(via Instapundit/Washington Examiner):
"Evidence continues to accumulate from far and wide that the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now is lousy with corruption. The latest revelations come from Louisiana and Oklahoma. In the former, the local ACORN Housing Corp. office received contracts worth a combined $625,000 from the City of New Orleans for repairing existing low-income housing and developing new units in poor neighborhoods. The contracts were paid for with funds from federal Community Development Block Grants from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development. An investigation by the Pelican Institute think tank of New Orleans, however, found that no work was actually performed to fulfill the contracts. Worse, Pelican couldn’t talk to the ACORN official managing the contracts because he had left the organization months ago. One more thing: The office address listed on the contracts for ACORN turned out to be a vacant lot, although new plumbing connections indicated a trailer had recently been located on the site.
"Meanwhile, in Oklahoma City, documents found in a recently vacated ACORN office included a detailed memo titled “Power Plan” for a five-year effort to elect supportive legislators and transform Oklahoma to a progressive state “in the way it was 100 years ago.” The man in charge of the office left town without paying back rent or utility bills, according to OklahmaWatchdog.org. Also found in the documents was a script for a Houston ACORN-directed recruiting campaign for “hiring Outreach Workers to remind people to get out and vote for Barack Obama in the upcoming election.” As a tax-exempt nonprofit, ACORN is barred from participating in partisan election activities, and its national spokesmen have insisted throughout the 2008 presidential race that their organization was not working to elect Obama...."
http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/opinion/Now-will-Congress-investigate-ACORN_-8332988-63292032.html
Monday, October 5, 2009
Generals contradicting Bush? Great! Now?
From the Telegraph, we have the meme (media theme) of uncritical acceptance of the Obama-philes narative that Gen. McCrystal has no business speaking his desires for more troops in public. The utter hypocricy and double standard is apparently lost on the MSM talkers/opiners--generals that departed from Bush's preferred strategy and tactics were roundly celebrated and considered to be the gold standard, the authorities proving how foolish Bush was. Now? :
"Barack Obama furious at General Stanley McChrystal speech on Afghanistan: The relationship between President Barack Obama and the commander of Nato forces in Afghanistan has been put under severe strain by Gen Stanley McChrystal's comments on strategy for the war." By Alex Spillius in Washington
" According to sources close to the administration, Gen McChrystal shocked and angered presidential advisers with the bluntness of a speech given in London last week.
The next day he was summoned to an awkward 25-minute face-to-face meeting on board Air Force One on the tarmac in Copenhagen, where the president had arrived to tout Chicago's unsuccessful Olympic bid.
"Gen James Jones, the national security adviser, yesterday did little to allay the impression the meeting had been awkward.
"Asked if the president had told the general to tone down his remarks, he told CBS: "I wasn't there so I can't answer that question. But it was an opportunity for them to get to know each other a little bit better. I am sure they exchanged direct views."
An adviser to the administration said: "People aren't sure whether McChrystal is being naïve or an upstart. To my mind he doesn't seem ready for this Washington hard-ball and is just speaking his mind too plainly."
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/northamerica/usa/barackobama/6259582/Barack-Obama-furious-at-General-Stanley-McChrystal-speech-on-Afghanistan.html
From AFP: "WASHINGTON (AFP) – "By openly declaring their views on the Afghan war, US military leaders have placed President Barack Obama in a bind as he faces a fraught decision over the troubled US-led mission.
"Obama has refused to quickly approve a request from his commanders for a major troop build-up in Afghanistan, insisting first on a full vetting of the current strategy.
But while a war council takes place behind closed doors at the White House, top military officers have made no secret of their view that without a vast ground force, the Afghan mission could end in failure.
"They want to make sure people know what they asked for if things go wrong," Lawrence Korb, a former assistant secretary of defense, told AFP.
"As a result, if Obama chooses to change course in Afghanistan or decline a request for large numbers of troops, he will be rejecting the advice of the US military, raising the political stakes.
"Commentators on the left say the military ought to keep its advice private without trying to influence public debate, with New York Times columnist Frank Rich accusing the generals of an attempt to "try to lock him (Obama) in" on Afghanistan.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20091004/pl_afp/usafghanistanmilitarypolitics
"Barack Obama furious at General Stanley McChrystal speech on Afghanistan: The relationship between President Barack Obama and the commander of Nato forces in Afghanistan has been put under severe strain by Gen Stanley McChrystal's comments on strategy for the war." By Alex Spillius in Washington
" According to sources close to the administration, Gen McChrystal shocked and angered presidential advisers with the bluntness of a speech given in London last week.
The next day he was summoned to an awkward 25-minute face-to-face meeting on board Air Force One on the tarmac in Copenhagen, where the president had arrived to tout Chicago's unsuccessful Olympic bid.
"Gen James Jones, the national security adviser, yesterday did little to allay the impression the meeting had been awkward.
"Asked if the president had told the general to tone down his remarks, he told CBS: "I wasn't there so I can't answer that question. But it was an opportunity for them to get to know each other a little bit better. I am sure they exchanged direct views."
An adviser to the administration said: "People aren't sure whether McChrystal is being naïve or an upstart. To my mind he doesn't seem ready for this Washington hard-ball and is just speaking his mind too plainly."
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/northamerica/usa/barackobama/6259582/Barack-Obama-furious-at-General-Stanley-McChrystal-speech-on-Afghanistan.html
From AFP: "WASHINGTON (AFP) – "By openly declaring their views on the Afghan war, US military leaders have placed President Barack Obama in a bind as he faces a fraught decision over the troubled US-led mission.
"Obama has refused to quickly approve a request from his commanders for a major troop build-up in Afghanistan, insisting first on a full vetting of the current strategy.
But while a war council takes place behind closed doors at the White House, top military officers have made no secret of their view that without a vast ground force, the Afghan mission could end in failure.
"They want to make sure people know what they asked for if things go wrong," Lawrence Korb, a former assistant secretary of defense, told AFP.
"As a result, if Obama chooses to change course in Afghanistan or decline a request for large numbers of troops, he will be rejecting the advice of the US military, raising the political stakes.
"Commentators on the left say the military ought to keep its advice private without trying to influence public debate, with New York Times columnist Frank Rich accusing the generals of an attempt to "try to lock him (Obama) in" on Afghanistan.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20091004/pl_afp/usafghanistanmilitarypolitics
Sunday, October 4, 2009
O-bots must accept IOC snubbed "The One"
Yes, within hours the hacks had their "ticket" (John Lovitz meets Bush Derangement Syndrome) with their laughable "Bush so alienated the world for 8 years for (fill in the blank with any selections from the left's menu of mythical complaints) that even Obamesiah couldn't undo the damage in 8 months. Reality? Quite different, as it turns out (blogger Don Surber, quoting Danish sources):
"It comes down to respect. President Obama showed none.
