If you can stomach the elitist arrogance and condescension exuding in the video below, you will see liberal news media members in action on CNN discussing the "desecration" of the internet caused by bloggers. Not by pornography, hate sites or terrorist created ones. No, blogs that express points of view that are at odds with the far-left, out of touch news media. Just people exercising their rights of free speech, dissemination of information and opinions.
As we discovered with the Journolist scandal, these media members want to completely control the transmission and availability of information ... with a very liberal/progressive angle.
Even with his own Party, it is all about Obama. He will throw Democrats under the bus in order to enact his legislation and ideologies.
Obama is a clear and present danger to most!
We have been calling for impeachment of Obama for a long time for myriad reasons. He presents an unprecedented existential threat to the welfare and survival of America as we have known it in the past – founded on principles of liberty, freedom, equality, justice and individuality and with a non-intrusive government.
In fact, the primary motivation and impetus for the creation of this website was the realization of the threats and risks to a free America that Obama presented combined with a far-left radical Democrat juggernaut in the Senate and House of Representatives. Information needs to be disseminated so we can all be informed and aware of what is transpiring and act accordingly. As we have just recently learned regarding the media collusion in the Journolist scandal, such information has been egregiously manipulated, controlled and even suppressed to support a far-left agenda (and candidate in Obama). The “main stream” media has become a de facto political wing and propaganda source for the Democratic Party and hence, the functioning government.
This is an incredibly dangerous situation for us American citizens and for the survival of our Democracy.
In the following trenchant, thorough and convincing editorial written by Tom Tancredo, who was a five term member of Congress, he calls for the impeachment of Obama. He concisely sums up the immense danger that Obama presents to our country by stating that:
For the first time in American history, we have a man in the White House who consciously and brazenly disregards his oath of office to protect and defend the Constitution. That's why I say the greatest threat to our Constitution, our safety and our liberties, is internal. Our president is an enemy of our Constitution, and, as such, he is a danger to our safety, our security and our personal freedoms.
If we can vote in enough Republicans to take over the House and Senate in November, then we will have what it takes to impeach Obama's - though we may also need to coax our elected officials to pursue this course of action.
The case for impeachment Obama has violated his oath of office over immigration
Tom Tancredo July 22, 2010
Eleven years ago, like every citizen elected to serve in Congress or any person appointed to any federal position, I swore an oath to "support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies foreign and domestic."
I've always thought it significant that the Founders included domestic enemies in that oath of office. They thought liberty was as much at risk from threats within our borders as from outside, and French political thinker and historian Alexis de Tocqueville agreed with that warning.
In the immediate aftermath of the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, the greatest threat to our nation was clear - and foreign. While Islamic terrorism still represents the greatest external threat to America and American lives, the avowed program of the Obama regime has changed the picture in a fundamental way.
For the first time in American history, we have a man in the White House who consciously and brazenly disregards his oath of office to protect and defend the Constitution. That's why I say the greatest threat to our Constitution, our safety and our liberties, is internal. Our president is an enemy of our Constitution, and, as such, he is a danger to our safety, our security and our personal freedoms.
Barack Obama is one of the most powerful presidents this nation has seen in generations. He is powerful because he is supported by large majorities in Congress, but, more importantly, because he does not feel constrained by the rule of law. Whether he is putting up the weakest possible defense of the Defense of Marriage Act despite the Justice Department's legal obligation to support existing law; disenfranchising Chrysler and GM bondholders in order to transfer billions of investor dollars to his supporters in the United Auto Workers; or implementing yet a third offshore oil-drilling moratorium even after two federal courts have thrown out two previous moratoriums, President Obama is determined to see things done his way regardless of obstacles. To Mr. Obama, the rule of law is a mere inconvenience to be ignored, overcome or "transcended" through international agreements or "norms."
Mr. Obama's paramount goal, as he so memorably put it during his campaign in 2008, is to "fundamentally transform America." He has not proposed improving America - he is intent on changing its most essential character. The words he has chosen to describe his goals are neither the words nor the motivation of just any liberal Democratic politician. This is the utopian, or rather dystopian, reverie of a dedicated Marxist - a dedicated Marxist who lives in the White House.
Because of the power he wields over budgets, the judiciary, national defense and even health care, his regime and his program are not just about changing public policy in the conventional sense. When one considers the combination of his stop-at-nothing attitude, his contempt for limited government, his appointment of judges who want to create law rather than interpret it - all of these make this president today's single greatest threat to the great experiment in freedom that is our republic.
Yes, Mr. Obama is a more serious threat to America than al Qaeda. We know that Osama bin Laden and followers want to kill us, but at least they are an outside force against whom we can offer our best defense. But when a dedicated enemy of the Constitution is working from the inside, we face a far more dangerous threat. Mr. Obama can accomplish with the stroke of his pen what bin Laden cannot accomplish with bombs and insurgents.
Mr. Obama's actions, not just his words, show the threat he poses. A level of government deficit spending unheard of since World War II and trillion-dollar deficits as far as the eye can see represent an unacceptable threat to our economic security and our children's future. Mr. Obama could be the first president to guarantee that the next generation of Americans has a lower standard of living than their parents.
Mr. Obama's most egregious and brazen betrayal of our Constitution was his statement to Sen. Jon Kyl, Arizona Republican, that the administration will not enforce security on our southern border because that would remove Republicans' desire to negotiate a "comprehensive" immigration bill. That is, to put it plainly, a decision that by any reasonable standard constitutes an impeachable offense against the Constitution. For partisan political advantage, he is willfully disregarding his obligation under Article IV, Section 4 of the Constitution to protect states from foreign invasion.
There is no higher duty of the federal government and our elected representatives than to protect our nation from invasion. Multiple reports and testimony before Congress by U.S. law enforcement and intelligence officials have stated that a porous border with Mexico is "a path" terrorists will use if they can. Some would-be terrorists, including at least one associated with Hezbollah, already have. Recent reports of contacts between Hezbollah and Mexican drug cartels make it all but certain that terrorists intent on destroying us will come across our southwestern border. Therefore, it is of utmost importance for the administration to do everything in its power to keep Americans safe. Our safety is not a bargaining chip for another amnesty - or for any other political objective whatsoever.
Mr. Obama's refusal to live up to his own oath of office - which includes the duty to defend the United States against foreign invasion - requires senators and representatives to live up to their oaths. Members of Congress must defend our nation against all enemies, foreign and domestic. Today, that means bringing impeachment charges against Mr. Obama.
Tom Tancredo is a former member of the House Foreign Affairs Committee and five-term member of Congress from Colorado. He serves as chairman of the Rocky Mountain Foundation.
A few examples of demagogic racist groups and individuals who glibly but falsely claim racism when they want special treatment or don't like unrelated circumstances. Except for the Black Panthers, they are also sought out by the media as spokespersons and experts for an entire race:
NAACP
Congressional Black Caucus
The New Black Panther Party
Jesse Jackson, Louis Farrakhan, Al Sharpton, Eric Holder, Rev. Jeremiah Wright, Van Jones, Jay-Z
University Depts. of Black Studies - akin to Mosques with Imams preaching hatred. (See Professor Henry Jones of Obama/Cambridge Police Dept. fame)
The TEA Parties are comprised of normal everyday people of all persuasions and ethnic backgrounds who just want their freedoms, rights and government back.
The following explosive video exposes and explores the issue of Obama’s Presidential campaign allowing a prominent presence on his web site of the New Black Panthers Party. This was not an accidental coincidence or oversight by the Obama team which ran a very precise and carefully orchestrated campaign. You don’t publicize or honor a person or a group to such an extent if you strongly disagree with them or find them repugnant. This was the featuring of a group that is ideologically similar to Obama.
And we have seen what that ideology is over the last 18 months. Viciously and vehemently:
Anti-American.
Anti-White.
Anti-Capitalism.
Anti-Establishment.
Anti-Semitic. Anti-Christian.
But strongly narcissistic, hedonistic, pro-Islamic and racist (as in black nationalism as in Rev. Wright, Louis Farrakhan and Van Jones, et al.)
This is what is occupying the White House at present ... and why he needs to be removed.
The Dept. of Justice, which should be protecting the rights of all Americans and the Constitutionally enumerated equality of all (Fourteenth Amendment), apparently is not fulfilling its mandate. Under Obama and Attorney General Eric Holder, a racist bias has suffused the agency. Their ideology is that some people - blacks in particular and Democratically voting Hispanics - are "more equal" than others, specifically Whites. Some of this also stems from Obama's 20 years attending the vitriolic, racist rants of Rev. Wright in church where he preached black nationalism and supremacy. (Then again, Obama "claimed" to have heard nothing controversial. And Bill Clinton "didn't inhale" or "have sex with that woman".)
This sanctioned and enforced racism of blacks over whites is something that all Americans need to be aware of and react and respond to aggressively. If not, our rights will continue to progressively erode and we will find ourselves in a racially very hostile country that may be balkanized.
Obama's instructions that NASA transform itself into essentially a pro-Islam social service and jettison its celestial exploration plans fulfills yet another one of his goals in the systematic destruction of our country from within. The space agency will spend its allocated money on exalting the Islamic scientific contributions(?) rather than researching and building the next generation shuttles and planning expeditions back to the Moon and maybe to Mars.
Meanwhile, China is continuing its aggressive research and planned space missions. Maybe if Obama bows down low enough, they may allow him to attend the rocket launch for their mission to the Moon.
The following video captures the racist vitriol of one of the individuals charged in the New Black Panther Party voter intimidation case that occurred in Philadelphia during the Presidential elections. He lost the case that the Bush Administration had originally filed but then the Obama Administration dismissed all charges without explanation.
If this had been the KKK or a white supremacy group, you can be most assured that this case would have been prosecuted to the fullest and you would have read about it ad infinitum in the news media.
Millions of misguided voters found Obama to be quite articulate and disarming before the Presidential elections. Who knew that these “skills” would be applied in a widespread manner such as in arms negotiations and national defense? In case you missed it, Obama is effectively unilaterally disarming the United States and exposing us to a future apocalypse by mandating reductions, removal and/or cancellations of defensive and offensive weaponry.
Such actions are suicidal, indefensible and irresponsible. As discussed in the following article, Obama’s thorough disarming of our country will make us infinitely more vulnerable not just to Russia or China but also to North Korea, Iran, small belligerent nations and terrorists groups.
In our opinion, if Obama sets these actions in motion, Congress with public pressure should investigate the possibility of grounds for impeachment.
Dropping The Shield
Investors Business Daily 06/30/2010
National Security: The administration is ready to sign a treaty stripping us of our ability to defend ourselves against enemy nuclear missiles, including Iran's and North Korea's. In space, no one can hear you surrender.
On Monday, the ground-based Terminal High Altitude Area Defense system, part of the U.S. missile defense shield, successfully shot down a ballistic missile launched from a ship's deck off Kauai, Hawaii. The test simulated an Iranian SCUD launched from the deck of a ship off the U.S. coast, which, if armed with a nuke, could devastate the American heartland.
The simulated Scud was launched from the deck of the decommissioned 603-foot amphibious assault ship Tripoli. U.S. Army soldiers of the 6th Air Defense Artillery Brigade from Fort Bliss, Texas, successfully intercepted it with a Terminal High Altitude Area Defense (THAAD) interceptor.
Missile defense, the dream of President Reagan, is a successful reality. With a layered system of ground-based, long-range interceptors, the sea-based Aegis system and theater systems such as the Patriot and THAAD, we can defend against — rather than just avenge — a ballistic missile attack.
Yet our disarmer in chief, President Obama, stands ready to strip us naked before our enemies by signing a treaty designed to demilitarize space. Since interceptors such as THAAD are designed to hit their targets on the edge of space and can be modified to kill satellites, such a treaty would effectively ban their use.
Almost simultaneously on Monday, the Obama administration unveiled a new space policy that reverses the Bush administration policy of unrestricted access to and operations in space. The Bush policy, released in August 2006, said it "rejects any limitations on the fundamental right of the United States to operate in and acquire data from space." We had a right to defend ourselves.
That right will be surrendered unilaterally by a new space policy under which the U.S. will "consider proposals and concepts for arms control measures if they are equitable, effectively verifiable and enhance the national security of the United States and its allies."
Such fairness is in the eyes of the beholder, and this administration does not have a good track record of enhancing the national security of the United States. For example, it has cut the number of ground-based interceptors planned for Alaska and Hawaii, both within range of North Korea's Taepodong-2.
It has also betrayed our Polish and Czech allies by scrapping plans for a similar system in Europe. And it has scrapped tested and ready systems like the Air Force's Airborne Laser (ABL), a modified Boeing 747-F that can be deployed anywhere in the world, loitering off an enemy's coast to destroy its missiles in their vulnerable boost phase. And it's reusable.
These "proposals and concepts" could come soon in the form of the PAROS (prevention of arms race in space) treaty. Like the nuclear freeze once proposed at the height of the Cold War, these Munich clones are designed not to prevent war, but to disarm America.
Russia, China, North Korea and Iran, among others, would like to see us unilaterally give up our ability to render their huge investments in nuclear missiles irrelevant.
A simple Iranian Scud missile, with a nuclear warhead, could be fired from an inconspicuous freighter in international waters off our coast and detonated high above the U.S. It would wreak near total devastation on America's technological, electrical and transportation infrastructure. The ship could then be scuttled, taking the identity of the attacker with it.
If a hostile power detonated a nuclear weapon high over the U.S., generating an electro-magnetic pulse that would fry virtually every circuit and electronic device in the country, America and its economy could be sent back a century or more.
Iran has practiced launching and detonating Scuds in midflight from ships in the Caspian Sea. Iran has also tested high-altitude explosions of its Shahab-3 ballistic missile, a test consistent with an EMP attack.
Surrendering missile defense through such a treaty amounts to more unilateral disarmament in the face of dangerous and hostile enemies. The president wants us to rally around a white flag.
In a more thorough interview with Megan Kelly, he exposed the rampant attitude of pro-black racism in the Justice Dept. as well as the arrogance, incompetence and culture of corruption present there.
This is an eye-opener … and another reason why the Democrats need to be voted out of office in November and why Obama must be vigorously opposed and ultimately removed as President.
