By: Neil Stevens (Diary)  |  May 23rd at 03:30 AM  | 

Unnecessary legislation watch: House Democrats (and a Republican) want to meddle in the matter of employer access to Facebook. Sure, a lot of people aren’t smart about Facebook, but that’s no good reason to expand government here. Let’s not micromanage. We just went over this with ECPA.

How can we trust new government regulations of Cybersecurity, Obama-style, when heavily regulated utilities are doing so poorly? That’s why we need a light touch, low on regulation, CISPA-style.

By: Dan McLaughlin (Diary)  |  May 22nd at 05:59 PM  | 

Let me put down here some facts that are worth returning to from time to time, as arguments over the history of Islam and Islamism are back in the news with today’s beheading in London. In debates over the history of tension between Muslims and Christians, the Crusades are often cited, out of their historical context, as the original cause of such clashes, as if | Read More »

By: Moe Lane (Diary)  |  May 22nd at 05:00 PM  | 

The New York Times baldly says why (bolding mine): “One day before President Obama is due to deliver a major speech on national security, his administration on Wednesday formally acknowledged that the United States had killed four American citizens in drone strikes in Yemen and Pakistan.” Best to have that finally on the record before said speech, eh? – Particularly since the administration needs to tread | Read More »

By: jefflandry (Diary)  |  May 22nd at 02:33 PM  | 

Right now, the Louisiana Legislature is considering legislation to force Governor Jindal to accept the Medicaid expansion portion of Obamacare, and some Republican legislators are supporting it. While I may not agree with our governor 100 percent of the time, Gov. Jindal is 100 percent right in rejecting the expansion. Over time, the Medicaid expansion will impose a greater financial burden on Louisiana’s state government, | Read More »

By: Daniel Horowitz (Diary)  |  May 22nd at 01:51 PM  | 

The best way to win a political argument is by manipulating the rhetoric used to describe the two sides in a debate.  The Democrats and the Chuck Schumer Republicans have done a marvelous job hijacking the term “reform” and deriding those who oppose their bill to grant mass amnesty, double record immigration levels, and hamper future enforcement, as anti “immigration reform.”  They have repeated the | Read More »

By: Ben Howe (Diary)  |  May 22nd at 12:30 PM  | 

It seems that Google is constantly falling afoul of conservatives, consumers, pundits, regulators and really everyone else on earth (except for the Obama campaign) for its privacy-infringing tendencies. It got hammered for “alleged” spying in the Safarigate scandal, where it wound up agreeing to a record-breaking $22.5 million fine in connection with charges it surreptitiously tracked Apple Safari users who Google had said could opt | Read More »

By: Breeanne Howe (Diary)  |  May 22nd at 12:00 PM  | 

Four years ago, comedian and Fox News contributor Steven Crowder issued his first Qur’an Challenge video wherein he explored who Muhammad was and if the Muslim religion really was the “religion of peace.”   He asked viewers to let him know if he was misinterpreting the Qur’an and/or if anything had changed in the religion since the book was first written.  The video was a hit | Read More »

By: Steve Maley (Diary)  |  May 22nd at 11:30 AM  | 

First Bill Jefferson, now Martha Shoffner. Cash-filled pie boxes are a recurring theme among corrupt Democrats.

By: Repair_Man_Jack (Diary)  |  May 22nd at 10:30 AM  | 

Since August or September of 480BC, Western Culture has been well aware of the power multiplier that comes with establishing and holding a choke point. When King Leonidas of Sparta held a vast army of Persians at bay for several days with a smaller force at Thermopylae; the world then knew that chokepoints were strategic fulcrums from whence power could be leveraged far beyond its initial limits. The economic analog to such a chokepoint is the monopoly. The government permit power is just such a chokepoint generating function to empower the state beyond its circumscribed constitutional limits.

When the government controls activity via permit, they are able to do several things that go far beyond their enumerated Constitutional powers. They can pick winners and losers. They can dictate the size and scope of activities without having to depend on the approval of courts or legislators. An agency wielding permit power can skim a surplus off the top through fees that go beyond the cost of providing inspection and certification related to the permit. Like a gang of brigands controlling a bridge, a regulating agency can use the permit power to dictate who gets to pass, how much traffic traverses the road and how much in bribes have to be paid in order to get across the river

By: Brad Jackson (Diary)  |  May 22nd at 10:05 AM  | 

On today’s edition of Coffee and Markets, Brad Jackson is joined by Kristina Ribali to discuss her work with The Blaze and their Mercury One charity to help victims of the devastating tornado in Moore, Oklahoma earlier this week, the 24 hour telethon they are having tomorrow on The Blaze Radio and how you can contribute to their relief efforts.

By: Daniel Horowitz (Diary)  |  May 22nd at 09:16 AM  | 

If I were granted one wish about the state of today’s politics it would be for the Democrats to be saddled with their own version of John McCain.  Once again, McCain is working to score points for Democrats and undermine Cruz/Paul and Lee – the “Wacko Birds” – in their attempt to prevent a free debt ceiling increase. Back in January, Republicans and conservatives got | Read More »

By: Dana Loesch (Diary)  |  May 21st at 11:31 PM  | 

This was just too much. Lerner’s attorney offers this excuse as to why she’s pleading the 5th: Lerner ‘has not committed any crime or made any misrepresentation,’ Taylor’s letter read, ‘but under the circumstances she has no choice but to take this course.’ He is asking the oversight committee to excuse Lerner from testifying, claiming that calling her in a congressional hearing would ‘have no | Read More »

