THURSDAY,  OCTOBER 22,  2009

ROTTEN, WARMONGERING, BUSH-LOVING REPUBLICAN RAMBOS! - AT 9:01 P.M. ET:  These Republicans, always asking embarrassing questions.  Why can't they trust our new Russian brothers and sisters, like the Hollywood stars do?  The Washington Times reports the disgraceful Red scare: 

Republicans in the Senate are gearing up to battle the Obama administration over the high-priority plan to finish a new arms-control treaty with Russia before the end of the year.

Sen. Jon Kyl, Arizona Republican and No. 2 Republican Senate leader, recently identified a key issue that is likely to complicate the administration's plan: Russia for years has been violating the current Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (START), which is set to expire Dec. 5.

Mr. Kyl said in a Senate floor speech Oct. 19 that Russia's development of a new multiple-warhead RS-24 missile that was tested as recently as May 2007 violates the current treaty.

"That would be illegal for the Russians to deploy under START. So why are they testing it?" Mr. Kyl asked.

COMMENT:  Another senator who doesn't understand that everything has changed in the world since The One was inaugurated in January.

Or maybe nothing has changed. 

Ronald Reagan and the people around him knew how to negotiate arms-control agreements, and they knew how to say "nyet" when necessary, as when Reagan refused to give up missile defense.  The Obamans don't exactly have the same savvy, to put it mildly.

I'm glad John Kyl is on the case.  This is too important to be left to the kids around Obama.

October 22, 2009   Permalink

THE ROAD TO HELL IS PAVED WITH... - AT 8:15 P.M. ET:  No decent person likes hate crimes or hate speech.  However, attempts to tack the word "hate" onto legislation can come back to haunt us, no matter how pure our intentions:

WASHINGTON — The Senate voted Thursday to extend new federal protections to people who are victims of violent crime because of their gender or sexual orientation, bringing the measure close to reality after years of fierce debate.

The 68-to-29 vote sends the legislation to President Obama, who has said he supports it.

The measure, attached to an essential military-spending bill, broadens the definition of federal hate crimes to include those committed because of a victim’s gender or gender identity, or sexual orientation. It gives victims the same federal safeguards already afforded to people who are victims of violent crimes because of their race, color, religion or national origin.

COMMENT:  We certainly want to punish people who commit those crimes.  The problem comes as we increasingly broaden the definition of "hate."  We've seen what's happened on college campuses where, to avoid "hate," speech codes have been enacted that restrict even legitimate political and social discussion. 

And we've seen the word "hate" used to play favorites with groups.  Criticize a member of one group and it's "hate."  Say the same thing about a member of a less-favored group, and it's "robust speech" (an actual term used by the ACLU).

And, with misguided American support, a unit of the UN is moving toward adoption of a program against "defamation" of religion, which some have interpreted as meaning any criticism of Islam.

Do we want a better, more civil society?  Sure.  But that's a loaded concept, especially when you start punishing people for what they think, or even what they say.  By all means, fight hatred.  But I'm uneasy when colleges, schools, religious institutions and the government get into the act, swayed by whichever group has the largest megaphone.

October 22, 2009   Permalink

CHILDREN MUST PLAY - AT 7:05 P.M. ET:  Sarah Palin's book is about to come out, news that seems to greatly bother an element of the fringe press, as The Politico notes:

Editors from the progressive magazine The Nation are pulling together a book to be released the same day as Sarah Palin’s with a similar title and cover mocking the former Alaska governor’s memoir.

What, precisely is "progressive" about The Nation?  The Nation is Marxist-friendly, never met a left-wing dictatorship it didn't like, and doesn't much care for the United States or any of its policies since George Washington.

And the sick obsession with Sarah Palin is amusing.

The book titled “Going Rouge: Sarah Palin an American Nightmare” is edited by Richard Kim, a senior editor at the weekly magazine, along with The Nation’s Executive Editor Betsy Reed.

The book’s cover displays a picture nearly identical to the photo chosen for the cover of Palin’s own “Going Rogue: An American Life.”

