestions said while the Democratic Party of Georgia has a right to determine its membership, that right coexists with the state’s right to govern.

“The party is free to submit any name as their next presidential candidate. However, Georgia is not required to accept such submissions and waste taxpayer money on ballots where such candidates are clearly not qualified to hold the office sought.”

He also pointed out that voters do not have the authority to waive constitutional requirements.

“Constitutionally protected rights are held inviolate regardless of the majority’s desire to violate them. Without such protections, any law could be enacted simply because it becomes popular. …. Congress could legalize the killing of all Jews, for example, as was done in World War II Germany. Constitutional requirements are absolute, and must be followed regardless of how popular or unpopular such requirements may be.

“Defendant’s presumption that popular vote overrides the Constitution runs contrary to the Constitution.”

In Taitz’ proposal to the judge, she raised concerns about elections fraud, evidence of forgery in the birth certificate image, Social Security fraud and the use of multiple last names

“Plaintiffs assert that based on law and fact, Obama is not eligible to be on the ballot in the state of Georgia as a presidential candidate and such finding should be forwarded to the secretary of state of Georgia,” she wrote.

She said the contempt “exhibited by the defendant … is so egregious that it warrants forwarding of the evidence and findings … to the attorney general of Georgia for criminal prosecution.”

“It is common knowledge and described at length in defendant Obama’s memoirs, such as ‘Dreams from my Father,’ that Obama’s father was a foreigner. Obama senior was a foreign exchange student who resided in the U.S. for a couple of years while he got his education and he returned to his native Kenya. At the time of Obama’s birth, his father, who came from Mombasa, Zanzibar region of Kenya, was a British ‘protected person’. Obama automatically inherited his father’s British citizenship upon the British Nationality act of 1948. Upon the declaration of the independence of Kenya on December 11, 1963, Barack Obama automatically received his Kenyan citizenship on December 12, 1963.”

The drama over student rights and religious freedom continues to rage at Vanderbilt University, as the higher education facility doubled-down this week on enforcing strict rules that some say discriminate against campus religious groups.

At the center of debate is the university’s nondiscrimination policy, which bans student-led faith groups, among others, from requiring leaders to hold specific beliefs.

The policy, which in many ways contradicts theological requirements, has created angst among members of both the student body and the university’s faculty. These opponents see the ban as a crackdown on their freedom of religion and speech. School leaders, though, maintain that the policy is necessary to ensure that all students feel welcome at campus clubs and events.

The Blaze first reported about the situation back in September. Our original coverage provides the background needed to understand how the situation was started:

Vanderbilt University in Nashville, Tennessee, is making headlines after a Christian fraternity, Beta Upsilon Chi, asked an openly gay member to resign. Upon leaving the group, the young man filed a discrimination complaint and now college administrators are trying to figure out whether the campus organization violated the school’s nondiscrimination policy.

Of course, this incident has grown into a much larger controversy in which university administrators are reviewing all student-led organizations. As a result, officials are concerned about specific clauses that five Christian campus groups have in their constitutions.

These clauses require members of the groups to share their religious beliefs, something that didn‘t concern campus administrators until the student’s complaint was made. Now, the school wants the constitutions amended and the controversial clauses dropped.

Currently, four campus groups violate this policy, as they require their leaders to maintain Christian messages.

Club heads argue, though, that leaders responsible for planning Bible studies should actually believe in the material they are preaching. The campus groups in question are the Christian Legal Society, Beta Upsilon Chi, Graduate Student Fellowship and Fellowship of Christian Athletes.

At an event on Tuesday evening, the college defendedits policies to an audience of over 200 students. Provost Richard McCarthy and Vice Chancellor for University Affairs and Athletics said that the university doesn’t plan to back down. If student groups fail to comply, they will lose their official status with the college. Despite administrators’ insistence, the community forum did provide students with an opportunity to share their opposition and reasoning with policy-makers at the helm.

“The Vanderbilt discrimination policy is directed against the Christian community,” said Leighton Watts, a member of Beta Upsilon Chi, a Christian fraternity (he wasn’t inside the meeting, but he was watching from a computer outside of the venue and commented to media).

“We want to be able to elect our leaders based on our beliefs,” said Joseph Williams, a former student body president at the university. He spoke out against the restrictions during a question and answer period.

