This is a battle fought every year between the secular left and the majority of Americans, but the sad part here is that Luzerne County officials chose to surrender to the anti-Christian hate groups, including the ACLU, instead of standing up for the majority of county residents.

From The Associated Press:

WILKES-BARRE, Pa. (AP) — Officials in northeastern Pennsylvania have removed a pair of religious holiday symbols from a public space after being threatened with legal action.

Luzerne County commissioners took down the creche and menorah from the courthouse lawn on Wednesday after receiving an objection from two civil liberties groups.

The ACLU and Americans United for Separation of Church and State told the county in a Dec. 11 letter that the displays are an unconstitutional government endorsement of religion.

County Solicitor Vito DeLuca says officials chose to forgo a legal fight because of a local budget crisis and other pressing matters.

The nativity scene is county-owned and has been placed on the lawn in Wilkes-Barre for decades. The county added a menorah about 20 years ago.

For more on how to fight the liberal fascists, check out the American Center for Law and Justice (ACLJ) Web site.

Barbara Oakley, a fellow of the American Institute of Medical and Biological Engineers and an engineering professor at Oakland University, offers an interesting perspective on the recent revelation that much of the science used to prop up the global warming theory has been manufactured by so-called scientists.

From a recent Oakley column:

The breathtaking dishonesty and incompetence of climatology's intellectual leadership clearly reveals that a discipline can become dominated by a small group of ideologically-motivated intellectual gatekeepers. So much so that these gatekeepers can cut off the ability of dissenters to publish in a peer-reviewed journal. Publication in a peer-reviewed journal, of course, is the sine qua non of grants, which in turn leads to careers in academia. No publications — no career.

Narrow intellectual gatekeeping is omnipresent in academia. Want to know why the government wastes hundreds of millions of dollars on math and science programs that never seem to improve the test scores of American students? Part of the reason for this is that today's K-12 educators—unlike educators in other high-scoring countries of the world — refuse to acknowledge evidence that memorization plays an important role in mastering mathematics. Any proposed program that supports memorization is deemed to be against "creativity" by today's intellectual gatekeepers in K-12 education, including those behind the Math and Science Partnerships. As one NSF program director told me: “We hear about success stories with practice and repetition-based programs like Kumon Mathematics. But I'll be frank with you—you’ll never get anything like that funded. We don't believe in it." Instead the intellectual leadership in education encourages enormously expensive pimping programs that put America even further behind the international learning curve.

Read the full column, "Take This Paradigm and Shove It," at Oakley's blog on the Psychology Today Web site.

It takes a lot of nerve for one of Obama's far-left loons to call the Republican Party "extreme" but there she goes again.

Valerie Jarrett continues the Obama misinformation campaign and the Fringe Media (formerly known as the Mainstream Media) falls for it.

Jarrett: GOP 'more and more extreme' - Mike Allen - POLITICO.com

Visit http://stopjarrett.com/ to learn more about Valerie Jarrett, one of Obama's most radical advisers and her campaign to silence free speech.

This is indoctrination at its worst. And this is a public school, supported by tax collars. Does the separation of church and state apply when your church is Government and your deity is Barack Obama?

If you can't make out the sound, here is a transcript of the lyrics (2nd song sung to "The Battle Hymn of the Republic" -

Song 1:
Mm, mmm, mm!
Barack Hussein Obama

He said that all must lend a hand
To make this country strong again
Mmm, mmm, mm!
Barack Hussein Obama

He said we must be fair today
Equal work means equal pay
Mmm, mmm, mm!
Barack Hussein Obama

He said that we must take a stand
To make sure everyone gets a chance
Mmm, mmm, mm!
Barack Hussein Obama

He said red, yellow, black or white
All are equal in his sight
Mmm, mmm, mm!
Barack Hussein Obama

Yes!
Mmm, mmm, mm
Barack Hussein Obama

Song 2: (sing to the Battle Hymn of the Republic - everyone!)
Hello, Mr. President we honor you today!
For all your great accomplishments, we all doth say "hooray!"

Hooray, Mr. President! You're number one!
The first black American to lead this great nation!

Hooray, Mr. President we honor your great plans
To make this country's economy number one again!

Hooray Mr. President, we're really proud of you!
And we stand for all Americans under the great Red, White, and Blue!

