SHORT TAKES ON THE DRIFTING WRECKAGE – AT 9:25 P.M. ET:

THE TAPE – A tape has surfaced, allegedly a recording of Mitt Romney earlier this year saying to a private fundraiser that 47% of Americans are dependent on the government, and that this group is Obama's base.  The tape is already getting gleeful play from the in-the-tank media.  Don Lemon, CNN's afternoon anchor, and clearly a front man for the administration, could barely contain himself today in rushing the tape on the air, all the while blandly stating that CNN couldn't vouch for its authenticity.  (Don't you get that point nailed down before going on air?)  The fundamental argument on the tape is correct, but the numbers are exaggerated, with the wording sloppy.  It won't help Romney, who seems almost to have disappeared...allowing others to define him.

UNBELIEVABLE – A new Pew poll gives Obama reasonably high marks for his handling of the Mideast crisis, and slams Mitt Romney for his comments.  From The Hill:   "While 26 percent of Americans approved of Romney's comments critical of the president's response to the attacks, which left four American foreign service officers dead, 48 percent of those surveyed disapproved and an additional 26 percent did not voice an opinion, according to a poll from the Pew Research Center.  Meanwhile, 45 percent of those polled said they approved of the president's handling of the situation, versus 36 percent who disapproved."  In my view, those results reflect, almost entirely, the press bias we now face.  Romney was correct in his comments, and Obama's handling of the crisis has been dishonest and incompetent.  But who, except the alternative media, will tell you?

PANETTA WARNS – While we've been concentrating on the Mideast, Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta is warning of war between China and Japan over some disputed islands in the western Pacific.  Sounds like something out of World War II.  The official American position is that the islands belong to Japan, but that the U.S. is not actively taking sides in the dispute.   Another Obaman act of assurance toward an ally, in this case Japan.  Obama gives only enemies of the U.S. any reason to love us.

OUR FUTURE? – And what's playing on Egyptian TV during this crisis?  How about this, reported by the Washington Times:   "A Muslim cleric hosting an Egyptian television show recently outlined his version of Islamic instructions for wife-beating. In another show, a cleric claimed that the Muslim Brotherhood, now governing Egypt, one day will rule the world.  'If not through peace, there is nothing preventing war. We welcome war,' said the second cleric, who added that 'one of the tenets of the Muslim Brotherhood, which they cannot renounce,' is the goal of global dominance by an Islamic caliphate."  Nice, huh?  But who are we to question other cultures?

September 17, 2012