The Washington Times reports the era of big government has returned with a vengeance, in the form of the largest federal work force in modern history.

The Obama administration says the government will grow to 2.15 million employees this year, topping 2 million for the first time since President Clinton declared that “the era of big government is over” and joined forces with a Republican-led Congress in the 1990s to pare back the federal work force.  [Read More]

According to Townhall, a Senior Intelligence Officials instructed Congress today that Al-Qaeda is expected to attempt an attack on the United States in the next three to six months.

CIA Director Leon Panetta insists the terrorist organization is deploying operatives to the United States to carry out new attacks from inside the country, including “clean” recruits with a negligible trail of terrorist contacts.  [Read More]

According to the Wall Street Journal, the Senate voted 70-30 to reappoint Ben Bernanke for a second four-year term as chairman of the Federal Reserve.

Democrats have been running around frantically pushing the ‘necessary’ re-confirmation of Bernanke (just as they did with the Porkulus, Healthcare, Climategate, etc.) while promoting little examination of his effect on the American economy.  Sen. Robert Menendez, (D) New Jersey rambled a fearful message today stating, “”To vote against confirmation could unnerve investors and exacerbate economic uncertainty.”

Republican Sen. Richard Shelby of Alabama, the senior Republican on the Senate Banking Committee reminded the American people that “Bernanke fiddled while our markets burned.”  [Read More]

The markets responded quite contrary to Sen. Menendez’ remarks with the dramatic plunge upon news of the Bernanke re-confirmation.  Americans and investors alike understand that a vote for Bernanke is a vote for more Bailouts and further Government intervention into the private sector and their daily lives.  Until midterm elections later this year, one can only wonder how much more destruction the Obama Administration and Democrats in Congress will unleash on the American economy and way of life.

From Michelle Malkin at Townhall:

There are more loopholes in President Obama’s proposed “spending freeze” than in an Olympic volleyball net. Gargantuan government entitlements (Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid) are exempt. A half-trillion in unspent stimulus money is exempt. Foreign aid is exempt. The Democrats’ proposed $154 billion jobs bill (Stimulus II) is exempt.

Pet federal education programs will be exempt (including $4 billion for the White House “Race to the Top” standards initiative and an additional $1.35 billion he just requested in the 2011 budget). Green jobs spending will be exempt. (Obama proposed $10 billion in new clean energy spending earlier this month.) Electorally driven tax-credit expansions will be exempt. The health care takeover plan is not included. As even The New York Times reported, the “estimated $250 billion in savings over 10 years would be less than 3 percent of the roughly $9 trillion in additional deficits the government is expected to accumulate over that time.”  [Read More]

ASSOCIATED PRESS, SEOUL – North Korea fired artillery rounds toward its disputed sea border with South Korea on Wednesday, prompting a barrage of warning shots from the South’s military and raising tensions on the divided peninsula.  No casualties or damage was reported following the incident.

North Korea fired about 30 artillery rounds into the sea from its western coast and the South immediately responded with 100 shots from a marine base on an island near the sea border, an officer at the Joint Chiefs of Staff in Seoul said. The North said it would continue to fire rounds.  [Read More]

(H/T The Washington Times)

Nearly one year after Barack Obama put the ink down to sign his stimulus (the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, ARRA) into law, the CBO has ‘updated’ its estimate on how much it will cost. The unsurprisingly more expensive new estimate will cost taxpayers another $75 billion.

When ARRA was being considered, the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) and the staff of the Joint Committee on taxation (JCT) estimated that it would increase budget deficits by a total of $787 billion… it appears that ARRA will have larger effects in later years than originally estimated. All told, CBO now anticipates that the law will increase deficits by $862 billion.  [Read More]

(H/T Townhall)

BOSTON –Yahoo News has reported an epic upset in liberal Massachusetts. Republican Scott Brown rode a wave of voter anger toward President Obama today to defeat Democrat Martha Coakley in a U.S. Senate election that left President Barack Obama’s health care overhaul in doubt and capped off his first year of failures in office.  The response by today’s voters acts as a clear referendum on the President and his Agenda.

Immediately, Brown will become the 41st Republican in the 100-member Senate, which could allow the GOP to block the president’s health care legislation and the rest of Obama’s agenda. Democrats needed Coakley to win for a 60th vote to thwart Republican filibusters.  [Read More]

(H/T The Drudge Report)

BOSTON, Mass.—With the leftist agenda hanging in the balance, President Barack Obama plunged Sunday into the hotly contested Massachusetts Senate race, urging voters to rally around the drowning Democratic candidate Martha Coakley.  Republican candidate Scott Brown, a state senator, said the president’s visit was a result of a “distress call to Washington” by the Coakley campaign.

Mr. Brown is riding a grassroots wave fueled by public discontent, and is appealing to independents, who make up more than 50% of the state’s registered voters, as well as Republicans.   The unexpectedly tight race has raised concern among Democrats that the party may be in for a trouncing this Fall, when all seats in the House and one third of those in the Senate are up for grabs.  Democrats control the Senate with a 60-vote majority, enough to override any Republican veto. A win by Mr. Brown would alter the numbers and throw the White House’s agenda into disarray.

