He’s certifiably insane.

COUNCIL BLUFFS, Iowa — Ron Paul accused President Barack Obama on Thursday of offering suspected terrorists fewer legal protections than Nazi war criminals were given.

The Republican presidential candidate laced into Obama for authorizing the CIA-led drone strike that killed Anwar al-Awlaki, an Al Qaeda leader, in Yemen this September. He reiterated his previously stated position that al-Awlaki’s American citizenship entitled him to due process.

“As bad as they were, you know even Adolf Eichmann finally when he was captured he was taken to Israel. Israel gave him a trial. What did we do with the Nazis — war criminals — after World War II? They got trials. Yeah, and they got what was deserving: they got hung,” Paul told more than 700 voters during a campaign speech at a convention center in western Iowa.

“This year has not been good for the cause of personal liberty because about a year ago the president announced there are so many bad people around that he has to really go after them to protect us.

“There are some dangerous people out there. There’s a lot of ’em. Most of them get a trial, but he changed the rules. He says now it is proper for the president to decide to assassinate an American citizen without a trial, without charges, because he thinks they’re that dangerous,” he said.

Paul took no questions from the audience or reporters, and he again avoided directly engaging with the opponents who have intensified their attacks on him. In broad contours, he attacked his opponents for advocating militarism.

“Some just can’t wait ‘til the shooting starts over Iran,” Paul said.

How the hell is Ron Paul still in a statistical tie for first place?

(MSNBC) — Former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney and Texas Rep. Ron Paul are running neck-and-neck in Iowa, former Pennsylvania Sen. Rick Santorum is surging and former House Speaker Newt Gingrich collapsing just four days before the state’s Jan. 3 caucuses, according to a new NBC News-Marist poll.

Romney drew the support of 23 percent of likely caucus-goers in Iowa — identified based on interest, chance of voting and past participation — ahead of Paul, at 21 percent.

They are followed by Santorum at 15 percent, Texas Gov. Rick Perry at 14 percent, Gingrich at 13 percent and Minnesota Rep. Michele Bachmann at 6 percent.

Egyptian Christians need our support more than ever.

(Al-Masry Al-Youm) — Dozens of residents of the village of Baheeg in Assiut, Upper Egypt, burnt three houses owned by a Christian family after a Christian villager allegedly published cartoons mocking Islam on his Facebook account.

A number of Muslim students attacked their Coptic classmate for posting the cartoons, a Muslim student told Al-Masry Al-Youm.

The Muslim students attacked the Coptic student on Thursday at Monqebad Secondary School in Assiut. Eyewitnesses said the military intervened to break up the fight and escorted the Coptic youth and his family away from the village. Later, Muslim villagers set fire to the family’s houses.

Firefighters extinguished the blaze and armed forces and police imposed a security cordon around the site of the incident.

(WaPo) — Releasing information on the Friday before a big holiday is a time-tested way to bury bad news. So when the Government Accountability Office’s fiscal 2011 financial statements for the federal government were released on the Friday before Christmas, it made sense to read them closely.

Since 1997, the United States has been a rare example of a government willing to publish financial statements using accrual accounting, which counts the cost of promises made as well as cash paid out. And the GAO’s professionalism over the years has won it a reputation for impartiality and effectiveness.

That professionalism is evident in the GAO analysis of the net present value of the Social Security and Medicare promises Washington has made to Americans. “Net present value” means the total that would have to be set aside today to pay the costs of these programs [Medicare and Social Security] in the future. The government puts these numbers in appendices, rather than in headlines. But the costs are real.

In fiscal 2011, the cost of the promises grew from $30.9 trillion to $33.8 trillion. To put that in context, consider that the total value of companies traded on U.S. stock markets is $13.1 trillion, based on the Wilshire 5000 index, and the value of the equity in U.S. taxpayers’ homes, according to Freddie Mac, is $6.2 trillion. Said another way, there is not enough wealth in America to meet those promises.

If the government followed corporate accounting rules, that $2.9 trillion increase would be added to the $1.3 trillion cash deficit for fiscal 2011 that has been widely reported. And a $4.2 trillion deficit is something that Americans need to know about.

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Paging Michael Moore.