By: Breeanne Howe (Diary)  |  May 21st at 05:00 PM  | 

According to The Hill, there is new legislation coming down the pipe that aims to protect women from being lied to about their health care. Democrats in the House and Senate are looking to stop what they say are deceptive advertising practices by anti-abortion health clinics that imply they offer abortion services, but instead encourage birth and promote adoption. The legislation is aimed at crisis | Read More »

By: John Hayward  |  May 21st at 03:50 PM  | 

Serfdom is making a big comeback these days.  It never really went out of style, of course, but it’s remarkable how many people are now willing to submit to government authority without question, or without much in the way of expectations.  Shoddy performance, from fiscal insolvency to a moribund economy, is no cause for outrage among the modern serfs.  They accept the “New Normal” without | Read More »

By: Daniel Horowitz (Diary)  |  May 21st at 03:43 PM  | 

It looks like Mitch McConnell’s pass from Chuck Schumer to publicly remain silent on the amnesty bill has expired. While McConnell has come out of the witness protection program to attack the ‘low-hanging fruit’ IRS scandal with alacrity, he has remained silent on the most profound threat to our Republic – the Schumer immigration reform bill.  How can the sitting GOP leader remain silent on | Read More »

By: Chris Versace (Diary)  |  May 21st at 11:58 AM  | 

As you know, there is a lot going on in the press these days — with the IRS targeting conservatives, federal officials scandalously obtaining the phone records of AP journalists and the killing of four Americans by terrorists at the U.S. consulate in Benghazi, Libya, to name a few. Another key concern is immigration and immigration reform. Joining me this week on PowerTalk to sort | Read More »

By: Moe Lane (Diary)  |  May 21st at 11:30 AM  | 

Well.  Isn’t this a thing: Sharyl Attkisson, the Emmy-award winning CBS News investigative reporter, says that her personal and work computers have been compromised and are under investigation. “I can confirm that an intrusion of my computers has been under some investigation on my end for some months but I’m not prepared to make an allegation against a specific entity today as I’ve been patient and | Read More »

By: Repair_Man_Jack (Diary)  |  May 21st at 10:44 AM  | 

I apologize. Lizz Winstead is no longer part of The Daily Show. An earlier version of this article strongly implied that she still directed the content of Daily Show jokes. ‘This tornado is in Oklahoma so clearly it has been ordered to only target conservatives,’ wrote comedian Lizz Winstead, in a tweet, around 3:30 Monday afternoon. (HT:Daily Mail) Earlier this Spring I pondered why this | Read More »

By: Brad Jackson (Diary)  |  May 21st at 10:00 AM  | 

On today’s edition of Coffee and Markets, Brad Jackson and Ben Domenech are joined by former Arizona Attorney General Grant Woods to discuss the immigration reform bill in the Senate, problems he faced as a border state AG and why new technology could help us secure the border.

By: Erick Erickson (Diary)  |  May 21st at 04:30 AM  | 

I think Governor Rick Perry is the conservative Ben Kenobi. I started to title this piece, “Help me Obi Wan Perry, You’re My Only Hope.” In light of the IRS scandal, you would think that Texas Republicans would not be so foolish as to vote for SB 346 in the state legislature, but apparently they are that foolish. The legislation, in Texas of all places, | Read More »

By: Neil Stevens (Diary)  |  May 20th at 10:30 PM  | 

You know what happens when you use other people’s email services, such as Yahoo or Google? You become especially vulnerable to attacks on your privacy, including the ability of the government to search your email provider’s computers. The ECPA is a red herring, really. Sure, we an tweak it, but when you use somebody else’s computer, I’m not sure you should have much of an expectation of privacy.

Hey, look: While Pandora spends money lobbying to try to change the law to rig the system, Apple is negotiating to get what it wants for Internet radio like a free market participant should.

By: Daniel Horowitz (Diary)  |  May 20th at 07:08 PM  | 

A common ploy in parliamentarian scheming is for leaders to hand out hall passes for vulnerable members to vote against leadership’s proposal, knowing that it has the votes to pass anyway.  The rationale is that those members should be able to hoodwink their constituents without compromising passage of the bill.  This dynamic usually plays out with the leadership and rank-and-file of the same party, but | Read More »

By: John Hayward  |  May 20th at 04:58 PM  | 

The proper attitude of government towards its citizens is humility.  The State kneels before the people who invest it with terrible authority.  The Declaration of Independence and Constitution are full of language that illustrates this relationship, but you don’t have to look back that far, because American politicians constantly cloak themselves in the language of humility.  They always talk about how honored they are to receive | Read More »

By: Dana Loesch (Diary)  |  May 20th at 04:44 PM  | 

Where was the DOJ on this leak? Eric Holder claimed that the story on the Yemen terror plot bust was the “worst” leak he’d seen. In fact, WaPo says just the opposite, that: For five days, reporters at the Associated Press had been sitting on a big scoop about a foiled al-Qaeda plot at the request of CIA officials. Then, in a hastily scheduled Monday morning meeting, the journalists were | Read More »

By: Moe Lane (Diary)  |  May 20th at 03:30 PM  | 

The Occupiers apparently plan to come out by the tens tomorrow to show their support for Democratic Virginia gubernatorial candidate Terry McAuliffe: Contrast that with Occupy Roanoke’s rhetoric in 2011: …we would like to see the end of paid lobbyists. Washington’s K Street is made up of many former legislators and staff whose job it is to help write the laws after showering Congress with | Read More »