On Sunday the nonpartisan Cook Political Report, which closely follows national campaigns, said the Massachusetts race remains “very much of a toss up,” with Mr. Brown “holding onto a very narrow, single-digit lead.”  The report added, “Given the vagaries of voter turnout, particularly in lower participation level special elections, this race could still go either way, but we put a finger on the scale for Brown.”   [Read More]

According to the Telegraph, Tim Geithner’s Federal Reserve Bank of New York urged AIG (American International Group) to remain silent on $105B paid to banks including Goldman Sachs and Deutsche Bank.

A series of emails obtained and made public by Congressman Darrell Issa reveal that AIG had planned to inform investors in a regulatory filing published on December 24, 2008.  AIG had paid counter-party banks owed money at a rate of 100 cents on the dollar.

However, according to the emails, an official from the NY Fed crossed out the reference ahead of publication, and there was no mention of the payments, which came to light five months later, in the filing.  “It appears that the New York Fed deliberately pressured AIG to restrict and delay the disclosure of important information,” said Congressman Issa. [Read More]

So much for transparency in Washington during this new age of ‘hope and change.’  It’s about time for our personal tax-cheat Tim Geithner to receive his walking papers as he has done nothing to end the recession, and at the same time has done everything in his power to flourish it.

According to the Washington Post, Senator Chris Dodd (D-Conn.) will announce his retirement from the Senate tomorrow:

Word of Dodd’s retirement plans comes after months of speculation about his political future, his faltering poll numbers and a growing sense among the Democratic establishment that he could not win a sixth term in the Senate.

After 20 years in the Senate it’s about time!  Sadly, Dodd’s departure will likely put his solid blue district in safe Democrat hands. But we can still celebrate the demise of a corrupt Democratic dinosaur, and who knows? we might just have a chance.

Iranian media on Sunday reported Tehran will conduct a large-scale military exercise next month, coinciding with what government officials now say is a deadline for the West to respond to its counteroffer to a nuclear-fuel deal.

The commander of Iran’s ground forces, Brig. Gen. Ahmad-Reza Pourdastan, said the drill will be conducted by Iran’s army, in conjunction with some units of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, to improve “defensive capabilities,” Press TV, the English-language, state-run media outlet reported. [Read More]

(H/T The Drudge Report)

At least a dozen former Guantánamo Bay inmates have rejoined al-Qaeda to fight in Yemen, The Times has learnt, amid growing concern over the ability of the country’s Government to accept almost 100 more former inmates from the detention centre.

The Obama Administration promised to close the Guantánamo facility by January 22, a deadline that it will be unable to meet. The 91 Yemeni prisoners in Guantánamo make up the largest national contingent among the 198 being held.

Six prisoners were returned to Yemen last month. After the Christmas Day bomb plot in Detroit, US officials are increasingly concerned that the country is becoming a hot-bed of terrorism. Eleven of the former inmates known to have rejoined al-Qaeda in Yemen were born in Saudi Arabia. The organisation merged its Saudi and Yemeni offshoots last year.  [Read More]

(H/T The Drudge Report)

Now that our attention is focused on airline security measures thanks to the failed airline attack on Christmas Day, it’s worth mentioning that one senator took money away from aviation security to line the pockets of a constituency that supported his presidential campaign in a big way.

According to the Washington Examiner, back in July, Senator Chris Dodd, D-Conn., proposed an amendment reducing aviation security appropriations by $4.5 million in favor of firefighter grants — a notoriously inneffective program. In fact, the money was specifically “for screening operations and the amount for explosives detection systems.”

The amendment was also sponsored by Sen. Lieberman, D-Conn., and Sen. Carper, D-Del., but Dodd deserves to be singled out here because the firefighters union is a pet constituency of his. In 2007 he campaigned all through Iowa with the firefighters union. It was one of the few distinguishable features of Dodd’s ill-fated presidential bid.  [Read More]

(H/T The Drudge Report)

According to a Wall Street Journal Report, a passenger on a Detroit-bound Northwest Airlines flight tried Friday to detonate an explosive device strapped to his leg and later told investigators he had affiliations with al Qaeda and was trying to blow up the plane, according to a senior U.S. official.

The suspect told investigators he was given the device by al Qaeda operatives in Yemen, along with detonation instructions, the official said.  Rep. Peter King (R., N.Y.) identified the man as a 23-year-old Nigerian named Abdul Mudallad.

Officials said they believed the man boarded a KLM flight in Lagos, Nigeria, and changed planes in Amsterdam.  The suspect’s name didn’t appear on any terrorist watch lists maintained by U.S. authorities, Mr. King said, but it turned up “hot” in other terrorism-related databases maintained by intelligence officials.  [Read More]

WASHINGTON (AP) – President Barack Obama’s commitment to close the U.S. detention center at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, by next month may be delayed until 2011 because it will take months for the government to buy an Illinois prison and upgrade it to hold suspected terrorists.

