I'm sure not seeing anything like that down South.
Posted on 11/08/2008 3:06:12 AM PST by backhoe
Obamas first 16 months:
3 Terror attacks.
Huge oil spill.
Start ruining health care
Stock market troubles
High unemployment
Piling on Debt
Iran & DPRK still developing WMD
Abandoning Israel
Heightening social strife
No, Obama is right on schedule
This idiot lies all the time 24/7
Yep, thats a pretty darn accurate assessment.
ObamaCare is a national disaster. http://www.dispatch.com/live/content/editorials/stories/2010/04/28/malpractice.html?sid=101
John Brooks, Chicagos fire commissioner, is retiring out of the blue and the media here in Chicago says its because of some sexual harassment suit thats been brought against him.
Which is weird, because Brooks is often seen at The Lucky Horseshoe in Boystown, so unless he was sexually harassing a male employee, we doubt he has anything to worry about when the charges against him are investigated. You would be surprised who turns up at the Horseshoe. The Chicago police chief is there quite a bit himself, and its not for license inspection or to ensure the dancers are covering up everything they are supposed to be covering.
This is such a strange town to live in sometimes, especially for people like us who try to stay as active and involved as possible, and keep our eyes and ears open. The media here never reports the actual news its like they just write fiction in Bizarroworld.
Or, it often feels like episodes of Buffy the Vampire Slayer where the Scoobies catch a Sunnydale newscast, and the demon and vampire activities are all blamed on street gangs and the giant hole that opened when a monster tried to belch out of the Hellmouth is chalked up to a sinkhole caused by sewer construction.
As someone noted in the Open Thread, there was a bizarre murder-suicide at the Old Navy store on State Street today which happens to be the Old Navy we all shop at. The Old Navy we were at just yesterday, in fact, the one next to Marshall Fields and across the street from Block 37 which is one of Daleys failed disastrous pet projects.
Youd think a murder-suicide would get some play, but checkout the Tribune site today:
As much as we love photos of hockey guys being awesome, a story about the Blackhawks should not trump a murder-suicide in broad daylight in an Old Navy on State Street.
That great street.
The street Daley is desperate to reinvigorate.
As a reader noted, it does feel like Daleys been putting pressure on the media to clamp down on all stories about crime and violence in the city especially near Block 37. This is one of the biggest boondoggles in Chicago history, and a story people dont like to talk about for fear of enraging the Mayor-Emperor. Daley wasted close to a billion dollars on this pile of junk. It was supposed to be the station for a pie-in-the-sky pipedream for two massive underground superspeed rail lines connecting the Loop to the two airports here in Chicago. But, the problem is that the city is built on a marsh, below the water table. Not only would it require use of both Chunnel-digging excavation machines to dig the tunnels, but the hydrology issues involved would cost hundreds of millions to resolve, with an unsustainable financial burden in perpetuity to keep those tunnels dry ones the trains would start running, sometime in the 2030s or so, by the time this would all be completed.
Daley is counting on federal spending at some point in the future to build the tunnels. Hes already built the train station shell, at great tax dollar waste, and on top of that he built an eyesore of a retail complex with few retailers at all interested in setting up shop.
The last thing Daley needs is for people to start thinking State Street is unsafe to visit because for Block 37 to ever recoup any of its money, it needs to attract lots of visitors. Thats not going to happen if murder-suicide stories at Old Navy are what people associate with the street.
Hence, the Tribune seemingly doing whatever it can to bury the story.
Welcome to Sunnydale.
Coroner: Metra chief's death 'appears to be a suicide'
UPDATE:Metra Director Pagano Throws Himself Front Of Train Sources Say[Feds Durbin Probe Rail Boss]
--OK, so Faisal Shahzad was placed on our terrorist watch list by the Clinton Administration in 1999, kept on the list during the Bush years, but was taken off the list by the Obama Administration sometime in 2009?
And didn't Shahzad become a naturalized U.S. citizen in April 2009? That means that either
(i) Obama's INS allowed a Pakistani immigrant who was on Department of Homeland Security's terrorist watch list and had been on the list for 10 years to become a naturalized U.S. citizen, or
(ii) Obama got Shahzad (and likely thousands of other suspected terrorists) removed from the terrorist watch list, without careful study of the particulars of each case, within his first two months in office!
I think that this is the biggest scandal in this story.
(thanks AuH2ORepublican)
Plus this: Maybe if the president and Congress did the grocery shopping, theyd know why were mad.
QUOTE OF THE YEAR: Do we really want to live in a country where when someone busts into your house at night youre supposed to assume they might be cops?
Id rather live in a country where you get a bounty for shooting people who bust into your house illegally one thats doubled if theyre cops. Apparently, though, Im more likely to get the former. And to those who want to criticize my approach to illegal breakins: Why are you so soft on criminals?
UPDATE: Reader J.A. Lyons thinks a bounty is rather drastic. Well, yes. Id be happy with stripping official immunity in no-knock raids, so that police and, more significantly, supervising officials would become liable for anything that goes wrong. No-knock raids should be extraordinary measures, only used when there is imminent threat of death or great bodily harm. Thats not the case in the vast, vast majority of no-knock raids. And illegal breakins are . . . illegal. They dont become less so, somehow, when engaged in by those sworn to uphold the law.
Meanwhile, to see what Im talking about, watch this video.
More...Curiouser & curiouser...
Interesting article on American Thinker this morning about the mess in Chicago and the role of the media in it:
http://www.americanthinker.com/2010/05/vote_for_the_crook_its_importa_1.html
Obamas really bad, not good, terrible week. Lost in the bluster of the panel discussion is the real problem for the White House this week, which is the loss of a sense of competence across the board. In that sense, the Gulf spill is akin to Katrina for Bush, and the botched Times Square attack adds onto the impression that this administration has become clueless. The Sunday talk shows will chew that over at length unless the White House dramatically changes the narrative which is why well probably get a SCOTUS leak today or tonight.
WALL STREET JOURNAL: Meet The Unemployable Man.
UPDATE: On Facebook, Alex Lightman suggests that if youre unemployed or underemployed, you take advantage of these free online business courses from MITs Sloan School of Management.
Meanwhile, also via Alex, heres a list of MITs most popular free online courses. Alas, this wont help those who arent well-enough educated to benefit from this level of course.
Morgen Richmond from Verum Serum broke this story earlier this week at Big Government.
Its worth repeating.
Democrat Barney Frank, the chairman of the House Financial Services Committee, sent a letter this week to the White House urging the President to reject the attempt by Republicans to include GSE (Fannie Mae-Freddie Mac) reform in any financial reform bill. Frank argued that had already been reformed and did not need to be included in the Senates financial reform bill. Frank told democratic senators, As Fannie and Freddie operate today, going forward, there is no loss.
Freddie and Fannie have already been reformed, to some extent, by virtue of being placed into conservatorship.
So the argument that we have ignored the need to change the operation of Fannie and Freddie in our rush to do financial reform is of course exactly backwards, Frank wrote. We did Fannie and Freddie first.
Frank also wrote that the Republican proposal to abolish Freddie and Fannie would remove an important government prop to the housing market. It is the unanimous view of every profit and nonprofit entity concerned with the housing market in the United States that simply to abolish Fannie and Freddie, as the Republicans are proposing in the House bill, and not do anything to replace the functions they are now performing with a conservatorship, would be a disaster for housing, and therefore for the economy as a whole, Frank said
This is an important point that has to be repeated as Fannie and Freddie operate today, going forward, there is no loss, Frank wrote.
These statements by Frank came one day before Freddie Mac requested an additional government bailout of $10.6 billion to cover losses incurred in the first quarter.
Frank became chair of the House Financial Services Committee in January 2007, after the Democrats re-took congress. While the housing market decline had already begun, it would be well over a year before the financial crisis really began to accelerate. Fannie and Freddie, in fact, were not placed under federal control until September 2008.
President Bush warned the Democratic Congress 17 times in 2008 alone about the systemic consequences of financial turmoil at Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac and also put forward thoughtful plans to reduce the risk that either Fannie Mae or Freddie Mac would encounter such difficulties. Unfortunately, these warnings went unheeded, as the Presidents repeated attempts to reform the supervision of these entities were thwarted by the legislative maneuvering of those like Frank and Pelosi who emphatically denied there were problems.
Instead of curtailing the power of these failed mortgage giants, Frank passed legislation that limited oversight of Freddie and Fannies mortgage holdings.
Morgen Richmond added this on Franks failed record:
Let it be noted that in May 2007 Barney Frank and the Democrat-controlled House would go on to pass GSE reform legislation. Legislation which was adamantly opposed by the Treasury Dept. and the Bush Administration for limiting federal oversight of Fannie and Freddies mortgage holdings. Legislation which included Franks pet project, an affordable housing fund backed by tax payers.
