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Insider Report: Steve Forbes Praises 'Do As I Say' Special From NewsMax's Most Informed Sources
Headlines (Scroll down for complete stories):
1. Schwarzenegger Persona Non Grata in Mexico The legislature in a Mexican state has declared California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger a persona non grata for what it terms his "racist policies" regarding immigration. The resolution to declare Schwarzenegger unwelcome in the state of Baja California Sur was officially approved by the state legislature on January 17.
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"The Terminator forgets that he too is an immigrant who came to the United States, and now he is applying racist policies against immigrant workers, above all against Latinos, which is why we have declared him persona non grata in Baja California Sur," said Arturo Pena Valles, chairman of the legislature's Human Rights Committee. Legislative action against Schwarzenegger was first proposed in 2003 while he was California's governor-elect. At the time, a Baja California Sur official said it was "reprehensible" for Schwarzenegger to "endorse and promote racist campaigns against immigrants, especially in California where 25 percent of the population is Latino and, of those, 75 percent are of Mexican origin." Mexican officials took issue with Schwarzenegger's opposition to the issuance of California driver's licenses to undocumented immigrants. They were also unhappy with his support for the state's Proposition 187, which sought to deny unauthorized aliens most state-financed benefits, including public education. The proposition passed, but was later struck down in the courts. In April 2005, Gov. Schwarzenegger told a group of newspaper publishers that the U.S. needs to "close the borders in California and all across Mexico and the United States." He later amended "close" to "secure." The move to declare Schwarzenegger a persona non grata is "asinine," writes Barnard R. Thompson on the Web site Mexidata.info. He points out that Baja California Sur is a "remote strapped-for-money state that is dependent on tourism from the U.S.A., largely California, for its all-important visitor industry." Schwarzenegger is the second American to be declared a persona non grata in Baja California Sur. The first was President Bush. The left-of-center governing party in the Mexican state issued a call for the prosecution of Bush for alleged war crimes stemming from the decision to invade Iraq. Editor's Note:
2. Ashcroft Lobbies Against Boeing An Israeli aerospace company is competing with U.S.-based Boeing for a contract to build an early-warning radar system for South Korea, and former Attorney General John Ashcroft is working to help one side win the $1 billion deal. The Israeli side. The Ashcroft Group, a Washington, D.C.-based lobbying organization founded by Ashcroft in May 2005, has been hired by Israel Aircraft Industries (IAI) to promote the company's Phalcon system over a similar, more expensive system built by Boeing, the publication The Hill reports. The radar systems are designed to greatly improve an air force's ability to track enemy aircraft during combat. The Ashcroft Group and IAI signed a nondisclosure agreement, a spokesperson told The Hill, and public records do not disclose how much IAI is paying Ashcroft. U.S. law requires Israel and any other country seeking to resell American military technology to get approval from the State Department. The South Korean government had planned to announce its choice by the end of last year, but it told the two companies that it would delay its decision until May. That gives IAI more time to secure approval from the State Department. "It is not unusual for foreign governments to hire Washington lobbyists to navigate the executive-branch bureaucracy," The Hill states. Israel has come under fire from the U.S. over several of its arms deals with other countries, including Israel's attempt last year to sell China spare parts for Harpy drone aircraft. In October the U.S. pressured Israel to cancel a lucrative deal to upgrade Venezuelan warplanes. Israel has already sold the Phalcon system to India and Chile, while Boeing has sold its competing system to Australia and Turkey. The Ashcroft Group's other clients include Oracle and the American Institute of Certified Public Accountants.
