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"It is natural to man to indulge in the illusions of hope. We are apt to shut our eyes against a painful truth -- and listen to the song of that syren, till she transforms us into beasts. Is this the part of wise men, engaged in a great and arduous struggle for liberty? ... For my part, whatever anguish of spirit it might cost, I am willing to know the whole truth; to know the worst, and to provide for it." --Patrick Henry

GOVERNMENT & POLITICS
The Trojan Horse for single-payer health care
Something Smells Fishy About This Kool-Aid

President Barack Obama appeared to backtrack on a key provision of his attempted health care coup, telling a Colorado town hall audience that "the public option, whether we have it or we don't have it, is not the entirety of health care reform. This is just one sliver of it, one aspect of it." So the president is giving in on the government-run option, right? Wrong.

While it's a given that some on the Left are going bananas over the announcement, none other than former DNC Chief Howard "The Scream" Dean let the cat out of the bag on the strategy. "The president knows very well that you aren't really going to have health care reform without a public option," Dean told MSNBC's Joe Scarborough. "But he also knows he has to get this out of the Senate." So the president is playing a cynical game of politics with health care? Say it ain't so!

For now, 60 votes in the Senate are necessary to avoid a filibuster, and the public option is making that threshold harder to reach. If the bill were passed without the public option, it could be added back during reconciliation, at which point only 50 votes would be necessary for passage.

White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs spun the strategy shift by calling it a "boring consistency to our rhetoric." Nothing's changed, according to Gibbs. The facts, as usual, contradict the Democrats. On July 18, Obama said, "Any plan I sign must include an insurance exchange: a one-stop shopping marketplace where you can compare the benefits, cost and track records of a variety of plans -- including a public option to increase competition and keep insurance companies honest -- and choose what's best for your family." But according to Gibbs, changing "must include" to "whether we have it or we don't have it" is just "boring consistency."

The proposed alternative to the public option is nonprofit health insurance cooperatives. However, as the Cato Institute's Michael Tanner explains (http://link.patriotpost.us/?136-890-890-185676-8498), "Government-run health care is government-run health care no matter what you call it. The health care 'co-op' approach now embraced by the Obama administration will still give the federal government control over one-sixth of the U.S. economy, with a government-appointed board, taxpayer funding, and with bureaucrats setting premiums, benefits and operating rules. Plus," Tanner adds, "it won't be a true co-op, like rural electrical co-ops or your local health-food store -- owned and controlled by its workers and the people who use its services. Under the government plan, the members wouldn't choose its officers -- the president would."

As for the public option, Jacob S. Hacker, the liberal Yale scholar widely attributed with originating the idea, denies that it is a "Trojan Horse" to sneak in single-payer, government-run health insurance behind citizens' backs. It seems, however, that Hacker also suffers from an acute case of "boring consistency." In 2008, Hacker sounded a different note: "Someone once said to me, 'Well, this is a Trojan horse for single payer.' I said, 'Well, it's not a Trojan horse, right? It's just right there! I'm telling you!' We're going to get there [to a government-run system] -- over time, slowly." He continued, "But we'll do it in a way that we're not going to frighten people into thinking they're going to lose their private insurance."

Sounds like the frog in the boiling water to us.

This Week's 'Braying Jackass' Award

"Look at it this way: There's Federal Express, there's UPS, and there's DHL. The public option is a stamp; it's e-mail. And because of the e-mail system, and because of the post office, it keeps DHL from charging $100 for an overnight letter, or UPS from charging $100 for an overnight letter." --Rep. Jesse Jackson Jr. (http://link.patriotpost.us/?136-890-890-185676-8502) (D-IL) expounding on Barack Obama's ill-advised comparison of the public option to the Post Office