Let it also be noted that going into 2007 Fannie and Freddie had never in history been allowed to purchase or finance sub-prime mortgages. But under pressure from Democrats in Congress (including Frank), they were granted this authority by regulators in September 2007.
Let it also be noted that in 2007 Frank aggressively pushed to increase the maximum loan limits which could be underwritten by the GSEs. A move which would ultimately transfer tens of billions of dollars of loan liabilities from private financial institutions to tax payers.
Its no wonder that even after the total collapse of Fannie and Freddie in 2008, at an ultimate cost to tax payers which could exceed $400B, Barney Frank is still adamantly opposed to legislation which would prevent any further federal bailouts of the GSEs. For Democrats like Frank, continued control over Fannie and Freddie represents the effective nationalization of the entire mortgage industry. Its a dream come true for those who wish to use the power of the federal government to implement their desired social and redistributive policies.
Barney Frank was a key figure at the center of the financial collapse in 2008. Today hes still pushing his radical and misguided agenda on America. He never learns.
Isnt it time Barney Frank was retired from his leadership duties?
Oh yeah, I heard an unspoken "boy' in this one. Not in the racial sense but in the "you're an immature man-child who needs to grow up now that you're President" sense.
VID AT LINK
(Video via Hot Air)
I couldn't pick Jan Brewer out of a line up and I'm not ashamed to say I love her.
Obama can't take a punch. He's thin skinned and testy. I really hope Republicans look at this kind of hard hitting ad as a model of how to attack him. Yes, he, the Democrats and the MFM will cry 'racism' but they are going to do that anyway. Better to ignore them and speak directly to voters.
Speaking of voters, folks in Colorado seem to have looked at what their neighbors to the southwest have done and are saying, sign us up.
Fifty-five percent (55%) of Colorado voters favor a law like the one just adopted in Arizona that authorizes local police to stop individuals they suspect of being illegal immigrants, according to a new Rasmussen Reports telephone survey in the state. Thirty-five percent (35%) oppose such a law.Nationally, 59% of voters favor a law like Arizona's, unchanged from a week earlier despite last weekend's protest rallies. Fifty percent (50%) have an unfavorable opinion of the protestors.
But also as is found nationally, 55% of voters in Colorado are at least somewhat concerned that this intensified effort to identify and deport illegal immigrants will end up violating the rights of some U.S. citizens. Forty-three percent (43%) do not share this concern. This includes 33% who are Very Concerned and 20% who are Not At All Concerned.
People seem more worried about actual problems than they are about media name calling. It's not guaranteed to translate to votes but it's certainly something for Republicans to build on.
God help America, now.
You won't see this on the networks starts at 1:10:
Legal immigrant ties into Tucson City Council
Best line from her is along the lines it is not the city's job to set political agendas.
Just some of the bile in that video:
[The USA] is the Northern front of a revolutionary Latin American movement...our enemy is captalism
This guy is typical. This talk, yes by professors has been going on for 15 years. Terry Anderson has been swarmed by them since 1996 in the L.A. Area. Many of us have tried to tell the naysayers and open border republicans what was really going on with their peaceful migrants.
Did anyone get the name of the speaker on the video?
Heres a lot more of it, I dont know if hes in this bunch:
The Takeover of America
CD Produced by the California Coalition for Immigration Reform
SO IM NOT AN EXPERT LIKE JOE KLEIN, BUT DOES THIS COUNT AS SEDITIOUS SPEECH? UCLA Professor Calls For Mexican Revolution in the United States.
UPDATE: Allahpundit says the video is from 2007. That makes it okay. Its impossible to commit sedition when a Republican is in the White House!
DAN RIEHL ON the fallout from Utah.
UPDATE: A reader emails: If the establishment GOP lets itself become back biting spoilers, they are done. No one lives up to deals cut with back biters and spoilers. They dont have to. They only need them to win, not govern. The GOP old guard need to find themselves a coalition to join. There is only one that has any momentum, and that actually believes the ideals the old guard has pretended to believe, the tea parties. Bennett could have joined them himself, but he chose to brazen it out.
ANOTHER UPDATE: Reader Jim Verdolini writes: His base told him pretty clearly they would not stand for TARP, spending, and compromise Health Care Schemes. Bennett, like most of or leadership ignored them. Now he is retired. Eventually republican leadership will understand that they work for us. Till then they will become ever more extinct.
MORE: Utah Tea Partier David Kirkham emails: After convention we walked up on the podium and took this picture. We took over the Utah GOP. All of our candidates were elected today without having to go to a primary (or booted in the case of Bennett). Obama has awakened a sleeping giant.
UPDATE: Heres a news report.
ANOTHER UPDATE: Richard Fernandez on what it means:
The game was redefined in a single place and time from one of Republicans versus Democrats (Romneys reference) to that of Small Government versus Big Government. In isolation the Bennett defeat is insignificant, but it now raises the wider question of whether the Smaller Government idea can catch on. If it does then it has the potential to redefine the political landscape in ways that are both a threat and opportunity to different communities.
The Tea Parties represent an asymmetric threat to political organizations optimized for party-line warfare. The threat is no longer across the aisle but outside the building.
...That new reality is driven by economics. The real problem is that Washington and Brussels globally considered is running out of Other Peoples Money (OPM)...
"So let it be written, so let it be done.
My hope is a culling of America, part of me wants it to be violent, bloody, as to leave a lasting scar. The more rational part of me wants to do it peacefully, so the rest of the world sees how its REALLY done. "
"...The arrogance of politicians to stay in office seemingly forever speaks of their desire for power, not a desire to represent their constituents. My own belief is that 12 years in office is enough, period. I say throw out all incumbents and lets start from scratch ..."
"I forgot to add this. The Republicans, once in the majority, had better not return to their pre 2006 methods, because people like me will go after them as hard as we are now going after those that now irk us."
THEG's opinion?
Damn straight- Slash and Burn, until they hear us again. I am past being tired of being ignored by Perfumed Princes in the city, Atlanta, and DC.
Soap
Ballot
Jury
Ammo
Don't make me open that Last Box, boys- I will, if you won't listen, and you are not going to like it one little bit.
"Back in 1988, archaeologist Joseph Tainter wrote The Collapse of Complex Societies. There have been an astonishing number of complex civilizations over the millenia, almost all of which have collapsed! To oversimplify, Tainters argument is that unproductive overhead grows as a civilization matures, and keeps growing until its unaffordability brings the whole society down. Sound familiar?
Clearly, modern Big Government has already run out of the ability to tax enough to pay for all the things politicians want. Big Government is now in the process of running out of the ability to keep borrowing enough to make up the difference between what those politicians want to spend and what they can actually cover with taxes. We are rapidly coming up on Peak Government.
The challenge is what happens next? "
"Man, that La Raza guy really boils my blood. He can take his Fidel and Che and stuff it. What a bunch of fools who believe these things, and how long must we suffer them? Theres a huge problem with immigrants, all immigrants not just Hispanics. I saw this big time with the Yankees who fled the Rust Belt in the 70s and moved in all around us in Texas. You see it all over south Florida, today, or any hapless place out West where the Californicator refugees have landed en masse. Immigrants, whether from the Mexican south or the rusting North or Kalifornia, flee their troubled lands only to set about changing their new place up, making it more like back home from whence they fled."
Read the COMMENTS Here: Posted by DrewM. at 07:04 PM New Comments Thingy
Fore!
Barack Obama went golfing today as Nashville continued to suffer from the worst disaster since the Civil War.
Its a self-help disaster.
Thank goodness the state-run media cleared that up for us. After all, were not able to think for ourselves so they have to form our thoughts for us
The AP today absolved Obama for his response to the Gulf oil spill crisis.
(FOX News)
In case you forgot about Obamas weak response to the spill Doug Ross has the time line. Thats all you need to know. 12 days after the explosion, Barack Obama finally visited the disaster zone.
Obama was out golfing today.
One of the worst ways that the lack of ideological diversity in America's newsrooms shows forth is in the media's treatment of sensational accusations against the current president.
Oftentimes, explosive allegations against presidents are either untrue or drastically overstated: George W. Bush deliberately lying to get the U.S. to war so he can cash in or deliberately ignoring Hurricaine Katrina due to his hatred of black people (a la Kanye West), Bill Clinton's supposed involvment in the drug trade, so on and so forth.
Journalists do the public a service by rebutting absurd conspiracy theories and wacko charges. In recent memory, though, they have taken a much greater zeal toward stamping out allegations against Democrats, particularly President Obama, a stark contrast to the kidglove or even promotional attitude they took toward books by liberal authors alleging all sorts of anti-Bush absurdities.
World Net Daily-affiliated author Aaron Klein recently discovered this when he sent his new book, "The Manchurian President," to members of the media he hoped would review it. He got some very angry responses. Here are some of the more colorful ones:
"Never, ever contact me again," wrote Time Magazine senior writer Jeffrey Kluger.
