An open letter to Chelsea Clinton’s unborn child

(New York Post) – Chelsea Clinton and her husband, hedge fund manager Marc Mezvinsky, are expecting their first child. Clinton, 34, made the announcement in the exact same way you would, in a speech she gave together with her mother at a Lower East Side event promoting the Clinton Foundation’s effort to empower girls. The baby is due sometime this fall.

Dear Baby Clinton-Mezvinsky:

Welcome to advanced gestation! Since you’re new around here, I thought you’d like to know a little bit about what makes you so special. The reason is, you’re going to live your whole life in make-believe!

Do you know the fairy stories about a princess in a castle? Well, you get to be that real-life prince or princess, in a real-life castle where Mommy Chelsea is also a princess, Grandma is about to be crowned Queen, and Grandpa Bill is a retired ex-King with lots of helpful advice on ruling the kingdom, er, monarchy. (Your other grandma and grandpa were both a kind of court vassal called Congressmen. Oopsies, other grandpa, Edward Mezvinsky, even went to something called “prison,” which is kind of like a big, cozy crib! Can you say “wire fraud”? Good, you can’t! Don’t! Around here we pretend Grandpa isn’t a criminal!)

Inside the castle towers you will find that Mommy, Mommy’s mommy and Mommy’s daddy Bill are all really good at make-believe games. So you get to pretend all the time! Mommy’s mommy and Mommy’s daddy even pretend to still be married even though they’ve been living hundreds of miles apart for 14 years!

Before you were even born your mommy’s mommy pretended that it’s a completely normal thing to announce your own grandchild’s birth to the world at a joint press appearance with your mom, hosted on Skype and live-streamed. With America Ferrera!

Although you will at all times pretend to be a normal baby, you actually already have your very own career, like doctor or fireman or lobbyist! Can you say “Campaign Asset”? Good, now let’s learn about skill sets! You only need one talent. Ready? It’s “Soften the Candidate”! Sort of like human bubble bath.

Now, even though you have a busy life, sleeping 18 hours a day, nursing and learning to roll over, all of this comes second to being a stage prop to the grandma they call “Hillary” or “Madame President” or “Lady Pantsuit.” When big, scary men with huge, glowing boxes on their shoulders come around, don’t be afraid! They’re only here to shine blinding lights into your widdle eyes. Kind of like a dozen suns shining at the same time! Just think of them as the Sunshine Men. They will be accompanied by nice pretend journalists who are actually castle-outreach people named Katie or Oprah or Diane, whose job it is to make you and Grandma look good, so don’t cry so much, and only on cue! (Example: When Grandma Hillary says, “That ol’ John Boehner sure gets upset when he doesn’t get what he wants,” start wailing!)

There are a few special little things you need to know about. For instance, if you are a girl, mean people will mail you blue Gap dresses. You don’t need to worry about where they came from, because the castle’s shining knights will go after them. These knights work for a castle security program called the IRS. Those blue Gap dresses are a reference to something unfortunate that happened a long, long time ago that we all pretend didn’t happen and anyway was all the fault of barbarians and trolls living outside the castle. We call these twisted creatures Republicans.

In two years or so, when most babies are just learning to crawl, you will be hitting the road! Grandma Hillary is going to need you to smile and coo whenever there are Sunshine Men around. So play nice and don’t projectile vomit. Grandma is not what grown-ups call “maternal,” and was busy turning $1,000 into $100,000 in the magical cow trading market when your mommy was a baby, so she will have to make believe she is really “helping out” with you. No crying if she gets the diaper on the wrong end!

When you’re a teenager, you may start getting strange invitations from Grandpa Bill. Don’t be surprised if he asks you to invite all of your girl friends and their bikinis over to his house for a pool party. Grandpa Bill loves young people, especially young female people frolicking in the sunshine!

The best part of your make-believe Clinton-Mezvinsky life is that people will pretend you’re good at things and give you gifts like high-paying consultancy gigs when you just got out of college, jobs reporting for NBC News when you have as much camera-awareness as a smoked flounder, and the leadership of the free world because you “deserve it.” Learn to accept everything as your due, baby Clinton-Mezvinsky, and maybe Mommy and you will be the third and fourth Clintons to rule the kingdom!