3. Poll: Michael Steele Leads Dems in Senate Race Maryland Lt. Gov. Michael Steele is ahead of the two leading Democratic candidates for the state's open U.S. Senate seat, a new poll reveals. Republican Steele, Maryland's first black elected statewide official, would get 45 percent of the vote in a head-to-head match-up with Rep. Benjamin Cardin, who is considered the most likely Democratic challenger, while Cardin would get 40 percent, according to the poll by Rasmussen Reports. Steele would also garner 45 percent of the vote in a head-to-head race against former NAACP President Kweisi Mfume, who would get 38 percent, in the contest to replace retiring Democratic Sen. Paul Sarbanes. The poll results are "another example of the tremendous momentum that Michael Steele has, just under three months into his Senate candidacy," Steele campaign manager Leonardo Alcivar told the Washington Times. More good news for Steele came with the disclosure that his campaign had raised more funds than Cardin in the last quarter of 2005. The Steele campaign reported that he raised $853,350, including about $500,000 on a single day in November when President Bush attended a Baltimore fund-raiser for the lieutenant governor. Cardin's campaign raised nearly $800,000 in the quarter, less than he did in the third quarter of 2005, which Steele's campaign said was a sign of slowing momentum. The Steele campaign has criticized Cardin for receiving $3.9 million in special-interest money for campaign spending over the past 20 years, the Times reports. And campaign manager Alcivar told The Baltimore Sun that Cardin has taken in a "disproportionate" amount of money from corporate political action committees. Editor's Note:
4. Stern Boosts Sirius Over XM With Howard Stern joining its lineup, Sirius Satellite Radio surged past industry leader XM in net new subscribers for the last quarter of 2005. XM Satellite Radio remains the market leader by a large margin, with 6 million subscribers compared to Sirius' 3.3 million. But Sirius added 1.4 million subscribers in the quarter ended December 31, compared to XM's addition of 900,000, outpacing XM in quarterly subscriber additions for the first time, reports the Web site Twice, which monitors the consumer electronics industry. "There is no doubt that Stern was the driving force behind this," a Sirius spokesman said. XM announced that it added 2.7 new subscribers in 2005, while Sirius added 2.17 million, but Stern didn't go on the air on Sirius until after the New Year.
5. Steve Forbes Praises 'Do As I Say' Book Former presidential candidate Steve Forbes has high praise for Peter Schweizer's new book about liberal hypocrisy, calling it "a book that'll make your eyes pop." Forbes, editor-in-chief of Forbes magazine, writes in his Fact and Comment column about "Do As I Say (Not As I Do): Profiles in Liberal Hypocrisy," saying that "the mainstream media love it when notable conservatives get caught not practicing what they preach concerning public behavior." But "as this book engagingly documents," liberals "are in many respects even bigger hypocrites than are fallen conservatives." Forbes cites several examples of blatant liberal hypocrisy exposed by Schweizer, a fellow at the Hoover Institution, including:
"On and on it goes," Forbes writes. "Strangely (not!), Schweizer's revelations have received scant coverage in most of the media." Editor's Note:
6. Collegiate Network Helped Reinstate Le Moyne Student The Collegiate Network, affiliated with the Intercollegiate Studies Institute, is proudly announcing that it played a part in the reinstatement of Le Moyne College graduate student Scott McConnell, who was expelled for endorsing corporal punishment in elementary school. The Collegiate Network (CN) focuses public awareness on the politicization of American colleges and universities. Each year the organization gives its Campus Outrage Awards - popularly known as "Pollys" - to call attention to the most outrageous excesses of "politically correct" students, faculty and administrators in higher education.
Last year Le Moyne College in Syracuse, N.Y., was chosen as the Grand Prize Winner for expelling McConnell after he wrote a paper advocating a classroom environment "based upon strong discipline and hard work," and calling for light spanking in elementary schools. McConnell's expulsion from the education program came even though he received an A-minus for the paper and had a grade-point average of 3.78. The director of the education program sent McConnell a letter stating: "I have grave concerns regarding the mismatch between your personal beliefs regarding teaching and learning and the Le Moyne College program goals." But on January 18, a New York appellate court ordered Le Moyne College to reinstate McConnell in its graduate education program, "thus validating the CN's 2005 choice," CN's Director of Communications and Public Affairs Caitlin Anderson said in a statement. The court held that McConnell's acceptance letter from Le Moyne stated that academic performance, not personal beliefs, would govern whether he officially matriculated, and Le Moyne was wrong to expel him without due process. CN's Executive Director Stephen M. Klugewicz declared: "This court victory again highlights the impact of the Campus Outrage Awards. Scott's case would not have garnered so much attention had it not been for the fact that we awarded Le Moyne College first place for its outrageous attempt to squash free thought on its campus." The Foundation for Individual Rights in Education (FIRE) also played a major part in McConnell's reinstatement by bringing the case to public attention last year. "This is a great day for all those who believe colleges should keep their promises to students," said FIRE Interim President Greg Lukianoff. "Le Moyne College has learned that it cannot promise freedom and fairness but deliver repression and injustice." Editor's Notes:
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