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MADISON — Mary Bell calls herself an “unlikely advocate” — just a Wisconsin Rapids school teacher who heard the call. She speaks with an earnest edge to her voice, hoping to persuade Wisconsinites to the rightness of her cause. The image, of course, is contrived. She is a handsomely paid activist, who is years removed from the classroom. And she heads the state’s most powerful lobbying organization — the Wisconsin Education Association Council. But most Wisconsinites simply call it “the teacher’s union.” Long before Scott Walker came to the statehouse, Bell was a union firebrand. “This is a highly emotional,...

Obama Calls for 'Common-Sense Policies' to Move EconomyBy Devin Dwyer | ABC News – 16 hrs ago Continuing to cast himself as an activist president defying slim odds for election-year legislative compromises, President Obama in his weekly address pushes "a few common-sense policies that would make a difference" with the economy. "There are things we can do - right now - to help create jobs and restore some of the financial security that so many families have lost," Obama says. The list of initiatives - which the White House has billed as Congress' "To-Do list" - includes elimination of tax...

..............IT'S TIME TO FIGHT for the survival of Americanism,............................ Americanism is freedom founded on the power of the individual, and his ability to achieve without undue government interference. It’s the idea that the state exists to serve man, to protect God-given rights, and to allow the greatest amount of political freedom within the bounds of ordered liberty. It’s the idea that people truly own their property and are not merely renting it, and that they are free to use their talents, initiative, and “can do” spirit to make the lives they dream for themselves a reality. It is indisputable that...

WASHINGTON — A top White House aide on Sunday said President Barack Obama wants to strike an “appropriate balance” between advancing human rights and maintaining U.S. relations with China, the first public comments by the administration on its potential involvement in harboring a Chinese activist on the eve of diplomatic talks between the two world powers. John Brennan, Obama’s counterterrorism adviser, declined to provide details on the incident or say whether the activist, Chen Guangcheng, might be hiding in the U.S. embassy in Beijing as reported.

Washington - A top White House aide on Sunday said President Barack Obama wants to strike an “appropriate balance” between advancing human rights and maintaining U.S. relations with China, the first public comments by the administration on its potential involvement in harboring a Chinese activist on the eve of diplomatic talks between the two world powers. John Brennan, Obama’s counterterrorism adviser, declined to provide details on the incident or say whether the activist, Chen Guangcheng, might be hiding in the U.S. embassy in Beijing as reported. Chen, who has exposed forced abortions and

Saul Alinsky: The activist who terrifies the rightNewt and other conservatives are obsessed with tying Obama to Saul Alinsky. Here's where their hatred comes from By Thomas J Sugrue Tuesday, Feb 7, 2012 8:00 AM 18:51:25 EST **SNIP** By his own admission, Obama had a rough time being a community organizer. “Sometimes I called a meeting, and nobody showed up,” he recalled. **SNIP** For his part, Alinsky, who died in 1972, never had much patience for elected officials: Change would not come from top-down leadership, but rather from pressure from below. In his view, politicians took the path of least...

You have to love Hamas. They're just so subtle. Hamas has sent some of its goons to attack Mahmoud Abu Rahma after Abu Rahma exposed Hamas' use of Gaza citizens as human shields. The stabbing in Gaza of a Palestinian rights activist after he exposed Hamas' contempt for its own people by using them as human shields, and after he criticized the radical Islamic group for torture, abuse and trampling free speech, should be strongly condemned by the United Nations—both as an attack on the victim’s human rights, and on the idea of freedom of expression. Masked attackers on Friday...

1. There is no confidence in our judiciary when a Supreme Court Justice does not bother to recuse herself when she had direct involvement in the issue before the court.

OKLAHOMA CITY – It’s already been a rough week for the two main “Occupy” groups in Oklahoma, with a death at Occupy OKC and a heavy-handed response to Occupy Tulsa by the Tulsa Police Department early this morning. First, at Occupy OKC in Kerr Park on Oct. 31, police responded to the discovery of a body in a tent at the encampment. Identified only by his street name “Street Poet,” the young man had delivered a poem the day before his death, and “how the system had failed him,” according to The Oklahoman. Our sources informed us that Street Poet...

Journalism: Is the New York Times a news organization or a front for left-wing activists? Reporter Natasha Lennard was filmed leading an Occupy Wall Street panel, offering radicals tips on keeping their identities secret. Openly. In a video that appeared on BigGovernment.com, Lennard, a Times freelance reporter who was arrested with 700 other leftists for shutting down the Brooklyn Bridge this month, revealed herself to be within the actual leadership of the Occupy Wall Street protest movement. Along with four other "comrades," she addressed a roomful of people at a bookstore in Manhattan, officiously advising the fractious movement on how...