Newsweek deputy editor Rana Foroohar quipped,"This is sensational rubbish that is of no interest to any legitimate publication."
"Absolute crap," replied Evelyn Leopold, a Huffington Post contributor who served for 17 years as U.N. bureau chief for Reuters until recently.
Nancy Gibbs, editor-at-large for Newsweek, fired, "Remove me from your list."
David Knowles, AOL's political writer, responded, "seriously, get a life."
Ben Wyskida, publicity director for The Nation, claimed Klein's book is "so offensive" and "so far afield."
(Excerpt) Read more at newsbusters.org ...
Subjects covered:
Obamas mysterious college years unearthed
*Shocking new details of Obamas relationship with Bill Ayers and other Weathermen terrorists
*Obamas ties to Islam and black liberation theology
*Startling facts about Obamas eligibility to serve as president
*Obamas membership in a socialist party probed
*How Obamas hope, change slogans stem from communist activism
*Radical socalists involved in drafting stimulus bill, ObamaCare
*Communists, socialists and other radicals on team Obama, including an expose on Obamas top guns in the White House
*Never-before-revealed depth of Obamas relationship with ACORN
For "Thunder on the Border," click the picture:
Yep.
Those 12-20 million figures are as fraudulent as... the current _Resident of our White house...
And "Movin' On Up!"
Unfortunately,
Check out this "instruction sheet" to Muslims on how to islamicize their public schools. There is no separation of mosque and state -- mosque is state in Islam.
If this guide shows us anything, it's what idiots they take us for. This is, of course, an outrage. None of this should be introduced into the public school. If this is what Muslim parents want, they should send their children to madrassah.
This is an Islamic site -- Sound Vision Islamic Products and Information.
(Excerpt) Read more at atlasshrugs2000.typepad.com ...
House 2010: Nobody Is Safe. A ONE-SENTENCE EMAIL FROM THE UTAH TEA PARTY: Term limits began today.
Faster & Harder, please...
THIS SEATTLE POLICE BEATING SOUNDS DREADFUL, and if it turns out that things happened as reported, heads should roll. But Im guessing it will create less national outrage than Arizonas immigration bill.
UPDATE: They all get religion when they discover theyve been caught on video.
ANOTHER UPDATE: Reader Michael Keating writes: If that beating had occurred in AZ, it would have been blamed on our new immigration law. Oh, you know it.
Speaking as one who's trained a jillion LEO's ( and others... ) in the Gentle Arts of Special Weapons & Tactics? Good cops are fine men- and bad ones are Thugs, with a badge & and gun & a nightstick...
High School Where Flag Flap Occurred Hides A Racist Secret. Whats more divisive: students wearing American flag shirts or administrators sanctioning a racial supremacist group?
Related: Roger Simon: Identity Politics is for idiot sheep and the LA Unified School District.
Alright, THEG will sound off- I post this because you ought to read it.
I would not want any girl or woman I've ever cared about to support herself this way... but... if it was her best choice of several worse ones? If she avoided the drugs & alcohol & petty crime that usually goes with it? She's not an evil person. Grace O' God, there go I, and other stuff I've seen along life's roads and byways:
TRACY QUAN: The Secret Lives of Prostitute Moms.
Meanwhile, for you gals who are still giving "it" away for free: Lemondrop vs. Slate on whether ugly gals are better in bed. Still more on this vital issue, here.
A BEDBUG EXPLOSION IN NEW YORK CITY. Bring back DDT. The recent citywide resurgence of bedbugs has been well documented. In 2004, the Health Department tallied 537 complaints and 82 actual violations. Last year, those numbers ballooned to 10,985 complaints and 4,084 violations (given that the problem is thought to be significantly underreported, the notion that there arent far more cases is daylight madness).
Here, by the way, is a recipe for homemade DDT, though I havent tried it and dont vouch for it. Perhaps some readers will know more. Given New Yorks problem, Im surprised theres not a flood of homemade DDT. Its happened before.
It's been four days since May 5, and I'm still angry.
"Cinco De Mayo," the annual quasi-bacchanalia of Mexican-American pride, had some extra connotations this year. Quite a few celebrants crossed the line from pride to supremacy, and there was some blowback.
In California, a few students decided that they'd show their pride in their heritage by wearing American flag apparel to school on that day. The school's administration soon put an end to that nonsense -- they were sent home for their "disrespectful" attire.
That got me angry, and when I get angry in cases like this, I get reading -- and writing.
First up, there are almost no circumstances where a student should be disciplined for wearing an American flag. Sure, if the school has a uniform requirement or a dress code that forbids the apparel in question regardless of the flag aspect, then that's one thing -- it's not the flag being singled out here. But banning the presence of the flag itself? No way.
In some places, the Mexican flag was raised to honor the holiday. Again, fine. But proper flag etiquette demands that no flag ever be raised higher than the American flag, or in its place, on American soil.
Then I started digging (OK, not very deeply) into the whole "Cinco De Mayo" thing. And I learned quite a bit about the holiday.
First up, it's really not that big a deal in Mexico. It's not their Independence Day -- that's September 16. It commemorates victory at the Battle Of Puebla, so it's the equivalent of Bunker Hill Day here in the US.
And what was the Batle of Puebla? It was a Mexican victory over France in the middle of a long string of defeats that would have ended with Mexico losing, had not the United States offered a hand.
And really -- the FRENCH? They're proud of beating the French? That's a pretty low standard right there...
What really got me steamed, though, was the massive student walkout on Thursday. 200 Mexican-American students protested, demanding that the offending students who had dared wear American flags to an American school on American soil be disciplined further (just being sent home for the day wasn't enough to satisfy their wounded pride).
Bullshit.
We don't see this kind of reaction on St. Patrick's Day or Columbus Day (two other holidays tied to ethnic groups here in the US that get short shrift in the homeland). No, it's only on May 5th that it happens.
And that's simply unacceptable.
As I said up front, pride is not only acceptable, but commendable. However, there is a line between "pride" and "supremacy," and the reactions this last week showed us that a lot of people have crossed that line. By showing that they would not tolerate any other group asserting their own identity and pride on "their" day, they showed that their demands for "respect" are strictly a one-way street and they have no intention of showing any.
The 200 students who were "offended" and "insulted" by American citizens wearing their nation's ensign to the point where they walked out of school are the ones who should be disciplined. The administration should have simply locked the doors behind them and told them to come back when they're ready to acknowledge that non-Mexican Americans have rights, too.
At times like this, I start to worry that I sound a bit too much like Pat Buchanan and the "America First" crowd. But then I remember that the best lies have a grain of truth in them, it's simply impossible for a human being to be wrong 100% of the time (Joe Biden being a possible exception), and anyone who doesn't rankle at the thoughts of American citizens being told that wearing an American flag is "provocative" and "disrespectful" and "inappropriate" needs a serious attitude adjustment.
I've always liked his books...
That's different - that's them, not us.
Try fearing for your life and shooting an innocent person and see if you get the same complete absolution as someone who does the same thing while wearing a badge.
I'm starting to think that not-shooting-at-helicopters is a failed conservative policy.
The Times Square bomb failed. What will we do when the next bomb works?
I dunno, maybe fire Janet Napolitano?
Monday opens with a SCOTUS bang. NBC News reports tonight that Harvard Law School dean turned solicitor general Elena Kagan will be the White House SCOTUS nominee to replace retiring Justice John Paul Stevens. It was widely rumored she would be the pick leading into the weekend. The announcement is expected at 11 a.m. Eastern:
President Barack Obama will nominate U.S. Solicitor General Elena Kagan to serve as an associate justice on the U.S. Supreme Court, NBC News Pete Williams reported late Sunday night.
Kagan, 50, served as the Dean of Harvard Law School from 2003 to 2009. Obama nominated her to serve in her current post as solicitor general early in 2009, and she won Senate confirmation by a vote of 61-31. She is the first woman to serve as solicitor general of the United States.
She was widely viewed as a front-runner when Obama was considering candidates for a Supreme Court opening last year, but the president ultimately chose Sonia Sotomayor for the job.
The Beltway conventional wisdom has already cast her as a mooooderate and a pragmatist. Ed Whelan at Bench Memos has the appropriate retort to that narrative.
And heres a reminder from my blog almost exactly a year ago when Kagan was on the short list for the SCOTUS slot that ultimately went to Sonia Sotomayor:
Dean Kagans nomination to the Supreme Court would be concerning given her complete lack of judicial or appellate experience. She has never been a judge or even argued a case in a court of appeals. It is difficult to see how her experience fundraising for Harvard Law School qualifies her for a seat on the Nations high court.
-Dean Kagan has taken positions that are disturbingly out of the mainstream. For example, driven by her view that the dont ask; dont tell policy adopted by a Democrat Congress and President Clinton is a profound wronga moral injustice of the first order, she argued that it violates the First Amendment for the United States to withhold funds from colleges that ban the military from recruiting on campus. The Supreme Court unanimously rejected this view.
