Liberals and "Free"

In my experience when liberals start using the word "free," anyone with a decent job should grab their wallet and hold it tight. It's probably about to be picked.

The joys of being a lame duck President with a hostile Congress

You can make all kinds of ridiculous proposals that you know are going nowhere.

President Obama plans to propose raising $320 billion over the next 10 years in new taxes targeting wealthy individuals and big financial institutions to pay for new programs designed to help lower- and middle-income families, senior administration officials said Saturday.

Read the rest here.

North Korea publishes racist attack on Obama

It could have been written by the Klan. Read the story here. I decline to quote it.

Obama Biden to skip Winter Olympics

The White House announced Tuesday that President Obama, Vice President Biden and the first lady will not attend the Winter Olympics in Sochi, Russia, in February, a pointed snub by an administration that is feuding with Russian leaders on a range of foreign policy and human rights issues.

The U.S. delegation will be led by a former cabinet secretary and a deputy secretary of state, and will include two openly gay athletes — tennis legend Billie Jean King and ice hockey player Caitlin Cahow — in an apparent bid to highlight opposition to Russia’s anti-gay laws.

Read the rest here.

Mandela Security Scandal: It was worse than we thought

It's becoming increasingly clear that when President Obama arrived at the Nelson Mandela memorial service in Johannesburg, South Africa Tuesday, he stepped into an atmosphere so chaotic, disorganized, and unsafe that under any other circumstances the White House and Secret Service might well have insisted the president not appear.

FNB Stadium, where the memorial was held, seats 95,000 people. Even with a steady rain and thousands of empty seats in uncovered areas, there were tens of thousands of people in the area with the president. It appears most of them got in without going through any security.

"There were no security checks upon entry to the stadium," a local South African activist wrote Friday in a letter to the Johannesburg Star newspaper. "I walked freely to my seat without passing through metal detectors, being searched or any other check."

The stadium's main entrance was "completely unattended," a reporter for a Washington, D.C., television station told Politico. "There were no workers performing bag checks or pat-downs — there were no magnetometers to walk through, no metal detector wands being used — anywhere."

Read the rest here.

In the Navy we had a term for this sort of thing... FUBAR.

No, I'm not going to break that down.

Bizarre

JOHANNESBURG — The sign language interpreter who gestured meaninglessly at the Nelson Mandela memorial in South Africa on Tuesday has faced charges of murder, rape, theft, breaking and entering, malicious damage to property and kidnapping, according to eNCA.com.

The South African news site said the outcome of the murder charge against Thamsanqa Jantjie, brought in 2003, was unknown because the court case file is “mysteriously empty.”

Read the rest here.

I imagine that the Secret Service must be flipping out over this.

Obama's Dragnet

Within hours of the disclosure that the federal authorities routinely collect data on phone calls Americans make, regardless of whether they have any bearing on a counterterrorism investigation, the Obama administration issued the same platitude it has offered every time President Obama has been caught overreaching in the use of his powers: Terrorists are a real menace and you should just trust us to deal with them because we have internal mechanisms (that we are not going to tell you about) to make sure we do not violate your rights.

Those reassurances have never been persuasive — whether on secret warrants to scoop up a news agency’s phone records or secret orders to kill an American suspected of terrorism — especially coming from a president who once promised transparency and accountability.

The administration has now lost all credibility. Mr. Obama is proving the truism that the executive will use any power it is given and very likely abuse it. That is one reason we have long argued that the Patriot Act, enacted in the heat of fear after the 9/11 attacks by members of Congress who mostly had not even read it, was reckless in its assignment of unnecessary and overbroad surveillance powers.

Read the rest here.

Obama has violated his oath of office and should be impeached.

The End of the Perpetual War

Every few years the NY Times screws up and they publish an editorial that I actually agree with, at least in part. To whit...

