The Stiletto

THE DAILY BLADE: Dems Singing The Healthcare “Reform” Blues

The Stiletto — Thu, 18 Mar 2010 01:22:00 GMT

“MMM, MMM, MMM! Barack Hussein Obama.” No, this isn’t another preschool presidential paean, but a doleful Democrat Dirge, according to The Christian Science Monitor:

Remember Marjorie Margolies-Mezvinsky?

Anyone over a certain age who follows politics does. She was the first-term Democratic congresswoman from Pennsylvania who cast the decisive 218th House vote for President Clinton’s budget reconciliation bill in 1993 – and then went on to lose reelection in 1994.

Today, as the Democrats work to lock down just enough votes to pass an unpopular healthcare reform bill, “MMM” isn’t far from thought. No one wants to be the MMM of 2010. But there are several who could suffer that fate.

Remember when voters and pundits alike thought President George Bush’s “stubbornness” was a problem? Now, The Washington Post’s Howard Kurtz writes about Obama’s “grim determination” to pass the Dems’ healthcare legislation.

The president “shows no signs of rethinking his approach,” according to USA Today:

Despite the qualms of Congress and the public, “I'm going to be stubborn on this issue,” [the president] said.

He demonstrated his persistence again … when he gave another speech promoting changes he wants to make … “My strategy is pretty simple: Explain the problem to the American people, and keep explaining it and explaining it.” …

[The president] doesn't have a lot to show for the 18 weeks in which he's been making regular speeches to promote his … proposals. … Polls show support has dropped since he's been promoting the plan. …

“There's no doubt in my mind that I'm doing the right thing on this issue," he said in a speech.

The year was 2005, the president was Bush and the proposal was to allow younger workers to invest part of their taxes in stocks and bonds. Repubs let an unpopular plan die on the vine.

Health insurance “reform” is Social Security privatization all over again, but instead of killing the bill and starting from scratch, Dems plan to resort to arcane, shifty-sounding parliamentary maneuvers.

Despite all of Obama’s jaw-boning, polls show that disapproval of his signature domestic policy initiative has hardened, and using the “Slaughter solution” to pass the Senate healthcare legislation without an up-or-down vote will “do little to keep Democrats from getting butchered in November,” as Investor’s Business Daily so pithily puts it.

Update: In a Washington Post op-ed, Margolies writes that “I had no idea that when I voted for the Clinton budget, I was writing the first line of my obituary” and that “I voted my conscience” on Hillarycare. She adds: “I am your worst-case scenario. And I'd do it all again.” Though she admits she was “a lousy politician,” Margolies urges Congressional Dems to “simply to cast the vote you can be proud of next week, next year and for years to come.” The Stiletto is sure she will soon be regaling her grandchildren with stories of how their other grandfather’s and grandmother’s domestic agenda derailed her budding political career, but that it all turned out OK in the end since she has them to love.

THE OTHER SHOE DROPS: Updates To Previous Posts

The Stiletto — Thu, 18 Mar 2010 00:06:00 GMT

† A To Z Approach On Illegal Immigration In AZ: A Washington Post editorial terms the most recent attempts of AZ state legislators to keep forged documented aliens on their side of the U.S.-Mexico border “official malice,” and contends that proposed laws defining illegal entry into the U.S. as “trespassing,” criminalizing the hiring of undocumented workers and requiring local law enforcement help enforce federal immigration laws are meant to “harass, intimidate and hound the state's several hundred thousand undocumented residents.” The WaPo adds: “No other state has gone so far to usurp the federal government's authority over immigration enforcement.”

† States’ Rights Vs. The Feds: AZ’s insistence on asserting control over what is legal within its borders has become a flash point with the Obama administration. So too, mandatory health insurance coverage. The VA Legislature is poised to pass legislation that will be “one of the greatest tests of federal power over the states since the civil rights era,” reports The Boston Globe:

Virginia’s lawmakers are focused on constitutional questions and the power of states to run their own affairs.

“The administration is trying to shift from a government by social compact, agreement between elected officials and citizens, to a government where the leaders tell the subjects what to do,’’ said Virginia Delegate Bob Marshall, a Republican and chief sponsor of the measure. “That is not what the American Revolution was about.’’

The National Conference of State Legislatures says similar bills or state constitutional amendments are being proposed in at least 32 states. …

In Arizona, for example, voters will have a chance to approve a constitutional amendment this fall that would “preserve the freedom of all residents of the state to provide for their own health care.’’

Obama won Virginia in the presidential election, but that was followed by the 2009 election of McDonnell as governor, which was interpreted partly as an ebb in enthusiasm for the president’s policies.

The effort to reject a federal mandate is not only a challenge to Obama’s proposal but also to Obama himself. The president is a former constitutional law professor who has rejected claims from Republicans that his proposed mandate is unconstitutional. …

But opponents insist an insurance mandate is not legal because there is nothing in the Constitution that gives the federal government the right to penalize citizens for failing to purchase something. That is different, proponents says [sic], from specifically enumerated federal powers such as taxation, raising an army, or regulating commerce. …

Clint Bolick, a litigation specialist with the conservative Goldwater Institute who wants to test the mandate in the US Supreme Court if it passes, said Obama’s plan to mandate insurance coverage is nothing more than an effort to require one group of people to subsidize insurance for another.

According to The New York Times, states’ rights proponents “are on a roll”:

Gov. Mike Rounds of South Dakota, a Republican, signed a bill into law on Friday declaring that the federal regulation of firearms is invalid if a weapon is made and used in South Dakota.