-It is also unclear that a Justice Kagan would be an adequately independent check on executive excesses. She has argued in favor of greatly enhanced presidential control over the bureaucracy, which is concerning in light of President Obamas unprecedented centralization of power in the White House.
-Dean Kagan has argued that nominees to the Supreme Court should undergo a searching inquiry into the nominees substantive views of the law, and should comment particular issues. If nominated, it will be interesting to see whether Dean Kagan remains faithful to this prescription in answering the Committees questions.
The nutroots arent happy with Kagans clubby academic ties or her work for Goldman Sachs. HuffPo:
While the work [Elena] Kagan did for Goldman remains largely brief or unknown, the Huffington Post was passed along two reports that the advisory council completed in 2005 and 2008. The findings touch on the broad risks that the world economy faced and contain the type of insight expected from a largely formal panel. In terms of content, they came up a bit short, failing to mention credit bubbles in major economies (such as the U.S. housing market) as a looming problem.
Considering how many actual economists missed the housing bubble in real time, it would be difficult to hold Kagan to a higher standard though Goldman was already betting against the housing market by the time the latter report was published.
The issue for progressives, however, isnt her lack of long-term market salience. But rather the ties however small to a firm that is now a black mark on Wall Street and a pariah in Congress. I just dont understand why the Administration would want to makes themselves and their nominee vulnerable to the opposition at a time when American skepticism of Wall Street is at an all time high, said a prominent progressive strategist speaking on the condition of anonymity. This is like handing the Republicans the mantle of populism just for trying to oppose Kagans confirmation.
Yeah. Its going to make it a little more difficult to pull off the compelling personal story/SCOTUS nominee in touch with the people schtick that smoothed the path for Sotomayor.
Heckuva job, Obama optics experts
***
Amen to what Sen. Jeff Sessions wrote in the Washington Post on Friday:
As government continues its rapid expansion, Americans are looking for judges in the mold of Chief Justice John Roberts, not Justice John Paul Stevens. They are looking for judges who will stay true to our Founders vision instead of imposing their own. They are looking for judges who recognize the limits on government power; who restrain themselves to the text of the Constitution; and who will defend the rights of all citizens without bias, without prejudice and without hesitation.
***
File under Curious Timing: The late Friday night resignation of top White House lawyer Daniel Meltzer, who shepherded Sotomayor through her SCOTUS nomination last year, is interesting, isnt it?
Daniel J. Meltzer, a top White House lawyer who has played a critical behind-the-scenes role in the administration legal team, is resigning next month and will return to his tenured position as a Harvard law school professor, the White House said on Friday.
Mr. Meltzers last day as the principal deputy counsel to President Obama will be June 1. Since the administration took office, he has worked on nearly every major legal issue the White House has handled, a sprawling portfolio that ranged from domestic policies to national security matters.
Among other things, Mr. Meltzer played a leading role in the administrations efforts to close the military prison at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, and related policies affecting terrorism detainees.
In addition, Mr. Meltzer, who teaches courses on the federal courts at Harvard, helped prepare Supreme Court Associate Justice Sonia Sotomayor for her confirmation hearings a role he may reprise in his final weeks by working with Mr. Obamas forthcoming Supreme Court nominee, which the president is expected to announce as soon as Monday.
Tom Goldstein at SCOTUSblog weighs in on where we go from here, process-wise:
Note the relationship between Mondays announcement and the Senate calendar. There are seven weeks between Monday and June 28. Six to seven weeks is traditionally regarded as the minimum amount of time between a nomination announcement and hearings before the Senate Judiciary Committee. June 28 marks the last week the Senate is in session before its July 4 recess, which runs from Saturday, July 3 to Sunday, July 11. So, tomorrows announcement is timed to permit hearings to be conducted prior to the recess, if (and its a big if) the Senate Judiciary Committee agrees.
Whether they will agree will depend on a number of factors. Kagans relatively short paper trail note the contrast with the nearly two decades of decisions by Sonia Sotomayor means there is less to review, and thus less time is required prior to the start of hearings. Kagan was also recently confirmed by the same Committee as Solicitor General.
Senate Democrats will prefer to move the process forward quickly for two reasons: so that Kagan is not left hanging for nine weeks before she appears before the Committee; and so that the nomination can be moved forward to make room in the calendar for legislative efforts. On the other hand, Republicans, as the opposition, will prefer delay because as more time passes there is a greater chance that something will emerge that justifies defeating (or at least undercuts) the nomination.
Also important will be the speed with which the Administration produces documents not only the nominees questionnaire to the Senate but also the documents it intends to produce from Kagans time in the Clinton Administration. A genuine fight over materials could lead to a delay.
***
From SCOTUSReport:
Rick Garnett, professor of law and associate dean of University of Notre Dame Law School, and former law clerk for Chief Justice Rehnquist: Elections matter, and the election of President Obama has turned out to matter a great deal for the future decisions and direction of Supreme Court. With the nomination of Solicitor General Kagan, the President has taken a significant step toward reshaping the Court and its work for generations. No one should think that this nomination is inconsequential, or that it changes little because it involves merely replacing one liberal justice with another. A conservative might someday win back the White House, but any future Republican president will be playing defense with his or her Supreme Court selections. With his second Supreme Court pick and, to be clear, he will almost certainly have more the President is on the way to having had more influence over the Court than any President since Reagan, and perhaps even Roosevelt. Future elections might undo some of the Presidents policies, but his more liberal views about the Constitution, the powers of the national government, and the role of unelected federal judges, are now being locked in securely.
David McIntosh, co-founder of the Federalist Society and former congressman from Indiana: Im deeply disappointed that President Obama has chosen to nominate an individual who has demonstrated a lack of adherence to the limits of the Constitution and a desire to utilize the court system to enact her beliefs of social engineering. Solicitor General Kagan has been nominated with no judicial experience, a mere two years of private law practice, and only a year as Solicitor General of the United States. She is one of the most inexperienced nominees to the U.S. Supreme Court in recent memory.
Heh: I love it when the most transparent administration ever picks a nominee because they dont have much of a paper trail.
Super suckup and Keith Olbermann lapdog Jonathan Alter of the soon to be defunct Newsweek Magazine, has written a book about The Ones first year in office (an annus horribilis if there ever was one). It seems as if the street thug in a fancy suit has a foul temper and likes to try to bully the people who are trying to actually defend this country. Of course it is easy for him to humiliate and launch into tirades against McChrystal, Petraeus, Netanyahu, etc. people who actually love America, however when it comes to Chavez, Ahmadinejad, and those who are trying to destroy us he is as supine as a cheap whore.
Read the rest here: New Obama book by Newsweek senior editor Jonathan Alter airs private flares of temper
because it gives you bitter-clinging, Zionist, Xtianist, redneck, low-IQ, low-education, two-digit, Walmart-shopping, steak-on-the-backyard-BBQ, homeskooling, Boy-Scout-supporting, US-flag-wearing cousinfuckers the IDEA you can actually be responsible for your own life.
The President Bush who emerged after September 11 took his party and the country back to the divisive politics of earlier decades, giving us seven years of ideological recrimination. By the time of the last presidential campaign, millions were transfixed not by the wisdom or folly of Barack Obamas policy agenda, but by absurd rumors about his birth certificate and his socialism. Now he has been elected president by a healthy majority and is grappling with a wounded economy and two foreign wars he inheritedand what are we talking about? A makeshift Tea Party movement whose activists rage against government and the media, while the hotheads of talk radio and cable news declare that the conservative counterrevolution has begun.It hasnt. [...]
A new strain of populism is metastasizing before our eyes, nourished by the same libertarian impulses that have unsettled American society for half a century now. [...] It appeals to petulant individuals convinced that they can do everything themselves if they are only left alone, and that others are conspiring to keep them from doing just that. This is the one threat that will bring Americans into the streets.
Welcome to the politics of the libertarian mob. [...]
Quite apart from the movements effect on the balance of party power, which should be short-lived, it has given us a new political type: the antipolitical Jacobin. The new Jacobins have two classic American traits that have grown much more pronounced in recent decades: blanket distrust of institutions and an astonishingand unwarrantedconfidence in the self. They are apocalyptic pessimists about public life and childlike optimists swaddled in self-esteem when it comes to their own powers. [...]
A million and a half students in the United States are now being taught by their parents at home, nearly double the number a decade ago, and representing about fifteen students for every public school in the country.11 There is nothing remarkable about wanting to escape unsafe schools and incompetent teachers, or to make sure your children are raised within your religious tradition. Whats remarkable is American parents confidence that they can do better themselves. [...]
[T]he movements rapid growth and popularity are unthinkable without the demagogues new ability to tell isolated individuals worried about their futures what they want to hear and put them in direct contact with one another, bypassing the parties and other mediating institutions our democracy depends on. When the new Jacobins turn on their televisions they do not tune in to the PBS News Hour or C-Span to hear economists and congressmen debate the effectiveness of financial regulations or health care reform. They look for shows that laud their common sense, then recite to them the libertarian credo that Fox emblazons on its home page nearly every day: YOU DECIDE.