McCarthy’s response to this was intriguing: Students can vote for any individual they’d like, but the clubs cannot have written rules banning students who don’t hold specific views from running for leadership roles. He essentially told students not to vote for people with whom they disagree.

Carol Swain, a law professor at Vanderbilt and an adviser to the Christian Legal Society, disagrees with the college’s stance and is working to assist groups who stand opposed to the rule. In an interview with FOX News, she said:

“There are people on campus who are very threatened by the idea of religious freedom and they would like to create an environment where no one hurts anyone else’s feelings – unless it’s Christians.

This political correctness is running amuck on campus and its constraining one group – and that group tends to be conservatives. They will be forced to either accept the university’s policy or leave campus by the end of the academic year. They are in limbo.”

The Blaze also spoke with Joshua Charles, who co-authored Glenn Beck’s “The Original Argument.” Charles, who was a Founding Father and President of the Beta Upsilon Chi chapter at the University of Kansas, had some strong feelings on the matter.

“It seems difficult to imagine a scenario in which any religious group could, without any infringement whatsoever, worship and practice freely if they
cannot even make decisions on their own membership or leadership,” Charles said. “Groups are formed in order to advance causes, ideals, or something of the sort. But if the integrity of that group cannot be maintained, then neither can
the causes or ideals for which it was founded in the first place.”

In the end, Christian student groups are clearly stuck at this point, as administrators are refusing to budge. But it’s not just religious groups that could encounter a problem. What if a gay and lesbian rights group on campus wants to ensure that those in leadership roles hold true to certain values of equality? Or — what if an environmental group wants members to pledge their allegiance to protecting the earth?

“Freedom of association — the ability to mingle with those you wish to mingle
with, to connect with those you wish to connect with, and to join in common
cause with them, is a fundamental liberty,” Charles continued.

In the end, this is a policy that certainly holds the potential to create further angst and inter-student contention.

A pro-life event at the Rhode Island State House was disrupted by Occupy Wall Street protesters who heckled speakers and dumped condoms on Catholic girls in the crowd.

Last Friday, an estimated crowd of 150 pro-life supporters (including a reported two dozen legislators) had assembled in the rotunda of the State House for the 39th annual Pro-Life Rally, but they were prevented from speaking by members of Occupy Providence and other OWS sympathizers who shouted and chanted during speeches, held signs in front of the faces of speakers and prevented the delivery of the closing prayer by local Catholic leader Father Bernard Healey.

Rhode Island’s Right-To-Life Executive Director Barth Bracy was the scheduled keynote speaker, but the chanting and shouted made it impossible for him to deliver his speech. Bracy told Fox News radio that one Occupier climbed to the third floor balcony and dumped a box of condoms on a group of Catholic girls gathered below. Mr. Bracy wondered:

“What kind of individual throws condoms on Catholic school girls?”

This is not the first time OWS members have been involved in disrupting pro-life rallies. Just last week in Washington, Occupiers disrupted a peaceful prayer vigil and march being held by the inter-denominational faith group CEC For Life.

Protesters tried to surround and intimidate those gathered. At one point they stood within inches of the musicians and people praying and began screaming. Lifenews.com reported that some in the crowd attempted to engage the Occupiers in a discussion, but “few would stop yelling long enough to speak with these courageous young people.”

According to the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, adult stem cells — undifferentiated cells found in every human body that can transform into specialized cells with the medial potential to repair certain areas of the body damaged by disease or injury — fall under its jurisdiction for regulation as a drug.

The FDA states on its website:

Stem cells, like other medical products that are intended to treat, cure or prevent disease, generally require FDA approval before they can be marketed. At this time, there are no licensed stem cell treatments.

The Alliance for Natural Health states that the FDA has claimed in a legal conflict with a Colorado medical clinic, Centeno-Schultz, that a treatment it conducts using adult stem cells is under its regulatory jurisdiction. Centeno-Schultz’s Regenexx-SD is a non-surgical procedure to treat joint pain with adult stem cells by removing the stem cells from the patient’s blood and re-inserting them into the area needing treatment. No outside drugs are involved.

Since the stem cells are, as it says in FDA’s statement above, being used as a treatment, they are subject to regulation. ANH states that the FDA claims the authority to regulate because of interstate commerce:

The clinic is engaging in interstate commerce and is therefore subject to FDA regulation because any part of the machine or procedure that originates outside Colorado becomes interstate commerce once it enters the state. Moreover, interstate commerce is substantially affected because individuals traveling to Colorado to have the Regenexx procedure would “depress the market for out-of-state drugs that are approved by FDA.”