President Obama’s speech on Thursday was the most important statement on counterterrorism policy since the 2001 attacks, a momentous turning point in post-9/11 America. For the first time, a president stated clearly and unequivocally that the state of perpetual warfare that began nearly 12 years ago is unsustainable for a democracy and must come to an end in the not-too-distant future.

“Our systematic effort to dismantle terrorist organizations must continue,” Mr. Obama said in the speech at the National Defense University. “But this war, like all wars, must end. That’s what history advises. It’s what our democracy demands.”

As frustratingly late as it was — much of what Mr. Obama said should have been said years ago — there is no underestimating the importance of that statement. Mr. Obama and his predecessor, President George W. Bush, used the state of war that began with the authorization to invade Afghanistan and go after Al Qaeda and others who planned the Sept. 11 attacks to justify extraordinary acts like indefinite detention without charges and the targeted killing of terrorist suspects.

While there are some, particularly the more hawkish Congressional Republicans, who say this war should essentially last forever, Mr. Obama told the world that the United States must return to a state in which counterterrorism is handled, as it always was before 2001, primarily by law enforcement and the intelligence agencies. That shift is essential to preserving the democratic system and rule of law for which the United States is fighting, and for repairing its badly damaged global image.

Read the rest here.

Yeah, there are some points where I disagree. But broadly speaking they are, astonishingly, right.

Republicans (finally) Have a Real Scandal

After four years of desperately looking for a scandal to pin on the Obama Administration, the GOP appears to have just been handed the real deal. No, I am not talking about Benghazi. As scandals go that one is fairly garden variety. Basically it was the keystone cops running crisis management and then they tried to cover up their incompetence. Lots of knavery but I don't see anything criminal.

Not so today's announcement by the IRS that they targeted conservative political groups in 2010 and 2012 for special scrutiny. That's not just unethical, its illegal. And not just in the administrative sense. This could (big word there) be a major scandal involving the politically motivated use of one of the most powerful law enforcement agencies in the country against the opposition party.

That's bad news for Obama. Worse, I don't see anyway he can order an in house investigation that would not be stripped of all credibility from its inception. The best thing he could do, and frankly the only thing he should do, is to call up Speaker Boehner and Minority Leader McConnell and ask them for the name of someone he could appoint as an independent council with full prosecutorial authority and a mandate to go wherever the evidence takes him/her..

Congressional Abdication and the Rise of the Imperial Presidency

IN MATTERS of foreign policy, Congress, and especially the Senate, was designed as a hedge against the abuses exhibited by overeager European monarchs who for centuries had whimsically entangled their countries in misguided adventures. America would not be such a place. The Constitution would protect our governmental process from the overreach of a single executive who might otherwise succumb to the impulsive temptation to unilaterally risk our country’s blood, treasure and international prestige. Congress was given the power to declare war and appropriate funds, thus eliminating any resemblance to European-style monarchies when it came to the presidential war power.

Importantly and often forgotten these days, Article I, Section 8 of the Constitution was also carefully drawn to give Congress, not the president, certain powers over the structure and use of the military. True, the president would act as commander in chief, but only in the sense that he would be executing policies shepherded within the boundaries of legislative powers. In some cases his power is narrowed further by the requirement that he obtain the “Advice and Consent” of two-thirds of the Senate. Congress, not the president, would “raise and support Armies,” with the Constitution limiting appropriations for such armies to no more than two years. This was a clear signal that in our new country there would be no standing army to be sent off on foreign adventures at the whim of a pseudomonarch. The United States would not engage in unchecked, perpetual military campaigns.

Congress would also “provide and maintain a Navy,” with no time limit on such appropriations. This distinction between “raising” an army and “maintaining” a navy marked a recognition of the reality that our country would need to protect vital sea-lanes as a matter of commercial and national security, confront acts of piracy—the eighteenth-century equivalent of international terrorism—and act as a deterrent to large-scale war.