On Thursday, Wyoming’s governor, Dave Freudenthal, a Democrat, signed a similar bill for that state. The same day, Oklahoma’s House of Representatives approved a resolution that Oklahomans should be able to vote on a state constitutional amendment allowing them to opt out of the federal health care overhaul.

In Utah, lawmakers embraced states’ rights with a vengeance in the final days of the legislative session last week. One measure said Congress and the federal government could not carry out health care reform, not in Utah anyway, without approval of the Legislature. Another bill declared state authority to take federal lands under the eminent domain process. A resolution asserted the “inviolable sovereignty of the State of Utah under the Tenth Amendment to the Constitution.” …

Alabama, Tennessee and Washington are considering bills or constitutional amendments that would assert local police powers to be supreme over the federal authority, according to the Tenth Amendment Center, a research and advocacy group based in Los Angeles. And Utah, again not to be outdone, passed a bill last week that says federal law enforcement authority, even on federal lands, can be limited by the state.

The Times quotes legal scholars who warn that such laws run afoul of Article 6 of the Constitution, because federal law is supreme. But Tenth Amendment Center founder Michael Boldin counters that states successfully legalized medical marijuana despite marijuana use and possession remaining illegal under federal law.

† Obama Doctrine Taking Shape: Washington Post columnist Robert Kagan, a senior associate at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, makes the case that President Hussein Obama “has worse relations overall with American allies than George W. Bush did in his second term” because it has devoted disproportionate time and attention to:

[T]the failed first-year attempt to improve relations with Iran; the ongoing attempt to improve relations with Russia; the stalled effort to improve cooperation with China; and the effort - fruitless so far - to prove to the Arab states that the United States is willing to pressure Israel to further the peace process. Add to these the efforts to improve relations with Syria, engage Burma and everything with Af-Pak, and not much has been left for the concerns of our allies.

This is bad enough, but compounding the problem has been the administration's evident impatience with allies who don't do as they are told. Europeans get spanked for a pallid commitment to NATO defense spending even as they contribute 30,000 troops to a distant war that European publics mostly don't believe in. Japan gets spanked when its new government insists on rethinking some recent agreements. In both cases, the administration has a point, but it's always easier to hammer allies when they misbehave than to hammer tough competitors such as Russia or China.

The president has shown seemingly limitless patience with the Russians as they stall an arms-control deal that could have been done in December. He accepted a year of Iranian insults and refusal to negotiate before hesitantly moving toward sanctions. The administration continues to woo Syria and Burma without much sign of reciprocation in Damascus or Rangoon. Yet Obama angrily orders a near-rupture of relations with Israel for a minor infraction like the recent settlement dispute - and after the Israeli prime minister publicly apologized. …

This administration pays lip-service to "multilateralism," but it is a multilateralism of accommodating autocratic rivals, not of solidifying relations with longtime democratic allies.

† Employers Hiring Forged Documented Aliens Are Lawbreakers In Other Ways, Too): The Washington Post reports that “there are signs that the recession has prompted more employers to shortchange their workers, either by failing to pay the promised amount or by offering less than minimum wage in the first place” and that those who are most vulnerable to being exploited are “[c]onstruction, restaurant and janitorial workers … especially if they are immigrants who don't speak English or lack legal status.”

† All The News That’s Fart To Print (ninth item): In what can only be described as sheer lunacy, environmentalists are now taking issue with another body cavity. A reader purportedly wrote to The Washington Post's "The Green Lantern" fretting that the disposable pads and tampons she uses while menstruating could be bad for the planet. She was advised to consider using maxi pads that aren't individually wrapped, tampons without applicators or pads and tampons made with organic cotton instead of rayon. But if she is “willing to make a really radical change” she should use “machine-washable fabric maxi pads, for example, sold under brand names like Lunapads and GladRags” or “menstrual cups, which catch the flow internally and can be cleaned and reused.” It would appear that to save the planet, women have to turn the clock back to the 19^th Century, before disposable feminine hygiene products were invented. Hmm. What would Gaia do?

† Updates To Previous Posts (sixth item, The Keystone Kops Are Enforcing U.S. Immigration Laws): Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano is cutting the federal government’s losses on the "virtual fence" along the 2,000-mile U.S.-Mexico border and plans to divert $50 million of stimulus funds that would have gone to the glitch-plagued project in favor of spending the money on “more proven and cost-effective security technology,” reports The Washington Times:

The decision to pull back funding on the initiative aimed at protecting the U.S. from terrorists, violent drug smugglers and illegal immigrants comes on the heels of a series of damning reports by the Government Accountability Office, and as Ms. Napolitano attempts to justify to lawmakers a 30 percent budget reduction for U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) in the midst of a raging drug war along the Southwest border.

To date, the U.S. government, through the Secure Border Initiative, has paid Boeing Co. more than $1 billion to build less than 700 miles of barriers between ports of entry, and a costly but flawed system of radar towers, ground sensors and cameras known as SBInet, a $4 billion project that appears to be in jeopardy.

"Not only do we have an obligation to secure our borders, we have a responsibility to do so in the most cost-effective way possible," Ms. Napolitano said. "The system of sensors and cameras along the Southwest border known as SBInet has been plagued with cost overruns and missed deadlines."

Ms. Napolitano said the department will instead … buy security technology such as mobile surveillance, thermal-imaging devices, body scanning units, mobile radios, cameras and laptops for pursuit vehicles.

At a time when taxpayers are being tapped to bail out failing corporations, corporations failing to provide goods and services the federal government has paid for with our tax dollars should refund our money.