In its call for a summary judgement, the FDA expounds upon how under the Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act (FDCA) and the Commerce Clause it should be able to exert its regulatory authority over Centeno-Schultz’s procedure, which ANH reports it has been battling on this issue for several years. Here are a few snippets of the FDA’s argument from the case documents:

As we show below, the FDCA contains no “practice of medicine” exception that excuses Defendants’ conduct, and FDA’s exercise of jurisdiction over Defendants’ conduct is a permissible exercise of federal power under the Commerce Clause. Defendants’ remaining arguments are likewise without merit.

[...]

The Constitution grants Congress broad power to “regulate Commerce . . . among the several States,” U.S. Const., art. I, § 8, cl. 3. Congress may “regulate the channels of interstate commerce”; it may “regulate and protect the instrumentalities of interstate commerce, and persons or things in interstate commerce”; and it may “regulate activities that substantially affect interstate commerce.”

[...]

In Raich, the Court sustained Congress’s authority to prohibit the possession of home-grown marijuana intended solely for personal use. 545 U.S. at 32-33. It was sufficient that the Controlled Substances Act “regulates the production, distribution, and consumption of commodities for which there is an established, and lucrative, interstate market.”

[...]

United States v. 9/1 Kg. Containers, 854 F.2d 173, 176 (7th Cir. 1988) (“Congress gave the FDA comprehensive powers to license the manufacture of drugs and limit their sales. To regulate drugs is to be ‘involved’ in the ‘practice of the healing arts.’”

SlashGear states that the next step is for the court to decide “whether or not something that resides in every human being can be subject to government intervention.”

Recently the BBC saw a secret NATO report which says that the Taliban in Afghanistan are being directly supported by the Pakistani security services – the ISI (Inter-Services Intelligence). There is nothing particularly new about this revelation, as we have heard much on this alignment before. It is the fact that the co-operation between the Pakistani ISI and Taliban is in black and white in a (formerly secret) NATO document.

What does the NATO document tell us?

-         Information garnered from over 27,000 interrogations of over 4,000 Taliban, Al-Qaeda and other Afghan insurgents.

-         The Taliban generally and more and more so have the backing of the people.

-        Pakistan knows the locations of the Taliban leadership.

-         Report itself states that it should be taken as informational and not necessarily analytical.

-         Widespread collaboration between insurgents and Afghan police and military.

-         Unprecedented interest from Afghan government officials in joining Taliban.

-         Where ISAF (International Security Assistance Force) has withdrawn, Taliban influence increases with no resistance from Afghan forces and police who are supposed to fill the void. In fact they often join the Taliban.

Additional Information:

-         Haqqani family resides immediately west of ISI office at the airfield in Miram Shah inPakistan. (The Haqqani family used to be the CIA-backed anti-Soviet group, which has now become one of the most feared anti-western militant organizations in the area.)

-         Taliban weary of war, but see little hope of negotiated peace.

-         Narcotics trade provides funding, but not indirectly from donations made to the Taliban by farmers or smugglers or others along the production line of the drug.

-         This past year (2011) more funds than in any previous year given to the Taliban.

There is much more contained in the report, but I have highlighted the main points.

So why are we in Afghanistan? There is more reason to wonder why. The Karzai government is corrupt and the last elections were unfair, Osama bin Laden was captured in a compound inPakistan  – most probably set up by the Pakistani ISI for his safety.

Deadly attacks by Afghan army personnel on US, British and most recently French troops amongst others. (Possibly a reason President Sarkozy has moved up the French withdrawal to the end of 2013 in addition to the French soldiers’ deaths is the likelihood that he saw, or got wind of the NATO report.)

Again, Why Are We Still in Afghanistan?

The real reason for going intoAfghanistan, or so we were told, was to capture Osama bin Laden. That has been done, he is dead (according to theUSauthorities as we have seen no proof).

We sent over 100,000 troops between NATO and US forces intoAfghanistanwhen a much smaller specialist force of Marines and Rangers could have done the job of tracking down Al-Quada, and much quicker. Instead we decided to nation-build, putting US and NATO forces in harm’s way by having them build schools, act as public liaison officers with the locals, and playing a politically correct game which has reduced significantly the ability of US and NATO forces to act as soldiers in order to win the war.