"And in the end, the Olympics committee returned the favor by humiliating the president of the United States, according to stories in the Berlingske Tidende newspaper in Copenhagen. The Google translations are a tad rough, but serviceable."
"The front page headline read: “Rio vandt — Obama tabte” or “Rio won — Obama lost.”
That story began: “The world’s most powerful man traveled to Copenhagen to ensure the Olympics to Chicago in 2016. But sensational smoke Americans out in the first round, while the IOC members did hosting the Rio de Janeiro.”
"Kai Holm, a former Olympics committee member, told the newspaper (translated): “The fact that Barack Obama came, could not do it. I think we lacked emotion, it seemed too empty and business-like. ...
"Obama was the first president to make such a plea. But Obama showed dumb diplomacy. He was ill-prepared and his staff failed to lay the foundation for his appearance. He came off as an ugly American who knew nothing about the territory and who felt the world somehow owed him something."
(DS)"Lesson learned? I doubt it.
"Meanwhile, Pele and President Lula of Brazil wept. They played the game right. They actually learned the rules and worked to earn it, rather than flying in and demanding it (please see my previous post).
"If my pleasure in seeing Obama fail and Rio succeed makes me unpatriotic in the eyes of some balding hippies, so be it...."
http://blogs.dailymail.com/donsurber/archives/789
"It comes down to respect. President Obama showed none.
"And in the end, the Olympics committee returned the favor by humiliating the president of the United States, according to stories in the Berlingske Tidende newspaper in Copenhagen. The Google translations are a tad rough, but serviceable."
"The front page headline read: “Rio vandt — Obama tabte” or “Rio won — Obama lost.”
That story began: “The world’s most powerful man traveled to Copenhagen to ensure the Olympics to Chicago in 2016. But sensational smoke Americans out in the first round, while the IOC members did hosting the Rio de Janeiro.”
"Kai Holm, a former Olympics committee member, told the newspaper (translated): “The fact that Barack Obama came, could not do it. I think we lacked emotion, it seemed too empty and business-like. ...
"Obama was the first president to make such a plea. But Obama showed dumb diplomacy. He was ill-prepared and his staff failed to lay the foundation for his appearance. He came off as an ugly American who knew nothing about the territory and who felt the world somehow owed him something."
(DS)"Lesson learned? I doubt it.
"Meanwhile, Pele and President Lula of Brazil wept. They played the game right. They actually learned the rules and worked to earn it, rather than flying in and demanding it (please see my previous post).
"If my pleasure in seeing Obama fail and Rio succeed makes me unpatriotic in the eyes of some balding hippies, so be it...."
http://blogs.dailymail.com/donsurber/archives/789
No time for his general but fundraising, golf, etc
"JOSEPH CURL: Obama distractions sideline Afghan plan"
"Just after proclaiming October as National Cybersecurity Awareness Month and just before departing for Copenhagen to lobby for his hometown as an Olympics host city, President Obama found the time Thursday to pop by the posh St. Regis Hotel a few blocks from the White House to hobnob with a gathering of Democratic governors and help raise some campaign cash.
"But he didn't find time to say a word about the war in Afghanistan and what he plans to do about it. He didn't refer to the deteriorating situation there or take questions from the press corps - which he's done just once in five weeks. ...
"In the past month, the president has found the time to play golf - four times. He's had links legend Arnold Palmer and other top golfers over to the White House. He's shot some hoops with friends and yukked it up with hockey's Pittsburgh Penguins.
"He's celebrated Ramadan at the White House, eulogized newsman Walter Cronkite in New York City, attended several fundraisers (including Thursday afternoon's luncheon), appeared on David Letterman's late-night show (one of eight interviews), delivered two speeches to AFL-CIO rallies and dropped by the Washington Monument and the Jefferson Memorial for a visit with his wife and daughters.
"And the brief jaunt to Copenhagen to buttonhole members of the International Olympic Committee on behalf of Chicago's 2016 Olympics bid was Mr. Obama's seventh trip out of town since Sept. 1.
"Yet still no decision on strategy for the war in Afghanistan. ..."
http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2009/oct/02/curl-obama-distractions-sideline-afghan-plan/
"Just after proclaiming October as National Cybersecurity Awareness Month and just before departing for Copenhagen to lobby for his hometown as an Olympics host city, President Obama found the time Thursday to pop by the posh St. Regis Hotel a few blocks from the White House to hobnob with a gathering of Democratic governors and help raise some campaign cash.
"But he didn't find time to say a word about the war in Afghanistan and what he plans to do about it. He didn't refer to the deteriorating situation there or take questions from the press corps - which he's done just once in five weeks. ...
"In the past month, the president has found the time to play golf - four times. He's had links legend Arnold Palmer and other top golfers over to the White House. He's shot some hoops with friends and yukked it up with hockey's Pittsburgh Penguins.
"He's celebrated Ramadan at the White House, eulogized newsman Walter Cronkite in New York City, attended several fundraisers (including Thursday afternoon's luncheon), appeared on David Letterman's late-night show (one of eight interviews), delivered two speeches to AFL-CIO rallies and dropped by the Washington Monument and the Jefferson Memorial for a visit with his wife and daughters.
"And the brief jaunt to Copenhagen to buttonhole members of the International Olympic Committee on behalf of Chicago's 2016 Olympics bid was Mr. Obama's seventh trip out of town since Sept. 1.
"Yet still no decision on strategy for the war in Afghanistan. ..."
http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2009/oct/02/curl-obama-distractions-sideline-afghan-plan/
Saturday, October 3, 2009
How soon is it O's abysmal economy? Now!
From NRO:
"The Stimulus in Action: Unemployment Reaches 9.8 Percent [Rea Hederman Jr.]
This is a very bad, troubling jobs report. While labor-market reports in the previous few months have been bad, they have also contained some positive aspects to give hope that a bottom was near. But in September, every labor-market signal was bad. Hours worked? Down. Weekly Wages? Down. Unemployment rate? Up, with the male unemployment rate at its highest level since the Great Depression. The only reason the overall unemployment rate did not top 10 percent is because so many Americans dropped out of the labor force entirely. In future months, the unemployment rate will continue to climb as people try to reenter the labor force.
"This report is a stinging indictment of the failure of the stimulus bill. The heavy-construction industry has lost 5 percent of its total workforce since May; so much for shovel-ready projects boosting that sector. An unemployment rate of 9.8 percent and climbing shows how wrong stimulus proponents were to claim that the stimulus would hold unemployment at 8 percent. The cost per job created by the stimulus bill must be staggeringly high.
"Teen unemployment climbed to a record-high 25.9 percent despite almost 150,000 fewer teenagers looking for work. The July minimum-wage increase, combined with other new legislation to raise employment costs, such as the health-care mandates, will ensure a very slow, painful recovery for teenage workers.