So continue ---- Mr. President we know you'll do the trick
So here's a hearty hip-hooray ----

Hip, hip hooray!
Hip, hip hooray!
Hip, hip hooray!

(H/T NetRightNation.com)

"The increasingly hysterical use of the the race card by liberal columnists, bloggers and politicians reflects the last gasps of people who, being unable to win an argument on the merits, seek to end the argument," writes William Jacobson, associate clinical professor of Law at Cornell Law School.

From a recent op-ed by Jacobson:

While the false accusation of racism is not a new tactic, it has been refined by Obama supporters into a toxic powder which is causing damage to the social fabric of the country by artificially injecting race into every political issue.

The American people, while they still mostly like Obama on a personal level, increasingly oppose his policies and plans. Democrats know that the debate on the merits of initiatives such as health care and cap-and-trade has been won on the merits by the opposition.

Not surprisingly, the pace of racial accusations has picked up as opposition has grown. Just in the past few days the usual and not-so-usual suspects have been seeking to out-do each other in making accusations of racism including Eugene Robinson, Maureen Dowd, Jimmy Carter, Rep. Hank Johnson, Chris Matthews, a wide range of Democratic politicians, and of course, almost all of the mainstream media.

The effect of these accusations is poisonous. Race is the most sensitive and inflammatory subject in this country. By turning every issue, even a discussion of health care policy, into an argument about race, liberals have created a politically explosive mixture in which the harder they seek to suppress opposing voices, the harder those voices seek to be heard.

Read the full column at RealClearPolitics.com

Also check out Williamson's excellent blog, Legal Insurrection

A guest column from Tony Perkins of the Family Research Center on the hysterical left's use of race to shut down all criticism of the Obama administration.

Race Card: Sign of Desperation

By Tony Perkins

Yesterday, the House voted 240 to 179 to censure Rep. Joe Wilson (R-S.C.) for saying the President was lying about aspects of his health care reform plan. What was more telling than the vote was the rhetoric that surrounded it. Those pushing to publicly flog Wilson avoided the subject at hand, the health care reform plan and whether or not the President's statements were false.

Rather, House members like Rep. Hank Johnson (D-Ga.) and Rep. Barbara Lee (D-Calif.) used the opportunity to say Wilson 's actions were motivated by racial animus. In an interview with CNN, Johnson said "I guess we'll probably have folks putting on white hoods and white uniforms again and riding through the countryside, intimidating people. That's the logical conclusion if this kind of attitude is not rebuked." On ABC's World News, referring to Wilson's comments, Lee said "Hate speech can turn into hate crimes."

Working out of the Left's classic playbook, former President Jimmy Carter, interviewed on NBC Nightly News, chimed in not only on Wilson's comments but on the public opposition to the President's liberal plans saying, "I think an overwhelming portion of the intensely demonstrated animosity toward President Barack Obama is based on the fact that he is a black man, that he's African-American."

This is a classic move by the Left when they can't win the policy debate; they try to marginalize their opponents by calling them racist.

NEWS ITEM: President Obama to address the nation's schoolchildren live from the White House, via the White House Web site and on C-SPAN, at 12:00 p.m. on Sept. 8.

CNSNews.com - Revision: Education Dept. Changes Suggested Classroom Activities for Students Who Watch Obama's Speech

Posted using ShareThis

See related post at Bluftooni

From CNSNews.com:

Anyone who posts comments on the White House's Facebook, MySpace, YouTube and Twitter pages will have their statements captured and permanently archived by the federal government, according to a plan that the White House is now seeking a contractor to carry out.

The Executive Office of the President is looking for a private contractor to capture and archive comments and information posted on social networking and new media sites where the White House has established a presence. While the Presidential Records Act (PRA) generally requires that the administration preserve information generated by the president and his staff, the White House says that in seeking to collect and preserve comments made by common citizens on social networking sites it is acting "out of an abundance of caution" to comply with the law.

In mid-August, the White House put out a "request for quotation" (RFQ)which seeks bids from private firms for the project. Under the terms stated by the White House, the contractor would have broad responsibilities in collecting information from White House related Web pages.

The RFQ for bids says the contractor is to "capture, store, [and] extract" information that will be transferred to the National Archives and Records Administration (NARA) for permanent storage. According to the White House proposal, the information involved will include the "capture of comments and publicly visible tags posted by users" on publicly accessible Web sites where the White House has established a presence.

