:: September 2009 ::







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Resounding Success

[rcp] This Friday, September's job-loss total will be announced. Whatever the numbers, administration officials surely will tell us that life is better -- because of them. "We brought the global economy back from the brink," President Obama said at the close of the G-20 meeting last week. "(B)ecause of the bold and coordinated action that we took, millions of jobs have been saved or created; the decline in output has been stopped; financial markets have come back to life".

This has been the president's theme: His so-called stimulus package, bailouts for politically connected banks and industries, ludicrously wasteful programs like Cash for Clunkers, etc. have saved America from the greatest disaster since the Great Depression.

But this theme runs up against some rather unfortunate facts.

In January, the administration's economic models warned that unemployment would hit 9 percent next year if its $787 billion "stimulus" wasn't passed. Passing it would keep the jobless rate under 8 percent before it begins to fall.

Well, the packaged passed -- and unemployment in August rose to 9.7 percent.

Oops.

OK, economic forecasters make mistakes. Fair enough. But neither the administration experts nor President Obama will acknowledge that their models and strategy are flawed. Instead, they spin the numbers and proclaim success, insisting that the plan is working even though unemployment is higher than they said it would be.

For example, Christina Romer, chief of the president's Council of Economic Advisers, preferred to emphasize that the 216,000 jobs lost in August were about half a million less than six months before. Never mind that the economic strategy hasn't restored any of those 700,000 jobs previously lost. They'd rather distract us by focusing on the slowing rate of loss rather than the losses themselves.

But, New York University economist Mario Rizzo writes, to take credit for this is to imply that "in the absence of fiscal stimulus, the rate of increase in unemployment never falls". That's ridiculous. Should Obama get credit anytime things aren't as bad as they might have been?

"The stimulus apologists are ignoring the original prediction based on a model. By that prediction, the stimulus is doing harm," Rizzo commented. [...]

This lack of accountability -- this claim of success no matter what happens -- should surprise no one. Many of us warned about it months ago. Remember, Obama didn't promise to create 3.5 million jobs. He promised to create or save that many. There is no way to test that. If you still have your job, does that mean Obama saved it? If an entrepreneur created a new job, in spite of Obama's destructive anti-business regulatory apparatus, does Obama still deserve the credit?

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48 Days Before Release : Palin Book #1 on Amazon and Barns & Noble

[p] Two days after the release date of Sarah Palin’s book was announced, it's already become the top seller at both Amazon.com and BarnesandNoble.com.

Palin’s publisher announced Monday that the former governor of Alaska and Republican vice presidential candidate had finished her memoir, "Going Rogue: An American Life," early and was moving the release date up from the spring to November 17.

HarperCollins will print 1.5 million copies for the book’s first run, the same number that was printed for late Sen. Ted Kennedy’s memoir "True Compass."

Kennedy’s book, published earlier this month, currently stands at number six on the Amazon list.

A publishing industry source told POLITICO that they "cannot remember a non-fiction book taking off like this in the pre-order market. It became number one only a couple of hours after nothing more than a date announcement. It is truly unprecedented."

Much of the 400-page book is based on journals Palin kept during her vice-presidential run.

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Without Bush, media lose interest in war caskets

[wex] Remember the controversy over the Pentagon policy of not allowing the press to take pictures of the flag-draped caskets of American war dead as they arrived in the United States? Critics accused President Bush of trying to hide the terrible human cost of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.

"These young men and women are heroes," Vice President Biden said in 2004, when he was senator from Delaware. "The idea that they are essentially snuck back into the country under the cover of night so no one can see that their casket has arrived, I just think is wrong."

In April of this year, the Obama administration lifted the press ban, which had been in place since the Persian Gulf War in 1991. Media outlets rushed to cover the first arrival of a fallen U.S. serviceman, and many photographers came back for the second arrival, and then the third.

But after that, the impassioned advocates of showing the true human cost of war grew tired of the story. Fewer and fewer photographers showed up. "It's really fallen off," says Lt. Joe Winter, spokesman for the Air Force Mortuary Affairs Operations Center at Dover Air Force Base in Delaware, where all war dead are received. "The flurry of interest has subsided."

That's an understatement. When the casket bearing Air Force Tech. Sgt. Phillip Myers, of Hopewell, Va., arrived at Dover the night of April 5 -- the first arrival in which press coverage was allowed -- there were representatives of 35 media outlets on hand to cover the story. Two days later, when the body of Army Spc. Israel Candelaria Mejias, of San Lorenzo, Puerto Rico, arrived, 17 media outlets were there. (All the figures here were provided by the Mortuary Affairs Operations Center.) On subsequent days in April, there were nearly a dozen press organizations on hand to cover arrivals.

Fast forward to today. On Sept. 2, when the casket bearing the body of Marine Lance Cpl. David Hall, of Elyria, Ohio, arrived at Dover, there was just one news outlet -- the Associated Press -- there to record it. The situation was pretty much the same when caskets arrived on Sept. 5, 9, 10, 12, 13, 14, 16, 22, 23 and 26. There has been no television coverage at all in September. [...]

So far this month, 38 American troops have been killed in Afghanistan. For all of 2009, the number is 220 -- more than any other single year and more than died in 2001, 2002, 2003, and 2004 combined.

With casualties mounting, the debate over U.S. policy in Afghanistan is sharp and heated. The number of arrivals at Dover is increasing. But the journalists who once clamored to show the true human cost of war are nowhere to be found.

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[s] Did ACORN chicanery elect Al Franken? That's the import of this tactfully phrased Minneapolis Star Tribune column. Franken won by 312 votes. ACORN claimed to have registered 48,000 new Minnesota voters. If just 1% were ineligible but cast ballots, or had ballots cast for them illegally, and survived the recount process ... that's 480 votes, almost certainly overwhelmingly cast for Franken. ... Maybe in pristine Minnesota even ACORN is clean. If so, the state would apparently be an outlier. ...

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Merkel prepares to form new German government

[t] Angela Merkel surged back into power last night at the helm of a pro-business Government that is committed to cutting taxes and ending a ten-year taboo on the use of nuclear power.

With her main challenger conceding defeat, the German Chancellor told cheering supporters that a new Government made up of her Christian Democrats and the liberal Free Democrats would lead the country out of crisis.

“I’m happy that we have a stable majority in a new Government with the Free Democrats,” she said, beaming for the first time in weeks.

Reliable projections by ARD state television, based on exit polls and partial vote counts, gave the future government line-up 330 seats against a total of 280 seats for the Social Democrats, the Left (Die Linke) and the Greens — easilly enough to pass even the most controversial of legislation.

Ms Merkel had pressed for a tax-cutting, deregulatory, privatising government when she ran for office in 2005 — and almost lost the election. Germans, afraid of painful changes, forced her into an uncomfortable tandem with the Social Democrats.

Now, plainly, she feels that she is back on course, the Grand Coalition dead and buried. The polls revealed a predicted implosion of the Social Democratic Party (SPD), which, with 23 per cent, was heading for its worst result since the Second World War.

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Blame Game

[gu] Randy Kirby of Spartanburg nearly exploded when reading Jamie Sparks' comments suggesting President George W. Bush allowed 9/11 to happen. "If he really thinks Mr. Bush is responsible, may I suggest he read the book, 'Dereliction of Duty,' by Lt. Col. Robert Patterson, who was a military aide to President Bill Clinton and an eyewitness to how Mr. Clinton handled matters of national security," says Mr. Kirby. "From 1993 to 2001, Islamic terrorists attacked American targets 10 times, and each time Mr. Clinton stood before the American people and said he would use all means to bring those responsible to justice. Unfortunately for the United States, Mr. Clinton never brought anyone to justice. The majority of the responsibility (for 9/11) should be placed squarely on the shoulders of President Clinton."

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Gaddafi interpreter 'collapsed during UN speech'

[t] Muammar Gaddafi's personal translator broke down towards the end of the Libyan leader's meandering 94-minute UN speech and had to be rescued by a UN Arabic speaker.

The Libyan translator matched the "Brother Leader of the Revolution" word-for-word for 90 minutes before collapsing from exhaustion, just after Mr Gaddafi denounced the popular Ottawa Treaty outlawing landmines.

"A mine is a defensive weapon. If you put it there, you come to it. I put it along the border of my country. If you want to invade me then you may be killed," Mr Gaddafi said.

The translator broke down as the man once denounced by Ronald Reagan as the "mad man" of the desert embarked on a tirade about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and an explanation of his call for a single-state solution called "Isratine".

