Chick-fil-A has learned upholding traditional values is not just good for the soul; it’s also good for business. Since President Dan Cathy stirred up a firestorm of controversy and protests by daring to say in public that he supports traditional marriage, the fast food chain has enjoyed record sales and increased brand recognition.

According to a report by USA Today, consumer use, visits, and ad awareness all rose measurably in the third quarter, despite widespread negative media coverage of Cathy’s remarks to the Baptist Press opposing same-sex “marriage.”

A Sandelman and Associates survey of more than 30,000 fast-food shoppers in markets where Chick-fil-A operates showed consumer use of the restaurant chain rose 2.2 percent in the third quarter compared with the same period in 2011. Their market share rose 0.6 percent. Awareness of their advertising rose 6.5 percent.

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You’d think health insurance CEOs would be chilling the bubbly with Republican Mitt Romney’s improved election prospects, but instead they’re in a quandary.

Although the industry hates parts of President Barack Obama’s health care law, major outfits such as UnitedHealth Group and BlueCross Blue Shield also stand to rake in billions of dollars from new customers who’ll get health insurance under the law. The companies already have invested tens of millions to carry it out.

Were Romney elected, insurers would be in for months of uncertainty as his administration gets used to Washington and tries to make good on his promise repeal Obama’s law. Simultaneously, federal and state bureaucrats and the health care industry would face a rush of legal deadlines for putting into place the major pieces of what Republicans deride as “Obamacare.”

Would they follow the law on the books or the one in the works? What would federal courts tell them to do?

The answers probably would hinge on an always unwieldy Congress.

Things could get grim for the industry if Republicans succeed in repealing the Affordable Care Act’s subsidies and mandates, but leave standing its requirement that insurers cover people with health problems. If that’s the outcome, the industry fears people literally could get health insurance on the way to the emergency room, and that would drive up premiums.

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Obama National Field Director Jeremy Bird released a memo on Thursday designed to calm nervous Democrats by advancing the Obama campaign’s meme that it is dominating early voting in the battleground state of Ohio.

But as former Republican National Committee strategist Adrian Gray points out, the Obama campaign’s Ohio narrative is bogus.

“When things are ugly for a campaign, these types of memos can start flying,” writes Mr. Gray. “It is troubling for the president’s supporters that they could not come up with at least a handful of positive data points in Ohio.”

As Mr. Gray notes, the Obama campaign’s Ohio memo is heavy on anecdotes, light on verifiable data, and plucks mathematical minutiae from sub-group polls to paint a political portrait approximating momentum.

In the memo, the Obama field director touts the fact that he has seen “groups as big as 100 voters going to vote in Athens, Ohio.” The problem: just 604 Democrats in the entire country have voted in person, and no more than 40 in a single precinct.

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As John and Scott point out, the CIA has issued a statement making it clear that “no one at any level in the CIA told anybody not to help those in need [in Benghazi]; claims to the contrary are simply inaccurate.” That statement surely was issued with the approval, and presumably at the direction, of the CIA’s director, General Petraeus.

Who, then, made the several decisions denying help to the Americans in Benghazi who needed it? Who, initially, told CIA to “stand down” in face of the attack? Who decided that American defense forces an hour or two away in Southern Europe would not be deployed?

Bill Kristol argues that, at least with respect to not sending in the military, the decision must have been made by President Obama. Given what was at stake – the safety of Americans, including an ambassador, in the face of an attack by hostile forces – Kristol surely is right. It is inconceivable that none of the key actors — Secretary of Defense Panetta, Secretary of State Clinton, and General Petraeus — failed to present to Obama the decision of how to respond. And if Obama failed to make a decision, that would be more damning than making the wrong one.

Kristol goes on to ask: “When and why—and based on whose counsel obtained in what meetings or conversations—did President Obama decide against sending in military assets to help the Americans in need?”

The key question is “why.”

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Soon after he took office, President Barack Obama began a process ultimately designed to reestablish full US diplomatic relations with Iran, including a reopening of embassies, an Israeli daily reported Sunday. The initiative, part of a wider shift in America’s diplomatic orientation, aimed at reaching understandings with Tehran over suspending its nuclear program, Maariv claimed, citing “two Western diplomats very close to the administration.”

The initiative led to at least two US-Iran meetings, the report said. Israel was made aware of the contacts, and opposed them.

But Iran rebuffed the “diplomatic hand” offered by the White House, Maariv reported. The Islamist regime “opposed any sign of normalization with the US, and refused to grant a ‘prize’ to the Americans,” according to an anonymous Israeli source quoted by the paper.

The information — the lead item on Maariv’s front page, headlined “Obama offered to renew relations with Iran” — comes on the heels of reports earlier this month that the US and Iran held back channel contacts toward establishing direct talks over Tehran’s nuclear program. Both the White House and Iran denied those reports.

According to Maariv, Deputy Secretary of State William Burns met with chief Iranian nuclear negotiator Saeed Jalili for an hour in 2009, and one other meeting between officials from both sides took place as well.

Included in the diplomatic incentives package offered by Washington would be, in the first stage, the opening of interest sections in Washington and Tehran, with the possibility subsequently of expanding to full diplomatic ties, including US and Iranian embassies and ambassadors in each other’s capitals, Maariv claimed.

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I have never entertained the idea that Obama was a Muslim and always believed he was a socialist. But Obama’s behavior over the last four years regarding Islam has convinced me that Obama has a Socialist/Islamic centered worldview — a combination that is not uncommon in many parts of the Muslim world.

Having been a journalist in Egypt for six years in the seventies, I have witnessed socialism with an Islamic twist to be a popular political ideology, especially amongst Arab journalists and intellectuals. Socialism, and even communism, have managed to survive in the ruthless Islamic political system as an alternative to full-fledged Sharia. The two ideologies have blended together in cases including the Baath Party in Syria and Iraq and socialist regimes in Egypt and Yemen. One major difference between the two ideologies is that Islam uses Allah, while socialism uses atheism, to fight the God of Christianity. Free democracies, such as the United States, are alien to Islam and socialism both because they regard government as a servant of the people and hold that human rights are granted by God and not by government or the code of Sharia.

Both Sharia and socialism are united in their envy of Western society and need to change it. That is why Obama has become the savior of both Islam and socialism. He embodies both ideologies. The claim that Obama is a Christian was a silly joke, but a necessary lie for the greater cause of changing America to fit the goals of both creeds.

Obama became the One, the savior of both Islam and socialists. To do that, Obama had to deny who he really was, which explains why his actions and words have never added up. At the recent Alfred E. Smith Catholic Charity dinner speech, Obama did not seem to be just kidding when he said that Romney uses his middle name Mitt and “I wish I could use my middle name.” Obama was referring, of course, to his Islamic middle name of Hussein. In Obama’s mind, he was not ashamed for having deceived America — he blamed America for putting him in the position of having to deny his true pride in his middle name.

STOP the politicians, President Obama and others from politically capitalizing on US national security operations and secrets!

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Filthy scum...watch your backs.