The United States is headed by among its most inept, internationally scorned, ridiculed and disrespected Presidents ever (Jimmy Carter, an Obama advisor, is the competition for this “honor”). He is universally seen as a feckless amateur without leadership skills and a zero intimidation factor.
The anti-Reagan.
Add this to his far-felt pacifist beliefs and throw in a far left political appointee with little practical experience and the physiognomy of a school board member to serve as an arms negotiator with the ruthless Russians under Putin … and this spells a disaster in the making.
A sheep negotiating with wolves.
We are not safe while Obama remains our President!
The consequences of his ineptitude, lack of leadership and common sense, his destructive pacifism and quixotic ideologies are real existential threats to our country.
Missing Defense
Investors Business Daily 06/18/2010
Undersecretary of state for international security and arms control Ellen Tauscher
National Security: There seems to be only one thing White House arms negotiators want more than a reduction in U.S. nuclear weapons — a reduction in U.S. missile defenses to protect us from such weapons.
The Washington Times' Bill Gertz reports that U.S. diplomats are secretly negotiating with Russia to link nuclear arms reduction to limits on our anti-missile defenses.
As Gertz points out, "Pro-arms-control officials within the administration dislike missile defenses, viewing them as an impediment to offensive arms agreements."
Ellen Tauscher, the undersecretary of state for international security and arms control, has been talking to Moscow's deputy foreign minister, Sergei Rybakov, and that in and of itself should generate fears.
Tauscher's qualifications for her current job amount to little beyond her experience as a Democratic Party fundraiser and seven terms as a San Francisco congresswoman with a reputation, according to the media at least, as a centrist, but a voting record that shows her to be an unalloyed liberal.
Tauscher let it be known when she left the House for the State Department last year that her priority was to eliminate all nuclear weapons in the world.
If that requires giving away the store on missile defense, it's worth it in the worldview of an administration that was sure an extended hand would lead Iran to end its nuclear program.
Deputy Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty negotiator Frank Rose less than a month ago said at a London conference that the Obama administration was seeking a deal on missile defense "cooperation" via the Tauscher-Rybakov negotiations.
As quoted by Gertz, Rose said, "The door to tangible, mutually beneficial missile defense cooperation with the United States, and potentially with NATO, is wide open."
President Obama has already abandoned the Czechs and the Poles on missile defense against Russian aggression under the rule of former KGB operative Vladimir Putin.
Are we now going to leave ourselves defenseless too?
It's worth remembering the crucial role that a commitment to missile defense played in the demise of the Soviet empire.
Soviet dissident Natan Sharansky noted that President Reagan's Strategic Defense Initiative, and the realization that Moscow didn't have the resources to compete with it, made Mikhail Gorbachev's advisers "finally accept demands for internal reform."
As British historian Andrew Roberts notes in his "History of the English-Speaking Peoples Since 1900," Reagan himself would call strategic missile defense "the single most important reason, on the United States' side, for the historic breakthroughs that were to occur" in the years before the fall of the Berlin Wall.
Yet the Obama administration's attitude is like that of the liberal internationalists of the 1980s, described by Reagan Defense Secretary Caspar Weinberger in his autobiography: "The idea that any country might try to defend itself against the nuclear weapons of another country was not only revolutionary, it was sacrilegious."
As Roberts notes, detentists at the time "alternately (and contradictorily) denounced" missile defense "as expensively unworkable and strategically destabilizing."
The decades since have proved that missile defense is fantastically workable. The only thing that will stop free people from defending themselves against nuclear missiles is leaders deluded by notions of utopianism and appeasement.
We have always vehemently felt that the dismissal by the Obama Administration of voter intimidation charges against the New Black Panther Party was evidence of their racist, double-standard ideology and not because of lack of evidence. The U.S. had all but won the case yet when it was dismissed, black Attorney General Eric Holder stonewalled all who sought an explanation for the action.
Finally, we now have an answer provided by an attorney within the Justice Dept. who was directly involved in the case. This attorney, J. Christian Adams, has provided explicit inside information on this particular case as well as the mindset and ideologies of those within the Justice Dept. What he reveals in an excoriating expose is precisely what we expected and what is at the ideological core of Obama and his Administration: anti-White racism and a double-standard of ignoring minority perpetrated acts of lawlessness while prosecuting those where Whites were the violators.
This should come as no surprise to those who have investigated or paid close attention to even parts of Obama’s past. His 20 years in the Black Nationalist, anti-White, anti-American Trinity United Church of Christ in Chicago which was led by Rev. Wright and honored and revered the despicably racist, anti-Semitic and anti-American Nation of Islam leader Louis Farakkhan. (See video as refresher). His associations with many other black racists over much of his life (check the category Reverse Racism for more).
The endemic (reverse) racism in the government fostered, facilitated and condoned by Obama and his appointees MUST NOT BE TOLERATED!
We must widely expose, condemn and attack this corrupt and illegal attitude and behavior which starts at the top: Obama
OBAMA MUST BE REMOVED FROM OFFICE!!
Inside the Black Panther case Anger, ignorance and lies
By J. Christian Adams June 25, 2010
On the day President Obama was elected, armed men wearing the black berets and jackboots of the New Black Panther Party were stationed at the entrance to a polling place in Philadelphia. They brandished a weapon and intimidated voters and poll watchers.
After the election, the Justice Department brought a voter-intimidation case against the New Black Panther Party and those armed thugs. I and other Justice attorneys diligently pursued the case and obtained an entry of default after the defendants ignored the charges. Before a final judgment could be entered in May 2009, our superiors ordered us to dismiss the case.
The New Black Panther case was the simplest and most obvious violation of federal law I saw in my Justice Department career. Because of the corrupt nature of the dismissal, statements falsely characterizing the case and, most of all, indefensible orders for the career attorneys not to comply with lawful subpoenas investigating the dismissal, this month I resigned my position as a Department of Justice (DOJ) attorney.
The federal voter-intimidation statutes we used against the New Black Panthers were enacted because America never realized genuine racial equality in elections. Threats of violence characterized elections from the end of the Civil War until the passage of the Voting Rights Act in 1965. Before the Voting Rights Act, blacks seeking the right to vote, and those aiding them, were victims of violence and intimidation. But unlike the Southern legal system, Southern violence did not discriminate. Black voters were slain, as were the white champions of their cause. Some of the bodies were tossed into bogs and in one case in Philadelphia, Miss., they were buried together in an earthen dam.
Based on my firsthand experiences, I believe the dismissal of the Black Panther case was motivated by a lawless hostility toward equal enforcement of the law. Others still within the department share my assessment. The department abetted wrongdoers and abandoned law-abiding citizens victimized by the New Black Panthers. The dismissal raises serious questions about the department's enforcement neutrality in upcoming midterm elections and the subsequent 2012 presidential election.
The U.S. Commission on Civil Rights has opened an investigation into the dismissal and the DOJ's skewed enforcement priorities. Attorneys who brought the case are under subpoena to testify, but the department ordered us to ignore the subpoena, lawlessly placing us in an unacceptable legal limbo.
The assistant attorney general for civil rights, Tom Perez, has testified repeatedly that the "facts and law" did not support this case. That claim is false. If the actions in Philadelphia do not constitute voter intimidation, it is hard to imagine what would, short of an actual outbreak of violence at the polls. Let's all hope this administration has not invited that outcome through the corrupt dismissal.
Most corrupt of all, the lawyers who ordered the dismissal - Loretta King, the Obama-appointed acting head of the Civil Rights Division, and Steve Rosenbaum - did not even read the internal Justice Department memorandums supporting the case and investigation. Just as Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr. admitted that he did not read the Arizona immigration law before he condemned it, Mr. Rosenbaum admitted that he had not bothered to read the most important department documents detailing the investigative facts and applicable law in the New Black Panther case. Christopher Coates, the former Voting Section chief, was so outraged at this dereliction of responsibility that he actually threw the memos at Mr. Rosenbaum in the meeting where they were discussing the dismissal of the case. The department subsequently removed all of Mr. Coates' responsibilities and sent him to South Carolina.
Mr. Perez also inaccurately testified to the House Judiciary Committee that federal "Rule 11" required the dismissal of the lawsuit. Lawyers know that Rule 11 is an ethical obligation to bring only meritorious claims, and such a charge by Mr. Perez effectively challenges the ethics and professionalism of the five attorneys who commenced the case. Yet the attorneys who brought the case were voting rights experts and would never pursue a frivolous matter. Their experience in election law far surpassed the experience of the officials who ordered the dismissal.
Some have called the actions in Philadelphia an isolated incident, not worthy of federal attention. To the contrary, the Black Panthers in October 2008 announced a nationwide deployment for the election. We had indications that polling-place thugs were deployed elsewhere, not only in November 2008, but also during the Democratic primaries, where they targeted white Hillary Rodham Clinton supporters. In any event, the law clearly prohibits even isolated incidents of voter intimidation.
Others have falsely claimed that no voters were affected. Not only did the evidence rebut this claim, but the law does not require a successful effort to intimidate; it punishes even the attempt.
Most disturbing, the dismissal is part of a creeping lawlessness infusing our government institutions. Citizens would be shocked to learn about the open and pervasive hostility within the Justice Department to bringing civil rights cases against nonwhite defendants on behalf of white victims. Equal enforcement of justice is not a priority of this administration. Open contempt is voiced for these types of cases.
Some of my co-workers argued that the law should not be used against black wrongdoers because of the long history of slavery and segregation. Less charitable individuals called it "payback time." Incredibly, after the case was dismissed, instructions were given that no more cases against racial minorities like the Black Panther case would be brought by the Voting Section.
Refusing to enforce the law equally means some citizens are protected by the law while others are left to be victimized, depending on their race. Core American principles of equality before the law and freedom from racial discrimination are at risk. Hopefully, equal enforcement of the law is still a point of bipartisan, if not universal, agreement. However, after my experience with the New Black Panther dismissal and the attitudes held by officials in the Civil Rights Division, I am beginning to fear the era of agreement over these core American principles has passed.
J. Christian Adams is a lawyer based in Virginia who served as a voting rights attorney at the Justice Department until this month. He blogs at electionlawcenter.com.
One of the first moves that Obama made when becoming President was to remove a bust of Winston Churchill and send it back to Great Britain. This unwarranted act was politically imprudent and irresponsible and was interpreted as such by one of our greatest longtime allies. It should have also served as a portent for all as to the radical direction that Obama would take and ideology that he subscribes to.
Obama White House loved the magazine cover of him walking on water
Andrew Malcolm June 21, 2010
Ever since the Obama White House got rid of that British colonial era bust of Sir Winston Churchill on-loan from Great Britain, they've been on the lookout for new less offensive art.
Now we learn, thanks to Howard Kurtz on CNN, that Obama adviser David Axelrod made a call to the editor of the New Yorker magazine requesting a copy of the Feb. 1 cover of the magazine showing No. 44 walking on water. (No, not the newly-resurfaced Gulf of Mexico.)
The only stipulation: The cover art had to be autographed by artist Barry Blitt.
Here's the exchange between Kurtz and magazine editor David Remnick on "Reliable Sources":
REMNICK: Well, they wanted a signed version of the cover. And, you know, there were other covers maybe they didn't like as well. But I think they got over it. In fact, they got over it a lot faster than some other people.
KURTZ: What did Axelrod's office tell you about Obama's personal reaction?
REMNICK: I think Axelrod and Obama were laughing hysterically over this cover. And the fact to their credit, within a matter of weeks, that they reversed the really sinking trend that they were experiencing, and they passed health care. And the White House certainly reversed its downward trend pretty quickly after that cover. I'm not saying the cover was anywhere near responsible for it.
KURTZ: Well, it's a good thing you didn't have him sinking all the way into the water after Scott Brown's victory.
We'll add below one of the other Obama covers that Remnick alludes to, referencing Obama's alleged Muslim ties from the 2008 campaign.
Obama’s dereliction of duty regarding expeditiously and appropriately responding to the Gulf oil spill is now being compensated for by strong-arm threats from him and other Administration officials. The American public, including much of his fawning liberal support base, find these to be offensive, unwarranted and not constructive. They are repulsed by his initial actions of sending lawyers through Attorney General Eric Holder to investigate legal infractions rather than marshalling clean-up and stop-up crews.
His most recent response was to form a committee filled with his appointees to deal with the spill two months after it occurred. And who are the members of it? Oil industry experts? Individuals with maritime expertise?
Of course not! They are bureaucrats, environmentalist and political insiders – Obama ideologues. There is no real world experience related to this scenario but that is not the least bit surprising with this arrogant, corrupt, incompetent and ideologically rigid and radical administration.
And these are just a few of the infinite reasons that Obama’s support continues to plummet even among his previously most ardent supports.
Obama's thuggery is useless in fighting spill
Michael Barone June 20, 2010
Thuggery is unattractive. Ineffective thuggery even more so. Which may be one reason so many Americans have been reacting negatively to the response of Barack Obama and his administration to BP's Gulf oil spill.
Take Interior Secretary Ken Salazar's remark that he would keep his "boot on the neck" of BP, which brings to mind George Orwell's definition of totalitarianism as "a boot stamping on a human face -- forever." Except that Salazar's boot hasn't gotten much in the way of results yet.
Or consider Obama's undoubtedly carefully considered statement to Matt Lauer that he was consulting with experts "so I know whose ass to kick." Attacking others is a standard campaign tactic when you're in political trouble, and certainly BP, which appears to have taken unwise shortcuts in the Gulf, is an attractive target.
But you don't always win arguments that way. The Obama White House gleefully took on Dick Cheney on the issue of terrorist interrogations. It turned out that more Americans agreed with Cheney's stand, despite his low poll numbers, than Obama's.
Then there is Obama's decision to impose a six-month moratorium on deepwater oil drilling in the Gulf. This penalizes companies with better safety records than BP's and will result in many advanced drilling rigs being sent to offshore oil fields abroad.
The justification offered was an Interior Department report supposedly "peer reviewed" by "experts identified by the National Academy of Engineering." But it turned out the drafts the experts saw didn't include any recommendation for a moratorium. Eight of the cited experts have said they oppose the moratorium as more economically devastating than the oil spill and "counterproductive" to safety.
