‘HE’S BAACK! World Stands Still for O.J. Parole Ruling’: NY Post Cover for July 20, 2017
Posted: July 20, 2017 Filed under: Breaking News, Crime & Corruption, Entertainment, Mediasphere, U.S. News | Tags: media, Nevada, New York, New York Post, Nicole Brown Simpson, NYC, O. J. Simpson, Parole Hearing, Tabloid Leave a comment
Pro-Gun Democrats Silenced as Party Veers Left on Second Amendment
Posted: May 21, 2016 Filed under: Guns and Gadgets, Law & Justice, Politics, Self Defense, White House | Tags: Bernie Sanders, Capitol Hill, CNN, Democratic Party (United States), Democrats, Gun control, Harry Reid, Hillary Clinton, Nevada, NRA, Socialism, Vermont 1 Comment
LOUISVILLE — David Sherfinski reports: Gun rights backers lament what they describe as a leftward drift on Second Amendment rights by Democrats in recent years, and predicted the push for stricter laws in blue state bastions such as California and Illinois will cost them even more independent-minded 
voters.
“They have shifted. Oh, heavens yes I’d say the last eight years. You go back to Kennedy and all the other Democrats — they were pro-gun. There was never an issue.”
— Sandy Jarrett, 60-year-old retiree from Troy, Ohio
Within the last decade, Democrats, including then-Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, were making overtures to gun groups including the National Rifle Association.
But the 2012 Newtown school shooting spurred a realignment, with Democrats at the national level increasingly adopting a gun control posture, pushing gun rights Democrats to suppress their own views, said attendees at the National Rifle Association’s annual convention, which kicked off Thursday in Louisville.
“They have shifted. Oh, heavens yes I’d say the last eight years,” said Sandy Jarrett, a 60-year-old retiree from Troy, Ohio. “You go back to Kennedy and all the other Democrats — they were pro-gun. There was never an issue.” Read the rest of this entry »
Susan Sarandon Spreads Timothy Leary’s Ashes at Burning Man
Posted: September 6, 2015 Filed under: Art & Culture, Mediasphere, U.S. News | Tags: Black Rock Desert, Burning Man, Cecily Strong, Instagram, Katy Perry, Lysergic acid diethylamide, Nevada, Sony Pictures Classics, Susan Sarandon, Timothy Leary 1 Comment
Susan Sarandon participated in Burning Man in Black Rock Desert, Nev. on Saturday to distribute the ashes of close friend and late LSD advocate Timothy Leary, according to USA Today.
The actress marched with Leary’s remains into a special church, which was built as one of the many art displays during the seven-day event. The gothic cathedral structure was later set aflame with other art creations (including a 60-foot giant man) in a spectacle that left crowds in awe.
“When I went to Burning Man last time, that’s when I thought I’d bring him back here. I think he’d be so happy.”
Most of Leary’s ashes were sent to outer space in 1997, but Sarandon kept a small amount that she saved for a special moment. The actress worked with Burning Man and photographer Michael Garlington to lend a creative hand during the weeklong festival. Read the rest of this entry »
James Pethokoukis: How Crony Capitalism is Slowing Global Economic Growth
Posted: July 8, 2015 Filed under: Economics, Global, Think Tank | Tags: Austrian School, Barack Obama, Budget, Central bank, Economic growth, Economy of the United States, Great Depression, Great Recession, Joseph Schumpeter, Nevada, Paul Krugman, United States 1 Comment
James Pethokoukis writes: US productivity growth, at least as measured, has been in low gear for a decade. And especially so since the Great Recession, averaging just 0.6% annually from 2010 through 2014. We’re aren’t going to consistently hit 3% GDP growth, much less 4%, like that.
Then again, productivity growth has slowed in most OECD countries over the past decade. A new OECD research note doesn’t think the problem is a lack of innovation, so much as an inability to spread innovation broadly throughout advanced economies. “A breakdown of the diffusion machine” is what the OECD calls it.
[Read the full text here, at AEIdeas]
The gap between high productivity firms and low productivity firms is increasing. (Maybe also helping to explain rising inequality.) So why aren’t innovations spreading as fast as they used to? The WSJ’s analysis of the paper sums it up nicely:
One key reason appears to be that the process of “creative destruction” identified by Austrian economist Joseph Schumpeter as essential to capitalism’s dynamism appears to have lost some of its ferocity. In the OECD’s words, “market selection is weak.” One reason for that is government policy, which the OECD said favors incumbents across a whole range of areas, from regulations designed to protect the environment, to taxation. As a result, older firms that suffer from low productivity growth endure, often “trapping” workers in jobs for which they are over qualified. Read the rest of this entry »
Remember Gridlock? What Was That About?
Posted: April 26, 2015 Filed under: Law & Justice, Mediasphere, Politics, U.S. News, White House | Tags: Albany International Airport, Barack Obama, CNBC, Daily Mail, Democratic Party (United States), Harry Reid, Nevada, New York Post, Party leaders of the United States Senate, United States 2 Comments
[VIDEO] Harry Reid: ‘I think a lot of people, as I read, they kinda don’t like me as a person, and I think that’s unfortunate’
Posted: April 15, 2015 Filed under: Crime & Corruption, Politics, U.S. News | Tags: Bill Clinton, CNBC, Democratic Party (United States), Harry Reid, Joe Biden, John Harwood, Mitch McConnell, Nevada, Party leaders of the United States Senate, Republican Party (United States), Rush Limbaugh 1 CommentReid Denies He Got Beat Up By The Mob
Al Weaver reports: Harry Reid denied fabricating the explanation for his eye injury in an interview with CNBC’s John Harwood.
