Today, Darrell Issa's committee released the abstract of its report on Angelo Mozilo's Countrywide VIP loan program, which features an interesting cast of recipients, some of whom you will recall from when this story was more in the headlines, and in some ways a Who's Who of Who Screwed You. Walter Cronkite and celebrities are logged in, as the program originated as a favor granting desk in California, but the most interesting name in the bunch to me, at the moment, is Edolphus Towns. We knew that he'd taken favors before, but between the early coverage of the scandal, connected with the collapse of the GSEs, Towns and Issa have squared off over Fast and Furious and Eric Holder, with the former defending the Attorney General and characterizing Issa's congressional investigation into that sordid matter a witch hunt with racial overtones, never mind the hundreds of dead Mexicans or the truly contemptuous manner in which Holder has treated Congress.
Countrywide's task force of 70 lobbyists was successful at making sure that various attempts to reform mortgage lending practices proposed from 2000-05 never made it out of committee, which ended up costing US taxpayers hundreds of billions, when it turned out that as a matter of congressional interpretation they were responsible for backing the bad loans. Which was not a tax.
Keep Aaron Walker in your thoughts and prayers as he heads to court to do battle once again with Brett Kimberlin. Portions of the story of his railroading that he has not been able to write about before are contained in this post from yesterday. Also, check out below Da Techguy's ruminations on Instapundit's magnification of Stacy's coverage of Kimberlin, Rauhauser and the Whole Sick Krew.
I've been remiss in not welcoming Katie's Conservative Corner to the Island of Misfit Blogs. Please go check out her place. You may also wish to check out The People's Vote, and look for new announcements from RightSolutions, tomorrow, perhaps—though if you back the National Bloggers Club, Stacy and Aaron are giving them kudos for their support.
Yesterday evening, a tweeter was marvelling at the incredible intrusiveness of Obama's Facebook application, which wants to suck every drop of potentially useful information out of your contacts.
If you look closely at the Obama Facebook app, it's shocking how creepy and invasive it is. It keeps pulling my data twitter.com/ComfortablySmu…
— ComfortablySmug (@ComfortablySmug) July 5, 2012
I'm not surprised.
Philip Jenkins wrote an interesting reflection on Penn State's "Catholic Problem." I think you know my thoughts about this.
Yesterday, Catholics wrapped up their Fortnight for Freedom with a rousing Aquinian homily from Archbishop Chaput.
Archbishop Charles Chaput — Fortnight for Freedom Closing Homily from Rocco Palmo on Vimeo.
Liberals like to talk about the dignity of man and human rights, but man is nothing but (in Shakespeare's words) a "forkéd animal" unless the proposition that he is made in the image and likeness of God is true, and it is only if our rights, including the right to self-determination for better or worse, proceed from thence that they truly belong to us.
Anthony Martin reports that evidence is accumulating that the Brian Terry records are under court seal because they contain information that would embarrass the Obama administration. Not to worry, though: the lapdog media knows its place, and will run interference, as they've already been doing.
With regard to the MSM, they are preparing to be more mendoucheous than ever before, and it will take everyone's best efforts to try to expose them at every turn and flood the official channels whenever they lie by commission or omission. You might want to set aside 15 minutes a day to give them butthurt and agida. When it's appropriate, and when you are in full control of the facts. So, that is homework for us all.
Here's a good example of a story from Wisconsin that the national-level MSM haven't bothered to cover:
In 2004, the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel detailed how Wisconsin Citizen Action in partnership with Voces practiced similar Get Out The Vote efforts involving school children during the presidential contest between George W. Bush and John Kerry. The efforts centered on Milwaukee, Madison, and Racine where children as young as 11 were missing class to go door-to-door and phone bank. According to the Journal Sentinel, Racine Horlick High School teacher Al Levie admitted to sending out 300 high school students with help from Voces on election day, identical to the Get Out The Vote tactics seen on June 5, 2012.
Also in 2004, two activists working for the Federation for American Immigration Reform (FAIR) travelled from Michigan to Wisconsin to participate in Voces de la Frontera voter drives in Milwaukee and Racine due to their belief that Voces was registering illegal immigrants. The activists posed as undocumented workers and recorded their interactions with Voces volunteers who helped the pair register to vote. Prosecutors in Milwaukee and Racine recovered the voter registration cards but refused to prosecute.
In December 2005, Voces demonstrators surrounded the home of Republican State Senator Cathy Stepp after Stepp voted in favor of a bill that required those seeking a Wisconsin driver’s license to prove citizenship. According to Stepp, demonstrators were looking in her window and half a dozen cars were parked outside her home. The Racine County Sheriff was called to her home but after an investigation, the District Attorney decided not to prosecute the organization.
In 2008, Voces once again used high school students in Milwaukee and Racine to turn out the vote. According to the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, Voces was able to muster 550 high school students on election day in 2008 to assist Democratic candidate Barack Obama.
Since 2008, Voces activists in Racine and elsewhere adopted the tactic of sit-ins and disruptions, purposely trying to get arrested. In 2010, Voces Executive Director Christine Neumann-Ortiz and Racine activists Maria Morales and Al Hutton were arrested for trespassing in Rep. Paul Ryan’s district office. Neumann-Ortiz and others were very publicly dragged out of a Joint Finance Committee hearing on the budget in June 2011 for disorderly conduct.
Voces de la Frontera is closely aligned with the labor movement and is currently organizing worker’s at Palermo’s Pizza in Milwaukee as they go on strike. Citizen Action of Wisconsin lists Voces as a coalition partner with Neumann-Ortiz sitting on the Board of Directors for the Milwaukee-based labor coalition.
These Marxists believe that your children belong to them.
