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While no one yet knows what ignited Major Nidal Malik Hasan's murderous rage Thursday afternoon, Nov. 5, at Fort Hood, the kindling was hiding in plain sight. The Army had ordered Hasan, wrestling with the conflicting demands of being a soldier, a psychiatrist and a Muslim, to the post with the highest toll of Army suicides. Fort Hood is one of the Army's most stressed posts because of its units' revolving-door deployments to Afghanistan and Iraq. Finally, the Army made clear that Hasan couldn't escape his own pending deployment to Afghanistan, where he'd have to salve the mental wounds of...

MADISON, Wis. (Reuters) - A year after his historic election, President Barack Obama sought to remind Americans on Wednesday the biggest problems he is grappling with -- from the economy to the war in Afghanistan -- are the legacy of his predecessor, George W. Bush. With his approval ratings down from once-lofty levels and Tuesday's Democratic election losses raising questions about his political clout, Obama held no special ceremony to mark the anniversary of his election as America's first black president.

President Obama is degrading the Oval Office. In recent months, his administration has engaged in puerile, partisan attacks on his predecessor, former President George W. Bush. Nearly every problem in America - the economy, health care, financial regulatory reform, Afghanistan, Iraq and Guantanamo - is being blamed on Mr. Bush. For example, White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel recently hinted on CNN that Mr. Obama's indecision regarding sending more troops to Afghanistan was caused by his predecessor's inept policies. "It's clear that basically we had a war for eight years that was going on, that's adrift," Mr. Emanuel said....

In a roundtable today with Pakistani editors, Hillary Clinton responded to a question about the Israeli-Palestinian issue with the now-familiar Obama administration litany: the problems are hard, they were inherited, they were ignored by the prior administration: I think that, look, we all know that the Israeli-Palestinian issue is one that is a very serious and difficult problem that we are working hard also to try to resolve. We inherited a lot of problems. If you remember, when my husband left office, we were very close to an agreement because he worked on it all the time. The next administration...

Old Soviet joke: Moscow, 1953. Stalin calls in Khrushchev. "Niki, I'm dying. Don't have much to leave you. Just three envelopes. Open them, one at a time, when you get into big trouble." A few years later, first crisis. Khrushchev opens envelope 1: "Blame everything on me. Uncle Joe." A few years later, a really big crisis. Opens envelope 2: "Blame everything on me. Again. Good luck, Uncle Joe." Third crisis. Opens envelope 3: "Prepare three envelopes." In the Barack Obama version, there are 50 or so such blame-Bush free passes before the gig is up. By my calculation, Obama...

Old Soviet joke: Moscow, 1953. Stalin calls in Khrushchev. "Niki, I'm dying. Don't have much to leave you. Just three envelopes. Open them, one at a time, when you get into big trouble." A few years later, first crisis. Khrushchev opens envelope 1: "Blame everything on me. Uncle Joe." A few years later, a really big crisis. Opens envelope 2: "Blame everything on me. Again. Good luck, Uncle Joe." Third crisis. Opens envelope 3: "Prepare three envelopes." In the Barack Obama version, there are 50 or so such blame-Bush free passes before the gig is up. By my calculation, Obama...

If vindication means anything its name is spelled George Bush. As former U.S. president George W. Bush spoke to a Saskatoon audience, I stood in the wings, sneaking a peek through the curtains at the spectators beyond the footlights. The crowd was friendly to be sure. But more than that, the relationship was like a musical virtuoso carrying the audience through every nuance, crescendo and dynamic of a composition. With every pause, smile, laugh and down stroke of seriousness, Bush had the crowd in his hand. Before the show, a friend who recently dined with the former Texas governor and...

How many times have we heard President Barack Obama or high-ranking members of his administration lament the fact that the president "inherited" a recession? Quite a few, if anyone is keeping track. Now the Dow Jones Industrial Average (DJIA) has broken through the 10,000-point barrier. But that begs the question given the inevitable credit Obama will get from the media and other supporters for this rally, should former President George W. Bush get some of the credit if Obama is so willing to blame him for the collapse? It's a question Neil Cavuto put to the test on his Oct....

