THURSDAY,  OCTOBER 15,  2009

WHAT OBAMA MUST CONFRONT - AT 9:08 P.M. ET:  While President Obama ponders what to do in Afghanistan - a decision is expected in 2013 - our enemies are not on vacation.  The New York Times reports a series of disturbing, and telling, developments:

ISLAMABAD, Pakistan — A wave of attacks against top security installations over the last several days demonstrated that the Taliban, Al Qaeda and militant groups once nurtured by the government are tightening an alliance aimed at bringing down the Pakistani state, government officials and analysts said.

A state with a nuclear arsenal.  Hillary Clinton recently declared that the Pakistani nukes are safe.  She also once thought that her husband was loyal.

More than 30 people were killed Thursday in Lahore, the second largest city in Pakistan, as three teams of militants assaulted two police training centers and a federal investigations building. The dead included 19 police officers and at least 11 militants, police officials said.

Nine others were killed in two attacks at a police station in Kohat, in the northwest, and a residential complex in Peshawar, capital of North-West Frontier Province.

The assaults in Lahore, coming after a 20-hour siege at the army headquarters in Rawalpindi last weekend, showed the deepening reach of the militant network, as well as its rising sophistication and inside knowledge of the security forces, officials and analysts said.

The umbrella group for the Pakistani Taliban, Tehrik-e-Taliban, claimed responsibility for the attacks in Lahore, the independent television news channel Geo reported on its Web site.

COMMENT:  But the left wing of the Democratic Party wants us out of that region, so the funds can be devoted to pet projects at home. 

What is striking is the new aggressiveness of our enemies in Pakistan and Afghanistan...since Barack Obama took office.  Maybe they know a pushover when they see one, especially a pushover who kinds of brags about being one.

Obama faces decisions in the next month that can well determine whether terrorist groups will get their hands on Pakistani nuclear weapons.  And we wonder whether the newly minted Nobel peace laureate is up to the task.

October 15, 2009   Permalink

BULLETIN: CNN TO BE SAVED! - AT 5:57 P.M. ET:  CNN, tanking in the ratings, dying in the quality assessments, third-worldish in the reporting, is about to be saved, we think.

There are reports circulating on the internet that Ted Turner, that sane, reasoned guy who thought Jane Fonda was a perfectly proper matrimonial match, would like to run his old network again.

Well, that will solve everything.  He could even have Jane do national security updates while sitting on an anti-aircraft gun.

Maybe Code Pink could supply the anchors.

We'll be following this.  Stop laughing.

October 15, 2009   Permalink

ANOTHER WARNING FROM MOSCOW - AT 5:14 P.M. ET:  Boy, Hillary Clinton certainly accomplished a great deal in Moscow.  I want to see that list.  I'm sure I'd feel great pride.  Not.

Here is the latest from our new Russian friends:

MOSCOW (AP) - Russian news agencies are quoting a top Russian diplomat as suggesting the U.S. should not talk with non-NATO nations about a prospective missile shield.

Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov's remarks appeared to reflect alarm over the idea that neighbors such as Ukraine or Georgia could potentially host U.S. missile defense facilities.

State-run RIA Novosti and ITAR-Tass cite Ryabkov as saying Russia has "concerns" about what he called U.S. contacts on missile defense with countries outside NATO.

President Barack Obama has removed a major irritant in relations with Russia by scrapping U.S. plans to deploy interceptor missiles in Poland and a radar in the Czech Republic.

But Russian officials say they want to know details about what system the U.S. will put in place instead.

COMMENT:  Well, Hillary promised transparency to the Russians (and got no promise in return), so I guess we'll tell them everything.  After all, we must reset our relations with Russia after they were so horribly damaged by the infamous BUSH (!!).

You've noticed, I'm sure, the improvement in our relationship with Moscow.  Look in tomorrow's mail for a coupon.  Big discounts on caviar.  Overnight delivery.

October 15, 2009   Permalink

THE NUMBERS, THEY ARE NOT GOOD - AT 4:50 P.M. ET:  Someone finally asked the key political question.  The answer can bring no joy to the White House.  From Fox News:

In what may be the ultimate job rating, 43 percent of voters say that they would vote to re-elect President Obama if the 2012 election were held today, down from 52 percent six months ago, from April 22-23, 2009.

Obama's job approval rating comes in at 49 percent this week. That's down just one percentage point from late September, but it marks a new low approval for the president -- and the first time the Fox News poll has measured his approval below 50 percent.