QUESTION:  If a buyer confuses the two and buys the wrong book, will there be a free exchange?  I think there should be.

In both pictures, Palin is wearing red behind a cloudy sky, though the background of “Going Rouge” is dark and gloomy with a lightning bolt come down over Palin’s left shoulder.

The book, being published by OR Books, will contain contributions from twenty-three writers including Joe Conason, Katha Pollitt, and Jim Hightower.

Katha Pollitt, after the attacks of 9-11, publicly expressed her distress that her own son wanted to fly an American flag from his window.  Guess we know the tone this book will take.

October 22, 2009   Permalink

A RASMUSSEN RECORD - AT 9:35 A.M. ET:  The White House will not be tacking this up on the president's bulletin board:

The Rasmussen Reports daily Presidential Tracking Poll for Thursday shows that 26% of the nation's voters Strongly Approve of the way that Barack Obama is performing his role as President. That’s the lowest level of Strong Approval yet measured for this President. Thirty-nine percent (39%) Strongly Disapprove, giving Obama a Presidential Approval Index rating of -13 (see trends).

For the first time during Obama’s time in office, the Approval Index has been in negative double digits for seven straight days.

COMMENT:  I've never seen a president sink this fast.  The American people are catching on.  The suit is empty, the head is half-empty, the policies are less than empty.

October 22, 2009   Permalink

THE DEEP THINKER THINKS - AT 9:09 A.M. ET:  The president continues his casual course on Afghanistan, as American men are in the field.  From The Politico:

President Barack Obama hinted Wednesday that his administration might refrain from announcing a new plan for the Afghan war effort until Afghanistan's presidential runoff election is complete, even as one influential Democrat urged him to wait until after the election campaign before making any firm strategic decisions.

The influential Democrat is Mr. National Defense, John Kerry.

In an interview with NBC News, Obama said he was encouraged by the progress Afghanistan had made toward holding a second round of voting on Nov. 7, but that there was still uncertainty about what the country's government would look like after the election.

"I think we're still finding out how this whole process in Afghanistan is going to unfold," Obama said. "I think it is entirely possible that we have a strategy formulated before a runoff is determined. We may not announce it."

COMMENT:   Former Vice President Cheney severely criticized Mr. Obama last night for his confusion and delay on Afghanistan, and Cheney is correct.  Obama seems overly sensitive to pressures coming from his party's left.  In war, you cannot wait until every condition is perfect.  We fought the Korean War, and saved South Korea, although there was a problematical government in Seoul.  We fought World War II alongside many governments that did not meet our standards.

I get the feeling that the Obama stall has little to do with Afghan elections, and much more to do with his party's radical base.

October 22, 2009   Permalink 

FROM THE WONDERFUL GUYS WHO BROUGHT YOU PEARL HARBOR - AT 8:41 A.M. ET:  Credit for that line must be given to advertising ace Jerry Della Femina.  I'm reminded of it now because, coming in under the radar, we have growing problems with Japan.

Another great foreign policy triumph for the Obama administration is the recent election in Japan of a new government that has a clear hostility toward the United States and the American-Japanese alliance.  Defense Secretary Gates is meeting with the Japanese now to try to work out differences, but the going is rough.  The Japanese people, in electing this new crowd of left-leaning politicians, apparently weren't very moved by Mr. Sweetheart in the White House:

TOKYO - Playing hardball with its closest ally in Asia, the Obama administration warned Japan yesterday of serious consequences if it backs out of a commitment to allow the relocation of a US air base on Okinawa.

Gates’s words, during a two-day visit here, were a blunt challenge to efforts by Japan’s month-old government to carve out a more “equal’’ relationship with Washington.

Prime Minister Yukio Hatoyama and his Democratic Party of Japan won a landslide election in August with a vow to be more assertive and less passive in dealing with the United States, which is treaty-bound to protect Japan in time of war.

COMMENT:  We have no report of President Obama doing anything to set right this historic, and critical, relationship.  You know, he doesn't care much for American allies like Britain, Israel, or, probably, Japan.  But if the new Japanese government becomes increasingly anti-American, he'll warm up.