News From the Swamp: Intimidation Time

"In a move some fear is a reprisal for opposing President Obama's health care plan, Democrats sent 52 letters to health insurers requesting financial records for a House committee's investigation," Fox News reports. (http://link.patriotpost.us/?136-890-890-185676-8507) "Reps. Henry Waxman, D-Calif., and Bart Stupak, D-Mich., sent a letter warning health insurers that the House Energy and Commerce Committee is 'examining executive compensation and other business practices of the health industry.'" Politico has a list (http://link.patriotpost.us/?136-890-890-185676-8500) of the 52 companies targeted. Health insurers have until Sept. 4 to provide information on all employees who earned more than $1 million a year between 2003 and 2008, as well as documents about transportation, food, lodging, entertainment, conferences and events held on company property, and even gifts. Waxman's letter gives no indication as to what or why the information is being requested, but the message is clear: Cough up the info or else. "This is using the raw power of the Congress to extort information and humiliate citizens," says former Speaker Newt Gingrich. "It is a chilling example of intimidation." Indeed.

From the 'Non Compos Mentis' File

The Leftmedia continue to portray town hall protestors as right-wing, gun-toting racist nutjobs, even when the shoe clearly doesn't fit. As we noted last week, some "protestors" are carrying signs with Barack Obama sporting a Hitler mustache and the message "I've changed." Of course, the media dutifully highlights the signs, while ignoring that they are distributed by and bear the Web site name of LaRouche PAC, the political action committee of seven-time Democrat presidential aspirant and committed socialist conspiracy nut Lyndon LaRouche. That doesn't fit the template.

Protestors with guns are also a target. The Leftmedia frets that citizens can carry guns near some of these town halls, including outside one held by the president in Phoenix, Arizona. MSNBC's Contessa Brewer commented (http://link.patriotpost.us/?136-890-890-185676-8496), "A man at a pro-health care reform rally ... wore a semiautomatic assault rifle on his shoulder and a pistol on his hip.... There are questions about whether this has racial overtones. I mean, here you have a man of color in the presidency, and white people showing up with guns strapped to their waists or onto their legs." What Brewer failed to mention is that the man carrying the rifle was black. In addition, the video shown on MSNBC was carefully cropped to avoid showing that the man was black -- it only showed the man's back and waist, not his face.

Of course, the anti-gun narrative is not new to MSNBC or Contessa Brewer, and neither is the racial double standard mentioned Thursday by Mark Alexander (http://link.patriotpost.us/?136-890-890-185676-8505). Truth, unfortunately, is kicked to the curb.

Abortion Will Be Part of ObamaCare

It should come as no surprise that the health care overhaul being designed by congressional Democrats include provisions for federally mandated coverage of abortions by insurance providers. After all, liberals embrace what President Obama has called "reproductive justice," which apparently includes killing unborn children. (The "justice" aspect has us scratching our heads.) Some members of Congress and the president himself on occasion have stated publicly that no such mandate exists, but they are lying.

The word abortion does not appear in the draft legislation, but several provisions would not only force insurance companies to cover abortions, they would override several state laws and would ultimately lead to taxpayer funded abortions. This is what groups like Planned Parenthood have worked for all along, but the secret is out now, thanks in part to some liberal members of Congress who brazenly admit their stance that taxpayers should pay for abortions, regardless of their moral stance on the issue. "Abortion will be covered as a benefit by one or more of the health care plans available to Americans," said Rep. Zoe Lofgren (D-CA), "and I think it should be." Naturally, a broad cross-section of the public is opposed to this idea, but that's never stopped liberals before.

This Week's 'Alpha Jackass' Award

"We are God's partners in matters of life and death." --Barack Obama (http://link.patriotpost.us/?136-890-890-185676-8485)

Hope 'n' Change: White House Spam

Let's say one doesn't agree with a White House policy. What does one do in the Information Age? Write a blog about it or post an opinion on a social network like FaceBook, or send an e-mail to friends, family and associates. By doing so, the writer creates a "paper trail," albeit in the electrons of the Internet. Once a communication is in cyberspace, it usually has infinite shelf life, and, often, the anti-White House posting can be traced back to the author.

To expedite things, a White House functionary asked supporters (a.k.a. "snitches"), ala neighborhood watchers in Communist, fascist or other totalitarian regimes, to report "fishy" speech about ObamaCare to flag@whitehouse.gov. Such reports would contain some identification of the originator of the post, hence the fear of an "enemies list."