According to the New York Post, the Libyan translator shouted: "I just can't take it any more."

Rules specify that UN translators only provide live interpretation for 40 minutes at a time, and they are used to seamless handovers.

But Libya insisted on using its own translators for English and French rather than one of the 25 world-class Arabic translators at the UN. Libyan diplomats said that Colonel Gaddafi would be speaking a dialect on Wednesday that only his staff could understand. In the event, he spoke standard Arabic.

Colonel Gaddafi ended up speaking six times longer than the 15-minute limit set by the UN General Assembly. But he did not even come close to Fidel Castro's 1960 General Assembly record of four and a half hours.

The longest-ever UN speech was delivered by V. K. Krishna Menon, who spent nearly eight hours defending India’s position on Kashmir to the Security Council in January 1957.

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Sarkozy : "We Live in a Real World

[t] [...] Nicolas Sarkozy, the French president, came close to mocking his American counterpart for the good intentions, which Mr Obama had heralded as an "historic" step towards nuclear abolition, even though it set no specific targets or fresh mandates.

"We live in a real world not a virtual world," the Frenchman told the 15-member council. "And the real world expects us to take decisions.

"President Obama dreams of a world without weapons ... but right in front of us two countries are doing the exact opposite.

"Iran since 2005 has flouted five security council resolutions. North Korea has been defying council resolutions since 1993.

"I support the extended hand of the Americans, but what good has proposals for dialogue brought the international community? More uranium enrichment and declarations by the leaders of Iran to wipe a UN member state off the map," he continued, referring to Israel.

The sharp-tongued French leader even implied that Mr Obama's resolution 1887 had used up valuable diplomatic energy.

"If we have courage to impose sanctions together it will lend viability to our commitment to reduce our own weapons and to making a world without nuke weapons," he said.

Mr Sarkozy has previously called the US president's disarmament crusade "naïve".

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Where's Joe Biden? Oh, There He Is : Biden on Stimulus: ‘Never Thought It Would Work This Well’

[wsj] Vice President Joe Biden delivered a rousing review of the government’s economic stimulus plan in a conversation with the nation’s governors. “In my wildest dreams, I never thought it would work this well,” he said. “Thank you, thank you.”

Biden oversees the $787 billion spending program, a centerpiece of the Obama administration’s economic recovery effort. He was speaking on a conference call with 55 governors, territorial officials or their designees, who next month must report to the White House on how many jobs were created or saved by stimulus money.

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Obama's churlishness is unforgivable

[t] The juxtaposition on our front page this morning is striking. We carry a photograph of Acting Sgt Michael Lockett - who was killed in Helmand on Monday - receiving the Military Cross from the Queen in June, 2008. He was the 217th British soldier to die in the Afghan conflict. Alongside the picture, we read that the Prime Minister was forced to dash through the kitchens of the UN in New York to secure a few minutes “face time” with President Obama after five requests for a sit-down meeting were rejected by the White House.

What are we to make of this? This country has proved, through the bravery of men like Acting Sgt Lockett, America’s staunchest ally in Afghanistan. In return, the American President treats the British Prime Minister with casual contempt. The President’s graceless behaviour is unforgivable. As most members of the Cabinet would confirm, it’s not a barrel of laughs having to sit down for a chat with Gordon Brown. But that’s not the point. Mr Obama owes this country a great deal for its unflinching commitment to the American-led war in Afghanistan but seems incapable of acknowledging the fact. You might have thought that after the shambles of Mr Brown’s first visit to the Obama White House - when there was no joint press conference and the President’s “gift” to the Prime Minister was a boxed DVD set - lessons would have been learned. Apparently not. Admittedly, part of the problem was Downing Street’s over-anxiety to secure a face-to-face meeting for domestic political purposes but the White House should still have been more obliging. Mr Obama’s churlishness is fresh evidence that the US/UK special relationship is a one-way street.

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Very amusing of the saga that, well, you'll either know already or not care. Or have to look into it yourself.

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Change! Er...uh...

[w] The Obama administration has decided not to seek legislation to establish a new system of preventive detention to hold terrorism suspects and will instead rely on a 2001 congressional resolution authorizing military force against al-Qaeda and the Taliban to continue to detain people indefinitely and without charge, according to administration officials. [...]

The administration has concluded that its detention powers, as currently accepted by the federal courts, are adequate to the task of holding some Guantanamo Bay detainees indefinitely. And although legal advocacy groups, such as the American Civil Liberties Union, are unhappy with the existing system, they acknowledge that it has enabled some detainees to win their release and limited government power in ways that any new law might not. [...]

The president also has the authority to detain persons who were part of, or substantially supported, Taliban or al-Qaeda forces or associated forces that are engaged in hostilities against the United States or its coalition partners, including any person who has committed a belligerent act, or has directly supported hostilities, in aid of such enemy armed forces."

That recast the Bush administration's broad claim of inherent executive authority to hold any person who was "part of or supporting" the Taliban or al-Qaeda.

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Obama : Cliched Mush

[nyp] President Obama yesterday did his best impression of a high-school soph omore participating in his first Model UN meeting, retailing pious clichés he learned from his pony-tailed social studies teacher.

Even Woodrow Wilson might have blanched at the mushy-headed exhortations to world peace and collective action better suited to a college dorm-room bull session or a holiday-season Coca-Cola commercial. [...]

Obama's mistake is in believing "the interests of nations and peoples are shared." They aren't. Georgia has an interest in becoming a strong nation capable of defending itself; Russia has an interest in quashing it. China has an interest in dominating all of East Asia; Japan and other neighbors have an interest in containing it.

Iran has an interest in gaining a nuclear weapon; Israel -- and the United States -- has an interest in stopping it. [...]

As for Iran, if it moves ahead on its nuclear program, it "must be held accountable."

How? Obama can't say, because Moscow and even Paris apparently haven't gotten word about the "new era of engagement based on mutual interests and mutual respect." Both are making discouraging noises about any serious sanctions against Iran.

Obama's version of America leadership mostly consists of a public diplomacy of self-flagellation and rhetoric touting fashionable causes. He'll pursue global disarmament and fight global warming. Indeed, Laurie David, not Hillary Clinton, might be ideally suited to be his secretary of state.

Obama hopes that all our self-effacing niceness will catalyze the world into ending its "bickering about outdated grievances." No wonder he twice had to deny that he was being naive.

The president isn't wrong to talk sweepingly of peace. Ronald Reagan did the same thing, although with a concomitant emphasis on freedom. But Reagan realized the world wouldn't lead itself, at least not where we should want it to go.

Look no further than the United Nations, that incoherent collection of the world's finest democracies and most dismal dictatorships. At the end of his speech, Obama said the United Nations could be "a place where we indulge tyranny, or a source of moral authority."

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UN loves Barack Obama because he is weak

[t] Barack Obama’s Gallup approval rating of 52 percent may well be lower at this stage of his presidency than any US leader in recent times with the exception of Bill Clinton. But he is still worshipped with messiah-like adoration at the United Nations, and is considerably more popular with many of the 192 members of the UN than he is with the American people. [...]

It is not hard to see why a standing ovation awaits the president at Turtle Bay. Obama’s popularity at the UN boils down essentially to his willingness to downplay American global power. He is the first American president who has made an art form out of apologizing for the United States, which he has done on numerous occasions on foreign soil, from Strasbourg to Cairo. The Obama mantra appears to be – ask not what your country can do for you, but what you can do to atone for your country. This is a message that goes down very well in a world that is still seething with anti-Americanism.

It is natural that much of the UN will embrace an American president who declines to offer strong American leadership. A president who engages dictators like Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and Hugo Chavez will naturally gain respect from the leaders of the more than 100 members of the United Nations who are currently designated as “partly free” or “not free” by respected watchdog Freedom House.

The UN is not a club of democracies - who still remain a minority within its membership – it is a vast melting pot of free societies, socialist regimes and outright tyrannies. Obama’s clear lack of interest in human rights issues is a big seller at the UN, where at least half its members have poor human rights records. [...]

The Obama administration is now overseeing and implementing the biggest decline in American global power since Jimmy Carter. Unfortunately it may well take another generation for the United States to recover.

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Canada to Walk Out on Speech

[np] Canada will boycott Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's speech at the United Nations today, saying his outbursts about the Holocaust and Israel are "shameful."

Foreign Minister Lawrence Cannon will be at the world body to attend the opening of the UN General Assembly's annual debate, but officials signal he and other members of the Canadian delegation will vacate the Canadian seats when the Islamic republic's President approaches the podium.