Just wait for the Tokyo speech on how wrong it was to use the atomic bomb.

October 22, 2009   Permalink

DISTURBING, BUT SATISFYING - AT 8:22 A.M. ET:  We are free enterprise types here, but even we have our limits.  The news that the federal government will regulate the "compensation" of senior executives in companies that received government bailouts makes us uneasy.  You wonder where this is going:

WASHINGTON — Responding to the furor over executive pay at companies bailed out with taxpayer money, the Obama administration will order the firms that received the most aid to slash compensation to their highest-paid employees, an official involved in the decision said on Wednesday.

The plan, for the 25 top earners at seven companies that received exceptional help, will on average cut total compensation this year by about 50 percent. The companies are Citicorp, Bank of America, American International Group, General Motors, Chrysler and the financing arms of the two automakers.

Some executives, like the top traders at D.I.Y., will face tight limits on their pay. In addition, the top-paid employees at all the affected companies will face new limits on their perks.

Uneasy, yes.  And yet, I cannot deny the touch of a smile that I experienced when reading the story.  Joseph Kennedy Sr., the founding father, once said that all businessman are bastards.  Well, all businessmen aren't bastards.  I've known some very fine managers who perform with distinction.  But some businessmen definitely are, and we have a sad crop of them today.

Some of these "executives" have no sense of shame, no sense of loyalty, no sense of leadership, and no respect for what a free market really means.  It means competitive free enterprise, not legal stealing.  Some of these "talented" men (and a few women) have actually added very little to their firms, but have taken bundles in "compensation," often arranged by the friends they put on boards of directors.  (There's a new book on Hollywood that points out that many media "moguls" aren't very moguls, and actually make little contribution to to the value of their "studios.")

The gap between the highest paid and lowest paid worker in a corporation is vastly larger in the United States than in any other country.  The executive excess here is doing enormous damage to the credibility of our economic system.  So, although I generally oppose most (but not all) government intervention in the marketplace, I have no sympathy for the latest targets.  They've had it coming for a long time.

The president of the United States earns $400,000 a year.  There's no shortage of applicants.

I know some readers will disagree with my view, but think of an employee who has given honorable service, is laid off in middle age, with kids about to go to college, and reads that the CEO of the company that fired him will get a $20-million "bonus" for "making the tough decisions," even though the company is failing.

Yuch.

October 22, 2009   Permalink 

THE INCREDIBLE SHRINKING PRESIDENCY - AT 8:01 A.M. ET:  What else can you call it?  The man in the White House, only nine months in office, seems determined to diminish himself and the trust he holds.

How else do we account for this obsession with Fox News?  How else do we account for the president giving valuable face time to Rachel Maddow and Keith Olbermann of MSNBC, two minor leaguers who have fewer viewers than letters in their names?

Fox News dutifully, and with as much neutrality as possible, reports the president's journalistic favor-giving: 

President Obama spoke publicly for the first time Wednesday about his administration's portrayal of Fox News as an illegitimate news organization -- only to say he's not "losing sleep" over the controversy.

Obama, in an interview with NBC, at first attempted to deflect a question about the White House's criticism of Fox News, saying "the American people are a lot more interested in what we're doing to create jobs or how we're handling the situation in Afghanistan."

The interviewer then pressed, noting that Obama's advisers have targeted the network openly.

"I think that what our advisers simply said is, is that we are going to take media as it comes," Obama said. "And if media is operating, basically, as a talk radio format, then that's one thing. And if it's operating as a news outlet than that's another. But it's not something I'm losing a lot of sleep over."

Given the intensity of the White House assault on Fox, apparently he is.

Several top White House advisers have gone on other channels to criticize Fox News' coverage of the administration, dismiss the network as the mouthpiece of the Republican Party and urge other news organizations not to treat Fox News as a legitimate news station.

COMMENT:  True, other presidents have despised particular news organizations.  President Kennedy, for example, cancelled the White House subscription to the old New York Herald Tribune. 