As the girls dig in to their math problems, Farrier contemplates the Republican presidential candidates who are vying for the support of homeschoolers like her. "They're wooing us. It feels really good," she says.

Women are to be allowed to vote in Saudi Arabia. K ing Abdullah bin Abdulaziz announced the change yesterday and also said women would be allowed to run in elections. However, the new law will not come into force until 2015. In a speech, the king said the move was in accordance with sharia law.

Not the White House, nor the Obama 2012 campaign, nor Democratic National Committee had any immediate comment Tuesday when contacted by ABC News and asked about comments made by Koch referring to the 2012 campaign as a repeat of the Iraq War. “We have Saddam Hussein, this is the Mother of All Wars we’ve got in the next 18 months,” Koch said in comments at a private gathering in Colorado in June, first reported by the progressive Brad Blog and Mother Jones Magazine. ”For the life or death of this country.” ADD Philip Ellender, President and COO, Government and Public...

Much-arrested Hollywood actress Daryl Hannah was taken away from the White House in restraints Tuesday afternoon. Hannah was taking part in an ongoing protest against the unbuilt Keystone XL oil pipeline. "Sometimes it's necessary to sacrifice your freedom for a greater freedom," Hannah said in Lafayette Park before her arrest. "And we want to be free from the horrible death and destruction that fossil fuels cause, and have a clean energy future." Together with dozens of others, Hannah sat on the sidewalk in front of the White House and refused three requests from the Park Police to move. The group...

Denver, Colo., Aug 17, 2011 / 06:12 pm (CNA).- Michael Voris, the founder and host of RealCatholicTV, says he was completely unaware of recently discovered troubles within his organization, involving a staff apologist's sexually explicit writings, and his nonprofit corporation's loss of legal status two years ago. “I don't know what the issue is on any of this stuff,” said Voris, who is currently in Spain promoting his unofficial “No Bull in Madrid” meetings during World Youth Day.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's speech to the Joint Session of Congress on Tuesday was disrupted by a left-wing protester calling to stop the Israeli occupation in Palestine. The heckler was identified as Rae Abileah, a 28-year-old Jewish-American activist, of Israeli decent, who works with human rights organization CODEPINK. Abileah stood up from the gallery as Netanyahu was congratulating the United States for the killing of Osama bin Laden and shouted “stop Israeli war crimes.”

SAN ANTONIO-It's been tried before over the years, but it never happened. Changing the name of Durango Boulevard to Cesar E. Chavez Boulevard. The change to honor the late civil rights leader would affect Durango from Interstate 37 here in downtown to 36th street to the west. It would cost the city roughly 100-thousand dollars to make the changes. The issue was put on the fast track by councilman Philip Cortez of district 4--one of four districts that would be affected. But the cost goes beyond just changing street signs. It's been called Durango since the 1880s. But this street...

Unions spent an estimated $200 million electing President Barack Obama and re-electing Democratic majorities in Congress in 2008. Union officials ought to be ecstatic with Obama’s performance since then because he has delivered everything he promised the unions, and more. Obama’s largesse is all the more amazing when it is remembered that unions represent fewer than 7 percent of all private-sector workers. Fortunately for the country, Democrats in Congress don’t always share Obama’s loyalty to the union label. Consider Thursday’s cloture vote in the Senate on Obama’s nomination of 39-year-old UC Berkeley School of Law professor Goodwin Liu to the...

Could Newt Gingrich's week get any worse? Just days into his 2012 presidential bid, the former House speaker has been under fire this week from fellow Republicans for trashing Rep. Paul Ryan's proposal on Medicare during his appearance on NBC's "Meet the Press" on Sunday--criticism that forced Gingrich to apologize. On Monday, an Iowa voter was caught on camera griping him out. And Tuesday, it was revealed that Gingrich at one point owed at least $250,000 to Tiffany's—an embarrassing detail that could potentially come back to haunt the self-described fiscal conservative's 2012 bid.

When white liberals are against options that help poor minorities (charter schools and vouchers)...it makes me wonder.

More on County Circuit Judge Maryann Sumi & SonBloggers use son to attack judge in union bargaining case By Jason Stein of the Journal Sentinel March 21, 2011 11:31 a.m. Madison -- In a sign of how contentious the struggle over Gov. Scott Walker’s union bargaining law remains, conservative bloggers are using a Dane County judge’s son to criticize her ruling against the measure. **SNIP** But conservative blogs have been noting that Sumi’s son, Jacob Sinderbrand, worked in the past for labor unions and questioning whether that could in some way influence Sumi’s judgment. In a brief statement, Sumi dismissed...