“Why in the world would I come up with some story that I got hurt in my own bathroom with my wife standing there? How could anyone say anything like that?”
“In the last few days, a bunch of people are saying, ‘Reid, he didn’t have an exercise accident. He got beaten up by the mob,’” Harwood said.
Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV) (R) talks to the media, after a weekly Senate party caucus luncheon on Capitol Hill in Washington, Feb. 24, 2015. (REUTERS/Yuri Gripas)
“You know, I don’t really care. I think they’re all losers.”
“It shows the credibility of Rush Limbaugh. He’s the guy who got that started,” Reid responded. “Why in the world would I come up with some story that I got hurt in my own bathroom with my wife standing there? How could anyone say anything like that?”
[TREACHER: Why Isn’t Harry Reid Suing The Manufacturer Of That Exercise Band?]
“I think a lot of people, as I read, they kinda don’t like me as a person, and I think that’s unfortunate,” he added.”
Reid also called Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell a “lump of coal” and remarked that all the Republican candidates for 2016 are “losers.” Read the rest of this entry »
Harry Reid’s Brother to Face DUI, Gun Charges
Posted: April 9, 2015 Filed under: Crime & Corruption, U.S. News | Tags: Alcoholics Anonymous, Boulder City, DUI, Harry Reid, Larry Reid, LAS VEGAS, Las Vegas Review-Journal, Nevada, Nevada Highway Patrol, Police officer 3 CommentsWesley Juhl reports: Sen. Harry Reid’s brother, Larry Joe Reid, will be charged with drunken driving and a gun charge among others after a run-in with a Nevada Highway 
Patrol trooper, the Clark County district attorney’s office said Thursday.
He faces one count each of driving under the influence, battery of a protected person, possession of a firearm while intoxicated, failing to comply with an officer and not wearing a seat belt.
Arrest records obtained by the Review-Journal said a trooper saw a black SUV driven by Reid enter a dirt median from southbound U.S. Highway 95 near the edge of the Boulder City city limit and the turnoff to Nelson about 12:30 a.m. on Feb. 2.
The trooper approached the SUV to see if there was a mechanical problem he could assist with, the report said, but the trooper could not understand Reid due to his incoherent, slurred speech. The trooper asked Reid if he was all right several times, and Reid responded by 
asking if he could leave.
[Also see – LEAD SUSPECT in Harry Reid’s Beating – His Brother – Is Arrested for Assaulting Police]
When the trooper said no, Reid cursed at him and began to drive off, the report said. The trooper tried to grab the keys out of the ignition and had to jump onto the running board beneath the driver’s side door to avoid being dragged. The two struggled over the steering wheel, and the trooper pointed his weapon at Reid and ordered him to stop. Read the rest of this entry »
Harry Reid Changes His Story On How He Sustained New Year’s Day Injuries
Posted: April 8, 2015 Filed under: Breaking News, Mediasphere, Politics | Tags: Bob Menendez, CBS Interactive, Chuck Schumer, Democratic Party (United States), Harry Reid, Jorge Ramos (news anchor), Michael Patrick Leahy, Nevada, Party leaders of the United States Senate, Politico, Univision 2 Comments
Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid is changing the story about how he sustained those gruesome New Year’s Day injuries that have left him blind in one eye
Michael Patrick Leahy reports:
…Previously, Reid claimed that an exercise band he was using “broke.”
“Sources familiar with the incident said Reid was exercising in his bathroom, with the exercise band attached to the shower door.”
— Politico reported on January 22.
“I was doing exercises that I’ve been doing for many years with those large rubber bands and one of them broke and spun me around and I crashed into these cabinets and injured my eye,” (emphasis added) Reid said at a press conference on January 22.
(You can see the video of that press conference here.)
But now, in an interview conducted by Fusion (a joint venture between ABC and Univision), excerpts of which have been released today, Reid tells Univision anchor Jorge Ramos that the exercise band “slipped,” rather than “broke.”
“Now, however, Reid tells Ramos a different story. The exercise band was not attached to the shower door in his bathroom, Reid says, but was instead attached to ‘a big metal hook that came out from the wall’ in an unspecified room in his new Nevada home.”
“[T]he [elastic band] strap had no handle on it, slipped, spun me around, uh, about, oh I guess four feet (Reid points with his right hand to the wall of the interview room) and so I smashed my face into a cabinet,” Reid tells Ramos.
Reid’s latest version of the incident, as told to Ramos, differs from previous versions advanced by his team in another very significant way.
“Sources familiar with the incident said Reid was exercising in his bathroom, with the exercise band attached to the shower door,” Politico reported on January 22. (emphasis added)
As Breitbart News reported previously, that version of the story, almost certainly told to Politico by Reid’s staffers with his approval, is not credible.
Now, however, Reid tells Ramos a different story. The exercise band was not attached to the shower door in his bathroom, Reid says, but was instead attached to “a big metal hook that came out from the wall” in an unspecified room in his new Nevada home.
Watch the full video of the excerpts of the Fusion interview here:
Here’s a partial transcript of the excerpt of the interview released by Fusion:
Ramos: You said recently that the accident had nothing to do with your decision to retire.