Moreover, the number of Americans saying they would vote to re-elect President Obama has dropped. If the election were held today the poll finds more voters say they would back someone else in the 2012 election than would back the president.

COMMENT:  No matter how this is spun, it isn't good news for the president.  True, presidents fall in popularity during their first year, but we were told by the huge used-car lot known as Obama headquarters that this was a very special president, The One, the man from whom all blessings flowed.

So far, not many blessings.  Many headaches.  Get the Alka-Seltzer.

October 15, 2009   Permalink

ARE YOU BELIEVING THIS? - AT 3:13 P.M. ET:   From NewsBusters:

The Magazine Publishers of America's American Society of Magazine Editors has added a category to its annual magazine cover awards: Obama. This new category is the only ASME category focused on a single person, and highlights the reverential attitude for the President widely held in the magazine publishing community.

ASME represents about 850 magazine editors nationwide. According to its website, the organization "works to preserve editorial independence." How they manage to maintain this air of objectivity while devoting an entire awards section to such a polarizing figure is a mystery.

COMMENT:  Wait.  We haven't seen the petitions to put him on Mount Rushmore - next week - in anticipation of expected greatness and divinity.

Reverence by the press gets into dangerous territory.  it also reflects what these "journalists" were taught in school and by the "mentors" of their profession, who were shaped by the sixties. 

Ronald Reagan brought the Cold War to a successful close, without firing a shot.  I don't recall similar reverence, and, unlike red darling Gorbachev, he never received the Nobel Peace Prize.  Who said it's a fair world?

October 15, 2009   Permalink

NOBEL PRIZE = NO-VOTE PRIZE - AT 9:55 A.M. ET:  It's now been almost a week since we learned that President Obama was to receive the Nobel Peace Prize.  Notice the difference?

In fact, the president's award has not exactly been hailed by the American people.  Rasmussen reports this morning that the president's poll numbers have actually gone down since the prize was announced. 

Some 48% of likely voters approve of the president's performance, whereas 51% disapprove.

In Ras's presidential approval index, measuring the gap between those who strongly approve, and those who strongly disapprove, the president stands at minus eight, 30% to 38%. 

Maybe we should get him some more prizes. 

October 15, 2009   Permalink

WELCOME TO THE RECOVERY - AT 8:59 A.M. ET:  We regularly run our "welcome to the recovery" tidbits to point out that there remains real, continuing pain in the actual economy, despite gains in the artificial economy of Wall Street.  We point out once more that there was a stock market rally between 1933 and 1937, in the depths of the Great Depression:

NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) -- Despite concerted government-led and lender-supported efforts to prevent foreclosures, the number of filings hit a record high in the third quarter, according to a report issued Thursday.

"They were the worst three months of all time," said Rick Sharga, spokesman for RealtyTrac, an online marketer of foreclosed homes.

During that time, 937,840 homes received a foreclosure letter -- whether a default notice, auction notice or bank repossession, the RealtyTrac report said. That means one in every 136 U.S. homes were in foreclosure, which is a 5% increase from the second quarter and a 23% jump over the third quarter of 2008.

Nevada continued to be the worst-hit state with one filing for every 23 households.

COMMENT:  One of the great hustles of the last 25 years is the notion, bought by too many gullible citizens, that real estate never goes down.  Of course it does. 

Yes, for many it's been a wonderful investment, and, being pro-free enterprise, we applaud good investments, in real estate or anything else.   But too many Americans became true believers, and have gotten burned.

There are no sure things. 

October 15, 2009   Permalink

REPEAT AFTER ME:  "THERE IS NO TERROR THREAT.  IT'S AN INVENTION OF BUSH (!!), THE NEO-CONS, AND THEIR CAPITALIST GIRLFRIENDS" - AT 8:43 A.M. ET:  From Fox News:

NEW YORK — The airport shuttle driver accused of plotting a bombing in New York had contacts with Al Qaeda that went nearly all the way to the top, to an Osama bin Laden confidant believed to be the terrorist group's leader in Afghanistan, U.S. intelligence officials told The Associated Press.

Mustafa Abu al-Yazid, an Egyptian reputed to be one of the founders of the terrorist network, used a middleman to contact Afghan immigrant Najibullah Zazi as the 24-year-old man hatched a plot to use homemade backpack bombs, perhaps on the city's mass transit system, the two intelligence officials said.

Intelligence officials declined to discuss the nature of the contact or whether al-Yazid contacted Zazi to offer simple encouragement or help with the bombing plot prosecutors say Zazi was pursuing.