You stupid people! How dare you challenge The Establishment!! We are the Experts! We have Degrees and Certificates! We go to the correct Cocktail Parties! We are the Taste Makers!
Not to worry though, between Obamas FCC flipping the bird at the courts and contemplating the declaration of the Internet as a utility, the continued push by Congressional Dems for Orwellian-named Fairness Doctrine and Leftist newspapers making their Internet presence even more radically Left, this kind of silly, naive, and shall we say SO 18th Century! belief in individual sovereignty will be shut down one way or another.
Maybe well take a page from Germany and start jailing homeschoolers for teaching without a state license as a start
(h/t Allahpundit)
************************************************
UPDATE:
VIDEO AT LINK
But the crowd didnt quiet, and the boos and catcalls spread through the crowd, and suddenly Ceausescu got a look of horror on his face. He realized that the game was up, and all the secret police in the world wouldnt be able to save him.
Now I dont believe that our political class is in much danger of being hung from lampposts, but they have that look in their eyes, just like Ceausescu, they know they are in trouble.
This is the time, like Nikolai on the balcony, that they try to shush the crowd. It didnt work then, and it wont work now. The game is up."
To: All
The Welfare States Death Spiral. What were seeing in Greece is the death spiral of the welfare state. This isnt Greeces problem alone, and thats why its crisis has rattled global stock markets and threatens economic recovery. Virtually every advanced nation, including the United States, faces the same prospect.
RELATED:
TIM CAVANAUGH: California: The American Greece. What do Europes most bankrupt nation-state and Americas most bankrupt united state have in common, aside from being bankrupt? In what is undoubtedly a coincidence noticed only by free-market fundamentalists, it turns out that Greece, that sun-drenched paradise on the Aegean, and California, that sun-warmed El Dorado on the Pacific, are the worst places to do business in their respective economic zones. . . . The insidious thing about an unfriendly business climate is that it takes a long time for the effects to show up in the governments inability to pay its bills. So long, in fact, that when the sovereign bankruptcy comes, its easy to draw the conclusion that tax rates are too low. Both California and Greece are going through a variety of this type of denial right now. But with the governor of California and the prime minister of Greece both promising to turn over a new leaf, this is a good time to remember that you cant take peoples money if you prevent them from making money in the first place.
Tea Parties May Be Europes Only Hope. "Compare and contrast: In America, Tea Partiers peacefully march and demand their government spend less money to head off an impending crisis before it happens. In Greece, they evade taxes, wait until the economy collapses, then kill bank employees when the government is forced to cut benefits. "
JOHN HINDERAKER: Are the Feds Trying to Nationalize Your Retirement Savings? At this point, I think the best we can say is this: the federal government is desperate for cash, and the biggest untapped source of wealth is the hundreds of billions or trillions of dollars that Americans who are now nearing retirement age have saved over their lifetimes.
WHAT THE G.O.P. doesnt get about blogs.
LIBERAL FASCISM: THE FONT.
Obama has Lost Almost Half of his US Jewish Support. And most of what remains is based on denial. . .
The most damning part is Obamas admission that he doesnt know how to work an iPod. Good grief. Remember when he was going to be our hip, tech-savvy President? Now hes coming across like Grandpa Simpson. UPDATE: Bill Quick remembers something. DONALD SENSING: The floods were Nashvilles biggest disaster ever. And Obozo's... this will leave and indellible mark in flyover, err, throwaway, country. America won't forget this slight... Culture of Corruption: Hilda Solis editionIf you did your homework last year and read Culture of Corruption, you already know all about Labor Secretary Hilda Soliss Big Labor corruptocracy (background here). Heres an unsurprising update on the reign of Hilda from Rob Bluey at Heritage:
Remember: Its all about the boodle. Always about the boodle. Posted in: Corruption, Unions
I was just browsing through my little pocket edition of our Constitution and saw Article II, Section 4 The President, Vice President and all Civil Officers of the United States, shall be removed from office on impeachment for, and conviction of, Treason, Bribery, or other high crimes and misdemeanors. Now, that seemes pretty clear, right? "It is easy to spend other peoples money." First Lesbian SCOTUS Justice: Elena KaganPosted by hillbuzz under Uncategorized | Tags: Democrats strategy, Elena Kagan, First lesbian SCOTUS Justice, identity politics, What's Democrats' real plan with Kagan? |[99] Comments Drudge Reports running the headlines that Elena Kagan will be nominated to the Supreme Court of the United States today. Whatever anyone says about her, this nomination could have been worse. Our pick for the SCOTUS was Ann Claire Williams whom we hope President Palin makes her first nomination to the Court in 2013. READ IT ALL- at the link... I dont care about her sexual lifestyle. I dont care about her appearance. I dont even care that she was never a judge. After all, there was talk a while back that Hillary might get nominated for the Supreme Court. None of us here would say that Hillary was not qualifed because she wasnt a judge. What disturbs me is Kagans view on the Constitution. She believes it is defective: http://weaselzippers.us/2010/05/10/rnc-does-kagan-views-the-constitution-as-defective/ That should be questioned. Rasmussen: Sestak Tops Specter, 47-42AceWe will probably not get the thrill of retiring this nasty (perennially voted among the Senate's meanest) bastard ourselves; the Democrats will beat us to the punch. One partisan, media-bashing point: The media will take the ouster of Bob Bennet as an indictment of conservatives. We're too ideological and/or partisan, they'll claim. (See the predictable Kathleen Parker, for example.) This take-down of one of the "good guys" (that is, someone willing to bend the Democrats way) proves that, as if it needed further proving. First of all, one of the media's go-to Neutral Story Lines is that incumbents have too much of advantage in elections and there's not enough turn-over and fresh blood (read: drama which makes the news more fun to write) each election. Mickey Kaus often notes the media likes Neutral Story Lines, as they're easy to write, but are supposedly nonpartisan, as they usually criticize some procedural defect in both parties. What makes the "Neutral Story Line" not neutral at all is that the media seems most interested, each cycle, in the "Neutral Story Li9ne" that hurts the Republicans more. For instance, the amount of money flowing into elections became a more and more intense problem as more and more money flowed to Republicans, putting Democrats at a disadvantage. The supposedly Neutral Story Line doesn't really seem all that Neutral when you consider that there's-too-much-money-in-politics reached its crisis stage during Bush's 2004 election, when he spent more money than anyone in history, but suddenly wasn't a problem at all when Obama topped him in 2008. This despite the fact that Bush actually had a higher percentage of small-money donors than Obama (as a percentage of total money donated), and Obama had a bigger percentage of high-dollar donors. The media loves these story lines, because facially they appear neutral -- "money in politics is a danger" has no on-its-face, explicit partisan import -- but the timing of when to deploy a particular story line is highly partisan, and always made with the Democratic Party's best interests in mind. Thus, when Bush refused the campaign spending limits, and spent only private money, it was nearly a constitutional crisis; when Obama did the same, it was a triumph of people-powered politics. Are conspiracy theories bad? Well, right now, when the Republican base is vulnerable to buying into conspiracy theories about Obama's birthplace or sabotaged deep-drilling oil rigs, conspiracy theories are bad, and examples of the Paranoid Style of American Politics. On the other hand, when former Secretary of State Madeleine Albright confessed to Mort Kondracke she feared Bush had actually captured bin Ladin and was secretly holding him only to publicize his capture on the eve of the 2004 elections, a party's trafficking in conspiracy theories wasn't even worth noting. Certainly such conspiracy theories weren't worth noting when Bush and Cheney (and their deadly cabal) were accused of sabotaging a plane in order to murder a sitting and popular liberal US Senator. Now, of course, in the case of Bob Bennet, the media is instructing us that we on the right are too partisan and too ideological and too inflexible and so on and so on -- the "neutral story line" they're pushing; a call for moderation is neutral, by its own terms -- and ignoring the other possible neutral story line -- that it's wonderful that an incumbent got beat, which proves that our politics can change when an electorate gets involved. But consider the case of Sestack and Specter: The media will once again have its choice of two "neutral story lines" when that primary is resolved. It's heads the Democrats win, tails the Republicans lose, as far as the media is concerned. If Sestack wins, the media will in fact push the "neutral story line" they could have pushed, but chose not to, in Bennet's case: That we're retiring an old warhorse in favor of a fresh face and that proves that our system works. On the other hand, if Specter wins, they'll push the "neutral story line" that the Democrats, unlike Republicans, are welcoming of moderates. (And Specter, a moderate Republican turncoat now voting as a somewhat-less-moderate Democrat, is still pretty moderate.) So that story line does have something to it. But we'll have no stories about "overly-partisan and inflexibly ideological Democrats driving out a true moderate and fence-crosser" if Specter should lose -- trust that. Instead we'll have the other supposedly-neutral story line, the one that once again just happens to wind up praising Democrats. And this is how media bias works 75% of the time. Most of the time, the media is selecting between several possible "rules," many of which are arguably correct, but which are contradicted by nearly opposite rules, which are also arguably correct. The media never decides which rule is correct in the most cases; instead, they choose whichever "rule" benefits the Democrats this cycle. Are we too interested in personal scandals which don't really have much to do with a party's governing philosophy? The answer is "No" if you mean Mark Foley or Mark Sanford; the answer is "Yes" if you mean Eric Massa or John Edwards. Is it out of line for a former vice president to toughly criticize a new president of a different party? Well, if you're Al Gore criticizing Bush, you're just being patriotic and expressing the frustrations of millions of Americans. If you're Dick Cheney criticizing Obama, you're deliberately weakening a new president and endangering national security. Is it patriotic, or treasonous, for a high-level national security staffer to leak to the press? Well, if you're exposing Bush's SWIFT snooping, you're a patriot, keeping a vigilant eye on the shadowy, murky world of espionage. If you're embarrassing Obama by noting that he has no Iran plan at all, you're a dirty leaking traitor giving away critical state secrets for a cheap partisan advantage. And dissent? Is it the highest form of patriotism or the lowest form of partisanship? I think you know the answer there, and the answer is, of course, It depends on who's dissenting. In each of these situations, a halfway decent case can be made either way -- often, both of these "rules" is kinda-sorta true and kinda-sorta false. The way the media shapes opinion is by stating, categorically, without caveat, that one rule is true in all cases when it benefits Democrats, and then, the following election cycle (or even the following month) that its opposite rule is categorically, and without caveat, true, in all cases, when it hurts the Republicans. Neutral story lines are only really neutral when the criteria for choosing them is neutral. When partisan and ideological considerations drive the choice of which conflicting "neutral" story line to push, it's just a partisan press covering its tracks with the thinnest pretense of objectivity. As usual.