† Updates To Previous Posts (fourth item, Is Hasan A Crazy Terrorist, Or A Terrorist Crazy?): The Washington Times reports more evidence that because of political correctness nothing was going to stop the U.S. Army from promoting Nidal Malik Hasan through the ranks no matter how unfit he was for duty, citing internal e-mails between residency director Maj. Scott Moran and his superiors. Time and again Moran raised red flags about Hasan’s performance (“He is a chronically somewhat unprofessional officer with a somewhat poor work ethic”) and time and again his concerns were brushed aside:

The communications are the latest in a series of early signs that showed officers had reason to suspend Maj. Hasan's training, and perhaps re-evaluate his suitability as a military physician, but failed to do so. …

In May 2007, as a then-Capt. Hasan approached a June 30 date to complete his residency in psychiatry, his direct supervisor warned higher-ups he had failed a physical by being overweight. …

Maj. Moran said he was preparing to put Maj. Hasan on probation and extend his residency.

But the superior rejected the idea, saying it would prompt a total re-evaluation of Maj. Hasan.

The superior wrote back to Maj. Moran: "Please don't go forward on anything yet. If you put him on probation, even administrative, will require me to convene a relook board." …

Then came Maj. Hasan's research project that was required for completing the residency … "Koranic World View as it Relates to Muslims in the U.S. Military." The slide presentation promoted Islamic law over the U.S. Constitution.

At first, Maj. Moran was appalled. "This is not scholarly project level," he e-mailed other staff members. "[We] are going to meet with him this AM and counsel him." …

One staff supervisor was ecstatic. "Dr. Hasan does an excellent job speaking without 'reading' slides!" he wrote on a "resident evaluation."

"His balance of academic knowledge and personal awareness is remarkable." …

Charles Gittins, attorney for Maj. Moran, said the e-mails show his client was trying to hold Maj. Hasan to Army standards.

† Updates To Previous Posts (sixth item, There's No Such Thing As Free Healthcare): In a Wall Street Journal op-ed, Galen Institute president Grace-Marie Turner takes issue with former MA Gov. Mitt Romney’s recent assertion that the health reform plan he stuck the state’s residents with in 2006 is "the ultimate conservative plan." She adds that the “likely 2012 presidential aspirant … has been on the wrong side of the defining political battle of our time”:

[T]here are many similarities between it and the ObamaCare loathed by conservative voters.

Both have an individual mandate requiring most residents to have health insurance or pay a penalty. Most businesses are required to participate or pay a fine. Both rely on government-designed purchasing exchanges that also provide a platform to control private health insurance. Many of the uninsured are covered through Medicaid expansion and others receive subsidies for highly-prescriptive policies. And the apparatus requires a plethora of new government boards and agencies. …

[I]nsurance companies are required to sell "just-in-time" policies even if people wait until they are sick to buy coverage. That's just like the Obama plan. There is growing evidence that many people are gaming the system by purchasing health insurance when they need surgery or other expensive medical care, then dropping it a few months later. …

Mr. Romney insists that in Massachusetts, "We didn't do what President Obama's doing, which is putting controls on our system of premiums for private insurance companies."

But that is what's happening now: Faced with soaring medical expenses, Gov. Deval Patrick, Mr. Romney's successor, wants to cap insurance rate increases at 4.8%, not the 8% to 32% increases the companies have requested for April 1. Three of the four major health insurers in Massachusetts showed operating losses for 2009. If their rates are capped, they say they'll be forced to cut payments to health providers, putting further pressure on doctors and fragile hospitals.

Turner also calls bullsh*t on Romney for claiming in his book "No Apology" that “everyone in Massachusetts now has access to "portable, affordable health insurance":

68% of the newly insured since 2006 receive coverage that is heavily or completely subsidized by taxpayers. …

Another 140,000 remained uninsured in 2008 and were either assessed a penalty or exempted from the individual mandate because the state deemed they couldn't afford the premiums.

Mr. Romney's promise that getting everyone covered would force costs down also is far from being realized. … Per capita spending is 27% higher than the national average.

Turner urges Romney to be “more honest” about his healthcare “experiment and its failings.”

† Updates To Previous Posts (second item, Putting The “Boo” In Boomer): Our grandparents and parents rely on Medicare to get treatment for arthritis, broken hips and other infirmities of old age, as well as for stroke, Alzheimer’s and other serious and debilitating ailments. The availability of high-tech (and expensive) diagnostic imaging tools like functional MRI and cutting-edge (and expensive) post-stroke rehab, for instance, has improved the quality of life of our elders, and lengthened their lifespans. That’s why cuts to Medicare are such a touchy subject. But costs of keeping the Baby Boomer generation alive on their terms will end up ruining a good thing for everyone else. These aging hippies never stopped using illicit drugs recreationally, so Medicare has to cover the cost of drug abuse treatment, as well as the cost of the heart attacks and strokes that would not have occurred but for drug abuse. Now, The Associated Press reports that “people in their 60s, 70s and 80s coming to terms with the truth that they are gay, lesbian, bisexual or transgender.” So does this mean that in the coming years Medicare will be paying for tens of thousands of “gender reassignment” surgeries for transgender Baby Boomers? The Stiletto long resigned herself to the likelihood that Social Security and Medicare will not be available when she needs it, but was somewhat comforted by the thought that these programs would take care of her parents’ needs. But not if the perennially selfish Baby Boom generation has anything to say about it.

