At Rasmussen:

The president this week reached out to Muslims, making clear that America has no quarrel with their faith. But we do have a very big quarrel with those who would use that faith, who would use the words of the Koran, as a basis for violent attacks on us as “infidels.” That they “believe” in what they are doing makes them more dangerous and more deadly.

Religion is one of God’s and man’s great gifts, a source of faith when life is hard, a source of meaning when life is cruel, the tie that binds us together as families and people. It is also the greatest source of hatred in the world today. Handle with care. Happy holidays.

From RCP:

From RCP:

Watch CBS Videos Online

Economist Mark Perry:

GM to announce before Dec. 31, 2009 it will file for Chapter 11 Bankruptcy: 74.3%

Tim Geithner to depart as Secretary of the Treasury before June 30, 2009: 11.2%

Advance GDP figure for Q1 2009 to be -4.0% or worse: 83%

US GDP growth for Q2 of 2009 will be positive: 10.1%

US GDP growth for Q3 of 2009 will be positive: 32%

US GDP growth for Q4 of 2009 will be positive: 50%

US GDP growth for Q1 of 2010 will be positive: 73%

US Unemployment Rate Dec 2009 greater than 10.0%: 61%

Jerusalem Post:

President Shimon Peres had some unusually aggressive words for Iran Sunday, seemingly threatening military action if US President Barack Obama’s overtures to the Islamic republic fail to bear fruit.
President Shimon Peres.

“Ahmadinejad recruits forces against us, but there are also forces against him,” Peres said. “What happened in Egypt created a fierce opposition and we must unify all his opponents - the Sunnis and the Europeans, as well as those afraid of nuclear weapons and terror.”

In an interview with Kol Hai Radio, Peres also said that the arrest before the weekend of a Hizbullah terror cell in Egypt was a blow to Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s power.

Politico:

Pastor Rick Warren, after making apparently contradictory statements about his stance on a gay-marriage measure, canceled an Easter Sunday appearance on ABC’s “This Week” just “moments before the scheduled interview,” host George Stephanopoulos told viewers.

Stephanopoulos said Warren’s representatives said the best-selling evangelical author was “sick with exhaustion.” The host told viewers that he wished the pastor a speedy recovery.

Warren’s appearance would have given him the chance to clear up his claim last week on CNN’s “Larry King Live” that he “never once … gave an endorsement” to California’s Proposition 8, a successful November ballot measure that banned gay marriage in the nation’s largest state.

From the Tiahrt campaign:

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Contact: Josh Bell - 316.265.2517

Tiahrt Files to have Name Placed on 2010 Ballot as Official US Senate Candidate

WICHITA-U.S. Congressman Todd Tiahrt (R-Goddard) today took the third and final step in making his candidacy for the United States Senate official by filing with the Kansas Secretary of State to have his name placed on the ballot in 2010. Tiahrt announced his candidacy in front of hundreds of Republicans gathered in Topeka in late January. In early February Tiahrt filed official papers with the Federal Election Commission through the Secretary of the Senate. Thursday’s filing is the final step in officially getting Tiahrt’s name placed on the Kansas ballot in 2010. (more…)

From KFL:

Call To Action
Kansans for Life
March 31, 2009
Contact: Executive Director Mary Kay Culp, cell 913-406-4446

State Board acts to take Tiller license for fraud & financial affiliation

Shortly after a 6-member jury acquitted George Tiller of 19 criminal misdemeanor abortions based on illegal financial affiliation with Dr. Kris Neuhaus, the Kansas state Board of Healing Arts is taking the position that he is guilty and they intend to do something about it.

Tiller is heading to an as-yet-unscheduled hearing for license revocation, based on a Dec. 12, 2008 Board petition charging him with fraud, unprofessional conduct and illegally using Neuhaus for 11 abortions in 2003. See charges at http://www.ksbha.org/Press_Releases/12-12-08_tillerpetition.pdf (more…)

The Next Right:

Out of power in both houses of Congress and the White House, one would think that like the Republican Party, the Pro-Life Movement is in the wilderness and without leaders. However, this couldn’t be further from the case… In fact, the Pro-Life Movement is more united then ever. Case in point: the Susan B. Anthony List Campaign for Life Dinner held earlier this month in Washington, D.C.

In case you are unfamiliar with the Susan B. Anthony List (SBA), founded in 1994, it is EMILY’s List, except the opposite: it elects Pro-Life women to Congress or Pro-Life men running against Pro-Abortion women.

This past election cycle, its connected PAC bundled and earmarked over $1 Million into key races across the country. Besided electing pro-life candidates, it mobilizes over 150,000 pro-life activists nationwide to lobby Congress on critical life issues, and even helped form the Pro-Life Women’s Caucus for the women it helps elect. It also trains future generations of activists by conducting training academies on college campuses.

Unlike many Pro-Life organizations, SBA was not left in the dust by technology, as it has a very clean, cool website. SBA also has over 1,000 friends on Facebook, is active daily on Twitter and has its own “SuzyB” blog.

