May 21, 2012
FSM HOT TOPICS
Exclusive: Oval Office Watch – Thursday, February 19
by OVAL OFFICE WATCH February 19, 2009
Bogus Bipartisanship: The loyal opposition was right to oppose the Democratic stimulus bill.
Robert Ehrlich, Weekly Standard.com
A timely front page article in the February 4th Washington Post provided desperately needed insight into the most misunderstood term in Washington today. Of course, I refer to the term "bipartisan."
The media demands it. The political pundits love it. It polls extremely well--almost as high as "change." It is antithetical to its ugly twin--"partisan." And, the voters delivered a firm message they want more of it on November 4, 2008.
So, what does it mean? Read article.
Obama's antithesis to recovery
Ralph R. Reiland, Pittsburgh Live.com
Repeatedly talking down the American economy, Barack Obama, pushing the so-called "stimulus" package, incessantly claimed that we're "going through the worst economic crisis since the Great Depression."
In fact, he was off by four decades. It's the worst economy since Jimmy Carter.
Ronald Reagan inherited rates of 13.5 percent inflation and 7.6 percent unemployment from Carter in 1980, a misery index (the inflation rate added to the unemployment rate) of 21.1.
Obama, in contrast, came into office with a January 2009 unemployment rate of 7.6 percent and a zero rate of inflation, a misery index of 7.6 percent, a third of the inflation/unemployment problem that Reagan faced.
Reversing his "hope over fear" campaign slogan, Obama proclaimed that he'd "inherited the most profound economic emergency since the Great Depression," a "crisis" that would turn into a "catastrophe," possibly "irreversible," if we didn't hurry up and get on board with his trillion-dollar package of pork, political payoffs and "shovel-ready" government projects, the largest expansion of government in American history.
At last count, the mayor of Las Vegas was seeking $2 million for more neon, Chula Vista, Calif., wanted a new $500,000 dog park, the mayor of Pittsfield in Maine sought money to patch his "pain in the hiney" potholes, and Shreveport, La., appealed for eight new Harleys for the cops and six new water slides, all with money to be deducted from our paychecks or borrowed from China. Read article.
Obama will get no warning when the people's response to this crisis comes
Gary Younge, Guardian.co.uk
The president is popular for now - but while his stimulus package is being hailed as a victory, no one truly believes it will work.
On Friday, the day Congress passed the stimulus bill, more than 250 people arrived at the Holiday Inn in Somerset for a careers fair. There are scenes like this all over the country. In San Francisco last week, queues for a similar fair went out of the door and around the block. In Miami last month, a thousand people waited in line, some overnight, for just 35 firefighter jobs.
But New Jersey has not quite suffered like the rest of the country, and in Somerset the line of hopefuls is long but moves reasonably fast. For the most part, they came in sober suits dressed as though - if someone made an offer - they could start work today. Most clutched résumés and stared off into the middle distance, trying not to catch anyone's eye. And in a county broadly reflective of the nation demographically, white men over the age of 40 were considerably over represented.
The fact that there is a queue at all in Somerset county is significant. According to the census, Somerset has a median income that is almost twice the national average and a poverty rate below 25%. If there's a line here, then there are lines everywhere. Read article.
The Smoking Gun
Betty Freauf, NWV.com
The Democrat -controlled House, Senate and the Barack Obama Executive branch plan to tuck billions of dollars away from the Stimulus bill preparing for the upcoming 2011-2012 presidential election cycle.
This is why many reporters are saying the money in many instances won’t be available until 2011-2012. By using Barack’s “community organization” at the national level, they want to completely overwhelm the Republicans with so much cash available to the Democrats that the two-party system will be completely eliminated assuring Barack permanent residency in the White House.
There will be more employees working for the Democrats in this patronage system then in the U.S. Army. The jobs will be camouflaged in a million different ways – either a Democrat will be working for the city, the state or federal government and when the election comes around, they are going to be obliged to get the voters to the polls just like Acorn did only on a much larger scale. Savage felt this money-laundering scheme was only Phase I. He said, “Just wait until amnesty will be granted for all illegal aliens who will then vote Democrat”. Never mind it is unconstitutional to oblige anyone to submit to involuntary servitude. Read article.