Cost of the War

-         Going on 3,000 US and NATO troops lives.

-         Financial burden is half a trillion dollars and rising.

-         Billions of dollars in aid toPakistan.

Where Do We Stand Right Now?

Relations between the US and Pakistan are at one of their lowest points ever, since the US raid that captured Osama bin Laden, the killing of Pakistani soldiers by US aircraft through a misunderstanding on both the Afghan and Pakistani sides of the border, as a result of which Pakistan closed a vital NATO supply route into Afghanistan. Now this no-holds-barred NATO report has ratcheted the whole mess up even further.

This Correspondent says we cannot trust the Pakistanis, if we ever could, and there is no reason to believe that we ever can. They control, one way or another, the whole Afghanistan/Pakistan picture. We cannot win and never could. It is time to leave. Not in 2014, not in one year, but RIGHT NOW.

So Why Are We Still in Afghanistan? Answer: For No Good Reason Whatsoever.

The Assembly budget committee approved a bill today that would enable $865 million of borrowing from existing state accounts, Senate Bill 95. Chiang, after consultation with the Department of Finance and state Treasurer Bill Lockyer, is also seeking about $2.4 billion in delayed payments to universities, counties and Medi-Cal, as well as additional borrowing from outside investors.

Against a backdrop of loud opposition from protesters, Indiana has become the first Rust Belt state to enact the right-to-work labor law prohibiting labor contracts that require workers to pay union representation fees.

Republican Gov. Mitch Daniels signed the bill Wednesday after it passed the Senate following weeks of discord that saw House Democrats boycott the Legislature and thousands of protesters gather at the Statehouse.

“Seven years of evidence and experience ultimately demonstrated that Indiana did need a right-to-work law to capture jobs for which, despite our highly rated business climate, we are not currently being considered,” Daniels said in a statement.

“This law won’t be a magic answer but we’ll be far better off with it. I respect those who have objected but they have alarmed themselves unnecessarily: no one’s wages will go down, no one’s benefits will be reduced and the right to organize and bargain collectively is untouched and intact.The only change will be a positive one. Indiana will improve still further its recently earned reputation as one of America’s best places to do business, and we will see more jobs and opportunity for our young people and for all those looking for a better life,” he said.

Supporters say the measure helps create a pro-business climate that attracts employers and increases jobs. Opponents say right to work leads to lower wages and poorer quality jobs.

Indiana will be the first state in a decade to enact a right-to-work law, although few states with legislation in place boast Indiana’s union clout, borne of a long manufacturing legacy. The move is likely to embolden national right-to-work advocates who have unsuccessfully pushed the measure in other states following a Republican sweep of statehouses in 2010.

Protesters say the fight isn’t over and note that Indiana passed right to work once before but repealed it. Thousands of union members gathered inside the Statehouse chanted “Shame on you!” and “See you at the Super Bowl!” as the vote was announced, a preview of their plan to hold a rally outside in the Indianapolis streets.

Earlier this week, Daniels called it a “colossal mistake” for protesters to try to disrupt Super Bowl festivities, predicting it would backfire on them.

The Republican-controlled Senate approved the bill in a 28-22 vote Wednesday morning.

“We’re giving freedom to workers who don’t want to be a part of something they don’t believe in,” said Republican Sen. Carlin Yoder, shortly before the vote.

But testifying against the bill Wednesday, Sen. Vi Simpson, D-Bloomington, said there was no evidence that right to work created jobs.

Passage of the law closes one chapter in the contentious debate that sparked a five-week walkout by outnumbered House Democrats last year and saw them stage numerous boycotts this session. This year, however, Republicans outnumbered Democrats in the House and Senate, and House Democrats facing stiff fines if they walked out for a lengthy period.

Conservatives have made much of Barak Obama’s connections to the leftist agitator Saul Alinski. Alinksi’s book “Rules for Radicals” is a veritable handbook for the hard left. Now there are reports that Alinksi’s ideas were well received by former Michigan Governor George Romney. Romney whose liberal positions led him to walk out of the Republican convention that nominated Barry Goldwater in 1964. It was Romney who invited Alinksi to advise him on urban policy after the 1967 Detroit riots. Afterward Romney told associates that “ I think you ought to listen to Alinski.” While this may seem like old news the fact is that currant Republican front runner Mitt Romney  has made much of his admiration of his father’s political philosophy and this worries to many in his party’s conservatives wing.

