The Patriot Post® · Joe Was the Only One Laughing

“If a wise man has an argument with a fool, the fool only rages and laughs, and there is no quiet.” –Proverbs 29:9

Conventional wisdom says that vice presidential debates don’t move the needle in elections, and last night’s debate was probably no exception. That said, Thursday night’s debate couldn’t have contrasted two more different candidates. Paul Ryan, the respectful, serious and earnest policy wonk, against Joe Biden, who behaved like a drunken clown and a jerk and paid due homage to the mascot of the Democrat Party – the Jackass.

On substance, Ryan held his own against Vice President Chuckles, despite having to face a second debate opponent in “moderator” Martha Raddatz of ABC News. Yet on style, whether the subject was the terrorist attack on our Libyan embassy, the ailing economy or abortion, Biden smiled, laughed, sneered, rolled his eyes and strategically interrupted Ryan every time the congressman hit his stride on an answer. And if it wasn’t Biden interrupting, it was Raddatz.

Biden is obviously a disciple of Saul Alinksy, who in his “Rules for Radicals,” Rule No. 5, said, “Ridicule is man’s most potent weapon. It is almost impossible to counterattack ridicule. Also it infuriates the opposition, who then react to your advantage.” Clearly, the Obama team decided that the president’s failure last week was that he was “too polite,” and that Biden had to use ridicule to shore up their anxious base. The result was appalling, but then again, Biden has been rehearsing his socialist obfuscation and diversion in Washington for 40 years.

With that, here are a few high- and lowlights.

Libya: Biden blamed the intelligence community for the ever-changing story coming from the White House, and flat out lied when he claimed ignorance as a defense. “[W]e weren’t told they wanted more security” at the embassy, he said.. But the bottom line is that the whole episode is, as Ryan responded, “indicative of a broader problem,” and we’re witnessing “the unraveling of the Obama foreign policy.”

Iran: Biden made the ridiculous assertion that even though Iran has spent the last four years further developing fissile material for a nuclear weapon, “they have to be able to have something to put it in. There is no weapon that the Iranians have at this point.” Well, building a bomb to “put it in” is the easy part. When the argument shifted to how the ayatollah sees it, Biden argued that the administration’s “most crippling sanctions in the history of sanctions, period,” have the Iranians looking at an “economy being crippled … the currency going into the tank … [and] the economy going into free fall.” We wondered if he meant the Iran economy or the U.S. economy. Maybe the administration should ease up on sanctions here at home.

Economy: We have to give Raddatz props for asking Biden why White House projections of unemployment under 6 percent were so wrong, but Biden immediately defaulted to blaming Bush. He then berated Mitt Romney for wanting to “let Detroit go bankrupt,” in contrast to the administration, which “rescued General Motors.” What he neglected to mention was that Detroit did go bankrupt – the White House just made sure the unions came out okay.

Biden then proceeded to the usual leftist class warfare, accusing Republicans of holding the middle class “hostage” to tax cuts “for the super wealthy.” Yet tax policy should be about growth, not “fair shares” and “economic patriotism,” as Barack Obama put it last week. As Ryan noted, “The economy is barely limping along. It’s growing at 1.3 percent. That’s slower than it grew last year and last year was slower than the year before.” The Romney/Ryan tax cut plan – a 20 percent cut across the board with reforms to deductions and credits – is first and foremost a pro-growth plan. The so-called “cost” of cutting those taxes will be more than offset by economic growth. Ryan tried to note despite rude interruption that John F. Kennedy and Ronald Reagan did the same thing with great success, contrary to the leftist assertion that we “can’t afford” it and that the Bush-era tax cuts caused the current deficits.

As for unemployment, the real (U-6) rate, which includes those who are underemployed and those who have become discouraged and simply given up looking for work, is reported as 14.7 percent but, as with U-3, is probably much higher. In addition, the real unemployed and underemployed ranks of Americans have swollen to more than 20 million, households considered impoverished have grown to one in six, and there are 47 million food stamp recipients – up 50 percent since Obama’s election. Obama has also amassed $5 trillion in new debt, and our national debt now totals $16 trillion, which for the first time in history now exceeds U.S. annual economic output. Finally, median household income has declined by $4,520 (8.2 percent) since Obama took office (that’s the real “Obama tax”), energy prices have doubled because of Obama restrictions, and economic growth has slowed to an anemic 1.3 percent.