However, we are seeing the consequences of what happened.
What really happened?
Was it really with an elastic band? Read the rest of this entry »
REWIND: Kevin D. Williamson on Harry Reid
Posted: March 27, 2015 Filed under: Mediasphere, Politics, Reading Room, Think Tank, U.S. News | Tags: Barack Obama, Congress, Harry Reid, Kevin D. Williamson, National Review, Nevada, NRO, Senate Majority Leader, Senate minority leader, The Clown of the Senate 1 Comment
Good piece @NRO: In honor of @SenatorReid‘s retirement, @KevinNR‘s cover piece from June
Via @elianayjohnson
Breaking: Harry Reid Trips Out
Posted: March 27, 2015 Filed under: Breaking News, Politics | Tags: Chuck Schumer, Democratic Party (United States), Dick Durbin, Harry Reid, Nevada, Party leaders of the United States Senate, United States Congress, United States House of Representatives, United States Senate 1 Comment
From this morning’s New York Times:
Senator Harry Reid, the tough tactician who has led Senate Democrats since 2005, will not seek re-election next year, bringing an end to a three-decade congressional career that culminated with his push of President Obama’s ambitious agenda against fierce Republican resistance.
Mr. Reid, 75, who suffered serious eye and facial injuries in a Jan. 1 exercise accident at his Las Vegas home, said he had been contemplating retiring from the Senate for months. He said his decision was not attributable either to the accident or to his demotion to minority leader after Democrats lost the majority in November’s midterm elections.
“I understand this place,” Mr. Reid said. “I have quite a bit of power as minority leader.”
The National Republican Senatorial Committee responds to Harry Reid’s retirement:
“On the verge of losing his own election and after losing the majority, Senator Harry Reid has decided to hang up his rusty spurs. Not only does Reid instantly become irrelevant and a lame duck, his retirement signals that there is no hope for the Democrats to regain control of the Senate. With the exception of Reid, every elected statewide official in Nevada is Republican and this race is the top pickup opportunity for the GOP.”
Hot Air‘s Ed Morrissey comments:
“…The contrast of Reid’s obstructionism on budgets through most of his reign and the easy way in which Republicans settled back into normal order would have proved embarrassing when the GOP used it on the campaign trail next year, and Reid would have become the poster boy for the kind of dysfunction voters would get if they chose Democrats in Senate races.
Senate Majority leader Harry Reid, nearing retirement, is reportedly using LSD regularly. Pictured here is one of Reid’s drug-inspired pause to study his own hand during a floor speech
Now, after announcing his retirement, Reid’s clout will recede even further. A Minority Leader who doesn’t plan on running again will hold fewer cards for whipping his caucus into line. Other Democrats will look to those who will control committee assignments in future sessions, and the jockeying for leadership slots will necessarily push Reid to the sidelines. Procedurally, Reid might be able to cause some problems, but the more he does that the more he damages Democrats in the next election cycle, especially to the extent that it’s seen as running interference for a lame-duck President who suffered two successive midterm disasters. Read the rest of this entry »
LA Desk: Supporters of an NFL Stadium in Carson Deliver 15,000 Signatures to City Clerk in Support of Ballot initiative
Posted: March 25, 2015 Filed under: Mediasphere, U.S. News | Tags: ABC7, AEG, Carson City, Downtown Los Angeles, Farmers Field, Los Angeles, National Football League, Nevada, Oakland Raiders, Robert Holguin, San Diego Chargers, St. Louis Rams, Stan Kroenke Leave a commentSupporters of an #NFL stadium in #Carson deliver 15,000 signatures to city clerk in support of ballot initiative. pic.twitter.com/bAvCvCatY2
— Robert Holguin (@ABC7Robert) March 25, 2015
SELFIE: Mars Rover Curiosity Gears Up
Posted: February 15, 2015 Filed under: Mediasphere, Science & Technology, Space & Aviation | Tags: Aeolis Mons, Curiosity (rover), Gale (crater), Google, HiRISE, Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Mars, Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter, Mars rover, NASA, Nevada, Opportunity (rover), Pahrump 1 Comment
After cooling its heels for a month on the Red Planet, NASA’s Mars rover Curiosity is gearing up for lots of action in the coming weeks.
Curiosity’s handlers sent no commands to the rover for most of April, because Mars was on the opposite side of the sun from Earth at the time. But this planetary alignment, known as a Mars solar conjunction, is now over, and the mission team is planning to drill into a Red Planet rock soon and then send Curiosity off on an epic, miles-long trek to the base of a huge and mysterious mountain.
“A couple of weeks to move to the site and drill, and then the experiments themselves can take also a couple of weeks — that’s about the time scale we’re looking at,” said Curiosity deputy project scientist Ashwin Vasavada, of NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif. “And then we’d hopefully get going.”
[Curiosity’s Latest Amazing Mars Photos]
He stressed, however, that this timeframe could shift depending on how the drilling operation goes, and what Curiosity discovers.
Curiosity healthy after ‘spring break’
The Curiosity rover wasn’t idle during conjunction. It continued monitoring Martian weather and radiation and perfomed some relatively simple science work using commands sent up in advance, Vasavada said.
“That all went fine — it kind of executed flawlessly a long set of preplanned activities,” he told SPACE.com. “We had never planned 30 days at once [before], so that was a relief.”
But things have picked up since mission controllers got back in touch with Curiosity late last week. They’ve already uploaded a minor software update to the rover, which emerged from conjunction in fine health, Vasavada said.