The Obama administration blamed President George W. Bush for 13,000 new support troops headed to Afghanistan, even though Bush has not been commander-in-chief for nearly ten months.The Washington Post had a front page story this morning saying Barack Obama had authorized the troops in addition to the 21,000 increase in combat troops he ordered in March.White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs told reporters today, according to the AP, that President Bush, who left office 276 days ago, was to blame for the latest troop increase:Later, spokesman Robert Gibbs rejected a published report that the president had authorized 13,000 additional troops...

In trying to understand what is happening in the nation and world, we all employ narratives -- story lines that indicate where things are going and what is likely to happen next. We can check the validity of these narratives by observing whether events move in the indicated direction. If so, the narrative is confirmed. But if things seem to be moving in an entirely different direction, it's time to discard the narrative and look for another. When Barack Obama took office, most Americans and certainly most of the press had a narrative in mind. Call it Narrative A. The...

Fifty-five percent (55%) of likely voters say the nation’s current economic problems are due to the recession which began under President George W. Bush, according to the latest Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey. Thirty-seven percent (37%) say the current economic problems are caused by the policies President Obama has put in place since taking office. These findings have remained relatively stable since May. Eighty-seven percent (87%) of Democratic voters blame Bush; 65% of Republicans blame Obama. Fifty percent (50%) of unaffiliated voters attribute the current economic situation to the Bush administration.

Some Chicago officials say anti-American resentment likely played a role in Chicago's Olympic bid dying in the first round Friday. President Obama could not undo in one year the resentment against America that President Bush and others built up for years, they said. "There must be" resentment against America, the Rev. Jesse Jackson said, near the stage where he had hoped to give a victory speech in Daley Center Plaza. "The way we [refused to sign] the Kyoto Treaty, we misled the world into Iraq. The world had a very bad taste in its mouth about us. But there was...

Could these people be any more predictable? There’s nothing they won’t blame on Bush. Even Obama’s failure to sell himself to the corrupt IOC is Bush’s fault. As if his emotional, heartfelt, energetic appeal should have been enough to win over the world, if not for that evil cowboy in Texas. Olympic swimmer Rowdy Gaines called it a hangover from the past eight years. Um, I think he may be right about the hangover, but it’s from the past eight months! Roland Burris said Obama failed because Bush tarnished America’s image so badly even The One couldn’t undo the damage....

Rowdy Gaines, NBC swimming commentator, was asked why by ESPN news why Chicago lost the bid in the first round. Replied Gaines, "I looked at the bid, it had everything needed, it was the best bid. Maybe it was political. Maybe there's still a hangover from the last eight years. I don't know."....obama's loyal disciples continue to drown in their delusions....

In May of 2008, Times Online ran an article entitled, Barack Obama: the New Great Redeemer. The author, Gerard Baker, recognized something many American voters at that time were unwilling to admit, which was, The idolatry of Mr. Obama is a shame...The Illinois senator is indeed, an unusually talented, inspiring and charismatic figure...But he is not a saint. He is a smart and eloquent man with a personal history that is startlingly shallow set against the scale of the office he seeks to hold... If the past 40 years have taught us anything they have surely taught that premature canonization...

Some Chicago officials say anti-American resentments likely played a role in Chicago’s Olympic bid dying in the first round today. President Obama could not undo in one year the resentment against America that President Bush and others built up for decades before, they said. “There must be” resentment against America, the Rev. Jesse Jackson said, near the stage where he had hoped to give a victory speech in Daley Plaza. “The way we [refused to sign] the Kyoto Treaty, we mislead the world into Iraq. The world had a very bad taste in its mouth about us. But there was...

Remember President Obama's first full day in office: "The record is clear: Rather than keep us safer, the prison at Guantanamo has weakened American national security," Obama said during an address on national security at the National Archives in Washington. "It is a rallying cry for our enemies. It sets back the willingness of our allies to work with us in fighting an enemy that operates in scores of countries. By any measure, the costs of keeping it open far exceed the complications involved in closing it." At the time the President was roundly criticized for announcing the closing without...

Tehran, 14 Sept. (AKI) - United States president Barack Obama is being held "captive by extremist Republicans", said the media advisor and close aide to Iran's hardline president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad on Monday. Ali Akbar Javanfakr, quoted by Iran's student news agency ISNA, said Obama's stance and behaviour regarding Iran shows that "he is held captive by extremist Republicans and has been very unsuccessful with keeping George Bush’s ideas out of the White House." In addition, Javanfekr said Obama also needs to find radical solutions for problems if it wants sustainable relations with Iran. "If Americans favour sustainable and trustworthy ties...