Al-Yazid's contact with Zazi indicates that Al Qaeda leadership took an intense interest in what U.S. officials have called one of the most serious terrorism threats crafted on U.S. soil since the 9/11 attacks.

COMMENT:  We remain at risk, a risk that will only grow if terror groups get their hands on weapons of mass destruction, something that they're attempting to do.

Our risk also increases if an enemy believes he can get away with terror against the United States, or feels he is so well protected in his homeland that he'll never be caught, or even pursued.

And yet, we have a weak president whose base is a segment of his party that is often hostile to national defense, and which too often believes that threats against the American people are caused simply by cultural misunderstanding.

Once again we learn that elections have consequences, and that the election of 2008 had disastrous consequences. 

There's another election next year.  There are polling signs that the public is waking up.  It is our job to keep Americans awake, and appropriately angry.

October 15, 2009    Permalink

DISGRACEFUL - AT 8:25 A.M. ET:  This is another kind of democracy - democracy by intimidation.  From The New York Times:

One day after Commissioner Roger Goodell said that Rush Limbaugh’s bid to buy the St. Louis Rams would receive little support from N.F.L. ownership, Limbaugh was dropped from the group of investors hoping to buy the team.

“Rush was to be a limited partner — as such, he would have had no say in the direction of the club or in any decisions regarding personnel or operations,” Dave Checketts, the former Madison Square Garden executive who is leading the group that included Limbaugh. “This was a role he enthusiastically embraced. However, it has become clear that his involvement in our group has become a complication and a distraction to our intentions; endangering our bid to keep the team in St. Louis. As such, we have decided to move forward without him and hope it will eventually lead us to a successful conclusion.”

COMMENT:  I wrote about this at the Angel's Corner last night.  The disgrace here is that Limbaugh was dropped based on trumped-up charges of racism - charges founded partly on statements he hotly denies making, and that no one can find.

You can like Rush, or not like him, but this is modern-day McCarthyism.  If Rush were pro-Communist or pro-Nazi, I could understand the objection to him.  But he's a conservative, with no serious evidence that he's a racist.  This smear will be with him for the rest of his life, unless he fights back to clear his name.  I hope he does.

October 15, 2009    Permalink

NOBEL DEMOCRACY - AT 8:14 A.M. ET:  Well now, this is interesting, from AFP:

OSLO — Three of the five members of the Norwegian Nobel Committee had objections to the Nobel Peace Prize being awarded to US President Barack Obama, the Norwegian tabloid Verdens Gang (VG) reported Thursday.

"VG has spoken to a number of sources who confirmed the impression that a majority of the Nobel committee, at first, had not decided to give the peace prize to Barack Obama," the newspaper said.

In a surprise move last Friday, the Nobel committee attributed the Nobel Peace Prize to Obama less than nine months after he had taken office.

The committee, appointed by the Norwegian parliament, honoured Obama for "for his extraordinary efforts to strengthen international diplomacy and cooperation between peoples."

"The committee was unanimous," its influential secretary Geir Lundestad told AFP on Friday.

COMMENT:  Look, Obama came up through Chicago politics.  He understands this kind of thing.  No one should be embarrassed.

Yuch.

October 15,  2009   Permalink

WEDNESDAY,  OCTOBER 14,  2009

SARAH ON THE GO - AT 7:58 P.M. ET:  Next month will be Sarah Palin month.  Her book comes out, she'll be the rage of talk shows and the object of automatic ridicule.  She could write "Hamlet" and be laughed it.  (You can just hear Chris Matthews ridiculing a play about a Danish prince.  No tingle up his leg.)

Now the former governor is launching a political group, as The Wall Street Journal reports:

Sarah Palin fans can expect to see a new Palin political organization surface as her memoir, “Going Rogue: An American Life,” hits the shelves next month.

“There will be an announcement about it coming up,” Palin associate Tim Crawford said Wednesday.

The New York Post reported this week that Palin’s new group will be called “Stand Up For Our Nation.” (News Corp. owns both the Post and The Wall Street Journal as well as HarperCollins Publishers, publisher of Palin’s book.) Crawford, who is treasurer of Palin’s existing political-action committee, SarahPAC, refused to provide any details about the new organization’s purpose or structure.

But Palin supporters say the former Alaska governor and last year’s GOP vice presidential nominee is eager to keep the public’s attention, even as she rakes in big earnings. “She wants to continue to be in a position to help causes dear to her heart and help people close to her,” said Fred Malek, a former fund-raiser for Sen. John McCain.

