AJ DiCintio, NMJ.us

 

President Obama likes to say that his trillions in deficits are “unsustainable.” However, this attempt at intellectual honesty is abjectly disingenuous because he has never discussed even one negative consequence of his astonishing spending orgy.

 

 But there is more than politics-as-usual that lies behind this egregious sin of omission; for it is motivated by an instinctive Alinskyite’s avoidance of anything that will cause the public to understand that when he promised to “perfect this nation,” he meant, “transform the United States into a nanny state a la the European Model.”

 

 To make matters worse, the president is supported by most of the elite media, which has freely chosen to sin a sin of omission a second if it means helping their hero make his dreams come true.

 

 Faced with these truly frightening realities, what is one to do? Well, what else but firmly and persistently speak of consequences that Obama et al. would rather no decent person bring up, in polite conversation or otherwise —

 

 ...hyper-inflation, always especially cruel to seniors

 

 ...shocking tax increases, certain to choke investment, job growth, and innovation, levied sooner rather than later on the entire middle class

 

 ...cowardly, perverse, shamelessly ironic sin taxes, including taxes on “sinful” foods, disproportionately heaped on the backs of the nation’s lowest income families

 

 ...a quantum leap in the size of the insatiably power loving, money sucking government bureaucracy. Read article.

 

Phil Kerpen, Fox Forum.Blogs.Fox News.com

 

In the May 27 Washington Post, the White House floats a really scary trial balloon—a new national Value-Added Tax (VAT) to pay for out-of-control spending and a Washington take over of health care. Senate Budget Committee Chairman Kent Conrad appears to be on board. So does Ezekiel Emanuel, brother of White House chief-of-staff Rahm Emanuel, who has been hired by the White House budget office to help design the health care plan and whose book on health care uses a VAT to fund the new government program. Obama economic adviser Paul Volcker is also on-board the VAT-train.

 

What is the VAT? It’s a type of national sales tax that is collected in pieces throughout the production chain, instead of being collected all at once at the cash register like a retail sales tax. In theory, sales taxes like the VAT are pretty good taxes because they are broad-based, difficult to evade, and minimize economic distortions. In practice, they are the ATM machine for runaway government growth, because they are largely invisible to the public and they can raise huge amounts of money in very small chunks, thus minimizing the effective political opposition that generally keeps taxes in check.

 

A couple of years ago Dan Mitchell wrote a great summary of the VAT experience in Europe that explains how the VAT was the key policy change that moved Europe to a much higher level of taxes and spending than the U.S. Because the tax is difficult for the public to see, it’s very easy for politicians to raise, and VAT rates in Europe have steadily increased since the tax was first introduced. With the VAT tax weapon in hand, European governments have grown to more than 40 percent of GDP, a level unknown in the United States outside of world wars. Now that scary scenario could, unfortunately be in store for us if the White House pursues a VAT in the U.S. Read article.

 

Michael O'Hanlon, Washington Times.com

 

In the effort to understand North Korea's decision to test a nuclear weapon this week, several theories have been advanced.

 

The North Korean military probably wanted to test and prove a weapon it had spent years developing and that had performed very poorly in its first test in 2006. Kim Jong-il, probably fading from the scene and hoping for one of his sons to succeed him, wanted to please his country's powerful military at a crucial time in the transition process.

 

North Korean hard-liners in general, perhaps somewhat worried by President Obama's pledge of openness as well as his international popularity, may have preferred to rekindle tension in the U.S.-North Korean relationship - believing they must portray the United States as a bully when it reacts to North Korean provocations in order to stay on good terms with China and Russia. North Korean leaders also may have been frustrated by Mr. Obama's relative lack of attention to their part of the world to date.

 

All these theories probably have a kernel of truth. In addition, while North Korea risks some tightening of sanctions as a result of this test, on balance it probably will not pay a huge and enduring price for its provocation. After all, it has tested before and suffered only modest consequences. Read article.

 

Joy Tiz, Canada Free Press.com

 

The unavoidable by-product of the Cheney/Obama joust was the demonstration of dissimilarity between a Real Man and the Metro Sexual in Chief. In his characteristic low key style, Cheney recited weighty fact after weighty fact. Obama groused about how burdensome it is to be Obama always having to battle imaginary enemies. The president’s ineptitude and narcissism were on exhibit.

 

Liberals didn’t learn from Clinton’s wussified approach to Islamic terrorism that putting a narcissistic pantywaist in the White House doesn’t make terrorists love us after all. Clinton sat on his hands while terrorists attacked us repeatedly:

 

Mogadishu, the USS Cole bombing, the attacks on our embassies in Kenya and Tanzania, please forgive me if I overlooked any others. There was his indefensible refusal to capture bin Laden when the terror leader was offered up to him. Clinton hobbled our military when there were clear opportunities to take the savage barbarian out before 9/11. Read article.

