THE OTHER SHOE DROPS: A current events round-up for conservatives

Turning back the tide of information overload with a digest of the latest developments in news conservatives need to pay attention to:

† R-E-S-P-E-C-T: You get as you give (click here for related article): Dems and liberals continually perceive slights directed towards President Barack Hussein Obama from Repubs and conservatives, but are somehow unable to discern signs of "disrespect" from their own ranks or from those who surround the president. Case in point: More than a dozen Secret Service agents and military personnel who traveled to Columbia in advance of Obama’s attendance at the Summit of the Americas are accused of cavorting with prostitutes in their hotel rooms. And they not only bragged to the hos that they were on the president’s security detail, but also had copies of the president’s schedule in their rooms. Obama, who said he will be “angry” to learn that the allegations are true, may be wondering whether his Secret Service agents – who are sworn to protect a president’s life – are slacking off in his case, because their shocking misconduct is unprecedented.

† Does The U.S. Need An Election Monitor?: The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit upheld a provision of Proposition 200, a ballot initiative AZ voters passed in 2004, requiring voters to show ID at voting places (related article, third item on the page). However, another provision requiring proof of citizenship was struck down, Reuters reports:

The "photo identification requirement is not an invidious restriction" and does not violate the 14th Amendment's equal protection clause, the court's majority concluded in an opinion by Judge Sandra Ikuta. …

The Ninth Circuit's ruling also comes just about a week before the U.S. Supreme Court will hear arguments on another controversial Arizona law touching on citizenship issues, the state's first-in-the-nation effort to crack down on illegal immigration inside its own borders.

† BHO Blooper Reel: President Barack Hussein Obama once again demonstrates that he is geographically challenged (related article, last item on the page). The Telegraph of London reports that during a speech at the Summit of the Americas in Cartagena, Colombia, Obama referred to the Falkland Islands as “the Maldives.” Obama meant to call them “Malvinas” – the Spanish name for the disputed archipelago off the coast of Argentina – but flubbed his diss to our close ally, England. The Maldives, BTW, are a group of islands near India. But hey, they’re both South of the Equator so close enough!

Curiously, after a string of such errors -- referring to the “English Embassy” in December 2011; referring to our "Intercontinental Railroad" in September 2011; and famously calling "Austrian" a language in April 2009 -- The Telegraph characterizes this latest gaffe as "an uncharacteristic error, more akin to those of his predecessor George W Bush" in the sub-hed of the article.

† Another Cockamamie Lib Idea Fails The Real World Test (second item on the page): If your hands are still trembling over the hefty check you wrote the IRS, this wasteful expenditure of your tax dollars is bound to make your blood boil. The Obama administration set up the U.S. The Global Alliance for Clean Cookstoves in 2010 and has pledged $105 million to provide 100 million households in Third World countries with cookstoves in an effort to reduce indoor air pollution. As it turns out, a new study suggests the replacement stoves may not be any less polluting than cooking over a flaming heap of dung. Meanwhile, in his relentless efforts to turn the U.S. into a Third World country, Obama’s Department of Agriculture (USDA) is “investing” $5 million in public funds to build a "biogas anaerobic digester" that will use cow manure to heat an ethanol plant in KS.

† TSA (Thieving Security Agent): Clayton Keith Dovel, a Transportation Security Administration baggage inspector at Dallas/Fort Worth Airport has been indicted on charges of theft by a public servant of items for stealing Apple iPads from checked luggage over an eight-month period, The Star-Telegram (Dallas/Fort Worth, TX) reports:

According to airport police, a traveler reported Jan. 24 that his iPad 2 had been stolen and that he had traced it electronically to a home in Bedford owned by Dovel.

While arresting Dovel in that case, airport police discovered another iPad in Dovel's leather satchel. Dovel told authorities that the iPad was his but that he couldn't remember where he bought it, according to police reports.

Using that iPad's serial number, police traced it to a Grand Prairie man who had reported that it was stolen as he traveled through Terminal E in May.

Dovel has been suspended indefinitely from his job. If convicted, he faces between two and 10 years in prison.

Editorial Note: You may want to steer clear of JFK International Airport. According to a recent investigation by CBX News, a “staggering” 200 such thefts occur per day by baggage handlers, jetway workers and security personnel, and JFK security lawyer Kenneth Mollins described the belly of the plane as “a flea market for airport employees [who] go through all the luggage unencumbered, unchecked.”