Read the full story at the link below:

CNSNews.com - White House Seeks to Capture and Archive Citizens’ Comments on its Facebook, YouTube, MySpace Sites

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The Obama administration has dropped the controversial flag@whitehouse.gov e-mail address that gave people an opportunity to snitch on fellow Americans who oppose Obamacare.

From the Row 2 Seat 4 blog:

The White House posts on their blog tonight their explanation on changes to their Reality Check site, and specifically the removal of flag@whitehouse.gov. This post was put on the blog moments ago and was not sent out as a press release from the White House Press Office.

For more on the growing e-mail controversy, including allegations the White House participated in a "spam" campaign, check out Fox News.

Talk radio host and author Doug Giles offers encouragement in the form of an open letter to the so-called "mob" of Americans expressing their First Amendment right to free speech during recent town hall meetings with members of Congress.

From his letter:

Isn't it funny that the liberals, who have historically encouraged the contrarian, are now crying foul since conservatives, libertarians and non-Obama addled Democrats have decided, en masse, to become the contrarians and shout Obama, his policies, and his step-n-fetch gofers down?

As you know by now, the Obamanoid's town hall sale of Obamacare ain't going that well for Dems because thinking, unbeholden people aren't buying Barack's crack. So, what did the White House do in light of the GP's legitimate concerns over Barack's proposed legislation? Did they go back and flush it down the crapper? No. Did Obama bend one of his big ears to our bigger concerns? Yeah, right.

No, the White House, in the spirit of tolerance, hope and change officially dispatched some pursed-lip chick to video warn the serfs of Obamaland that if we disagree with His Highness' health scare bill in a "fishy" e-mail or casual conversation then the White House wants to know about it — and we could very well be deep weeds.

What is this, Russia? Did I wake up in Venezuela? Is this an Austin Powers flick, or a joke? If it isn't, I'm screwed; all I have been doing for the past umpteen weeks is ... uh ... disagreeing with B-HO on my show.

Read the full column, "My Fishy Letter of Encouragement for the Town Hall Rebels," at Townhall.com

A guest column by Robert Romano, senior editor at Americans for Limited Government.

The Rise of the Obama Police State — An Early Demonstration?

By Robert Romano

"We don't want interacting," said the police officer, to the shock of the conservative activist holding the camera. She was in Baton Rouge, LA, filming a demonstration by ACORN in favor of Barack Obama's proposed government-run health care. And what she had just witnessed, as the officer led the offending man away who had dared speak to the activist, was nothing short of the disruption of free speech, of the press, and of the right to assemble — by the police.

As reported by the Examiner, "Things took a surprising and dangerous turn when a police officer, clearly sympathetic to the ACORN rally, attempts to shut down the opposition. At one point, during a very civil discussion between an opponent and a supporter of the president's plan, the police officer returned and actually told the individuals opposing the president's plan they were not allowed to speak. The man in blue shirt, a supporter of the president's plan, later returns and attempts to defend the free speech rights of the counter protesters."

For all intents and purposes, she was reporting on the demonstration. And yet, every time she attempted to converse with opponents of ObamaCare, the police intervened. Not exactly what one would call the protection of unalienable rights. It looks more like a police state — in its infancy.

On Wikipedia, a police state is described, "The inhabitants of a police state experience restrictions on their mobility, and on their freedom to express or communicate political or other views, which are subject to police monitoring or enforcement." Exactly what was seen in Baton Rouge.

In this case, nobody was arrested. But it is troubling, to say the least, that the police were apparently ordered to disrupt any interaction between supporters and opponents of ObamaCare, even ones that were perfectly willing to debate.

"We disagree. We can have a civil conversation and talk while we walk. We disagree. It's fine," said one ObamaCare supporter, who too was disgusted by the police action.

Really, the ones who had obviously expressed a desire to avoid even civil discourse of their views were the ACORN demonstrators. Of course, there is no such thing as freedom from speech, or debate. But if one does not like what is being said, they can simply move to the other side of the street.

But since they were protesting, wasn't the point to defend their views? When they put themselves out there, as members of a self-described public interest organization, they actually are public figures — a part of the national political debate. That makes the views expressed by the organization subject to public scrutiny by press or citizen journalists alike.

Instead, in Omerica, apparently there is the stunning emergence of a political elite. They are beyond reproach and criticism. And the police will see to that, as can be seen in this appalling display.