Walking out of the chamber is seen as a strong diplomatic show of disgust at the UN -- and since the chamber is generally packed on the first day of the annual summit, Canada's empty seats will not go unnoticed. [...]

"President Ahmadinejad's repeated denial of the Holocaust and his anti-Israel comments run counter to the values of the UN General Assembly, and they're shameful," said one Canadian official.

"He uses his public appearances to provoke the international community, and that is why Canada's seats will be empty."

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Obama's time warp

[we] In the early 1980s, while planning a vacation in Latin America, I went to bookstores to find histories of the region. All I could find were Marxist tracts arguing that "the people" were exploited by greedy corporations and military dictators, all propped up by the United States. Available literature on Latin America today includes much more sensible accounts. But some people, including Barack Obama, whose college thesis written in those years has never been made public, seem stuck in a time warp in which the United States is the bad guy.

That, at least, seems to explain Obama's latest foreign policy moves, starting with Honduras, where the president was ousted by the Supreme Court for violating a constitutional provision that forbids any moves to seek a second term. (Other Latin countries, notably Mexico, have similar constitutional prohibitions.) The White House immediately interpreted this as a military coup and decided that, this time, the United States would come out on the side of "the people." In fact, we find ourselves siding with a friend of the Iranian mullahs, Hugo Chavez, who swept aside similar constitutional limits in Venezuela, and opposing the elected Congress, courts and civil society of Honduras.

Honduras is not the only or, sad to say, most important example of where this administration has come out on the side of our enemies and against our friends. [...]

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Knee-Slapper : Obama's message to Abbas, Bibi: 'I'm losing patience'

[p] President Obama's central message to the Israeli and Palestinian leaders in New York today was simple, a U.S. official said: He's running out of patience.

"The President of the United States is impatient," said the senior U.S. official. "That's what he told them."

"There’s a limited window of opportunity here, and he's determined, but he’s also impatient and we need to get going," the official said.

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Obama is beginning to look out of his depth

[t] [...] Regimes in Moscow, Pyongyang and Tehran simply pocket his concessions and carry on as before. The picture emerging from the White House is a disturbing one, of timidity, clumsiness and short-term calculation. Some say he is the weakest president since Jimmy Carter.

The grizzled veterans of the Democratic leadership in Congress have found Mr Obama and his team of bright young advisers a pushover. That has gravely weakened his flagship domestic campaign, for health-care reform, which fails to address the greatest weakness of the American system: its inflated costs. His free trade credentials are increasingly tarnished too. His latest blunder is imposing tariffs on tyre imports from China, in the hope of gaining a little more union support for health care. But at a time when America's leadership in global economic matters has never been more vital, that is a dreadful move, hugely undermining its ability to stop other countries engaging in a ruinous spiral of protectionism.

Even good moves are ruined by bad presentation. Changing Mr Bush's costly and untried missile-defence scheme for something workable was sensible. But offensively casual treatment of east European allies such as Poland made it easy for his critics to portray it as naïve appeasement of the regime in Moscow.

Mr Obama's public image rests increasingly heavily on his extraordinary speechifying abilities [...]

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Obama : Da Bomb

[nyt] [...] But eight months after his inauguration, all that good will so far has translated into limited tangible policy benefits for Mr. Obama. As much as they may prefer to deal with Mr. Obama instead of his predecessor, George W. Bush, foreign leaders have not gone out of their way to give him what he has sought.

European allies still refuse to send significantly more troops to Afghanistan. The Saudis basically ignored Mr. Obama’s request for concessions to Israel, while Israel rebuffed his demand to stop settlement expansion. North Korea defied him by testing a nuclear weapon. Japan elected a party less friendly to the United States. Cuba has done little to liberalize in response to modest relaxation of sanctions. India and China are resisting a climate change deal. And Russia rejected new sanctions against Iran’s nuclear program even as Mr. Obama heads into talks with Tehran.

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NEA : Shoes Dropping

Yet Another 'Nothing Done Wrong' But...NEA Communications Director Resigns

[abc] Embattled former National Endowment for the Arts communications director Yosi Sergant is out of a job. Late this afternoon, the NEA released a short statement saying, "This afternoon Yosi Sergant submitted his resignation from the National Endowment for the Arts. His resignation has been accepted and is effective immediately." The agency provided no further details.

Sergant had been under scrutiny after leading a controversial conference call on August 10, where he encouraged artists to create work to promote the Obama administration's agenda. Sergant was initially removed from his post as communications director, but continued to work at the NEA.

Just two days ago, NEA Chairman Rocco Landesman defended the conference call, saying it “was not a means to promote any legislative agenda and any suggestions to that end are simply false.”

NEA Scrubs ‘Health Care Resource’ From Website

[bh] Yesterday, Scott Johnson at Powerline reported that the NEA homepage ”Health Care Resource” link took you to the Artists’ Health Insurance Resource Center (AHIRC), whose own homepage urged artists to ”get involved in the health care debate,” contact Congress and “demand affordable-guaranteed insurance.” [...]

Well, what a difference a day makes. Not only has the NEA completely removed the link to what was essentially a lobbying demand for health care reform, but the AHIRC did a little scrubbing of their own to nudge the rhetoric closer to 501(c)(3)-ey territory…

Shoe Drop?

[twe] [...] Conservatives are "going ape" over the intrigue at the National Endowment for the Arts, but all that happened was that "a White House flack and an NEA flack arranged a conference call with a bunch of artists and encouraged them to create artwork in support of the president's National Day of Service." The Right will regret making a big deal of this "nothingburger" unless another shoe drops.

Nice try, said Ben Shapiro in Big Hollywood. But at least six federal laws and regulations were violated when then–NEA communications director Yosi Sergant and White House Office of Public Engagement deputy director Buffy Wicks tried twisting the arms of artists and arts groups interested in getting federal arts grants. If Congress doesn't launch a full investigation, it is endorsing "the misuse of taxpayer funds."

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Theatre of The Absurd : Newspaper Revitalization Act

[th] The president said he is "happy to look at" bills before Congress that would give struggling news organizations tax breaks if they were to restructure as nonprofit businesses.

"I haven't seen detailed proposals yet, but I'll be happy to look at them," Obama told the editors of the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette and Toledo Blade in an interview.

Sen. Ben Cardin (D-Md.) has introduced S. 673, the so-called "Newspaper Revitalization Act," that would give outlets tax deals if they were to restructure as 501(c)(3) corporations. That bill has so far attracted one cosponsor, Cardin's Maryland colleague Sen. Barbara Mikulski (D).

White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs had played down the possibility of government assistance for news organizations, which have been hit by an economic downturn and dwindling ad revenue.

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Laughable : Obama on ACORN: 'Not Something I've Followed Closely'

[abc] [...] While the President said that ACORN "deserves to be investigated" in light of the "inappropriate" video that's gone viral, he did not endorse recent votes in Congress to cut off federal funding for the community group.

STEPHANOPOULOS: How about the funding for ACORN?

OBAMA: You know, if -- frankly, it's not really something I've followed closely. I didn't even know that ACORN was getting a whole lot of federal money.

STEPHANOPOULOS: Both the Senate and the House have voted to cut it off.

OBAMA: You know, what I know is, is that what I saw on that video was certainly inappropriate and deserves to be investigated.

STEPHANOPOULOS: So you're not committing to -- to cut off the federal funding?

OBAMA: George, this is not the biggest issue facing the country. It's not something I'm paying a lot of attention to.

Joe Wilson was unavailable for comment. This brand of blatant nonsense is what makes this administration such a sad joke. Anyone that can believe this would do well to get their head examined pronto. Kanye? He's up on it. ACORN, his past employer, he's just not that aware of the billions in stimulus they had been pegged to receive nor has he been paying attention to it. That's either flat out lies or beyond the pale incompetence. Or both. But hey, nice speech. Maybe he can crack 100 speeches before Halloween.

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ACORN : In A Nutshell : Summary

[nyp] For decades ACORN has presented itself as a grassroots network dedicated to improving the lives of the poor.

But there's more to ACORN than its do-gooder veneer.

Just ask the banks, corporations and politicians who've been the target of ACORN's shameless shenanigans over the past 40 years.

Here's how the tiny seed of 1960s radicalism blossomed into a well-funded, national organization with political connections reaching all the way to the White House...