Biden made hay of Romney’s statement about 47 percent not paying federal income taxes, but that created an opening for Ryan’s best zinger of the night: “I think the vice president very well knows that sometimes the words don’t come out of your mouth the right way.”

Medicare and Social Security: Ryan hit the most critical point, saying, “Medicare and Social Security are going bankrupt. These are indisputable facts.” He noted that Democrats “got caught with their hands in the cookie jar, turning Medicare into a piggybank for ObamaCare,” taking $716 billion from future Medicare outlays to make ObamaCare look less expensive, but in essence trying to spend the same dollar twice. Biden countered with the same lie about Ryan’s “voucher” plan supposedly costing seniors $6,400 a year when it does nothing of the sort. Biden’s real assertion is the same old canard that markets and competition don’t work, only government does.

Taxes: This was largely covered under the economy section, but it was at this point that Ryan really nailed it: “[W]e think that government taking 28 percent of a family and business’s income is enough. President Obama thinks that the government ought to be able to take as much as 44.8 percent of a small business’s income.” And, given that “[e]ight out of 10 businesses file their taxes as individuals, not as corporations,” this is key.

Afghanistan: Ryan took issue with Obama’s withdrawal deadline because “we don’t want to lose the gains we’ve gotten. We want to make sure that the Taliban does not come back in and give al-Qa'ida a safe haven.” That’s exactly what’s beginning to happen under the current commander in chief. Biden’s reply was essentially that deadlines are good for cooperation. And, he noted, “I’ve been throughout that whole country, mostly in a helicopter, and sometimes in a vehicle.” Well then, that settles it!

Religion and abortion: This is not the top issue for most voters, but the candidates’ answers certainly were a window into their philosophies. While both men are Catholic, only one of them expressed genuine faith. Ryan noted that “reason and science” go hand in hand with his faith, saying that, when they saw the “seven-week ultrasound for our firstborn child, and we saw the heartbeat,” it confirmed to him that “life begins at conception.” Biden agreed, “Life begins at conception in the church’s judgment. I accept it in my personal life.” And yet somehow, in public policy, he’s determined to protect not that innocent life but a woman’s right to “control [her] body.” His faith teaches that abortion is murder, yet he thinks it should be legal and funded by the federal government. The contradiction was stunning.

Biden also played fast and loose with verb tenses in claiming that Catholic institutions don’t have to pay for contraception, per the ObamaCare mandate. They will next year. And Ryan responded with a simple question: If the administration is so great on religious liberty, “Why would they keep suing you?”

In closing: Biden struck the pose of the used-car salesman trying to make a deal with a sucker: “Who you gonna trust, me or your lyin’ eyes?” Ryan contrasted the two approaches, listing all of Obama’s unkept promises, and saying, “The choice is clear: a stagnant economy that promotes more government dependency or a dynamic, growing economy that promotes opportunity and jobs. … [W]e will not try to replace our founding principles. We will reapply our founding principles.” That would indeed be an excellent place to start.

Quote of the Week

“On nearly every specific issue on which Mr. Biden attacked, he was demonstrably wrong. The Administration’s Medicare actuary really does say that 15% of hospitals will take on operating deficits as a result of ObamaCare’s cuts in payments to Medicare providers. The American Enterprise Institute study doesn’t say that Mr. Romney’s plan will raise taxes on the middle class, and Mr. Ryan’s Medicare plan doesn’t raise costs for seniors by $6,400. Mr. Biden never even tried to offer a second-term agenda. But this 90 minutes wasn’t about an exchange of ideas or a debate over policies. It was a Democratic show of contempt for the opposition, an attempt to claim by repetitive assertion that Messrs. Ryan and Romney are radicals who want to destroy ‘the middle class.’ Mr. Ryan’s cool under assault was a visual rebuttal of that claim, and we certainly know who looked more presidential.” –The Wall Street Journal

On Cross-Examination

“A team of 19 Heritage [Foundation] experts cut through the malarkey and focused on [the] substance” of last night’s debate. Read their outstanding analysis.

Open Query

“Vice President Biden is laughing. Are you?” –Republican National Committee ad

Government and Politics

Campaign Trail: Obama’s Money Machine

A scandal is brewing over potential campaign-finance violations by the Obama campaign, but it’s not getting much press coverage. A new report by the Government Accountability Institute (GAI) notes that the Obama campaign has extraordinarily lax online security that leaves it open to receiving foreign and fraudulent donations. The 108-page study points out that the official Obama campaign website requires a credit card security code to purchase merchandise but not to make a contribution. It also doesn’t have a strong address verification system, which, like the security code, is a standard tool used in e-commerce.