"The actions of the federal government are not helping the labor market. At some point, hopefully soon, companies will cease their layoffs, but for the labor market to recover, companies will need to start hiring. Currently, there is too much uncertainty, both with the economic recovery and with Washington. The Left is trying to impose many different expensive mandates and regulations on businesses. That makes it impossible for businesses to determine what the actual cost of a new employee will be. How can a business be expected to hire if suddenly its labor costs are 2 percent or even 8 percent higher than expected? It cannot be surprising that hiring has ceased in the last few months, as businesses cannot tell what their future costs are going to be....
— Rea Hederman Jr. is assistant director of the Center for Data Analysis and senior policy analyst at The Heritage Foundation.
"The Stimulus in Action: Unemployment Reaches 9.8 Percent [Rea Hederman Jr.]
This is a very bad, troubling jobs report. While labor-market reports in the previous few months have been bad, they have also contained some positive aspects to give hope that a bottom was near. But in September, every labor-market signal was bad. Hours worked? Down. Weekly Wages? Down. Unemployment rate? Up, with the male unemployment rate at its highest level since the Great Depression. The only reason the overall unemployment rate did not top 10 percent is because so many Americans dropped out of the labor force entirely. In future months, the unemployment rate will continue to climb as people try to reenter the labor force.
"This report is a stinging indictment of the failure of the stimulus bill. The heavy-construction industry has lost 5 percent of its total workforce since May; so much for shovel-ready projects boosting that sector. An unemployment rate of 9.8 percent and climbing shows how wrong stimulus proponents were to claim that the stimulus would hold unemployment at 8 percent. The cost per job created by the stimulus bill must be staggeringly high.
"Teen unemployment climbed to a record-high 25.9 percent despite almost 150,000 fewer teenagers looking for work. The July minimum-wage increase, combined with other new legislation to raise employment costs, such as the health-care mandates, will ensure a very slow, painful recovery for teenage workers.
"The actions of the federal government are not helping the labor market. At some point, hopefully soon, companies will cease their layoffs, but for the labor market to recover, companies will need to start hiring. Currently, there is too much uncertainty, both with the economic recovery and with Washington. The Left is trying to impose many different expensive mandates and regulations on businesses. That makes it impossible for businesses to determine what the actual cost of a new employee will be. How can a business be expected to hire if suddenly its labor costs are 2 percent or even 8 percent higher than expected? It cannot be surprising that hiring has ceased in the last few months, as businesses cannot tell what their future costs are going to be....
— Rea Hederman Jr. is assistant director of the Center for Data Analysis and senior policy analyst at The Heritage Foundation.
O: Carterized in only 9 months (not good thing)
From Instapundit:
UH OH: Foreign policy polling badly. “The latest Fox News/Opinion Dymanic poll is chock-full of bad news for the president. But on foreign policy, the results are nothing short of stunning. On who they trust more to decide the next steps in Afghanistan, 66 percent say military commanders, while only 20 percent say the president. Even Democrats have more faith in the military commanders (by a 45 to 37 percent margin). On Iran, 69 percent say Obama has not been tough enough, including 55 percent of Democrats. Sixty-one percent favor a U.S. military action, if needed, to keep Iran from getting nuclear weapons. Fifty-one percent think Obama apologizes for American too much. . . . In short, Obama has already achieved what it took Jimmy Carter an entire term to attain: the conviction of a large majority of the American people that he is not protecting our interests or performing adequately as commander in chief.”
Posted at 7:25 am by Glenn Reynolds
UH OH: Foreign policy polling badly. “The latest Fox News/Opinion Dymanic poll is chock-full of bad news for the president. But on foreign policy, the results are nothing short of stunning. On who they trust more to decide the next steps in Afghanistan, 66 percent say military commanders, while only 20 percent say the president. Even Democrats have more faith in the military commanders (by a 45 to 37 percent margin). On Iran, 69 percent say Obama has not been tough enough, including 55 percent of Democrats. Sixty-one percent favor a U.S. military action, if needed, to keep Iran from getting nuclear weapons. Fifty-one percent think Obama apologizes for American too much. . . . In short, Obama has already achieved what it took Jimmy Carter an entire term to attain: the conviction of a large majority of the American people that he is not protecting our interests or performing adequately as commander in chief.”
Posted at 7:25 am by Glenn Reynolds
Friday, October 2, 2009
Hope and change...for populist/marxist change
From Powerline: "Spread the wealth around revisited
August 31, 2009 Posted by Scott at 6:24 AM
"When Barack Obama responded to the Ohio plumber who didn't want his taxes raised that he wanted to "spread the wealth around," I wanted to tell him to spread his own wealth around. It was in any event a rare moment of candor on the part of candidate Obama.
"Obama all but told the plumber that his wealth should be seized in the name of equity. The encounter played out one of the old themes of democratic politics: the appeal to the many to take from the few. It's traditionally an easy sell in small-d democratic politics.
"Obama's "spread the wealth around" gospel has many intellectual and political forerunners. In American politics, Obama's gospel harks back to Huey Long, among others. In his regular Newsweek column George Will calls Obama an Ivy League Huey Long. He doesn't mean it as a compliment and he doesn't much pursue the analogy with Long.
"Interested readers may want to take a look back at Long's Share Our Wealth platform and related Share Our Wealth Society clubs. "By the summer of 1935," according to the linked page on Long's program, "there were more than 27,000 Share Our Wealth clubs with a membership of more than 7.5 million. Loyal followers met every week to discuss Long's ideas and spread the message."
"Now, of course, Barack Obama has Organizing for America to do the legwork and the mainstream media to spread his message.
http://www.powerlineblog.com/archives/2009/08/024406.php
August 31, 2009 Posted by Scott at 6:24 AM
"When Barack Obama responded to the Ohio plumber who didn't want his taxes raised that he wanted to "spread the wealth around," I wanted to tell him to spread his own wealth around. It was in any event a rare moment of candor on the part of candidate Obama.
"Obama all but told the plumber that his wealth should be seized in the name of equity. The encounter played out one of the old themes of democratic politics: the appeal to the many to take from the few. It's traditionally an easy sell in small-d democratic politics.
"Obama's "spread the wealth around" gospel has many intellectual and political forerunners. In American politics, Obama's gospel harks back to Huey Long, among others. In his regular Newsweek column George Will calls Obama an Ivy League Huey Long. He doesn't mean it as a compliment and he doesn't much pursue the analogy with Long.
"Interested readers may want to take a look back at Long's Share Our Wealth platform and related Share Our Wealth Society clubs. "By the summer of 1935," according to the linked page on Long's program, "there were more than 27,000 Share Our Wealth clubs with a membership of more than 7.5 million. Loyal followers met every week to discuss Long's ideas and spread the message."
"Now, of course, Barack Obama has Organizing for America to do the legwork and the mainstream media to spread his message.
http://www.powerlineblog.com/archives/2009/08/024406.php
Another simply "must read" post...