Crisis presidency
Bradley R. Gitz, NWANews.com
Liberals are depicting Barack Obama as the next Franklin Delano Roosevelt, drawing an obvious parallel with the dismal economic circumstances that FDR inherited in 1933.
Economic conditions today are not yet as dire as they were in 1933, but an argument could be made that they were already bad enough that they propelled Obama into the presidency in much the same manner as the Great Depression catapulted FDR. Roosevelt's presidency was different from all others, however, due to the fact that thus far he is the only president to have presided over both a world depression and a world war.
Perhaps the great irony in it all is that the second crisis FDR faced, World War II, was both partially caused by and essentially solved his first, the Depression.
There is, of course, a third category here apart from presidents who care-take tranquility and those who inherit monumental challenges: those who are beset and ultimately defined by crises no one foresaw. Read article.
Obama should stick to politics, leave radio alone
Dan Surber, Daily Mail.com
My name is Don Surber. I am an American. I pay my taxes. I listen to Rush Limbaugh. And if my president doesn't like it, too bad.
Barack Obama works for us, not the other way around. He should stick to making sure the military is well-equipped and ready for action.
Obama's admonition on listening to Mr. Limbaugh was not presidential. Good gravy, Obama's skin is thin.
Unlike Limbaugh, I do not hope that Obama's socialistic policies will fail.
That's because I know they will. They always have and they always will.
Doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results is the definition of insanity, which is why I am not surprised to see the Ivy League crowd embrace the failed policies of expanded government again.
Expanding government giveaway programs - this $800 billion spending spree brings back welfare as we knew it - creates only government jobs. Read article.
Hey! Let's give a friend of Reverend Wright a job in the White House.
Ed Lasky, American Thinker.com
Reverend Jeremiah Wright may be gone but he won't be forgotten. That's because President Obama has named Otis Moss, Jr. - father of the current pastor of Trinity United Church - to sit on the brand new Advisory Council for the Office of Faith-Based and Neighborhood Partnerships. Moss co-wrote a book with Wright and has penned articles for Trinity United publications.
Weekly Standard: "Even more interesting, perhaps, is Moss's own rhetoric. He is a political preacher and has said, "If you are preaching a gospel that has nothing about politics, nothing about economics, nothing about sociology, you are preaching an empty gospel with a cap and shoes but no body to it."
His sermons at Olivet are hard to come by. But from public lectures, one concludes that, while his style is more subdued than Wright's (or his own son's) and his themes more benign, there are still plenty of comments that call into question his suitability for government service. Take, for instance, this observation made at Yale in October 2004:
"You have heard that it was said, 'God bless America.' But I say unto you, Pray for all of the Osama bin Ladens and the Saddam Husseins." Read article.
Remember Rev. Wright? A colleague of his has just been added to the roster of the Obama administration.
Meghan Clyne, Weekly Standard.com
Back in May, when the furor over Jeremiah Wright threatened to derail the Obama campaign, the candidate mournfully explained his decision to leave the controversial Trinity United Church of Christ. "We don't want to have to answer for everything that's stated in a church," Obama said. "On the other hand, we don't want to have a church subjected to the scrutiny that a presidential campaign legitimately undergoes." After Obama parted from Wright, the preacher and Trinity United became the campaign issue that dared not speak its name.
Now the campaign is over and so, it appears, is the scrutiny--for the new president has just made a personnel decision that reopens the entire issue. Earlier this month, he appointed the Reverend Dr. Otis Moss Jr. to serve on the new President's Advisory Council established as part of the White House Office of Faith-Based and Neighborhood Partnerships. The official White House press release notes that Moss is the pastor emeritus of Cleveland's Olivet Institutional Baptist Church. Not noted, however, are Moss's many ties to Trinity and its troublesome former pastor.
To begin with, Moss's son, Reverend Otis Moss III, succeeded Wright at Trinity. The younger preacher is known for his own fiery sermons and for likening the backlash against Wright to a "public lynching." The new member of the Obama administration, though, has plenty of ties to Wright on his own. Otis Moss Jr. and Wright shared a mentor in Samuel DeWitt Proctor, who helped give rise to black liberation theology. Read article.
Joe Biden: Rain Man of the Democrat Party
Rachel Marsden, Townhall.com
Where is Vice-President Joe Biden? In the Obama administration, he’s a political quadriplegic sending signals from underneath the HopenChange Party Bus. It’s a sort of morse code, and last week he managed to get out: “3-0-%-S-C-R-E-W-E-D”.