† Updates To Previous Posts (last item, 10 Reasons Michelle Obama Should Be Proud – Really Proud – Of America): This latest installment in The Stiletto Blog’s ongoing series meant to help instill the necessary pride of country in Michelle Obama’s consciousness to enable her to serve as an unofficial ambassador focuses on Erez Lieberman-Aiden, 30-year-old graduate student at MIT and Harvard who, CNN reports, “had a nagging feeling that his grandmother's death, which occurred after a hard fall, could have been prevented”:

Lieberman-Aiden invented a high-tech shoe insole to help older people manage their balance before a catastrophic fall occurs. His "iShoe" sneaker insoles track a person's balance patterns using digital sensors. The battery-powered footbeds transmit data to computers about a person's walking and standing stability.

"The model of 'I go into my doctor once every six months or once a year to get a check up' is kind of more the speed of a society where people write long letters to each other every three months to be in touch," he said. "Now information can travel all over the place in real time. ... That model is beginning to influence medicine as well." …

"There are interventions people can engage in in order to improve their balance," he said. "It's kind of like, in some sense, heart disease, where you're increasingly prone to it as you age, but there are treatments that can improve the situation."

The key to a person's balance, it turns out, is not in how well they walk but how well they stand still, he said. So the iShoe takes particular note of how much a person shifts his or her weight while standing. A well-balanced person might shift weight every 40 seconds, he said, but a person with potentially dangerous balance problems might shift weight constantly, or every second.

The iShoe spits out balance data sets that can be interpreted by doctors, or potentially by patients themselves, he said. It uses a Bluetooth connection to transmit the info from a person's shoes to a computer.

Lieberman-Aiden was among four students awarded the Lemelson-MIT Collegiate Student Prize awarded to “inventive and entrepreneurial” students attending MIT, Caltech, Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute and the University of Illinois. He plans to use the $30,000 prize money “to further his research efforts, help with baby expenses and, possibly, to buy a new couch.”

NOT THE SHARPEST KNIFE IN THE DRAWER: Booby Trap Traps Boob

The Stiletto — Wed, 17 Mar 2010 05:04:00 GMT

Police responding to a 9-1-1 call found a 24-year-old man with a gunshot wound in his lower left leg sitting in a black Honda Accord in the parking lot of Seward Park who claimed to be the victim of a robbery attempt. But when the police found the proverbial smoking gun in the bushes, his story started to fall apart, reports the Seattle Post-Intelligencer:

"When questioned about the incident, (the man) stated that he had set a booby trap as an anti-theft device by placing his loaded .38 caliber Smith and Wesson revolver with the hammer in the cocked position under his steering wheel," Gang Unit Detective Rob Thomas wrote in a police document.

"When he returned to his vehicle after jogging in the park he attempted to disarm his booby trap, accidentally set off the gun and shot himself in the leg."

Police discovered the man has had five felony convictions since 2005, two of them for firearms violations. It’s a fair bet that he’s looking at a third felony conviction for firearms violations.

IF THE SHOE FITS: Psychopaths' Brains May Focus Solely On Reward

The Stiletto — Wed, 17 Mar 2010 05:03:00 GMT

Psychopaths' Brains May Focus Solely On Reward

- HealthDay News, March 16, 2010

PENETRATING INSIGHTS: For Better Relationships, Just Be Yourself

The Stiletto — Wed, 17 Mar 2010 05:02:00 GMT

For Better Relationships, Just Be Yourself

- LiveScience.com, March 15, 2010

WHAT A HEEL: Bank Behaving Badly

The Stiletto — Wed, 17 Mar 2010 05:01:00 GMT

NY Supreme Court Justice Jeffrey Spinner ruled that Wells Fargo had "perpetrated a trespass" against Steven Tyson by changing the locks on his Greenlawn, NY, home and repeatedly entering without notice or permission, reports New York Law Journal:

"[T]he conduct of Plaintiff was nothing short of oppressive and would best be described as heavy handed and egregious, to say the least," Justice Spinner wrote in Wells Fargo v. Tyson. …

Tyson claimed his door's lock cylinders had been drilled out and was told that his property had been "inspected and secured" because it had allegedly been abandoned. recount

Tyson, who appeared pro se, said he was advised that such an entry was "standard procedure" but was given a new key to the premises. He testified that he told the bank to stay away from his home and was assured no other unauthorized entries would occur.

But approximately one month later, the property was entered again. … Later that day, [Tyson] returned to find his garage open and numerous items missing, prompting him to file a police report.

Spinner ordered the bank to pay $200 for the trespass, $4,892 for the lost property, and $150,000 "as an appropriate deterrent to any future outrageous, improper and unlawful deeds."

Wouldn’t it be great if Tyson used the money to pay off his mortgage and get Wells Fargo off his back once and for all?

THE OTHER SHOE DROPS: Updates To Previous Posts

The Stiletto — Tue, 16 Mar 2010 04:02:00 GMT

† DIY Profiling: In the immediate aftermath of Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab’s being foiled in his attempt to blow Northwest 253 out of the sky on Christmas Day by the passengers and crew on the flight, Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano famously said, “the system worked.”

The take-away message for Navy veteran, Washington attorney and frequent flier Ray Hartwell, who has been “patted down, scanned and searched” thousands of times: air travelers realize the “system” depends on all of us being alert, aware and ready to spring into action, if necessary. But are we all on the same page about when and how to act? Having questioned 15 to 20 fellow passengers he is “pretty comfortable that I know the lay of the land” and details what he’s learned in this op-ed for The Washington Times:

[W]e have limited options. We have no ability to deny boarding to someone linked to terrorists … Similarly, we have no control over the Transportation Security Administration's (TSA) choice of screening equipment.

