Waukesha girl's sweet gesture returned by grateful troops

◼ REAGAN DEMOCRATS: 'TEA BAGGERS' OR MSNBC VIEWERS? - Ann Coulter

Something conservatives should keep in mind: not all former Democrats (or even current Dems) are “libs”, “Liberals”, or Leftists

◼ ...I thought Democrats were the Autobots, Thundercats, Holograms, and Rebel Alliance…and Republicans were the Decepticons, the Mutants, the Misfits, and the Evil Galactic Empire.... - Hillbuzz

ATLAS - COMING NEXT FRIDAY!

Stay tuned for details! Let's fill the theater!

Earth Day Ends Obama's 53,300 Gallon Trip

◼ During his trip, Obama's 30-car motorcade was used to carry him to events. His limo, and there are usually two in the motorcade, gets a high of 8-10 miles per gallon... - USNews

President Obama declared today's 41st annual Earth Day proof of America's ecological and conservation spirit—then completed a three-day campaign-style trip logging 10,666 miles on Air Force One, eating up some 53,300 gallons at a cost of about $180,000. And that doesn't include the fuel consumption of his helicopter, limo, or the 29 other vehicles that travel with that car.

◼ MICHELLE OBAMA CANCELS EARTH DAY EVENT... - Drudge

Petition to Redistribute GPA Scores

Waukesha girl's sweet gesture returned by grateful troops

◼ Her Girl Scout cookie project wins praise from top general

This one will make your day.

The power of TWITTER

◼ Conservatives poke Obama's Facebook town hall

In an early social media skirmish in the 2012 campaign, a conservative political group claims to have forced Facebook to temporarily shut down the event page for President Obama's online town hall meeting after steering hundreds of negative comments to the site....The cyber-battle shows just how much the dynamics of campaigns are shifting in the social media era.

◼ Twitter Power
Some folks are organizing a TWITTER Army of Davids going to call out the media on all their bogus coverage... it amounts to crowd sourcing the fact checking... call them on every bogus story they do... Learn more at the link.

Get your TWITTER and Facebook accounts ready before the next election cycle.

During two terms as New Mexico governor, he eliminated the state’s budget deficit and cut the rate of state government growth in half while reducing the state workforce by more than 10% without laying off a single qualified state worker

◼ New Mexico Governor Gary Johnson announces presidential bid, plans to ski Tuckerman Ravine

"Our leaders in Washington, DC, have ‘led’ America to record unemployment, a devalued currency, banking scandals, the mortgage crisis, drug crisis, economic crisis, loss of our nation’s industrial might — and a long list of other reminders our nation is way off course," Johnson said.

"Why am I telling you this? Because America is better than this. And because I can help fix it. I’m a fix-it man," he said.

Johnson, 58, said during two terms as New Mexico governor, he eliminated the state’s budget deficit and cut the rate of state government growth in half while reducing the state workforce by more than 10 percent without laying off a single qualified state worker.
"I was called ‘Governor Veto,’ and accepted that nickname proudly," he said.

Beck: Power Outage

In Wisconsin: Kloppenburg has called for a statewide recount

◼ Kloppenburg has called for a statewide recount - Althouse

Assistant Attorney General JoAnne Kloppenburg requested Wednesday a statewide recount - the first in 22 years - to check the results in the April 5 election for state Supreme Court race she lost to Justice David Prosser, the Government Accountability Board said....

Kloppenburg also called on the board to appoint a special investigator to probe the "actions and words" of Waukesha County Clerk Kathy Nickolaus.

◼ Kloppenburg requests recount in Supreme Court race - Milwaukee Journal Sentinel

Local Company Teams With Lowe’s to Give Away One Million Trees for Earth Day

◼ In celebration of Earth Day, Lowe’s will be giving away hundreds of seedlings to customers at each of its 1,700-plus locations (the closest one to us is in Redding) this Saturday, with the total planned giveaway reaching one million baby trees.
◼ the Jonsteen Company
Based in McKinlyeville - Jonsteen specializes in giant sequoias and coast redwoods, and the nursery is also home to many other valuable and interesting forest and landscape trees.
◼ Lowe's

David Spady lists California's Top Ten Most Outrageous Government Pensions and explains why California needs real reforms to prevent a pension crisis.

