Obama Fundraising Trips Leave Taxpayers With Hefty Tab
President Obama left Tuesday for a two-day fundraising tour in Las Vegas and Los Angeles. The Democratic National Committee is expected to pick up part of the cost, but if history is any gauge, taxpayers will pick up most of the tab.

Actor Craig T. Nelson: I won’t pay taxes
He’s mad as hell, he’s not going to take it anymore, and he wants the Howard Beale of cable news to turn the sentiment into a movement. I’m sympathetic — no fiscal conservative who’s seen those blood-curdling deficit charts could be otherwise.

California justices say marriage is 1-man, 1-woman
The California Supreme Court today affirmed a voter-approved state constitutional amendment that limits marriage to one man and one woman. But in a decision today that essentially was a 6-1 vote, the court upheld the estimated 17,000 to 18,000 same-sex relationships that were formalized last year between its approval of "gay marriage" in May and the November ballot initiative that overruled the decision.

Columbus PD Officers saved by Pork to be Laid Off
It was a success story the White House was eager to highlight: Earlier this year, President Obama attended the graduation of 25 police recruits in Columbus, Ohio, touting it as a victory for the federal stimulus package. Without the money, the officers never would have hit the streets. They were to be laid off before their first day of patrol, victims of city budget cuts, until the stimulus money saved the class. But facing a growing deficit and a fight to pass an income tax hike, Columbus Police on Tuesday announced massive budget cuts that mean hundreds of layoffs among them the 25 new officers who shook the president's hand.

Obama's green guru calls for white roofs mandate
President Obama's energy adviser has suggested all the world's roofs should be painted white as part of efforts to slow global warming.

North Korea threatens to attack US/Obama Silent
North Korea threatened military action Wednesday against U.S. and South Korean warships plying the waters near the Koreas' disputed maritime border, raising the specter of a naval clash just days after the regime's underground nuclear test.

Napolitano Upsets Canadians with Remark
U.S. Homeland Secretary Janet Napolitano wanted to make it clear to Canada on Wednesday that she knows she misspoke when she erroneously said that the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorists entered the United States through Canada.

New Fees & Regulations on Food Industry
A food safety bill making its way through the House of Representatives will result in higher costs for consumers, says a food industry group. The House Energy and Commerce Committee has scheduled a June 3 hearing on the bill, which -- according to Democrats -- gives the Food and Drug Administration the authority and money it needs to better ensure the safety of the nation's food supply. The Food Safety Enhancement Act of 2009 would create a registry of all food facilities serving American consumers. All food facilities operating in the U.S. or importing food into the U.S. would be required to register annually with the Food and Drug Administration. An annual $1,000 registration fee would "generate revenue for food safety activities at the FDA," according to a summary of the bill.

Supervisor Asks Woman To Take Down American Flag
For one Arlington woman, the answer was "no" after she hung an American flag in her office just before the Memorial Day weekend. Debbie McLucas is one of four hospital supervisors at Kindred Hospital in Mansfield. Last week, she hung a three-by-five foot American flag in the office she shares with the other supervisors. When McLucas came to work Friday, her boss told her another supervisor had found her flag offensive. "I was just totally speechless. I was like, 'You're kidding me,'" McLucas said. McLucas' husband and sons are former military men. Her daughter is currently serving in Iraq as a combat medic.

Towns Rethink Self-Reliance as Finances Worsen
As the recession batters city budgets around the U.S., some municipalities are considering the once-unthinkable option of dissolving themselves through "disincorporation." Benefits of this move vary from state to state. In some cases, dissolution allows residents to escape local taxes. In others, it saves the cost of local salaries and pensions. And residents may get services more cheaply after consolidating with a county.

ESPN Anchor: Raising Taxes can Spur Layoffs and Raise Unemployment
ESPN anchor Stephen A. Smith told CNSNews.com that while he applauds some of the policies of President Barack Obama, he is highly skeptical of raising taxes on people making over $250,000 a year and worries that the immense federal spending increases -- $1.3. Trillion -- ultimately will have to be paid by our children and grandchildren.

Wind Turbine driving neighbors mad
When Stephen Monday spent £20,000 on a wind turbine to generate electricity for his home, he was proud to be doing his bit for the environment. He got planning permission and put up the 40ft device two years ago, making sure he stuck to strict noise level limits. But neighbors still complained that the sound was annoying - and now the local council has ordered him to switch it off.