The climate change fanatic has plenty of outside income. Did he obtain the proper waivers from NASA as he must according to the law? In this “Sunshine Week” — amid revelations that the vow of transparency was not, as George Stephanopoulos famously said about Bill Clinton’s truthiness, one of the campaign promises Barack Obama intended to keep — I have just filed an administrative appeal with NASA challenging its thoroughly puzzling refusal to release ethics-related records for its high-profile global warming activist/advocate, the astronomer Dr. James Hansen. This request and appeal are on behalf of the American Tradition Institute’s Environmental...

Hopefully, Big Government readers can help us identify these Democrat senators from Wisconsin. In the video, they claim they are heading back to the state to fulfill their constitutional obligation. They’re Democrats though, so we’re skeptical they worry about things like that. We’ll see.

In loving memory of Anthony Eugene "Budge" Rahe, Jr. December 3, 1934 - February 1, 2011 Anthony "Budge" Rahe, Jr., 76, of Pine Bluff, died Monday, February 1, 2011. He was born December 3, 1934 in Houston, Texas, son of the late Anthony Rahe, Sr. and Margaret Insirillo Rahe. Mr. Rahe was reared and received his early education in Houston, graduating from Beaumont High School. After moving to Pine Bluff, Budge worked as a radio disk jockey for KOTN for many years and recently as a Wal-Mart greeter. Survivors include two nephews, Kyle Ponder and Brad Ponder. Memorial services will...

Gay activists gathering in Minneapolis for a national convention will be seeing a new focus on faith issues.

Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor has set herself apart from colleagues with her fervent statements protesting the majority's refusal to take some appeals, particularly involving prisoners. Each month, the justices spurn hundreds of petitions from people who have lost in lower courts, and rarely does an individual justice go public with concern about the denial. In the seven times it has happened since the annual term opened in October, Justice Sotomayor has signed four of the opinions, more than any other justice. She was the lead author on three, again more than any other justice. She forcefully dissented when the...

Proving once again that Hollywood always gravitates to the wrong causes, Tim Cavanaugh of Reason.com reported on Dec. 14 that the California town made famous by Erin Brockovich — an activism that Hollywood embraced with a major motion picture starring Julia Roberts — has proven not to have lived up to all the anti-corporate fearmongering that brought the town to the country’s attention. For those of you that are hazy on the story, local activist Erin Brockovich successfully took Pacific Gas and Electric to court forcing it to pay a record $33 million class-action settlement

Good Morning America's Claire Shipman on Thursday tried to disguise a Democratic activist as just a jobless American who would be hurt by Republican failure to extend unemployment benefits. Shipman sympathetically recounted that Edrie Irvine, who she didn't explain spoke at a Nancy Pelosi press conference on Wednesday, "never thought her very livelihood would depend on a political debate in Congress." A graphic reading "unemployed" appeared onscreen as Irvine complained, "They are talking about tax cuts for the rich and are holding people like me hostage." Who is Ms. Irvine? According to her bio on the leftist Democracy For America...

Vegan activist Walter Edmund Bond, of Utah, today pleaded guilty to felony counts related to an April fire that burned down the Sheepskin Factory in Glendale. Bond, 34, was arrested on July 22, accused of using fire or explosives to damage property involved in interstate commerce and of using force, violence or threats involving animal enterprises. The blaze caused more than $500,000 in damage to the Sheepskin Factory in the early hours of April 30. On July 28, Bond pleaded not guilty to the federal charges. By changing his plea today, he may be eligible for a shorter prison sentence....

(Reuters) - A self-described animal-rights activist known on the Internet as "Lone Wolf" pleaded guilty in federal court on Thursday to arson in a fire that destroyed a local sheepskin business.

With Congress on recess until after the November elections, much of news in the political world has focused on campaigning, margin of error polling, controversial stump statements, off-the-record / now on-the-record statements, and run-of-the-mill election run-up commentary.  Noticeably absent from the chatter of election season with Congress on adjournment is talk of "recess appointments" - those made when the Senate is adjourned for more than three days - that usually rule the news-day during times such as these. In a last-minute deal brokered by Senate Leaders before adjournment, Majority Leader Reid agreed to convene the Senate in pro forma session Tuesdays and Fridays...