(NBC Los Angeles) — Members of the Occupy movement are finalizing plans for a scheduled demonstration Jan. 2 at the Rose Parade in Pasadena.

The movement’s latest plans were announced in November and could bring anywhere from 4,000 to 40,000 protesters to the highly attended and viewed event.

There are four phases to the demonstration, as is described on the Occupy the Rose Parade website. [...]

The demonstrators are planning to form a human float in the shape of an octopus for the third phase, and are expected to trail the final parade float down Colorado Boulevard. The octopus is meant to represent the hold corporations have on the country.

“The last float in the parade is number 43,” said Occupy protester Pete Thottam in a past interview. “We’re going to be float number 44, which coincidentally is the Obama Administration’s float number.”

The Occupiers plan to gather for a pow wow in the final phase of the event, which may include a press conference at Pasadena City Hall and a subsequent music concert.

Nuts.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) — The Obama administration is considering transferring to Afghan custody a senior Taliban official suspected of major human rights abuses as part of a long-shot bid to improve the prospects of a peace deal in Afghanistan, Reuters has learned.

The potential hand-over of Mohammed Fazl, a ‘high-risk detainee’ held at the Guantanamo Bay military prison since early 2002, has set off alarms on Capitol Hill and among some U.S. intelligence officials.

As a senior commander of the Taliban army, Fazl is alleged to be responsible for the killing of thousands of Afghanistan’s minority Shi’ite Muslims between 1998 and 2001.

According to U.S. military documents made public by WikiLeaks, he was also on the scene of a November 2001 prison riot that killed CIA operative Johnny Micheal Spann, the first American who died in combat in the Afghan war. There is no evidence, however, that Fazl played any direct role in Spann’s death.

Senior U.S. officials have said their 10-month-long effort to set up substantive negotiations between the weak government of Afghan President Hamid Karzai and the Taliban has reached a make-or-break moment. Reuters reported earlier this month that they are proposing an exchange of “confidence-building measures,” including the transfer of five detainees from Guantanamo and the establishment of a Taliban office outside of Afghanistan.

Now Reuters has learned from U.S. government sources the identity of one of the five detainees in question.

What are the odds Pelosi avoids them like the plague?

(Hawaii Reporter) — U.S. House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, one of the most powerful supporters of the Occupy Wall Street movement, may be in the right place at the right time to protest with the Big Island branch of the movement, Occupy Hawaii Island.

The former House Speaker is once again spending her holiday at the exotic and luxurious Four Seasons Resort Hualalai at Historic Ka’upulehu in Kona on the island of Hawaii. The hotel web site says the resort is a tropical paradise with a spa, beachfront dining, fashion boutiques and a Jack Nicklaus signature golf course. According to West Hawaii Today, she spent previous Christmas holidays in Kona at the same hotel in an elaborate presidential suite that rents for $10,000. Her spokesperson has not disclosed which suite Pelosi is staying in this year, saying such personal information is not released publicly.

Pelosi’s trip coincides with a planned protest by the Hawaii Island occupy groups near her hotel.

Jim Albertini, a well known community organizer, who has held several local protests, writes on his blog: “I just got a report from Kona. There are about 30 private half billion dollar jets parked at the Kona airport. I’m up for a drive over to protest at Kukio and possibly other 1% gated communities just north of the airport. Any others interested in joining me? The 1% pay only a little more to park their jet as it costs us to park our cars overnight. Something is wrong with that picture.”

In an email to supporters this week, Albertini confirmed he organized a protest with “all Hawaii Island Occupy groups” this Saturday, December 31, from 10 a.m. to 1 p.m. on the road just south of the Four Seasons/Hualalai Resort.

“It’s time to say to the 1% — PAY YOUR SHARE! At a time when 26% of children on this island are food insecure, this kind of extravagant wealth of the jet setters is SHAMEFUL! Ring in the New Year with friends who care for the people and the planet!” Albertini writes.

Keep reading…

Can they name the new AQ arm after Obama? That’s the least they can do to show their appreciation for taking out Gaddafi on their behalf.

(CNN) — Al Qaeda’s leadership has sent experienced jihadists to Libya in an effort to build a fighting force there, according to a Libyan source briefed by Western counter-terrorism officials.