Curiosity continues to operate on its backup, or B-side, computer, which it switched to after a glitch knocked out its primary computer (or A-side) in late February.
The rover team has still not fully figured out what happened to the A-side, but engineers have made significant troubleshooting progress. For example, Curiosity would have been OK if an issue during conjunction had forced the rover to swap back over to the A-side computer, Vasavada said.
Curiosity Mars Rover Self Portrait
Drilling another hole
Curiosity touched down inside Mars’ huge Gale Crater last August, kicking off a two-year surface mission to determine if the Red Planet could ever have supported microbial life.
The rover team has already checked off this primary goal, announcing in March that a spot dubbed Yellowknife Bay was indeed habitable billions of years ago. Scientists reached this conclusion after studying Curiosity’s analyses of material pulled from a 2.5-inch-deep (6.4 centimeters) hole the rover drilled into a Red Planet outcrop.
[Ancient Mars Could Have Supported Life (Photos)]
Now that conjunction’s over, the mission team wants to drill another hole in a nearby rock, to confirm and perhaps extend the exciting results gleaned from the first drilling activity.
“Probably in the next week or two, we will slightly move the rover to a new location, which the science team is actively choosing right now,” Vasavada said. “Primarily, it will be to duplicate the results from the first hole, because they were so exciting and, in some cases, unexpected that the people who run the experiments just want to make sure it’s really correct before writing all the papers up.” Read the rest of this entry »
Senator Reid’s Brother Accused of DUI, Battery
Posted: February 4, 2015 Filed under: Breaking News, Crime & Corruption, Mediasphere, Politics | Tags: Arrest, Boulder City, DUI, Harry Reid, KTNV-TV, Larry Reid, Nevada, Nevada Highway Patrol, Police officer 2 Comments
A spokeswoman for Sen. Reid confirmed Larry Reid is Harry Reid’s brother, but wouldn’t comment about the arrest
LAS VEGAS (AP) — Authorities say the 73-year-old brother of Senate Democratic leader Harry Reid was arrested on misdemeanor driving under the influence, weapon and battery on an officer charges after he was found in a vehicle parked in a dirt median of a state highway in southern Nevada.
Nevada Highway Patrol Trooper Loy Hixson said Tuesday that Larry Reid was arrested a little after noon Monday and released after spending a night at the Clark County jail on charges also including driving across a median and not wearing a seatbelt. Read the rest of this entry »
‘Forgot the Safe Word’
Posted: January 22, 2015 Filed under: Entertainment, Humor, Mediasphere, Politics | Tags: Democratic Party, Harry Reid, Nevada, SOTU, Twitter, U.S. Senate 1 Comment
Via Twitter – Caleb Howe
Harry Reid Hospitalized with Broken Face
Posted: January 2, 2015 Filed under: Breaking News, U.S. News | Tags: Arizona, Democratic Party (United States), Harry Reid, LAS VEGAS, Mitch McConnell, Nevada, University Medical Center (Tucson 1 Comment
Catalina Camia reports: Senate Democratic leader Harry Reid is in a Las Vegas hospital following injuries sustained while exercising at home.
A statement issued Friday by Reid’s office said doctors expect a “full recovery.”
[Harry Reid Breaks ‘Number of Ribs and Bones in His Face’ While Exercising]
“A piece of equipment Senator Reid was using to exercise broke, causing him to fall and break a number of ribs and bones in his face,” according to the statement. “Senator Reid will return to Washington this weekend and be in the office Tuesday as the Senate prepares to reconvene.”
“A piece of equipment Senator Reid was using to exercise broke, causing him to fall and break a number of ribs and bones in his face.”
Adam Jentleson, the senator’s spokesman, told the Associated Press that the accident occurred when an elastic exercise band broke and hit the 75-year-old Reid in the face, causing him to fall. As the senator fell, Jentleson said, Reid struck part of the equipment and broke several bones near his right eye. Reid broke several ribs as he hit the floor. Read the rest of this entry »
Dan Henninger: It Wasn’t Just Obama
Posted: November 13, 2014 Filed under: Politics, U.S. News | Tags: Associated Press, Barack Obama, Democratic Party (United States), Harry Reid, John Boehner, Nancy Pelosi, Nevada, Party leaders of the United States Senate, Republican Party (United States), United States 2 Comments
Democrats’ policies have been pillaging their own political base
No. 1: It’s not us; it’s what’s his name, the unpopular president. (And that awful Valerie Jarrett. )
No. 2: It was a midterm election with a bad map; we’ll be back in 2016. Hillary to the rescue.
Official Obama Explanation : My ideas and policies are fine; I just have a messaging problem.
USS Democrat Captain Nancy Pelosi : “There was an ebbing, an ebb tide, for us.”
This all reminds me of the classic film satire, “I’m All Right, Jack,” about the dying days of the British trade-union movement. When an idealistic young factory worker shows the efficiency gains possible from actually using a forklift, the union steward calls a strike. Three guesses which Democrats in the U.S. version would play the roles of Peter Sellers, Terry-Thomas and Margaret Rutherford.
“The Democratic Party has become the Nickel-and-Dime Empire. Their compulsion to chisel money out of the population is collapsing the empire from within.”
A few Democratic voices, mostly party professionals whose job is winning elections, have said the donkey herd that just ran off the cliff needs to rethink its sense of direction. No one is listening to them. Most Democrats, especially the left that took control of the party in 2008, deny any problem. And well they might. There is no Plan B.