But of course it is. One sure way to determine the state of the Obama Aministration’s policies is by the thickness of it’s political skin. Fun to watch because Gibbs gets sooooooo irritated. At today’s WHPB CBS reporter Chip Reid I believe, asked Robert Gibbs to explain why things seem to be getting worse since the President announced his new strategy (increased troop levels, unmanned drones in Pakistan, and taking the fight to the poppy farmers as well as AQ) for Afghanistan. Gibbs response grew testiier by the minute … but it didn’t take long to blame the whole thing...

Barack Obama And The Democrats Did Not Inherit The Bad Economy; They Caused It And Made It Worse Check it out - here!

Leading conservative economist Bruce Bartlett writes that the Obama-hating town-hall mobs have it wrong—the person they should be angry with left the White House seven months ago. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Where is the evidence that everything would be better if Republicans were in charge? Does anyone believe the economy would be growing faster or that unemployment would be lower today if John McCain had won the election? I know of no economist who holds that view. The economy is like an ocean liner that turns only very slowly. The gross domestic product and the level of employment would be pretty much the...

Question : Who was President , when the massive housing entitlement program started, which led to this entire downfall? Answer : President Bill Clinton. Question : Who is the President, who has approve trillions in debt, wasteful spending, has increased our deficit faster then any other President in American history, and has led America to nothing but higher unemployment, and more dependency on government. Answer : President Barack Obama. Do the Democrats understand what I just wrote above? Nope, they just continue to blame Bush for all of the problems

As he announces an improvement in the GDP decline, House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer (D-Maryland) reminds everyone that once President Obama took office, Congress "confronted the worst economy this coutnry had seen in 75 year. That was the legacy that we inherited."

With President Barack Obama’s poll numbers falling to earth, he’s decided to embark on a bold new initiative - blaming former President Bush for the country’s woes. Didn’t see that coming. Democratic strategists are supporting the president in the only way they know how - engaging in mind-numbing spin: “I’m not convinced that Obama and his supporters are bashing Bush as much as they are quite rightfully reminding people that our current economic mess and the wars were inherited from the Bush administration,” said Democratic strategist Bud Jackson. “It’s important to remind people of this because Republicans are now criticizing...

With Republicans citing the continuing economic distress to bash the economic stimulus plan pushed through by President Obama and his Democratic allies in Congress, the Democratic National Committee is hitting back with a media campaign blaming Republicans for creating the mess to begin with. In a new TV ad announced today, the DNC goes after the top four congressional Republicans -- Senators Mitch McConnell of Kentucky and Jon Kyl of Arizona, and Representatives John Boehner of Ohio and Eric Cantor of Virginia -- by saying they "supported the Bush policies that sank our economy into recession. They broke it -...

On Thursday, Sen. Harry Reid said don't blame the Obama administration for the government travel restrictions to resort destinations like Las Vegas. Reid said the policy came from the Bush administration. Holding nearly 50 pages of e-mails and memos, Reid explained.

Most Americans—54%--still blame President George W. Bush for the nation’s economic woes. A Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey found that 39% say the policies of President Barack Obama are to blame. Those top-line figures are unchanged from a month ago. Two months ago, 62% blamed Bush.

Report: Bin Laden's Son Killed in Pakistan Air Strike Wednesday, July 22, 2009 U.S. officials believe Usama bin Laden's son Saad bin Laden was killed in a U.S. air strike in Pakistan, according to a report from NPR.org.

Well slap my ass and call me Sally. It appears the American people are finally beginning to come to grips with Comrade Obama’s systematic destruction of the American economy and the bankruptcy of America. Can this slip in the polls really be happening to Dear Leader? Surely not. It must be that horrible George Bush’s fault!! It’s time for the Democrats to hold investigative hearings on this matter and get to the bottom of it.

...“It’s a job I gladly accept,” he said to applause. “I love these folks who helped get us in this mess. And then suddenly say, ‘Oh, this is Obama’s economy.’ That’s fine. Give it to me. My job is to solve problems -- not to stand on the sidelines and carp and gripe. So I welcome the job. I want the responsibility.”....