This was blatant dishonesty by the administration, on an Orwellian scale. In defense of a policy that has all the earmarks of mindless panic, that penalizes firms and individuals guilty of no wrongdoing and that will worsen rather than improve our energy situation. Ineffective thuggery.
And what about the decision not to waive the Jones Act, which bars foreign-flag vessels from coming to the aid of the Gulf cleanup? The Bush administration promptly waived it after Katrina in 2005. The Obama administration hasn't and claims unconvincingly that, gee, there aren't really any foreign vessels that could help.
The more plausible explanation is that this is a sop to the maritime unions, part of the union movement that gave Obama and other Democrats $400 million in the 2008 campaign cycle. It's the Chicago way: Dance with the girl that brung ya.
Or the decision to deny Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal's proposal to deploy barges to skim oil from the Gulf's surface. Can't do that until we see if they've got enough life preservers and fire equipment. That inspired blogger Rand Simberg to write a blog post he dated June 1, 1940: "The evacuation of British and French troops from the besieged French city of Dunkirk was halted today, over concerns that many of the private vessels that had been deployed for the task were unsafe for troop transport."
Finally, the $20 billion escrow fund that Obama pried out of the BP treasury at the White House when he talked for the first time, 57 days after the rig exploded, with BP Chairman Tony Hayward. It's pleasing to think that those injured by BP will be paid off speedily, but House Republican Joe Barton had a point, though an impolitic one, when he called this a "shakedown."
For there already are laws in place that insure that BP will be held responsible for damages and the company has said it will comply.
So what we have is government transferring property from one party, an admittedly unattractive one, to others, not based on pre-existing laws but on decisions by one man, pay czar Kenneth Feinberg.
Feinberg gets good reviews from everyone. But the Constitution does not command "no person . . . shall . . . be deprived of life, liberty or property, without due process of law except by the decision of a person as wise and capable as Kenneth Feinberg." The Framers stopped at "due process of law."
Obama doesn't. "If he sees any impropriety in politicians ordering executives about, upstaging the courts and threatening confiscation, he has not said so," write the editors of the Economist, who then suggest that markets see Obama as "an American version of Vladimir Putin." Except that Putin is an effective thug.
In a scathing editorial by a liberal regarding Obama’s abysmal international reputation based on the magnitude and clarity of Obama’s ineptitude, inexperience, lack of sophistication, and narcissism, Mort Zuckerman writes:
America right now appears to be unreliable to traditional friends, compliant to rivals, and weak to enemies. One renowned Asian leader stated recently at a private dinner in the United States, "We in Asia are convinced that Obama is not strong enough to confront his opponents, but we fear that he is not strong enough to support his friends."
This unprecedented and consensus view portends extremely for the United States as a country as well as for international stability and constructive resolution of conflicts and issues.
World Sees Obama as Incompetent and Amateur The president is well-intentioned but can't walk the walk on the world stage
Mortimer B. Zuckerman June 18, 2010
President Obama came into office as the heir to a great foreign policy legacy enjoyed by every recent U.S. president. Why? Because the United States stands on top of the power ladder, not necessarily as the dominant power, but certainly as the leading one. As such we are the sole nation capable of exercising global leadership on a whole range of international issues from security, trade, and climate to counterterrorism. We also benefit from the fact that most countries distrust the United States far less than they distrust one another, so we uniquely have the power to build coalitions. As a result, most of the world still looks to Washington for help in their region and protection against potential regional threats.
Yet, the Iraq war lingers; Afghanistan continues to be immersed in an endless cycle of tribalism, corruption, and Islamist resurgence; Guantánamo remains open; Iran sees how North Korea toys with Obama and continues its programs to develop nuclear weapons and missiles; Cuba spurns America's offers of a greater opening; and the Palestinians and Israelis find that it is U.S. policy positions that defer serious negotiations, the direct opposite of what the Obama administration hoped for.
The reviews of Obama's performance have been disappointing. He has seemed uncomfortable in the role of leading other nations, and often seems to suggest there is nothing special about America's role in the world. The global community was puzzled over the pictures of Obama bowing to some of the world's leaders and surprised by his gratuitous criticisms of and apologies for America's foreign policy under the previous administration of George W. Bush. One Middle East authority, Fouad Ajami, pointed out that Obama seems unaware that it is bad form and even a great moral lapse to speak ill of one's own tribe while in the lands of others.
Even in Britain, for decades our closest ally, the talk in the press—supported by polls—is about the end of the "special relationship" with America. French President Nicolas Sarkozy openly criticized Obama for months, including a direct attack on his policies at the United Nations. Sarkozy cited the need to recognize the real world, not the virtual world, a clear reference to Obama's speech on nuclear weapons. When the French president is seen as tougher than the American president, you have to know that something is awry. Vladimir Putin of Russia has publicly scorned a number of Obama's visions. Relations with the Chinese leadership got off to a bad start with the president's poorly-organized visit to China, where his hosts treated him disdainfully and prevented him from speaking to a national television audience of the Chinese people. The Chinese behavior was unprecedented when compared to visits by other U.S. presidents.
Obama's policy on Afghanistan—supporting a surge in troops, but setting a date next year when they will begin to withdraw—not only gave a mixed signal, but provided an incentive for the Taliban just to wait us out. The withdrawal part of the policy was meant to satisfy a domestic constituency, but succeeded in upsetting all of our allies in the region. Further anxiety was provoked by Obama's severe public criticism of Afghan President Hamid Karzai and his coterie of family and friends for their lackluster leadership, followed by a reversal of sorts regarding the same leaders.
Obama clearly wishes to do good and means well. But he is one of those people who believe that the world was born with the word and exists by means of persuasion, such that there is no person or country that you cannot, by means of logical and moral argument, bring around to your side. He speaks as a teacher, as someone imparting values and generalities appropriate for a Sunday morning sermon, not as a tough-minded leader. He urges that things "must be done" and "should be done" and that "it is time" to do them. As the former president of the Council on Foreign Relations, Les Gelb, put it, there is "the impression that Obama might confuse speeches with policy." Another journalist put it differently when he described Obama as an "NPR [National Public Radio] president who gives wonderful speeches." In other words, he talks the talk but doesn't know how to walk the walk. The Obama presidency has so far been characterized by a well-intentioned but excessive belief in the power of rhetoric with too little appreciation of reality and loyalty.
In his Cairo speech about America and the Muslim world, Obama managed to sway Arab public opinion but was unable to budge any Arab leader. Even the king of Saudi Arabia, a country that depends on America for its survival, reacted with disappointment and dismay. Obama's meeting with the king was widely described as a disaster. This is but one example of an absence of the personal chemistry that characterized the relationships that Presidents Clinton and Bush had with world leaders. This is a serious matter because foreign policy entails an understanding of the personal and political circumstances of the leaders as well as the cultural and historical factors of the countries we deal with.
Les Gelb wrote of Obama, "He is so self-confident that he believes he can make decisions on the most complicated of issues after only hours of discussion." Strategic decisions go well beyond being smart, which Obama certainly is. They must be based on experience that discerns what works, what doesn't—and why. This requires experienced staffing, which Obama and his top appointees simply do not seem to have. Or as one Middle East commentator put it, "There are always two chess games going on. One is on the top of the table, the other is below the table. The latter is the one that counts, but the Americans don't know how to play that game."
Recent U.S. attempts to introduce more meaningful sanctions against Iran produced a U.N. resolution that is way less than the "crippling" sanctions the administration promised. The United States even failed to achieve the political benefit of a unanimous Security Council vote. Turkey, the Muslim anchor of NATO for almost 60 years, and Brazil, our largest ally in Latin America, voted against our resolution. Could it be that these long-standing U.S. allies, who gave cover to Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and Iran's nuclear ambitions, have decided that there is no cost in lining up with America's most serious enemies and no gain in lining up with this administration?
The end result is that a critical mass of influential people in world affairs who once held high hopes for the president have begun to wonder whether they misjudged the man. They are no longer dazzled by his rock star personality and there is a sense that there is something amateurish and even incompetent about how Obama is managing U.S. power. For example, Obama has asserted that America is not at war with the Muslim world. The problem is that parts of the Muslim world are at war with America and the West. Obama feels, fairly enough, that America must be contrite in its dealings with the Muslim world. But he has failed to address the religious intolerance, failing economies, tribalism, and gender apartheid that together contribute to jihadist extremism. This was startling and clear when he chose not to publicly support the Iranians who went to the streets in opposition to their oppressive government, based on a judgment that our support might be counterproductive. Yet, he reaches out instead to the likes of Bashar Assad of Syria, Iran's agent in the Arab world, sending our ambassador back to Syria even as it continues to rearm Hezbollah in Lebanon and expands its role in the Iran-Hezbollah-Hamas alliance.
The underlying issue is that the Arab world has different estimates on how to deal with an aggressive, expansionist Iran. The Arabs believe you do not deal with Iran with the open hand of a handshake but with the clenched fist of power. Arab leaders fear an Iran proceeding full steam with its nuclear weapons program on top of its programs to develop intermediate-range ballistic missiles. All the while centrifuges keep spinning in Iran, and Arab leaders ask whether Iran will be emboldened by what they interpret as American weakness and faltering willpower. They did not see Obama or his administration as understanding the region, where naiveté is interpreted as a weakness of character, as amateurism, and as proof of the absence of the tough stuff of which leaders are made. (That's why many Arab leaders were appalled at the decision to have a civilian trial of Khalid Sheikh Mohammed in New York. After 9/11, many of them had engaged in secret counterterrorism activities under the umbrella of an American promise that these activities would never be made public; now they feared that this would be the exact consequence of an open trial.)
America right now appears to be unreliable to traditional friends, compliant to rivals, and weak to enemies. One renowned Asian leader stated recently at a private dinner in the United States, "We in Asia are convinced that Obama is not strong enough to confront his opponents, but we fear that he is not strong enough to support his friends."
The United States for 60 years has met its responsibilities as the leader and the defender of the democracies of the free world. We have policed the sea lanes, protected the air and space domains, countered terrorism, responded to genocide, and been the bulwark against rogue states engaging in aggression. The world now senses, in the context of the erosion of America's economic power and the pressures of our budget deficits, that we will compress our commitments. But the world needs the vision, idealism, and strong leadership that America brings to international affairs. This can be done and must be done. But we are the only ones who can do it.
George Soros is the ideological soul mate of Obama and has helped him directly and indirectly over the years. The multibillionaire, through MoveOn.org and many other groups including the SEIU, has supported Obama's far-left efforts and his campaigns over the years. So the question is,then: Has Obama's ostensibly inept and delayed responses on the Gulf oil spill disaster been somewhat intentional in order to reward his benefactor Soros?
This surely can't be excluded and is not inconsistent with his other actions/inactions and ideologies.
Obama Boss George Soros Ready To Profit From Oil Disaster
June 14, 2010
Perhaps this is why drilling in Alaska is off the table– it would actually keep America safe and strong and won’t make Obama Boss George Soros even richer than he is now.
Interestingly, it seems the more trouble we have, the better it is for Soros. Last year, Soros noted he was “having a very good crisis” having bet against the United States and profiting from her economic downturn.
Now we learn Soros is set to be one of the biggest beneficiaries of the Gulf oil catastrophe. With Obama’s ‘moratorium’ and the Obama Admin’s general hostility to drilling, it’s reported many oil companies have already looked into with Brazil regarding a move those shores. And what is Soros principally invested in right now? Petrobras, the Brazilian state oil company.
Obama’s Boss Sees Silver Lining in BP Spill
Reuters is reporting that Brazil stands to benefit from the BP oil spill catastrophe as the US moratorium makes more rigs available for other countries.
Even as an ecological catastrophe makes the future of U.S. offshore drilling less certain, Brazil is plowing ahead with a $220 billion five-year plan to tap oil fields even deeper than BP’s ill-fated Gulf well, which is still leaking crude.
It’s estimated that thirty five rigs are now sitting idle in the Gulf of Mexico. Brazil is already getting inquiries from companies wanting to move their rigs there. Brazil’s state oil company, Petrobras already produces about a fourth of the world’s deep water oil…
The shortage of rigs could help Brazil become a major oil exporter.
What an amazing stroke of good fortune for Obama’s boss, unrepentant Nazi collaborator, George Soros! Soros is also invested in offshore oil drilling in Brazil, assisted by the American taxpayers.
Soros Fund Management, LLC holds a stake in Petrobras of approximately $900 million as of December 31, 2009.
George Soros’ principal investments are in oil; one in particular is Petrobras, the Brazilian-owned company. This happens to be the largest investment in the Soros portfolio at the present time.
Soros also owns quite a lot of real estate in Brazil. Soros’ Adecoagro, which invests in renewable energy, owns or leases about 840,000 acres of farmland in Argentina, Brazil and Uruguay growing coffee, soybeans and other commodities. Royal Dutch Shell Plc and Bunge Ltd. Are also expanding into ethanol in Brazil.
When you get to boss the president around, you never have to let a good crisis go to waste.
UPDATE: Dan in comments reminded me of the $2 billion loan deal Obama made to Brazil last year, furthering the connection between Obama, our tax dollars, and Soros’ business. here’s the WSJ’s take on the matter on August 18, 2009
Obama Underwrites Offshore Drilling
Too bad it’s not in U.S. waters.
You read that headline correctly. Unfortunately, the Obama Administration is financing oil exploration off Brazil.
The U.S. is going to lend billions of dollars to Brazil’s state-owned oil company, Petrobras, to finance exploration of the huge offshore discovery in Brazil’s Tupi oil field in the Santos Basin near Rio de Janeiro. Brazil’s planning minister confirmed that White House National Security Adviser James Jones met this month with Brazilian officials to talk about the loan.
The U.S. Export-Import Bank tells us it has issued a “preliminary commitment” letter to Petrobras in the amount of $2 billion and has discussed with Brazil the possibility of increasing that amount. Ex-Im Bank says it has not decided whether the money will come in the form of a direct loan or loan guarantees. Either way, this corporate foreign aid may strike some readers as odd, given that the U.S. Treasury seems desperate for cash and Petrobras is one of the largest corporations in the Americas.