Sunshine patriots second-guess their betters who helped keep them safe
Share Post PrintAugust 27, 2009 Posted by Paul at 10:10 PM
"I hope all of you have read today's Wall Street Journal editorial about the CIA Inspector General's report on interrogations. The WSJ editors capture the essence of the report in the sub-title of their piece: "Interrogations were carefully limited, briefed on Capitol Hill, and yielded information that saved innocent lives."
"John has already made the first point -- that the CIA IG's report shows "how humane our treatment of captured terrorists was intended to be, and generally was."
The second point -- that Congress was briefed on the interrogation program -- takes on particular significance because it strongly suggests that Speaker Pelosi has not told the truth about this matter. As the WSJ editors put it:
"The IG report belies House Speaker Nancy Pelosi's claims that she wasn't told about all this. "In the fall of 2002, the Agency briefed the leadership of the Congressional Intelligence Oversight Committees on the use of both standard techniques and EITs. . . . Representatives . . . continued to brief the leadership of the Intelligence Oversight Committees on the use of EITs and detentions in February and March 2003. The [CIA] General Counsel says that none of the participants expressed any concern about the techniques or the Program . . ." Ditto in September 2003.
"Finally, on the issue of effectiveness, the IG's report is compelling:
While the report doesn't take a position on the value of enhanced techniques, the facts speak loudly that they caused detainees to yield important information. The report notes that early on Zubaydah provided some information, but that the waterboard resulted in "increased production." It also notes that since the use of the waterboard, "Zubaydah has appeared to be cooperative."
"Abd al-Rahim al-Nashiri, who planned the 2000 bombing of the USS Cole, was not waterboarded. "However," says the report, "following the use of [enhanced techniques], he provided information about his most current operational planning as opposed to the historical information he provided before the use of [enhanced techniques]."
http://www.powerlineblog.com/archives/2009/08/024386.php
Share Post PrintAugust 27, 2009 Posted by Paul at 10:10 PM
"I hope all of you have read today's Wall Street Journal editorial about the CIA Inspector General's report on interrogations. The WSJ editors capture the essence of the report in the sub-title of their piece: "Interrogations were carefully limited, briefed on Capitol Hill, and yielded information that saved innocent lives."
"John has already made the first point -- that the CIA IG's report shows "how humane our treatment of captured terrorists was intended to be, and generally was."
The second point -- that Congress was briefed on the interrogation program -- takes on particular significance because it strongly suggests that Speaker Pelosi has not told the truth about this matter. As the WSJ editors put it:
"The IG report belies House Speaker Nancy Pelosi's claims that she wasn't told about all this. "In the fall of 2002, the Agency briefed the leadership of the Congressional Intelligence Oversight Committees on the use of both standard techniques and EITs. . . . Representatives . . . continued to brief the leadership of the Intelligence Oversight Committees on the use of EITs and detentions in February and March 2003. The [CIA] General Counsel says that none of the participants expressed any concern about the techniques or the Program . . ." Ditto in September 2003.
"Finally, on the issue of effectiveness, the IG's report is compelling:
While the report doesn't take a position on the value of enhanced techniques, the facts speak loudly that they caused detainees to yield important information. The report notes that early on Zubaydah provided some information, but that the waterboard resulted in "increased production." It also notes that since the use of the waterboard, "Zubaydah has appeared to be cooperative."
"Abd al-Rahim al-Nashiri, who planned the 2000 bombing of the USS Cole, was not waterboarded. "However," says the report, "following the use of [enhanced techniques], he provided information about his most current operational planning as opposed to the historical information he provided before the use of [enhanced techniques]."
http://www.powerlineblog.com/archives/2009/08/024386.php
Oh hell just read about the scam...
From Powerline: "Another take on Obama's recklessness August 22, 2009 Posted by Paul at 4:32 PM
"Bill Otis offers a powerful analysis of President Obama's current woes:
"It seems to me that the explanation for Obama's current woes is simple: He over-read his mandate, to the extent there ever was a "mandate."
"When you campaign on vacuous nonsense like "Yes We Can!" and "Hope and Change" and other such empty bromides, your victory hardly betokens a public desperate for specific and massive changes affecting intensely personal issues, like who you can choose as your doctor and how it's going to get paid for (or not paid for and thus, as people are starting to understand, rationed).
"This would be true in any event, but it's especially true with Obama, for several reasons. First, he got no landslide. Winning 53 to 46 isn't that close, but it's not anything like what (say) Reagan got in either of his elections. Second, Obama ran as The Man Who Wasn't Bush. That was shrewd, and successful, but it scarcely bespeaks a public clamor for any particular change. Third and relatedly, but for the banking meltdown in mid-September, it isn't clear that Obama would have won at all; the polls were close up to that point. Fourth, as has been noted many times, a significant part of the public wanted to elect a black man as President. That is understandable in its way, but the subterrainian longing for racial expiation can hardly be confused (by rational people, anyway) as a longing for socialized medicine.
"And it's not so much that Obama tried to put over "too much too soon," as is commonly said. That gives him more credit than he deserves. It's that he tried to put over something the majority simply doesn't want and is properly suspicious of -- a massive change in a system that most people believe (correctly) serves them well.
"Still, the push for health care "reform" is in one important way, as your title states, a recklessness borne of arrogance -- or if not arrogance exactly, then of the echo-chamber quality of a liberalism that can no longer hear the outside world or, increasingly, itself. This is again related to the way Obama campaigned and has governed. The fact that big majorities are satisfied with the health care system in general and their care in particular just does not register with him. What registers are the Queen for a Day stories -- the cancer-stricken granny whose insurance company cuts her off three days before chemotherapy was to have begun, etc.
Putting a single human face on policy choices that will affect 300,000,000 people paints a powerful picture. But in short order it succumbs to the defects of its "virtues." The public is not yet so dumbed-down that it's going to cashier a system it knows and likes in favor of the Government Sponsored Unknown, and still less is it going to do such a thing on the basis of a handful of anecdotal horror stories -- stories that it senses are deeply dishonest for attempting to convey as routine something people know is anything but.
"Bottom line: When you hide your substantive agenda and campaign on nothing, don't be surprised when nothing is the public's response after the agenda actually shows itself."
http://www.powerlineblog.com/archives/2009/08/024348.php
"Bill Otis offers a powerful analysis of President Obama's current woes:
"It seems to me that the explanation for Obama's current woes is simple: He over-read his mandate, to the extent there ever was a "mandate."
"When you campaign on vacuous nonsense like "Yes We Can!" and "Hope and Change" and other such empty bromides, your victory hardly betokens a public desperate for specific and massive changes affecting intensely personal issues, like who you can choose as your doctor and how it's going to get paid for (or not paid for and thus, as people are starting to understand, rationed).