The Federal Election Commission doesn’t require candidates to maintain basic credit card security procedures for online transactions, nor does it require recipients to record and track donations under $200. The problem here is that without proper security protocols in place, there is no way to determine if candidates are accepting foreign donations, which is illegal. But one might easily believe that the Obama campaign deliberately shirked these online security protocols in order to accept illegal foreign donations.

For 10 months during this election cycle, the campaign’s official website, BarackObama.com, received visitors redirected from a privately owned site, Obama.com. The latter URL was purchased in 2008 by businessman and Obama supporter Robert Roche, a China-based U.S. citizen with strong ties to several state-controlled financial institutions. The lax security procedures at BarackObama.com meant there was no way of knowing if any of the 68 percent of the foreign visitors to the Roche-owned site made illegal contributions to the president’s campaign. But we do know that Obama has raised over $270 million in contributions under $200. And we also know that in his 2008 campaign Obama raised $335 million in contributions under $200 with a similar open-door contribution policy and overall lack of transparency.

Hope ‘n’ Change: Obama Campaign Pulls Down Offensive Flags

As noted in Mark Alexander’s column, The ObamaNation Plantation, the Obama campaign store contained crudely painted American flags with the Obama seal taking the place of the stars. Called the “Our Stripes” collection, it now appears to have been pulled from the store. The links no longer work and we’ve been unable to locate the art on their site. Draw your own conclusions.

News From the Swamp: Senators Meet to Avoid Fiscal Cliff

A group of eight senators met this week to try to carve out a deal to prevent the country from going over a fiscal cliff that will hit taxpayers with a massively larger bill come January. The three-day meeting included four Republicans – Saxby Chambliss (GA), Mike Crapo (ID), Tom Coburn (OK), Mike Johanns (NE) – and four Democrats – Michael Bennet (CO), Kent Conrad (ND), Dick Durbin (IL), Mark Warner (VA). Also in attendance was Alan Simpson, co-chair of the 2010 Simpson-Bowles debt reduction commission.

The three-day gathering was the latest in a series of failed attempts to come up with a workable plan to tackle the mounting federal debt, and the attendees aimed to come up with a framework for broader debate once the Senate reconvenes after the election. No details of the framework have emerged, but Washington’s track record on the issue doesn’t offer high hopes. Obama helped craft the Simpson-Bowles commission himself only to later reject the commission’s findings. Since then Congress has repeatedly failed to devise a plan on which Republicans and Democrats can agree. If Congress does nothing, the ruinous tax increase will likely push the economy over a cliff and back into recession.

Another Voter ID Law Upheld, if Delayed

A three-judge panel of the Fourth District Court of Appeals in Washington, DC, upheld South Carolina’s voter ID law this week, the second defeat for proponents of voter fraud in as many weeks. Last week, Pennsylvania’s law was upheld. The headlines for both rulings, however, blared that judges had “blocked” the laws. In reality, the judges acknowledged that the rulings were too close to the election to be reasonably enforced by then, and so deferred enforcement until next year. In neither case did the judges find fault with the laws themselves. The only victory the Obama Justice Department can claim in challenging these laws is that they successfully delayed them until after Barack Obama’s re-election opportunity.

Voter fraud came into play again this week when Obama supporters were caught on camera offering aid to investigators pretending to be seeking to vote for Obama more than once. No wonder Democrats object to the supposedly “racist” hindrance of having to present a photo ID at the polls before voting.

Economy

Income Redistribution: Food Stamps Hit Another Peak

Lost in the hoopla about a deceptive employment report released last Friday was a cruel reminder that our economic recovery is far from complete – the number of Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program recipients hit a record 46.68 million in July. Yes, one out of every seven Americans receives government help to buy food, at a monthly cost exceeding $6 billion. But hey, Obama cares.

While the USDA summary blamed the jump on weather-related issues in some parts of the country, the depressing fact is that the number of recipients has exceeded 46 million every month since last September, meaning that ever more people grow ever more dependent upon governmental assistance every day because their long-term employment prospects are bleak.