The jihadists include one veteran fighter who had been detained in Britain on suspicion of terrorism. The source describes him as committed to al Qaeda’s global cause and to attacking U.S. interests.

The source told CNN that the al Qaeda leader, Ayman al-Zawahiri, personally dispatched the former British detainee to Libya earlier this year as the Gadhafi regime lost control of large swathes of the country.

The man arrived in Libya in May and has since begun recruiting fighters in the eastern region of the country, near the Egyptian border. He now has some 200 fighters mobilized, the source added. Western intelligence agencies are aware of his activities, according to the source.

Another al Qaeda operative, of dual European-Libyan nationality, was arrested in an unnamed country on his way to Libya from the Afghan-Pakistan border region.

The individual now trying to establish a bridgehead for al Qaeda in Libya is known as “AA.” His name has not been made public because of UK law on terrorist suspects who are detained but not charged.

“AA” has been close to Ayman al-Zawahiri since the 1980s and first traveled to Afghanistan in the early 1990s to join mujahideen fighting the Soviet occupation — as did hundreds of Arab fighters.

“AA” later moved to the United Kingdom, where he began spreading al Qaeda’s ideology to younger Muslims. He was an admirer of Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, who emerged as leader of al Qaeda in Iraq after the U.S. invasion and who led an especially brutal campaign that targeted civilians and promoted sectarian hatred between Sunni and Shia Muslims.

Keep reading…

HT: capt diggs

After reading some of his old newsletters I can see why he “identifies” with OWS.

Via Weekly Standard:

While campaigning in Iowa on Wednesday, Republican presidential candidate Ron Paul praised the Occupy Wall Street movement, comparing it to the Tea Party movement. “In many ways, I identify with both groups,” Paul said. Both groups are fed up with problems in Washington and “the two-party-system,” Paul said while speaking at an insurance company in Des Moines.

Praising the left-wing Occupy Wall Street movement is an unusual move for a Republican presidential candidate, but Ron Paul is, of course, an unusual Republican presidential candidate. He jumped to first place in the Iowa caucus polls partly because of support from people who aren’t Republicans. His comments that members of the Tea Party and Occupy Wall Street are unhappy with the “two-party system” could fuel speculation that Paul will make a third-party bid of his own — something he has not ruled out.

Although “some people like to paint Occupy left and the Tea Party people right,” Paul said, “I think it makes my point. There’s a lot of people unhappy, and they’re not so happy with the two-party system because we have had people go in and out of office, congress changes, the presidency changes, they run on one thing, they do something else. Nothing ever changes.”

Paul praised the Occupy movement for focusing attention on the “very rich” who became wealthy because of government bailouts or contracts, but said that wealthy people who make an honest living “have to be protected. We shouldn’t be jealous or envious of those people.”

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Note: This post was bumped from the ZipWire.

You really can’t make this stuff up.

(INN) — The Obama administration is trying to convince Israel to release arch-terrorist and mass-murderer Marwan Barghouti.

According to the Hamas-aligned Al Quds daily, Washington views Barghouti as its preferred candidate for Fatah to field against Hamas in Palestinian Authority (PA) elections in May 2012.

“A high-profile US delegation has regularly discussed with officials in Tel Aviv the option to free Al Barghouti to lead Fatah against Hamas in the next elections,” the sources that the daily did not identify, said.

The Al-Quds report comes as Arab capitals are abuzz with the news that PA chairman Mahmoud Abbas will not seek re-election, leaving Washington concerned Fatah has no one to field against Hamas.

However, the release of Barghouti, who was sentenced to five life sentences for as many terror related murders in Israel, and who security services say is responsible for at least 21 other murders, is widely opposed in Israel.

Indeed, even the suggestion that Barghouti might be released as a part of a deal to free 1,027 terrorists in exchange for kidnapped soldier Gilad Shalit created a firestorm of outrage in the Jewish state.

An Israeli missile turns two Hamas fighters caught planting explosives into a fine red mist.

Ok, maybe not all that shocking.

Via Verum Serum:

Based on this survey, 59% of liberal Dems consider “socialism” a positive compared to just 31% of the population as a whole. Since that 31% includes liberal Dems as part of the total, the percentage would be even lower if they were removed from consideration

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