The following editorial describes the deleterious effects that Obama’s aggressive remarks and rebukes toward Israel have had on that country. These, by themselves, are supremely important. However, if you look at the big picture, the damage that Obama has engendered by his lack of leadership and executive experience, his naiveté and disingenuous ideologies, and ill-advised commentaries, apologies and rebukes is incalculable.
In America, he has unleashed divisiveness and racism (ie. - incendiary comments on Arizona’s illegal immigration legislation with countless cities and organizations now attacking or boycotting Arizona- also pitting one state against another; his countenancing of Helen Thomas’ anti-Israel and anti-Semitic rants setting a poor example; dropping prosecution of the New Black Panther Party in the Philadelphia voter intimidation case; maintaining strong associations with black racists such as Cornel West, Henry Jones, Louis Farrakhan, Jay-Z, etc.)
Internationally, by denigrating America and apologizing for it, insulting and /or decreasing support and protection for our long-time allies (Great Britain, Israel, Poland, Czechoslovakia, Honduras, etc.), remaining silent in the defense of freedom and democracy (ignoring the Iranian people uprising against the theocratic repressive Islamic regime), talking loudly but carrying a very tiny stick (none to useless threats to Iran; loser in nuclear talks to Russia/Putin) and denying Islamic terrorist we are unquestionably witnessing the expected consequences.
Our enemies are emboldened and that spells death and disaster. There has been an explosion of terrorism attempts (fortunately they have thus far failed) in this country since he took office. Iran is progressing unimpeded in its quest for nuclear weapons which it will use – and which will precipitate a conflagration of unparalleled proportions. Turkey and other countries see a green light to be aggressive to Israel. Venezuela is saber rattling even more and upsetting the stability in South America.
And the list goes on.
Obama is not fit to be President. He must be removed from office to protect our country and the world!
Open Season On The Jewish State
Investors Business Daily 06/08/2010
In its latest slight, the White House temporarily withdrew an invitation to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu following Israel's killing of nine.
Israel: Of all the ironies of the Obama presidency, the strangest is now unfolding: The election to purge American racism somehow lowered the bar for anti-Semitism.
The 89-year-old Helen Thomas had been roosting in the front row of the White House press briefing room for decades. Yet her ugly feelings that Jews should get the hell out of Palestine and return "home" to Poland or Germany or America — or wherever it is the Jews belong — took this long to bubble up out of the cauldron of her gut in proximity to a camera.
The now ex-doyenne of the White House Press Corps was long known as no friend of the Jewish state, but somehow the intentional chill that the Obama administration has engineered in U.S.-Israeli relations has reduced the caution regarding attacking the state of Israel, and undoubtedly helped set her off.
It's almost like people sensing that the brawny big brother, America, has grown tired of going to the trouble of escorting his persecuted little brother, Israel, through the neighborhood. And all that long-suppressed resentment is beginning to burst out now that the protector is not on hand.
"Israel is finally getting its comeuppance" seems to be the perception of many of the critics of the Middle East's only democracy, save for U.S.-liberated Iraq.
In wondering how someone in public life, who was in her 20s when the Nazis were slaughtering millions of Jews in Germany and Poland, could act like the caricature of a bigot from an earlier era, it's impossible not to consider the disintegration over the past 16 months of our relationship with our staunchest Mideast ally.
The latest slight was the temporary withdrawal of an invitation to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to come to the White House after Israeli forces killed nine aboard a Turkish-backed flotilla trying to break an Israeli blockade of Gaza last week.
It turns out, according to reports, that the administration's rejection of Israeli intelligence reports and consequent refusal to provide advanced weapons led to Netanyahu refusing to authorize the use of tear gas and other anti-riot measures. After Israeli commandos were soon outmatched by Turkish personnel, live fire was ordered by the Israeli naval commander.
The White House demand that Israel "exercise extreme caution and restraint," as a diplomat told WorldTribune.com, apparently ended up costing lives. Would this "Freedom Flotilla" have even attempted to break an Israeli blockade if Israel still had our strong backing? And would Iran be threatening to use its Revolutionary Guards to help smash the blockade with a naval escort?
Would the United Nations' International Atomic Energy Agency be placing Israel's nuclear weapons power status on its governing board's agenda this month for the first time in nearly two decades if the American-Israeli relationship wasn't deteriorating?
Would the likes of bush-league diplomatic players such as Turkey and Brazil be coming out of the woodwork with a deal to threaten even the tepid sanctions against an Islamofascist regime in Iran that will soon be able to launch a nuclear warhead against Israel?
A good case could be made that little or none of this would be happening if the U.S. had not let it be known, in various ways, that it wasn't going to be supporting Israel the way it used to.
With photos circulating of the president hugging Helen Thomas in the press room, White House spokesman Robert Gibbs scrambled to condemn her remarks as "offensive and reprehensible." And then the president followed with a personal condemnation.
But distancing itself from Thomas' bigotry doesn't allow the president to escape blame. Like former President Jimmy Carter, who used the flotilla incident to accuse Israel of "besieging Gaza" and claim that because of Israel, "the people of Gaza remain isolated and deprived of their basic human rights," this administration believes Israel should be blamed for defending itself from terrorism.
In fact, the Jewish state, surrounded by bloodthirsty enemies, should be lauded for its restraint over the decades, not subject to further persecution.
Great Britain and Canada are finding that the relentlessly escalating costs of socialized medicine present a financially untenable situation. There is not enough money to meet the needs of the unrestrained demand. Of course, this situation was entirely predictable despite the dissembling and prevarication by liberals.
How are they contemplating addressing this problem? Rationing.
Since they can’t afford to pay for all the services demanded, the governments will selectively limit usage by restricting visits, procedures and other utilizations. In addition, there will be a requisite deterioration in quality of care.
Such an outcome was resolutely predicted and feared by millions of Americans who opposed Obamacare. In spite of this vociferous opposition, Obama and the arrogant elitist Congressional Democrats rammed the legislation through, needing corrupt stratagems in order to bribe some of their fellow ideologues to vote yes.
If Obamacare is not repealed or defunded, what is transpiring in Great Britain, Canada and elsewhere will occur here as well, long after the deconstruction of the world’s best healthcare system. And we will also be tens of trillions of dollars more in debt than necessary … and probably bankrupt.
The Doctor Will See You Later
Investors Business Daily 06/07/2010
Health Care: The British government has decided that it needs to cut millions of operations because the public system cannot afford them. This is coming soon to a hospital or doctor's office near you.
According to the Daily Mail, Britain's National Health Service is "preparing to cut millions of operations" so that it can save $29 billion by 2014. Procedures that will be "decommissioned," if we may borrow a particularly descriptive term used by one doctor, include hip replacements for obese patients, some operations for hernias and gallstones, and treatments for varicose veins, ear and nose problems, and cataract surgery.
Thus is the future of all socialized medicine. Bureaucratic rationing of treatment is inevitable. No system can forever meet the demand of "free" care. Jeff Taylor of the Economic Voice clarified the problem when he wrote last week that "the U.K. is broke."
"Our whole society and way of life is now built on the shaky foundation of debt," he writes in response to the NHS cuts.
"Our hospitals, schools, armed forces, police, prisons and social services are founded on debt. In truth we have not yet paid for the operations that have already taken place."
As former British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher famously — and fittingly — said: The problem with socialism is you eventually run out of other people's money to spend. This is a universal truth, more universal than the health care provided in Britain. To trifle with it, ignore it, disrespect it, attempt to repeal it or arrogantly try to bypass it will always lead to trouble.
Yet the political left continually makes those mistakes and operates as if governments will never run out of other people's money. Until it does. And then the government has to make cuts and ration the benefits.
What have the congressional Democrats who rammed through their health care overhaul been watching over the years as both hard and soft socialist governments have either collapsed, continued to bring misery or become unsustainable? Despite ample evidence that a welfare state cannot thrive, these lawmakers have forced on the country a "reform" that will load Americans with a burden they will not long be able to bear.
Though it was sold to the public as a plan that, at $940 billion over the first decade, would bring down the deficit, the real cost for the initial 10 years could be as much as $2.5 trillion, including mandates placed on the private sector, according to an estimate by the Cato Institute.
It's possible that the Cato projection is off. But history shows us that it's more likely to be right than Washington's estimate. Government programs always cost more than the rosy initial projections that are used to drum up public support. It's another lesson that remains unlearned by most of our elected officials and the voters who keep putting them in office despite the problems the lawmakers refuse to stop creating.
Given our lawmakers' inability to learn from the health care policy blunders committed in Britain and Canada — which is reassessing its model because of ruinous costs — no one should be surprised when rationing by bureaucracy becomes a feature of the U.S. public health care system.
There should be no shock when waiting lists for treatment are simply rosters of Americans suffering — and in some cases dying — from a lack of care. No astonishment when those who do get treatment get substandard care, no dismay as a two-tiered system develops in which the more important among us get top-flight medicine while the rest get what the public clinics have to offer.
Our own polling shows that the disapproval of the Democrats' health care legislation is beginning to wane. That's as alarming as the heated opposition to the law had been encouraging. If we surrender ourselves to the soft tyranny of elected officials gone too far, we will be leaving an America that future generations won't want.
The following opinion piece can be found on myriad websites with some variations. It was written by Robert A. Hall, who has served as a marine in Vietnam, a State Senator from Massachusetts and is a freelance writer.
This was written just a few weeks after Obama took office yet it sounds even more penetrating, insightful and fresh today.
I'm Tired
Robert A. Hall February 19, 2009
I’ll be 63 soon. Except for one semester in college when jobs were scarce, and a six-month period when I was between jobs, but job-hunting every day, I’ve worked, hard, since I was 18. Despite some health challenges, I still put in 50-hour weeks, and haven’t called in sick in seven or eight years. I make a good salary, but I didn’t inherit my job or my income, and I worked to get where I am. Given the economy, there’s no retirement in sight, and I’m tired. Very tired.
I’m tired of being told that I have to “spread the wealth around” to people who don’t have my work ethic. I’m tired of being told the government will take the money I earned, by force if necessary, and give it to people too lazy or stupid to earn it.
I’m tired of being told that I have to pay more taxes to “keep people in their homes.” Sure, if they lost their jobs or got sick, I’m willing to help. But if they bought McMansions at three times the price of our paid-off, $250,000 condo, on one-third of my salary, then let the leftwing Congresscritters who passed Fannie and Freddie and the Community Reinvestment Act that created the bubble help them—with their own money.
I’m tired of being told how bad America is by leftwing millionaires like Michael Moore, George Soros and Hollywood entertainers who live in luxury because of the opportunities America offers. In thirty years, if they get their way, the United States will have the religious freedom and women’s rights of Saudi Arabia, the economy of Zimbabwe, the freedom of the press of China, the crime and violence of Mexico, the tolerance for Gay people of Iran, and the freedom of speech of Venezuela. Won’t multiculturalism be beautiful?
I’m tired of being told that Islam is a “Religion of Peace,” when every day I can read dozens of stories of Muslim men killing their sisters, wives and daughters for their family “honor;” of Muslims rioting over some slight offense; of Muslims murdering Christian and Jews because they aren’t “believers;” of Muslims burning schools for girls; of Muslims stoning teenage rape victims to death for “adultery;” of Muslims mutilating the genitals of little girls; all in the name of Allah, because the Qur’an and Shari’a law tells them to.
I believe “a man should be judged by the content of his character, not by the color of his skin.” I’m tired of being told that “race doesn’t matter” in the post-racial world of President Obama, when it’s all that matters in affirmative action jobs, lower college admission and graduation standards for minorities (harming them the most), government contract set-asides, tolerance for the ghetto culture of violence and fatherless children that hurts minorities more than anyone, and in the appointment of US Senators from Illinois. I think it’s very cool that we have a black president and that a black child is doing her homework at the desk where Lincoln wrote the emancipation proclamation. I just wish the black president was Condi Rice, or someone who believes more in freedom and the individual and less in an all-knowing government.
I’m tired of a news media that thinks Bush’s fundraising and inaugural expenses were obscene, but that think Obama’s, at triple the cost, were wonderful. That thinks Bush exercising daily was a waste of presidential time, but Obama exercising is a great example for the public to control weight and stress, that picked over every line of Bush’s military records, but never demanded that Kerry release his, that slammed Palin with two years as governor for being too inexperienced for VP, but touted Obama with three years as senator as potentially the best president ever.
Wonder why people are dropping their subscriptions or switching to Fox News? Get a clue. I didn’t vote for Bush in 2000, but the media and Kerry drove me to his camp in 2004.
I’m tired of being told that out of “tolerance for other cultures” we must let Saudi Arabia use our oil money to fund mosques and madrassa Islamic schools to preach hate in America, while no American group is allowed to fund a church, synagogue or religious school in Saudi Arabia to teach love and tolerance.
I’m tired of being told I must lower my living standard to fight global warming, which no one is allowed to debate. My wife and I live in a two-bedroom apartment and carpool together five miles to our jobs. We also own a three-bedroom condo where our daughter and granddaughter live. Our carbon footprint is about 5% of Al Gore’s, and if you’re greener than Gore, you’re green enough.
I’m tired of being told that drug addicts have a disease, and I must help support and treat them, and pay for the damage they do. Did a giant germ rush out of a dark alley, grab them, and stuff white powder up their noses while they tried to fight it off? I don’t think Gay people choose to be Gay, but I damn sure think druggies chose to take drugs. And I’m tired of harassment from cool people treating me like a freak when I tell them I never tried marijuana. Update: People have written to tell me I'd have more sympathy if this was close to me. It is exactly having seen the destruction of alcoholism and herion addiction in my own family that makes me pretty itolerate of people who are willing to destroy the people around them to indulge themselves.
I’m tired of illegal aliens being called “undocumented workers,” especially the ones who aren’t working, but are living on welfare or crime. What’s next? Calling drug dealers, “Undocumented Pharmacists”? And, no, I’m not against Hispanics. Most of them are Catholic and it’s been a few hundred years since Catholics wanted to kill me for my religion. I’m willing to fast track for citizenship any Hispanic person who can speak English, doesn’t have a criminal record and who is self-supporting without family on welfare, or who serves honorably for three years in our military. Those are the citizens we need. Update: A few people have taken this to indicate some bias against Catholics, bbased on events 400 years ago. While I think they are either too touchy or fail to understand, I was onlly trying to say that Ihave zero problem with Catholics wanting to come to the US, but that I hav great concerns about Muslims, as a good % of them do want to kill me, or force their religion and moral code on me.