 

James Taranto, Best of the Web, WSJ.com

 

What about the substance of their criticism? Was the comment in question racist in character? That depends. Here is the quote in dispute:

 

"I would hope that a wise Latina woman, with the richness of her experiences, would more often than not reach a better conclusion than a white male who hasn't lived that life."

 

We'll discount the "I would hope" and assume what follows is a statement of belief, not just aspiration. Here is Merriam-Webster's definition of racism:

 

 

By the first definition, Sotomayor's statement is not racist, even assuming that "Latina" is a racial category. She is quite clear that her belief in the superior decision-making skills of "a wise Latina woman" as compared with "a white male" is contingent on culture and experience, not rooted in some essential racial difference.

 

Sotomayor's statement is, however, an expression of prejudice, an exercise in stereotyping. It reminds us of an exchange on an early episode of "All in the Family," which we caught as part of a retrospective aired earlier this week on the TV Land cable network. Archie Bunker and the Meathead are arguing over a brochure advertising a slate of candidates for local office:

 

Archie: What's the matter with this? I call this representative government. You've got Salvatori, Feldman, O'Reilly, Nelson--that's an Italian, a Jew, an Irishman and a regular American there. That's what I call a balanced ticket.

Meathead: Why do you always have to label people by nationality?

Archie: 'Cause, how else are you going to get the right man for the right job? For instance, take Feldman there. He's up for treasurer. Well, that's perfect. All them people know how to handle money. Know what I mean?

Meathead: No, I don't.

 

Archie: Well, then you got Salvatori running for D.A. He can keep an eye on Feldman. You know, I want to tell you something about the Italians. When you do get an honest one, you really got something there. Read article.

 

Jonah Goldberg, RCP.com

 

Why make this complicated?

 

President Obama prefers Supreme Court justices who will violate their oath of office. And he hopes Sonia Sotomayor is the right Hispanic woman for the job. Here's the oath Supreme Court justices must take:

 

 

Contrast that with Obama's insistence that the "quality of empathy, of understanding and identifying with people's hopes and struggles" is the key qualification for a Supreme Court justice. According to White House talking points, Judge Sotomayor's "American story" of humble origins -- she was raised in the South Bronx -- best prepares her for the high court because it shows "she understands that upholding the rule of law means going beyond legal theory to ensure consistent, fair, common-sense application of the law to real-world facts." Read article.

 

Blog.Heritage.org

 

 

- Then Illinois state senator Barack Obama, speaking to the 2004 Democratic Convention in 2004.

 

 

- Judge Learned Hand, eulogizing the first Hispanic Justice on the Supreme Court, Justice Benjamin Cardozo in 1938.

 

 

- President Barack Obama’s Supreme Court nominee, federal appeals court judge Sonia Sotomayor, speaking to a Berkeley La Raza Law Journal in 2001.

 

Analyzing Sotomayor’s statement above, National Journal’s Stuart Taylor writes:

 

Imagine the reaction if someone had unearthed in 2005 a speech in which then-Judge Samuel Alito had asserted, for example: “I would hope that a white male with the richness of his traditional American values would reach a better conclusion than a Latina woman who hasn’t lived that life” — and had proceeded to speak of “inherent physiological or cultural differences.”

…

Any prominent white male would be instantly and properly banished from polite society as a racist and a sexist. Read article.

 

Sher Zieve, American Daily.com

 

Although the prevention of online Cyber-attacks has - in the past - been handled by DHS, Supreme Leader Obama has decided he will instill yet another office and individual to monitor the Internet. The new “Cyber Tsar” will also monitor the Internet for content, the US Stock Exchange, private business computer networks, the US Energy grid and other entities as so ordered by Obama. The Internet will soon be under Obama’s control - both usage and content - and I predict it will look like China’s censored version very soon. The reason? We-the-people’s elected officials have not done - and still aren’t doing - anything to stop this Stalinist-resurrection. 

 

Note: As we already know, Obama’s DHS Chief Janet Napolitano has identified as dangerous to the USA those who are pro-life, conservatives, Christians (under the guise of only going after the hateful cult “Christian Identity”), those who support third-party candidates and - in general - anyone who opposes the policies of Barack Hussein Obama. Notably, nothing attached to Islamist terrorists or real criminals was included in her now infamous report.