The Internet Is Not Neutral (and No Law Can Make It So)
The Internet is a complete success story by almost all accounts. More people have more access to more information and connections with other people than ever before. And all of this happened without government regulation or control. Yet, net neutrality proponents claim the Internet is in danger. They say Congress needs to pass legislation regulating the way Web content flows through networks and government must require cable companies and Internet service providers to treat all customers and content alike. A new Reason Foundation study, however, finds net neutrality would stifle the very innovation that has allowed the Web to grow so quickly and become such a powerful, integral part of our lives.

Pope2You.net receives nearly 500,000 visits on first day
On its first day online, the new website enabling young people from around the world to get to know Pope Benedict XVI, received almost half a million visits.??According to webmaster Father Paolo Padrini of Vatican Radio, the website sponsored by the Pontifical Council for the Laity is intended “to create a climate of belonging, of participating in the Church, through ever greater closeness with the Holy Father.” The new site, which allows users to learn the teachings of Benedict XVI on Facebook, download tools for iPhones and have access to the Vatican on Youtube, sent out “almost ten thousand virtual postcards on its first day” and received almost “half a million visits.”

New Cartoon Show makes fun of “Greenies”
Life's not easy if you're an organic-eating, tree-hugging, SUV-eschewing, carbon-footprintless, gender-identity-indifferent, diversity-celebrating, nonjudgmental (well, except for those damn U.S. flag pins) vegan pacifist. Just ask Gerald and Helen Goode, the First Couple of PC America.

POW who communicated by code with McCain dies
Jack Bomar, a retired Air Force colonel who communicated by code with U.S. Sen. John McCain while they were confined in a North Vietnamese prisoner of war camp, has died. "He was a super neat guy," his wife, Kay, said Wednesday, recalling her husband's love of family, bravery and dry wit. "I was lucky to have him."

Biden: The gift that keeps on giving!
After the wind blows down the teleprompter of Vice President Biden at the Air Force Academy graduation he joked "what am I going to tell the President when I tell him his teleprompter is broken? What will he do then?"

This week TKF will focus on Obama Supreme Court Nominee, Sonia Sotomayor:

Sotomayor a member of "The Race"
As President Obama's Supreme Court nominee comes under heavy fire for allegedly being a "racist," Judge Sonia Sotomayor is listed as a member of the National Council of La Raza, a group that's promoted driver's licenses for illegal aliens, amnesty programs, and no immigration law enforcement by local and state police. According the American Bar Association, Sotomayor is a member of the NCLR, which bills itself as the largest national Hispanic civil rights and advocacy organization in the U.S. Meaning "the Race," La Raza also has connections to groups that advocate the separation of several southwestern states from the rest of America.

Gingrich: Sotomayor a Racist and should withdraw
Just a day after President Obama announced he was nominating appellate court judge Sonia Sotomayor to the Supreme Court, the battle over her confirmation has begun with former House speaker Newt Gingrich branding her a racist and saying she should withdraw.

Limbaugh: Obama's judicial pick a 'racist'
Focus on the Family Action today expressed alarm that President Obama's pick to replace David Souter on the U.S. Supreme Court disregards "judicial impartiality" and believes her experience as a Latina enables her to reach a better conclusion than a "white male who hasn't lived that life." Talk radio icon Rush Limbaugh was a little more direct. "So here you have a racist," he said on today's program about 2nd Circuit Court of Appeals judge Sonia Sotomayor, whose nomination was announced today. "You might want to soften that and you might want to say a reverse racist," Limbaugh said. "And the libs of course say that minorities cannot be racists because they don't have the power to implement their racism. Well, those days are gone because reverse racists certainly do have the power to implement their power. Obama is the greatest living example of a reverse racist, and now he's appointed one. ..."

Sotomayor Ruled That States Do Not Have to Obey Second Amendment
Supreme Court nominee Sonia Sotomayor ruled in January 2009 that states do not have to obey the Second Amendment’s commandment that the right to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed. In Maloney v. Cuomo, Sotomayor signed an opinion of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit that said the Second Amendment does not protect individuals from having their right to keep and bear arms restricted by state governments.

Sotomayor reversed 60% by high court
With Judge Sonia Sotomayor already facing questions over her 60 percent reversal rate, the Supreme Court could dump another problem into her lap next month if, as many legal analysts predict, the court overturns one of her rulings upholding a race-based employment decision.