"This would be true in any event, but it's especially true with Obama, for several reasons. First, he got no landslide. Winning 53 to 46 isn't that close, but it's not anything like what (say) Reagan got in either of his elections. Second, Obama ran as The Man Who Wasn't Bush. That was shrewd, and successful, but it scarcely bespeaks a public clamor for any particular change. Third and relatedly, but for the banking meltdown in mid-September, it isn't clear that Obama would have won at all; the polls were close up to that point. Fourth, as has been noted many times, a significant part of the public wanted to elect a black man as President. That is understandable in its way, but the subterrainian longing for racial expiation can hardly be confused (by rational people, anyway) as a longing for socialized medicine.
"And it's not so much that Obama tried to put over "too much too soon," as is commonly said. That gives him more credit than he deserves. It's that he tried to put over something the majority simply doesn't want and is properly suspicious of -- a massive change in a system that most people believe (correctly) serves them well.
"Still, the push for health care "reform" is in one important way, as your title states, a recklessness borne of arrogance -- or if not arrogance exactly, then of the echo-chamber quality of a liberalism that can no longer hear the outside world or, increasingly, itself. This is again related to the way Obama campaigned and has governed. The fact that big majorities are satisfied with the health care system in general and their care in particular just does not register with him. What registers are the Queen for a Day stories -- the cancer-stricken granny whose insurance company cuts her off three days before chemotherapy was to have begun, etc.
Putting a single human face on policy choices that will affect 300,000,000 people paints a powerful picture. But in short order it succumbs to the defects of its "virtues." The public is not yet so dumbed-down that it's going to cashier a system it knows and likes in favor of the Government Sponsored Unknown, and still less is it going to do such a thing on the basis of a handful of anecdotal horror stories -- stories that it senses are deeply dishonest for attempting to convey as routine something people know is anything but.
"Bottom line: When you hide your substantive agenda and campaign on nothing, don't be surprised when nothing is the public's response after the agenda actually shows itself."
http://www.powerlineblog.com/archives/2009/08/024348.php
Golden oldies of Bush Derangement Syndrome...
Re ‘O Ye of Little Memory’ [Jay Nordlinger]
"Have a few more, and don’t forget that VDH and I are giving you nothing like an unabridged list — we are just scratching the surface:
"Howard Dean, on the eve of becoming chairman of the Democratic National Committee, said, “I hate the Republicans and everything they stand for. This is a struggle of good and evil. And we’re the good.”
"Former senator John Glenn said of Republican campaign rhetoric, “It’s the old Hitler business.” Julian Bond, as chairman of the NAACP, said of the Bush administration, “Their idea of equal rights is the American flag and the Confederate swastika flying side by side.” Rep. Keith Ellison, Democrat of Minnesota, compared 9/11 to the Reichstag fire.
"Presidential assassination? On Bill Maher’s show, Sen. John Kerry joked about killing Bush. (“I could have gone to 1600 Pennsylvania and killed the real bird with one stone.”) A New York Democrat, Alan Hevesi, spoke to graduating students at Queens College. He said that his fellow New York Democrat, Chuck Schumer, would “put a bullet between the president’s eyes if he could get away with it.” Happy Graduation!
"A CBS talk-show host, Craig Kilborn, showed Bush giving a speech, and he put on the screen the words “SNIPERS WANTED.” This was CBS, mind you, not a video made by a sicko in his basement.
"Betty Williams is an Irishwoman who won the Nobel Peace Prize. She said, “I have a very hard time with this word ‘non-violence,’ because I don’t believe that I am non-violent. . . . Right now, I would love to kill George Bush.”...
"Have a few more, and don’t forget that VDH and I are giving you nothing like an unabridged list — we are just scratching the surface:
"Howard Dean, on the eve of becoming chairman of the Democratic National Committee, said, “I hate the Republicans and everything they stand for. This is a struggle of good and evil. And we’re the good.”
"Former senator John Glenn said of Republican campaign rhetoric, “It’s the old Hitler business.” Julian Bond, as chairman of the NAACP, said of the Bush administration, “Their idea of equal rights is the American flag and the Confederate swastika flying side by side.” Rep. Keith Ellison, Democrat of Minnesota, compared 9/11 to the Reichstag fire.
"Presidential assassination? On Bill Maher’s show, Sen. John Kerry joked about killing Bush. (“I could have gone to 1600 Pennsylvania and killed the real bird with one stone.”) A New York Democrat, Alan Hevesi, spoke to graduating students at Queens College. He said that his fellow New York Democrat, Chuck Schumer, would “put a bullet between the president’s eyes if he could get away with it.” Happy Graduation!
"A CBS talk-show host, Craig Kilborn, showed Bush giving a speech, and he put on the screen the words “SNIPERS WANTED.” This was CBS, mind you, not a video made by a sicko in his basement.
"Betty Williams is an Irishwoman who won the Nobel Peace Prize. She said, “I have a very hard time with this word ‘non-violence,’ because I don’t believe that I am non-violent. . . . Right now, I would love to kill George Bush.”...
Yes, please lecture us on civility lefties
"O Ye of Little Memory . . ." [Victor Davis Hanson]
"We are all worried about the level of discourse, and conservatives must speak out when lunatics talk about things like secession and coups.
"But the sudden liberal worry that conservatives in general have gone over the line in legitimate opposition to Obama’s rather radical agenda is not only unfair but amnesiac — given that not long ago any means were deemed tolerable for the noble ends of destroying George Bush — not defeating him — but destroying his character entirely.
"We all recall the Nazi/brownshirts outbursts by Gore, Soros, Byrd, etc., the Aflred Knopf novel Checkpoint about killing Bush, or the Toronto Film Festival award-winning docu-drama about killing Bush — but perhaps we forget there was no outrage from the Democratic congress or the New York Times at all that and worse. In addition, we may have forgotten the New York play I’m Gonna Kill the President or the creepy Guardian column by Charles Brooker published on the eve of the 2004 election:
"The world will endure four more years of idiocy, arrogance and unwarranted bloodshed, with no benevolent deity to watch over and save us. John Wilkes Booth, Lee Harvey Oswald, John Hinckley Jr. — where are you now that we need you?
"At about the same time, one Ahmed Omar Abu Ali was tried and convicted, inter alia, for planning to kill George Bush."
Keep reading this post . . .
"We are all worried about the level of discourse, and conservatives must speak out when lunatics talk about things like secession and coups.
"But the sudden liberal worry that conservatives in general have gone over the line in legitimate opposition to Obama’s rather radical agenda is not only unfair but amnesiac — given that not long ago any means were deemed tolerable for the noble ends of destroying George Bush — not defeating him — but destroying his character entirely.