An attorney who presented evidence to a Georgia judge last week on Barack Obama’s eligibility for the state’s 2012 presidential ballot believes she now has a right to demand to see his original Hawaii documents.

Obama last April released what he said was a copy of his original Hawaii birth documentation, but a number of imaging, document and computer experts contend it is a fraud.

The original birth documentation could undermine Obama’s claim to be a “natural-born citizen,” as the Constitution requires. Many of his critics, however, say the birth documentation doesn’t matter, because Obama’s father never was a U.S. citizen. The Founders likely understood “natural-born citizen” to mean the offspring of two U.S. citizens.

Now California attorney Orly Taitz, who has brought a number of major legal challenges to Obama’s eligibility in various courts up to the U.S. Supreme Court, has told WND that when Obama and his lawyer wrote a letter to Georgia Secretary of State Brian Kemp last week refusing to attend the hearing on Obama’s eligibility status, they included a copy of the image that the White House released last April.

They also sent a copy to the court of Judge Michael Malihi, the hearing officer, whose ruling is expected to be made available in the next few days.

That act, Taitz explained, effectively gave the court a copy of the White House documentation, and under ordinary rules of evidence the opposing side is supposed to have access to the original to verify the authenticity of the purported copy.

“They submitted a copy and said this is a copy of the original birth certificate. Now the other party has a right to examine the original,” she said.

Her next step was to ask Malihi for a letter to the courts in Hawaii seeking a subpoena for the records. When the judge responded that the issue probably was outside his jurisdiction as an administrative law judge, she received permission to take her request to the Fulton County Superior Court.

An email Taitz posted online showed the court in Georgia carried permission from Malihi to “feel free to petition the Superior Court, if you so choose.”

The birth-certificate issue has plagued Obama since before the 2008 election. When concerns arose about his eligibility, his campaign posted online an image of an abbreviated birth record called a “Certification of Live Birth.”

At the time, his campaign stated that it was the only document available from the state of Hawaii documenting births, even though other people were able to obtain a long-form document.

It was when the first hardcover edition of Where’s the Birth Certificate?” by Jerome Corsi was about to be released that Obama dispatched one of his private attorneys to Hawaii to fetch another document image, this time a long-form “Certificate of Live Birth.”

Many experts then concluded it likely was a computer-generated document and not a copy of an original 1961 document.

Taitz told WND that her request to the Superior Court will be to ask the Hawaii court system to issue a subpoena for the original documentation so she can examine it and compare it to the White House representation.

“I have a green light to proceed,” she said.

They also sent a copy to the court of Judge Michael Malihi, the hearing officer, whose ruling is expected to be made available in the next few days.

That act, Taitz explained, effectively gave the court a copy of the White House documentation, and under ordinary rules of evidence the opposing side is supposed to have access to the original to verify the authenticity of the purported copy.

“They submitted a copy and said this is a copy of the original birth certificate. Now the other party has a right to examine the original,” she said.

Her next step was to ask Malihi for a letter to the courts in Hawaii seeking a subpoena for the records. When the judge responded that the issue probably was outside his jurisdiction as an administrative law judge, she received permission to take her request to the Fulton County Superior Court.

An email Taitz posted online showed the court in Georgia carried permission from Malihi to “feel free to petition the Superior Court, if you so choose.”

The birth-certificate issue has plagued Obama since before the 2008 election. When concerns arose about his eligibility, his campaign posted online an image of an abbreviated birth record called a “Certification of Live Birth.”

At the time, his campaign stated that it was the only document available from the state of Hawaii documenting births, even though other people were able to obtain a long-form document.

It was when the first hardcover edition of Where’s the Birth Certificate?” by Jerome Corsi was about to be released that Obama dispatched one of his private attorneys to Hawaii to fetch another document image, this time a long-form “Certificate of Live Birth.”

Many experts then concluded it likely was a computer-generated document and not a copy of an original 1961 document.

Taitz told WND that her request to the Superior Court will be to ask the Hawaii court system to issue a subpoena for the original documentation so she can examine it and compare it to the White House representation.

“I have a green light to proceed,” she said.

She explained that the image was sent to Kemp and the judge at the time the attorney for Obama, Michael Jablonski, told Kemp he should simply cancel the hearing, because the president would not participate.