 

Obama’s close personal and professional ties to the under-multiple-indictments group ACORN have been well-documented. While a community organizer in Illinois, Obama trained many of his adherents - training ala the radical Saul Alinsky - on how to organize a community to the leftist point of view and only that viewpoint. Obama’s ACORN is under investigation in at least 14 states for fraud and corruption (some have already pled guilty) and still Supreme Leader has decided to use them for the US Census in order to rewrite districts to his benefit. Read article.

 

Spiegel.de/international/Germany

 

Barack Obama's great uncle was one of the soldiers who liberated a subcamp of Buchenwald. One week before the US president's planned stopover in Germany, where he is expected to visit the concentration camp memorial, SPIEGEL spoke to Charles Payne, 84, about his experiences in WWII.

 

SPIEGEL: Mr. Payne, early in June your great-nephew, President Barack Obama, will visit the former concentration camp Buchenwald, which you helped liberate at the end of the war. Will he be travelling in your footsteps?

 

Charles Payne: I don't buy that. I was quite surprised when the whole thing came up and Barack talked about my war experiences in Nazi Germany. We had never talked about that before. This is a trip that he chose, not because of me I'm sure, but for political reasons. Read article.

 

Daniel Henninger, Online WSJ.com

 

How long before the midnight drag races return on dark and dusty roads?

 

When Barack Obama announced that the government will use its fist to wave onto the highways of America cars that get 39 miles to a gallon of liquefied switch grass or something, he said, "Everybody wins."

 

Everybody? What country has he been living in? This marks the end of the internal combustion engine as we knew it, and it is the way Americans have defined, designed and literally driven much of the nation's culture for as long as anyone can remember. Car culture is America's culture.

 

Mr. Obama is fond of giving people iPods as gifts. I've got a playlist for Mr. Obama's iPod.

 

Track 1: "Shut Down" by the Beach Boys. Clip: "Superstock Dodge is windin' out in low/But my fuel-injected Stingray's really startin' to go. To get the traction I'm ridin' the clutch/My pressure plate's burnin', this machine's too much." Read article.

 

Jennifer Rubin, Pajamas Media.com

 

The jig is up.

 

The stimulus is a bust. That has some serious political ramifications for Democrats who will be on the ballot in 2010.

 

The president sold the stimulus on the promise he’d save or create 3-4 million jobs this year and that unemployment would be held to 8%. Reuters reports:

 

So far, it has saved or created nearly 150,000 jobs, a relatively small impact on an economy that is still losing hundreds of thousands of jobs a month due to the recession.

 

While the monthly tally of jobs lost appears to be shrinking, the National Association for Business Economists on Wednesday predicted total U.S. job losses of roughly 4.5 million in 2009, leading to a jobless rate of 9.8 percent. …

 

Obama’s top economic adviser, Cristina Romer, told MSNBC she was optimistic about some improving economic indicators, that it appeared “we are nearing the bottom” of the economic trough and that growth may well resume by year’s end.

 

“The gold standard is going to be jobs numbers. And realistically, we’re not going to see us adding jobs for a while,” she said.

 

It is not surprising that the Republicans are pointing to the pork barrel program and decrying the plan as a flop. Minority Whip Eric Cantor (who organized the unanimous Republican opposition to the stimulus) explained, “In the 100 days since that misdirected bill was enacted, well over 1 million Americans have lost their jobs. … These are not the results America hoped for.” Read article.

 

Does Barack Obama believe Israel is a sovereign state?

Richard Baehr, American Thinker.com

 

Does Barack Obama believe Israel is a sovereign state? Wednesday, his diplomatic mouthpiece Hillary Clinton said Israel must stop all settlement activity -- outposts, new settlements and natural growth of existing settlements. 

 

What exactly is natural growth of existing settlements? It means adding a new room to a home within the boundaries of a settlement if a family gets larger, say though a new baby, or building a new home in this settlement, if a couple gets married. 

 

In essence, Obama is now telling Israelis not to have children and not to marry. Such a friend. Does anyone really believe that adding on that new room or that new home is what has stopped the Arabs and Palestinians from making peace with Israel the last 40 years? Virtually all Americans, whether from the Clinton or Bush administrations, who have participated in The Israeli Palestinian negotiating track since the Oslo process began, have accepted that most of the settlements near the green line will become part of Israel if a peace deal is reached. Is Obama signaling that he believes the 1949 armistice lines should be the new boundaries of Israel, as demanded in the Arab League proposal?

 

Virtually all Americans, whether from the Clinton or Bush administrations, who have participated in The Israeli Palestinian negotiating track since the Oslo process began, have accepted that most of the settlements near the green line will become part of Israel if a peace deal is reached. Is Obama signaling that he believes the 1949 armistice lines should be the new boundaries of Israel, as demanded in the Arab League proposal? Read article.

 

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