Columnist.
ACORN is doing what it does best: playing the victim, blaming everyone else for its self-inflicted wounds, perpetuating false narratives and defending the entitlement industry to the death. On Thursday, the disgraced welfare rights organization filed suit over a congressional funding ban passed in September after nationwide undercover sting videos exposed ACORN's criminal element. The group and its web of nonprofit, tax-exempt affiliates have collected an estimated $53 million in government funds since 1994.
White House interim communications director Anita Dunn assumed the role of lead Fox News Channel-basher this weekend. The attack was a dud. The left-leaning Nation magazine ridiculed President Obama's press shop for turning him into the "whiner-in-chief." AOL media columnist Jeff Bercovici called the war on Fox a "loser's strategy" that "signals weakness." And that's the friendly fire.
There are serious problems with the administration of the U.S. census. Americans have good reason to be wary of the stranger's knock on the door. Unfortunately, anything critics say about the federal census can and will be used against them in the court of left-wing opinion. First, the disturbing news about the government's most recent census travails: According to a new General Accounting Office report, botched fingerprinting by ill-trained employees led to the hiring of some 36,000 census workers with insufficient background checks. "More than 200" of those workers may have had serious criminal records, according to the GAO.
Lights, camera, agitprop! The curtains opened on yet another artfully staged performance of Obamacare Theater this week. One hundred and fifty doctors took their places on the plush lawn outside the West Wing -- many acting like "Twilight" groupies with cameras instead of credible medical professionals. The president approved the scenery: "I am thrilled to have all of you here today, and you look very spiffy in your coats."
It's hard out there for a first lady of the United States. Take it from travel-weary Michelle Obama. On Tuesday night, she boarded a luxury 757 for Copenhagen. Think of the stairs she had to climb. Oh, the agony of the feet!
When government officials play the Olympic lottery, taxpayers lose. That has been the disastrous experience of host cities around the world. (Forbes magazine even dubbed the post-Olympic financial burden the "Host City Curse.") So, why are President Obama and his White House entourage headed to Copenhagen, Denmark, this week to push a fiscally doomed Chicago 2016 bid? Political payback. Bringing the games to the Windy City is Chicago Mayor Richard M. Daley's "vision." The entrenched Democratic powerbroker -- in office since 1989 -- would like to cap off his graft-haunted tenure with a glorious $4 billion bread-and-circuses production. The influential Daley machine backed Barack Obama for the presidential primary. Obama lavished praise on Daley's stewardship of the city. Longtime Daley cronies helped pave Obama's path to 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue. Now, they're returning the favor for their hometown boss.
When the White House announced plans for the president's nationwide address to schoolchildren two weeks ago, worried parents were dismissed as "kooks." We pointed to the subtext of "social justice" activism rampant in American classrooms. It's time for a big fat Told You So. Out of the spotlight, politicized lessons continue to supplant core academics. Earlier this year, at the B. Bernice Young Elementary School in Burlington Township, N.J., schoolchildren were instructed to memorize a paean to Barack Obama. A video uploaded to the YouTube account of Charisse Carney-Nunes, author of the children's book "I Am Barack Obama" and a self-described Harvard Law "schoolmate" of the president's, showed students lined up in the auditorium snapping their fingers and chanting in unison:
Terror suspect Najibullah Zazi has done us all a favor. But is it enough to rouse a nation in permanent snooze-button mode? The arrest of Zazi, a Colorado-based Afghan airport shuttle driver who counterterrorism officials believe may have been plotting bomb attacks on New York City mass transit trains, raised alerts on rail lines across the country. A joint FBI-Department of Homeland Security assessment issued Monday warned law enforcement agencies about the use of improvised explosive devices against passenger trains overseas. Zazi was allegedly trained in manufacturing liquid explosives with hydrogen peroxide -- the same material used in the London subway attacks in 2005. FBI/DHS analysts have recommended random sweeps and patrols at rail stations and terminals as deterrents. The bust reminded America that while the annual September 11 memorials are over, the jihadi threat looms. Yet, homeland security remains crippled by a 9/10 mentality. Remember: The New York chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union filed suit against the New York Police Department a few years ago to try to stop random bag searches. The civil liberties absolutists are against random searches because they constitute "unreasonable" invasions of privacy. They're against targeted searches because they amount to racial, religious or ethnic "profiling." And they're against across-the-board searches because they lack "individualized suspicion."