"We all recall the Nazi/brownshirts outbursts by Gore, Soros, Byrd, etc., the Aflred Knopf novel Checkpoint about killing Bush, or the Toronto Film Festival award-winning docu-drama about killing Bush — but perhaps we forget there was no outrage from the Democratic congress or the New York Times at all that and worse. In addition, we may have forgotten the New York play I’m Gonna Kill the President or the creepy Guardian column by Charles Brooker published on the eve of the 2004 election:
"The world will endure four more years of idiocy, arrogance and unwarranted bloodshed, with no benevolent deity to watch over and save us. John Wilkes Booth, Lee Harvey Oswald, John Hinckley Jr. — where are you now that we need you?
"At about the same time, one Ahmed Omar Abu Ali was tried and convicted, inter alia, for planning to kill George Bush."
Keep reading this post . . .
It means a lot: to whom Obama talks, snubs
From NLO "What Are We Thinking with All This Talking?" [Kathryn Jean Lopez] Daniel Henninger writes:
"The one thing the Obama tack of talking to dictators and slow-walking free trade assures is that many of these populations may be run indefinitely by economically incompetent psychopaths who pose no threat to the interests of American labor and their Democratic dependents. This anti-democratic protectionism of course has fans on the xenophobic right in the U.S., too.
"This is a risky business. What if the new authoritarian, make-believe democratic model gains? Our dictator chat partners are getting brazen about staging and then rigging elections. Iran's mullahs proved there will be no sustained push-back from the U.S. or Western Europe to a fraudulent election. Instead the great powers' energies go into pounding tiny Honduras, which tried to save itself from the Chávez- and Castro-admiring Manuel Zelaya.
"What if the world's real democrats, after enough bullets and dungeon time, lose belief in the American democracy's support for them on this central idea? They may come to regard their betters in the U.S. and Europe as inhabiting a world less animated by democratic belief than democratic decadence. ..."
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704471504574444890430083018.html
"The one thing the Obama tack of talking to dictators and slow-walking free trade assures is that many of these populations may be run indefinitely by economically incompetent psychopaths who pose no threat to the interests of American labor and their Democratic dependents. This anti-democratic protectionism of course has fans on the xenophobic right in the U.S., too.
"This is a risky business. What if the new authoritarian, make-believe democratic model gains? Our dictator chat partners are getting brazen about staging and then rigging elections. Iran's mullahs proved there will be no sustained push-back from the U.S. or Western Europe to a fraudulent election. Instead the great powers' energies go into pounding tiny Honduras, which tried to save itself from the Chávez- and Castro-admiring Manuel Zelaya.
"What if the world's real democrats, after enough bullets and dungeon time, lose belief in the American democracy's support for them on this central idea? They may come to regard their betters in the U.S. and Europe as inhabiting a world less animated by democratic belief than democratic decadence. ..."
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704471504574444890430083018.html
So nobody believed O's "no tax on middle class"
Yet another admission that the verbal disengenuousness, the rhetorical slight of hand, hell, the flat-out, bald-faced lie that he wouldn't raise taxes on anyone "making under $250,000," was just that (via Instapundit):
JAMES PETHOKOUKIS: Obama’s Not-So-Secret Plan to Raise Taxes. “Does President Obama have a secret plan to raise taxes on middle-class Americans — and,well, pretty much everybody else — with a European-style, value-added tax? Actually, it’s not such a big secret. . . . Obama’s campaign promise to not raise taxes on households making less than $250,000 a year was always considered a joke here inside the Beltway.”
http://blogs.reuters.com/james-pethokoukis/2009/09/30/obamas-not-so-secret-plan-to-raise-taxes/
JAMES PETHOKOUKIS: Obama’s Not-So-Secret Plan to Raise Taxes. “Does President Obama have a secret plan to raise taxes on middle-class Americans — and,well, pretty much everybody else — with a European-style, value-added tax? Actually, it’s not such a big secret. . . . Obama’s campaign promise to not raise taxes on households making less than $250,000 a year was always considered a joke here inside the Beltway.”
http://blogs.reuters.com/james-pethokoukis/2009/09/30/obamas-not-so-secret-plan-to-raise-taxes/
Thursday, October 1, 2009
Deficits: used to matter but not so much now
Just use the link to see the graphic growth of deficits under Obama. Another hint, before TARP, the deficit O would have inherited from Bush would have been around $400 bn--Obama voted for TARP and so voted for the additional $800+ bn in deficit he claims to have "inherited."
"Making Bush Look Like a Piker" By Veronique de Rugy
"Based on Congressional Budget Office (CBO) data, the following chart shows a projection of deficit numbers for each year until fiscal 2018. Each color represents the difference between the projected deficits at different points in time...."
http://www.american.com/archive/2009/september/making-bush-look-like-a-piker
"Making Bush Look Like a Piker" By Veronique de Rugy
"Based on Congressional Budget Office (CBO) data, the following chart shows a projection of deficit numbers for each year until fiscal 2018. Each color represents the difference between the projected deficits at different points in time...."
http://www.american.com/archive/2009/september/making-bush-look-like-a-piker
Obama: Results, not victory--that's the ticket
(via Glenn Reynolds/Instapundit): L.A. TIMES: What Obama won’t say about the Afghan war today, at least publicly. “Signs are growing that Obama will seek to change the war goals, to redefine what is success and divert the discussion away from the more-troops measure. It’s not defeat in Afghanistan; it’s victory of a different kind. . . . Here’s the entire Obama transcript. But notice anything missing here? No more mention of the original 9/11 bad guys, the Taliban. No mention either of defeating them. And no more mention of making it safe for democracy to flourish in Afghanistan. Through such overlooked omissions are the political goals and measures of American victory in Afghanistan being subtly shifted without any notice or announcement by the Obama administration.”
http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/washington/2009/09/obama-afghanistan-copenhagen.html
http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/washington/2009/09/obama-afghanistan-copenhagen.html
"The threat of 'stealth jihad'" West responds to pressure with accommodation By FRank Gaffney:
"A Denver airport shuttle driver from Afghanistan who plotted to blow up subway trains in New York City. A Jordanian who tried to destroy one of Dallas' tallest skyscrapers. An American who thought he was detonating a truck bomb aimed at a federal courthouse in Springfield, Ill.
"Law enforcement authorities who successfully stymied these attacks have been at pains to emphasize that there are no connections between the three.
"Of course there are.
"Maybe it will prove to be the case that the three suspects at the heart of these interrupted plots - Najibullah Zazi, Hosam Maher Husein Smadi and Michael C. Finton (also known as Talib Islam) - had no connection in a tactical or operational sense.
"Still, it is absurd, and extremely dangerous, to insist that they are not connected in at least one way: What apparently animated all three of these suspects (and perhaps a number of others believed to have been involved in the New York plot who are still at large) is the seditious, supremacist theo-political-legal program authoritative Islam calls Shariah.
"Shariah requires its adherents to engage in jihad - the struggle to bring about the triumph of Islam worldwide through whatever means are available. Shariah explicitly calls for the use of violent techniques designed to instill terror in those who stand in the way of a global Muslim theocracy. ...