Jablonski told Kemp that “serious problems” had developed in the hearings “pending before the Office of State Administration Hearings.”

He said, “At issue in these hearings are challenges that allege that President Obama is not eligible to hold or run for re-election to his office, on the now wholly discredited theory that he does not meet the citizenship requirements.”

Jablonski said the judge – who previously rejected Obama’s demand to quash a subpoena for him to appear and bring with him his birth records documenting his status as a “natural-born citizen” – has “exercised no control” over the proceeding.

“It threatens to degenerate into a pure forum for political posturing to the detriment of the reputation of the state and your office. Rather than bring this matter to a rapid conclusion, the ALJ has insisted on agreeing to a day of hearings, and on the full participation of the president in his capacity as a candidate,” Jablonski wrote.

In a response posted online, Kemp told Jablonski the case referral and hearing was “in keeping with Georgia law.”

“As you are aware, OSAH Rule 616-1-2-.17 cited in your letter only applies to parties to a hearing. As the referring agency, the Secretary of State’s Office is not a party to the candidate challenge hearings scheduled for tomorrow. To the extent a request to withdraw the case referral is procedurally available, I do not believe such a request would be judicious given the hearing is set for tomorrow morning.”

He continued, “I expect the administrative law judge to report his findings to me after his full consideration of the evidence and law. Upon receipt of the report, I will fully and fairly review the entire record and initial decision of the administrative law judge.”

He also had a warning about the costs of not showing up for a court hearing.

“Anything you and your client place in the record in response to the challenge will be beneficial to my review of the initial decision; however, if you and your client choose to suspend your participation in the OSAH proceedings, please understand that you do so at your own peril.”

But Jablonski said, “We will, of course, suspend further participation in these proceedings, including the hearing scheduled for January 26.”

The hearing was held on concerns raised by citizens of Georgia under a state law that allows voters to challenge the eligibility of candidates on the state’s ballot. It is the states that run elections in the U.S., and national elections are just a compilation of the results of the 50 state elections.

The state law requires “every candidate for federal” office who is certified by the state executive committees of a political party or who files a notice of candidacy “shall meet the constitutional and statutory qualifications for holding the office being sought.”

State law also grants the secretary of state and any “elector who is eligible to vote for a candidate” in the state the authority to raise a challenge to a candidate’s qualifications, the judge determined.

Citizens raising concerns include David Farrar, Leah Lax, Thomas Malaren and Laurie Roth, represented by Taitz; David Weldon represented by attorney Van R. Irion of Liberty Legal Foundation;and Carl Swensson and Kevin Richard Powell, represented by J. Mark Hatfield. Cody Judy is raising a challenge because he also wants to be on the ballot.

Top constitutional expert Herb Titus contends that a “natural-born citizen” is born of parents who are citizens. That argument also is supported by a 19th-century U.S. Supreme Court decision, Minor vs. Happersett in 1875. The case includes one of very few references in the nation’s archives that addresses the definition of “natural-born citizen.”

That case states: “The Constitution does not in words say who shall be natural-born citizens. Resort must be had elsewhere to ascertain that. At common law, with the nomenclature of which the framers of the Constitution were familiar, it was never doubted that all children born in a country of parents who were its citizens became themselves, upon their birth, citizens also. These were natives or natural-born citizens, as distinguished from aliens or foreigners.”

An extensive analysis of the issue was conducted by Titus, who has taught constitutional law, common law and other subjects for 30 years at five different American Bar Association-approved law schools. He also was the founding dean of the College of Law at Regent University, a trial attorney and special assistant U.S. attorney in the Department of Justice.

“‘Natural born citizen’ in relation to the office of president, and whether someone is eligible, was in the Constitution from the very beginning,” he said. “Another way of putting it; there is a law of the nature of citizenship. If you are a natural born citizen, you are a citizen according to the law of nature, not according to any positive statement in a Constitution or in a statute, but because of the very nature of your birth and the very nature of nations.”

If you “go back and look at what the law of nature would be or would require … that’s precisely what a natural born citizen is …. is one who is born to a father and mother each of whom is a citizen of the U.S. or whatever other country,” he said.

“Now what we’ve learned from the Hawaii birth certificate is that Mr. Obama’s father was not a citizen of the United States. His mother was, but he doesn’t qualify as a natural born citizen for the office of president.”