Posted by Ace at 04:12 PM New Comments Thingy
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Video: Schoolgirl's Drawing Of American Flag Called 'Offensive' By Teacher
Mexican Students Knock U.S. Flag to the Ground (Morgan Hill)
Meet the place of Obamas birth, according to Hawaii Governor
When Barack Obama Jr. was born on Aug. 4,1961, in Honolulu, Kenya was a British colony, still part of the United Kingdoms dwindling empire. As a Kenyan native, Barack Obama Sr. was a British subject whose citizenship status was governed by The British Nationality Act of 1948. That same act governed the status of Obama Sr.s children.http://fightthesmears.com/articles/5/birthcertificate.html
Factcheck.org goes on to say this about Obama Sr., Jr. and the British Nationality Act of 1948:
In other words, at the time of his birth, Barack Obama Jr. was both a U.S. citizen (by virtue of being born in Hawaii) and a citizen of the United Kingdom and Colonies (or the UKC) by virtue of being born to a father who was a citizen of the UKC.http://www.factcheck.org/askfactcheck/does_barack_obama_have_kenyan_citizenship.html
Even the modern day State Department rules discusses the problems associated with dual citizenship:
7 FAM 081: U.S. Policy on Dual Nationality:http://www.state.gov/documents/organization/86563.pdf(e)While recognizing the existence of dual nationality, the U.S. Government does not encourage it as a matter of policy because of the problems it may cause. Dual nationality may hamper efforts by the U.S. Government to provide diplomatic and consular protection to individuals overseas. When a U.S. citizen is in the other country of their dual nationality, that country has a predominant claim on the person.
...
the U.S. Supreme Court has stated that dual nationality is a "status long recognized in the law" and that "a person may have and exercise rights of nationality in two countries and be subject to the responsibilities of both." See Kawakita v. United States, 343 U.S. 717 (1952).
So, back to the question: "HOW CAN A NATURAL BORN CITIZEN'S STATUS BE "GOVERNED" BY GREAT BRITAIN?"
It can't. Of course not. Yet, right there, on his campaign web site F.T.S., it's stated that a foreign government "governed" Barry from birth and the reason it did, was that Barry inherited that foreign citizenship by way of his foreign national father (no matter where he was born), a fact backed up by Factcheck.org. Assuming, of course, that Sr. was his legal father at birth.
How, then, could he possibly be a "Natural Born Citizen" of the U.S.?
Barry Soetoro, the divided citizen at birth!
Undoubtedly just a mental lapse on his part to admit this.
...EU president Van Rompuy warned that the bloc risks irrelevance and the end of its expensive welfare programs if it can't speed up economic growth, forecast to expand by just 1 percent this year.So just as the Europeans are clue'ing up that their"With 1 percent growth we can't finance our social model any more. With 1 percent structural growth we can't play a role in the world," he told the World Economic Forum in Brussels. "We need to double the economic growth potential that we now have."
Many are skeptical that can be achieved...
The New Dark Ages are upon us. All we need are a bunch of Huns and Vandals sacking the joint to make it complete.
29 Well if its vandals and huns, I am joining the vandals, because I like their uniform and that big red V on the front. plus the chicks are hotter.
May 10, 2010 10:54 AM by Michelle Malkin
Ive said it before and it bears repeating even louder: Entrenched incumbency is not an argument for more entrenched incumbency.
Conservatives in Utah sent that message loud in clear this weekend in ousting entrenched GOP incumbent Sen. Bob Bennett, who begged and pleaded furiously to save his hide in the weeks leading up to the state Republican convention. All together now: Dont Let The Door Hit You on the Way Out!89 Comments
Were cleaning house in the GOP in this cycle then we're wiping the Dems. "
READER CREEDE KURTZ shot this photo of the Ardmore, Oklahoma tornado: Ardmore got lucky many town all around us got hit hard, according to breaking reports. The storm has moved 70 miles in 90 minutes and has dropped multiple tornadoes. Local news is saying no reports of injuries or fatalities. PS taken with an Olympus Stylus 850 SW.
What were seeing in Greece is the death spiral of the welfare state. This isnt Greeces problem alone, and thats why its crisis has rattled global stock markets and threatens economic recovery. Virtually every advanced nation, including the United States, faces the same prospect. Aging populations have been promised huge health and retirement benefits, which countries havent fully covered with taxes. The reckoning has arrived in Greece, but it awaits most wealthy societies.[...]
The welfare states death spiral is this: Almost anything governments might do with their budgets threatens to make matters worse by slowing the economy or triggering a recession. By allowing deficits to balloon, they risk a financial crisis as investors one day no one knows when doubt governments ability to service their debts and, as with Greece, refuse to lend except at exorbitant rates. Cutting welfare benefits or raising taxes all would, at least temporarily, weaken the economy. Perversely, that would make paying the remaining benefits harder.
Greece illustrates the bind. To gain loans from other European countries and the International Monetary Fund, it embraced budget austerity. Average pension benefits will be cut 11 percent; wages for government workers will be cut 14 percent; the basic rate for the value added tax will rise from 21 percent to 23 percent. These measures will plunge Greece into a deep recession. In 2009, unemployment was about 9 percent; some economists expect it to peak near 19 percent.
If only a few countries faced these problems, the solution would be easy. Unlucky countries would trim budgets and resume growth by exporting to healthier nations. But developed countries represent about half the world economy; most have overcommitted welfare states. They might defuse the dangers by gradually trimming future benefits in a way that reassured financial markets. In practice, they havent done that; indeed, President Obamas health program expands benefits. What happens if all these countries are thrust into Greeces situation? One answer another worldwide economic collapse explains why dawdling is so risky.
Sure. But thats all so dark cloudyish. And, you know, down the road.
Meantime: FREE "stuff"!
The selfish gamble implicit in the welfare state is that, though most people know on some level that spending in excess of revenue isnt a very fiscally responsible long-term plan on which to build a stable society, many are willing to bet that resources wont run out in the short term which means these types of voters believe they will still get theirs so long as they continue to vote in their own economic interests.
Future generations? Not their problem.
And besides. If their kids dont like being poor, let them do what everyone does to climb out of poverty: get a government job.
(h/t sdferr)
We're starting to see a coalescing of the narrative from the Left in terms of what they perceive our intentions to be. The narrative seems to be not so much a downsizing of government, but an elimination of government altogether- in short, to paint the right as anarchists.
Obviously, that isn't the case- quite the contrary, the clear story from the commenters here and at other blogs shows a deep devotion to the Constitution and the rule of law.
I'd noticed it recently from lefty postings on Facebook- the attempts to defend socialism- particularly in regards to the health care debate- by asking whether conservatives like having roads, emergency services, and so forth. That argument is, of course, comparing apples to oranges, and utterly ridiculous.