"Even more insidious, though, is what Robert Spencer calls "stealth jihad." This practice involves using myriad nonviolent measures to insinuate Shariah into non-Muslim societies. Adherents demand such concessions as special treatment for them and their faith in public spaces, private corporations, schools, communities and government at every level.
"The prime mover behind these demands is the Muslim Brotherhood, an organization that shares the violent jihadists' commitment to advance Shariah's end state of a global caliphate, but seek (for the moment, at least) to do so nonviolently.
"The successful prosecution last year of one Brotherhood front, the Holy Land Foundation, established that the organization's mission is "to destroy Western civilization from within ... by its own miserable hand." ...
Read the very-disturbing rest of the article: http://washingtontimes.com/news/2009/sep/29/the-threat-of-stealth-jihad/
"A Denver airport shuttle driver from Afghanistan who plotted to blow up subway trains in New York City. A Jordanian who tried to destroy one of Dallas' tallest skyscrapers. An American who thought he was detonating a truck bomb aimed at a federal courthouse in Springfield, Ill.
"Law enforcement authorities who successfully stymied these attacks have been at pains to emphasize that there are no connections between the three.
"Of course there are.
"Maybe it will prove to be the case that the three suspects at the heart of these interrupted plots - Najibullah Zazi, Hosam Maher Husein Smadi and Michael C. Finton (also known as Talib Islam) - had no connection in a tactical or operational sense.
"Still, it is absurd, and extremely dangerous, to insist that they are not connected in at least one way: What apparently animated all three of these suspects (and perhaps a number of others believed to have been involved in the New York plot who are still at large) is the seditious, supremacist theo-political-legal program authoritative Islam calls Shariah.
"Shariah requires its adherents to engage in jihad - the struggle to bring about the triumph of Islam worldwide through whatever means are available. Shariah explicitly calls for the use of violent techniques designed to instill terror in those who stand in the way of a global Muslim theocracy. ...
"Even more insidious, though, is what Robert Spencer calls "stealth jihad." This practice involves using myriad nonviolent measures to insinuate Shariah into non-Muslim societies. Adherents demand such concessions as special treatment for them and their faith in public spaces, private corporations, schools, communities and government at every level.
"The prime mover behind these demands is the Muslim Brotherhood, an organization that shares the violent jihadists' commitment to advance Shariah's end state of a global caliphate, but seek (for the moment, at least) to do so nonviolently.
"The successful prosecution last year of one Brotherhood front, the Holy Land Foundation, established that the organization's mission is "to destroy Western civilization from within ... by its own miserable hand." ...
Read the very-disturbing rest of the article: http://washingtontimes.com/news/2009/sep/29/the-threat-of-stealth-jihad/
Not anti-war, just anti-Bush's war (cont'd)
"Without Bush, media lose interest in war caskets" By: Byron York Chief Political Correspondent September 29, 2009
"Remember the controversy over the Pentagon policy of not allowing the press to take pictures of the flag-draped caskets of American war dead as they arrived in the United States? Critics accused President Bush of trying to hide the terrible human cost of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.
"These young men and women are heroes," Vice President Biden said in 2004, when he was senator from Delaware. "The idea that they are essentially snuck back into the country under the cover of night so no one can see that their casket has arrived, I just think is wrong."
"In April of this year, the Obama administration lifted the press ban, which had been in place since the Persian Gulf War in 1991. Media outlets rushed to cover the first arrival of a fallen U.S. serviceman, and many photographers came back for the second arrival, and then the third.
But after that, the impassioned advocates of showing the true human cost of war grew tired of the story. Fewer and fewer photographers showed up. ..."
Read the rest: http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/politics/Without-Bush-media-lose-interest-in-war-caskets-8310113-62427012.html
"Remember the controversy over the Pentagon policy of not allowing the press to take pictures of the flag-draped caskets of American war dead as they arrived in the United States? Critics accused President Bush of trying to hide the terrible human cost of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.
"These young men and women are heroes," Vice President Biden said in 2004, when he was senator from Delaware. "The idea that they are essentially snuck back into the country under the cover of night so no one can see that their casket has arrived, I just think is wrong."
"In April of this year, the Obama administration lifted the press ban, which had been in place since the Persian Gulf War in 1991. Media outlets rushed to cover the first arrival of a fallen U.S. serviceman, and many photographers came back for the second arrival, and then the third.
But after that, the impassioned advocates of showing the true human cost of war grew tired of the story. Fewer and fewer photographers showed up. ..."
Read the rest: http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/politics/Without-Bush-media-lose-interest-in-war-caskets-8310113-62427012.html
Not all Intell failures equally outrage left
From Glenn Reynolds' Instapundit:
"RON ROSENBAUM: Huge Intelligence Scandal: Will All the Pundits Who Relied on the Discredited 2007 NIE on Iran Now Admit That They Were Wrong? “Will the congressional intelligence committees demand to know how such a deliberately misleading report was being leaked and fed to the public by half-baked pundits even after (we now learn) they knew that some part of the ‘intelligence community’ knew — before the the NIE was issued — about the secret nuclear fuel facility we’re now reading about?”
"Yeah, that’ll happen. The purpose of the N.I.E. was to paralyze us until after the election. It succeeded."
"RON ROSENBAUM: Huge Intelligence Scandal: Will All the Pundits Who Relied on the Discredited 2007 NIE on Iran Now Admit That They Were Wrong? “Will the congressional intelligence committees demand to know how such a deliberately misleading report was being leaked and fed to the public by half-baked pundits even after (we now learn) they knew that some part of the ‘intelligence community’ knew — before the the NIE was issued — about the secret nuclear fuel facility we’re now reading about?”
"Yeah, that’ll happen. The purpose of the N.I.E. was to paralyze us until after the election. It succeeded."
The ghost of Neville Chamberlain & appeasem't
Hugh Hewitt unreservedly calls it appeasement, and on four fronts: Iraq, Iran, missile abandonment in Poland/Czech, and Afghanistan. Those disputing the applicability of the term "appeasement" must make an intellectually honest case, and not simply engage in dismissive trash-talking. Here's some of HH's transcript:
"From the (Max Boot) interview:
"HH: Now some of my Democratic friends really bristle when I use the term appeasement. And I point out to them that appeasement has a genealogy, it has a specific approach to world affairs, it has a specific way of dealing with aggressive regimes. Is it fair for me to use the term appeasement, Max Boot, in relation to the world’s response to Iran?
"MB: Well, it’s an incendiary term, but I think in the current case, it more or less applies, because here you have Iran doing outrageous things in violation of international accords, and the reaction from the world is basically to meet with Iran, and to talk about serious consequences, but not really deliver those serious consequences. So yeah, I mean, if that’s not appeasement, I’m not sure what is.