Many Cranston, Rhode Island, citizens likely found themselves frustrated over 16-year-old Jessica Ahlquist’s successful crusade against a prayer banner in her high school. Others, of course, supported her efforts.

But following the educational and theological debate surrounding the mural’s presence, there’s a new point of contention to debate over — the weighty cost of the legal battle she launched.

As we’ve reported, U.S. District Court Judge Ronald Lagueux ruled in Ahlquist’s favor last month. While the district hasn’t yet decided whether it will appeal, the current decision requires the mural to come down and the district to pay for the teenager’s legal feels. According to the final tally, the city of Cranston is being asked to dole out $173,000 in legal fees. This, of course, is on top of the costs the district incurred in both staff and legal fees for its own defense.

Lawyers from the Rhode Island chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union filed the request for funds on Tuesday. In addition to making the monumental financial demand, the ACLU claims that the lump sum doesn’t encompass all of the time that the group spent on the case. Ahlquist will apparently only receive $25 in damages.

Since the ruling, the teenager has faced ridicule from classmates, politicians — even local businesses. However, she’s standing by her original claim that the banner is unconstitutional and she shows no signs of backing down.

“It’s almost like making a child get a shot even though they don’t want to,” she said last week. “It’s for their own good. I feel like they might see it as a very negative thing right now, but I’m defending their Constitution, too.”

Halfway through what might turn out to be the second mildest U.S. winter on record, major parts of the nation’s economy are feeling the impact, for better or worse.

Apparel sales have been dented, ski slopes are emptier, and there has probably been a modest impact on economic figures for everything from payroll numbers to housing starts.

But lower energy prices mean that some consumers and municipal governments will likely benefit as heating charges and snow removal costs decline. And some retailers are betting on the early sale of lawn mowers.

After two brutally long winters, the temperatures this year have been so balmy – forecasters say the average temperatures across the nation have been 3-4 degrees Fahrenheit above normal in January – that many Americans have been wondering whether the cold will arrive at all.

In January, the U.S. recorded the least amount of snowfall since the mild winter of 2006, while Canada had the second lowest snowfall amount in 50 years, according to Planalytics weather forecasters.

Natural gas prices have slumped to 10-year lows as warm weather cuts heating demand, hammering the profits of drillers and forcing firms like Chesapeake Energy and ConocoPhillips to shut in production.

In shopping malls, retailers are struggling to get rid of winter clothing as consumers do without seasonal apparel.

“We are going through peak heating season and temperatures have been well above normal for most of the nation with weather maps going into early February painting a similar picture,” said Chris Jarvis, president of Caprock Risk Management in Rye, New Hampshire.

Below is a summary of some of the sectors affected:

NATURAL GAS PRICES

Energy prices offer the clearest signal that the weather isn’t behaving normally, as traders scour forecast screens for a hint of how much heat households and businesses will need in the coming days and weeks.

The answer this winter: not much. November, December and January have come and gone without much sustained cold in the major energy demand centers such as the Northeast, swelling gas inventories to more than 20 percent above last year. Even oil demand has been hit slightly.

Heating degree days, a measurement that reflects the strength of energy demand for home heating, are running 12 percent below winter norms and analysts say gas storage levels will remain high unless there is an extreme and prolonged spell into early spring.

To return storage levels to normal by the end of winter, every single day between mid-February and mid-April would need to be 10 degrees colder than normal, according to Jan Schulte, in-house analyst at Thomson Reuters Natural Gas Analytics.

“That is simply impossible,” Schulte said.

Above-normal temperatures are forecast for the first half of February, though private forecaster Weather Services International sees colder than normal temperatures across most of the northern and western United States for some weeks after that.

THE ECONOMY

The mild winter likely provided a slight temporary boost to the economy as builders broke ground on new home construction earlier than normal, though researchers at JPMorgan recently estimated this impact was minor.

Goldman Sachs estimates the weather probably led employers to add about 20,000 jobs to payrolls in December, about 10 percent of the total gain in employment that month.

Fewer snow storms allowed people to shop more readily. Without the mild weather, there may have been a small contraction in retail sales in December rather than a 0.1 percent increase, Goldman estimates.

Lower spending by households on heating in the fourth quarter subtracted a bit from economic growth during the period. The money, though, may show up eventually in higher consumption of other products and services or in a higher savings rate.

