The Little America Hotel in downtown Salt Lake City was abuzz with activity and excitement when your reporter arrived on July 14 for the opening of the U.S. & China Trade, Culture & Education Conference 2011. Throngs of Chinese delegates and journalists packed the lobby, while still more delegates from the People’s Republic of China (PRC) disembarked from limousines and tour buses at the hotel entrance. The scene was much the same across the street at the hotel’s pricier corporate sister, the Grand America Hotel, which served as the main venue for the National Governors Association Annual Meeting and U.S.-China Governors Forum.

The National Governors Association Annual Meeting in Salt Lake City, Utah, July 15-17, was a smashing success — at least from the viewpoint of China's Communist Party officials and its state-controlled mega-corporations. A major component of this year's annual NGA confab was the first-ever U.S.-China Governors Forum, which brought the U.S. governors together with four of their Chinese counterparts, the governors of Zhejiang, Anhui, Yunnan, and Qinghai  provinces. Leading the official Chinese delegation was Zhao Hongzhu, Communist Party Secretary of Zhejiang Province.

Over the past several years, the People's Republic of China (PRC) has stepped up its courtship of America's state and local officials. A growing stream of Governors, Mayors, County Commissioners, school superintendents, college presidents and university officials have been making the pilgrimage to Beijing and other Chinese "sister cities," in efforts aimed at wooing Chinese investors to their communities and in search of export opportunities to China's growing consumer market.

How long would your bank account hold out if an agency of the federal government were fining you $75,000 per day? A couple of hours, maybe — or a few minutes? Not many homeowners could handle that kind of crushing financial blow. Even a Bill Gates, a Warren Buffett, or a George Soros might blanch at such astronomical fines.

Mitt Romney’s China investment controversy is far from over. A March 15 story in the New York Times concerning Romney’s family trust investments in a Chinese company that manufactures surveillance cameras used by the Communist Party-ruled police-state apparatus continues to cause waves and draw attention to U.S. policies vis-à-vis the People's Republic of China (PRC) that are immoral, as well as being harmful to our economy and harmful to the human rights of the Chinese people.

John Liu’s ties to the Communist Party leadership of China and North Korea, as well as his connections to the Communist Workers Party in New York City, should have been sufficient to stop his political career long ago. However, the New York City media not only turned a blind eye to Liu’s troubling relations with our nation’s avowed enemies, they also provided him with favorable coverage that enabled him to be elected comptroller, the city’s chief financial officer.

U.S. Senator Rand Paul (R-Kentucky) is hosting a national, live Tele-Town Hall meeting tonight, Tuesday, March 13, 2012 at 9:00 p.m. to discuss his new legislation, the Defense of Property Act of 2012 (S. 2122), and answer questions about it.

“I can tell you the right course for America with regard to energy policy is to focus on job creation and not global warming.”

— Mitt Romney, November 2, 2011                                            

“In my administration, coal will not be a four-letter word.”

— Mitt Romney, March 5, 2012                                             

Everyone knows Mitt Romney has been running from the liberal RINO (Republican In Name Only) image that stood him in good stead in Massachusetts, the ultimate Blue State. He has been running as fast as he can from his RomneyCare healthcare program in Massachusetts, which was a prototype for ObamaCare. He’s also running from his Greenie record, pushing the idea that he’s the man to take on the enviro-extremists that are preventing America from drilling for oil and digging for coal.

“Peter Gleick lied, but was it justified by the wider good?” That question forms the headline for a revealing (and disturbing) column by James Garvey on February 27 in the Guardian. Revealing and disturbing, but not surprising, considering the fanatical ideology that drives so many of the green alarmists. And not all that surprising coming from the Guardian, which has been in the vanguard of Britain’s most strident anthropogenic (manmade) global-warming (AGW) alarmists.

Did you pay cash for that latte this morning at the Starbuck's drive-through? Well, that smiling lady who handed you your frothy espresso and your change may have been taking down your license plate as you drove off —  before jumping on the phone to report your "suspicious activity" to the FBI.