The Democrats’ standard political model is generally attributed to FDR confidante Harry Hopkins : “We will spend and spend, and tax and tax, and elect and elect.” Hopkins denied ever using these words, but the formula lived on.
Tax, spend and elect just slammed into the mountain.
In Wisconsin, the party’s armies not only lost to Scott Walker (twice!) but watched Republicans gain the most seats in the state’s legislature in 50 years. Read the rest of this entry »
John Fund: Curtains for Reid? He May Not Even be Minority Leader After Tuesday
Posted: November 2, 2014 Filed under: Politics, The Butcher's Notebook, Think Tank | Tags: corruption, Democrats, Election 2014, GOP, Harry Reid, Iowa, John Fund, Midterms, Mitch McConnell, Nevada, Senate Majority Leader, Senate minority leader Leave a comment
Whether history will be cruel or kind to the political career of Harry Reid remains to be seen, but in the short term, one thing is for sure, the blame for Democrats’ upcoming election defeat will be served generously to Harry, in multiple helpings. Judgement day is almost here. Until as recently as a week ago, I was too superstitious and too cautious to predict that the Tuesday’s election will firmly close the book on the Reid era. Now that Tuesday is almost here, I’m throwing caution to the dogs. It’s half-past Reid-O’clock. Time to chill the champagne, unwrap the cigars, put sparkly icing on the cowboy cupcakes, and light the candles. Harry’s days as senate majority leader are in the final twilight. The show’s almost over. I get emotional just thinking about it, don’t you?
At The Corner, John Fund writes:
It looks as if Harry Reid is at high risk of losing any Senate leadership role after Tuesday’s election.
Reid said Saturday that it’s all up to Iowa to determine whether he keeps his job. He told Democratic donors that if Republican Joni Ernst wins her victory, it “would mean . . . that Mitch McConnell would be leader of the United States Senate.”
“Reid indicated to the newspaper that ‘other Democrats would only get their chance to lead the caucus if they pried the title from his cold, dead hands’.”
Given that Sunday’s Des Moines Register poll shows 
Ernst with a seven-point lead over Democrat Bruce Braley, Reid can be forgiven some nervousness.
“But this year, at a news conference held in September, Reid declined to clarify whether he would stay on as minority leader if his party lost the majority.”
But Reid may also not even remain minority leader after Tuesday, though Democrats around him exude inside-the-Beltway loyalty to him in public. Chuck Schumer, the No. 3 ranking Democrat and a man known for his ambition, told Meet the Press last month that Reid had a lock on the majority leader’s job. Read the rest of this entry »
Heartache: Poll Finds Harry Reid’s Approval Rating At All-Time Low, 21%
Posted: October 6, 2014 Filed under: Mediasphere, Politics, U.S. News | Tags: Democratic Party (United States), Federal Election Commission, Gallup, Harry Reid, Nevada, Party leaders of the United States Senate, United States, Weasel Wonk 1 CommentHeartache: Poll Finds Harry Reid’s Approval Rating At All-Time Low, 21%… http://t.co/Bt5IgvvUl8 #tcot pic.twitter.com/XqmX6pp3V7
— Elisabeth (@10thAmendment) October 6, 2014
Half of Illinois Wants to Leave State
Posted: May 2, 2014 Filed under: Mediasphere, Politics, U.S. News | Tags: Connecticut, Gallup, Illinois, Maine, Maryland, Montana, Nevada, New York 1 Comment
If everybody in America had the opportunity to pack up and move to the state of their choice, Illinois, Connecticut, and Maryland would empty out, according to a new Gallup poll. Around half of residents in all three states said they would relocate to another state given the chance, with Illinois having the highest rate of people (50%) who want to get out; Connecticut clocked in at 49%, and Maryland at 47%. People in Montana, Hawaii, and Maine were the most inclined to stay put, with just 23% of residents of each state saying they would take the opportunity to move. Read the rest of this entry »
Annals of the Richest .01%: How Did Harry Reid Get So Wealthy?
Posted: April 24, 2014 Filed under: Politics, U.S. News | Tags: Bed Bath & Beyond, George Washington University, Harry Reid, John L. Smith, Nevada, Nordstrom, RealClearPolitics, Reid, Senate 4 Comments
The first of two parts
For RealClearPolitics, Adam O’Neal writes: Last month, as the Senate was busy negotiating the final details of its Ukraine aid package, Majority Leader Harry Reid became temporarily distracted with a campaign finance issue. Since winning re-election in 2010, Reid’s campaign had purchased gifts for supporters and donors from vendors like Bed Bath & Beyond, Amazon, Nordstrom, and the Senate gift shop, among others. But one round of spending was directed to a less recognizable firm: Ryan Elisabeth, a jewelry line.
In 2012 and 2013, the campaign spent $31,267 purchasing gifts from the company, which is owned by Reid’s granddaughter, Ryan Elisabeth Reid. All told, she took in nearly seven times more cash than all vendors of donor gifts combined during that period of time.
Veteran Nevada political journalist Jon Ralston first reported the news after receiving a tip about the expenditures. (Ryan Elisabeth’s last name did not appear on the FEC reports, and the senator’s office initially failed to confirm her identity.) While Sen. Reid does not appear to have broken the law, he understood that the purchases created a perception of favoritism. Lamenting the unwanted attention heaped on his granddaughter, he decided after the news broke that “it would be best to pay for her work out of my own pocket.”