But I think it's fair to say that we haven't seen such a concentrated attack on a news organization as we're seeing now.  If the White House wants to take issue with particular Fox reports, fine.  But to, in effect, delegitimize it as a news organization, is absurd.  It makes this president look small, something he seems to be working at. 

Americans don't like small presidents.  One of Harry Truman's problems was that, although he made some of the weightiest decisions of our age, he often came off as petty.  It was said of him, "He does the biggest things in the biggest ways and the littlest things in the littlest ways."  Obama is starting to look like the small-time Chicago pol that he actually is.  He needs a grown-up to sit down and explain his office to him.

October 22, 2009   Permalink

WEDNESDAY,  OCTOBER 21,  2009

CHENEY STRIKES BACK - AT 8:55 P.M. ET:  The former vice president has struck back against the meandering, and endless whining, of the Obama administration, whose tactics are placing the nation in danger.  Andrew Malcolm, of the L.A. Times's great Top of The Ticket site, reports:

With public support for the Afghan conflict melting and approval of the president's job as commander in chief waning, two top Barack Obama aides -- senior advisor David Axelrod and Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel -- went on the TV talk shows Sunday and used very similar words to explain their latest lengthy policy review as the fault of the long-gone Bush administration ignoring the needs of Afghanistan for years.

Tonight, as first reported by Fox News's "Special Report," former Vice President Dick Cheney fires back in a candid, even blunt, retort:

Having announced his Afghanistan strategy last March, President Obama now seems afraid to make a decision, and unable to provide his commander on the ground with the troops he needs to complete his mission....

It’s time for President Obama to make good on his promise. The White House must stop dithering while America’s armed forces are in danger.

Cheney's criticism of the succeeding Democratic administration is not new. However, he reveals tonight that the outgoing Bush administration handed a complete Afghan policy review to the Obama transition team, which asked the Republicans not to release it. The Bush team agreed and its recommendations formed much of the basis of Obama's announcement in March. But now Axelrod and Emanuel are stating that those review questions had not been asked for eight years.

COMMENT:  Axelrod and Emanuel were deceptive.  The questions were asked, and the incoming administration was fully briefed. 

Let's see if the mainstream media tags the White House for this obvious lack of truthfulness.  Don't hold your breath.

We're dealing with the lives of American troops.  There doesn't seem to be any great sense of urgency in the Oval Office.  Must plan the next big dinner party or night out on the town.

October 21, 2009   Permalink

THE WARNING THIS TIME - AT 6:23 P.M. ET:  There's been another terror arrest here at home.  From The Washington Post:

A Massachusetts man has been arrested on charges of conspiring to support terrorists in a long-running investigation into Americans seeking military-style training overseas, federal authorities announced Wednesday morning.

This is the new and growing threat - Americans who can get terror training overseas, and not stand out if they then target Americans anywhere.

Tarek Mehanna, 27, of Sudbury, a small town west of Boston, allegedly conspired from 2001 to May 2008 with Ahmad Abousamra and others to support and carry out attacks abroad, including on U.S. and allied soldiers in Iraq, the Justice Department announced.

COMMENT:  Of course, with Obama in the White House, all these people will become friends of the United States.

Laugh now.

October 21, 2009   Permalink

MORE STATISTICAL "OUCH" FOR OBAMA - AT 5:59 P.M. ET:  News from Gallup provides more evidence that the president is paying a heavy poll tax (okay, okay).

From Gallup:

PRINCETON, NJ -- In Gallup Daily tracking that spans Barack Obama's third quarter in office (July 20 through Oct. 19), the president averaged a 53% job approval rating. That is down sharply from his prior quarterly averages, which were both above 60%.

In fact, the 9-point drop in the most recent quarter is the largest Gallup has ever measured for an elected president between the second and third quarters of his term, dating back to 1953.

Who can they blame?  Who can they blame?

In Obama's first quarter and second quarter, his job approval average compared favorably with those of prior presidents. But after the drop in his support during the last quarter, his average now ranks near the bottom for presidents at similar points in their presidencies. Only Clinton had a lower third-quarter average among elected presidents.