Perhaps most important, we cannot force TSA personnel to look at people carefully and actually think about their characteristics and behavior. Yet this option - screening and profiling - is the only one that directly presents an opportunity for effective passenger action. There is much we cannot do, but we can - our very own selves - look at our fellow passengers and pay attention to their demeanor and their actions. …

Most focus first and foremost on men of military service age who appear to be Middle Eastern or Arabic, wearing Muslim attire or are bearded. Others say they don't "profile" on appearance but rather on behavior: "We have to stop Tim McVeigh as well as Richard Reid." All are alert for conduct that "doesn't look right" ("DLR," as one put it). …

Suspicious or provocative behavior in the terminal or after boarding should be reported to airline personnel, TSA and law enforcement authorities. If this is not feasible or if … strong suspicions are ignored, most said, don't board the plane and, if on board already, demand that if Mr. Abdulmutallab and friends are allowed to fly, you must be allowed to get off.

And in flight? … There was unanimity that directions from the flight crew should be followed except in extremis. Flight attendants - and passengers who assist them - should be granted broad immunity from liability for subduing and placing in restraints passengers who are disruptive, willfully disobedient or engaging in threatening behavior.

Although passengers see physical action as a last resort, they're willing to act because they know a failure to do so could have deadly consequences. … Most think the virtual certainty that fellow passengers will join in quickly turns the odds in favor of the good guys.

Let the headless chickens at TSA run around in circles issuing and retract regulations about blankets and bathroom visits. As usual, the American people are more sensible than – and way ahead of – Washington bureaucrats.

† The Pluck Of The Irish: On Wednesday Irish Prime Minister Brian Cowen - who has “been laboring to put debt-saddled Ireland back into the black” - will meet with President Barack Hussein Obama in Washington, D.C. “as a global spokesman for fiscal restraint,” reports The Washington Post:

He has been slashing public-sector salaries - including his own - and making cuts in social services to assure foreign investors that Ireland can meet its obligations.

Thus far, the pain is paying off, with Ireland largely avoiding the debt crisis seen in Greece as well as the surge in borrowing costs that hit other financially troubled countries in Europe, including Spain and Portugal. But Cowen's government has paid a hefty price: Its approval ratings are among the lowest in recent Irish history. …

"I don't think any country has a choice. When you have such pressure on public finances, you simply have to confront these issues."

Part of Cowen’s plan to grow his country’s economy is to “lure” U.S. companies with a 12.5 percent corporate tax rate, which puts him on a collision course with the Obama administration’s plans to grow the U.S. economy by trying to keep jobs from migrating overseas, notes The WaPo.

† That Dog Won’t Vote (second item): The Washington Post profiles a fresh, new candidate for public office: Murray Hill, who is “young, bold, media-savvy, a Washington outsider eager to reshape the way things are done in the nation's capital.” What Hill isn’t: Human. The WaPo explains:

Murray Hill is actually Murray Hill Inc., a small, five-year-old Silver Spring public relations company that is seeking office to prove a point (and perhaps get a little attention).

After the Supreme Court declared that corporations have the same rights as individuals when it comes to funding political campaigns, the self-described progressive firm took what it considers the next logical step: declaring for office.

"Until now, corporate interests had to rely on campaign contributions and influence-peddling to achieve their goals in Washington," the candidate, who was unavailable for an interview, said in a statement. "But thanks to an enlightened Supreme Court, now we can eliminate the middle-man and run for office ourselves." …

The firm, whose clients include labor unions and environmentalists, is seeking to enter the Republican primary for the 8th District seat held by Rep. Chris Van Hollen (D).

The firm "wanted to run as a Republican because we feel the Republican Party is more receptive to our basic message that corporations are people, too," Klein said, adding that his client has no particular beef with Van Hollen. …

The WaPo notes that Murray Hill may not meet minimum requirements to run for Congress. The Montgomery County Board of Elections rejected the candidate’s voter registration application because Hill is not a U.S. citizen of at least 18 years of age. And the U.S. Constitution requires candidates for Congress to be at least 25 years old, which means that the Maryland State Board of Elections is not likely to issue a Certificate of Candidacy to put Hill’s name on the state’s Primary ballot.

Someone should tell Klein tht Republicans also believe fraudulent ballots should not be permitted to dilute the ballots cast by legitimate voters, and it is comforting to know that the officials we entrust with keeping our elections honest are doing their jobs. Maybe Hill can get elected to the board of ACORN – or whatever the voter-fraud promoting group is calling itself these days.

† The Cruiser Of The Future: Not willing to cede the high-tech patrol car business to upstart Carbon’s E7 without a fight, Ford is phasing out the Crown Vic and will replace the venerable cruiser with the Police Interceptor, “designed to be faster, safer and stronger, and … packed with advanced technology,” reports The Los Angeles Times:

The Crown Victoria police car, which debuted in 1983, will not be going away any time soon. Ford will be making them until late next year - about the same time that Police Interceptors will start coming off the production line. …

The Police Interceptor will be built on the same platform as Ford's 2010 Taurus.

But company spokesman Said Deep said that about 90% of the Police Interceptor has been engineered specifically for law enforcement use. …

It will have a V-6 engine that produces 263 horsepower. Ford said it will have 25% better fuel efficiency than the Crown Victoria police car, which has a V-8 engine. …

Switching to a new model is a risk for Ford, which has dominated the law enforcement market since the mid-1990s, when General Motors stopped making its Chevrolet Caprice police car.

The major competitors that remain are Chevy Impala and Dodge Charger police cars.

The Crown Vic has a base price of around $27,000 and it’s not likely that cash-strapped police departments will upgrade to the new cruisers any time soon if there is a significant cost differential.