Robert Romano is the ALG Senior News Editor. For more, visit GetLiberty.org

America's third largest party has called on Barack Obama and the Democratic Party to end what appears to be "a budding campaign of union violence targeted at citizens who differ with the White House" over Obamacare.

The Libertarian Party opposes not only the White House's plans for government-run medicine, but the use of violence to achieve political or social goals, says Donny Ferguson, Libertarian National Committee Communications Director.

From a press release issued by the Libertarian Party condemning the Gestapo-tactics orchestrated by the White House to silence critics of Obamacare:

"The Libertarian Party is founded on one principle. We do not support the initiation of force to achieve political or social goals," said Donny Ferguson, Libertarian National Committee Communications Director. "Democrats seem to think differently. When the Obama administration ordered Democrats to 'punch back twice as hard' against citizens who question them, Democrats responded. This Chicago-trained White House has brought Chicago-style union violence to small towns across America."

A Tampa Bay Tribune story and a video posted to the Drudge Report both report physical assaults on dissenting citizens by union organizers brought to meetings by Democrats. In Tampa, union organizers blocked citizens who differed with the White House from entering a public town hall with Rep. Kathy Castor (D-FL,) and allegedly scuffled with some of them. A video posted to YouTube appears to show union organizers physically attacking citizens who disagreed with the White House.

"The White House told Democrat leaders Thursday (Aug. 6) to 'punch back twice as hard' when citizens express disapproval. That kind of irresponsible rhetoric is never proper when discussing popular dissent. The also made it clear they will bend Senate rules and force through government-run health care whether or not America supports it. That is a frightening departure from the traditional American practice of governing though popular will," said Ferguson.

"If bringing in union thugs is an attempt by Democrats to scare citizens into not questioning them, it won't work. Union violence may be how communities are organized in Chicago, but the American people won’t stand for people who think violence is the proper response to the fact they no longer have majority support."

"Americans still believe in the consent of the governed. Libertarians urge Democrats to listen to the American people, call off their union enforcers and drop their wildly unpopular scheme of government-run medicine," said Ferguson.

For more information on this issue, visit Libertarian Party Web site at http://www.LP.org

Chilling post by Jeff Emanuel at RedState.com about the network of informants Obama has set up to spy on fellow Americans who resist his socialist agenda. This is only the beginning of the totalitarian state Obama and his followers want to set up.

From Emanuel's post:

If you see anybody publicly opposing President Obama's plan to implement a government-centric overhaul of the health care system, the White House wants you to report that person (or persons) ASAP.

From the White House Web site:

There is a lot of disinformation about health insurance reform out there, spanning from control of personal finances to end of life care. These rumors often travel just below the surface via chain emails or through casual conversation. Since we can’t keep track of all of them here at the White House, we’re asking for your help. If you get an email or see something on the web about health insurance reform that seems fishy, send it to flag@whitehouse.gov.

Read the full post here.

Nat Hentoff is a leading authority on the First Amendment and the Bill of Rights. He also happens to be one of the most liberal syndicated columnist in the country. So when Hentoff wants to discuss how the Democratic majority in the House of Representatives has clearly violated the Constitution by passing a law to target "thought crime," everyone needs to pay attention.

From a recent Hentoff column:

Why is the press remaining mostly silent about the so-called "hate crimes law" that passed in the House on April 29? The Local Law Enforcement Hate Crimes Prevention Act passed in a 249-175 vote (17 Republicans joined with 231 Democrats).

These Democrats should have been tested on their knowledge of the First Amendment, equal protection of the laws (14th Amendment), and the prohibition of double jeopardy (no American can be prosecuted twice for the same crime or offense). If they had been, they would have known that this proposal, now headed for a Senate vote, violates all these constitutional provisions.

This bill would make it a federal crime to willfully cause bodily injury (or try to) because of the victim's actual or PERCEIVED "race, color, religion, national origin, gender, sexual orientation, gender identity or disability" — as explained on the White House Web site, signaling the president's approval. A defendant convicted on these grounds would be charged with a "hate crime" in addition to the original crime, and would get EXTRA prison time.

Liberal fascism is upon us. And if Obama stacks the Supreme Court with far-left idealogues, who will be left to protect our Constitutional rights? This could help explain the rise in gun ownership in this country.

Read Hentoff's full column here.