Then a funny thing happened. All of a sudden, many Americans (including numerous Patriot readers) began getting unsolicited e-mail from the White House, some with the request that the e-mails be further circulated. Standardized unsolicited e-mail, sent in large quantities, is known as "spam." Thus, the White House became one of the most reviled users of the Internet, a spammer, a Netiquette violator.

Due to public outrage, the informant e-mail address has been shut down, though now informers can use the White House's "reality check" Web site (http://link.patriotpost.us/?136-890-890-185676-8509). And the spamming was explained away and blamed on "outside organizations" submitting e-mail addresses to the White House. But the administration has demonstrated how Big Brother can use the Internet for dissident identification and for dissemination of propaganda. Is it, as H.G. Wells might have asked, "the shape of things to come"?

Ted Kennedy Seeks Quick Replacement

Sen. Ted Kennedy (D-MA) is always a Democrat first. In a rare open demonstration of how this last of the golden Kennedy boys has always worked behind the scenes, he recently requested the Massachusetts legislature to change a law to allow Gov. Deval Patrick, a Democrat, to appoint a temporary replacement for him in the Senate, just in case. Kennedy has brain cancer and has been mostly absent for the last 15 months. "It is vital for this commonwealth," he urged state lawmakers, "to have two voices speaking for the needs of its citizens and two votes in the Senate during the approximately five months between a vacancy and an election." In other words, health care is coming to a vote this fall, and another Democrat senator is needed to ensure 60 votes should Kennedy still be absent; but he wants an "explicit personal commitment" that the appointee would not seek the seat permanently.

Obviously, the change he requested is necessary -- for his purposes. In 2004, however, Kennedy succeeded in changing the law to its current form so that then-Gov. Mitt Romney, a Republican, could not appoint a Republican to replace John Kerry, should the latter have won the presidential election. Furthermore, Kennedy himself would likely not be a U.S. Senator under his proposed change. In 1961, when his older brother moved to the White House, Ted was too young to take the seat, so a loyal placeholder kept the seat for him until he could run in 1962. As we said, always a Democrat first. Or maybe it's Kennedy first, Democrat second.

Robert Novak (1931-2009)

On Tuesday, noted journalist, television host and political commentator Robert Novak died after suffering from a brain tumor diagnosed 13 months ago. Novak's Washington career spanned over a half-century and influenced many a conservative journalist (yes, the species does exist). Perhaps it was this influence, along with his gruff, sometimes pessimistic demeanor, that earned him the moniker "the Prince of Darkness" -- a tag that Novak embraced.

The Leftmedia focused on Novak's last big story, the outing of Valerie Plame Wilson as a "super-covert" CIA desk jockey. His revelation led to an investigation by Special Prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald, who, although he knew the leaker's identity early on, pressed on and ended the career of Vice President Cheney's chief of staff, I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby. The New York Times called Novak "churlish," "pugnacious" and inexplicably charged that he "could not always document" his scoops -- a practice with which the Times itself is all too familiar. ABC's "Good Morning America" and CBS's "The Early Show" didn't bother mentioning Novak's death at all, even though they had plenty of time to cover Michael Jackson ... again.

More honest journalists, however, have recalled Novak for a vast body of work. It's a political résumé highlighted by his representation of conservatism on a number of televised political forums, including CNN's "Crossfire" and "Inside Politics," and by his longtime collaboration with fellow Washington journalist Rowland Evans Jr. on the Evans-Novak Report, a publication which provided insight on political events and campaigns for over four decades and survived Evans' 2001 death before finally closing up shop after the 2008 election.

The most fitting tributes recall Novak as perhaps the last great "shoe leather" reporter, whose vast wealth of sources -- to him one was either a source or a subject -- gave him the scoop on stories inside the Beltway. Once compiled, the stories were written with outstanding prose that gave readers a clear insight on events and the circumstances surrounding them. In short, Novak exhibited a talent that won't be replaced easily and his passing closes an era in Beltway journalism.