Are the three news networks actively working to defeat the Republican candidate for Governor in Wisconsin? According to the far-left Service Employees International Union, yes, they most certainly are. SEIU spokesman John-david Morgan - also, incidentally, a former journalist - told a staffer (audio embedded below the fold) for GOP gubernatorial candidate Scott Walker that local media affiliates for all three major networks were "willing partners" in the union's efforts to defeat Walker. The staffer gave a fake name and recorded the conversation without Morgan's knowledge."They've really been willing partners in it,"

If you’d like to know what hours of fingernail scraping on a chalkboard feels like, simple give the recent California marriage decision a close read. It’s so blatantly biased as to border on comical. And because it is so over-the-top, the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals will find it hard to uphold it without employing some creative legal gymnastics to minimize the damage created. The man responsible for the opinion is United States District Chief Judge Vaughn R. Walker, whose conduct at trial and tone in the opinion resembles Perez Hilton at the Miss America pageant. Who can forget Hilton...

Teenage U.S. environmentalist to visit N. Korea on bold peace mission By Lee Haye-ah SEOUL, Aug. 10 (Yonhap) -- A teenage American boy says he is traveling to North Korea this week with a letter urging leader Kim Jong-il to allow the creation of a peace forest that would grow over the heavily armed border between the Koreas. "You may be wondering why a 13-year-old boy wants to go into North Korea, especially right now when there are a lot of problems," Jonathan Lee, a Korean-American from Mississippi, wrote in his letter. "Well, I've been talking about planting chestnut trees...

Has anyone ever heard of Tomas de Torquemada, the fanatical leader of the Spanish Inquisition ? Well...he is back. He has been re-incarnated as Thomas Perez, the head of the Civil Rights Division in the Obama-Holder Department of Justice. Not surprisingly, he is a zealot who is stretching the responsibilities of the office to the breaking point. Byron York reports over at the Washington Examiner: Of all the transformations that have taken place in the Obama administration, perhaps none is so radical as that within the Civil Rights Division. Under Perez, it is bigger, richer and more aggressive than ever,...

Did Judge Make Right Call In Gay Marriage Case? A federal judge ruled on Wednesday that Prop. 8, California's gay marriage ban is unconstitutional. Do you agree with the judge's decision? Share your thoughts. First answer our question below. Then click "Leave a Comment." Did Judge Make Right Call In Gay Marriage Case? Yes -- Prop. 8 violates the Constitution. No -- Marriage is an institution between a man and a woman. I don't care what the judge thinks about the Constitution. I'm not sure but shouldn't the voters views count for something? Other (leave a comment).

One talent Supreme Court nominee Elena Kagan displayed in her career climb could create unique ethics questions for her as a justice: the ability to persuade Harvard Law School alumni and other wealthy donors to give hundreds of millions of dollars, more than meeting a daunting fundraising goal that came with her job as dean. The $476 million total Kagan reached for the "Setting the Standard" campaign was a record not just for her university but for all law schools....Kagan's prolific fundraising sets her apart from the current Supreme Court justices. ... If Kagan is confirmed to the court as...

Immigrant-rights activist and former Santa Ana schools trustee Nativo Lopez was jailed in Los Angeles Thursday after being indicted by the grand jury there for eight felony counts alleging voter fraud. Los Angeles arrest records show that he was booked into the Twin Towers Correctional Facility, and is being held in lieu of $55,000 bail. Los Angeles District Attorney spokeswoman Sandi Gibbons said he faces a mental competency hearing on Aug. 6. The Mexican American Political Association, of which he is president, responded with a press release today. “Let it be known that he will be fasting in stance with...

Wisconsin Democratic Sen. Herb Kohl was only half right in an observation he offered during opening statements in the confirmation hearing of President Barack Obama’s nomination of Solicitor General Elena Kagan to the Supreme Court. Said Kohl: “We have less evidence about what sort of judge you will be than on any nominee in recent memory. Your judicial philosophy is almost invisible to us.” There is indeed less concrete evidence on the document side of the ledger, for the simple reason she’s never been a judge and has little experience as a practicing attorney. But contrary to the Wisconsin senator’s...

Kagan's Thesis Has Supreme Court Nominee Praising Activist Judges Washington, DC -- When President Barack Obama nominated Elena Kagan for the Supreme Court, he likely spent enough time with her to know she appreciates activist judges who make law from the bench rather than interpret it. Without the benefit of knowing her intimately, pro-life groups are left to research her background. http://LifeNews.com/nat6429.html

SNIPPET: "The navy will operate under the assumption that groups of provocateurs are aboard any future ships that try to break the Israel-imposed sea blockade on the Gaza Strip, Deputy Commander of the Navy Rear-Admiral Rani Ben-Yehuda told The Jerusalem Post on Monday."

n the wake of AP’s report that Solicitor General Elena Kagan is President Obama’s choice to fill the Supreme Court vacancy, Americans For Truth About Homosexuality (AFTAH) reiterates its call for Kagan to answer the question: ‘Are (or were) you a practicing homosexual?’ According to some reports it is an open secret that Kagan is a practicing lesbian — to which AFTAH President Peter LaBarbera responds: If Kagan is practicing immoral sexual behavior, it reflects on her character as a judicial nominee and her personal bias as potentially one of the most important public officials in America. The popular mantra...