Jumbo Humboldt squid wash up minutes after 4.0 earthquake hit off the coast of La Jolla It was an odd start to the morning in La Jolla. First residents were jolted out of bed at 7.34 a.m. by a 4.0 magnitude earthquake that was centered 19 miles out to sea. First residents were jolted out of bed by an earthquake, which is not uncommon in San Diego, but what happened just minutes later was a little fishy. “I was having coffee up on the balcony and I felt it shaking,” Kate Lutkemeier said. She wasn’t the only one. “I heard...

Should the Green Revolution succeed in toppling the regime, it will be the greatest event since the collapse of the Soviet Union. It will prove to be a more decisive event than even the invasion of Iraq and will rival the attacks of September 11, 2001, in influencing the course of history. The stakes could not be higher. The regime could fall, resulting in the greatest victory in the war on terror to date, or the regime will survive, leaving behind tens of thousands of bloodied bodies, a discouraged population unlikely to take such risks again and bitter at the...

WASHINGTON (AP) -- The Federal Reserve threatened to force the ouster of Bank of America CEO Kenneth Lewis if he didn't follow through with plans to buy Merrill Lynch & Co., Republicans said Wednesday after reviewing internal documents. Republicans also said there was evidence that the government tried to restrict information related to the merger from being publicly released. However, none of the documents showed that the government explicitly instructed Bank of America to hide Merrill Lynch's losses from shareholders, they said.

Administration blames Bush for GM crisis By Mike Soraghan Posted: 06/07/09 11:24 AM [ET] The Obama administration has a familiar response to criticism of the General Motors bailout – they inherited this mess from George W. Bush. Austan Goolsbee, a senior economic adviser to President Obama, said the administration's options were sharply limited by President Bush's handling of the auto industry, and accused the prior administration of running out the clock. "They shook up the can. They opened the can and handed [it] to us in our laps," Goolsbee said on Fox News Sunday. "When George Bush put money into...

GALVESTON — Another hurricane season is the last thing Galveston wants to think about after last year's devastation from Hurricane Ike.

I’m gonna blame Bush foreversung by King Hussein to the tune of Forever and Ever, Amen with apologies to Randy Travis You may think that I’m acting foolish You’ve heard that I’m new & I’m green You may wonder how I can promise you now We’ll spend a trillion dollars while we still owe three And it’s not my blood that is spilling When I give up memos of the CIA It’s not my money that I will be spending On every left-wing program that enters my brain I’m gonna blame Bush forever, forever & ever amen As long as...

Press Releases Contact: Brendan Daly/Nadeam Elshami 202-226-7616 For Immediate Release 05/15/2009 Pelosi Statement on Panetta Message to CIA Employees Washington, D.C. – Speaker Nancy Pelosi issued the following statement today in response to a message today to CIA Employees from Director Leon Panetta: “We all share great respect for the dedicated men and women of the intelligence community who are deeply committed to the safety and security of the American people. My criticism of the manner in which the Bush Administration did not appropriately inform Congress is separate from my respect for those in the intelligence community who work to...

The Republican Party is in the political wilderness. Out of power after eight years of George Bush, its minorities in Congress and state governors are hammered daily by the media, heirs to every mistake -- real or imagined - that Bush made. The bubble of Japan’s economic “miracle” came to a crashing halt in the early 1990s. Floundering politicians left the Japanese economy flat on its back for what became known as Japan’s “lost decade.” The GOP needs to face the fact that it may be in the wilderness for a very long time. Unless it can shake the Bush...

I have bad news for you. I have it on good authority that the congressional Republican leadership, if that is not an oxymoron, plans to give Barack Obama a pass on all of his major appointments. They'll give them a bye. They'll close their eyes, cover their ears and speak no evil against some of the most dangerous nominees for high posts in an administration in American history. I'm talking about kooks and crazies like Cass Sunstein, the so-called "regulatory czar," who once proposed what can only be characterized as a "Fairness Doctrine" for the Internet including a notion for...

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – U.S. and NATO forces are close to achieving "irreversible momentum" in their battle with insurgents in eastern Afghanistan, a senior commander said on Wednesday. The Taliban and other insurgent groups have been strongest in eastern and southern Afghanistan but U.S. Army Major General Michael Tucker said security had improved this year in the east, where U.S. forces lead NATO troops. He said about 80 percent of insurgent activity now took place in southern Afghanistan, where the United States plans to deploy thousands of troops in the coming months to reinforce British, Canadian, Dutch and other NATO soldiers....