I’m tired of latte liberals and journalists, who would never wear the uniform of the Republic themselves, or let their entitlement-handicapped kids near a recruiting station, trashing our military. They and their kids can sit at home, never having to make split-second decisions under life and death circumstances, and bad mouth better people then themselves. Do bad things happen in war? You bet. Do our troops sometimes misbehave? Sure. Does this compare with the atrocities that were the policy of our enemies for the last fifty years—and still are? Not even close. So here’s the deal. I’ll let myself be subjected to all the humiliation and abuse that was heaped on terrorists at Abu Ghraib or Gitmo, and the critics can let themselves be subject to captivity by the Muslims who tortured and beheaded Daniel Pearl in Pakistan, or the Muslims who tortured and murdered Marine Lt. Col. William Higgins in Lebanon, or the Muslims who ran the blood-spattered Al Qaeda torture rooms our troops found in Iraq, or the Muslims who cut off the heads of schoolgirls in Indonesia, because the girls were Christian. Then we’ll compare notes. British and American soldiers are the only troops in history that civilians came to for help and handouts, instead of hiding from in fear. UPDATE: It has rightly been pointed out to me, several times, that I should have included Canadian, Australian and New Zealand troops here. My apologies for slighting these gallant allies of freedom.
I’m tired of people telling me that their party has a corner on virtue and the other party has a corner on corruption. Read the papers—bums are bi-partisan. And I’m tired of people telling me we need bi-partisanship. I live in Illinois, where the “Illinois Combine” of Democrats and Republicans has worked together harmoniously to loot the public for years. And I notice that the tax cheats in Obama’s cabinet are bi-partisan as well.
I’m tired of hearing wealthy athletes, entertainers and politicians of both parties talking about innocent mistakes, stupid mistakes or youthful mistakes, when we all know they think their only mistake was getting caught. I’m tired of people with a sense of entitlement, rich or poor.
Speaking of poor, I’m tired of hearing people with air-conditioned homes, color TVs and two cars called poor. The majority of Americans didn’t have that in 1970, but we didn’t know we were “poor.” The poverty pimps have to keep changing the definition of poor to keep the dollars flowing.
I’m real tired of people who don’t take responsibility for their lives and actions. I’m tired of hearing them blame the government, or discrimination, or big-whatever for their problems.
Yes, I’m damn tired. But I’m also glad to be 63. Because, mostly, I’m not going to get to see the world these people are making. I’m just sorry for my granddaughter.
The following editorial by Wayne Allyn Root concisely captures Obama’s stratagem to transform America from a capitalist and democratic country to a communistic/socialistic one with severe abrogation of our rights and freedoms. This is all unfolding rapidly before our eyes facilitated by ruthlessly corrupt and dissembling individuals such as Obama facilitated by a complicit media, unions, ACORN and radical democrats.
If you conclude that what you Obama’s words, actions and behaviors are not in accord with rational behavior expected of someone who has the Nation’s best interests at heart, you are entirely correct.
For a clearer understanding of the whole picture, that is Obama’s previously hidden and intentionally suppressed past, we strongly recommend that you read the “Manchurian President” by Aaron Klein.
Obama is indeed trying to destroy our country from within and must be stopped before it is too late!
Obama's agenda: Overwhelm the system
Wayne Allyn Root
Rahm Emanuel cynically said, "You never want a crisis to go to waste." It is now becoming clear that the crisis he was referring to is Barack Obama's presidency.
Obama is no fool. He is not incompetent. To the contrary, he is brilliant. He knows exactly what he's doing. He is purposely overwhelming the U.S. economy to create systemic failure, economic crisis and social chaos -- thereby destroying capitalism and our country from within.
Barack Obama is my college classmate (Columbia University, class of '83). As Glenn Beck correctly predicted from day one, Obama is following the plan of Cloward & Piven, two professors at Columbia University. They outlined a plan to socialize America by overwhelming the system with government spending and entitlement demands. Add up the clues below.
Taken individually they're alarming. Taken as a whole, it is a brilliant, Machiavellian game plan to turn the United States into a socialist/Marxist state with a permanent majority that desperately needs government for survival ... and can be counted on to always vote for bigger government. Why not? They have no responsibility to pay for it.
-- Universal health care. The health care bill had very little to do with health care. It had everything to do with unionizing millions of hospital and health care workers, as well as adding 15,000 to 20,000 new IRS agents (who will join government employee unions). Obama doesn't care that giving free health care to 30 million Americans will add trillions to the national debt. What he does care about is that it cements the dependence of those 30 million voters to Democrats and big government. Who but a socialist revolutionary would pass this reckless spending bill in the middle of a depression?
-- Cap and trade. Like health care legislation having nothing to do with health care, cap and trade has nothing to do with global warming. It has everything to do with redistribution of income, government control of the economy and a criminal payoff to Obama's biggest contributors. Those powerful and wealthy unions and contributors (like GE, which owns NBC, MSNBC and CNBC) can then be counted on to support everything Obama wants. They will kick-back hundreds of millions of dollars in contributions to Obama and the Democratic Party to keep them in power. The bonus is that all the new taxes on Americans with bigger cars, bigger homes and businesses helps Obama "spread the wealth around."
-- Make Puerto Rico a state. Why? Who's asking for a 51st state? Who's asking for millions of new welfare recipients and government entitlement addicts in the middle of a depression? Certainly not American taxpayers. But this has been Obama's plan all along. His goal is to add two new Democrat senators, five Democrat congressman and a million loyal Democratic voters who are dependent on big government.
-- Legalize 12 million illegal immigrants. Just giving these 12 million potential new citizens free health care alone could overwhelm the system and bankrupt America. But it adds 12 million reliable new Democrat voters who can be counted on to support big government. Add another few trillion dollars in welfare, aid to dependent children, food stamps, free medical, education, tax credits for the poor, and eventually Social Security.
-- Stimulus and bailouts. Where did all that money go? It went to Democrat contributors, organizations (ACORN), and unions -- including billions of dollars to save or create jobs of government employees across the country. It went to save GM and Chrysler so that their employees could keep paying union dues. It went to AIG so that Goldman Sachs could be bailed out (after giving Obama almost $1 million in contributions). A staggering $125 billion went to teachers (thereby protecting their union dues). All those public employees will vote loyally Democrat to protect their bloated salaries and pensions that are bankrupting America. The country goes broke, future generations face a bleak future, but Obama, the Democrat Party, government, and the unions grow more powerful. The ends justify the means.
-- Raise taxes on small business owners, high-income earners, and job creators. Put the entire burden on only the top 20 percent of taxpayers, redistribute the income, punish success, and reward those who did nothing to deserve it (except vote for Obama). Reagan wanted to dramatically cut taxes in order to starve the government. Obama wants to dramatically raise taxes to starve his political opposition.
With the acts outlined above, Obama and his regime have created a vast and rapidly expanding constituency of voters dependent on big government; a vast privileged class of public employees who work for big government; and a government dedicated to destroying capitalism and installing themselves as socialist rulers by overwhelming the system.
Add it up and you've got the perfect Marxist scheme -- all devised by my Columbia University college classmate Barack Obama.
Wayne Allyn Root was the 2008 Libertarian Party vice presidential nominee and serves on the Libertarian National Committee.
If it is possible that some Americans are still oblivious to Obama’s true allegiances, the recent events off the coast of Israel should clarify it further. Of course, one just has to examine his long, though intentionally suppressed (by him and the sycophantic news media) history of radicalism and associations with individuals of such ilk to understand that his actions comport completely with this ideology. Like his long friendships and reverence of Weatherman domestic terrorist William Ayers and Rashid Khalidi, the pro-Palestinian and erstwhile PLO spokesperson and supporter – just to name a few.
The first article below, written by Aaron Klein, reveals the duplicity of Obama and his close associates and friends in the Middle East situation. Their intentional provocation of Israel has provided Obama the story line to publicly rebuke that country and galvanize support for the Palestinians which is, of course, where his sentiments lie. This position contravenes that of a vast majority of Americans and the position that the United States has taken since that country’s founding in 1948.
This is another example Obama’s despicable and egregious treatment of our longtime Allies.
Noting this, we also need to look at the big picture, particularly his pattern of behavior.
Is this a President who we could trust to protect our rights and freedoms and who is there to serve us all?
Most definitely not!
Virtually everything that he has done points to a consolidation and aggrandizement of government powers with ever increasing restrictions of our rights, freedoms, choices and confiscation of the fruits of our labors. Furthermore, he has encircled our Constitutional government around 40 appointed radical czars who answer to no one but him. In the trenches among us are his ideological and corrupt armies comprised of ACORN and union members, especially SEIU, who serve as enforcers. Coverage, exposure and critical analysis of nearly all of this is being suppressed by the fawning but also unwittingly controlled news media.
Unless we all respond appropriately and thwart his (and others, of course) radical agenda, the future of a free America appears bleak.
All aboard! Obama pals back violent Gaza flotilla Activists from president's circle of friends top supporters of anti-Israel protest ships
By Aaron Klein May 31, 2010 WorldNetDaily
The group behind the Gaza flotilla that engaged in deadly clashes with Israeli commandos today counts among its top supporters the friends and associates of President Barack Obama, namely the founders of the Weather Underground terrorist organization, William Ayers and Bernardine Dohrn, as well as Jodie Evans, the leader of the radical activist organization Code Pink.
Obama pals, flotilla backers: William Ayers and Bernardine Dohrn
Earlier today, Israeli navy commandos raided the six-ship flotilla, encountering heavy resistance and live fire from the activists. Several activists were killed and dozens of others were reportedly injured, as were several of the Israeli commandos.
The flotilla was organized by the Free Gaza Movement, a coalition of leftist human rights activists and pro-Palestinian groups engaged in attempts to break a blockade imposed by Israel on the Hamas-controlled Gaza Strip.
Ayers, Dohrn and Evans' Code Pink have led several recent Free Gaza Movement initiatives, including attempted marches into the Gaza Strip. Dorhn was in the Middle East just last month on behalf of the movement.
Ayers and Dohrn were close associates for years with President Obama, while Evans was a fundraiser and financial bundler for Obama's presidential campaign.
In January, WND reported Ayers, Dohrn and Evans were involved in provoking chaos on the streets of Egypt in an attempt to enter Gaza with the Free Gaza Movement to join in solidarity with the territory's population and leadership.
The three helped to stir riots after the Egyptian government refused to allow a large number of protesters to enter neighboring Gaza. Eventually, the protesters accepted an Egyptian offer of allowing about 100 marchers into Gaza. Once in the territory, those marchers were reportedly met on the Gaza side by Hamas' former Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh.
At the time of the march, Sen. John Kerry, D-Mass., wrote a letter in support of a "humanitarian delegation from Massachusetts" to Gaza. Members of Ayers', Dohrn and Evans' group documented on their blogs how Kerry's letter was used at the U.S. Embassy in Cairo while attempting to pressure Egypt to let their group into Gaza.
Images of the letter were also posted on the Electronic Intifada website run by Ali Abunimah, who was with Evans' group in Egypt and who, WND previously reported, spoke at pro-Palestinian events in the 1990s alongside Obama. In one such event, a 1999 fundraiser for Palestinian "refugees," Abunimah recalled introducing Obama on stage.
Kerry's office previously met with Code Pink members, WND has learned. Sarah Roche-Mahdi of Code Pink also is a member of the United for Peace and Justice Palestine Task Force, which met with Kerry's staffers.
Kerry last year became the most senior U.S. politician to visit the Hamas-controlled Gaza Strip, although at the time he did not meet with Hamas leaders.
Dohrn later wrote on a blog that she was briefly detained at the U.S. Embassy in Cairo following the January protests there by her group: "Bill and I went to the American Embassy at 10 a.m. and asked to see the ambassador. We were ushered into a holding pen a block away from the embassy building where we joined 35 people already there, surrounded by Egyptian soldiers," she wrote.
Deadly clashes
Israeli Naval Forces intercepted the flotilla today attempting to break the maritime closure of the Gaza Strip.
An Israel Defense Forces spokesperson told WND commandos boarded the ships after numerous warnings from Israel requesting the ships redirect toward the Israeli port of Ashdod, where they would be able to unload their aid supplies, which could then be transferred to the Gaza Strip after undergoing security inspections.
During the boarding of one of the ships, the Marmara, activists onboard attacked IDF naval personnel with live fire and light weaponry including knives and clubs, the IDF spokesperson said.
"The demonstrators had clearly prepared their weapons in advance for this specific purpose," said the spokesperson. "As a result of this life-threatening and violent activity, naval forces first employed riot dispersal means, followed by live fire.
"IDF naval personnel encountered severe violence, including use of weaponry prepared in advance in order to attack them," said the spokesperson.
The IDF released a YouTube video clearly showing activists attacking Israeli commandos, including attacks with live fire.
Close Obama associates
Evans formed Code Pink, a far-left activist organization, in 2002 to protest America's war in Iraq. The group previously met with Hamas and with leaders of the Taliban. Evans was a fundraiser and financial bundler for Obama's presidential campaign.
Abunimah traveled in some of the same political circles as Obama in the 1990s. Abunimah previously described meeting with Obama at a fundraiser at the home of Columbia University professor Rashid Khalidi, reportedly a former PLO activist. Khalidi was also a close associate of Obama.
"[Obama] came with his wife. That's where I had a chance to really talk to him," Abunimah recalled. "It was an intimate setting. He convinced me he was very aware of the issues [and] critical of U.S. bias toward Israel and lack of sensitivity to Arabs. ... He was very supportive of U.S. pressure on Israel."
According to quotes obtained by Gulf News, Abunimah recalled a 2004 meeting in a Chicago neighborhood while Obama was running for his Senate seat. Abunimah quoted Obama telling him "warmly" he was sorry that "I haven't said more about Palestine right now, but we are in a tough primary race."
"I'm hoping when things calm down, I can be more up front," Abunimah reportedly quoted the senator as saying.
Abunimah said Obama urged him to "keep up the good work" at the Chicago Tribune, where Abunimah contributed guest columns that were highly critical of Israel.