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Obama's Worldwide Star Power Finds Limits

[w] Eight months into his presidency, Barack Obama has become a global celebrity, far more popular abroad than he is at home and sometimes eclipsing foreign leaders among their own people. [...]

But just as his domestic honeymoon has clearly ended, international events have demonstrated the limits of Obama's personal charm.

As he takes the stage to address the United Nations for the first time Wednesday, Obama will face world leaders -- adversaries and allies alike -- whose rebukes of the new American president serve as reminders that the world's differences with the United States transcend who is in the White House.

European nations have refused to send significant numbers of new troops to aid the U.S.-led war effort in Afghanistan. Few countries have agreed to accept detainees held at the U.S. military prison at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. Scottish officials ignored Obama's plea to keep the Lockerbie bomber in prison, and U.S. efforts to head off a coup in Honduras were ineffective. North Korea continues to develop nuclear weapons, Iran may be doing so, and Middle East leaders have rebuffed Obama's efforts at peacemaking.

"When he came into office, there was kind of a sigh of relief around the world because he wasn't Bush," said Leslie H. Gelb, a former president of the Council on Foreign Relations. "What was he going to do to solve these problems? They haven't seen that yet."

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Teleprompter Sounds Like Amnesty Next On Table

[wt] President Obama said this week that his health care plan won't cover illegal immigrants, but argued that's all the more reason to legalize them and ensure they eventually do get coverage. [...]

"Even though I do not believe we can extend coverage to those who are here illegally, I also don't simply believe we can simply ignore the fact that our immigration system is broken," Mr. Obama said Wednesday evening in a speech to the Congressional Hispanic Caucus Institute. "That's why I strongly support making sure folks who are here legally have access to affordable, quality health insurance under this plan, just like everybody else.

Mr. Obama added, "If anything, this debate underscores the necessity of passing comprehensive immigration reform and resolving the issue of 12 million undocumented people living and working in this country once and for all."

Republicans said that amounts to an amnesty, calling it a backdoor effort to make sure current illegal immigrants get health care.

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Obama Health Care Anecdotes : Wrong : Oh Well...The 'Essence' Was True

[wsj] President Barack Obama, seeking to make a case for health-insurance regulation, told a poignant story to a joint session of Congress last week. An Illinois man getting chemotherapy was dropped from his insurance plan when his insurer discovered an unreported gallstone the patient hadn't known about.

"They delayed his treatment, and he died because of it," the president said in the nationally televised address.

In fact, the man, Otto S. Raddatz, didn't die because the insurance company rescinded his coverage once he became ill, an act known as recission. The efforts of his sister and the office of Illinois Attorney General Lisa Madigan got Mr. Raddatz's policy reinstated within three weeks of his April 2005 rescission and secured a life-extending stem-cell transplant for him. Mr. Raddatz died this year, nearly four years after the insurance showdown.

Obama aides say the president got the essence of the story correct. Mr. Raddatz was dropped from his insurance plan weeks before a scheduled stem-cell transplant.

Nice Job Obama Admin / Slate : 'Whoops...Whoops...Whoops Again.'

[slate] How a factual error in Slate ended up in a White House speech....

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Masterstroke : Whitehouse Announces Bailing on Missile Shield on Anniversary of Invasion Of Poland

[dj] President Obama's announcement on September 17 that the US is shelving its plans to build a ballistic missile defense (BMD) system in Central Europe is likely to raise painful historical memories in Poland.
The Obama White House cancelled ballistic missile defense plans for Europe on a date with important historical significance for the people of Poland. Under the terms of the Hitler-Stalin Pact, the Soviet Union invaded eastern Poland 70 years ago, on Sept. 17, 1939, while western and central parts of Poland were being overrun by German armies.

Russia fought hard to keep American missiles away from its borders, and President Obama's decision is seen as a concession to Moscow in return for Russian support in curbing Iran's nuclear program. The Poles, always fearful of the Kremlin's imperial reach, are more likely to see it as a betrayal of their country, a faithful NATO ally of the U.S., just as Poland, whose soldiers fought alongside Americans against Nazi Germany, was betrayed by America at the end of World War II. [...]

These may be completely different times and different political stakes, but the Obama Administration has already demonstrated its lack of historical sensitivity and public diplomacy strategy when it refused Poland's invitation to send a high level representative to the official observances in Gdansk of the 70th anniversary of the start of World War II. Prime Minister Putin was there and even made sort of an apology for the Hitler-Stalin Pact while trying to deny Stalin's responsibility for helping Hitler to start World War II. [...]

People in the Obama White House may think there are no historical lessons to be drawn from their decision to scrap the missile defense system in Poland and Czech Republic, but any experienced public diplomacy expert would have told them that Central Europeans still remember World War II, Yalta, and the Cold War. At the very least, President Obama could have waited a day or two so that his missile defense announcement would not have been made on the 70th anniversary of the Soviet attack on Poland.

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Surprise : Legislation By Whim

[b] The Massachusetts House gave preliminary approval this afternoon to a bill that would allow Governor Deval Patrick to appoint an interim replacement for the late US Senator Edward M. Kennedy. [...]

"There's no doubt in my mind that what we are going to do today or attempt to do today is nothing short of partisan," Frost said. "It is clear to me and, I think, to most people in Massachusetts that if [2006 Republican gubernatorial candidate] Kerry Healey had won that election and was governor today, we would not be here," Frost said.

The Republicans, who account for only a small minority in the state Legislature, have charged Democrats with hypocrisy, saying that the Democrats rejected making precisely the same change to the law in 2004, because they did not want then-Governor Mitt Romney to have a chance to appoint a Republican to the Senate in the event that Senator John F. Kerry won the presidency.

"I object to the process that's now under way to retroactively change our election laws to suit the whims of one political party simply because they have the power to do so," Frost said.


Flashback : "....the state changed its succession law in 2004 to require a special election be held 145 to 160 days after the vacancy. At the time, legislative Democrats — with a wide majority in both chambers — were concerned because then-Republican Gov. Mitt Romney had the power to directly fill any vacancy created as Democratic Sen. John Kerry ran for president."

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Breakdown

[c] According to Jimmy Carter’s libel against opponents of Barack Obama, “an overwhelming portion of the intensely demonstrated animosity toward President Barack Obama is based on the fact that he is black man.” This reminds us once again of what a pathetic and mean-spirited figure Mr. Carter has become. But it is also evidence of how unhinged and desperate many liberals and some within the Democratic party are becoming. The hatred and fury that consumed them during the Bush years is returning with a vengeance. It turns out that the cause of their derangement during the Bush years may not have been Bush after all; he may simply have been the object of their crazed attacks.

It’s fascinating to watch how furious liberals have become despite Obama’s being president and Democrats’ controlling the Senate and the House by wide margins. This period should be—they expected it to be—years of milk and honey for them. But events and reality have intervened. They see the Anointed One, Barack Obama—their “sort of God”—failing. He is not only a mere mortal but also a deeply flawed one.

They see support for Obama’s effort to nationalize our health-care system collapsing. They see the American people rising up against his brand of liberalism. They see Republicans with all the intensity on their side. They see GOP candidates leading in the New Jersey and Virginia gubernatorial races. They see the popularity of their majority leader, Harry Reid, cratering. They see the Republican party drawing almost even with Democrats on issues like health care—and surging ahead of Democrats on many other issues. They see a dangerous loss of support for Obama among independents and the elderly. [...]

We’re only eight months into the Age of Obama—the period in which he promised to unite our divided country, heal our wounds, and bind up our divisions—and Obama’s critics are now routinely labeled as unpatriotic, racists, liars, mobsters, evil mongers, practitioners of un-American tactics, and more. As Obama’s failures mount up, it will only get worse. The volume will only get louder. And the charges will only get more desperate and incendiary.

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Dem Senator Warns of 'Big, Big Tax' on Middle Class in Baucus Bill

[abc] It's not every day that you hear a Democratic senator charge that a fellow Democrat is proposing to raise taxes on the middle class, but that is what happened on Tuesday when Sen. Jay Rockefeller, D-W.Va., ripped into the health-care bill developed by Sen. Max Baucus, D-Mt., the chairman of the Senate Finance Committee.

The Baucus proposal would impose, starting in 2013, a 35 percent excise tax on insurance companies for "high-cost plans" -- defined as those above $8,000 for individuals and $21,000 for family plans. [...]

The West Virginia Democrat worries, however, that a lot of middle class workers, like the coal miners in his state, will end up facing "a big, big tax" under the Baucus bill because they currently enjoy generous employer-provided health care benefits which they receive tax free.