I keep hearing that the Bush economic policy was to blame for the economic crisis we now face. Lord knows Bush's budgets were way out of line, even though he had 9/11, Wars, Katrina, Power Outages in NYC and the like (secondary causes of recession). The fact is that the primary culprit behind the economic crisis was the statist policies from Carter & Slick Willy that Bush inherited: 1977 CRA Community Reinvestment Act - The act provided that banks have an "affirmative obligation" to meet the credit needs of the communities in which they are chartered. 1989 Congress amended the...

AFTER the loss of more than 200 lives and almost a month of fear and grief, the Black Saturday bushfires have at last been tamed and the dark crisis is over. But it has taken nature to overcome the overwhelming. Cooler weather offers enormous relief for communities and firefighters. While four major fires remain burning, the forecasts for the next few weeks allowed firefighters breathing room, Emergency Services Commissioner Bruce Esplin said today. "We see a very bright light at the end of the tunnel now, we see that this weather is over," he said. "The pressure has been in...

A 42-year-old Richfield man, his 9-year-old son and a 12-year-old girl from another family were killed Sunday morning when the SUV they were riding in was hit by a truck that slid across a snow-covered road in Washington County. The man's 40-year-old wife, two of their children and the 12-year-old girl's 11-year-old brother suffered serious injuries and were taken to hospitals, according to the Washington County Sheriff's Department. The three men who were in the one-ton flatbed truck were not injured. ... According to the sheriff's department: The crash occurred just before 9 a.m. on state Highway 164 north of...

American officials say ties between Shiite organization, Mexican drug lords for trafficking of drugs, money, people into US strengthening over recent year. One official voice concern that al-Qaeda may use same routes. Ties between Lebanon's Shiite Hizbullah organization and Mexican drug cartels have been strengthening over the past few years, the Washington Times reported Friday. Hizbullah relies on "the same criminal weapons smugglers, document traffickers and transportation experts as the drug cartels," said Michael Braun, former administrator and chief of operations at the US Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA). "They work together," added Braun, "They rely on the same shadow facilitators....

FOR a guy who talks so much about wanting a new era of re sponsibility, President Obama spends an awful lot of time blaming Republicans for all the wild and reckless spending he crammed into his own budget. After running a campaign against the $1 trillion deficit he "inherited" from President Bush and the Republicans, Obama quickly matched it. During his first 50 days in office, he and his Democratic-controlled Congress spent $1 billion an hour. Under Obama's proposed budget, the overall national debt doubles in five years and triples in 10. Not exactly "moving from an era of borrow...

Former U.S. Border Patrol agent Ignacio "Nacho" Ramos wakes up in the middle of the night expecting a guard to shine a flashlight in his face. Jose Alonso Compean, his colleague, still has nightmares that he's not really home. It has not been easy readjusting to life outside their one-man prison cells where they spent the last two years of their lives in segregation. Since the commutation of their sentences by President Bush on his last day in office, the former agents, who were charged with the non-fatal shooting of a Mexican national after he abandoned a load of marijuana...

Greg Gutfeld helps out those still suffering from Bush Derangement Syndrome.

All the evidence suggests Elvis Presley is more alive today than Osama bin Laden. But tell that to the CIA and all the other misconceptualizers of the War on Terror. Seven years after Osama bin Laden's last verifiable appearance among the living, there is more evidence for Elvis's presence among us than for his. Hence there is reason to ask whether the paradigm of Osama bin Laden as terrorism's deus ex machina and of al Qaeda as the prototype of terrorism may be an artifact of our Best and Brightest's imagination, and whether investment in this paradigm has kept our...

Will the Democrats ever acknowledge they might be in trouble? Or will they just go down screaming "IT'S ALL BUSH'S FAULT."

Terrorist attacks foiled - seven arrested Thursday 12 March 2009 Six men and one woman have been arrested on suspicion of preparing to carry out terrorist attacks on shops in Amsterdam Zuidoost on Thursday. One of those arrested is a family member of a man connected to the Madrid bombing five years ago, said Amsterdam police chief Bernard Welten at a press confernce on Thursday evening. The arrests have reduced the threat of attacks but a risk remains, said Welten. All of those detained by the police are Dutch with a Moroccan background and are aged between 19 and 64...