There’s nothing routine about the 26 warning letters to Obama for America totaling “more than 1,500 pages of questions and data that outlined compliance concerns — including the longest one ever sent to a presidential candidate,”

◼ All the president’s funny money - Michelle Malkin

The debt ceiling has already been raised three times during Obama’s first two years in office

◼ In February 2009, Obama asked for and received a $789 billion debt limit hike to help pay for his stimulus plan. In December 2009, Congress passed a stand alone $290 billion debt ceiling increase and in February 2010, the Democrats in Congress hiked the limit another $1.4 trillion to today’s $14.3 trillion max. - Conn Carroll/Washington Examiner

Althouse, on honing your arguments and toughening your skin

◼ By writing on the web, you can toughen up to the point where you can stand your ground in the physical space that is dominated by people who feel physically and intellectually invulnerable. - Althouse

“If a police officer can’t look into your trunk when you get pulled over, they certainly can’t download your photos and text messages.”

◼ MICHIGAN COPS CAN NOW STEAL YOUR CELL PHONE DATA — ‘WITHOUT THE OWNER KNOWING’ - The Blaze

CNet.com reports the Michigan State Police (MSP) are using “extraction devices” to download personal information from motorists’ cell phones, including contacts, videos, GPS data, and pictures, “even if they’re not suspected of any crime.”

◼ iPhone keeps record of everywhere you go - Guardian

In a speech, Google's then-chief executive Eric Schmidt suggested that: "If you have something that you don't want anyone to know, maybe you shouldn't be doing it in the first place. If you really need that kind of privacy, the reality is that search engines – including Google – do retain this information for some time and it's important, for example, that we are all subject in the United States to the Patriot Act and it is possible that all that information could be made available to the authorities."

His words provoked an outcry from privacy rights campaigners, who pointed out that privacy is a right, and that it protects every citizen from abuses by those in power.

As part of President Obama’s plan to rebuild the grass-roots movement that propelled him to the White House, he took to YouTube this week to urge his 19.3 million Facebook friends to join him, and invite others, for a town-hall-style chat on Facebook Wednesday with Mark Zuckerberg, the social media site’s chief executive, at his side.

◼ By Tuesday afternoon, more than 22,000 people had signed up. NY Times

It is all part of Mr. Obama’s re-election effort to use social media and other online tools to galvanize supporters. But unlike in the last presidential campaign, Republicans are better prepared to compete online in the 2012 contest.

“The notion that the Internet was owned by liberals, owned by the left in the wake of the Obama victory, has been proven false,” said Patrick Ruffini, a Republican political online strategist...

Republican voters matched Democrats in their use of these tools, with 40 percent of Republican online users turning to social media to get politically involved in a campaign, compared to 38 percent of Democratic voters, according to a study by the Pew Research Center for the Internet and Society. Tea Party supporters were especially likely to use social media to connect with a political group or candidate.

“It is not necessarily that Democrats or young people or liberals have become less active,” said Aaron Smith, the author of the study. “It is more that older adults, conservative voters and Tea Party activists have come to join the party.”

Drudge headline is: 4/20: Less than 1% of 'friends' sign up for Obama FACEBOOK event...

◼ 'unlike' Obama - Le·gal In·sur·rec·tion

Obama answered just eight questions during Wednesday's hour-long session at Facebook's secondary headquarters building in Palo Alto, an event that was streamed on the Facebook Live video page.

But some of those questions came from Facebook employees who won a company lottery for the chance to sit in the live audience. That left hundreds of questions posted on the event's Facebook wall unanswered.

Karen Brooks: re: Atlas Shrugged showing

Karen Brooks
Rocky Mountain Distributors are putting out Atlas Shrugged and hope to release a copy to Coming Attractions, in Humboldt County, either this Friday or next. Make sure you look for it and see it. You can go to AS website to request it as well.