Obama will send that last line, anonymously, in a plain white envelope, over to the State Department.

The president isn't producing.  He is not being well served by the roughhouse Chicago crowd around him.  He can actually drag down the Democratic ticket next year.  This is not the change he planned for, or believed in.

October 21, 2009   Permalink

NO WONDER THEY ACT THE WAY THEY DO - AT 10:31 A.M. ET:  The president and his team are from Chicago.  That may explain things:

NEW YORK — Striving to attain that perfect life, work balance? You're not alone, but if you live in Chicago you're more unlikely to find it with residents of the Windy City the most stressed in the United States.

A survey by Harris Interactive found Chicago is the most stressed city in the nation, followed by Houston, Boston, Los Angeles and San Diego, while Miami is the least stressed, along with Dallas/Fort Worth, Las Vegas, Cincinnati and Minneapolis.

"It is (due) to a combination of different things. There wasn't one thing that made Chicago stand out but they were the ones who had the least attainment of life balance," Harris Interactive spokeswoman Regina Corso told Reuters.

COMMENT:  Yeah, do you get that feeling when looking at Rahm Emanuel?  This Obama crowd is snapping at Fox News, the Chamber of Commerce, various friendly countries, most of American history, and Gen. McChrystal.

They need relaxation. 

Even better...retirement.

October 21, 2009   Permalink

GRIM, GRIM, GRIM - AT 10:11 A.M. ET:  We always stress that a poll is a snapshot in time.  We look for trends.  With that in mind, the trends for President Obama in the Rasmussen poll aren't very encouraging.  For the sixth straight day, equaling the record for this president, Obama has been in negative double digits in Ras's presidential approval index - measuring the gap between those who strongly approve of his performance and those who strongly don't.  It's now 27% to 40%.

In overall approval, Mr. Obama stands at 47% approve, 53% disapprove.

We're about to endure a bunch of TV celebrations of Obama's big win last November.  These figures will not add to the merriment.

October 21, 2009   Permalink

UPDATE ON IRAN - AT 9:15 A.M. ET:  What a difference excellent reporting makes.  David E. Sanger, superlative reporter for The New York Times, gives us an update on this morning's story - see our first posting - on Iran's "agreement" over its nuclear program.  Sanger's copy reflects some of the concerns we raised when we saw the first reports, and extends them.  This is important stuff:

VIENNA — The head of the International Atomic Energy Agency said Wednesday that Iranian negotiators had agreed to a draft of an agreement to ship much of its stockpile of nuclear fuel to Russia, but cautioned that it would have to be approved by Friday in both Tehran and Washington.

The key to the agreement, if it works, would lie in the timing of the shipments — a detail officials were not discussing in Vienna in the hours after the announcement. If Iran actually sends the full 2,600 pounds of low-enriched uranium at issue to Russia in a single shipment, it would have too little fuel on hand to build a nuclear weapon for roughly a year, according to the agency’s experts. But if the fuel leaves Iran in batches, the experts warn, Iran would have the ability to replace it almost as quickly as it leaves the country.

That's the first asterisk.  There are more.  When dealing with Iran, there are many, many asterisks.

The 2,600 pounds amounts to about 75 percent of Iran’s known stockpile of fuel. That estimate, as one senior European diplomat put it on the sidelines of the three days of negotiations here, “assumes that Iran has accurately declared how much fuel it possesses, and does not have a secret supply.”

Something we noted earlier.  How will the White House react to this?  We hope it will react with heavy skepticism.

Ultimately, Mr. Obama would have to get Iran to agree to give up the enrichment process as well, or the fuel taken out of circulation in the draft agreement would soon be replaced. During the campaign, Mr. Obama and his aides said that Iran could not be trusted to enrich uranium. But he has not made the cessation of enrichment a prerequisite to talks, and it is still under way, in violation of three United Nations Security Council resolutions.

Another asterisk just dropped.

Iran’s representative to the I.A.E.A., Ali Asghar Soltanieh, told reporters on Wednesday that while his team of negotiators had accepted the draft agreement, senior officials in Tehran would have to approve it. “We have to thoroughly study this text,” he said.