Practical circumstances have changed, but basic philosophical principles should not. We reluctantly became a global military power in the aftermath of World War II, despite our initial effort to follow historical patterns and demobilize. NATO was not established until 1949, and the 1950 invasion of South Korea surprised us. In the ensuing decades, the changing nature of modern warfare, the growth of the military-industrial complex and national-security policies in the wake of the Cold War all have contributed to a mammoth defense structure and an atrophied role for Congress that would not have been recognizable when the Constitution was written. And there is little doubt that Dwight D. Eisenhower, who led the vast Allied armies on the battlefields of Europe in World War II and who later as president warned ominously of the growth of what he himself termed the “military-industrial complex,” is now spinning in his tomb.

Perhaps the greatest changes in our defense posture and in the ever-decreasing role of Congress occurred in the years following the terrorist attacks on U.S. soil of September 11, 2001. Powers quickly shifted to the presidency as the call went up for centralized decision making in a traumatized nation where quick, decisive action was considered necessary. It was considered politically dangerous and even unpatriotic to question this shift, lest one be accused of impeding national safety during a time of war. Few dared to question the judgment of military leaders, many of whom were untested and almost all of whom followed the age-old axiom of continually asking for more troops, more money and more authority. Members of Congress fell all over themselves to prove they were behind the troops and behind the wars.

Read the rest here.

Obama signals partial retreat on birth control mandate

The Obama administration proposed broader latitude Friday for religious nonprofits that object to the mandated coverage of contraceptives, one that will allow large faith-based hospitals and universities to issue plans that do not directly provide birth control coverage.

Their employees would instead receive a stand-alone, private insurance policy that would provide contraceptive coverage at no cost.

The new proposal aims to find middle ground between faith-based nonprofits that have a religious opposition to contraceptives and women’s health advocates who vociferously supported the required coverage of birth control without co-payment.

It could also breathe new life into lawsuits filed against the Affordable Care Act’s contraceptive requirement, some of which were put on hold until the Obama administration clarified its policy on the issue.

Read the rest here.

Federal government releases long-awaited health reform rules

Long-awaited federal rules for health insurance plans came out Tuesday, and they make clear that insurance plans that people can buy on the open market next year will look a lot like some of the most popular plans on offer now – with a few big differences.

As the 2010 health reform law requires, insurers will no longer be able to dump patients who are starting to cost too much, they won’t be able to charge women more than men, they have to cover anyone who can pay and they’ll have to pay for maternity care, eye exams for kids and for mental health services.

“Insurers will not be able to charge someone more just because she is sick or because she used to be sick,” Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius told reporters on a conference call.

Read the rest here.

Pastor nixed from Obama inaugural over anti-gay remarks

A pastor chosen by President Obama to deliver the inaugural benediction later this month has withdrawn amid controversy over anti-gay remarks he made more than a decade ago.

In a mid-1990s sermon, Rev. Louie Giglio, an Atlanta minister and founder of the Passion Conferences, a group dedicated to uniting students in worship and prayer, advocated for "ex-gay" therapy and urged listeners to prevent the “homosexual lifestyle” from becoming accepted.

Read the rest here.

Obama calls for new gun restrictions

President Obama on Monday began the first serious push of his administration to attempt to reduce gun violence, directing Cabinet members to formulate a set of proposals that could include reinstating a ban on assault rifles.

The effort will be led by Vice President Biden, according to two people outside the government who have spoken to senior administration officials since Friday, when a gunman killed his mother and rampaged through Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Conn., killing 20 children, six adults and himself.

Read the rest here.

No one should be able to legally buy a gun without undergoing a criminal background check. To the extent that this is not the case, it needs to be fixed. Beyond that I seriously doubt the efficacy of any proposed laws.

Obama: Higher taxes on wealthy are nonnegtiable

President Obama flatly rejected on Tuesday a Republican proposal to avoid an end-of-the-year fiscal crisis through spending cuts and limiting tax deductions, insisting that he would agree to no deal that did not include an increase in marginal tax rates on the wealthy.

Read the rest here.