NATIONAL SECURITY
Warfront With Jihadistan: Elections

Afghanistan held its second-ever presidential election Thursday, as well as its second-ever provincial council elections. Ballot counting will likely take weeks. In the first presidential election in 2004, more than 70 percent of the population cast ballots, but threats and attacks from a resurgent Taliban, including threats to cut off voters' fingers and other body parts, appears to have done the job this time -- turnout was more like 30 percent. Still, it is encouraging to see participatory government continue its attempt to take root in a still-backward Afghanistan. With 41 presidential candidates on the ballot, it is unlikely anyone will secure the necessary 50 percent of the vote to win, so a runoff in October is likely between the two leading vote getters. The current president, Hamid Karzai, is expected be one of those contenders. His top challenger is former Foreign Minister Abdullah Abdullah.

Prior to the vote, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton assured the Afghans of continuing U.S. support, saying the United States wanted elections that were "credible, secure and inclusive" and judged legitimate. However, apparently the secretary does not consider the elections of her own country to be legitimate. During an official visit to infamously corrupt Nigeria, she mentioned the 2000 U.S. presidential election, saying, "You know, we had some problems in some of our presidential elections. As you may remember, in 2000, our presidential election came down to one state where the brother of one of the men running for president was governor of the state. So we have our problems too."

For a U.S. secretary of state to say this in front of one of the most corrupt and illegal governments in the world is despicable and completely unworthy of her office. Still, we are not surprised, as Hillary has become nothing more than a shrill mouthpiece for the anti-American Obama regime.

The New York Times Breaks Another 'Scandal'

Without the "newspaper of record," Americans might never have known that the U.S. government has been working to kill al-Qa'ida operatives for several years. In fact, "The Central Intelligence Agency in 2004 hired outside contractors from the private security contractor Blackwater USA as part of a secret program to locate and assassinate top operatives of Al Qaeda, according to current and former government officials," The New York Times reports (http://link.patriotpost.us/?136-890-890-185676-8506). Note the word "assassinate," which is not legal for the CIA to do, instead of kill, which is necessary in a war. The Times unveiled this particular secret program earlier this summer as if it were a blockbuster news story, even though the program was never implemented. Of course, to the dovish Leftists at the Times, Blackwater's involvement adds insult to injury. Blackwater was vilified for killing 17 Iraqi civilians while protecting State Department vehicles in September 2007, though Blackwater employees claimed they were fired on first. The real news is that CIA director and Democrat lackey Leon Panetta cancelled the program. While Panetta and the Times might be slow on the uptake, the only way to win a war is to kill the enemy.

Lockerbie Bomber Freed

"Scotland released Thursday the Libyan agent convicted in the 1988 Lockerbie bombing on 'compassionate grounds,' defying both the U.S. government and the wishes of many victims' families," reports The Wall Street Journal (http://link.patriotpost.us/?136-890-890-185676-8494). Scottish Justice Secretary Kenny MacAskill decided to release Abdelbaset Ali Mohmed al-Megrahi because the poor bomber is terminally ill with prostate cancer. "No compassion was shown by him" to his victims, MacAskill conceded. "But that alone is not reason to deny compassion to him and his family in his final days. Our justice system demands that judgment be imposed but that compassion be available." Scottish doctors say al-Megrahi, 57, has three months to live.

Al-Megrahi was an early jihadi in the Long War -- a war the West had not yet acknowledged -- when he helped blow up a New York-bound Pan Am airliner over the Scottish town of Lockerbie in December 1988. All 259 passengers were killed, including 189 U.S. citizens, as well as 11 people on the ground. It was the worst terrorist attack ever in Britain, and the deadliest against American citizens until 9/11. He ended up serving less than a third of his 27-year minimum sentence, or less than 14 days per victim. Even Hillary Clinton said that the U.S. government is "deeply disappointed" by al-Megrahi's release. "Megrahi should serve out the entirety of his sentence in Scotland," she added. We think he should be six feet under, but instead, he returned to his native Libya, where he received a hero's welcome. His future plans are unknown. No doubt, he'd like to go out with a bang.