Few know more about lengthy stays on the unemployment line than the typical construction worker. Since construction employment peaked at 7.7 million in April 2006, the industry has shed more than two million jobs, with over one million of them during Obama’s term alone. This despite the $833 billion “stimulus” that promised “shovel-ready” projects to recover 400,000 of those jobs.

Instead, we’ve seen more and more once-proud workers forced onto food stamp rolls by the sheer necessity of needing to somehow feed a family. All Democrats seem to have stimulated is the caseload of thousands of government employees needed to continue refilling those electronic benefit transfer cards, month after agonizing month.

Picking – and Creating – the Losers

The $90 billion in “stimulus” debt spent on green energy was intended to jumpstart an industry the Obama administration wagered would be the wave of the future. But they failed to take a key aspect of the energy industry into account, as natural gas prices plunged thanks to new technology for extraction. That drop in natural gas prices has eased demand for coal, but Barack Obama’s pledge to make electricity more expensive is assisted by regulations that might force the closing of coal-fired plants accounting for a quarter of coal’s power production share. A study by energy industry experts calculated that utilities would need between $126 and $144 billion to retrofit and replace all that coal capacity.

The government won’t help utilities invest in fossil fuels, but they’re only too happy to support those who waste government subsidies with impunity. After the well-publicized failures of Solyndra, Ener1, and other “green energy” companies, two more companies are on the ropes after receiving millions. Abound Solar, recipient of $68 million (of about $370 million promised), filed for bankruptcy earlier this year. That’s hardly news except that Abound has also skipped out on nearly $2 million in unpaid property taxes and sold a product described as “working well unless the sun hit it.” Abound’s panels have an annoying tendency to underperform or even catch fire if the sun hits them.

In another success story, the future battery maker for the Chevy Volt has placed its employees on rotating furloughs due to a lack of demand. Compact Power, whose plant was built with $150 million in federal funds, hasn’t yet made a single battery for the Volt or a planned electric Ford Focus. But the lack of Volt sales has created a ripple effect at the Michigan plant that’s supposed to begin producing the batteries for it next year. The Volt’s batteries are currently made by a plant in South Korea, hardly a hotbed of American jobs.

Security

Department of Military Readiness: Romney’s Foreign Policy Foray

Barack Obama’s foreign policy took a solid flogging this week at the hands of presidential hopeful Mitt Romney, just in time for his senior accomplice, vice president Joe Biden, to defend it against vice presidential candidate Paul Ryan in round two of the debates. Romney pointed out the long trail of foreign policy missteps and humiliations inflicted by Team Hope ‘n’ Change. Among them: the blatant snubbing of our otherwise-close ally, Israel; the grave threat of allowing Iran’s nuclear ambitions to continue to develop; the stiff finger we gave to the millions who filled the streets of Iran in 2009 demanding freedom from an oppressive government; the dramatic cuts in our defense, leaving the U.S. in a weaker position to defend its vital interests abroad; and, most recently, the passive stance on the terrorist attacks on our embassies in the Middle East, culminating in deaths of four Americans, including the U.S. ambassador in Libya. While Obamaphiles drag the same tattered suit out of the closet, repeating, “The tide of war is receding,” the rest of the planet realizes the tide is not receding – it’s regrouping.

Romney apparently “gets” the threat from that tide, noting the substantial difference between administrations of the past and this one. Highlighting the critical role leadership plays in foreign affairs, Romney stated, “It is the responsibility of our president to use America’s great power to shape history – not to lead from behind, leaving our destiny at the mercy of events.” Driving the point home, Romney said, “I know the president hopes for a safer, freer and a more prosperous Middle East allied with the United States. I share this hope. But hope is not a strategy.” Likewise, while killing Osama bin Laden was a credit-worthy achievement, it, too, doesn’t amount to a coherent foreign policy. The threat from al-Qa'ida remains. Nor does a “run-for-the-exits” political move amount to a strategy.

How does Governor Romney propose to undo this mess? Simple: Leadership. Specifically, Romney outlined key pieces of his foreign policy that differed from the status quo. These include beefing up defense so that our words can be “backed up by deeds”; putting rogue nations like Iran on notice that the days of attempting to acquire “the bomb” are over through more stringent sanctions and, if necessary, actions; reaffirming ties with Israel and other Gulf “partners” by employing the old Arabian adage, “The enemy of my enemy is my friend”; reforming foreign assistance to bolster freedom, free enterprise and rule-of-law governance among nations we help; and championing free trade as a strategic tool of freedom, generally. Regarding this last point, Romney noted that Obama hasn’t signed a single new free-trade agreement during his tenure.