Sonia Sotomayor told conference courts 'set policy'
A judge on the 2nd Circuit Court of Appeals who once boasted during a conference that it is at that level in the court system where "policy is made" has been named by President Obama to replace the retiring Justice David Souter on the U.S. Supreme Court.

Kobach Announces Candidacy for Kansas Secretary of State
Former Kansas Republican Party Chairman and UMKC Law Professor and Fox News Contributor Kris Kobach has announced his candidacy for Kansas Secretary of State. Kobach is proposing a series of changes in election law including: Requiring voters to show photo ID at the polls. Requiring new voter registrants to prove citizenship by showing a birth certificate, passport or naturalization card. Purging the voter rolls to eliminate any noncitizens and voters who have moved or died. Creating a unit in the secretary of state’s office to investigate election fraud and assist district and county attorneys with prosecutions.

Sen. Brownback Responds to Sotomayor Appointment
Sen. Sam Brownback, R-Kansas, is among those voicing reservations about Pres. Obama's pick for the U.S. Supreme Court. Brownback voted against Sonia Sotomayor's appointment to the U.S. Court of Appeals. He says he continues to have reservations. “While I celebrate Sonia Sotomayor's life story, I am troubled by some of her statements,” Brownback said in a statement. Brownback says Sotomayor deserves a fair and respectful hearing, but he says she can expect to be questioned. "I do have serious questions about her record and her judicial philosophy regarding how she views the role of the Court," Brownback said. "In my view, the role of a justice is as an umpire, not a policy maker.”

Senator joins Leavenworth residents against bringing Gitmo inmates to fort
Sen. Pat Roberts of Kansas on Wednesday joined a large chorus here demanding that President Barack Obama not turn Fort Leavenworth into a replacement prison for alleged terrorists.

Even Police Cars not Safe from Crime
Mission police cars were vandalized this morning. Someone used a small knife to puncture six tires on four patrol cars parked in the Mission Police Department parking lot. Just after 5 a.m., a man called 911 and advised the dispatcher that he had just slashed the tires. A knife was recovered in the lot near one of the cars, according to a press release from the police department.

Two fire departments merge in western Johnson County
The county’s Board of Commissioners approved the merger of the De Soto Fire Department and Johnson County Rural Fire District No. 3 to create the Northwest Consolidated Fire District. “It provides better quality fire protection service with cost savings by serving a larger geographic area,” said Annabeth Surbaugh, board chairwoman. The new fire district will be governed by a five-member board appointed by the county commission and the De Soto City Council and will become fully operational Jan. 1.

Shawnee County considers prosecutor gun ban
The state has given Kansas prosecutors permission to carry firearms in county courthouses. But that doesn't mean the counties have to agree. Shawnee County commissioners are scheduled Thursday to consider a resolution that would ban prosecutors from carrying guns in the courthouse. The state law, which goes into effect July 1, allows county commissions and judicial officials to opt out of the law. Commissioner Vic Miller sponsored the resolution. He says carrying guns isn't necessary because the courthouse has adequate security measures. District Attorney Chad Taylor opposes the resolution, saying his prosecutors want to protect themselves coming to and going from the courthouse.

Former union secretary indicted in Wichita
A federal grand jury in Wichita has indicted a former Steelworkers union secretary on charges of embezzling union funds. The U.S. attorney's office announced the indictment against Daryl D. Becker of McPherson in a news release Thursday.

JOCO BOCC Passes Yet Another User Tax – Increased Fees ,br> The County Commission on Thursday approved bus fare increases to take effect July 1. Basic service, including routes to downtown Kansas City, will be $2. Now those trips are $1.25 and $1.75. The K-10 Connector, which runs between Johnson County Community College and the University of Kansas in Lawrence, will cost $3 — 50 cents more.

"Every aspect of our lives must be subjected to an inventory."

- House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA)

From Proverbs 16:12
Kings have a horror of wrongdoing, for by righteousness the throne endures.

Gospel of St. John 17:20-26

20 And not for them only do I pray, but for them also who through their word shall believe in me; 21 That they all may be one, as thou, Father, in me, and I in thee; that they also may be one in us; that the world may believe that thou hast sent me. 22 And the glory which thou hast given me, I have given to them; that they may be one, as we also are one: 23 I in them, and thou in me; that they may be made perfect in one: and the world may know that thou hast sent me, and hast loved them, as thou hast also loved me. 24 Father, I will that where I am, they also whom thou hast given me may be with me; that they may see my glory which thou hast given me, because thou hast loved me before the creation of the world. 25 Just Father, the world hath not known thee; but I have known thee: and these have known that thou hast sent me. 26 And I have made known thy name to them, and will make it known; that the love wherewith thou hast loved me, may be in them, and I in them.