Immigration Front: Border Corruption

Last Sunday, the Mexican government fired 1,100 customs officials in a move to wipe out rampant corruption in the agency charged with securing the transport of goods and people across the U.S.-Mexican border. Army troops temporarily took control of the ports of entry (POE's) along the 2,000-mile border.

Using more than 36,00 Mexican Army troops, President Felipe Calderon continues his war on the barbaric drug cartels that control and ravage much of Mexico. Last year, 5,600 people died at the hands of the cartels. The focus on the POE's is not just the interdiction of human and drug smuggling but also of the flow of firearms into Mexico where they are tightly controlled. Calderon has complained frequently that guns from the United States provide the cartels with most of their firepower, though we have noted the dubious nature of this claim on more than one occasion.

During his visit to Mexico last week, Barack Obama praised Calderon's efforts, but the Apologizer in Chief also readily blamed his own country for the violence. He pledged to dry up the flow of weapons into Mexico as well as to cut American demand for drugs. His strategy to stop the movement of guns includes reinstating (and, no doubt, enhancing) the 1994 ban on so-called "assault weapons" that expired in 2004. In addition, he promised an additional $1.6 billion for the Merida Initiative, a joint effort to fight against drug trafficking, money laundering and other crimes in Mexico and Central America.

But according to recent reports by the National Drug Intelligence Center, the Mexican cartels have been regulating "traffic" into and out of Mexico for some time, both at the POE's and the virtually uncontrolled borderlands from San Ysidro, California to Brownsville, Texas. The problem always comes back to our wide-open border that four successive administrations have made little attempt to control. Calderon's willingness to wage war on the cartels is truly admirable, but all things considered, it could end up as tilting at windmills.

BUSINESS & ECONOMY
Regulatory Commissars: Slap and Tax

The good news: Australia's Senate rejected "Cap and Trade" (a.k.a. "Cap and Tax") legislation that had been oozing down Parliament's halls. The bad news: Its slimy American cousin, Waxman-Markey, which narrowly passed in the House in June, is still slithering through U.S. Senate halls.

The ostensible premise underlying cap and tax is that carbon emissions are "bad," causing global warming, global cooling, climate change, El Niño, La Niña and Al Gore's excessive "carbon footprint," among a host of other manmade "evils." Accordingly, these emissions must be "capped." That's where the "trade" comes in, derived from the trade of carbon emissions "credits." Under this system, companies producing greenhouse emissions below their government-dictated "cap" receive credits that could be traded like other securities, to companies whose outputs exceed their caps.

Of course, government gets its cut in by taxing the transaction, collecting fees for compliance, or collecting fines for exceeding emissions caps. Not content with this idiocy, however, Senate Demo-gogues are proposing -- wait for it -- tariffs "to ensure that [American] manufacturers do not bear the brunt of our climate change policy." Um, wouldn't killing "our climate change policy" in the Senate do that?

Proponents claim that cap and tax is really nothing more than a free-market environmental solution to reduce greenhouse gases and save the planet. In reality, if passed, the ruse will likely be the largest tax in American history, resulting in the loss of over two million jobs, a 2.4 percent hit to economic growth, and damage to the U.S. GDP of at least $3.1 trillion, according to a study released by the National Association of Manufacturers (NAM) and the American Council for Capital Formation (ACCF). In Britain, where this sham has already been foisted on the public, the average family pays the equivalent of nearly $1,300 per year in "green taxes." And since average household income in Britain is about 75 percent of that in the U.S., figure the green-scam tax per household will be proportionately higher in the land of the formerly free.

But the threat from cap and tax isn't merely from the drain on family coffers. It's the limiting of Americans' freedom through the use of nanny-state measures that arbitrarily decide who can use energy and in what amount. It's also the swelling of an already-oversized government through the establishment of yet another regulatory empire. The truly scary part, however, is that no one really knows how much cap and tax legislation will ultimately cost.

