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October 16, 2009
Exclusive: Oval Office Watch - Friday, October 16
Top Twenty Things Obama Doesn't Say FIND OUT HERE.
Nobel Prize for Obama Backfires - READ ARTICLE HERE.
Democrats Must Attack to Win in 2010 - Uh-Oh.... GO HERE.
An administration of radicals: The president surrounds himself with dubious aides.
Editorial, Washington Times.com
When radicalism and ethical shortcomings reach such a critical mass, it's time to broadcast the dishonor roll. Therefore, in addition to Mr. Jennings, Mr. Holdren and Mr. Daschle, please consider the ramifications of an administration manned by the likes of the following. READ MORE HERE.
The Return of Bitter White Men
Peter Wehner, Commentary Magazine.com
E.J. Dionne Jr.’s column today attempts to explain the “politics of rage” that has been inspired by President Obama. The first thing Dionne does is to helpfully explain to his readers that among the Right, “racism is part of the anti-Obama mix.” But there is a “second level of angry opposition” directed toward Obama and to which he needs to pay more attention. “It involves the genuine rage of those who felt displaced in our economy even before the great recession,” Dionne writes, “and are now hurting even more.” These folks are “angry white men,” according to Dionne, invoking the sophisticated demographic phrase used to explain the results of the 1994 midterm election (the anger of white men should not be confused with the two-year-old temper tantrum that Peter Jennings believed explained the GOP takeover of the House in 1994). Many who feel rage in 2009 “have legitimate reasons for it, even if neither Obama nor big government is the real culprit,” we learn. All this is said without condescension, of course.
I have several thoughts on Dionne’s meditation. The first is that during virtually the entire tenure of Obama’s predecessor, E.J. was part of a group, Angry White Men Inc., whose membership included the likes of Keith Olbermann, Chris Matthews, Frank Rich, Paul Krugman, Jonathan Alter, Jonathan Chait, Bill Maher, Michael Moore, and many others. This homogenous crew was, to a person, afflicted with a condition diagnosed as Bush Derangement Syndrome, one that has effects on its victims long after the cause of the condition has left the stage.
Second, the patronizing tone Dionne uses to explain the “rage” he detects out there — which is “legitimate” but, we learn, has nothing at all to do with either the president or big government — reminds me of the comments Barack Obama made at a fundraiser in San Francisco in April 2008. ["bitter clingers..."] Read article.
It's a cruel world for Obama
Wesley Pruden, JWR.com
The cruel world is closing in on Barack Obama. Springfield was never like this. The president can only look back with yearning for the days when he was the star of the state legislature, where a legislator's only concern is who's going to pick up the tab for drinks and supper.
His dithering time in the big new world is limited by events, which occur to a timetable that mere man, even a minor-league messiah, cannot control.
The White House insists that the president is hard at work on what to do about Afghanistan, and whether to send more troops to fuel a "surge" like the surge that prevented a collapse of the West's attempt to rescue Iraq from barbarism and restore a fragile semblance of civilization. The brave young Americans put in harm's way in that godforsaken corner of the world often feel abandoned in a hopeless cause, so the president should feel the pressure to act, and quickly.
But the problem is "multilayered," his spokesman says. Translated into real English, that means "he hasn't yet figured out which layer of public opinion to appease, and which layer to disappoint." He'll do something as soon as he figures out which disappointed layer would squeak loudest and scream longest.
The Pakistanis occupy still another layer. The president is looking for a way to motivate an ally that doesn't want to be motivated. Money is usually the great motivator, and the administration proposes to send the generals who run Pakistan $7.5 billion in aid over the next five years, to, er, ah, ummmm, uh, well, it's not clear what, exactly. They'll think of something. The generals want to make sure the money arrives in Pakistan with no strings attached. It's not as if we're talking about real money.
Still another layer is the arsenal of nuclear weapons the Paks already have, and a layer beyond that is the nuclear weapon Mahmoud Ahmadinejad in neighboring Iran is about to have, unless the president gets out of the way and lets the Israelis resolve the dilemma. Read article.
Saudi Arabia behind Obama's Iran Policy
Sultan Knish via Ruthfully Yours.com
The first and most important thing to understand about Obama’s Iran policy is that it is driven primarily by the concerns of Saudi Arabia, not Israel, as the media and diplomats would have you believe.
The Saudis would like to see Iran defanged and its rising regional influence thwarted. Preferably through soft power and negotiations, but the possibility of a military strike cannot be completely ruled out either. US military intervention is nothing something the Saudis want, except as a checkmate. Osama’s attack on the United States in the aftermath highlighted the weaknesses of the House of Saud’s policy of relying on America for protection. Every time the Saudis call on the US for help, they must rebuild their credibility by boosting their promotion of terrorism and Islamism abroad, which in turn runs the risk of US military intervention hitting too close to home. 9/11 was the result of such a terrorist feedback loop. The Saudis do not want to repeat the experiment, but their inability to militarily confront Iran, leaves them with the choice of relying on either the US or on Israel.
