Abraham Lincoln's Warning; Bush and Obama Criminally Offered Positions for Favors; Death Panels Secret Passage; Auto Czar Settles Suit with $10 Million Fine

Abraham Lincoln issued this warning in his inaugural address: “Any people anywhere, being inclined and having the power, have the right to rise up and shake off the existing government and form a new one. This is a most valuable and sacred right – a right which we hope and believe is to liberate the world.” 

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Floyd Reports: This weekend, the Republican Congressman responsible for investigating presidential misconduct said that Barack Obama’s decision to offer a position to Joe Sestak as an incentive for him to drop out of a Democratic primary “was a criminal event under the law” — and that he is going to do absolutely, positively nothing about it.

ISSA: It is in fact an example of misconduct, in my opinion. Now, what happened throughout this process — and I’ve made this very clear — is we’ve discovered the problem’s bigger than that. It’s bigger than President Obama.
President Bush’s people said we did the same thing. Guess what? It was a criminal event under the law — a criminal event, when President Bush’s people did it, and I don’t know when they did it. They’ve just admitted that they did it…When you offer a position, paid or unpaid, existing statute makes it illegal to offer that job in return for affecting an election. That is — that is something we’ve got to get to stop. The American people do not want ambassadorships or any other position handed out to save a party money.
http://floydreports.com/watergate-so-what-issa-wont-investigate-sestak-crime/?utm_source=Expose+Obama&utm_campaign=170f51d0cc-EO_01_03_20111_3_2011&utm_medium=email
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Expose Obama writes: The Democrat who started the latest national debate over the inclusion of so-called “death panels” by the Obama administration into federal regulations now regrets doing so.
The office of Representative Earl Blumenauer, an assisted suicide advocate from Oregon who works closely with pro-euthanasia groups like Compassion and Choices, alerted supporters of the change the Obama administration implemented and worked to ask them to keep the news quiet.
“We would ask that you not broadcast this accomplishment out to any of your lists e-mails can too easily be forwarded,” his staff wrote. “Thus far, it seems that no press or blogs have discovered it but we will be keeping a close watch and may be calling on you if we need a rapid, targeted response. The longer this [regulation] goes unnoticed, the better our chances of keeping it.”
The memo talked of a “quiet” victory and had the congressman worrying about how Republican leaders would “use this small provision to perpetuate the ‘death panel’ myth.”
But LifeNews.com reported on the new regulations and, weeks later, the New York Times got a copy of the memo Blumenauer wrote and the national dustup began.
Now, Blumenauer told The Hill that he regrets the secretive language used in the email, which he says he did not see beforehand. [The regulation, which was taken out of the bill because Americans despised it was then secretly put back in with even stronger language: doctors will be paid EVERY year to provide this service, not once every 5 years!.  This is a perfect demonstration of the extreme power Obamacare gives to the Secretary of Health, forever - without the consent of Congress or the governed.]  http://www.exposeobama.com/2011/01/03/oops-democrat-who-outed-obamas-death-panels-is-sorry-you-found-out/?utm_source=Expose+Obama&utm_campaign=170f51d0cc-EO_01_03_20111_3_2011&utm_medium=email
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Forbes writes: The investment banker who helped lead the Obama administration’s auto industry overhaul has agreed to pay $10 million to settle influence-peddling allegations in New York.
Former “car czar” Steven Rattner admitted no wrongdoing as part of the deal, which was announced by state Attorney General Andrew Cuomo on Thursday.
Cuomo’s office had filed civil lawsuits against Rattner in November, accusing him of paying kickbacks to help his company land $150 million in state pension fund investments in 2004 and 2005. He denied the charges. http://www.forbes.com/feeds/ap/2010/12/30/general-specialized-consumer-services-us-pension-probe-rattner_8230177.html
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Reminding me of a proposal discussed by our own Progressives in government to convert all private 401(k)'s into government annuities which the government will inherit upon the death of the owner, the Washington Examiner writes about Europe: The most striking example is Hungary, where last month the government made the citizens an offer they could not refuse. They could either remit their individual retirement savings to the state, or lose the right to the basic state pension (but still have an obligation to pay contributions for it). In this extortionate way, the government wants to gain control over $14bn of individual retirement savings.
Read more at the Washington Examiner: http://washingtonexaminer.com/blogs/beltway-confidential/2011/01/europe-starts-confiscating-private-pension-funds#ixzz1A4SulreV

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Do you recall how President Obama got 6 Republicans to vote yes on the new Start Treaty by saying the we would still be able to produce defensive weapons? Townhall writes: The lower house of the Russian Duma has now taken up New START, and -- surprise! -- they're insisting that limits on US missile defense capabilities are a central element to the treaty:
"During the ratification of START in the US Congress the American lawmakers noted that the link between strategic offensive armed forces and antimissile defense systems is not juridically binding for the parties. They referred to the fact that this link was fixed only in the preamble of the document. Such an approach can be regarded as the US’ attempt to find an option to build up its strategic potential and the Russian lawmakers cannot agree with this," Kosachev says.  http://townhall.com/tipsheet/GuyBenson/2011/01/03/surprise_russian_duma_to_codify_missile_defense_language_in_new_start
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