COMMENT:  I hope that Palin is spending a good chunk of time learning the details of the major issues.  You can be sure the usual suspects will be out in force next month, trying to trip her up.  If she beats them, we'll be cheering.  But she's got to beat them.

October 14, 2009   Permalink

THE TOP MAN SPEAKS - AT 6:39 P.M. ET:  Putin is the guy to see in Russia, not those other guys with Russian names.  And Putin spoke today, but not to our secretary of state.  The great Ed Lasky of American Thinker refers us to this:

BEIJING (Reuters) - Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin warned major powers on Wednesday against intimidating Iran and said talk of sanctions against the Islamic Republic over its nuclear programme was "premature".

Putin, who many diplomats, analysts, and Russian citizens believe is still Russia's paramount leader despite stepping down as president last year, was speaking after U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton visited Moscow for two days of talks.

"There is no need to frighten the Iranians," Putin told reporters in Beijing after a meeting of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation.

Hillary has been in Moscow, no doubt enjoying the sights, but nothing else:

Clinton failed to secure any specific assurances from Russia on Iran during her visit, leaving her open to criticism at home that she had not received anything from Moscow after earlier U.S. concessions on missile defence.

You think?  The left wing of her party probably believes she didn't make enough concessions.

And get this.

Clinton said she would have liked to have seen Putin but that their agendas did not coincide.

Pathetic, pathetic, pathetic.  The secretary of state, and former first lady, gets snubbed by an old KGB guy after we withdraw missile defense from Eastern Europe, as a gesture toward the Russians.

Shows you what a little appeasement can get.

Obama, and messenger girl Clinton, will not bring us peace in our time, any more than the British chap did in 1938.

October 14, 2009   Permalink

THE PARTY OF THE PEOPLE - YEAH, RIGHT - AT 6:23 P.M. ET:  If you didn't think the Democratic Party now represents the chattering classes, think again.  From USA Today:

Democratic members of the House of Representatives now represent most of the nation's wealthiest people, a sharp turnaround from the long-standing dominance that Republicans have held over affluent districts.
A USA TODAY analysis of new Census data found that Democrats represent a far different constituency today than they did in 2005, when they were the minority in the House, or in 1990, when they were the majority.

The Democratic-controlled House is now an unusual combination of the richest and poorest districts, the best and least educated, and the best and the worst insured. The analysis found that Democrats have attracted educated, affluent whites who had tended previously to vote Republican.

The key word is "educated," darlings.  These are the "good" people, those who understand the higher things and the higher thoughts.

Democrats now represent 57% of the 4.8 million households that had incomes of $200,000 or more in 2008. In 2005, Republicans represented 55% of those affluent households.

"Democrats have made enormous gains in affluent, educated suburban districts," says Warren Glimpse, founder of Proximity, a firm that analyzes demographics. "What's not clear is whether this reflects a profound change or a temporary blip."

I worry about it.  There's an old saying that there are people of enormous wealth who'd give everything just to walk down a commencement aisle with a $50,000-a-year professor.  I'm afraid we're seeing that effect here.  We have a generation of affluent college graduates who were "educated" by the intellectual leftovers of the 1960s, and they were influenced.  This is where they think the prestige is.  This is where "goodness" is.

I wonder if these new, affluent Dems ever rub shoulders with the very people they think they're helping, the working stiffs.  Not a chance. 

About five years ago I tried to place a true story in Hollywood about a New York firefighter family and its tragic date with the 9-11 attacks.  One Hollywood guy angrily turned it down, shouting, "These are the people who elected BUSH!"  I am not kidding.  You can be sure he's one of the new, affluent liberals. 

And so we see changes in American politics.  We are in a period of illusion,.

October 14, 2009   Permalink

OH GOOD, OH GOOD, THEY'RE FIGHTING IN THE PLAYPEN - AT 5:44 P.M. ET:  The liberal troops - that contradiction in terms - are getting restless.  Why, it's disgraceful, this number of months into the reign of Barack the Wise - doctors can still treat patients without government approval, "Don't ask, don't tell" still exists, Fox News is still on the air, Huge Chavez hasn't received a state dinner.  What kind of president is this?  Probably one of them leftists in name only, a Rupert Murdoch plant.  Fox News (I told you) reports:

In recent weeks, President Obama has faced increasingly sharp criticism of his style and performance from an unlikely quarter: liberals.