Referring to Baucus, Rockefeller said, "He should understand that (his proposal) means that virtually every single coal miner is going to have a big, big tax put on them because the tax will be put on the company and the company will immediately pass it down and lower benefits because they are self insured, most of them, because they are larger. They will pass it down, lower benefits, and probably this will mean higher premiums for coal miners who are getting very good health care benefits for a very good reason. That is, like steelworkers and others, they are doing about the most dangerous job that can be done in America."

"So that’s not really a smart idea," Rockefeller continued. "In fact, it’s a very dangerous idea, and I’m not even sure the coal miners in West Virginia are aware that this is what is waiting if this bill passes."

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Obama Overexposed? Na.



[abc] This Sunday, President Obama will be interviewed on five shows -- ABC News’ “This Week With George Stephanopoulos,” CNN’s “State of the Nation”, CBS’s “Face the Nation”, NBC’s “Meet the Press” and Univision’s “Al Punto with Jorge Ramos." [...]

Polls indicate that Americans say the more they hear about the president’s proposed overhaul, the less they like it. An ABC News/Washington Poll last week showed 54 percent of Americans feel that way. White House officials say that’s because Americans are hearing false attacks on Obama’s plan, not reality -- hence the PR blitz.

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Young Adults Likely to Pay Big Share of Reform's Cost

[wapo] As health-care legislation advances through Congress, the young adults who were so vital to President Obama's election are emerging as a significant beneficiary of his top domestic priority, but they are also likely to play a major role in funding any reform.

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NEWSFLASH!

ACORN : Still Corrupt
Carter : Still a shameful embarrassment
Kanye : Still a primo tool

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Like Hoover, Obama is abdicating U.S. trade leadership

[wsj] President Obama traveled to Wall Street yesterday to press his case for more financial regulation, but the bigger economic issue of the day concerned other White House policies. To wit, what does it mean for the world economy if America now has its first protectionist President since Herbert Hoover?

The smell of trade war is suddenly in the air. Mr. Obama slapped a 35% tariff on Chinese tires Friday night, and China responded on the weekend by threatening to retaliate against U.S. chickens and auto parts. That followed French President Nicolas Sarkozy's demand on Thursday that Europe impose a carbon tariff on imports from countries that don't follow its cap-and-trade diktats. "We need to impose a carbon tax at [Europe's] border. I will lead that battle," he said.

Mr. Sarkozy was following U.S. Energy Secretary Steven Chu, who has endorsed a carbon tax on imports, and the U.S. House of Representatives, which passed a carbon tariff as part of its cap-and-tax bill. This in turn followed the "Buy American" provisions of the stimulus, which has incensed much of Canada; Congress's bill to ban Mexican trucks from U.S. roads in direct violation of Nafta, prompting Mexico to retaliate against U.S. farm and kitchen goods; and the must-make-cars-in-America provisions of the auto bailouts. Meanwhile, U.S. trade pacts with Colombia, Panama and South Korea languish in Congress.

Through all of this Mr. Obama has either said nothing or objected so feebly that Congress has assumed he doesn't mean it. Despite his pro-forma demurrals, Mr. Obama's actions and nonactions are telling the world that the U.S. is abandoning the global leadership on trade that Presidents of both parties have worked to maintain since the 1930s. His advisers whisper that their man is merely playing a little tactical domestic politics, but he is playing with fire, as the last 80 years of trade history should tell him. [...]

The reality is that without the U.S. leading by example, the world trading order is likely to deteriorate into every country for itself. This is especially dangerous amid a global recession in which world merchandise trade volume fell by roughly 33% from the second quarter of 2008 to June 2009. Reviving trade flows is crucial to restoring global growth.

Mr. Obama may not intend to start a trade war, but then Hoover didn't set out to pick one either. His political abdication is what made it possible, however, and trade passions once unleashed can be impossible to control. On his present course, President Obama is giving the world every reason to conclude he is a protectionist.

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Poll: News media's credibility plunges to new low

[p] The public’s assessment of the accuracy of news stories is now at its lowest level in more than two decades of Pew Research surveys, and Americans’ views of media bias and independence now match previous lows.



[y] The news media's credibility is sagging along with its revenue.

Nearly two-thirds of Americans think the news stories they read, hear and watch are frequently inaccurate, according to a poll released Sunday by the Pew Research Center for the People & the Press. That marks the highest level of skepticism recorded since 1985, when this study of public perceptions of the media was first done.

The poll didn't distinguish between Internet bloggers and reporters employed by newspapers and broadcasters, leaving the definition of "news media" up to each individual who was questioned. The survey polled 1,506 adults on the phone in late July.

The survey found that 63 percent of the respondents thought the information they get from the media was often off base. In Pew Research's previous survey, in 2007, 53 percent of the people expressed that doubt about accuracy. [...]

Newspaper ad sales plunged by 29 percent, or nearly $5.5 billion, during the first half of this year, according to the Newspaper Association of America. TV ad revenue on broadcast stations dropped by 12 percent, or nearly $3 billion, during the same period, according to the Television Bureau of Advertising. Radio advertising fell by 23 percent, or $2.3 billion, according to the Radio Advertising Bureau.

The budget squeeze "means facts don't get checked as carefully as they should," according to Bill Keller, executive editor of The New York Times.

* That last line is priceless and a perfectly reeking example of the brand of bs so often offered as professional - Ed

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Another Speech? OK...We're Long Past Surreal

Long past saturation, long past surreal, long past being a bad joke - and only into the ninth month. Hey, how about giving a speech Obama? Geezuz.

Great stuff. Equally great is the seriously pathetic MSM that all but ignored the 9/12 Washington event. Not that their foolish dereliction hasn't been glaringly obvious before, this is stretching to new heights that seems unattainable. Disgraceful.

Tidbits of underscored number tallies, downplayed blurbs if any mention at all and general apathy and obfuscation. Great job. It's sad that a profession that holds the importance that this one does has become such a sad display.

It's hard to believe really, but should be duly noted, is the seeming contrast of debris after the 9/12 event and the spectacle of pomp earlier in the year. Hardly a surprise - it's a generally similar contrast of class anytime there's a conversation between these political factions. Accurate comment from the page with the pics, "...guess they're waiting for Big Gov. to clean it up for them..."

Good old entitlement attitude. I'm sure someone must owe you something.

-The Cynical Bastard


Speech Surprise : Teleprompter Offers No New Policy Proposals

[nyt] [...] The president offered no new policy proposals during a lunchtime speech but sought to use the one-year anniversary of the fall of Lehman Brothers as a moment to mark how the country’s financial system has moved beyond the brink of collapse. As he urged lawmakers to adopt new regulations for Wall Street, he asked executives to accept tougher oversight.

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[at] The truth will out. Despite mainstream media attempts to characterize turnout as in the thousands, a spokesman for the National Park Service, Dan Bana, is quoted as saying "It is a record.... We believe it is the largest event held in Washington, D.C., ever."

Democrats and their media acolytes may wish this weren't so, and they may even employ the Ostrich Strategy, burying their collective heads in the sand, pretending that a major important political movement isn't happening. But they only hasten their own demise in doing so.

Meanwhile, Gateway Pundit compares the littler left behind on 9/12 with the aftermath of the Obama inauguration. It is a startling contrast. [gp]





[at] [...] Whatever the actual number it is sure to be seriously underestimated by the Obama-besotted members of the press corps who are also likely to misrepresent the participants and their views.

But as a participant, I want you to know the attendees were wonderful people, civil and polite. They showed their respect for the Capitol and the event by leaving no mess behind when they were through, in marked contrast to the inauguration and the usual left wing demonstrations here.

The feeling I have is that this is a wretched political class, as full of itself as it is idea-less and talentless and the people know it. They are disgusted enough with the new American elitism to travel on their own dime by any means available to come here to let Congress and the President know that they will use every legal means at their disposal to overthrow them. And overthrowing them is precisely what they intend to do.

Congress is up for election in 2010. They can rely on the grossly inaccurate press accounts if they choose. But I'm telling them it would be a major error to do so.

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By The Numbers : Story? What Story?



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An Obama Speech in 13 Easy Steps

[nro] Everyone marvels at Barack Obama’s rhetorical prowess. But don’t be overly bedazzled. With these 13 easy steps, you, too, can give a Barack Obama speech.

1) Create a false center. In his speech to a joint session of Congress, Obama positioned himself between the Left’s calling for a single-payer system and the Right’s agitating to end employer-based health insurance. Presto — he’s the very definition of a centrist. Anyone advocating almost any position can benefit from the same insta-centrism.