This was not the first time that Reid had mixed family and politics — or potentially run afoul of ethics rules.
Harry Reid has spent more than 40 years in government, starting as a small city’s attorney and eventually becoming the most powerful senator in the country. He has raised tens of millions of dollars in political contributions, established himself as an institution in Nevada politics along the way, and made himself a very wealthy man. His humble roots — from growing up in a remote desert town to working six days a week as a Capitol police officer while in law school — are legend in Washington and Nevada. Reid exhibits the toughness of a once destitute boy who completely transformed his life through determination, hard work — and good luck. Read the rest of this entry »
Bundy’s Racial Rhetoric
Posted: April 24, 2014 Filed under: Mediasphere, Politics, U.S. News | Tags: American Revolution, Cliven Bundy, Franklin D. Roosevelt, Henry David Thoreau, Kevin D. Williamson, Martin Luther King Jr, Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi, Nevada 1 Comment
We can survive cranks, but not a criminal government.
For NRO, Kevin D. Williamson writes: Cliven Bundy’s racial rhetoric is indefensible, and it has inspired a lot of half-bright commentary from the left today directed at your favorite correspondent, mostly variations on this theme: Don’t you feel stupid for having compared him to Mohandas Gandhi?
Short version: No. There is a time to break the law, and the fact that the law is against you does not mean that justice is against you. The law was against Washington and Martin Luther King Jr., too. That does not mean that what is transpiring in Nevada is the American Revolution or the civil-rights movement; it means that there is a time to break the law. As I wrote, “Cliven Bundy may very well be a nut job, but one thing is for sure: The federal government wouldn’t treat a tortoise the way it has treated him.”
Critics on the left, being an ignorant bunch, may be unaware of the fact, but the example of Mohandas Gandhi is here particularly apt, given that the great man had some pretty creepy ideas about everything from race to homosexuality, for example writing that blacks aspired to nothing more than passing their time in “indolence and nakedness,” objecting to blacks’ being housed in Indian neighborhoods, etc. Americans, many of whom seem to believe that Mr. Gandhi’s first name was “Mahatma,” generally confuse the Indian historical figure, a man whose biography contains some complexity, with the relatively straightforward character from the Richard Attenborough movie. We remember Gandhi and admire him because he was right about the thing most closely associated with him. In the same way, there is more to the life of Thomas Jefferson than his having been a slave owner. The question of standing in opposition to a domineering federal government that acts as the absentee landlord for nine-tenths of the state of Nevada is only incidentally related to Cliven Bundy’s having backward views about race. Mr. Bundy’s remarks reflect poorly on the man, not on the issue with which the man is associated. Read the rest of this entry »
[VIDEO] Rawhide! RC Roundup! Rounding Up Cattle by Remote Control
Posted: April 23, 2014 Filed under: Entertainment, Mediasphere | Tags: Blues Brothers, Brian Sandoval, Bureau of Land Management, Cattle, Cowboy, Dean Heller, LAS VEGAS, Nevada 2 Comments…with the Blues Brothers: Rawhide Hardstyle remix.
[VIDEO] Bill O’Reilly to Bundy Supporter: Whats the Difference Between Bundy and Occupy Wall Street?
Posted: April 23, 2014 Filed under: Mediasphere, Politics, U.S. News | Tags: Bill O'Reilly, Bundy, Cliven Bundy, Jon Stewart, Nevada, Occupy Wall Street, Scott Shaw 2 CommentsBill O’Reilly took on a militia leader Tuesday night supporting Nevada rancher Cliven Bundy and asked him a very blunt question: what’s the difference between Bundy supporters and Occupy Wall Street? Scott Shaw acknowledged that Bundy broke the law, but said Bundy should stick to his convictions.
O’Reilly suggested the government put a lean on the land for when he dies, which Shaw thought was a reasonable solution. He said he’s not comfortable with the government’s overreaction to the situation in Nevada, telling O’Reilly, “We’re only a nation of laws when it suits our federal overlords.” Read the rest of this entry »
Fund: Reid Calling Bundy Supporters ‘Domestic Terrorists’ Part of Democrat’s Effort to Rally the Base
Posted: April 20, 2014 Filed under: Mediasphere, Politics, U.S. News | Tags: Bunkerville Nevada, Bureau of Land Management, Harry Reid, LAS VEGAS, Nevada, Party leaders of the United States Senate, Ranch, United States 3 CommentsSee John Fund‘s most recent piece: “The United States of SWAT?”
AP Photo / J. Scott Applewhite
Military-Style Units From Government Agencies are Wreaking Havoc on Non-Violent Citizens
Posted: April 18, 2014 Filed under: Crime & Corruption, Think Tank, War Room, White House | Tags: Bureau of Land Management, Food and Drug Administration, John Fund, Nevada, Railroad Retirement Board, SWAT, Tennessee Valley Authority, United States 7 Comments
The United States of SWAT?
John Fund writes: Regardless of how people feel about Nevada rancher Cliven Bundy’s standoff with the federal Bureau of Land Management over his cattle’s grazing rights, a lot of Americans were surprised to see TV images of an armed-to-the-teeth paramilitary wing of the BLM deployed around Bundy’s ranch.
“Since 9/11, the feds have issued a plethora of homeland-security grants that encourage local police departments to buy surplus military hardware and form their own SWAT units.”
