The recent congressional passage of U.S. free trade agreements with South Korea, Panama and Colombia has elicited an outbreak of Beltway backslapping. Some congratulations are certainly warranted, but a closer look at just how these FTAs arrived on the president’s desk reveals serious problems with not only the agreements themselves, but also the current state of U.S. trade policy. (more)
Congressional passage of the three free trade agreements Wednesday brings the U.S. one step closer to smoothly exporting American-made gadgets to South Korea, Colombia and Panama. And trade organizations representing high-tech companies are eager to hire Americans to get it done. (more)
WASHINGTON (AP) — Congress approved free trade agreements Wednesday with South Korea, Colombia and Panama, ending a four-year drought in the forming of new trade partnerships and giving the White House and Capitol Hill the opportunity to show they can work together to stimulate the economy and put people back to work. (more)
Three pending free-trade agreements could reach Capitol Hill as early as Monday although no deal has been reached on how to move the accords through Congress. (more)
Congress moved closer to approving new free trade agreements with Colombia, Panama and South Korea after a procedural vote in the Senate Monday afternoon. (more)
Who says women shouldn’t use sex to get what they want? (more)
While millions of Americans continue to struggle to find work, tighten their belts during tough economic times and fight to defend their right to keep the best health care system in the world from being taken over by the government, President Obama continues his pursuit of a disastrous foreign policy agenda. (more)
In 1957, the Soviet Union launched a satellite into space. Therefore, taxpayers should give more money to politically favored corporations. This is not a rigorous line of thought. But it was typical of yesterday’s State of the Union address. (more)
President Barack Obama’s State of the Union address started out with some promise, but in the end, while it did not necessarily surprise, it did disappoint. (more)
1.) Unethical Google alumnus leaves White House one day after FCC passes net neutrality — Andrew McLaughlin should have left the White House in March, when he was found to be using his personal gmail account while at work, or even in May, when internal memos revealed McLaughlin was coordinating PR with Google’s U.S. public policy director. Instead, the nation’s deputy CTO waited until the FCC passed its net neutrality bill to bid adieu to government life. According to WaPo, “McLaughlin, who previously worked as a Google executive, oversaw many of the White House’s Internet policy initiatives including Internet access regulations, the expansion of broadband connections and global cybersecurity.” Not mentioned in WaPo’s writeup is Google’s ardent support for net neutrality regulations. McLaughlin will dive back into the startup world, creating products for state and local governments. He “also said he will return to teaching law, which he did at Harvard University’s Berkman Center seven years ago.” Interesting factoid: The Berkman center is the far-left think thank that the FCC commissioned to produce objective reports on the apparent need for net neutrality regulations. (more)
1.) Christ Christie commutes sentence of man convicted for being manly — While Florida Gov. Charlie Crist continues to toss and turn over the thought of pardoning the hell out of Jim Morrison, NJ Gov. Christ Christie has been worried about somebody more low key: Brian Aitken. Aitken was sentenced to seven years in prison this past August because he had two unloaded firearms in the trunk of his car. “Police found unloaded guns that had been purchased legally in Colorado. New Jersey law requires residents who want to transport firearms legally to request a permit from a local law enforcement office and produce a letter stating why it is necessary for them to carry a gun.” Aitken was switching residences and had yet to get the paperwork, ergo he deserved to lose seven years of his life. According to The Daily Caller’s Amanda Carey, Christie “commuted the sentence of Brian Aitken Monday, reducing his sentence from seven years in prison to time already served. According to Christie’s order, he will be released as soon as it’s ‘administratively possible.’” (more)
Americans can tell when we are being lied to. We’re being lied to when Harry Reid tells us that the Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (START) with Russia is a bit of unfinished business that the Senate must ratify because it’s “urgent.” Urgent? If that had been the case, why didn’t Mr. Reid bring the measure up last summer? Or last fall? (more)
Some folks are alleging that Tehran and Caracas have inked a deal that will establish a joint ballistic missile base in Venezuela, where Iranian missiles, potentially capable of reaching the United States, would be stationed. (more)
Southern Miss officials today identified the victims of an early morning shooting as football players Martez Smith, 22, of Canton, Tim Green, 21, of Columbia, S.C., and Deddrick Jones, 23, of Bastrop, La. (more)
SAN DIEGO (AP) — Newly released documents show the Diocese of San Diego long knew about abusive priests, some of whom were shuffled from parish to parish despite credible complaints against them. (more)
Colombia has been intermittently on and off the Obama administration’s agenda since it took office in 2009. When Hillary Clinton delivered her foreign policy address at the Council on Foreign Relations last week, she remarked that Mexico is “looking more and more like Colombia looked 20 years ago.” Shortly thereafter, President Obama rebuked the comparison in an LA-based Spanish newspaper. The turnaround is characteristic of Washington’s unjustified ambivalence towards one of our greatest and most promising Latin American allies. (more)
WASHINGTON _ Mexico’s struggle against powerful drug cartels increasingly resembles an insurgency that challenges the government’s control of its own soil, Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton said Wednesday. (more)
Three teens who were on a 69-name hit list posted on Facebook have been killed in the past 10 days in a southwestern Colombian town, officials say. (more)
Even in the best of times few people look forward to July and August here in Arizona. The annual monsoon adds enough humidity to the heat load to drive most folks indoors, as though it were Minneapolis in January. (more)
President Hugo Chávez engaged in some sabre-rattling Sunday, threatening to cut off the sale of oil to the United States if military action is taken against Venezuela on the Colombian border. (more)