Ayers, meanwhile, became a name in last year's presidential campaign when it was disclosed the radical worked closely with Obama for years.
Ayers helped launch Obama's political career with a fundraiser in his home. Obama served on the board of a Chicago nonprofit alongside Ayers. The terrorist later hired Obama to serve as chairman of the Chicago Annenberg Challenge, a job Obama later cited as experience that helped qualify him to run for public office.
While at the CAC, Obama and Ayers both granted funds to the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now, or ACORN.
WND columnist Jack Cashill has produced a series of persuasive arguments that it was Ayers who ghostwrote Obama's award-winning autobiography, "Dreams from My Father."
Ayers and Dohrn were two of the main founders of the Weather Underground, which bombed the New York City Police headquarters in 1970, the Capitol in 1971 and the Pentagon in 1972. The group was responsible for some 30 bombings aimed at destroying the defense and security infrastructures of the U.S.
Characterizing the Weather Underground as "an American Red Army," Ayers summed up the organization's ideology: "Kill all the rich people. Break up their cars and apartments. Bring the revolution home. Kill your parents."
"Everything was absolutely ideal on the day I bombed the Pentagon," Ayers recalled in his 2001 memoir, "Fugitive Days." "The sky was blue. The birds were singing. And the bastards were finally going to get what was coming to them."
Ayers brandished his unrepentant radicalism for years later, as evidenced by his now notorious 2001 interview with the New York Times, published one day after the 9/11 attacks, in which he stated, "I don't regret setting bombs. I feel we didn't do enough."
Ayers posed for a photograph accompanying the New York Times piece that showed him stepping on an American flag. He said of the U.S.: "What a country. It makes me want to puke."
Why Didn't Obama Order Veto Of U.N. Security Council Resolution Condeming Israel?
Hugh Hewitt June 01, 2010
The president's hostility to Israel flared again yesterday, with his concurrence in a U.N. Security Council resolution condemning Israel.
There is simply no way the United States or the other members of the Council are in a position to know what happened with sufficient detail to allow for such a resolution except for reflexive anti-Israeli sentiment. Peter Beinart can proclaim with certainty that the guilt lies with Israel's leaders and Israel's U.S. supporters, and there are plenty of voices inside Israel blasting the decision to stop the convoy.
But it is the job of the United States to prevent the Security Council from becoming just another "bash Israel" forum and make sure that all of the facts are known and that Israel --our most reliable ally in the region and the front line against the mullahs in Iran and their operatives in Lebanon and Gaza-- is not unfairly pummeled with the aftermath of an intentional provocation that ought not to have occurred in the first place given the embargo. Israel's response is just beginning to emerge, but already the U.S. has joined with the usual enemies of Israel to denounce the country.
How would the U.S. respond to an overland convoy of aid material to the heart of Taliban-controlled Afghanistan that is intended for the benefit of the forces carrying out war against the government of Afghanistan and their U.S. and western allies? Would Beinart urge that we allow such convoys to simply enter the area? If the convoy refused to stop at checkpoints, would he shrug his shoulders and say fine?
Beinart says the embargo of Gaza isn't working. But there are far fewer rockets falling on Israel today than there were before the Gaza incursion last year. There are still occasional attacks and fatalities, so there is no basis for claiming that Hamas has reformed or is evolving into something other than a terrorist organization.
Of course the world would prefer that Israel be able to interdict resupply of terrorists without loss of life, and the ship should have gone to the Israeli port for inspection. It is a complicated, dangerous situation.
But President Obama advances resolution of the situation not one inch by joining in the pounding of Israel. The unprecedented level of hostility to Israel from an American Administration continues, and Israel and its supporters must recognize that President Obama is not a reliable supporter when the going gets very tough indeed.
There are many parties that own considerable responsibilities regarding the uncontrollable BP oil disaster in the Gulf of Mexico as enumerated below by Charles Krauthammer. Clearly and inexplicably, BP didn’t have any contingency plans that would have been able to deal with disasters such as we are witnessing now. They bear substantial responsibility.
Here are some questions and issues that we must ponder regarding the Federal Government’s role in various levels of this disaster:
1. Once again, the government reveals its utter ineptitude in regulating and overseeing businesses/ industries. In this BP situation, it had just completed its inspection of the rig and deemed it to be safe. Of course, this same government was clueless about Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac, the banking industry, Bernie Madoff ponzi scheme that it had been warned about for years, etc.
2. Why didn’t the Federal government have plans in place to deal with such potential disasters? Clearly, the government is not the answer as we have seen.
3. Obama displayed boundless ineptitude, absence of leadership, abysmal “judgment”, arrogance and demagoguery. He is a rank amateur when it matters in the real world.
4. If it weren’t for unfettered legal issues and radical environmental influences, there would have been no need to drill for oil in 5000 feet of water where there are much greater costs and risks as we are witnessing. Such restrictions led to potentially uncontrollable disasters as evidenced in the Gulf.
5. Why weren’t the appropriate government agencies mobilized immediately? Why did a few of the heads of these agencies go on vacation despite knowing the scope of this disaster?
6. Among the earliest government moves, Obama and Attorney General Eric Holder sent a team of attorneys to the region. Were they going to cap the well?
Once again and in yet another area, the Federal government's inexcusable and embarrassing incompetence is on display. And Liberals state that the government is the answer for all our problems!
It seems to have problems in all that it is asked to do.
Oil spill culprits run deep
Charles Krauthammer 5/27/2010
Here's my question: Why are we drilling in 5,000 feet of water in the first place?
Many reasons, but this one goes unmentioned: Environmental chic has driven us out there. As production from the shallower Gulf of Mexico wells declines, we go deep (1,000 feet and more) and ultra deep (5,000 feet and more), in part because environmentalists have succeeded in rendering the Pacific and nearly all the Atlantic coast off-limits to oil production.
(President Obama's tentative, selective opening of some Atlantic and offshore Alaska sites is now dead.) And of course, in the safest of all places, on land, we've had a 30-year ban on drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge.
So we go deep, ultra deep – to such a technological frontier that no precedent exists for the April 20 blowout in the Gulf of Mexico.
There will always be catastrophic oil spills. You make them as rare as humanly possible, but where would you rather have one: in the Gulf of Mexico, upon which thousands depend for their livelihood, or in the Arctic, where there are practically no people? All spills seriously damage wildlife. That's a given. But why have we pushed the drilling from the barren to the populated, from the remote wilderness to a center of fishing, shipping, tourism and recreation?
Not that the environmentalists are the only ones to blame. Not by far. But it is odd that they've escaped any mention at all.
The other culprits are pretty obvious. It starts with BP, which seems not only to have had an amazing string of perfect-storm engineering lapses but no contingencies to deal with a catastrophic system failure.
However, the railing against BP for its performance since the accident is harder to understand. I attribute no virtue to BP, just self-interest. What possible interest can it have to do anything but cap the well as quickly as possible? Every day that oil is spilled means millions more in losses, cleanup and restitution.
Federal officials who rage against BP would like to deflect attention from their own role in this disaster. Interior Secretary Ken Salazar, whose department's laxity in environmental permitting and safety oversight renders it among the many bearing responsibility, expresses outrage at BP's inability to stop the leak, and even threatens to "push them out of the way."
"To replace them with what?" asked the estimable, admirably candid Coast Guard Adm. Thad Allen, the national incident commander. No one has the assets and expertise of BP. The federal government can fight wars, conduct a census and hand out billions in earmarks, but it has not a clue how to cap a one-mile-deep, out-of-control oil well.
Obama didn't help much with his finger-pointing Rose Garden speech in which he denounced finger-pointing, then proceeded to blame everyone but himself. Even the grace note of admitting some federal responsibility turned sour when he reflexively added that these problems have been going on "for a decade or more" – translation: Bush did it – while, in contrast, his own interior secretary had worked diligently to solve the problem "from the day he took office."
Really? Why hadn't we heard a thing about this? What about the September 2009 letter from Obama's National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration accusing Interior's Minerals Management Service of understating the "risk and impacts" of a major oil spill? When you get a blowout 15 months into your administration, and your own Interior Department had given BP a "categorical" environmental exemption in April 2009, the buck stops.
In the end, speeches will make no difference. If BP can cap the well in time to prevent an absolute calamity in the Gulf, the president will escape politically. If it doesn't – if the gusher isn't stopped before the relief wells are completed in August – it will become Obama's Katrina.
That will be unfair, because Obama is no more responsible for the damage caused by this than Bush was for the damage caused by Katrina. But that's the nature of American politics and its presidential cult of personality: We expect our presidents to play Superman. Helplessness, however undeniable, is no defense.
Moreover, Obama has never been overly modest about his own powers. Two years ago next week, he declared that history will mark his ascent to the presidency as the moment when "our planet began to heal" and "the rise of the oceans began to slow."
Well, when you anoint yourself King Canute, you mustn't be surprised when your subjects expect you to command the tides.
Earlier this year while jogging on a trail, Texas Governor Rick Perry shot and killed a coyote that was threatening his dog. Not unexpectedly, this served as fodder to illustrate how far our country has devolved from its founding which was exemplified by a strong work ethic, common sense, responsibility and practicality compared to where we are right now. The quintessential examples of this and polar opposites on myriad issues are Texas and California.
The Governors of California and Texas are jogging with their dogs along different trails at different times each is faced with a coyote that jumps out and starts to attack their dog. Their responses mirror the attitudes and politics of their respective states:
California Governor:
1. Governor starts to intervene and then realizes he should stop; the coyote is doing what is natural.
2. Call animal control. Animal control captures coyote and spends $200 testing it for diseases and $500 relocating it.
3. Call Vet. Veterinarian collects dead dog and spends $200 testing it for diseases.
4. Governor goes to hospital and spends $3500 getting checked for diseases from the coyote and getting bite wound bandaged.
5. Running trail gets shut down for 6 months while wildlife services conduct a $100,000 survey to make sure the area is clear of dangerous animals.
6. Governor spends $50,000 and starts a coyote awareness program for people who live in the area.
7. State legislature spends $2 million investigating how to better handle rabies and how to possibly eradicate it.
8. Governor’s security agent fired for not stopping the attack and letting the Governor try to intervene.
9. Cost $75,000 to train new security agent.
10. PETA protests the relocation of the coyote.
Texas Governor:
1. Governor pops a $1.23 .380 ACP Gold Dot Hollow Point and drops the coyote.
2. (Not complicated enough to need a #2.)
He and the dog keep jogging.
And people still wonder why California is BROKE… as are many other liberal/Democrat run states, counties and cities.
Obama made clear that he has no intention of visiting Arlington National Cemetery on Memorial day and instead will vacation back home in Chicago so that he can sleep in his own bed. To appear that he has some semblance of concern for those who have died in war, he will visit a nearby cemetery in Illinois.
We say: Don’t even bother, Obama.
The interminable disrespect that you have shown for America and those who have lost their lives fighting for our rights and freedoms as well as those of people worldwide is reprehensible and unforgivable. These dead patriots would turn in their graves knowing your intentional dismantling of our country’s offensive and defensive military capabilities which is in accord with your radical anti-American agenda.
Don’t desecrate by your presence these cemeteries filled with American heroes who were willing to die in defense of their country.
Obama, you are not worthy of that privilege.
The President's Memorial Daze
Investors Business Daily 05/28/2010
Leadership: Our commander in chief was to miss the wreath-laying ceremony at Arlington National Cemetery to go on vacation. Other presidents have missed it, but never at wartime.
All presidents deserve a vacation, and no president is ever off the clock. But we are at war, and Memorial Day at Arlington has special significance even in peacetime. Those who defend President Obama's decision to take time off were not so understanding whenever President George W. Bush spent time at his Crawford, Texas, ranch.
Obama was to be in his old Chicago-area stomping grounds, and those who attacked Bush for taking his vacations are defending Obama's right to do so. As leftist columnist David Corn so eloquently put it: "Does it matter if Obama throws some leaves on a tomb?" Yes, it matters.
Media Matters, the George Soros-connected house organ of the loony left, points out that George H.W. Bush also missed the Arlington ceremony in 1992 while campaigning. But we were not at war in 1992 when he attended a ceremony in Maine. And he was a bona fide war hero who risked his life for his country and who did not need to prove his commitment to the military.
President George W. Bush also missed Arlington's Memorial Day ceremonies in 2002, when he joined Veterans Affairs Secretary Anthony Principi, Secretary of State Colin Powell and a bipartisan congressional delegation for services at the American cemetery in Normandy, France, honoring those who paid the ultimate sacrifice on D-Day.
President Obama was to attend ceremonies and deliver remarks at the Abraham Lincoln National Cemetery in Elwood, Ill. We hope he was to be there to honor this particular location and those who are buried there, not because of its geographical proximity to his other plans.
And no, we don't think it's sufficient to send as an Obama stand-in at Arlington our silver-tongued vice president, Joe Biden, who thinks Brussels and not Washington, D.C., should be "the capital of the free world."
The Associated Press says Obama "will sleep in his own bed for the first time in more than a year." The White House isn't exactly some roadside campaign motel, and those buried at Arlington will sleep forever.
This is the president whose administration views the terrorist attacks of 9/11 as a "man caused disaster" and who says those who died in Iraq and Afghanistan paid the ultimate sacrifice in an "overseas contingency operation." Instead of stirring rhetoric, we get boilerplate bureaucratese read off a teleprompter.
The military has taken a beating under this administration. From the shooting down of the F-22 Raptor to the abandonment of ground-based missile interceptors in Europe, unilateral disarmament is now official policy. We won't test old nukes or build new ones. We tell our enemies what and how many weapons we have and when we'll use them. Our defense budget is at pre-9/11 levels.
Our defense secretary says we don't need billion-dollar destroyers to chase down pirates as the Chinese build aircraft carriers. In December 2009, President Obama journeyed to West Point, or the "enemy camp," as MSNBC's Chris Matthews described it, to attack the premise of the Iraq War and the president who won it.
Then there were the national spectacle and disgrace of watching our commander in chief say and do nothing while three Navy SEALs were put on trial for allegedly punching a captured terrorist who murdered American contractors in Iraq. We'd say a gesture of sympathy and support from this president was in order.