At least the military appreciates Romney’s straight-shooting approach. In a recent poll by the Military Times, former and current U.S. military personnel favor Romney over Obama by more than two-to-one, with character and economy handily besting other considerations, including national security, as factors. While we are not so naïve to presume that foreign policy is the pivotal issue in this election – either for former or current military members or for the rest of America – it’s certainly at least one among many important reasons why the Dear Leader must be ousted in November. No less than the fate of the nation hangs in the balance.

Warfront With Jihadistan: Changing the Tune Yet Again

Since the attacks on U.S. embassies in Libya, Egypt, Yemen and Tunisia on and around the anniversary of 9/11, we have chronicled the ever-changing story of the Obama administration. This week, the State Department claimed that it was “not our conclusion” that the protest and ensuing murders in Benghazi were caused by the anti-Islam movie trailer on YouTube. Yet White House officials, including Barack Obama himself in his shameful UN speech and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, repeatedly blamed the violence on the video. Now State wants us to believe that they never believed what they continued to say.

Not only didn’t they believe their own spin, but the State Department also now says there wasn’t a protest at all. The murder of Ambassador Chris Stevens, two former Navy SEALs and another security officer was simply the deliberate work of al-Qa'ida terrorists. This is finally a credible story, but why did it take a month for them to admit it?

In related news, Obama bragged while on the campaign trail of his foreign-policy promises kept. “Now, four years ago, I made a few commitments to you,” said Obama. “I told you I’d end the war in Iraq, and I did. I said I’d end the war in Afghanistan, and we are. I said we’d refocus on the people who actually attacked us on 9/11 – and today, al-Qa'ida is on its heels and Osama bin Laden is no more.”

His claims are full of holes. If al-Qa'ida successfully executed an attack on our embassies on the anniversary of their most successful terrorist attack, how exactly are they “on their heels”? They also killed a security official at the embassy in Yemen Thursday.

Furthermore, reports the Associated Press, “Al-Qaida is rebuilding in Iraq and has set up training camps for insurgents in the nation’s western deserts as the extremist group seizes on regional instability and government security failures to regain strength, officials say. Iraq has seen a jump in al-Qaida attacks over the last 10 weeks, and officials believe most of the fighters are former prisoners who have either escaped from jail or were released by Iraqi authorities for lack of evidence after the U.S. military withdrawal last December.”

It’s almost as if the commander in chief doesn’t want to lead the world’s only super power.

Immigration Front: Border Patrol Agent Update

Last week, we noted that U.S. Border Patrol Agent Nicholas Ivie was killed in the line of duty, and we pondered if there was a connection with Fast and Furious. Tragically, however, it turns out that Ivie was killed by friendly fire.

According to the Associated Press, “The head of the U.S. Border Patrol agents’ union says the agent killed last week in a shooting in southern Arizona apparently opened fire on two colleagues thinking they were armed smugglers and was killed when they returned fire.” He died at the scene. Our thoughts and prayers go out to Ivie’s wife and two children.

United States Navy Birthday

On Oct. 13, 1775, the U.S. Navy was born when the Continental Congress authorized the arming of two sailing vessels with 80 men and 10 carriage guns in order to intercept British supply and munitions transports. The Declaration of Independence came nine months later, followed by the creation of the Department of the Navy in 1798. Today, our Navy is the most powerful in the world. We at The Patriot Post offer our thanks to all our sailors for a job well done and wish you a Happy 237th Birthday! God bless you and your families.

Please visit The Patriot Post Shop for a great selection of items bearing the Navy’s insignia.

Culture

Second Amendment: The Chicago Way

Crime is up in Chicago this year (and not just due to the Obama campaign), with murders increasing a staggering 25 percent from last year’s already incredibly high body count. The city and surrounding Cook County have over 9,00 inmates, almost the local jail’s capacity of 10,155. Throw in street gangs, drug use, high-school dropouts, and it’s obvious what needs to be done in Chicago: Tax guns and ammunition. Because all gangsters will pay taxes when they buy their legal guns and ammo.