They shouldn’t have been. Dozens of federal agencies now have Special Weapons and Tactics (SWAT) teams to further an expanding definition of their missions. It’s not controversial that the Secret Service and the Bureau of Prisons have them. But what about the Department of Agriculture, the Railroad Retirement Board, the Tennessee Valley Authority, the Office of Personnel Management, the Consumer Product Safety Commission, and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service? All of these have their own SWAT units and are part of a worrying trend towards the militarization of federal agencies — not to mention local police forces.
“By 2005, at least 80 percent of towns with a population between 25,000 and 50,000 people had their own SWAT team.”
“Law-enforcement agencies across the U.S., at every level of government, have been blurring the line between police officer and soldier,” journalist Radley Balko writes in his 2013 book Rise of the Warrior Cop. “The war on drugs and, more recently, post-9/11 antiterrorism efforts have created a new figure on the U.S. scene: the warrior cop — armed to the teeth, ready to deal harshly with targeted wrongdoers, and a growing threat to familiar American liberties.”
Armed Federal Agents Defend Turtle Habitat but Fail to Secure Our National Borders
Posted: April 17, 2014 Filed under: Law & Justice, Think Tank | Tags: Bureau of Land Management, Endangered Species Act, Kevin D. Williamson, National Review, Nevada, Old Testament, United States 4 Comments
The Rule of the Lawless
For NRO, Kevin D. Williamson writes: Deserts always feel like my natural habitat, and I am very fond of them. That being said, I have, for my sins, spent a fair amount of time in Clark County, Nev., and it is not the loveliest stretch of desert in these United States, or even in the top twelve. Protecting the pristine beauty of the sun-baked and dust-caked outskirts of Las Vegas and its charismatic fauna from grazing cattle — which the Bureau of Land Management seems to regard as an Old Testament plague — seems to me to be something less than a critical national priority. At the same time, the federal government’s fundamental responsibility, which is defending the physical security of the country, is handled with remarkable nonchalance: Millions upon millions upon millions of people have crossed our borders illegally and continue to reside within them. Cliven Bundy’s cattle are treated as trespassers, and federal agents have been dispatched to rectify that trespass; at the same time, millions of illegal aliens present within our borders are treated as an inevitability that must be accommodated. In practice, our national borders are a joke, but the borders of that arid haven upon which ambles the merry Mojave desert tortoise are sacrosanct.
[Kevin Williamson’s book “The End Is Near and It’s Going to Be Awesome: How Going Broke Will Leave America Richer, Happier, and More Secure” is available at Amazon]
Strangely, many of the same people who insist that Mr. Bundy must be made an example of for the sake of the rule of law protest at the same time that it is not only impossible but positively undesirable for the federal government to deploy federal resources to rectify the federal crime of jumping the federal border. Read the rest of this entry »
The Obama-Putin Invasion Challenge
Posted: April 15, 2014 Filed under: Diplomacy, Humor, White House | Tags: Barack Obama, Nevada, Ukraine, Vladimir Putin 1 Comment
Jackass Quote of the Week: Former Arizona Sheriff Threatens to Use Women as Human Shields During Bundy Ranch Standoff
Posted: April 14, 2014 Filed under: Breaking News, Self Defense, U.S. News | Tags: Associated Press, Bundy, Bureau of Land Management, Chris Matthews, MSNBC, Nevada, Richard Mack, United States 3 Comments“We were actually strategizing to put all the women up at the front. If they are going to start shooting, it’s going to be women that are going to be televised all across the world getting shot by these rogue federal officers.”
Who is this “we”, I wonder? “We” were “actually strategizing?” When hatching this brilliant idea, were any of the actual women involved consulted? Did his group agree on this “strategy”? Highly doubtful. I suspect Richard Mack was “strategizing” out of his ass, in front of a TV camera, on his own.
What would be televised, is Mack leading his group of “Patriots” into a permeant cloud of shame, colossal public humiliation, an act of cowardice and dishonor from which his movement would never recover. Hiding behind women? That sounds more like something some extremist moron from the far Left would do.
When I first heard this on “The Real Story”, I nearly fell off my chair. What are you, Mack, a freaking Palestinian terrorist ? Are you taking a page from the Hamas playbook? Are you INSANE?
Credit: Gage Skidmore/Wikipedia
From TheBlaze.com:
Former Arizona Sheriff Richard Mack revealed on Monday that he and other organizers who traveled to Clark County, Nev., to support Cliven Bundy during his land dispute with the feds planned to put women on the front lines in case the “rogue federal officers” started shooting.
Mack made the chilling revelation on Fox News’ “The Real Story” Monday, two days after the tense standoff between Bundy and the federal government came to a peaceful end.
Mack apparently identifies with the Tea Party and claims to have spoken at numerous rallies. He also appeared on MSNBC’s “Hardball” with host Chris Matthews to promote the movement.
Mack was elected as Graham County sheriff in 1988 and he served two terms until 1997. The former sheriff also reportedly fought against the so-called “Brady Bill,” a 1993 gun control law that instituted federal background checks on firearms purchasers in the United States.