Yes, it's a day of hot dogs, hamburgers and family fun. It's also a day we honor those who died to give us the freedom to enjoy all that.
The following is an incisive assessment of the scandalous and reprehensible attitudes and of Obama and the Democrats. In fact, Obama’s inept, corrosive and seditious body of work of should earn him consideration for impeachment after the November elections.
Obama Administration and Democrats Kowtow to Other Countries While Scorning Those Who Have Died For Ours
Posted by Lori Ziganto 5/26/2010 from RedState
In the past week, the Obama administration and fellow Democrats have let their true feelings for America known more than ever before. Well, at least more blatantly. They aren’t even bothering to hide it now and have lost all shame. No longer content with merely worshipping at the altar of multiculturalism, they are now going out of their way to boast that they believe that practically any other country is actually superior to America, and that the men and women who have died fighting for our country aren’t worthy of honor and respect.
This has been clear for many years, to those who were paying attention, evidenced by the ever growing cries for some ill-conceived, thinly veiled diversity and tolerance objective, as well as the constant touting of the concept of “citizens of the world”. Our own Supreme Court started using European laws on which to base their decisions on American law, for goodness sake. Any complaints were met with “You just don’t understand, being philistines and all. Also, shut up.
Racists.”
But the current crop of Democrats have taken it to new lows; they are past rock bottom and are now frantically burrowing through the Earth’s crust. Since attaining power, everything they’ve done has been an attempt to fundamentally change our “defective” Constitution and country. They are trying to create a federal government involved in and in control of every aspect of our lives, even the foods we eat. They have attempted and continue to attempt to morally equate America with those who wish to kill us . They have actively tried to weaken our military and are attempting to further their belief that America is not special. We don’t need no stinkin’ Exceptionalism! Only, we do. And we are.
Obama took to it right away, and started it off with his incessant and seemingly involuntary reactive bowing, done whilst jetting off on his “Apologizing for America” tour. Then, this week, Democrats showed their true colors, in a way that can no longer be ignored, even by the most stubborn. Congressional Democrats cheered - and gave standing ovations - to Mexican President Calderon, as he demonized Arizona and its citizens and denigrated this country as a whole. As I said then, not only do the Democrats fail to figuratively stand up for America, but they literally stand up for and applaud those who seek to condemn it. Worse, they were wearing bracelets, protesting and bashing American citizens, while cheering a foreign leader who was doing the same. From our House floor.
Earlier this month, Joe Biden, always the last to know things, took the diminishing of America on tour. No one bothered to inform him that was no longer necessary. We now invite foreign leaders here to do the bashing for us. Poor Joe. Always in the dark. Biden spoke before the European Union and informed everyone that he believes that Brussels, not Washington, DC, is the “capital of the free world.” What’s wrong with all you patriots? America being the shining city on the hill and the beacon of freedom for the rest of the world is so old school!
Worse, not only does the Obama administration believe that America is passe, they scorn the very men and women who have been, and still are, the greatest force for good in the World - Our military. Our President will not be honoring the fallen, nor those currently serving, at Arlington cemetery on Memorial Day. In wartime no less. The for real kind, not the Dick Blumenthal kind. He needs a vacation, you see. He needs some rest after all that complex thinking and nuanced insight that resulted in his deep analysis of “just plug the damn hole” as a fix for the BP oil spill. Over a month later.
That’s the spin, at least. But, it’s not even the point. It’s his pattern of behavior and the reasons for it. He first showed his disdain for the military when he decided to jet off to Copenhagen to try to score the Olympics while troops were dying in Afghanistan. And he had talked to the Commander once. In two months. He cared more about serving the Olympics up to Chicago than he did about our soldiers serving in Afghanistan and Iraq.
He continued dithering over that same troop increase decision while he instead chose to focus on his whiny pants “war” on Fox News. At war with the Fourth Estate, he abandoned the 4th Infantry Division. As Commander in Chief, he chose to worry more about Fox News than foxholes. While our men and women died. While still in the midst of his raging indecision, he further showed what little respect he has for those who serve with this flippant remark at, yes, a photo op.
Obama arrived on the base 3:19 p.m. local time (1 a.m. Eastern Standard Time), and received a rousing welcome from 1,500 troops in camouflage uniforms, many holding cameras or pointing cell phones to snap pictures.
“You guys make a pretty good photo op,” the president said.
Do you know what you make, Obama? A pretty awful example of a leader and, frankly, a man. In your defense, at least you are succeeding at being a pretty good example of a Worst President Ever. I suggest you stay far away from Jimmy Carter; he’s going to be ticked that you stole that crown from him. Although, at least even Carter could pronounce the word Corpsman, I suspect.
There is a pattern. A pattern of pandering to other nations and attempting to apologize for America’s greatness. Now, they are also unforgivably scorning those who bravely help to make the entire world a better place. Who, at the bare minimum, give up their young adulthoods and the innocence of that age to protect and defend their Country, their Countrymen and to aid countless others around the World in their struggles against tyranny, genocide and other atrocities.
The greatest force for good that the World has ever known is powered by those men and women. Those who lost their lives, cut short in their prime, while in the line of duty deserve honor and respect.
Our President is not doing so; he can’t even be bothered to lay a wreath at Arlington cemetery. Perhaps it would help if he had a protest bracelet to wear, proclaiming America is meany pants? Maybe he could force himself to care then.
For those who emigrated from authoritarian regimes and came to America, what is transpiring here right now is frighteningly familiar. They have experienced and heard it before in their ex-homelands and don’t want to see the same pernicious transformation occur here.
The catch-phrases, racial propaganda issues and benign sounding social slogans that Obama and other “socialists” deviously insert in their rhetoric are Trojans that have all been insidiously used in the past as a part of a lethal package for revolutionary changes.
Like Nazi Germany in the 1930’s. The U.S.S.R. for decades. China. North Korea. And in those countries based on Marxism like Cuba.
This is not a path down which America must never travel. Millions are being duped including many of the intelligentsia.
Obama and his cronies must be stopped!
Perspectives Of A Russian Immigrant (No. 9)
By SVETLANA KUNIN 05/18/2010
In May 2008, Sen. Barack Obama delivered a commencement address at Connecticut's Wesleyan University that called for sacrificing in order to build a fair and socially just society.
"We may disagree on certain issues and positions," he said, "but I believe we can be unified in service to a greater good. I intend to make it a cause of my presidency.
Two years later, at this month's commencement at the University of Michigan, President Obama talked about the role of government as a solution to the problems facing America. He complained about a lack of civility in our public debate.
"Throwing around phrases like 'socialist' and 'Soviet-style takeover' and 'fascist right-wing nut' may grab headlines," he said, "but it also has the effect of comparing our government, or our political opponents, to authoritarian and even murderous regimes."
The president's rhetoric mesmerized the students at Wesleyan and persuaded supporters to join his cause for change. But to me and other immigrants from socialist countries, this rhetoric sounded familiar.
American college students, in awe of their new leader and excited about ideals such as social justice, a fair society, equality and the transformation of greedy capitalist systems in which workers are exploited, do not realize these progressive ideas are identical to what students in socialist countries were taught 40 years ago in required classes such as "political economics" and "Marxist-Leninist dialectical materialism."
The pleasant platitudes that make up leftist rhetoric are not new.
The policies and actions of this government are almost identical to what took place in countries moving toward socialism throughout the 20th century.
Government appropriation of banks, other financial institutions, medical care, education, natural resources and regulation of speech is what came of centralized power in young socialist societies, leading to totalitarian regimes such as those in the USSR, China, Cuba and North Korea.
When House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, other Democrats in Congress and the media portray critics of this government as racists, right-wing nuts, Nazis or terrorists, it is more than lack of civility; it is a deliberate, Soviet-style authoritarian tactic to impose conformity on people who happen to disagree with the government's definition of the greater good.
In the Soviet Union, those who dared to criticize the government were called vragy naroda, which translates as enemies of the people.
At his commencement address in Michigan, Obama said we have the option to get our information from any number of blogs, Web sites and cable news shows. This of course requires that we all agree on a certain set of facts to debate from, and that is why we need a vibrant and thriving news business that is separate from opinion makers and talking heads.
At his next commencement address at Hampton University in Virginia, Obama further aired his concerns about uncontrolled information, which: "becomes a distraction, a diversion. It's putting new pressure on our country and on our democracy."
It was much easier to manipulate and direct public opinion in the Soviet Union, where the state apparatus had complete control of all sources of information. Centralized government propaganda and draconian suppression of free speech created an enforced conformity no one could escape.
That is why Obama wants to regulate the Internet and cable news shows so they are "neutral" as defined by the government.
The Soviets demonized the opposition as enemies of the people; American leftists simply define any opposition to them as racist or extremist.
"The press should be not only a collective propagandist and a collective agitator, but also a collective organizer of the masses," said Vladimir Lenin. "He who now talks about the freedom of the press goes backward and halts our headlong course toward socialism."
Young, educated graduates, born in the freest society, figure Obama is not a socialist; he is something new and somehow uniquely qualified to enact tired, old ideas that will result in a new, fair and equal society.
The Rev. Al Sharpton, in a recent sermon in Danbury, Conn., summed it up well: "Dr. King's dream was not to put one black president in the White House. The dream was to make everything equal in everybody's house. President Obama is in the White House to help us get there, but we're not there yet."
An old Soviet joke defines socialist equality as follows: If your neighbor has a cow and you do not, kill your neighbor's cow.
Another Obama nominee for the Supreme Court … and another pernicious threat to our Constitutional rights. Even though Elena Kagan’s record is almost nonexistent, she has revealed a willingness if not propensity to restrict our First Amendment rights. If nothing else, that should be more than enough to deep six her being confirmed.
Everything else about her pales in comparison including no judicial experience, few cases argued, a long standing far left agenda, and unwavering support for socialism and big government.
She is a political appointee who hasn’t even reached the level of a judicial lightweight, never mind, having the wherewithal to become a Supreme Court justice.
We're Speechless
Investors Business Daily 05/12/2010
Supreme Court: Elena Kagan's thin paper trail was supposed to be an asset. But the confirmation of Obama's nominee may focus on one position it's clear she holds: that banning political speech can be constitutional.
'The government's answer has changed." That was how Solicitor General Kagan began her frantic damage control during a second round of oral arguments last September in the Citizens United case, which Kagan and the U.S. government ultimately lost and the First Amendment won.
Her deputy, Malcolm Stewart, in March of last year said the government had constitutional powers extending to banning books to limit corporate political influence.
As a result, the justices ordered a second round of arguments last fall to get into broader free speech questions.
For that, Kagan stepped into the fray herself, telling the justices that the government had reconsidered its position and conceding that banning books would elicit a strong court challenge.
So Chief Justice John Roberts asked her, "If you say that you are not going to apply it to a book, what about a pamphlet?"
"I think a pamphlet would be different," Kagan responded. "A pamphlet is pretty classic electioneering," and so the government could restrict such political speech.
Who you are should determine how much you can say — that is the admitted philosophy held by this high-court nominee.
According to the president, alluding to Kagan's role in the Citizens United case as he announced her as his Supreme Court choice on Monday, "powerful interests must not be allowed to drown out the voices of ordinary citizens."
But who decides who those powerful interests are and how much they can say?
The most powerful interest of all does: the government.
In a 1996 University of Chicago Law School Journal article titled "Private Speech, Public Purpose: the Role of Governmental Motive in First Amendment Doctrine," which gets raves from left-leaning legal academics, Kagan contended that "the application of First Amendment law is best understood and most readily explained as a kind of motive-hunting."
If the motive is compelling enough, in other words, the government can regulate speech in the name of the public good.
The view that "the government may never subject particular ideas to disadvantage" is mistaken, Kagan wrote. "The government indeed may do so, if acting upon neutral, harm-based reasons."
Again, it is the government that decides if, say, a talk radio host or Tea Partyer is doing "harm" by engaging in political speech that allegedly incites some wacko to violence.
Columnist Jacob Sullum hit the bull's-eye on this when he wrote:
"While the government may constitutionally restrict speech based on 'neutrally conceived harms,' Kagan says, it may not restrict speech based on 'hostility toward ideas.'But as she herself more or less acknowledges, this distinction ultimately collapses because people are hostile to ideas they consider harmful."
In last month's 8-to-1 U.S. v. Stevens court decision regarding depictions of animal cruelty, Kagan contended that First Amendment protection "depends upon a categorical balancing of the value of the speech against its societal costs," a claim Roberts called "startling and dangerous" in ruling against Kagan.
At only 50 years of age, Elena Kagan, a "speech redistributionist," could be on the high court for three decades.
Her upcoming confirmation hearings could be a First Amendment battle royal.
California is a paradigm of where Obama and Congressional Democrats are hijacking the rest of the country to. Massive unsustainable spending, oppressive but still rising taxes, gargantuan debt, bloated but ever enlarging government, strangulating regulations and red tape, business and employment unfriendly environment and intrusive government.
All of these are manifestations of years subjected to the unfettered and irresponsible actions of Progressives/Liberals. It now seems, California is at the edge of the abyss … and looking back at the rapidly approaching country as a whole.
We must not go there!
Sunset In Taxifornia?
Investors Business Daily 05/12/2010
Deficits: We've been hard on Arnold Schwarzenegger in recent months, but we're foursquare behind the California governor in his effort to balance the state's budget without raising taxes.
The Golden State's $18.6 billion budget deficit, the nation's largest, is the result of uncontrolled spending by the state's Democrat-controlled legislature — nothing else. Yet the very same Democratic legislators are pushing for tax increases in the middle of the state's worst downturn since World War II — and only a year after passing a $12.5 billion tax hike to boost revenue.
To call this foolish would be the understatement of the year. So we were glad to hear that Schwarzenegger will include steep spending cuts in the budget plan he'll release this week.
"We don't believe that raising taxes right now is the right thing to do," said the governator's spokesman Aaron McLear.
He's right. California's deficit is not only gargantuan, it's getting worse. In April, the state income tax month, revenue came in 26% below expectations at $3.6 billion — despite last year's tax hikes.
Democrats' answer to this isn't cutting back after years of profligacy. They want a new 10% severance tax on oil production, higher taxes on commercial property and a repeal of corporate tax breaks passed last year to help create jobs.