[H/T NewYorkPost: Kyle Smith]

Dump Reid … and Boehner

(WND) – In the immortal words of Oscar Hammerstein’s king of Siam, “Is a puzzlement.” Everything from the media’s silence when it comes to Benghazi to liberal voters not being even slightly perturbed by Obama’s constant lies about the Affordable Care Act, or the fascistic activities of the IRS, leaves my head spinning.

A reader of mine we’ll call Ray sent me six contradictions that sum up the thinking of progressives, or at least what passes for thinking in those bizarre quarters. It begins: “One, America is capitalist and greedy, and yet half the population is subsidized. Two, half the population is subsidized, yet they regard themselves as victims. Three, they think they are victims, yet their representatives run the government. Four, their representatives run the government, yet the poor keep getting poorer. Five, the poor keep getting poorer, yet they have things that people in other countries only dream about. Six, they have things that people in other countries only dream about, yet they want America to be more like those other countries.”

It seems that in spite of Nancy Pelosi predicting that the Democrats will be running on Obamacare this November and Obama’s running victory laps over the number of alleged enrollees, Obama keeps trying to pivot the discussion from his signature piece of legislation to the economy. Good luck with that. Nothing like bragging about fewer people holding down full-time jobs than when there were 30 million fewer of us than there are today, and with the promise that between Obamacare and a higher minimum wage there will be between 3 and 5 million fewer people employed in 2016 than there are today.

When a reader named William let me know that terrorist-cum-professor-cum Barack Obama’s best bud, Bill Ayers, was the scion of a very wealthy family, I wasn’t too surprised. In America, as in Western Europe, communists often emerge from a life of privilege. They feel that their status, though not earned, is fully deserved and entitles them to dictate how others should be forced to live.

In my own extended family, we had a number of poor communists and an equal number of wealthy, obnoxious, knuckleheads who never stopped parroting fanciful lies about the glories of the Soviet Union. Those relatives without money were a lot easier to stomach because as wrong-headed as they were, they weren’t hypocrites living a lie and they weren’t arrogant.

Speaking of the rich, while I am delighted to see the Koch brothers donating a ton of cash to electing Republicans to the Senate, I would love to see them finance a campaign to recall Harry Reid. Considering the role Reid has played in promoting Obamacare, the fact that Nevada has the highest unemployment rate in the nation and that he is very much involved in the Bureau of Land Management’s attempt to seize Cliven Bundy’s cattle ranch so that his cohorts can erect a solar panel power station on the property, I would think persuading Nevadans to dump the walking cadaver would be both easy and delightful.

Lest anyone think I am merely a mouthpiece for the GOP, let me say that I would also enjoy seeing John Boehner gone from the scene. The rest of us know that the prime purpose of these numerous congressional committee hearings is to get the Republican chairmen face time on TV, not to get to the bottom of the endless scandals in which this administration has become embroiled. But Bonehead Boehner continues to dither around, refusing to appoint special counsels with the power to jail perjurers, while the scandals fade, gather cobwebs and ultimately fall off the radar, much like that Malaysian jetliner.

Everyone but anti-Semites will readily acknowledge that until the Palestinians agree to at least recognize Israel’s right to exist, no U.S. president is going to see positive results from his attempts to broker a peace agreement. So why do they keep trying to place a dead horse before a broken cart? As with immigration reform, until an actual wall is erected along our entire southern border, it is nothing but a phony political football for Democrats and Republicans to kick around at election time.

Finally, according to a Bloomberg report, divorce is actually a boon for the economy. The report points out that when a couple call it quits, there is a need for moving vans, a second household with new furniture and dishware and, of course, paydays for two sets of lawyers.

I expect that the next Bloomberg report will point out the glorious financial advantages of death, what with the need for cosmeticians, gravediggers, casket makers, florists, hearse drivers and, where needed, professional mourners.

[H/T WND: Burt Prelutsky]

Gasoline greener than biofuels?

(Fox News) – Biofuels produced from waste products left from harvested corn plants are worse than gasoline in terms of carbon emissions, according to a $500,000 study paid for by the federal government and published in the journal Nature Climate Change.

The study said biofuels made with corn residue release seven percent more greenhouse gases than traditional gasoline.