◼ 300 theaters and counting.
Not near you yet? DEMAND Atlas to your town. Theaters being added regularly.

Libya rebels will receive $25 million from U.S.

◼ The new authorization for assistance would cover “vehicles, fuel trucks and fuel bladders, ambulances, medical equipment, protective vests, binoculars, and non-secure radios,” - Washington Times

Voters Are Listening

◼ Obama near record low approval rating, and so is everyone else. - John Hayward/Human Events

...These polls portray a landscape of disaffection with the current President. They’re waiting to hear bold and compelling talk about the alternatives. It’s time for the Republican presidential candidates to step up their game, and bring forth people who are ready to stand before that audience and speak with both reason and passion. Voters know we’re in deep trouble, and the same old cocktail of platitudes and bromides isn’t going to fix the problem. Note that Obama got absolutely no “bounce” whatsoever from his big “budget speech” at George Washington University. It looks like America retains a good number of voters who can tell the difference between nasty political rhetoric and a plan.

If there’s one thing the President’s cratering approval numbers tell us, it’s that people are tired of empty rhetoric, bitter class warfare, and vapid happy talk. They’ll return to a diet of such things in time, if they are not given something stronger and bolder to consider.

Update: An important additional point from reader Martin Hale is that even by the dismal standards for skewed mainstream media poll samples, this one's a whopper. The Washington Post / ABC poll included a mix of 32% who identified as Democrats, 22% Republican, 41% independent, and 4% who gave no response. That's an absurd 10% skew toward Democrats, which means the pollsters know the real numbers for Obama are even worse, and they do not want to report those numbers.

Dodge Ball, Freeze Tag, Wiffle Ball Deemed Dangerous in New Summer Camp Regs

◼ State creates “risky list” of activities to promote safety at summer camps. - NBC New York

Any indoor or outdoor recreational program that offers two or more organized activities, including one that falls on the “risky list” determined by state officials, will be considered a summer camp under the new rules and subject to the associated regulations.

The rules aim to curtail a loophole in previously passed regulations by the state Health Department that count activities like horseback riding and archery among the “risky list,” but do not include many activities like Freeze Tag and kickball featured in indoor programs....

UPDATE: ◼ NY backs off rules on kickball, tag at day camps

after a review spurred by a lawmaker's questions Friday and subsequent news reports, they've been judged too detailed and amount to micromanagement.

BREITBART: "I felt that it was kind of like coming out of the closet as not just gay but as a flaming transvestite with a sparkler fetish and with chaps."

◼ Andrew Breitbart's new book Righteous Indignation: Excuse Me While I Save the World! is out.

Available at Amazon: Known for his network of conservative websites that draws millions of readers everyday, Andrew Breitbart has one main goal: to make sure the "liberally biased" major news outlets in this country cover all aspects of a story fairly. Breitbart is convinced that too many national stories are slanted by the news media in an unfair way.

In RIGHTEOUS INDIGNATION, Breitbart talks about the key issues that Americans face, how he has aligned himself with the Tea Party, and how one needs to deal with the liberal news world head on. Along the way, he details his early years, working with Matt Drudge, the Huffington Post, and so on, and how Breitbart developed his unique style of launching key websites to help get the word out to conservatives all over.

A rollicking and controversial read, Breitbart will certainly raise your blood pressure, one way or another.

Andrew Breitbart is the creator of Breitbart.com, Breitbart.tv, Big Hollywood and Big Government. His new website, Big Journalism, launched in December 2009. His websites get millions of hits everyday.

Oh my: Palin’s website suddenly looking campaign-ready

◼ Allahpundit says "Looks good, and it’s clearly intended to make a statement coming so soon after her gangbusters Wisconsin speech." - HotAir

◼ sarahpac.com

TRANSCRIPT: Sarah Palin's Tax Day Tea Party Speech in Madison, Wisconsin

◼ With Video

Hello, Madison, Wisconsin! You look good. I feel like I’m at home. This is beautiful. Madison, I am proud to get to be with you today. Madison, these are the frontlines in the battle for the future of our country. This is where the line has been drawn in the sand. And I am proud to stand with you today in solidarity.