For some unknown reason (cough..liberals) judicial activism has become the norm and not the exception. Activist judges like this Barbara Crabbs are attempting to rewrite not only the Constitution but history. The rich religious heritage of this country should be celebrated and not swept under the rug. I am happy to see that President Obama seems to agree; although I am a bit leery of his reasons for doing so. The founders did not include anywhere in the Constitution a "separation of Church and State". What they included was the establishment clause within the 1st Amendment: Congress shall make no...

Amid allegations that President Obama’s appeal court nominee Goodwin Liu omitted extensive information from his senate questionnaire, Republican lawmakers are gearing up to challenge his confirmation at a hearing on Friday. Liu, a nominee for the ninth circuit court of appeals, neglected to disclose 117 items on his senate questionnaire, Republicans on the Senate Judiciary Committee said last week. The mandatory questionnaire requires judicial nominees to disclose all organizational affiliations, speaking engagements, published work, and comments they have made to media.Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-AL), ranking member of the Senate Judiciary Committee, sent a letter to the committee’s chairman Patrick Leahy (D-VT)...

Immigrant-rights activist and former Santa Ana schools trustee Nativo Lopez was cleared today to face trial after a mental competency hearing – but proceedings were interrupted when Lopez refused to identify himself to the court, and was sent to jail. Lopez faces voter fraud charges that he registered to vote in Los Angeles while living in Santa Ana. On Feb. 3, he was ordered to have a competency hearing after he fired his attorney and repeatedly told the court that he was not the defendant. The competency hearing began yesterday. “He refused to identify himself,” Deputy District Attorney Juliet Schmidt...

(IsraelNN.com) University of California at Berkeley was again the site of a clash involving pro-Israel and anti-Israel activists last Friday when Husam Zakharia, leader of the Students for Justice in Palestine, assaulted Jessica Felber of the pro-Israel Tikvah group with a shopping cart. The incident occurred during competing events from the SJP-run “Israel Apartheid Week” and “Israel Peace and Diversity Week” organized by Tikvah. Felber was holding a sign that read “Israel Wants Peace” when Zakharia intentionally slammed her from behind with a shopping cart filled with toys donated for the welfare of Arab children in the Hamas-controlled Gaza region.

Keli Carender has a pierced nose, performs improv on weekends and lives here in a neighborhood with more Mexican grocers than coffeehouses. You might mistake her for the kind of young person whose vote powered President Obama to the White House. You probably would not think of her as a Tea Party type. But leaders of the Tea Party movement credit her with being the first. A year ago, frustrated that every time she called her senators to urge them to vote against the $787 billion stimulus bill their mailboxes were full, and tired of wearing out the ear of...

The son of prominent Palestinian peace activist confessed Thursday he participated in an attempted terror attack against Israel Defense Forces last month which was documented with a camera belonging to Human rights organization B'Tselem. On January 21 Israel security forces arrested three West Bank Palestinians suspected of involvement with terrorist activity, one of whom was Mohanned Abu-Awwad, 21, whose father, Khaled Abu-Awwad, serves as the General Manager of the Israeli-Palestinian Bereaved Families Forum. The three residents of Beit Ommar, north of Hebron, were detained in a joint operation led by members of both IDF and Shin Bet units.

PRINCETON, MN – Freezing rain coated already slick roads on the 21st of January, making travel inconvenient, even by Minnesota standards. Despite the weather, as proceedings commenced in the Princeton library, late-comers to a Milaca Tea Party event continued to trickle in. Additional folding chairs were placed along the edge of the room to accommodate. The folk were plain, mostly older, orderly and attentive. The meeting opened with a prayer and the Pledge of Allegiance. Sue Bican took the floor and emceed a series of announcements and appeals for involvement. On February 4th, the start of the legislative session in...

When Rupert Dickinson, the chief executive of one of Britain's biggest property firms, left his BlackBerry behind in London while on a business trip to Ireland, he simply ordered one of his staff to get on a plane and deliver the device to him. For Dickinson's then head of sustainability, Tim Nicholson, the errand was much more than an executive indulgence: it embodied the contempt with which his boss treated his deep philosophical beliefs about climate change. In a significant decision today , a judge found Nicholson's views on the environment were so deeply held that they were entitled to...