2) Scorn ideology. Obama warned against “the usual Washington ideological battles.” Message: He has no philosophical commitments himself. He’s pushing a Great Society redux only as a matter of practicality. Superficial pragmatism is the ideologue’s best friend.

3) Talk about your openness to ideas from opponents. The more you do this, the less you have to adopt any of their ideas. “I will continue to seek common ground,” Obama said. “I will be there to listen. My door is always open.” While he does all this common-ground seeking, he will be whipping up the Democratic votes to pass a massive, liberal reordering of the health-care system. But he’ll be listening! [...]

6) Say things just because they sound good. Why not? Obama always says he’ll reduce costs even though the Democratic plans do little or nothing to reduce costs. That’s his sound bite, and he’s sticking to it. [...]

13) Load it up in a teleprompter. And repeat as necessary. [...]

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Teabaggin' Racist Mobster!



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Speechifier

[nrp] [...]We're expected to believe a Democrat-controlled Congress, with deep divisions in its ranks, will put together a bill that will keep everything the same for those who have health insurance through their jobs, Medicare, Medicaid, or the VA; mandate coverage of pre-existing conditions; ban caps on coverage; mandate coverage of routine checkups and preventive care, like mammograms and colonoscopies; offer health insurance to 30 million uninsured; provide tax credits for small businesses; painlessly mandate coverage for the young healthy uninsured; provide hardship waivers; provide choice and competition; keep insurance companies honest; avoid taxpayer subsidies for public option plans; keep out illegal immigrants; not pay for abortions; and not deny care to the elderly because of cost-benefit analyses, all while not adding one dime to our deficits – either now or in the future. [...]

And then, in a couple of days, after the 9/11 anniversary, the NFL season kicks off, one or two other news events will bubble up and take up some of the front pages, the polling numbers will come out and we'll see the numbers haven't moved much.

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Thieves and Liars Gathering Results in Upset at Being Called Liars

Woo! Another O speech.....and a grand time was had by all. All confidence has been bouyed up now that we've seen such an august gathering of deep minds.

What a sad-sack lot. SanFran Nan, looked like a skull head, empty and unaware entirely, until stunned and appalled that someone would call her demi-god preacher a liar. While he was calling everyone and their dog liars himself. Outrage! Let the media fawning and regurge commence.

SloJo Biden looked as dim as a 40 watt, no doubt pensive on his latest fabrication or wondering "what if it had been him up there as CnC," or maybe he was thinking about heading down to Home Depot for some wood screws. Deep stuff, no doubt.

Chuck #1, who should be cooling his heels in some concrete 8x12, looked like he was thinking about how to avoid paying for anything and it goes on and on while Chuck #2 looked like a second grader grinning at some lad mag and Johnny 'Magic Hat' tried to not nod off, spastically drumming his fingers like he had some speed metal beat in his head. The Hill, pushing her flaming red ensemble, looked the epitome of happiness and joy. Speaking of which, media? Can we have a bit more Bill Clinton on tv please? Nyuk nyuk, he's so darned funny and swell.

Look left. Now right! Spew forth. All stand. Well, some. Injustice! Applaud. Bromide. Applause. Sad story! Stand and applaud! Teddy! Morality! Woo!

Sheer awesomeness to behold. The people are all feeling the magic now. Can we now have the speech shown for the next 5 days or so please? I don't want the magical feeling to fade too quickly.

-The CynicalBastard

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Ground broken on $3.4 billion Homeland Security complex

[cnn] Washington notables broke ground on the future home of the Department of Homeland Security on Wednesday, symbolically starting construction on the biggest federal building project in the Washington area since the Pentagon 68 years ago.

The project will bring together more than 15,000 employees now scattered in 35 offices in the region, placing them on a 176-acre campus strewn with historic buildings in a long-neglected corner of Washington, five miles from the Capitol building.

Department leaders hope the $3.4 billion consolidation will help the department fulfill its core mission -- protecting the homeland -- in ways big and small.

"It will help us hold meetings," Secretary Janet Napolitano said. "It will help us build that culture of 'One DHS.'"

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Obama and the Bureaucratization of Health Care

[wsj] [...] Common sense tells us that the government's attempts to solve large problems more often create new ones. Common sense also tells us that a top-down, one-size-fits-all plan will not improve the workings of a nationwide health-care system that accounts for one-sixth of our economy. And common sense tells us to be skeptical when President Obama promises that the Democrats' proposals "will provide more stability and security to every American."

With all due respect, Americans are used to this kind of sweeping promise from Washington. And we know from long experience that it's a promise Washington can't keep.

Let's talk about specifics. [...]

Instead of poll-driven "solutions," let's talk about real health-care reform: market-oriented, patient-centered, and result-driven. As the Cato Institute's Michael Cannon and others have argued, such policies include giving all individuals the same tax benefits received by those who get coverage through their employers; providing Medicare recipients with vouchers that allow them to purchase their own coverage; reforming tort laws to potentially save billions each year in wasteful spending; and changing costly state regulations to allow people to buy insurance across state lines. Rather than another top-down government plan, let's give Americans control over their own health care.

Democrats have never seriously considered such ideas, instead rushing through their own controversial proposals. After all, they don't need Republicans to sign on: Democrats control the House, the Senate and the presidency. But if passed, the Democrats' proposals will significantly alter a large sector of our economy. They will not improve our health care. They will not save us money. And, despite what the president says, they will not "provide more stability and security to every American."

We often hear such overblown promises from Washington. With first principles in mind and with the facts in hand, tell them that this time we're not buying it.

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The Sorry Tale of America’s Out-of-control Spending

[a] [...] How did the richest country in the history of the world—and one with great international financial responsibilities—get into a position where its debt might easily spiral out of control? A little history explains a lot.

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Lamentations of the Elite

[nro] [...] The Jones mess brings up a larger issue. Americans were assured that with the ascendance of Barack Obama we would evolve beyond race. Yet in the last ninth months it is almost as if precisely the opposite has occurred — but with a strange twist. The country has been serially lectured about race from some of the most privileged Americans in the country. Columbia law grad elite Eric Holder accused the country of cowardice for its reluctance to speak about race. Harvard-law alum Barack Obama accused the Cambridge police of profiling and acting stupidly in taking elite Harvard professor Skip Gates down to the station after his screaming invective episode. Harvard-law educated Michelle Obama explained Justice Sotomayor’s unease at Princeton by comparing her own ordeal there. Chairman of the Ways and Means Committee Charles Rangel who had serially dodged his tax obligations claims that white angst explains his IRS problems. New York governor David Paterson blames his sinking polls on white racism, more prominent than ever in the age of Obama. Now Yale law graduate Van Jones claims smears did him in. The list could be easily expanded.

What we are seeing is a very unfortunate turn of events in which racism is now the guaranteed retreat position once many prominent African-American elites find themselves in controversy. The problem is that the rest of the population of all races and classes looks at this privileged cohort and does not really detect bias or ill-treatment in their past or present circumstances, but rather remarkable tolerance and race-blind attitudes, as exemplified by their career successes.

The roots of all this scapegoating were in the campaign, not just with the mansion/golf-course living Reverend Wright, the president’s mentor and pastor, slurring his country and its various constituencies, but also with Obama’s own stereotyping of Pennsylvania voters, once the election there did not go his way. Worse still, we are only in month nine of this new age of Obama — with more than three years to go in his first term — and the country is already tired of the blame-gaming and whining, when officials like Rangel and Jones start to defame others for their own lack of ethics and judgment. [...]

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Baron Hill (IN-09): This Is My Town Hall Meeting. I Set the Rules



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MSM "Sham"

[wt] [...] Inevitably, the American mainstream media - ABC, NBC, CBS, the New York Times, the Washington Post, Time, Newsweek, et al - must be held to account for sitting on the sidelines as this major story kept building without them, went viral on YouTube, and then became so large that a key appointee of President Obama was forced to step down.

But with their decision to ignore the Jones story, they may have actually done Mr. Obama far more harm than good: Who vetted this guy? How did he get past the FBI? What did he say, and how did he answer the infamous seven-page questionnaire that all Obama appointees were required to fill out? Inquiring Freedom of Information Act minds want to know.

For most people in this country, the resignation was the first they had heard of Van Jones. For this sin of journalistic omission, there's institutional media blame. Bias is too tame a word for the utter shamelessness on display: Only Republican scandals - real and imagined - matter.