Income Redistribution: Cost of Government Day

Thomas Jefferson warned against "labor[ing] sixteen hours in the twenty-four" just to "give the earnings of fifteen of these to the government...." Apparently, the memo didn't get to Washington, DC. According to the Cost of Government Day (COGD) report (http://link.patriotpost.us/?136-890-890-185676-8486), prepared by Monika Ciesielska for the Center for Fiscal Accountability, a project of Americans for Tax Reform, Americans this year worked from Jan. 1 to Aug. 12 -- a staggering 224 days -- just to cover the cost of government. This is nearly one month more than last year (July 16) and the first time COGD has pressed into August.

Of course, Cost of Government Day is only a national average. Some states are worse than others. Connecticut, New Jersey and New York had the highest cost of government. In Connecticut, COGD is Sept. 7 -- Labor Day, appropriately enough. Meanwhile, Alaska had the earliest COGD -- July 11.

Given that spending through July skyrocketed by 21 percent ($530 billion) over 2008 and that Washington has amassed a revised 2009 budget deficit of $1.6 trillion -- almost quadruple 2008's $459 billion -- the taxpayer overtime hardly comes as a surprise. The government will burn through 61 percent of national income this year just to fuel itself. Hardly a bright dawn to the promised "new era of responsibility."

Show Me the Money!

Proving once again that "the nine most terrifying words in the English language are: 'I'm from the government and I'm here to help,'" Democrats' star-crossed Cash for Clunkers program is creating more problems than it's theoretically solving. Congressional geniuses enacted a trifecta of bureaucratic bungling with too little funding, far too few paperwork processors (only 200 to handle millions of filings), and too many regulations (156 pages worth), which initially lasted only four days before it became insolvent. Now the program is ending again on Monday, only a month after it began.

Automotive dealers have discovered the Orwellian joys of working for the federal government that created the Clunkers program to sell it's Government Motors cars quickly ... after hours of paperwork per vehicle is filed under the Paperwork Reduction Act and after the dealers have to float millions of dollars waiting for the feds to reimburse them. Many dealers, fed up with unpaid millions in Clunker sales for which they cannot obtain collateral, ceased participation in the Clunkers program early, although Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood swears that dealers are "going to get their money." Naturally, Washington hales the "very popular" program (when was "free" money not popular?) as a smashing "success." We can only imagine the "success" of government-run health care.

CULTURE & POLICY
Obama's Legal Prevent Defense

In football terms, a "prevent" defense is employed late in the game to run out the clock while allowing the offense time-consuming small gains and attempting to prevent a game-changing long play. Apparently, the Obama Justice Department is employing a similar strategy in defending the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA); however, even that less-than-vigorous effort is too much for the homosexual-rights lobby.

A lawsuit brought by a same-sex couple asserts DOMA denies their rights because they live in a state that recognizes same-sex marriage while other states don't. The Justice Department says it's defending the law "as it traditionally does when acts of Congress are challenged." But Barack Obama was also careful to say he's working on the legislative side to have DOMA weakened or overturned.

Still, eliminating DOMA can't come quickly enough for homosexual-rights advocates who think the Justice Department shouldn't even put up a rudimentary defense against the suit. In a statement, the Human Rights Campaign stated, "it is not enough to disavow this discriminatory law.... We contend that it is the administration's duty to defend every citizen from discrimination."

Yet in this case DOMA isn't being defended on its morality. In their brief, DOJ lawyers noted: "The United States does not believe that DOMA is rationally related to any legitimate government interests in procreation and child-rearing and is therefore not relying upon any such interests to defend DOMA's constitutionality." [Emphasis ours.] With Obama and his allies already working on circumventing tradition and the Constitution in a number of other areas it's no surprise that the defense of marriage (defined as between one man and one woman) on his part would be less than robust as well.