Once again blaming inanimate objects instead of criminals, Cook County Board President Toni Preckwinkle wants to impose a “violence tax” on guns and ammunition sold in the city and suburbs. “If we were to pursue a tax on something like guns and ammo … it is consistent with our commitment to pursuing violence reduction in the city and in the county,” Kurt Summers, Preckwinkle’s chief of staff, said, adding that the idea is to reduce the number of guns in circulation. Left unexplained, of course, was how removing objects that don’t commit violence will reduce violence, but leftist logic has always been sketchy. We propose a violence tax on the perps illegally using firearms to commit violent crime. Say, 20 to 30?

Gun rights proponents rightfully vow to fight Preckwinkle’s tax idea. “This is just another example of the blame game. … [T]hey want to make legal gun owners – guys like me – the scapegoat,” said Todd Vandermyde, an NRA lobbyist who works in Springfield. He said this is an unfair tax on a constitutional right that will mostly hurt the poor.

Two bills in the Illinois legislature would create an explicit tax on ammunition, but both bills are currently parked in the House Rules Committee. These types of tax attacks on constitutional rights have been tried before and been successfully defeated. Let’s hope these two bills share the same fate.

Leftists Use Science to Justify Trampling Religious Liberty

Four hundred years after the Pilgrims journeyed to the New World in search of religious liberty, the president of this New World has been waging war against that religious liberty. Last week on the campaign trail, Barack Obama boasted of ObamaCare’s mandate that employers purchase insurance to cover contraception, including abortifacients: “I don’t think a college student … should have to choose between textbooks or the preventive care that she needs. That’s why we passed this law. And I am proud of it.”

He claims to allow exemptions for religious organizations, but even this flies in the face of liberty by relegating religious practice to the realm of “tolerated” rather than “free.” And in order to receive an exemption, an organization must meet Obama’s criteria of “religious,” which apparently a Bible publisher does not. Tyndale House Publishers, the Christian publisher named after William Tyndale, who was strangled and burned at the stake in 1536 for translating the Bible into English, sued the government over the mandate. If a Bible publisher isn’t religious, we’re not sure what is. Of course, if Tyndale set up shop in a government park or building, we imagine the administration would sing a different tune.

Supporting Obama’s war on religion, a new study found that free birth control results in significantly lower abortion and teen-birth rates. The study tracked 9,000 St. Louis women from 2008 to 2010 and concluded that, when unhindered by costs, women select more effective contraceptives – namely, implanted devices – over birth-control pills, thereby reducing the rate of pregnancy. Predictably, the authors claim that this proves ObamaCare’s contraception mandate works. What these results fail to address, however, are the myriad consequences of promiscuous sexual activity: STDs, emotional distress, family breakdown – the list goes on. The truth is that there is something that neutralizes all of these plus unintended pregnancies and works 100 percent of the time. It’s called abstinence. But to say so is akin to splashing leftists with holy water.

Faith and Family: Protestants Now a Minority

The U.S. made history this year. For the first time ever, Protestants represented less than half the population. The Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life reports that just 48 percent of Americans can be classified as Protestant. For the first time, no Protestants hold seats on the Supreme Court, and the GOP presidential ticket has no Protestants. Much of the change is due to the growth of nondenominational churches, which aren’t classified as Protestant, as well as a sharp increase in those who claim no religion at all.

The study seems to be another indicator that we are becoming ever more like Western Europe – a post-Christian nation saddled with a massive debt-financed welfare state because the church is largely absent. The non-religious tend to vote Democrat at least as heavily as Evangelical Christians vote Republican, and the latter seems to be a shrinking population. We would note that the GOP has largely failed to make the case that smaller government benefits people of all stripes and religious backgrounds, and that one need not embrace religion to support and defend our Constitution. But if the trend continues – not to mention the trend of minorities voting Democrat – the GOP could be in serious electoral jeopardy.

And Last…

Are you planning to carve a pumpkin for Halloween but unsure what design to carve? Well, you’re in luck, because Obama’s Energy Department has some helpful suggestions. “Green energy is going orange for Halloween,” reports CNS News, “as the U.S. Energy Department offers downloadable pumpkin-carving patterns on its website. The ‘Energy-ween’ designs include a windmill, solar panel, and compact fluorescent light bulb.” Those may not be the brightest ideas, but on the other hand, the sheer quantity of taxpayer money wasted on these projects is pretty scary. Perhaps we should just cut right to the chase and carve the scariest Jack-o-lantern of all: One that says, “$16,000,000,000,000.”

Semper Vigilo, Fortis, Paratus et Fidelis!
Nate Jackson for The Patriot Post Editorial Team