You do that, fella. 

Don't you love it?  We've accepted the draft, but we have to study it.  I guess they're for it before being against it. 

Or, as Golda Meir used to say, "If my grandmother had wheels, she'd be a carriage."

October 21, 2009   Permalink

THE PARTY LINE - BIG TIME - AT 8:25 A.M. ET:  I make a sharp distinction between women's rights and feminism.  Equal treatment for women is a responsible and noble goal.  (In this connection I should point out that George W. Bush appointed more women to high positions than any other president.)  Feminism is more of an ideological movement, sometimes almost religious, and often hard to define.  At Wellesley College, Hillary's alma mater, the word is often pluralized - feminisms - to denote the different interpretations.

But the question must be asked:  Does feminism today have much to do with women, or is it just a branch office of the political left?  The answer seems to be increasingly disturbing.

Kim Gandy, the radical former president of NOW (National Organization for Women) spoke at Harvard, which provides a loving home for every bad idea in American politics.  Her subject was the stereotyping of women in political affairs.  It's what she didn't say that was most telling.  From the Harvard Crimson:

The sexist portrayal of women politicians in the media is “not just a right wing thing” but a problem spanning across the ideological spectrum, said former President of National Organization of Women (NOW) Kim Gandy in a forum held last night in Emerson Hall.

The event—hosted by the Harvard College Women’s Center—featured the screening of television video clips followed by Gandy’s commentary and an interactive discussion between the current Kennedy School Institute of Politics fellow and audience members.

Gandy called attention to the apparent double standard that exists in the media’s treatment of women either running for or serving in public office, with the majority of the night’s conversation focused on Hillary Clinton in the 2008 presidential primary elections.

COMMENT:  There is not, in this article, a single reference to Sarah Palin, the only woman who actually ran on a national ticket last year.  She does not exist in the eyes of the "feminist" movement.

Yet it was Sarah Palin, not Hillary Clinton, who got the brunt of any sexism that we saw in the campaign.  Charlie Gibson would never have treated a man the way he treated Sarah. 

So-called "women's" organizations can address these issues intelligently when they become more inclusive, and come to understand that radical Marxists are not necessarily who American women look to for guidance.

October 21, 2009   Permalink

BULLETIN - AT 8:04 A.M. ET:  There's a story circulating this morning that Iran has agreed to a draft proposal on its nuclear program:

VIENNA (AP) -- The International Atomic Energy Agency says Iran has agreed to a draft deal on its nuclear program.

In addition, diplomats say the deal would see the country ship out most of its enriched uranium to Russia, stripping Tehran of most of the material it would need to make a nuclear weapon.

IAEA chief Mohamed ElBaradei said Wednesday that Iran and the U.S., Russia and France have signed off on a draft deal that he hoped would be approved by the nations' capitals by Friday.

He gave no details. But a diplomat inside the closed meeting told The Associated Press that the draft foresees the export most of Iran's stockpile of enriched uranium.

Iran says it is enriching to provide fuel for a future network of nuclear reactors. But enriched uranium can also be used to make the fissile core of nuclear warheads.

COMMENT:  In the immortal words of the great philosopher, George Gobel, wait a gosh-darned second. 

This is one of those reports that has to be looked at with three eyes.  First, it is coming from the IAEA, which would consider an Iranian nuclear bomb as wonderful news that showed that Muslims can do math.  So, take it with a truckload of salt.

Second, a draft agreement isn't a final agreement.  Even if there's a final agreement, what guarantee do we have that Iran, home to one of the most deceptive governments on Earth, would honor it?  Even if they did honor it, the extent to which they honored it is crucial. 

We know that Iran has hidden part, or even most, of its nuclear program.  So how can we be sure about the amount of enriched uranium that they actually have?  They can be running a shadow program, unseen by the world.  Remember, we recently revealed a nuclear plant that the Iranians had tried to hide.

Based on the record, this "agreement" may well be another attempt to buy time.  Trust, but verify.

October 21,  2009    Permalink