Here’s the context of Biden’s remarks: “Not since World War II has a caucus gathered with so many challenges facing our country and the stakes so high. If we do everything right … there’s still a 30 percent chance we’re going to get it wrong.”
When President Obama was asked what Biden meant, he said he wasn’t sure: “You know, I don’t remember exactly what Joe was referring to. Not surprisingly.”
Best I can tell, Biden gets a gut feeling, which makes its way to his brain, but usually ends up on the exit ramp to his mouth instead. Read article.
It’s All About The “O”: The Arrogance of Barack Obama
Brian Birdnow, Townhall.com
Much has been written in recent weeks concerning the Obama Administration’s early struggles and stumbles, particularly in matters such as properly vetting prospective cabinet nominees, differentiating between campaigning and governing, and staying on message during a rambling press conference.
Some commentators have tried to downplay or dismiss these difficulties, while others have chalked them up as the inevitable errors of an amateur who has been pushed too far, too fast. What many of the pundits tend to overlook in their analyses of President Obama’s first weeks is that these early misadventures illustrate the petulance and arrogance that stand as the defining elements of the man’s essential character. Read article.
More Unrealistic Expectations of Obama: 'They Think He's Going To Announce That Everybody Can Come Over Here'
JammieWearingFool.blogspot.com
Perhaps all these excited Kenyans ought to go visit George Hussein Obama if they think Barack Obama is going to lift a finger to do anything for them.
In the 17 years since Samuel Nyamwange came to New Jersey from Kenya, he's gotten used to his family calling about once every six weeks to check in.
That changed after Barack Obama, whose father was Kenyan, was elected president of the United States.
"Now, they're calling almost twice a week: `Has he (Obama) done anything yet?'" Nyamwange said. "They think he's going to announce that everybody can come over here."
Nyamwange said he, like many Kenyan immigrants in America, has suddenly gained near rock-star status back home since the election.
"Everybody wants to come over here (to America) now," Nyamwange said. Read article.
A crash-and-burn course on the census
Editorial, SFGate.com
The once-a-decade census is more than a national nose count. It's used to divvy tax dollars for roads and hospitals, spot population trends for schools, business and social programs, and - did we forget? - play high-stakes politics.
The task comes loaded with importance, and that's why the Obama team is making a mistake by requiring that the next census director report to the White House instead of the Commerce Department bureaucracy. The decennial count is about information gathering, not partisan score settling.
The political gamesmanship has just produced its first casualty or trophy kill, depending on your vantage point. Late last week New Hampshire Sen. Judd Gregg bowed out as the nominee for secretary of commerce, citing his opposition to the Democratic stimulus package and also a decision to whisk away the census from his job description. In divorce-court lingo, he cited "irresolvable conflicts" with the president on the two issues in dropping out and returning to the Senate. Read article.
Commerce Department Waives Syria Sanctions
Claudia Rosett, Forbes.com
"We will extend a hand if you are willing to unclench your fist." This was President Obama's inaugural offer last month to troublesome tyrants around the world. Most attention has focused on the relevance of that offer to Iran, following Obama's campaign promise to talk without preconditions (an offer to which Tehran has now responded with, you guessed it, a list of conditions).
But let's spare a moment for Iran's terror-sponsoring neighbor and sidekick, Syria--where already the Obama administration is not only extending a hand, but has just waived sanctions to allow aircraft servicing.
News emerged this week that the U.S. Department of Commerce has just approved a license allowing Boeing to go ahead with major overhauls of two 747 jetliners belonging to Syria's state-owned Syrian Arab Airlines. The administration itself has been coy on the subject. In response to my query, a Commerce spokesman e-mailed a statement that such license requests are granted on a case-by-case basis, and Commerce cannot comment on specific instances. Read article.
Has Obama thrown Iran sanctions under the bus?
Staff, AmericanThinker.com
It's very difficult to gauge the accuracy of this piece in Geostrategy Direct - an open source intel newsletter that Jim Hoft at Gateway Pundit believes has a good track record. (Hoft's reporting on Iran and the Middle East has been exemplary.)