RETAIL

Warm winter weather forced many U.S. retailers to offer deeper-than-usual discounts in January to clear their shelves off winter gear ranging from coats and sweaters to boots and gloves. Meanwhile restaurants and beer sellers might see a kick up in business.

“In this economy, nobody is going to buy unless there is a need for it, and the weather says, ‘You don’t need it,’” said Scott Bernhardt, chief operating officer of Planalytics, which provides weather data for businesses.

“It’s apparel that’s hit the most,” said Bernhardt, who expects outerwear sales to drop 20 to 30 percent in the month. Demand was weak for items such as snow shovels and rock salt as well, Bernhardt said.

At a Home Depot store in Overland Park, Kansas, where the temperature was an unseasonably warm 65 degrees Fahrenheit on Tuesday, snow shovels, snow blowers and other winter equipment had been relegated to a small corner at the end of the store. Prime selling space has been given over to shiny green lawn mowers.

A Target store in the Kansas City area had snow sleds on clearance last week.

Toro Co, which makes snow throwers, would not provide specifics on demand ahead of its quarterly earnings report. “Certainly the snow thrower products we sell would be negatively impacted by the lack of snow pretty much everywhere,” said Kurt Svendsen, spokesman for Toro.

Instead of hats, gloves and snow blowers, what consumers may be after in balmy weather is a nice cold beer.

“Warm weather does always help beer sales in the winter. Hard to quantify how much it’s helped the past two months though. Too early to tell,” said Harry Schuhmacher, editor and publisher of Beer Business Daily.

LOCAL GOVERNMENT

The mild winter is delivering welcome savings to many U.S. local governments still battling drag from the financial crisis and subsequent deep recession.

Cities, counties and other local governments report lower costs on heating bills for schools and other government buildings.

Lower overtime costs for ploughing crews, less use of salt to de-ice highways, and less wear and tear on equipment and roads, have also helped local authorities.

The state of Illinois reported that it saved $50,000 in December on heating the State Capitol and other buildings it controls in the state.

In Chicago, where a single fierce blizzard blew through the city’s snow budget in February 2011, the unseasonably warm December and January have barely dented the $20 million allocated for snow costs.

Plows were deployed just nine times in the past two months, versus 17 times during the same two months in the previous winter, while the amount of salt used so far is about half, said Matt Smith, spokesman for Chicago’s Department of Streets and Sanitation.

But the city, where Mayor Rahm Emanuel continues to chip away at a nearly $636 million structural budget gap with layoffs and other measures, is not counting yet on any savings.

“Just like every snow flake is different, every winter is different,” Smith said, adding “we still have a long way to go this winter.”

Kansas City snowfall this season is just three-tenths of an inch, down from the 1981-2010 seasonal average snowfall of 19.5 inches, and following two years when snowfall annually topped 40 inches, according to Kansas State climatologist Mary Knapp.

So far this has saved at least $250,000 in overtime pay, fuel and other snow-removal costs, city spokesman Dennis Gagnon said.

“No one wants to put a number on total savings, because you never know what will happen, and last February we had a big storm,” Gagnon said. “If we don’t use any salt, and can use it next year, additional savings might be as much as $1.3 million.”

The savings in the city’s $2.75 million yearly budget for snow removal were being offset by lost revenues tied to a tax on home heating fuel use, Gagnon said.

TOURISM

Business at ski resorts in New Hampshire in the U.S Northeast is down roughly 30 percent from a year ago because of the warmer weather, hurting sales at local inns and restaurants as well as the earnings of staff, said Ben Craig, snowsports school director and resort marketing coordinator for Dartmouth Skiway in the state.

“The warmer weather has certainly impacted business,” Craig said. “When people don’t see snow in their front yard, it’s hard to get excited to go skiing,” he said.

The lack of natural snow has forced the Dartmouth Skiway to make more snow than normal, raising costs, Craig said.

“A lot of ski resorts are in more rural areas and they are the biggest economic factor in those areas,” he said.

Warm-weather travel is also less on people’s minds when they don’t see snow on the ground, travel industry executives said.

David Fishman, president of Cadillac Travel in the Detroit suburb of Southfield, Michigan, said people have to be reminded during warmer winters that they want to go on vacation, preferably to a place where it’s sunnier.

“When it’s like this, people don’t think about travel as much,” he said. “People just aren’t as quick to pull the trigger because they are not looking outside or seeing snow or ice.”