† Should Glenn Beck Practice What He Preaches?: Politics aside, this Associated Press story explains why several otherwise practicing Catholics of The Stiletto's acquaintance no longer attend church:

Germany's sex abuse scandal has now reached Pope Benedict XVI: His former archdiocese disclosed that while he was archbishop a suspected pedophile priest was transferred to a job where he later abused children.

The pontiff is also under increasing fire for a 2001 Vatican document he later penned instructing bishops to keep such cases secret.

The revelations have put the spotlight on Benedict's handling of abuse claims both when he was archbishop of Munich from 1977-1982 and then the prefect of the Vatican office that deals with such crimes - a position he held until his 2005 election as pope.

And they may lead to further questions about what the pontiff knew about the scope of abuse in his native Germany, when he knew it and what he did about it during his tenure in Munich and quarter-century term at the Vatican's Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith. …

An Irish government-authorized investigation into the scandal and cover up harshly criticized the Vatican for its mixed messages and insistence on secrecy in the 2001 directive and previous Vatican documents on the topic.

"An obligation to secrecy/confidentialtiy on the part of participants in a canonical process could undoubtedly constitute an inhibition on reporting child sexual abuse to the civil authorities or others," it concluded.

One U.S. attorney representing several victims says the church’s insistence on secrecy amounts to “an international criminal conspiracy to obstruct justice."

† John Edwards: The King Of Heels Now And Forever: John Edwards’ paramour and the mother of his youngest child, Rielle Hunter, has hitherto kept a low profile. But now, she tells her side of the story to GQ. (“I feel comfortable talking now, because Johnny went public and made a statement admitting paternity. I didn't feel like I could ever speak until he did that.”)

In the Q&A interview she says she and the two-timing two-time candidate for national office are not engaged and never discussed wedding plans. She also says that: “[w]e love each other very much … and I believe that will be till death do us part”; she did not recognize him when they first met; they slept together the night they met; four days later, after nightly four-hour phone calls she was “[h]ead over heels in love”; she has not been with another man since falling in love with Edwards; because her father died of cancer, she has “such compassion” for Elizabeth Edwards; she is “not a mistress by nature … I fell in love with him … that was the role that was available to me”; Edwards had cheated on Elizabeth with other women over the years; she was already pregnant when Edwards renewed his wedding vows with Elizabeth; she was 43 and had never been pregnant and she “felt with all of my being that I needed to bring this little child into the world … I was blessed”; Quinn calls Edwards Da-da; it was Andrew Young’s idea to claim paternity of Quinn; she has no idea where the money for her, Quinn’s and the Young family’s living expenses came from, and that Young and his wife pocketed some of it; if she could do things differently, she never would have agreed to Young claiming paternity; and she expects Young to be indicted, but not Edwards.

Now that you've speed-read through Hunter's interview, you have time to read this description of the sex tape Edwards and Hunter made, and then to go take a shower.

† Erin Andrews’ Stalker Arrested: After Michael David Barrett, 49, admitted that he stalked the ESPN reporter for 18 months and followed her to at least three hotel rooms in three states in 2008 to spy on and film her, U.S. District Judge Manuel Real sentenced him to 2½ years in federal prison and ordered him to pay Andrews $7,366 in restitution.

† Updates To Previous Posts (sixth item, Is Obama Already A Lame Duck?: Politico reports that “[m]oderate House Democrats facing potentially difficult reelections this fall have a message for President Barack Obama: Don’t call us; we’ll call you”:

Interviews with nearly a dozen congressional Democrats on the ballot this year reveal a decided lack of enthusiasm for having Obama come to their districts to campaign for them - the most basic gauge of a president’s popularity. …

While these members aren’t necessarily attempting to distance themselves from the administration, there is nevertheless a noticeable reluctance to embrace the president among a certain class of incumbent, now that Obama’s approval rating has fallen to a new low - 46 percent in the latest Gallup survey.

It’s not an unusual development - President George W. Bush suffered a similar fate. As his popularity dipped and he became a more polarizing figure, few moderate Republicans wanted to be seen with him in their states for fear the association would be used against them by their rivals.

The difference, however, is that Bush was narrowly elected twice in a country divided between red and blue states, while Obama shredded that map. With his success in the interior West and upper South, Obama was thought to be such a political asset that he could play almost anywhere in the country.

† Updates To Previous Posts (last item, 10 Reasons Michelle Obama Should Be Proud – Really Proud – Of America): From April 13^th-15^th Michelle Obama will visit Mexico City, her first solo trip abroad as first lady. In case she has missed previous installments of The Stiletto Blog’s ongoing series meant to help instill the necessary pride of country in her consciousness to enable her to serve as an unofficial ambassador, here’s one for the road from reader Pam Siegfried:

Last month, an Uncle Joe’s Pizzeria manager came into the Anchorage convenience store where she works and said that one of his drivers saw an elderly woman walking along the road after dark without a coat or sweater. It had snowed roughly a foot that day, and the temperature was around 20 degrees at the time. The driver picked her up, apparently intending to drive her home. But he had to call the police, because she could not tell him her name or where she lived. The police eventually coaxed her name out of her and were able to contact her son.

Editorial Note: Rielle Hunter interview item updated.

NOT THE SHARPEST KNIFE IN THE DRAWER: Why Robin Hood Robs From The Rich

The Stiletto — Mon, 15 Mar 2010 23:35:00 GMT

A Hispanic woman in her 20s brandishing a semi-automatic handgun demanded money from 11 customers at La Chicanita Market in Thermal, CA, and made off with a grand total of $6.00, reports The Press-Enterprise (Riverside, CA):

The gunwoman was last seen climbing into the front passenger seat of an old, two-door Honda or similar car. It was black with white spots, witnesses said. No one was hurt.