White House Sends Leftward Budget Proposals To Congress

WASHINGTON — House Republicans said on Thursday that Treasury Secretary Timothy F. Geithner presented the House speaker, John A. Boehner, a detailed proposal to avert the year-end fiscal crisis with $1.6 trillion in tax increases over 10 years, an immediate new round of stimulus spending, home mortgage refinancing and a permanent end to Congressional control over statutory borrowing limits.

The proposal, loaded with Democratic priorities and short on detailed spending cuts, was likely to meet strong Republican resistance. In exchange for locking in the $1.6 trillion in added revenues, President Obama embraced $400 billion in savings from Medicare and other entitlements, to be worked out next year, with no guarantees.

He did propose some upfront cuts in programs like farm price supports, but did not specify an amount or any details. And senior Republican aides familiar with the offer said those initial spending cuts might well be outnumbered by upfront spending increases, including at least $50 billion in infrastructure spending, mortgage relief, an extension of unemployment insurance and a deferral of automatic cuts to physician reimbursements under Medicare.

Read the rest here.

Obama's off the record, now on the record interview

President Barack Obama suggested he'll be able to achieve a major fiscal reform deal as well as comprehensive immigration reform in his second term, according to his off-the-record conversation with the Des Moines Register.

The White House reversed course on insisting that the president's conversation on Tuesday with the editor and the publisher of the Iowa paper remain off-the-record and allowed the paper to publish a transcript of the conversation.

Read the rest here.

Romney And Obama Are Ideological Twins

100 Ways Mitt Romney Is Just Like Barack Obama.
HT: The Orthodox Caveman

New Polls: Obama's lead is widening

The Olympics are wrapping up and, at the end of July, when the Olympics began, we wrote that we were basically at halftime of the general election -- and Obama had a narrow lead. Well, it’s a little bigger than that now. (People may want to quibble, but you can’t dismiss every poll on sampling.) There’s clearly movement toward the president and clearly problems for Romney personally. We had found it in our polling for the last month and it hadn’t shown up everywhere yet. Now it has. The latest evidence: three new polls out today – from CNN, Fox, and Reuters/Ipsos – all showing President Obama leading Romney by seven points or more and at or near 50%. (CNN 52-45%, Fox 49-40%, Reuters/Ipsos 49-42%). What’s more, Romney continues to have an image problem. In CNN, Obama’s fav/unfav is +14, Romney’s -1. And in Fox, Obama’s +12, Romney’s +1. (Ipsos didn’t ask fav/unfav.)

Read the rest here.

There is going to be some variation in poll numbers and usually one candidate will have a lead. But these numbers coming from several different sources suggest Romney is in trouble. It's not Spring anymore. It's August now and this is a wide gap to overcome in not quite three months.

There are still the giant infomercials we used to call conventions coming up and Romney has yet to announce his VP choice. But time and opportunities to reverse the pro-Obama trends are starting to run thin. Money is not a major issue. Romney and the GOP have been out-raising Obama and the Democrats by a wide margin. But their huge financial advantages don't seem to be translating into a pro-Romney shift in the polling numbers. On the contrary, the trend for months has been for Obama and it seems to be picking up steam. If this gap is not narrowed significantly then we could see Obama reelected in a landslide.

Emails suggest Obama Administration was behind loss of pensions by non-union workers

Emails obtained by The Daily Caller show that the U.S. Treasury Department, led by Timothy Geithner, was the driving force behind terminating the pensions of 20,000 salaried retirees at the Delphi auto parts manufacturing company.

The move, made in 2009 while the Obama administration implemented its auto bailout plan, appears to have been made solely because those retirees were not members of labor unions.

The internal government emails contradict sworn testimony, in federal court and before Congress, given by several Obama administration figures. They also indicate that the administration misled lawmakers and the courts about the sequence of events surrounding the termination of those non-union pensions, and that administration figures violated federal law.

Read the rest here

Note: The Daily Caller is an independent news source that claims ideological neutrality. This however is not universally accepted. In any case they seem to have the emails to back their story up.