And it's not just those the Democratic-Media Complex dub as "mobs" or "tea baggers" that are taking notice. Diminishing audience and evaporating subscribership reflect widespread consumer dissatisfaction. Eventually, the money will run out.

But until then, the growing alternative media of Internet and talk radio and a burgeoning mass of justifiably angry Americans will make every effort to expose the sham that is mainstream journalism. [...]

Just as Mr. Obama was not even cursorily investigated, Van Jones, a fellow "community organizer," was not given the slightest media attention when named as an unaccountable "czar" selected to oversee billions in taxpayer money for the ambiguous purpose of "green energy." And that despite having a body of damning evidence that could be found with a single Google search by an ADHD-addled high-school journalism student.

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Study : Same mistakes made during the Great Depression

[t] [...]There are "troubling similarities" between the US President's actions since taking office and those which in the 1930s sent the US and much of the world spiralling into the worst economic collapse in recorded history, says the new pamphlet, published by the Institute of Economic Affairs.

In particular, the authors, economists Charles Rowley of George Mason University and Nathanael Smith of the Locke Institute, claim that the White House's plans to pour hundreds of billions of dollars of cash into the economy will undermine it in the long run. They say that by employing deficit spending and increased state intervention President Obama will ultimately hamper the long-term growth potential of the US economy and may risk delaying full economic recovery by several years.

The study represents a challenge to the widely held view that Keynesian fiscal policies helped the US recover from the Depression which started in the early 1930s. The authors say: "[Franklin D Roosevelt's] interventionist policies and draconian tax increases delayed full economic recovery by several years by exacerbating a climate of pessimistic expectations that drove down private capital formation and household consumption to unprecedented lows." [...]

The paper, which recommends that the US return to a more laissez-faire economic system rather than intervening further in activity, has been endorsed by Nobel laureate James Buchanan, who said: "We have learned some things from comparable experiences of the 1930s' Great Depression, perhaps enough to reduce the severity of the current contraction. But we have made no progress toward putting limits on political leaders, who act out their natural proclivities without any basic understanding of what makes capitalism work."

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Jack Webb Talks to Obama



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Jones : Case Study

[we] [...] Coverage of the Jones controversy was a case study of some of the deep divisions within the media. Fox News' Glenn Beck devoted program after program to Jones' past, and a number of conservative blogs were responsible for finding some of Jones' most inflammatory statements. Yet even as the controversy grew -- and even after Jones himself apologized for some of his words -- several of the nation's top media outlets failed to report the story. As late as Friday, as the Jones matter began to boil over, it had not been reported at all in the New York Times, the Washington Post, and the evening newscasts of ABC, CBS, and NBC. Although the Post and CBS went on to report the Jones story on Saturday, the Times did not inform its readers about the Jones matter until after Jones resigned.

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[nyt] “It’s so important to get a deal,” a White House official said, speaking on the condition of anonymity in order to be candid about strategy. “He will do almost anything it takes to get one.”

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Magic Man

[wapo] [...] The conventional wisdom is that Obama made a tactical mistake by farming out his agenda to Congress and allowing himself to be pulled left by the doctrinaire liberals of the Democratic congressional leadership. But the idea of Harry Reid and Nancy Pelosi pulling Obama left is quite ridiculous. Where do you think he came from, this friend of Chávista ex-terrorist William Ayers, of PLO apologist Rashid Khalidi, of racialist inciter Jeremiah Wright?

But forget the character witnesses. Just look at Obama's behavior as president, beginning with his first address to Congress. Unbidden, unforced and unpushed by the congressional leadership, Obama gave his most deeply felt vision of America, delivering the boldest social democratic manifesto ever issued by a U.S. president. In American politics, you can't get more left than that speech and still be on the playing field.

In a center-right country, that was problem enough. Obama then compounded it by vastly misreading his mandate. He assumed it was personal. This, after winning by a mere seven points in a year of true economic catastrophe, of an extraordinarily unpopular Republican incumbent, and of a politically weak and unsteady opponent. Nonetheless, Obama imagined that, as Fouad Ajami so brilliantly observed, he had won the kind of banana-republic plebiscite that grants caudillo-like authority to remake everything in one's own image.

Accordingly, Obama unveiled his plans for a grand makeover of the American system, animating that vision by enacting measure after measure that greatly enlarged state power, government spending and national debt. Not surprisingly, these measures engendered powerful popular skepticism that burst into tea-party town-hall resistance.

Obama's reaction to that resistance made things worse. Obama fancies himself tribune of the people, spokesman for the grass roots, harbinger of a new kind of politics from below that would upset the established lobbyist special-interest order of Washington. Yet faced with protests from a real grass-roots movement, his party and his supporters called it a mob -- misinformed, misled, irrational, angry, unhinged, bordering on racist. All this while the administration was cutting backroom deals with every manner of special interest -- from drug companies to auto unions to doctors -- in which favors worth billions were quietly and opaquely exchanged.

"Get out of the way" and "don't do a lot of talking," the great bipartisan scolded opponents whom he blamed for creating the "mess" from which he is merely trying to save us.

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Hmmm...

[as] [...] Already we see a cult of personality around Obama, one deliberately encouraged by the Obama political operation. Already we see him push for centralizing, fascistic economic powers. Already we see him creating "a civilian national security force that's just as powerful, just as strong, just as well-funded" as the regular military, complete with uniformed youths (and even senior citizens) formed into "cadres." And in order to make AmeriCorps less answerable to the public, Obama fired the Inspector General trying to blow the whistle on nefarious AmeriCorps activities. Now he is using AmeriCorps and the National Endowment for the Arts to politically agitate for his "recovery agenda."

And that's not to mention the Big Brother-like data-mining and reporting of "casual conversations" to a White House website, or the creepy address to all the nation's school children -- or the continued public trashing, by the permanent Obama campaign known as Organizing For America, of ordinary citizen protesters as "Right-Wing Domestic Terrorists."

Obama also is politicizing the Census; giving contracts to ACORN; letting a recognized hate group like the New Black Panthers go free; undermining the CIA at every turn, radicalizing the Supreme Court; re-orienting the civil rights division of the Justice Department; appointing more "czars" than anybody can keep track of and who, unlike Cabinet members, do not answer to Congress; resisting transparency on TARP bailout funds; refusing to enforce financial reporting requirements on union political organizers; and doing all sorts of other things designed, as are the items above, to consolidate power, tilt the deck, and rig the political rules in his favor for the long haul.

In foreign affairs, his radicalism is even more apparent. He keeps undermining allies while embracing enemies. He deliberately undercut the brave protesters in Iran. He stubbornly continues to punish Honduras and its citizens, via economic and travel sanctions, because Honduras actually followed its own Constitution in removing a harshly anti-American president from office -- when he should have been rewarding Honduras for its commitment to the rule of law. Yet while he punishes friendly Hondurans, he refuses to punish radical leftist Ecuadorean president Rafael Correa when Correa's government tries to shake down an American company for $27 billion. It's all very bizarre. One wonders what exactly his agenda is. But it's clearly something the likes of which we've never seen. Again, the comparison with Carter's foreign policy is telling. Carter's was full of woolly-minded, pie-in-the-sky idealism, but it didn't deliberately mollycoddle sworn enemies. Obama's, on the other hand, portrays Obama to the world as if Obama himself is more admirable than the nation he supposedly represents -- a nation for which he continually apologizes. This attempt, so far quite successful, to garner personal, worldwide glorification is another gambit for power. Again, it makes him nobody for domestic political adversaries to trifle with. It gives him tools never enjoyed by the Jimmy Carter who was burned in effigy by Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and his pals in 1979 and 1980.

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Deja Vu Dept : Rep. Rangel must step aside as chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee

[wapo] FOR POLITICIANS with major bad news to release or to make public, there's no time like the dead of August to do it. The thinking goes that the public won't remember a thing come September. We hope Rep. Charles B. Rangel (D-N.Y.) will have no such luck. His belated revelation of previously unreported income, property and bank accounts demands that he step aside as chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee.

Mr. Rangel's amended financial disclosure form, which exposes omissions from his 2002 through 2006 records, is a treasure trove of outrage. He neglected to report a checking account with the Congressional Federal Credit Union and one with Merrill Lynch, each valued between $250,000 and $500,000; the tens of thousands of dollars he's earning from dividends from a number of mutual funds and stocks; and the money made from the sale of a Harlem townhouse. As a result, Mr. Rangel's reported net worth doubled, from between $516,015 and $1,316,000 to between $1,028,024 and $2,495,000.