These are the kinds of policies that have driven California's economy into a ditch. Its jobless rate of 12.6% is among the nation's highest, and it has the lowest credit rating of any state.
Companies are fleeing a business-unfriendly environment created by years of leftist legislation that has taken the state from first to worst in terms of job creation. Recent studies call California's tax policies the worst in the nation. The Pacific Research Institute, a think tank, not-so-tongue-in-cheek calls the state "Taxi-fornia."
Job relocation specialist Joe Vranich counts 112 major companies since June 2009 that have either moved or opened new facilities in other states — costing California thousands of jobs. The most recent emigrant was none other than Northrop Grumman, which is moving its global headquarters to Northern Virginia.
"It's no mystery what causes companies to leave California," said Vranich. "High taxes, undue regulation, workers' comp costs, a legal environment stacked against businesses, and lengthy and costly construction-permitting requirements."
Each week, some 3,000 middle-class workers and entrepreneurs move elsewhere, recent estimates show. Some 1.4 million have left already.
If Schwarzenegger wins this fight, it could mark a defining shift toward fiscal sanity. If not, and taxes and regulations surge anew, California's darkest days will still lie ahead.
Media Research Center analyzed the news media coverage of Arizona’s new immigration legislation (S.B. 1070) and as expected, it was very one sided. Very ones sided - to the tune of an outrageous 12 to 1 negative stories to positive ones. This should be a surprise to no one given its history of distorting the news, controlling the political angle and even suppressing ones that are not in accord with its far left ideological tilt.
Meanwhile, around 70% of Arizonans were in support of the bill . Nationally, support for the law far exceeded those who opposed it. These are in diametric opposition to the media’s positions.
And the news media wonders why their ratings have plummeted and they are suffering severely financially?
MRC Study: By 12 to 1, ABC, CBS, and NBC Rip Arizona's Immigration Law
Tim Graham 05/06/2010
When political scientists compare populism and elitism, they could certainly find a test case in the new Arizona law on immigration enforcement. While Rasmussen found 70 percent of Arizonans favored the crackdown on illegal aliens, and new national media polls found majority support as well, ABC, CBS, and NBC denounced the popular will as short-sighted and discriminatory.
From April 23 to May 3, the top three television networks offered viewers 50 stories and interview segments on their morning and evening news programs. The tone was strongly hostile to the law and promotional to the "growing storm" of left-wing protesters: 37 stories (or 74 percent) were negative, 10 were neutral, and only three were positive toward the Arizona law's passage -- 12 negative stories for every one that leaned positive. Stories were much kinder and sympathetic to illegal aliens than they were to police officers. Cops were potential abusers of power. Entering the country illegally was not an abuse of power. It was portrayed as an honorable step by the powerless.
The soundbite count was also slanted, with 92 quotes against the law and only 52 in favor. The pro-law numbers, however, included many soundbites of Arizona public officials defending themselves against liberal charges that they were racists or in favor of racial profiling.
Opponents of the law didn’t even have to speak English to be quoted sympathetically. In a May 3 CBS Evening News story, Katie Couric fretted "many" illegals "no longer feel welcome." Reporter Kelly Cobiella focused on the story of non-English-speaking Manuela Quintana, who decided to move to Colorado. Cobiella cued up the mother of ten to deny she was a criminal: "‘No,’ she says, ‘a criminal is someone who kills. I just want to work.’" Over video of the kids piling into an SUV, Cobiella concluded: "The family packed up before dawn today and headed north to Colorado. Manuela says she's lost hope in this state. She thinks she'll find it again in another."
By contrast, law enforcers were the bad guys. On Sunday morning, April 25 , ABC Good Morning America host Bill Weir chided Sheriff Joe Arpaio, a well-known enforcer of immigration law, "With this new law, will you ramp it up?...Will you grab people on street corners?"
While an earlier MRC special report found 44 percent of stories on the Tea Party movement suggested they were dangerous or fringy, none of the Arizona stories ever labeled protesters as "liberal" or on the left. They were often cast in neutral terms as "human rights activists" or "Latino activists."
While several stories forwarded outrage from the Mexican government over the Arizona law, none of the network stories mentioned the hypocrisy: Mexico has a stricter immigration-enforcement regime on its southern border than America does. As with sympathetic media coverage of large amnesty rallies in 2006 , none of the stories allowed anyone to suggest it was improper for illegal aliens to petition the government whose laws they're breaking or cancel out the votes of law-abiding citizens.
Civility wasn't necessary. While the harshest Tea Party activists were scorned by the networks for any suggestion President Obama was a "Nazi," on 11 occasions these same networks unquestioningly forwarded smears that proponents of the Arizona law were like Nazis or Civil War-era slaveholders. NBC’s Andrea Mitchell used these slurs from liberal comedians to demonstrate how Arizona was becoming a "laughingstock."
Violence was downplayed. Only one ABC story reported violence by the protesters (in a "mostly peaceful" protest), and only one CBS story mentioned vandalism (smearing refried-bean swastikas on the state capitol building). There were only two references to the murder of rancher Robert Krentz, and four to the shooting of a deputy in Pinal County, all four in larger celebrations of May Day marches.
Viewers would assume protesters were in the majority. ABC Saturday anchor David Muir touted May Day protests [0]on World News. "Angry backlash from coast to coast. Huge rallies across this country tonight against that new controversial immigration law."
Real poll numbers were not important. The networks were very reluctant to note that the Arizona law was popular: only five stories mentioned that the protesters were on the losing side of public opinion, where almost 90 percent of those polled by CBS consider illegal immigration a serious problem. It’s a stunning contrast, then, that 74 percent of the stories channel the view of a tiny minority. When pressed, Americans suggested to pollsters they're sympathetic toward the poverty of illegal aliens and concerned about race-based harassment. But the Big Three TV networks demonstrated no professional appetite for neutrality or civility on this conflict.
Millions of Americans who only peripherally concerned themselves with the Presidential election were duped by Obama during his campaigning, interpreting the well controlled sound bites and the cheerleading of the liberal press as an affirmation that he would be a good change for America. Consequently, he received their vote and now they possess buyer’s remorse. On the other end of the spectrum, millions of voters clearly saw through the lies, smoke screens, denials and irrefutable incriminating evidence that belied his “moderate” image. Many even identified him as a dishonest, corrupt, ruthless, racist and radical anti-American whose goals were seemingly aimed at subverting the social and economic systems in our country, and with it, our freedoms and rights.
These latter individuals did correctly assess the situation … but it is actually potentially worse than many of his ardent foes might have thought. Following painstaking research and analysis, Aaron Klein wrote a book entitled The Manchurian President in which he provides a chilling accounting of Obama’s radical past and evolution that goes all the way back to his early childhood. What he reveals should frighten every American and put them on notice that this man represents real and existential threats to our freedoms, rights and America as we knew it.
Obama must be thwarted!!
See Video of Aaron Klein being interviewed by Sean Hannity:
The incessant left wing attacks on Arizona’s new immigration law are ideologically based emotional rants void of substantive facts. If these demagogues and uninformed parroting protestors availed themselves to examine the law they would note that it is essentially identical to the federal law which the federal government has chosen to largely ignore – for political reasons.
Meanwhile, Arizonans are under assault from these illegals and the Mexican drug and smuggling trade and must protect themselves since the federal government has abdicated its Constitutional responsibility.
Cafferty Blasts Obama and the Dems For the Arizona Law
And in another example of PC (political correctness) run amok (see Arizona Should Be Praised Rather Than Reviled For Seeking To Protect Its Citizens Since The Federal Government Hasn't):
PC In The DOD
Investors Business Daily 04/26/2010
Political Correctness: The Army disinvited the Rev. Franklin Graham from praying at the Pentagon because he might offend Muslim soldiers. But isn't that the same attitude that led to the Fort Hood massacre?
The Army didn't want to offend a Muslim soldier — Maj. Nidal Hasan — who openly threatened "infidels" in Islamic diatribes. Brass ignored his jihadist rants and treated him with kid gloves. Hasan later opened fire on soldiers.
An internal Pentagon probe mentioned none of this, so no one should be surprised that the painful lesson of Fort Hood has not been learned — that catering to militant Muslims does not win their hearts and minds. In fact, it can embolden them.
In the latest chapter of military PC, the Pentagon canceled the appearance of Graham, son of evangelist Billy Graham, at an upcoming National Day of Prayer event because of Muslim complaints over his past "inappropriate" remarks about Islam.
After the 9/11 attacks, Graham described Islam as "a very evil and wicked religion." He explained that he thought it was his "responsibility to speak out against the terrible deeds that are committed as a result of Islamic teaching."
The Council on American-Islamic Relations called on its supporters to pressure the Pentagon to withdraw its May 6 prayer invitation to Graham. CAIR hailed the Pentagon's cave-in as a "victory."
No matter the circumstances, bowing to such a radical group — one with proven terror ties — is a new low in political correctness, even for the Army.
Another group, the liberal Military Religious Freedom Foundation, joined CAIR in complaining about the "Islamophobic" Graham. It argued that the Pentagon showed religious favoritism toward Christianity in inviting him.
Really? The Pentagon holds annual Iftar dinners for Muslims and is building mosques for them. It's also actively recruiting Muslim soldiers, even after the Fort Hood betrayal, and offering them leave for Islamic holidays.
Yet letting an evangelical preacher pray is too "Christian-themed"? Please. If the Pentagon favors any faith these days, it's Islam.
Our military leadership has been impaired by a PC culture that blinds it to even internal Islamic threats. Now comes this affront to one of the nation's leading evangelicals, who has boldly warned about such threats.
As it happens, President Obama met over the weekend with the 91-year-old Billy Graham at his North Carolina home as part of a pre-scheduled meeting. Out of respect for the elder Graham, the commander in chief ought to overrule the Pentagon and re-invite his son to speak on the National Day of Prayer.
But given this president's obsession with apologizing to the Muslim world, we won't hold our breath.
The following essay captures so well the essence and dangers of Obama Delusion Syndrome. The damage done if Obama were just another nameless inconsequential loser would be minimal. Unfortunately, he is the President of what was once the greatest country ever. His delusional disorder together with his narcissistic personality disorder, and some outside political help have in a little more than a year wreaked severe and incalculable damages to our rights, freedoms, attitudes, America’s security, economy and future and have poisoned relationships with our long standing allies and have emboldened our sworn enemies to exploit our increased vulnerabilities.
Not a pretty picture! This must not be allowed to continue.
Obama Delusion Syndrome
Kevin McCullough April 18, 2010
Few things are less tasteful than arrogance amongst the empowered. Few things are sillier than believing one's own praise. Few people are more misguided than those who teach false doctrine, and few pose more danger than those who willfully deceive in order to gain power.
On all four points President Obama stands head and shoulders above us all.
It seems, however, that he saves his ugliest bit of guile, disdain, and self-exultation for when he is forced to deal with "We The People." For as much as he would like to believe it to be the case, he is not higher than us, but rather our servant. And though he bristles at the notion that anyone should be allowed to instruct his behavior or review his job performance, in November of this year the voters of America will do both.
Realizing this, if I were one of President Obama's advisors, I would caution him greatly on his continuing smug and arrogant defiance of the voters, especially as they express their thoughts on the greatest domestic crisis we face nationally: the economy.
This week, when addressing Democratic supporters who paid him (at least his party's campaign fund) between $250-$1250 dollars to hear him speak, the President dropped the curtain and let another shade of his true colors show.
Last year, when the tea parties began forming and the first of what would be over 5000 of them took place across the nation, he claimed to have barely been made aware that they were there. He claimed so despite the fact that the most watched cable news company reported live from gatherings that ranged from thousands to hundreds of thousands of attendees. (Attendance at these events was a fact that the White House would directly misguide people concerning throughout the year of 2009.)
But this year, instead of playing dumb, the President took a different tactic: arrogance and marginalization. Speaking to people who paid big money to hear him, he said, "I've been a little amused over the last couple of days where people have been having these rallies about taxes. You would think they would be saying thank you."
Thank you? For what, exactly, Mr President?
Since unemployment, which you pledged to never let grow past 8%, has been near 10% for the better part of your Presidency, should we thank you for the stimulus bill you passed that has made underemployment worse in dozens of states?
You do know Mr. President, don't you, that under President Bush nearly one in twenty families worked but did not have enough to make ends meet, but under you that percentage has, for the duration of your time in office, held fairly steady at one in five families?
Or should we thank you for the federal takeover of private industry, and the artificial propping up of some companies, while the indiscriminate failures of others went unheeded?
Perhaps we could thank you for removing the terms "terrorist, war on terror, and islamic radical" from federal usage in any official reference. After all, refusing to label what the terrorists really are, or worse yet their true intentions will create a more peaceful world... right?
Perhaps we can thank you for your repeated attempts through the Health Care Reform bill, your still-not-dead Cap & Trade legislation, and, coming soon, your legislation to normalize illegal aliens to put repeatedly harsh burdens upon the small businesses of America. After all small businesses only creates 2 of every 3 new jobs in the nation.
Mr. President there is also the matter of how you treat our allies. You assumed a posture, from the moment you were sworn into office with our closest ally Great Britain, and most recently our most important ally in the middle east Israel, to treat them with contempt. Yet you smilingly shake the hands of dictators, accept their socialist dogmas as gifts, and even tell them that your own nation is a bad player in world affairs, even though if it were not for your nation--America, most of the freedoms on the planet presently enjoyed would be non-existent.
President Obama, it has become clear to anyone with an ounce of objectivity, that you are engaged in a great delusion.
A delusion that sees your own policies as euphoric, when in reality they are significantly dangerous. It is a delusion that seems to think our allies are bad, and our enemies are good. A delusion that even has given you the "right" to arrogantly mock and marginalize those of us who know the law: that you work for us.
Mr. President how are we supposed to see "hope and change" in your actions that mock our needs, priorities, and desires?
In reality we'd prefer you to focus on attempting to heal the sick economy, restore our standing to one of respect amongst our allies and fear amongst our enemies, and in nearly every other area keep the long reach of government out of our lives. Then we'd have reason to thank you!
Unfortunately for us all, it is doubtful your delusion will allow you to see the need.
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