Liberal commentators from Saturday Night Live comedians to newspaper columnists to leftist bloggers to gay rights activists have been portraying Obama as a do-nothing president and "whiner-in-chief," expressing a growing concern that the commander in chief is not showing enough spine.

He's not lefty enough?

Critics on the left are growing impatient with Obama and pressuring him to reject a request from his chief military commander for more troops in Afghanistan, to include a government-run insurance option in his health insurance reform plan and to lift the don't-ask-don't-tell policy concerning gays in the military.

Wait, we haven't gotten to the part where they put Rush in jail.

On Sunday thousands of gay rights activists marched from the White House to the Capitol, demanding that Obama keep his promise to work to end discrimination against gays and lesbians.

"This president has done something pretty extraordinary," said Michael Gerson, a senior fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations and a former senior adviser to the Bush administration.

"He's managed to convince a lot of Americans that he's more liberal than he thought he was, at the same time he's disappointed his liberal base," he told FOX News. "That's an accomplishment of sorts."

Well, we knew he was an accomplishment sort of guy. 

But the left complaineth too much.  Just wait for Obama to cave completely to North Korea, Iran, and old favorite, Russia.  Ah, that'll be the day.  All those flowered jeans, celebrating.

October 14, 2009   Permalink

STILL A TOUGH ROAD - AT 10:02 A.M. ET:  Rasmussen reports this morning that Republicans still hold a slight edge in the generic congressional ballot, but have slipped at bit:

Support for Republican congressional candidates dipped slightly this week in the latest edition of the Generic Congressional Ballot.

The new Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey shows that 41% would vote for their district’s Republican congressional candidate while 39% would opt for his or her Democratic opponent.

Support for Democrats remains unchanged this week, while support for the GOP dropped two points.

Work to be done, obviously.  But here's the very good news:

Voters not affiliated with either party heavily favor the GOP, 41% to 24%.

Independents have been moving in our direction.  But we have to keep them moving, and keep our side motivated.  The generic survey is very close, and ACORN will undoubtedly "find" some liberal votes in next year's midterms, their greatest area of excellence.

October 14, 2009   Permalink

WELL, AT LEAST SHE MENTIONS HUMAN RIGHTS - AT 9:01 A.M. ET:  After having been rebuffed by Russian leaders on Iran, Hillary Clinton fell back to Plan B, talking to kids about human rights and giving an Obama-style apology.  From The New York Times:

Secretary of State Hillary Clinton called on Russia on Wednesday to uphold human rights, voicing concern at recent attacks on activists and reporters willing to challenge the Kremlin.

On the second day of her Moscow visit, at the end of a European tour, Clinton told an audience of students that Russia must defend freedom.

"People must be free to take unpopular positions, disagree with conventional wisdom, know they are safe to peacefully challenge accepted practice and authority," she said during a question and answer session at Moscow State University.

(Gee, I wonder if Obama agrees with that.)

When you see the phrase "an audience of students," you know it's boilerplate.  In liberal circles there's a certain mystique about "an audience of students."  They're safe, they're generally to the left, they don't do much.

You can be sure that Clinton didn't give that lecture to the people in power.

And here comes the musical tribute to Barack Obama:

"We have people in our government and you have people in your government who are still living in the past," Clinton said.

"They do not believe that the United States and Russia can cooperate to this extent. They do not trust each other. And we have to prove them wrong. That is our goal. Our goal is to be as cooperative as we can."

Oh, please.  People living in the past?  In the Obama government?  Who are these people?  The only past they're living in is the 1960s.

So she wants to be "as cooperative as we can."  That's nice.  I'm sure the residents of the Kremlin are already looking around for concessions they can make in response to our niceness.  Maybe some extra caviar at Hillary's next Moscow lunch. 

I prefer Reagan's "trust but verify." 

We're making no significant headway with the Russians, or, for that matter, with the Iranians, North Koreans and Venezuelans.  But I guess it's living in the past to say so.

October 14, 2009   Permalink

DOES ANYONE THINK THEY'LL LISTEN? - AT 8:38 A.M.  ET:  The sheer spin surrounding yesterday's passage of health-care "reform" by the Senate Finance Committee may require medical attention.  Even journalists who have respectable reputations are starting to buckle and get with the hysteria.  From The Politico:

Senate Finance Committee Chairman Max Baucus (D-Mont.) staked a powerful claim Tuesday that his health care bill is about as far as his party is willing to go in turning the president’s vision of reform into reality.