We called on Mr. Rangel to resign his coveted post last November while the House ethics committee probed his contact with a potential donor to a pet project who also had business before the committee. Mind you, that committee already was looking into his using official stationery to raise funds for that pet project, paying below-market rents on four Harlem apartments, failing to report income from a Florida condominium sale and failing to pay taxes on a home in the Dominican Republic. There's another subcommittee investigation into lobbyist-paid trips by Mr. Rangel and four other members of Congress.

Much is expected of elected officials. Much more is expected and demanded of those entrusted with chairmanships and the power that comes with them, especially when it involves the nation's purse strings. From all that we've seen thus far, Mr. Rangel has violated that trust continually and seemingly without care.

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Canada :
Hate speech law unconstitutional: rights tribunal

[np] The Canadian Human Rights Tribunal on Wednesday ruled that Section 13, Canada's much maligned human rights hate speech law, violates the Charter right to free expression because it carries the threat of punitive fines.

The shocking decision by Tribunal member Athanasios Hadjis leaves several hate speech cases in limbo, and appears to strip the Canadian Human Rights Commission of its controversial legal mandate to pursue hate on the Internet, which it has strenuously defended against complaints of censorship.

It also marks the first major failure of Section 13(1) of the Canadian Human Rights Act, an anti-hate law that was conceived in the 1960s to target racist telephone hotlines, then expanded in 2001 to the include the entire Internet, and for the last decade used almost exclusively by one complainant, activist Ottawa lawyer Richard Warman. [...]

Mr. Warman, a former investigator for the CHRC, brought a complaint against Mr. Lemire in 2003, after monitoring his website for almost a year. He alleged that postings on the discussion forum, mostly written by others, contravened Section 13 in that they were "likely to expose" identifiable groups to "hatred or contempt." Mr. Warman later urged the CHRC investigators to expand their investigation to other websites he believed Mr. Lemire was involved with, but to "hold off on informing" Mr. Lemire "until the police take a good look at it." No criminal charges were ever filed. [...]

Ezra Levant, a blogger who has led the campaign against human rights hate speech law, said the ruling "shows that the CHRC has been acting illegally for many years," and it forces the Conservative government to make a "new kind of decision" about whether to appeal.

"If they launch an appeal, they are casting their lot with the censors," he said.

Pearl Eliadis, a human rights lawyer and a defender of Section 13, played down the importance of the ruling, and said Mr. Hadjis "just got it wrong. With respect, it's constitutionally not within the normal way that these provisions are dealt with." She said he should have simply ignored the offending penalty section and upheld the law.

Bruce Ryder, a constitutional law professor at York University, said Mr. Hadjis was correct to find that the penalty provision "exacerbated the chilling effect" on freedom of expression. But he said Mr. Hadjis' reasoning "broke down at the end," and he should have simply rejected the penalty provision.

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Means and Ends in the Age of Obama

[pjm] One of the stranger things about this eerie first eight months of the Obama administration is how brazenly its supporters have been about the noble ends justifying the disreputable means.

Take taxes. I thought the mantra was that the Bush tax cuts — equal percentages of cuts to all involved, an even greater number of households excused from the tax rolls altogether — were supposed to be cruel and proof of conservative selfishness.

Candidate Obama once in an interview seemed to agree that greater revenue ensued for the federal treasury, but he felt that such benefits were not worth the empowerment of so many to become so wealthy. In other words, higher taxes were good for those who make money — and avoiding or cutting them was unpatriotic and greedy.

We now witness Rep. Charles Rangel, who not only somehow on a congressman’s salary compiled hundreds of thousands in cash in various accounts, but also seems to have skipped out on almost every conceivable tax on such lucre. We know the tired story of Treasury Secretary Geithner, who not only skipped his FICA taxes, but pocketed the cash allowances allotted precisely for them. Whether a Chris Dodd or Tom Daschle, the story is the same — insider perks from low interest mortgages to free limousine service were never reported and never taxed.

There are two ways of making sense of this paradox. One, such liberals assume that their cosmic humanitarianism and brotherly egalitarianism exempt them from following mere mortal laws (e.g., as in “We are so divine on the important stuff that we deserve a pass on small, insignificant matters”.) And two, in order to enact state planning, and superimpose an overarching government plan onto our own messy agendas, we must bow to a technocracy.

These gifted souls are like Plato’s Guardians —Übermenschen, trained at places like Harvard Law School, with government service at the Fed, years at this or that Cabinet post, or tenure in Congress under their belts, veterans of brief university postings. We are blessed with Geithners, Daschles, Obamas and others, and so can hardly demand they be bothered with minutiae like taxes, or following bureaucratic regulations governing gifts, whether Tony Rezko’s land deals or Friends of Angelo loan perks. [...]

One of the great tropes of the campaign was that a hip, cool Obama was “one of us” and had nothing to hide. In contrast, the Bush-Cheney nexus was knee-deep in secretive oil deals and military profiteering, involving the likes of Halliburton and Blackwater. Secrecy, executive privilege, and stone-walling the press were the usual tools of such a disreputable trade.

So we got promises of web postings of all pending legislation (never quite followed). There would be no planted questions or sympathetic toadies scattered at conferences and town halls (never quite followed). Instead of Scott McClellan, we were going to get something like a cross between a wonk like Paul Krugman and cool Brad Pitt — and got Robert Gibbs. There are no promised complete logs of who goes in and out of the White House.

Some of you say, “Well, yes, Victor, wake up, this is just politics”. Yes, of course, so “out of Iraq by March 2008” means 140,000 troops there in September 2009. I understand. Renditions and tribunals are Bush’s nefariousness, and my bite-the-lip necessities.

The point is thus twofold. The messianic promises proved (a) not just to be false, (b) but far less idealistic in reality than of those now castigated. “Culture of corruption” translated into Murtha, Rangel, and Dodd. No more lobbyists meant more than ever. Fiscal sobriety means $9 trillion more in borrowing. “Cash for clunkers” translates into borrowing millions to destroy perfectly good autos to allow down payments for consumers to go more in debt to buy imported compacts. “Stimulus” means more borrowing and little stimulation. Health-care reform envisions those who run the DMV or the cash for clunkers program deciding whether you really need that MRI for the lump on your neck.

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[bwhittle : america the mediocre?]

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Emo

PLAYBOY: Couldn't the attempt to rule whim out of life, to act in a totally rational fashion, be viewed as conducive to a juiceless, joyless kind of existence?

RAND: I truly must say that I don't know what you are talking about. Let's define our terms. Reason is man's tool of knowledge, the faculty that enables him to perceive the facts of reality. To act rationally means to act in accordance with the facts of reality. Emotions are not tools of cognition. What you feel tells you nothing about the facts; it merely tells you something about your estimate of the facts. Emotions are the result of your value judgments; they are caused by your basic premises, which you may hold consciously or subconsciously, which may be right or wrong. A whim is an emotion whose cause you neither know nor care to discover. Now what does it mean, to act on whim? It means that a man acts like a zombi, without any knowledge of what he deals with, what he wants to accomplish, or what motivates him. It means that a man acts in a state of temporary insanity. Is this what you call juicy or colorful? I think the only juice that can come out of such a situation is blood. To act against the facts of reality can result only in destruction.

PLAYBOY: Should one ignore emotions altogether, rule them out of one's life entirely?

RAND: Of course not. One should merely keep them in their place. An emotion is an automatic response, an automatic effect of man's value premises. An effect, not a cause. There is no necessary clash, no dichotomy between man's reason and his emotions -- provided he observes their proper relationship. A rational man knows -- or makes it a point to discover -- the source of his emotions, the basic premises from which they come; if his premises are wrong, he corrects them. He never acts on emotions for which he cannot account, the meaning of which he does not understand. In appraising a situation, he knows why he reacts as he does and whether he is right. He has no inner conflicts, his mind and his emotions are integrated, his consciousness is in perfect harmony. His emotions are not his enemies, they are his means of enjoying life. But they are not his guide; the guide is his mind. This relationship cannot be reversed, however. If a man takes his emotions as the cause and his mind as their passive effect, if he is guided by his emotions and uses his mind only to rationalize or justify them somehow -- then he is acting immorally, he is condemning himself to misery, failure, defeat, and he will achieve nothing but destruction -- his own and that of others.

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entire program here : [playlist]

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transmission at 8:37 AM | Permalink