Rayola Dougher from the American Petroleum Institute called that an eye opener for the green energy crowd. “You know, what are we doing? If that’s so, then we’re going down the wrong path here,” Dougher told Fox News in an interview. “We have to give ourselves at least press the pause button and look at what we’re trying to accomplish and look at the science, and look at it very carefully.”

The study contradicts the Obama administration’s narrative that biofuels are a much cleaner alternative, while also receiving more than a billion dollars in federal support.

Phil Flynn, an oil trader and senior market analyst with The Price Futures Group, said the promises made were too good to be true. “Celluosic biofuels was going to be our future. It wouldn’t impact our food. We could use the leftovers, and it would help greenhouse gas emissions and it would be the answer to all our problems. But what we’re finding out is that’s not the case,” said Flynn.

The Obama administration and those in alternative energy ripped the research, claiming it was flawed.

“This paper is based on a hypothetical assumption that 100 percent of corn stover in a field is harvested; an extremely unlikely scenario that is inconsistent with recommended agricultural practices,” an EPA spokesperson told Fox.

Jon Doggett from the National Corn Growers Association said he can point to other relevant research with opposing findings. “Well, we have one study that says one thing and we have about four or five other studies: we have the Environmental Protection Agency, the Department of Agriculture, we have the Argonne labs, we have the University of Illinois all saying something else.”

But those in more traditional energy say this should be a wakeup call to policymakers to figure out if alternatives are really working. “And make policy based on science, real true facts,” Dougher said.

[H/T FoxNews: Mike Emanuel]

Jeb Bush Pushes Amnesty, More High-Tech Visas at Education Conference

At a prominent conference of education innovators, Former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush, who is considering a 2016 presidential run, called for more guest worker programs and a path to amnesty for all of the country’s illegal immigrants.

(Breitbart) – Speaking at what is known as the “Davos in the Desert” event in Scottsdale, Arizona, on Monday evening, Bush said the United States needed “robust guest worker programs” and an expansion of H1-B visas for the high-tech industry,” even though the notion that there is a shortage of American high-tech workers has been called a myth. He also called for a “tough but fair path to legalized status” for all of the country’s illegal immigrants and an end to immigration quotas for countries. 

Bush said that it was not an “American value to have 12-13 million people living in the shadows” and spoke about the need to protect borders and sanction companies that may hire illegal immigrants.

He asserted that the “rags to riches rate” in the country is only four percent and that the American Dream is being replaced with “stickiness at both ends,” as those born either wealthy or poor are likely to remain so while the middle class feels the squeeze.

Bush has previously called illegal immigration “an act of love” and said the issue “shouldn’t rile people up.” Establishment Republican guru Karl Rove even conceded that Jeb Bush was not artful in those remarks. At the conference, which was co-hosted by Arizona State University and GSV Advisors, Bush made no reference to those prior comments, though he has previously defended them.

[H/T Breitbart: Tony Lee]

Stay Classy MSNBC

(Washington Free Beacon) – MSNBC Host to People Who Lost Their ‘Crappy’ Coverage Under Obamacare ‘Just Deal With That’

MSNBC strikes again!

MSNBC’s Melissa Harris-Perry had harsh words for the 5 to 6 million Americans whose health insurance policies were cancelled because of Obamacare.

“Yeah, you can’t keep your crappy plans. Just deal with that!” Harris-Perry said Sunday.

Opting for condescension rather than compassion, Harris-Perry made it clear that the plight of millions of Americans is simply not that big of a deal.

The Free Beacon requests Harry Reid and Melissa Harris-Perry watch the video below and realize how ridiculous their beliefs are:

[H/T WashingtonFreeBeacon]

Revealed: Scientists ‘edit’ DNA to correct adult genes and cure diseases

Experts hail ‘fantastic advance’ of new technique that can alter life-threatening mutations with pinpoint accuracy

(The Independent) – A genetic disease has been cured in living, adult animals for the first time using a revolutionary genome-editing technique that can make the smallest changes to the vast database of the DNA molecule with pinpoint accuracy.

Scientists have used the genome-editing technology to cure adult laboratory mice of an inherited liver disease by correcting a single “letter” of the genetic alphabet which had been mutated in a vital gene involved in liver metabolism.