But the fact that there are several sources saying the same thing - that the US will either seek to remove sanctions from Iran or not enforce them is extremely troubling. This from Hoft's site quoting from the "subscribers only" edition of GD:
The United States has abandoned its policy of sanctioning companies that aid Iran's nuclear and missile program, they said.
The officials said the new Obama administration of has decided to end sanctions against Iranian government agencies or companies that aid Teheran's missile and nuclear program. The officials said Israel has been informed of the new U.S. policy.
"We were told that sanctions do not help the new U.S. policy of dialogue with Iran," an official said. Read article.
Jimmy Carter and the Camp David Myth
Arthur Herman, WSJ.com
Will Jimmy Carter be President Barack Obama's role model on how to bring peace to the Middle East?
Some, especially in Israel, view that prospect with apprehension. Others, like Ralph Nader, have greeted the possibility with enthusiasm, urging Mr. Obama to rely on Mr. Carter's "wise and seasoned counsel" in dealings with the volatile region. After all, Mr. Carter is renowned as the master craftsman of the historic accord between Egypt's Anwar Sadat and Israel's Menachem Begin at Camp David in September 1978, which opened the way for a formal peace agreement three months later.
The myth of Camp David hangs heavy over American foreign policy, and it's easy to see why. Read article.
The Real Lessons of the Great Depression
Michael Barone, RasmussenReports.com
"Not since the Great Depression." "Not since the 1930s." You hear those phrases a lot these days, and with some reason. As Congress prepares to pass the Democratic stimulus package, it may be worthwhile to look back at Franklin Roosevelt's New Deal and consider how well it worked as policy -- and politically.
There's a fairly broad consensus on policy that some of Roosevelt's actions made a positive difference but that they didn't get us out of the Depression. Amity Shlaes in her path-breaking "The Forgotten Man" makes a strong case that some of Roosevelt's moves blocked recovery, and even his admirers admit that his policies led to a sharp recession in 1937-38.
After eight years of the New Deal, unemployment remained at 15 percent in 1940 -- double the figure for today. What really got us out of the Depression was World War II. The total number of employed persons and military personnel increased from 44 million in 1938 to 65 million in 1944. So it would be unwise to copy the New Deal as a recipe for economic recovery. Read article.
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Occupy Chicago freakout: The LRAD is coming, the LRAD is coming!
May 21, 2012 00:57 AM
Here is an LRAD. It’s a Long Range Acoustic Device better known as a sound cannon and it’s used to disperse unruly crowds. Here is an Occupy Chicago freakout over the LRAD (led by the same livestreamer who freaked out last night over a brief police stop): Two #LRAD s spotted heading to march.— Tim [...]
Michael Moore spreads hysterical, anti-police fable from his Occupy comrades
May 21, 2012 00:37 AM
The crockumentary film-maker should have read Twitchy first. As we told you Saturday night, the trio of Occupy Chicago livestreamers who freaked out over a brief, Chicago police pullover didn’t have their apartment raided, didn’t have any of their equipment damaged, were not “held at gunpoint,” and had none of their high-priced cameras, phones, and [...]
It will rain: Awww, Occupy Chicago's all wet; finally, free showers for all!
May 20, 2012 11:09 PM
Mother Nature is Chicago law enforcement’s best friend. Tonight, the rabble-rousers’ plans for anarchy got spoiled by rain. Twitter had fun as the Occupiers and their fearless livestream crews ran for cover, while a few of the mobsters hung around to harass officers on duty and break out in senseless chants: Fkin Streamers afraid of [...]
Marion Barry has change of heart after being saved by Filipino hospital staff
May 20, 2012 10:00 PM
In what reads like a bad Hollywood movie script Marion Barry has changed his mind about Filipino nurses. Just a few weeks after complaining about how many Filipino nurses work in Washington DC Barry's life was saved by Filipino nurses. That's right, the same people he wanted to push our of DC hospitals ended up treating his potentially life threatening blood clot.
May 20, 2012 06:15 PM
Violence erupts at the end of the NATO Summit protests. Earlier today, members of Black Bloc were arrested for plotting to attack police stations, Mayor Emanuel's home and President Obama's campaign headquarters. Their violence then turned to the protest; police in riot gear move in, wearing gas masks. Protesters are throwing things at police according to video, live photos and reports from on the ground in Chicago.
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