Instapundit has some links up to various blogs, talking about that very same thing. The attempt is, again, to define conservatives as anarchists. The corollary, by extension, is even more interesting- it notes the Left's absolute and unquestioning trust in their government, along with the predictable hatred and distrust of any other point of view.
It does bring up an interesting point, and not necessarily a dishonest question from the Left- what is the conservative stance on government's role?
The answer, as I believe it, is defined very specifically in the Constitution, and is something that it appears many Americans understand- to the chagrin of many in Congress, all of whom are having to reassert their allegiance to something- either the rule of law (in conservative districts) or to what makes them feel better (in statist districts).
It's going to be very important over the next few months- leading up to the midterms- and in the next two and a half years- leading up to the next presidential election- to define the conservative belief of the role of government as part of the sales pitch to get statists out of power.
What do you think? It obviously doesn't matter what I specifically think, but more about what we can define.
Have at it!
Posted by Open Blogger at 03:03 AM New Comments Thingy
884 Well this is interesting:
http://tiny.cc/7pp2d
The Obama administration also conspired with BP to fudge the extent of the oil leak, according to our federal and state sources. After the oil rig exploded and sank, the government stated that 42,000 gallons per day was gushing from the seabed chasm. Five days later, the federal government upped the leakage to 210,000 gallons a day.
However, WMR has been informed that submersibles that are monitoring the escaping oil from the Gulf seabed are viewing television pictures of what is a "volcanic-like" eruption of oil. Moreover, when the Army Corps of Engineers first attempted to obtain NASA imagery of the Gulf oil slick -- which is larger than that being reported by the media -- it was turned down. However, National Geographic managed to obtain the satellite imagery shots of the extent of the disaster and posted them on their web site.
There is other satellite imagery being withheld by the Obama administration that shows what lies under the gaping chasm spewing oil at an ever-alarming rate is a cavern estimated to be around the size of Mount Everest. This information has been given an almost national security-level classification to keep it from the public, according to our sources.
THE KNOXVILLE TEA PARTY FOLKS are protesting Al Gores honorary degree at the University of Tennessee.
Big Mommy Michelle Obama launched her childhood obesity campaign in February by dragging her daughters BMIs into the public spotlight and carrying water for the SEIUs legislative agenda. Whats next? Aggressive government pressure on, and policing of, food advertisers. Here they come:
The review by the Task Force on Childhood Obesity says one out of every three children is overweight or obese. The task force is a key part of First Lady Michelle Obamas campaign to solve the problem of obesity within a generation. President Obama ordered the comprehensive review of the issue.
The report includes familiar themes, emphasizing the importance of improved nutrition and physical activity. It also calls for some new and dramatic controls on the marketing of unhealthy foods.
The task force wants junk food makers and marketers to go on what amounts to an advertising diet. It says media characters that are often popular with kids should only be used to promote healthy products. If voluntary efforts fail to limit marketing of less healthy products to young viewers, the task force suggests the FCC should consider new rules on commercials in childrens programming. It also challenges food retailers to stop using in-store displays to sell unhealthy food items to children.
The advisory panel proposes better food content labeling on products and vending machines. Restaurants and vending machine companies are urged to display calorie counts. The experts say the FDA and USDA should cooperate with the food and beverage industries to develop a standard system of nutrition labeling on the front of packages. The study also suggests that restaurants should re-evaluate portion sizes, improve kids menus and list more healthy food choices.
The White House study says school systems should consider efforts to promote healthier food in cafeterias. One idea: swap deep fryers for salad bars.
In a proposal thats sure to be popular with children, the panel says schools should promote recess for younger students and physical activity breaks for upper level grades.
Because, you know, parents, teachers and administrators in their local school districts are too stupid and too uncaring to have figured this out already.
Youll recall the far Left attacks on me last summer when I had the audacity on ABCs This Week to discuss government unemployment benefits and the effect that endless extensions have on reducing the incentive to seek a job.
We revisited the subject in March during the Senate debate over the jobless benefits extension package protested by retiring GOP Sen. Jim Bunning.
And again when the Atlanta Journal Constitutions Cynthia Tucker resurrected her emotional objections to basic economic facts, which even NYTimes columnist Paul Krugman acknowledged:
The AJCs Cynthia Tucker blogged today about a testy exchange we had last summer on ABCs This Week regarding government unemployment benefits and the effect that endless extensions have on reducing the incentive to seek a job. Once again, she mistakes standard economic arguments for moral judgments: Does the right really believe the unemployed are lazy?
What offended Tuckers sensibilities was the blunt manner in which I summed up taxpayer-subsidized inducements: If you put enough government cheese in front of people, they are just going to keep eating it.
As I said in August and reiterated last week during the Bunning Senate floor showdown, the question is where do we draw the line? There is no such thing as a temporary entitlement in Washington and there are precious few politicians willing to challenge the permanent, ever-expanding Nanny State (quoting from the WaPo article: under multiple extensions enacted by the federal government in response to the downturn, workers can collect the payments for as long as 99 weeks in states with the highest unemployment rates the longest period since the programs inception.)
None other than Paul Krugman of the Fishwrap of Record acknowledges that generous unemployment benefits reduce the incentive to seek jobs.
As he put it exactly:
Everyone agrees that really generous unemployment benefits, by reducing the incentive to seek jobs, can raise the NAIRU [the minimum rate of unemployment consistent with a stable inflation rate].
Which brings us to todays story in the Detroit News about landscapers unable to find workers because theyd rather collect unemployment benefits than take a job:
In a state with the nations highest jobless rate, landscaping companies are finding some job applicants are rejecting work offers so they can continue collecting unemployment benefits.
It is unclear whether this trend is affecting other seasonal industries. But the fact that some seasonal landscaping workers choose to stay home and collect a check from the state, rather than work outside for a full week and spend money for gas, taxes and other expenses, raises questions about whether extended unemployment benefits give the jobless an incentive to avoid work.
Members of the Michigan Nursery and Landscape Association have told me that they have a lot of people applying but that when they actually talk to them, it turns out that theyre on unemployment and not looking for work, said Amy Frankmann, the groups executive director. It is starting to make things difficult.
Chris Pompeo, vice president of operations for Landscape America in Warren, said he has had about a dozen offers declined. One applicant, who had eight weeks to go until his state unemployment benefits ran out, asked for a deferred start date.
Its like, youve got to be kidding me, Pompeo said. Its frustrating. Its honestly something Ive never seen before. They say, Oh, OK, like I surprised them by offering them a job.
Some job applicants are asking to be paid in cash so they can collect unemployment illegally, said Gayle Younglove, vice president at Outdoor Experts Inc. in Romulus.
Unfortunately, we feel the economy is promoting more and more people and companies to play the system and get paid or collect cash money so they dont have to pay taxes, Younglove said.
No doubt such decisions are being made across the country. And with Democrats pushing for yet another massive unemployment benefits extension, theres no end in sight:
Congress faces a crush of votes on big-ticket items before the Memorial Day recess, setting up a debate on deficits less than six months before the November elections.
Democratic leaders are looking in the next three weeks to send President Barack Obama a slew of measures that cost more than $200 billion, including a multiyear extension of unemployment benefits, an extension of expiring tax provisions and Medicare doctor payments totaling $180 billion and a $33 billion Afghanistan war supplemental bill
The unemployment benefits program, which provides someone with up to 99 weeks of jobless benefits, has received two monthlong extensions in the past two months. It is unclear how much the next extension designed to last for the rest of this year will cost, but the price tag is expected to be in the tens of billions.
The number of realists who now understand that Obamacare will increase the federal deficit is at its highest level yet. 63% of voters know that the democrats health care bill will increase Americas deficit. And, 56% of American voters want the dems nationalized health care bill repealed.
Rasmussen reported:
The number of U.S. voters who expect the recently passed health care bill to increase the federal deficit is at its highest level yet, and most voters continue to favor its repeal.
The latest Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey of Likely Voters shows 63% now believe the health care reform legislation signed into law is likely to increase the federal deficit. Thats up four points from last week and up three points from when the law was passed in March.
Only 12% expect the law to reduce the deficit, down four points over the past week and the lowest level measured to date. Another 16% say the law will have no impact.
The percentage of voters who expect the law to increase the deficit has ranged from 57% to 63% since March.
Support for repeal is proving to be just as consistent as opposition to the plan before it was passed into law. Fifty-six percent (56%) now favor repeal, including 46% who Strongly Favor it. Thirty-seven percent (37%) are opposed to repeal, with 28% Strongly Opposed.
Why might such a large percentage of the American population be such vile counter-revolutionary traitors needing to be stamped out like cockroaches?
...Eighty-three percent (83%) say a company doing business in this country should be allowed to require its employees to speak English......Only 10% of Americans say requiring people to speak English is a form of racism or bigotry... [you don't even have all the moonbats on that one! - PA]
...Twelve percent (12%) believe that declaring English the official language would limit free speech in this country, but 78% feel otherwise and see no limits being placed on free speech...