The robber was wearing a jacket and a headdress over her head and face. Anyone with information may call deputies at 760-863-8990.

On the one hand, the victims were lucky she didn’t get ticked off at the piss-poor haul and kill one or more of them. On the other hand, she may have figured out that her overhead – the cost of gas and bullets – was equal to or higher than what she netted, so she would have been in the hole had she shot anyone.

IF THE SHOE FITS: Obesity, Drinking A Double Threat To The Liver

The Stiletto — Mon, 15 Mar 2010 23:34:00 GMT

Obesity, Drinking A Double Threat To The Liver

- HealthDay News, March 12, 2010

PENETRATING INSIGHTS: Happy From Your Vacation? It Won't Last

The Stiletto — Mon, 15 Mar 2010 23:32:00 GMT

Happy From Your Vacation? It Won't Last

- HealthDay News, March 12, 2010

WHAT A HEEL: Down-At-The-Heels CEO Of Bank For The Well-Heeled Charged With Embezzlement

The Stiletto — Mon, 15 Mar 2010 23:31:00 GMT

Federal prosecutors have charged Park Avenue Bank CEO Charles Antonucci with fraud, bribery, embezzlement and stealing from a church to further his application for $11.3 million in federal bailout money, “the first such executive to be so charged,” reports Crain’s New York Business:

A 10-count complaint against the 59-year-old Mr. Antoncci, who served as Park Avenue Bank's top executive from 2004 until last October, describes a three-year trail of criminal activity driven by the CEO's efforts to shore up his teetering bank and line his pockets at the same time.

Antonucci was released was released from federal custody on personal recognizance.

[Hat Tip: The Heel, an Ivy-educated attorney with a prestigious New York firm, and occasional contributor to this blog.]

THE OTHER SHOE DROPS: Updates To Previous Posts

The Stiletto — Sat, 13 Mar 2010 03:49:00 GMT

† Is This Any Way To Run A Transition?: Talk about the fox guarding the henhouse. Trade lawyer Eric Hirschhorn - tapped by President Barack Hussein Obama to head a Commerce Dep’t division that monitors exports of technology, software and items that can be used for both commercial and military purposes - represented a U.S. client that made shipments to Iran, Sudan and Syria. Two other clients were Hong Kong firms on the Commerce Department's "entity list" of companies subject to strict export licensing rules, because of their ties to a company in Dubai that manufactured parts found in roadside bombs that have killed and maimed American soldiers and civilians in Iraq, reports The Washington Times.

† The Keystone Kops Are Enforcing U.S. Immigration Laws: James Tomsheck, an assistant commissioner with U.S. Customs and Border Protection's Office of Internal Affairs, testified before a Senate subcommittee that the agency lacks funds and personnel to perform polygraph tests and background checks on new hires. As a result, corrupt agents are manning checkpoints along the southwest border. The Associated Press reports:

[O]nly about one in 10 of the new hires for agency jobs are given polygraph tests, and of those, 60 percent are deemed unsuitable for employment. …

"That 60 percent number is alarming to me," said U.S. Sen. Mark Pryor, D-Ark., who chaired the Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs' Subcommittee on State, Local, and Private Sector Preparedness and Integration.

An AP investigation tallied corruption-related convictions against more than 80 enforcement officials at all levels - federal, state and local - along the southwest border since 2007.

Since 2003, 129 customs officers and Border Patrol agents have been arrested on corruption charges, said Tom Frost, the Department of Homeland Security's assistant inspector general for investigations. That figure included the northern border and other ports of entry. …

The corruption activities "encompass almost every layer of the DHS border security strategy," including employees stationed away from the border, but with access to sensitive information.

They have used that access to "to [sic] vet drug trafficking organization members, track investigative activity, and identify individuals cooperating with the government," Frost said.

† Only The Little People Pay Taxes: According to U.S. Labor Department data, as the ax was falling at corporations from coast to coast, the public sector has been largely untouched. In addition, government workers earn significantly more on average than the taxpayers who are paying their salaries, reports The Washington Times:

The average government wage and salary per hour of $26.11 was 35 percent higher than the average wage and salary of $19.41 per hour in the private sector. But the percentage difference in benefits was much higher. Benefits for state and local workers averaged $13.49 per hour, nearly 70 percent higher than the $8 per hour in benefits paid by private businesses. …

After shedding 3.8 million net jobs during 2008, private employers slashed an additional 4.7 million last year. During the same two-year period, the public sector, including the federal government, gained more than 100,000 jobs. The combined work forces of state and local governments added 35,000 jobs during the 2008-09 period.

While private-sector jobs declined in every state except North Dakota over the previous 12 months, public-sector employment increased in 23 states, the Labor Department report showed. Even in North Dakota, as the private work force gained 300 jobs over the past year, the government sector surged by 1,000 new workers.

† Putting The “Boo” In Boomer: Or, should that be getting the poo out of boomers? Prune juice purveyor Sunsweet Growers “wants to capture the growing ranks of boomers who may be increasingly in need of the the [sic] product's digestive properties” reports brandchannel:

“The timing is perfect” for a new marketing push behind prune juice, Stephanie Harralson, Sunsweet Juice product manager, told brandchannel, “because people are looking for natural solutions for their health, and prune juice is just prunes and water – so it’s a totally natural product that works."

Sunsweet published a freestanding insert in newspapers nationwide last summer and “had a really good response from it,” Harralson said. And now the brand plans to contemporize the packaging of its prune juice in a way that plays to its “taste appeal,” she said.