Memo to Reid: Pack It Up Harry, It’s Over
Posted: April 14, 2014 Filed under: Politics, The Butcher's Notebook, U.S. News | Tags: Bureau Land Management, Cattle, Harry Reid, LAS VEGAS, Nevada, Party leaders of the United States Senate, Reid, Senate 2 Comments
Senator Reid on Cattle Battle: “It’s Not Over.” Harry, It’s Over
RENO, Nev. (MyNews4.com & KRNV) — Senate majority leader Harry Reid hasn’t been very vocal about the cattle battle showdown in recent days, but says “it’s not over.”
Harry? we talked about this. It’s over.
Reid tells News4’s Samantha Boatman his take on the so-called cattle battle in southern Las Vegas. “Well, it’s not over.
Well, yeah it is, Reid. It’s over.
“We can’t have an American people that violate the law and then just walk away from it. So it’s not over,” Reid said.
Harry, you represent a Federal government that violates the law every day, and walks away from it. You’re in the worst possible position to make statements like that anywhere near a live microphone. Sit down, shut up.
FEDS BLINK: Nevada Cattle Rancher Wins Range War With Federal Government
Posted: April 12, 2014 Filed under: Breaking News, Law & Justice, U.S. News | Tags: ABC News, Bundy, Bunkerville Nevada, Bureau of Land Management, LAS VEGAS, Nevada, Ranch 5 Comments
Liz Fields reports: A Nevada cattle rancher appears to have won his week-long battle with the federal government over a controversial cattle roundup that had led to the arrest of several protesters.
“Based on information about conditions on the ground, and in consultation with law enforcement, we have made a decision to conclude the cattle gather because of our serious concern about the safety of employees and members of the public”
— BLM Director Neil Kornze
Cliven Bundy went head to head with the Bureau of Land Management over the removal of hundreds of his cattle from federal land, where the government said they were grazing illegally.
[See also THE SAGA OF BUNDY RANCH–FEDERAL POWER, RULE OF LAW AND AVERTING POTENTIAL BLOODSHED]
Bundy claims his herd of roughly 900 cattle have grazed on the land along the riverbed near Bunkerville, 80 miles northeast of Las Vegas, since 1870 and threatened a “range war” against the BLM on the Bundy Ranch website after one of his sons was arrested while protesting the removal of the cattle.
Bundy Ranch: Unconfirmed Intimidation, Isolation Maneuvers
Posted: April 11, 2014 Filed under: Breaking News, Crime & Corruption, U.S. News | Tags: Brian Sandoval, Bundy, Bureau of Land Management, Free speech zone, Moapa Valley Nevada, Nevada, Twitter, United States 1 CommentBundy family reports cell towers near ranch have been shut down, preventing communication & video uploads. #BundyRanch
— Paul Joseph Watson (@PrisonPlanet) April 11, 2014
[PHOTO] Protest Image of the Day: ‘The First Amendment is Not an Area’
Posted: April 10, 2014 Filed under: Censorship, Politics | Tags: Bureau of Land Management, First Amendment Area, First Amendment to the United States Constitution, Fort Hood, Free speech zone, Las Vegas Review-Journal, Nevada, United States 4 Comments
As SteynOnline readers well know, in the wake of Seal Team Six, America has also acquired a Bunny Team Six and a Deer Team Six. Now comes news from Nevada ofCattle Team Six. It’s a long-running story of rights to graze on “federal land” vs protection of the “desert tortoise”, but, like so many disputes with American bureaucrats these days, it ends with paramilitary commandos training their weapons on civilians:
Federal snipers with the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) trained guns on members of a family yesterday after they dared to stop and take video footage of cattle…
Whoa, hold that thought! “Federal snipers with the Bureau of Land Management”. As I wrote only last week, if someone wants to stroll in to Fort Hood and shoot as many people as he’s minded to, the fellows on the receiving end have to call 911 and wait for the county sheriff to send a couple of deputies – because “the only government department without a military force at its disposal is the military“. But the Bureau of Land Management has snipers.
Bill Clinton — Surrounded by Hookers
Posted: March 2, 2014 Filed under: Entertainment, Mediasphere | Tags: Barbie Girl, Bill Clinton, British Rail, Bubba, Martin Scorsese, Moonlite BunnyRanch, Nevada, Robert De Niro 2 Comments
Bill Clinton has really whore’d himself out this time — surrounding himself with real prostitutes.
Slick Willie probably had no clue … but the women Bill posed with at an L.A. charity event Thursday night are two star hookers at the famed Nevada Bunny Ranch brothel.
The brunette goes by Ava Adora and the blonde goes by Barbie Girl. According to her bio on the BR website, the blonde is very flexible and specializes in de-virginizing. The brunette “knows how to please a variety of both men and women.”
We have no idea how they got in to the star-studded Unite4Humanity charity gala — which honored Clinton along with several other philanthropic celebs like Robert De Niro and Martin Scorsese — but we can take a wild guess why they showed.
Bubba’s really on a roll — back in 2012, he got cozy with a couple porn stars at a gala in Monaco.
UPDATE: 10:45 PST — Sources close to the people who ran the event say the 2 hookers were not invited guests — they were more than likely someone’s plus 1 — and were removed from the party after snapping the pic with Clinton.
However, sources close to the 2 women say that’s not true…
Large Black Bear: Freestyle Champion Solo Teatherball Player
Posted: December 11, 2013 Filed under: Entertainment | Tags: Animal Ark, Bear, Nevada, Nevada Department of Wildlife, Reno, Reno Nevada, Tetherball, YouTube Leave a commentAnimal Ark in Reno, Nevada has one killer tetherball player – animalark.org
pundit from another planet 