The Corner:

This is good news. I especially like this victory paragraph in this morning Wall Street Journal’s Review & Outlook:

Please pass Al Gore a Valium - and better make it a double - because his cap-and-trade dreams just took a dive in the U.S. Senate. In a vote late Wednesday, no fewer than 26 Democrats joined all 41 Republicans to insist that any new cap and tax on carbon energy would require at least 60 votes.

However, this vote doesn’t mean that the policy is completely dead. As the Journal warns:

Now look for Team Obama to attempt to impose cap and tax the non-democratic way, via regulation that hits business and local governments with such heavy costs that they beg Congress for a less-harmful version.

Read the whole thing here.

Brian Kennedy at NRO:

First, is it possible that North Korea would test this missile without the support or at least permission of the People’s Republic of China? As it stands - with North Korea receiving its food and energy from the PRC - they are wards of the Communist Chinese. It is inconceivable that the North Koreans would not serve the high policy of their Chinese masters.

Second, and related, does anyone seriously think it is possible that the North Korean missile test was not designed to embarrass Mr. Obama? While he is preening about a world without nuclear weapons, and beginning his justification for doing away with our rudimentary missile defense systems, the North Koreans launch a missile that further demonstrates their intention of being able to attack the United States or Japan.

Weekly Standard:

This according to a report from InsideDefense.com citing sources “close to the budget process.” According to those sources, Gates will essentially terminate the Missile Defense Agency and with it Boeing’s Airborne Laser System which was considered particularly well suited to the missile threat from North Korea.

Gates will further announce that the United States will have to make do with just nine aircraft carrier battle groups. The Navy currently has eleven, already considered a shortfall by the Senate Armed Services Committee which objected when the Bush administration decommissioned the USS John F. Kennedy in 2006 due to fiscal constraints. The shovel-ready, already under construction USS Gerald Ford, the first of the Navy’s new class of supercarriers, will be delayed.

On the upside, Gates is expected to announce an increase in the end strength of the F-22 fleet from the current 183 to 250, keeping the production line open for at least another three years. The Army’s deservedly maligned Future Combat Systems program will also be restructured and the massively over-budget program to replace the president’s fleet of helicopters will be terminated.

Barack Obama is spending billions on this country’s infrastructure, but he’s shortchanging the United States military and undermining its ability to project power overseas and mitigate the missile threat from rogue regimes. Obama will also be eliminating tens of thousands of high-tech and union jobs in the process.

Scorecard:

In a MSNBC interview this afternoon, Gov. Tim Pawlenty (R-Minn.) suggested that the Minnesota Senate recount between Republican Norm Coleman and Democrat Al Franken could take several more months to be resolved — leaving open the possibility that Coleman may appeal his case to the federal courts.

Asked if he would sign an election certificate if the three-judge panel rules that  Franken continues to hold a narrow lead over Coleman, Pawlenty said he would wait until the appeals process runs its course:

O’DONNELL: If this three-judge panel tomorrow, after counting these ballots, says that Al Franken has the lead, will you sign the election certificate that makes him Senator Al Franken?

GOV. PAWLENTY: The Minnesota Supreme Court said, in a recent decision, that a certificate shouldn’t issue or — isn’t likely that it should issue until the state court process has run its course. That would include the appellate process. It’s pretty clear one side or the other’s going to take that next step and it wouldn’t be appropriate for me or anyone else to step in front of it. It’s frustrating that this is taking so long. But we need a proper and just and accurate and legal result and it looks look it’s going to take a few more months to get that.

RCP Blog:

More importantly, while I would think that support for gay marriage has grown in California, I would be wary of reading too much into the fact that the 2008 vote was far closer than the 2000 vote. With Prop 22, gay marriage proponents were seeking to preserve the immediate status quo and were not actually faced with the prospect of stripping anyone of a right that was more than theoretical. Neither was true for Prop 8, meaning that at least some of the tightening was likely due to the differing factual contexts for Prop 8 and Prop 22.

It is also probably worth noting that the next time gay marriage comes up for a vote in California, these contexts will be more akin to those present for Prop 22 than for Prop 8, and that in the future, proponents of gay marriage will have the added disadvantage of being on the “yes” side of a ballot initiative, which is generally thought to be the more difficult side to be on.

Rhodes Cook:

For Republicans to have any real hope of a comeback in the next presidential election, that will have to change. Over the last few decades, whichever party won California was highly competitive nationally, and the vast majority of the time also won the White House. Meanwhile, whichever party lost California had to struggle hard to cobble together an Electoral College majority that left them little room for error. (more…)

Pictures of billboards — made of money — below the fold.

Mark Perry:

To protest the hyperinflation that has rendered the Zimbabwe currency worthless and to raise awareness of the dire economic situation there, the Zimbabwean Newspaper created an ad campaign featuring huge posters, wall murals, flyers, and even billboards all made out of trillions of Zimbabwean dollars. Check out the photos from the newspaper’s Flickr photostream. (more…)