† Updates To Previous Posts (third item, Always Remember And Don’t Ever Forget): The Swedish parliament has voted in favor of a resolution to recognize the Armenian Genocide. The motion also calls the mass murders of Chaldeans, Syrians, Assyrians and Pontian Greeks by Ottoman Turks a genocide – and rightly so (the Christians were killed off, which is why modern Turkey is 99.8 percent Muslim). Four center-right politicians voted with the opposition, and the resolution passed by one vote, reports The Local, an English-language news site based in Stockholm:

Left Party foreign policy spokesperson Hans Linde expressed his view that the time had come for Sweden to take a stand on the issue.

"Firstly, to hinder any repeat and to learn from history. Secondly, to encourage the development of democracy in Turkey - which includes dealing with their own history. Thirdly, to redress the wrongs committed against the victims and their descendants," Linde said. …

According to Sweden's Living History Forum, most researchers are now in agreement that the massacres constituted genocide according to the accepted 1948 UN definition. The exception to this is Turkish researchers. The Turkish government has never recognized the events as a genocide and it is illegal in Turkey to claim that it occurred.

The Living History Forum is a Swedish public authority which works with issues on tolerance, democracy and human rights from both a national and international perspective.

Predictably, Turkey recalled its ambassador to Sweden, and Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan canceled his visit to Stockholm next week for a summit between Sweden and Turkey.

† Updates To Previous Posts (fourth item, Mortgage Loan Modification Less Than Advertised): The Washington Post reports that the housing market will be hurting for years to come:

About 5 million to 7 million properties are potentially eligible for foreclosure but have not yet been repossessed and put up for sale. Some economists project it could take nearly three years before all these homes have been put on the market and purchased by new owners. And the number of pending foreclosures could grow much bigger over the coming year as more distressed borrowers become delinquent and then, if they can't obtain mortgage relief, wade through the foreclosure process, which often takes more than a year to complete. …

This "shadow market" reflects the increasing lag between defaults and foreclosures. Many lenders are struggling to keep up with the overwhelming number of borrowers who can't make their payments, and they're reluctant to rush repossessed homes onto the market when prices are depressed. …

The borrowers in trouble now are, for the most part, people who have better credit and safer loans and have become delinquent because they've lost their jobs or are dealing with other economic setbacks, economists said. More than 75 percent of the borrowers who are now seriously delinquent - meaning they have missed at least three monthly payments - have traditional prime loans, according to First American CoreLogic. …

It can take a borrower six to seven months to find out whether he or she qualifies for a permanent loan modification under the federal foreclosure relief program, Making Home Affordable, according to Barclays Capital. …

"Lenders are deluged by late-stage delinquencies. The pent-up foreclosure inventory is there," said Massoud Ahmadi, director of research for the Maryland Department of Housing and Community Development.

The uptick in foreclosure sales is helping depress Maryland home prices, he said. "We have seen that home sales are on an upswing, but prices are on a downswing. That is the impact of the shadow inventory. It is keeping prices down," Ahmadi said. …

[T]he backlog will hang over some communities for years. By the end of 2012, 39 percent to 50 percent of home purchases in Phoenix will still be foreclosed properties, J.P. Morgan Chase has estimated. In Los Angeles, they'll account for 28 percent of home sales.

†Updates To Previous Posts (ninth item, Garbage In, Garbage Out: Part II): The Kansas City school board is closing down 28 of its 61 schools – and this time, the move is being welcomed by education experts and the local teachers’ union, reports The New York Times:

Students have been leaving the Kansas City public schools in droves. Close to 18,000 students exited to better suburban districts or charter schools in the last 10 years alone. The student enrollment is now 17,400 children, who are mostly black and impoverished. …

Fewer than a third of elementary students in the city schools read at or above grade level. And in most of the schools, fewer than a quarter of students are proficient at their grade levels.

Faced with a $50 million deficit in its $300 million budget, the district decided to close the schools. The plan also calls for the elimination of 700 of 3,000 jobs, including teaching positions.

Education experts praised the new schools superintendent, John Covington, who was hired in April from the Pueblo, Colo., school district where he was also superintendent, for pushing for change. A former principal and teacher, Dr. Covington spent months researching and writing the Right-Sizing plan, and managed to win a 5-to-4 majority from the board.

Previous superintendents had failed in similar efforts to downsize the district. …

“We have buildings that are half empty,” said Andrea Flinders, the union president. “We recognized that schools needed to be closed, but the board wasn’t willing. This board is different.”

If the schools had fallen into bankruptcy, as was predicted before the closings, the state would have seized control, and made changes as it saw fit.

† Updates To Previous Posts (eighth item, The Right To Bear Arms Belongs To Us All: Part II): The Washington Times comments on all the heat that packing heat has generated:

If you want to have a nice, relaxing cup of coffee in a safe environment, try Starbucks. … Starbucks is letting customers openly carry guns in its stores. Americans thus can enjoy their rights and wash them down with a Frappuccino. …

The Brady Campaign warns businesses that allowing customers to carry guns will scare away other customers. Yet it seems pretty obvious that the businesses themselves - despite all the pressure they face from trial lawyers and bureaucrats to ban guns - are in a much better position to know what their customers want.

Hollywood and the liberal media have skewed public perceptions to such a degree that most Americans probably don't realize that not so long ago, people openly carried guns without a second thought all the time. Up until 1969, all but one of the public high schools in New York City had rifle teams. Thousands of students carried their rifles every day on subways, buses and streets on their way to school, when they went to practice in the afternoon and on their way home. The students would store their guns in homerooms in the morning and then pick them up in the afternoon. In more normal times, no one thought it was a big deal.