Back door agreements have already been discussed by Israel with the Gulf States for permission to overfly their territories on a bombing raid of Iran’s nuclear reactors. The convenience of using Israel to do their dirty work is that this sort of secret alliance is easy to disavow. Read article.
Stimulating Debt
Investors.com
With unemployment rising and strong growth nowhere on the horizon, perhaps it's inevitable that Democrats are pondering a second stimulus package. But why make the same mistake twice?
News accounts say Democratic leaders in Congress, worried about the 9.8% unemployment rate and 4.1 million jobs lost since the start of the year, are considering a number of new, direct "stimulus" measures.
They include tax credits for first-time homebuyers, tax breaks for companies that create jobs and an extension of jobless benefits. Still another idea would give money to the 50 million Social Security recipients who won't get cost-of-living increases next year.
These ideas might be popular, and some might even get enacted. But all should be shot down because they'll do the same thing as the $787 billion "stimulus" enacted in February — nothing. They merely take money from one pocket and put it in another.
A second "stimulus"? No thanks. Been there, done that and have nothing to show for it. Read article.
Where's My Economic Recovery?
Karl Denninger, Market Ticker.net
We were promised one, you know.
Dennis Kneale, Larry Kudlow, hell, name a "mouthpiece" on ToutTV or in the sell-side of Fraud Street and you'll find someone claiming that "the recession is over."
But if it is, how can this be true?
Lockyer’s spoke before Controller John Chiang said state general fund revenue fell $1.1 billion below estimates during the first three months of the fiscal year that began July 1.
Let's boil this down a bit: Sales tax revenues came in at $99.8 million, or 4.5% lower than expected.
Income tax revenues were also off big, but remember that income taxes are (usually) progressive, so a loss in income translates into a larger drop in tax revenues (as an aside this, my friends, is why "tax the rich" only works when the rich are getting richer - when they start to get poorer as a consequence of your redistribution schemes and move down the tax ladder, your income tax receipts collapse!) while sales taxes are a straight percentage of sales, often with the only exception that would skew on an income basis being food.
This strongly implies that California saw gross consumer sales off about 4.5% from where they expected; this, of course, raises the question "what was expected?"
What we do know is that for the three months ending in June they had expected a 14.4% drop - and got an 18.75% one.
It's not just California either:
"It's crazy. It's really just unbelievable," said Scott Pattison, executive director of the National Association of State Budget Officers, and called the states' revenue situations "close to unprecedented." Read article.
Obama opens up billions in business for Syria - Damascus gets crucial deal without promising to drop alliance with Iran
Aaron Klein, WND.com
The Obama administration was instrumental in facilitating a partnership deal that will see billions of dollars in trade flow between the European Union and Syria that may revitalize Damascus' stagnant economy, Egyptian and other Palestinian diplomatic sources told WND.
U.S. opposition was a main factor in the deal being delayed since it was drawn up as a draft pact in 2004. The deal is worth an estimated $7 billion a year for the Syrian economy. The Bush administration was particularly opposed to Syria's interference in Lebanese affairs and Damascus' military alliance with Iran.
According to the Egyptian and Palestinian diplomatic sources, the Obama administration dropped American opposition to the deal without first extracting a concession from Syria to end its alliance with Iran. Read article.
Obama’s Delay Is Turning Afghanistan Into A Quagmire
StopTheACLU.com
Barack Obama we are told is a smart man. He attended Columbia University and Harvard Law. He lectured Constitutional law at the University of Chicago, but does any of this qualify him to be Commander-in-Chief?
On the campaign trail, candidate Obama famously called Afghanistan the “good war”. But the truth of the matter, Afghanistan was the stagnant war. The enemy shifted its focus to Iraq because that is where we chose to fight. The Taliban and al Qaeda where chased out of Afghanistan and into Pakistan and needed to be regrouped. So they called on Islamic “freedom fighters” to engage the mean old United States in its war against Islam in Iraq. Iraq for all the left’s bitching was the front line of the Global War on Terrorism. Now that the Islamofascists have had their collective a**es handed to them in Iraq, the newly reorganized al Qaeda and Taliban are beginning to fight back in Afghanistan. Now that Iraq has been largely turned over to the Iraqis (prematurely or not) US forces are now needed in mass in Afghanistan or all will be lost.
Now that the Islamofascists have had their collective a**es handed to them in Iraq, the newly reorganized al Qaeda and Taliban are beginning to fight back in Afghanistan. Now that Iraq has been largely turned over to the Iraqis (prematurely or not) US forces are now needed in mass in Afghanistan or all will be lost. Read article.
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