Opposing Sotomayor is the Right's Thing to Do

Frank Ricci is "just" a fireman, and not, like Supreme Court Justice nominee Sonia Sotomayor, a federal judge. He is "only" a white male, and not, like Sotomayor, a Latina. And while he works in New Haven, Conn., he certainly didn't attend Yale Law School as Sotomayor did.

For one thing, he's dyslexic. That's why Ricci spent more than $1,000 to pay an acquaintance to make recordings of the educational materials Ricci needed to master in order to pass a 2003 test that was specially drawn up for the New Haven Fire Department. The test was to determine who was eligible for 15 lieutenant and captain promotions. After months of intensive study, Ricci scored sixth highest out of 77 candidates. Because the results were deemed racially unacceptable -- none of the 19 black test-takers made the cut -- New Haven mayor John DeStefano Jr. decided to junk all the test results and promote no one.

That was six years ago. This April, the Supreme Court heard Ricci v. DeStefano, a case that Sotomayor, as part of a three-judge panel, upheld on appeal against Ricci and the 17 other firemen who joined his complaint. Better to perpetuate group grievance, Sotomayor's decision tells us, than to ensure equality of opportunity. Better to pick winners and losers from the bench than to safeguard the rights of the individual to life, liberty and a fair shot at a promotion.

And better to advocate a kind of racial and sexual supremacism than to safeguard for one and all the kind of justice that is blind. "I would hope that a wise Latina woman with the richness of her experiences would more often than not reach a better conclusion (as a judge) than a white male who hasn't lived that life," Sotomayor said in her Judge Mario G. Olmos Law and Cultural Diversity Lecture at UC Berkeley's law school in 2001.

The cavalier condescension toward the "white" and the "male" in this statement is breathtaking. And in Ricci v. DeStefano, Sotomayor showed us precisely how she implements it: by upholding discrimination against the expendable, those such as Ricci and his co-plaintiffs who don't have black skin. This is reverse discrimination, and among activist judges such as Sotomayor and Democrats on the left, such as President Barack Obama, it is not only acceptable, it is a sterling credential.

But no one on the right is supposed to mention it, or so the conventional wisdom would have it. That's because Sotomayor, in addition to being a Latina -- or, rather, as a function of being a Latina -- is also a sacred cow. As a woman (check one) with parents from Puerto Rico (check two), she is by accident of birth virtually above criticism, a condition of neo-royalty that is death to a democratic republic. Worse, she is seen in these sacred terms by far too many Republicans, thus revealing the extent to which they, too, have bought into the dehumanizing givens of identity politics.

In other words, it's one thing for Sen. Charles Schumer, D-N.Y., to say, "They (Republicans) oppose her at their peril." It's quite another to hear the very same theme echoed by GOP professionals. "Republicans who pick a fight with an up-from-the-bootstraps Hispanic woman do so at their own peril," said GOP consultant Phil Musser. "If Republicans make a big deal of opposing Sotomayor, we will be hurling ourselves off a cliff," said former George W. Bush aide Mark McKinnon. "It's a bad visual. It's bad symbolism for the Republicans," said Matthew Dowd, another former Bush aide. "You want to be careful," said GOP chairman Michael Steele. "You don't want to be perceived as a bully."

Such shallow, pointless politicking, devoid of philosophical principle, reveals the crisis in conservative circles: namely, the lack of understanding of what is required to mount the philosophical arguments against the leftist social engineering, as practiced by Sotomayor and as promulgated by Obama, that has derailed the lives of countless Frank Riccis, stripping them of the protections of the Constitution in the name of perpetual resentment and unslakeable grievance.

Making this moral, conservative case isn't jumping off a cliff. It isn't "bad symbolism" and it isn't bullying. It's leadership based on fundamental, core principles. We'll find out if there is anyone left with any such principles when the Senate confirmation hearings for Sotomayor begin.

TKF Addition– Kudos to our own Senator Pat Roberts for being the first US Senator to take a stand against tyranny by already demonstrating a “No” vote for Sotomayor.

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