And it was a Republican — Sen. Olympia Snowe of Maine — who helped him stand up to his party’s liberals.

Oh, come on.   Liberals fold because Olympia cast a committee vote?  She's already said this doesn't guarantee what she'll do next.

After months of Democratic infighting, Baucus strengthened his hand by passing an $829 billion bill that checks the boxes on Obama’s wish list: cutting costs, expanding coverage, winning unanimous Democratic support on his committee and even picking up the blush of bipartisanship.

A blush?  Maybe a yawn.  And that public option box wasn't checked.  Wait 'til the "progressives" in the House sink their artificially whitened teeth into that one.

He sent a clear message to progressives who consider Baucus’s bill little more than a good start, a floor from which to build their bill of their dreams:

Don’t mess with a good thing.

Uh, haven't seen that crowd jumping up and down with joy.  Problem is, they don't necessarily think it's a good thing. 

A large mess ahead as "progressives" push their party even further to the left, Blue Dogs whine and Republicans practice their dullness.

October 14, 2009   Permalink

WHAT ARE WE LEFT WITH? - AT 8:16 A.M. ET:  If the polls are correct, the bloom is at least somewhat off Barack Obama's rose.  (Of course, the notion of a rose blooming at all may be stereotypical, and lack multiflower sensitivity, but we'll let it pass.)

While Obama still retains an intense following among his base, that base appears to be narrowing.  More and more Americans seem to be asking what we actually have, or don't have, in the current president.

Michael Gerson has written a fine piece in the Washington Post explaining that Americans are finally seeing the limits of star power, using the Nobel Peace Prize as a starting point:

It is a good thing, the argument goes, for an American president to be loved by foreigners, even if their sloppy display of affection is embarrassing.

But this point needs to be argued, not merely assumed. How does American standing translate into effective diplomacy? And what role does presidential popularity play in building national standing?

The first, most important, element of national standing is credibility -- the perception that a nation will act in its vital interests and do what it has promised.

And is Obama credible?

His initial decisions on Iraq and Afghanistan were generally responsible. His unilateral abandonment of missile defense agreements with Poland and the Czech Republic, his tolerance for engagement without outcomes, his dithering on Afghanistan policy, all raise serious questions on this score.

And Hillary Clinton now returns home from Moscow with, maybe, a box of chocolates, maybe a plastic pen with the hotel's name stamped on it.

A second element of national standing is reputation -- the general good will toward our country, which allows for American action in the world without constantly fighting suspicion and hostility.

And, despite all of Obama's apologies, Gerson argues, the U.S. has a humanitarian history - the Marshall Plan, AIDs assistance.  We are generous.

But Obama -- focused almost entirely on domestic matters -- has yet to add any significant contributions to this humanitarian history. And his demotion of human rights issues in the relentless pursuit of engagement has left many human rights advocates concerned.

The Iranian dissidents have noticed.  Obama will probably disappoint the Venezuelan dissenters as well.  And look at our embarrassment in Honduras.

The final measure of American standing is the personal popularity of its current leader. Here Obama has achieved wonders, especially in Europe.

But there's an asterisk...

But this adoration does not indicate support for American policy views. According to Pew, these improvements are "being driven much more by personal confidence in Obama than by opinions about his specific policies."

...Former Republican Sen. Jack Danforth has described the practical effect of these European attitudes bluntly: "What it really says is we will follow the U.S. provided the U.S. doesn't want to lead anywhere."

Then Gerson correctly lowers the boom, explaining the strange, twisted nature of Obama's appeal:

What does it mean to "do the right thing in world affairs"? For Europeans, this essentially means pacifism. A recent trans-Atlantic poll asked if the use of force can ever be "necessary to achieve justice." Seventy-one percent of Europeans said "no," while 71 percent of American said "yes." In general, Europeans believe that nothing -- not peace, or freedom, or security, or the rights of the weak -- is worth fighting for. It is an attitude Europeans can afford to hold because America has chosen to defend them. But it is not a view that an American president can share, or ultimately appease.

Hard power is essential. Soft power is useful. Star power matters mainly in Oslo.

Ouch.  I would modify that last sentence a bit, however.  Star power is still hot on American college campuses and in the pages of some elements of the elite media.  That's part of our problem in overcoming the Obama madness. 

Great image, bad everything else.  But don't sell Obama short.  He can still remain for eight years unless there's a credible opposition in 2012, and that will take a candidate with a pulse and heartbeat.

October 14,  2009   Permalink