The drawn-out construction timetable shows the political risk of Obama’s pledge, a delay that could even be extended by congressional opposition to funding the purchase and upgrades for the Thomson Correctional Center, an underused state facility about 150 miles west of Chicago.

Lawmakers in both parties have been wary of bringing detainees to the United States. Attorney General Eric Holder already has decided that self-declared 9/11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and four others will be tried in federal court in New York City.  [Read More]

(H/T The Drudge Report)

The Congressional Budget Office’s analysis of the final Senate health care bill indicates it would slap a mandatory annual fee of about $15,000 on middle-class families that earn an annual income greater than 400 percent of the federal poverty level ($88,200 for a family of four) and are not provided with health insurance by their employer.

The Senate health care bill gives employers two powerful incentives to stop offering health insurance coverage to their workers. First, if an employer does offer coverage, its lower-wage workers will lose the federal insurance subsidy they would otherwise get. Secondly, if an employer does not offer coverage, the $750-per-worker fine it faces will be far less than the premiums it would pay if it did offer coverage.

Where does this leave a mom and dad with two children and an annual income greater than $88,200? It leaves them without employer-based health insurance and facing a federally mandated $15,000-per-year insurance bill.  [Read More]

–

How’s that Hope and Change workin’ for ya?

Citizens all around the nation are showing their support this holiday season for the three Navy SEALs facing courts martial after capturing one of the most wanted terrorists in Iraq, and the most effective place for those to share their concerns and support the SEALs has been on the internet.

While much of the mainstream media has overlooked this story in the wake of looming healthcare reform and Tiger Woods’s marital woes, patriotic netroots have organized multi-purpose mediums in which citizens can easily locate and sign petitions, make donations, and voice their opinion.

A Facebook group named “Protest the prosecution of 3 Navy SEALs” has a whopping 175,000 members and the creator of the group Graham Ware told HUMAN EVENTS that it has grown at a rate of 10-12 thousand members per day.  [READ MORE]

The search for the organizers of an airplane filled with North Korean weapons bound for Iran and detained in Thailand has led to a company in Hong Kong.  A company called Union Top Management Ltd., registered in Hong Kong, signed a contract this month to lease the cargo plane, according to documents obtained by arms-trafficking researchers in Belgium and the U.S.

Attempts to reach Dario Cabreros Garmendia, listed in public documents as Union Top Management’s owner and director were unsuccessful.  A woman who answered the phone at an office in Hong Kong given on Union Top Management documents provided an email address for Mr. Garmendia. An email sent to the address was returned as undeliverable. Union Top Management’s filings list a Barcelona, Spain, postal address for Mr. Garmendia.  [Read More]

(H/T WSJ)

WASHINGTON — Political frustration over the bailouts of Wall Street and high unemployment erupted in the House Thursday, with one committee threatening to impose tighter scrutiny on the Federal Reserve and another trading words with Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner.

The House Financial Services Committee voted, 43-26, to approve a measure sponsored by Texas Republican Ron Paul, vociferously opposed by the Fed, that would direct the congressional Government Accountability Office to expand its audits of the Fed to include decisions about interest rates and lending to individual banks.

At the Joint Economic Committee, a couple of House Republicans called for the resignation of Mr. Geithner, who, as president of the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, played a major role in last fall’s moves to gain an ever-increasing control of the nation’s financial system. “The public has lost all confidence in your ability to do the job,” said Rep. Kevin Brady, Republican of Texas.

Although several Democrats defended Mr. Geithner at the hearing, some liberal Democrats have been complaining that the Obama administration isn’t doing enough to combat unemployment. Rep. Peter DeFazio (D., Ore.) called on Mr. Geithner to resign this week, and said in an interview that Mr. Geithner is too close to Wall Street.  [Read More]

(H/T Drudge Report)

Here are a few choice words from Jeffrey S. Flier, the Dean of Harvard Medical School regarding the ongoing healthcare debate by Congress and the Obama Administration:

As the dean of Harvard Medical School I am frequently asked to comment on the health-reform debate. I’d give it a failing grade.

Instead of forthrightly dealing with the fundamental problems, discussion is dominated by rival factions struggling to enact President Barack Obama’s agenda. The rhetoric is exaggerated and often deceptive. Those of us for whom the central issue is health—not politics—have been left in the lurch. And as controversy heads toward a conclusion in Washington, it appears that the people who favor the legislation are engaged in collective denial.

Our health-care system suffers from problems of cost, access and quality, and needs major reform.  A regulatory morass limits innovation. And deep flaws in Medicare and Medicaid drive spending without optimizing care.

Speeches and news reports can lead you to believe that proposed congressional legislation would tackle the problems of cost, access and quality. But that’s not true. The various bills do deal with access by expanding Medicaid and mandating subsidized insurance at substantial cost—and thus addresses an important social goal. However, there are no provisions to substantively control the growth of costs or raise the quality of care. So the overall effort will fail to qualify as reform.  [Read More]

(H/T WSJ)