Frontiers of Junk Science: Electric Cars

As the "new and improved" Government Motors prepares its 2010 launch of the electronically powered Chevy Volt, which GM claims will get 230 miles per gallon, envirofascists are singing its praises. But in order to get the promised "40 miles of electronic only, petroleum-free driving," Volt owners must plug the vehicle into the electric grid every day. Experts on both heavily populated coasts warn of the dangers of adding to an already over-taxed energy grid. Adam Victor, president of New York's TransGas Energy, says, "If a few thousand well-meaning dupes plug a few thousand new Chevy Volts into electrical outlets (especially in urban centers), you could actually add millions of pounds of dangerous, dirty unregulated pollution and carbon into the air we breathe -- possibly more pollution than would be offset by putting the Volts on the road."

The Congressional Research Service agrees, pointing out that most U.S. electricity is not carbon free and that use of these vehicles may actually increase carbon emissions, hence the cleverly coined term "elsewhere emission vehicles." Indeed, even those most indoctrinated by the Al Gore's of the world have to see that this is only robbing Peter to pay Paul. In the meantime, other automakers are jumping on the bandwagon. Nissan is planning to launch the Leaf, which it claims will get 367 mpg, next year.

Finally, as The Washington Times notes (http://link.patriotpost.us/?136-890-890-185676-8489), "There is an upside in that electric cars might give automobile companies cover to continue to make gas guzzlers. Under the latest federal Corporate Average Fuel Economy requirement, carmakers have to produce vehicle fleets that average at least 42 mpg by 2016. Companies with an average below that will have to pay a tax to the government. In order to avoid that tax, they will be willing to sell cars listed as having a high mpg at a loss. Each Volt sold will let GM sell nine cars that get 21 mpg without having to face the tax." How convenient. But, the Times concludes, "If we can still have our Corvettes and Mustangs, the government can pretend the Leaf gets 1,000 mpg."

Village Academic Curriculum: Berkeley Head Hunters

As law professor John Yoo walked into a lecture hall at the University of California at Berkeley's Boalt Hall School of Law on Monday morning, he was greeted not only by students enrolled in his class, but by protestors calling for his dismissal, disbarment and arrest. The demonstrators, dressed in orange prisoner suits and black hoods a la Abu Ghraib, chanted "war criminal" before acting out Yoo's mock arrest. Yoo did not dignify their theatrics with a response, but simply waited for police to arrive.

The 42-year-old professor has already made his position abundantly clear. While serving as an attorney for the Bush administration from 2001 to 2003, Yoo wrote several memorandums on the legality of harsh interrogation techniques of suspected terrorists. "To limit the president's constitutional power to protect the nation from foreign threats is simply foolhardy," Yoo wrote just last month.

Yoo has been under fire since 2004, when his memos were made public. The Berkeley City Council called on the feds to prosecute him, and convicted terrorist Jose Padilla is suing him, claiming that Yoo's legal opinions led to his "torture."

Yet even Berkeley, a bastion of the wacko Left, remains divided. The dean of the University has refused to dismiss Yoo without further investigation into his government work (which is impossible because it's classified). In addition, while some students are calling for Yoo to be tarred and feathered, others are supporting him, saying he should not be penalized for his political views. No doubt his reputation as a professor has helped: Yoo's classes are consistently a favorite among Berkeley students.

And Last...

The Onion is a satirical "news" site that we in our humble shop enjoy reading from time to time. Sometimes, however, life imitates comedy a little too well. A "story" headlined "Congress Deadlocked Over How To Not Provide Health Care" (http://link.patriotpost.us/?136-890-890-185676-8501) began, "After months of committee meetings and hundreds of hours of heated debate, the United States Congress remained deadlocked this week over the best possible way to deny Americans health care." The story then "quoted" Nancy Pelosi: "Both parties understand that the current system is broken. But what we can't seem to agree upon is how to best keep it broken, while still ensuring that no elected official takes any political risk whatsoever. It's a very complicated issue." Perhaps The Onion best hit the nail on the head by "quoting" President Barack Obama: "This administration is committed to not providing health care, not just for this generation of Americans, but for many generations to come." In the end, the story was so funny, we laughed until we cried.

*****

(Please pray for our Armed Forces standing in harm's way around the world, and for their families -- especially families of those fallen Soldiers, Sailors, Airmen, Marines and Coast Guardsmen, who granted their lives in defense of American liberty.)