A similar mutation in the same gene causes the equivalent inherited liver disease in humans – and the successful repair of the genetic defect in laboratory mice raises hopes that the first clinical trials on patients could begin within a few years, scientists said.

The success is the latest achievement in the field of genome editing. This has been transformed by the discovery of Crispr, a technology that allows scientists to make almost any DNA changes at precisely defined points on the chromosomes of animals or plants. Crispr – pronounced “crisper” – was initially discovered in 1987 as an immune defence used by bacteria against invading viruses. Its powerful genome-editing potential in higher animals, including humans, was only fully realised in 2012 and 2013 when scientists showed that it can be combined with a DNA-sniping enzyme called Cas9 and used to edit the human genome.

 

Since then there has been an explosion of interest in the technology because it is such a simple method of changing the individual letters of the human genome – the 3 billion “base pairs” of the DNA molecule – with an accuracy equivalent to correcting a single misspelt word in a 23-volume encyclopaedia.

In the latest study, scientists at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) used Crispr to locate and correct the single mutated DNA base pair in a liver gene known as LAH, which can lead to a fatal build-up of the amino acid tyrosine in humans and has to be treated with drugs and a special diet.

The researchers effectively cured mice suffering from the disease by altering the genetic make-up of about a third of their liver cells using the Crispr technique, which was delivered by high-pressure intravenous injections.

“We basically showed you could use the Crispr system in an animal to cure a genetic disease, and the one we picked was a disease in the liver which is very similar to one found in humans,” said Professor Daniel Anderson of MIT, who led the study.

“The disease is caused by a single point mutation and we showed that the Crispr system can be delivered in an adult animal and result in a cure. We think it’s an important proof of principle that this technology can be applied to animals to cure disease,” Professor Anderson told The Independent. “The fundamental advantage is that you are repairing the defect, you are actually correcting the DNA itself,” he said. “What is exciting about this approach is that we can actually correct a defective gene in a living adult animal.”

Jennifer Doudna, of the University of California, Berkeley, who was one of the co-discoverers of the Crispr technique, said Professor Anderson’s study is a “fantastic advance” because it demonstrates that it is possible to cure adult animals living with a genetic disorder.

“Obviously there would be numerous hurdles before such an approach could be used in people, but the simplicity of the approach, and the fact that it worked, really are very exciting,” Professor Doudna said.

“I think there will be a lot of progress made in the coming one to two years in using this approach for therapeutics and other real-world applications,” she added.

Delivering Crispr safely and efficiently to affected human cells is seen as one of the biggest obstacles to its widespread use in medicine.

Feng Zhang, of the Broad Institute at MIT, said that high-pressure injections are probably too dangerous to be used clinically, which is why he is working on ways of using Crispr to correct genetic faults in human patients with the help of adeno-associated viruses, which are known to be harmless.

Other researchers are also working on viruses to carry the Crispr technology to diseased cells – similar viral delivery of genes has already had limited success in conventional gene therapy.

Dr Zhang said that Crispr can also be used to create better experimental models of human diseases by altering the genomes of experimental animals as well as human cells growing in the laboratory.

Professor Craig Mello of the University of Massachusetts Medical School said that delivering Crispr to the cells of the human brain and other vital organs will be difficult. “Crispr therapies will no doubt be limited for the foreseeable future,” he said.

[H/T TheIndependent: Steve Connor]

States Quietly Sign Onto Plan to Eliminate Electoral College

(Fox News Insider) – Nearly a dozen states have quietly signed onto a plan to ditch the Electoral College and instead, award the White House to whoever wins the popular vote.

Watch the latest video at video.insider.foxnews.comThe National Popular Vote agreement would take effect if states that represent 270 electoral votes commit. New York has most recently joined the efforts, bringing the number of states to 10 plus the District of Columbia. Altogether, they represent 165 electoral votes.

Without the Electoral College, Fox News’ Chris Stirewalt said we would have had a whole different trajectory of presidents. If presidents are selected through the popular vote, he said that campaigns will focus on maximizing turnout in urban centers. He said the “plan is to subvert the will of the Constitution and the founders.”

“This is disempowering to rural America and empowering to urban America,” he said.

Watch the video above for more.

[H/T FoxNewsInsider]