"The only standard the IRS must assert is that the action was done merely to lower the tax burden (as if thats a bad thing), and not for any economically-substantial reason...
Sometimes you think the guy who flew his plane into the IRS building was right... this is equivalently saying yeah we have rules, but even if you follow them we still get your money. I mean, with the above they could get you if you went shopping for the cheapest [yet serviceable] item you could find because by buying a cheaper item you are paying a lower sales tax.
I thought Kelo was bad; but that statement..."
A much more scholarly and detailed examination of the creation of the first new major religion of the twentieth century. Definitely a good read.
Early in the article, he discusses the Magic Negro movie (which he calls the "black angel" movie) as laying the necessary groundwork for Obama's messianic campaign.
The first signs of the spiritual zeal that would eventually play a significant part in Obamas election came not from Washington or Chicago but from Hollywood. Our moviemakers are adept at measuring the zeitgeist of the nationof its liberal half, anywayand are a powerful force in shaping it. And for more than a decade, theyve been churning out what critics call black-angel movies. These films feature a white protagonist guided to enlightenment by a black character, usually of divine or supernatural origin or, at the very least, in touch with spiritual experiences that the main character lacks. With the black angels help, the white hero finds salvation.The genre includes, to name just a few, The Legend of Bagger Vance (2000), in which Will Smithplaying a caddie who is really, the film hints, Godrestores Matt Damons golf game and love life; Bruce Almighty (2003), in which Morgan Freeman, as God, bestows his powers on a manic Jim Carrey; and the awful What Dreams May Come (1998), in which Cuba Gooding, Jr. is a wise soul guiding Robin Williams through the afterlife. These movies have been numerous enough, David Sterritt points out in the Christian Science Monitor, to confuse TVs buffoonish Homer Simpson: in one episode, Homer mistook a black man in a white suit for an angelic visitor, all because (according to his embarrassed wife) hed been seeing too many movies lately.
Far and away the best of the black-angel films is Frank Darabonts The Green Mile (1999), based on a novel by Stephen King, whose knack for setting his finger on the cultural pulse has made him a multimillionaire. The basso profundo Michael Clarke Duncan plays John Coffey (note the initials), a gigantic black man wrongfully convicted of the rape and murder of two little girls in Depression-era Louisiana and sentenced to death; Tom Hanks plays Paul Edgecomb, a prison guard who discovers that Coffey is not only innocent but also a Christlike miracle worker. Coffeys laying-on of hands restores a dead mouse to life, cures Edgecomb of a bladder infection, and heals the wardens wifes brain cancer. Shortly before he is executedthe jeering of the girls anguished parents and the weeping of the prison guards who know the truth recall the account of the Crucifixion in LukeCoffey has this exchange with a tortured Edgecomb:
Edgecomb. Tell me what you want me to do. You want me to take you out of here? Just let you run away? See how far you could get?
Coffey. Why would you do such a foolish thing?
Edgecomb. On the day of my judgment, when I stand before God, and He asks me why did Idid I kill one of His true miracleswhat am I going to say? That it was my job? . . .
Coffey. You tell God the Father it was a kindness you done. . . . I want it to be over and done with. I do. . . . Im tired of people being ugly to each other. Im tired of all the pain I feel and hear in the world every day.
The writer or director of a black-angel film recognizes the unspeakable injustices once perpetrated by his country on black people; he wants to be forgiven the sins of his fathers. If he is simply a comedian, he makes Bruce Almighty, casting a black man as God in a sort of lighthearted flattery. If his waters run deeper, he understands that no plum role can atone for the crimes that weigh on him. Instinctively, he realizes what thinkers from Aristotle to Marcel Mauss have known: that whenever a gift is given, the prestige of the giver increases and that of the recipient declines. So he tells a story in which a black man gives the greatest gift of all, sufferinglike Jesus in Christian theologyfor others sins, in fact demanding to suffer, and by demanding, forgiving. White America is pardoned its wrongs, while black America, by pardoning, is elevated to godhood.
Are these movies ultimately condescending to blacks? After all, the white protagonist, the person who will be saved or damned according to his decisions, is invariably more interesting than the serene black angel hovering nearby. Indeed, the condescension, if such it is, is a cinematic version of affirmative actiona denial to blacks of Everymans struggle for salvation; a magnanimous extension to them of paradise.
None of that was Obama's doing, of course, but he did tap into that sentiment with the ooga-booga mysticism he dressed up as politics.
The article discusses (obliquely) what I think is an important driver in all this, that great masses of Americans have rejected and repudiated, they think, the non-rational desire for religious meaning in their lives.
But what they've actually done is only reject and repudiate conventional religion's offerings in this area. Having rejected the usual method of finding transcendence in everyday life, and yet still possessing a strong desire to discover such transcendence, they simply begin attaching religious significance to traditionally non-religious ideas and actions, such as buying local organic produce and fluorescent bulbs.
They haven't purged themselves, as they believe, of that prehistoric longing to be closer to God; they've only forbidden themselves from going about this in the historically-normal way. So when a 21st-century Charismatic like Obama appears, they are ready to Believe, capital B intended.
A related article at City-Journal seems to discuss this (I say seemed because I've only begun skimming it): How Science Fiction Discovered Religion.
The creepiest aspect of the campaign for me was the way crowds chanted his name, all in the same cadence. "O-BA-MA! O-BA-MA!" The scariest thing about those chants was not even the adoring crowd. It's how the One basked in their adulation, and seemed to agree that yes, he was quite awesome, thank you for noticing.
Ah yes. And don't forget the fainting--all those people fainting at his appearance. He was basically like the Holy Trinity of John, Ringo, and Paul--3 in one.
Which is more insulting -- that I'm expected to believe that Michelle Obama is beautiful or that President Wee Wee is intelligent?
Because all I see is a thin skinned, trash talking little pussy who lacks both manners and grace.
He's a lout.
That's the word I was looking for.
Has there ever been a more classless, uncouth presidency? Every day I have to hear this loutish buffoon run his stupid goddamned mouth. Eery time you turn on the TV or radio, there he is mouthing lies and lecturing America about how to live.
Clinton was an oily, forked tongued sleaze. This guy doesn't even have the talent to be likeable as he runs his con. It's right out there in the open, and everyone with a brain knows what the score is.
I can forgive people for being charmed by Clinton. This guy? You have to suspend all reason to believe that he's qualified enough to lead a Little League baseball team, much less the greatest nation on earth.
297 We are under enemy occupation.
210 The Cult Of Obama more like natives worshipping a Bic lighter. Or a Coke bottle, if I remember a certain movie's trailers correctly.
Posted by: t-bird at May 11, 2010 05:05 PM (FcR7P)
It's a cargo cult. "Bring us free stuff!"
As Yers Trooly, THEG ( the heavy equipment guy ) noted a long, long time ago?
"It's a Creepy Cargo Cult of Personality..."
RELIGION OF PEACE: Raging Muslim Students Screaming Allahu Akbar Assault Swedish Artist During Free Speech Lecture (Video). Dumb hicks.
UPDATE: Zombie has more.
CHANGE: Early retirement is no longer the goal of most workers. Even retirement at age 65 now seems unattainable to many people. The majority of Americans now expect to work until ( they are dead... )
Its safe to click this link, its to a piece he wrote for The Hill.
...The proliferation of online communities certainly appears to be leveling the playing field at the primary level, allowing candidates in better sync with their partys base to compete against better-known, better-funded, establishment-backed candidates. In such an environment, television becomes less important, while online outreach and field work pick up the slack. Traditional campaign consultants may not like it, but primary success increasingly hinges on building movements, rather than spending millions on sleazy negative television ads.Even a blind squirrel finds a nut now and then and I think Kos has found one here. Most of what he's saying I agree with, although he gives a tad more credit to organizing and outreach than I might.
I think the electorate has been burned very very badly and is paying a lot more attention than it has at any point in perhaps the past 100 years. A modest uptick in electorate awareness can offset millions of dollars of traditional campaign spending - IOW, if you're saying shit they don't like and they're paying attention, it doesn't matter how well or often you "explain" your unpopular positions. In fact, remaining tone deaf and continuing to "explain" unpopular positions like some Zombie robot in the face of overwhelming opposition to them just kinda pisses people off.
ESQUIRE: OBAMAS KATRINA? Why Obama Must Stop Blogging & Start Leading on the Gulf.
Please, God- this overelevated clown and his posse could not lead a lemonade stand- don't let the fool get involved in matters that need adult supervision...
16 REASONS Why California Is The Next Greece.
May 11, 2010 10:18 PM by Michelle Malkin13 Comments | 2 Trackbacks
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Just compare the illegal immigrants of today to those who went through Ellis Island or even the ones that go through the process legally.
It's a sad thing when we cannot even enforce the laws the books without be called racist by the open borders crowd, yet Mexico's own laws are even more stringent and are enforced without a peep from the MFM."