From the (Bill) Kristol interview:
"HH: Yeah, it is a four front policy of appeasement, and I used that word advisedly, not just Iran and Iraq, but the Pole and Czech decision, and then this decision that you reference, the Afghanistan pullback. And I want to go there now. I sense, especially in this Washington Post article today, the preparation of the political battlefield for basically a retreat from Afghanistan. Do you share that assessment?
"BK: Yes, I think that was a very significant piece in the Post where the forces who want to go to a so-called counterterrorism strategy, which is really a way of just staying offshore and killing a few terrorists, I suppose, and hoping it all doesn’t blow up in our face, that…I had assumed that Obama would reject those counsels. But I don’t see how you can explain his behavior over the last month except to say that he is trying in various ways to lay the groundwork for not accepting General McChrystal’s recommendation, the commander he put in there six or seven months ago. They’re going to pretend that the election changed everything, the Afghan election, was a mess and that changed everything, and somehow now we’re going to go to, I don’t think he’ll go to any kind of immediate withdrawal, but I really think we’re now…he is, I believe now, he had thought things through in this way. He thinks that he wants to go to the country in 2012, to this country for reelection as president, and say I have gotten our troops out of these messy wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, and we are having diplomacy all around the world, and he will hope that these places don’t blow up in his face. And they may not immediately. I mean, even if we have 30-40,000 troops in Afghanistan, they can probably do a lot of, prevent some bad things from happening for quite a while, cross his fingers, and hope Pakistan doesn’t just blow up, cross his fingers and hope that the Middle East doesn’t blow up, I guess. But you know, I really, as I say in the past, I’ve kind of assumed that look, he’s president of the United States, he’s going to…although there’ll be a lot of things I’ll disagree with, and things we’ll pay a price for, but that on some big decisions, he’ll be responsible. But I now really fear that on these really decisive decisions, he’s not going to make the right decision.
"Read both interviews in their entirety and you will be --or should be-- alarmed.
"These conversations reflect the growing concern among center-right, and perhaps even some honest center-left foreign policy elites that the president is in full retreat mode across the globe and that he views American power as always the problem and never the solution. Clearly the left wing of his party has always believed as much, but he did not run as its representative on any issue except Iraq, and the president in fact ran as a proponent of greater force in Afghanistan, up to and including an invasion of Pakistan.
"What is being unveiled right now is not just troubling but deeply dangerous. Center-right elites have held their fire in the months since President Obama's election and then his inauguration, and have hoped that the combination of Secretary Gates-General Jones-Admiral Mullen-General Petraeus would keep the president on a mainstream course, one which recognizes that American power must be deployed in the world to check its worst actors.
"If the decision on the Afghanistan recommendations by General McChyrstal goes the wrong way and President Obama refuses the reinforcements requested for a strategy of victory there, the course of the Obama Administration's foreign policy will be set and it will be unmistakable. It will also not be what the vast majority of Americans voted for, or what they believe in.And it will be an incredibly dangerous decision to trust that our enemies will leave us and our allies alone.
http://www.hughhewitt.com/blog/g/fd8ecf80-98bb-4dbf-a2e2-dcd642ea47ed
"From the (Max Boot) interview:
"HH: Now some of my Democratic friends really bristle when I use the term appeasement. And I point out to them that appeasement has a genealogy, it has a specific approach to world affairs, it has a specific way of dealing with aggressive regimes. Is it fair for me to use the term appeasement, Max Boot, in relation to the world’s response to Iran?
"MB: Well, it’s an incendiary term, but I think in the current case, it more or less applies, because here you have Iran doing outrageous things in violation of international accords, and the reaction from the world is basically to meet with Iran, and to talk about serious consequences, but not really deliver those serious consequences. So yeah, I mean, if that’s not appeasement, I’m not sure what is.
From the (Bill) Kristol interview:
"HH: Yeah, it is a four front policy of appeasement, and I used that word advisedly, not just Iran and Iraq, but the Pole and Czech decision, and then this decision that you reference, the Afghanistan pullback. And I want to go there now. I sense, especially in this Washington Post article today, the preparation of the political battlefield for basically a retreat from Afghanistan. Do you share that assessment?
"BK: Yes, I think that was a very significant piece in the Post where the forces who want to go to a so-called counterterrorism strategy, which is really a way of just staying offshore and killing a few terrorists, I suppose, and hoping it all doesn’t blow up in our face, that…I had assumed that Obama would reject those counsels. But I don’t see how you can explain his behavior over the last month except to say that he is trying in various ways to lay the groundwork for not accepting General McChrystal’s recommendation, the commander he put in there six or seven months ago. They’re going to pretend that the election changed everything, the Afghan election, was a mess and that changed everything, and somehow now we’re going to go to, I don’t think he’ll go to any kind of immediate withdrawal, but I really think we’re now…he is, I believe now, he had thought things through in this way. He thinks that he wants to go to the country in 2012, to this country for reelection as president, and say I have gotten our troops out of these messy wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, and we are having diplomacy all around the world, and he will hope that these places don’t blow up in his face. And they may not immediately. I mean, even if we have 30-40,000 troops in Afghanistan, they can probably do a lot of, prevent some bad things from happening for quite a while, cross his fingers, and hope Pakistan doesn’t just blow up, cross his fingers and hope that the Middle East doesn’t blow up, I guess. But you know, I really, as I say in the past, I’ve kind of assumed that look, he’s president of the United States, he’s going to…although there’ll be a lot of things I’ll disagree with, and things we’ll pay a price for, but that on some big decisions, he’ll be responsible. But I now really fear that on these really decisive decisions, he’s not going to make the right decision.
"Read both interviews in their entirety and you will be --or should be-- alarmed.
"These conversations reflect the growing concern among center-right, and perhaps even some honest center-left foreign policy elites that the president is in full retreat mode across the globe and that he views American power as always the problem and never the solution. Clearly the left wing of his party has always believed as much, but he did not run as its representative on any issue except Iraq, and the president in fact ran as a proponent of greater force in Afghanistan, up to and including an invasion of Pakistan.
"What is being unveiled right now is not just troubling but deeply dangerous. Center-right elites have held their fire in the months since President Obama's election and then his inauguration, and have hoped that the combination of Secretary Gates-General Jones-Admiral Mullen-General Petraeus would keep the president on a mainstream course, one which recognizes that American power must be deployed in the world to check its worst actors.
"If the decision on the Afghanistan recommendations by General McChyrstal goes the wrong way and President Obama refuses the reinforcements requested for a strategy of victory there, the course of the Obama Administration's foreign policy will be set and it will be unmistakable. It will also not be what the vast majority of Americans voted for, or what they believe in.And it will be an incredibly dangerous decision to trust that our enemies will leave us and our allies alone.
http://www.hughhewitt.com/blog/g/fd8ecf80-98bb-4dbf-a2e2-dcd642ea47ed
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