I am here today as a patriot, as a taxpayer, as a former union member, and as the wife of a union member. What I have to say today I say it to our good patriotic brothers and sisters who are in unions. I say this, too, proudly standing here as the daughter of a family full of school teachers. My parents, my grandparents, aunt, cousins, brother, sister – so many of these good folks are living on teachers’ pensions, having worked or are still working in education.

A pension is a promise that must be kept. Now, your Governor Scott Walker understands this. He understands that states must be solvent in order to keep their promises. And that’s what he’s trying to do. He’s not trying to hurt union members. Hey, folks, he’s trying to save your jobs and your pensions! But unfortunately some of your union bosses don’t understand this, and they don’t care if union members have to be laid off. No, they want to protect their own power, and if that means forcing a governor to lay off union workers, then so be it; they’ve proven that is fine with them. But that’s not real solidarity! Real solidarity means coming together for the common good. This Tea Party movement is real solidarity!

Willits City Council approved resolution opposing SmartMeters

◼ A resolution condemning the installation of PG&E SmartMeters in Willits was approved Wednesday by the Willits City Council. Mayor Bruce Burton was the only nay vote....

Twitter, Facebook and YouTube now it's an absolute must for candidates.

◼ Twitter, Facebook and YouTube now crucial to presidential campaigns

If you don't have a Facebook account yet, get one today. It's going to be important in the coming battle.

Tricia Willoughby, the 14-year-old girl who spoke — over boos and heckling — at the Tea Party rally in Madison.

◼ Tricia Willoughby, the 14-year-old girl who spoke — over boos and heckling — at the Tea Party rally in Madison. - Althouse
◼ A 14-year-old girl speaks at the Tea Party rally in Madison and is drowned out by chants, boos, and cowbells. - Althouse

California panel slashes funds for legislator vehicles

◼ California panel slashes funds for legislator vehicles - Press Democrat

With the state in a budget crisis, a government panel voted Thursday to end the decades-old practice of providing taxpayer-financed vehicles for Senate and Assembly members who want them, along with insurance, repairs and unlimited gasoline, all on the public tab.

The new deal: Get around in your own car. Starting in December, the state will give legislators a flat, $300-a-month payment to offset gas, insurance and other expenses, more than cutting in half the annual cost to taxpayers to keep lawmakers on the road.

The Citizens Compensation Commission, voting 5-0 with one abstention, sent a clear signal that it was time for legislators to surrender a luxury in a state where a car is often a necessity — and a status statement.

◼ Evans: $300 monthly car stipend too little - Press Democrat

No sooner had a state commission voted to take away her taxpayer-financed vehicle, replacing it with a flat $300-a-month payment for driving her own car, than state Sen. Noreen Evans, D-Santa Rosa, was on Twitter complaining about the raw deal.

The most revered moment in Martin Luther King’s speech was his dream that his children would live in a nation where they would “not be judged by the color of their skin, but by the content of their character.” To be conservative is to have boundless faith in the content of their character… and the character of their fellow citizens.

◼ Liberalism: The New Crack - John Hayward at Human Events

Video: Atlas is shrugging already w/update

◼ Atlas is shrugging already
◼ Film review: Atlas Shrugged

◼ 300 theaters and counting.
Not near you yet? Click here to DEMAND Atlas to your town. Theaters being added regularly.

◼ UPDATE: Atlas Shrugged the Movie Exceeds Expectations at Box Office - Gateway Pundit

Barack Obama raised a record-shattering $750 million on his way to winning the 2008 presidential election. But that stunning flood of cash has triggered an investigation by the FEC, which is taking a detailed look at the campaign's records and transactions... It was not required by law, since the Obama campaign did not accept federal matching funds and funded itself entirely with private donations. But allegations of improper contributions, coupled with the FEC's suspicions of certain transactions, led to the probe.

◼ FEC Investigators Digging Into Obama's 2008 Campaign - Newsmax