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SUNDAY,  MARCH 14,  2010

TOYOTA AND GLOBAL WARMING – AT 11:42 A.M. ET:  No, that's not the title of a term paper.  It's a thought.  Follow the Toyota story closely, and you'll see a resemblance to the global-warming hysteria.  How much of the Toyota scandal is about engineering, and how much about grabbing a buck?  Consider:

A federal safety investigation of the Toyota Prius that was involved in a dramatic incident on a California highway last week found a particular pattern of wear on the car's brakes that raises questions about the driver's version of the event, three people familiar with the investigation told the Wall Street Journal.

On Monday James Sikes, 61 years old, called 911 and told the operator his blue 2008 Toyota Prius had sped up to more than 90 miles per hour on its own on Interstate 8 near San Diego. He eventually brought the vehicle to a stop after a California Highway patrolman pulled alongside Sikes and offered help.

During and after the incident, Sikes said he was using heavy pressure on his brake pedal at high speeds.

But the investigation of the vehicle, carried out jointly by safety officials from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration and Toyota engineers, didn't find signs the brakes had been applied at full force at high speeds over a sustained period of time, the three people familiar with the investigation said.

We reported on this driver just yesterday.  Turns out he has a troubled financial past and a checkered business reputation.

A draft memorandum obtained Saturday by The Associated Press also said investigators were unable to make a Prius speed out of control as Sikes detailed.

During two hours of test drives of Sikes' car Thursday, technicians failed to duplicate the same experience that Sikes described, according to the memo prepared for the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform.

"Every time the technician placed the gas pedal to the floor and the brake pedal to the floor the engine shut off and the car immediately started to slow down," the memo said.

"Unintended acceleration" is a big lawsuit term.  I'm not an engineer.  I don't know if it's real or not.  But don't get carried away.  When there's money available, claims will follow.  As with global warming, look with two eyes. 

March 14, 2010   Permalink

IS THE WHITE HOUSE GETTING THE MESSAGE? – AT 11:01 A.M. ET:  A year ago, the public couldn't get enough of Hollywood-on-the-Potomac star Barack Obama.  Now, well, maybe the word "overexposure" is the word.  Or maybe "incompetent" is more to the point.  From The Politico:

Moderate House Democrats facing potentially difficult re-elections this fall have a message for President Barack Obama: don’t call us, we’ll call you.

Interviews with nearly a dozen congressional Democrats on the ballot this year reveal a decided lack of enthusiasm for having Obama come to their districts to campaign for them—the most basic gauge of a president’s popularity.

Some cite the president’s surely busy schedule. Others point to a practice of not bringing in national politicians to appear on their behalf. While these members aren’t necessarily attempting to distance themselves from the administration, there is nevertheless a noticeable reluctance to embrace him by a certain class of incumbent now that the president’s approval rating has fallen to a new low in the latest Gallup survey, 46 percent.

Politico notes that George W. Bush suffered a similar fate, but also notes the difference:

The difference, however, is that Bush was narrowly elected twice in a country divided between red and blue states, while Obama shredded that map. With his success in the interior West and upper South, Obama was thought to be such a political asset that he could play most anywhere in the country.

No longer.  When you're presented as a new deity, and you don't perform godlike acts, people get bored.

I don't recall a president slumping this quickly, and this decisively.  We caution, of course, that Obama might be able to reverse his decline.  And Republicans can stumble badly.  But right now the incumbent looks like the Edsel of presidents – introduced with a roar, and increasingly ridiculed.

March 14, 2010   Permalink

OH DEAR, ANOTHER FAILURE – AT 10:41 A.M. ET:  The Obama administration's half-hearted policy toward Iran has already failed, and other nations are trying to patch the holes in the ship so it sinks more slowly.  From Reuters:

(Reuters) - A U.N. resolution on new sanctions against Iran may not be ready until June and if a vote on it fails, European states could take unilateral measures instead, French and Finnish ministers said on Sunday.

China has already announced that it opposes new sanctions, so, unless they are watered down simply to bar the sale of Frisbees to Tehran, the vote will fail.  Europeans are now taking the lead:

If the United States, Britain, France and Germany -- the four leading the drive for sanctions that are expected to target Iranian banks and senior members of the Revolutionary Guard -- fail to secure U.N. backing, the EU looks likely to join the United States in imposing unilateral sanctions.

Finnish Foreign Minister Alexander Stubb, who is hosting a weekend gathering of foreign ministers from the EU and Turkey in Lapland, said on Saturday there was "consensus enough" in the EU for unilateral sanctions and said it would be discussed at the next EU foreign ministers' meeting on March 22nd.

COMMENT:  What is needed is strong American leadership.  What we're getting is weak American leadership, in the hands of a man far more interested in appeasing Muslim extremists than confronting them. 

Iran is proceeding with its weapons program.  Nothing has stopped Tehran.  Obama has essentially taken the military option off the table, dramatically reducing any clout we might have.  Iran will get the bomb.  Obama will blame someone else.

March 14, 2010   Permalink

WHAT KIND OF PRESIDENT? – AT 10:15 A.M. ET:  Once again Toby Harnden of Britain's Telegraph nails Barack Obama and his presidential character. 

This time Harnden, who has done some of the best commentary on American politics, uses the political execution of the White House social secretary, Desiree Rogers, as the launch point for his conclusion:

Bitter and jobless after being replaced by a leading Democratic fundraiser, shunned by Obama's inner circle and the subject of the usual finger-pointing anonymous briefings, Rogers is now fighting back. Her sorry tale says much about how the Obamas have failed to change Washington and how they blame others for their own failings...

...Rogers fell to earth with a crash last November when three gate crashers managed to get into Obama's first state dinner. The Social Secretary, naturally, was not on the gate but inside the event, resplendent in a Comme des Garçons gown.

And...

Then the whispering began. Fellow Obama cronies like Valerie Jarrett - who lives in the same Georgetown apartment block - cut her off. Rogers was told she had to resign. And then news of her resignation was leaked before she could line up another job. All along, White House aides now confide, Rogers was a show horse rather than a work horse, someone who boosted herself at the expense of the First Couple and viewed the Obamas as a business.

As if White House aides don't see him the same way.

The lavish social events that Rogers arranged despite the recession were not only signed off on by the Obamas but were part of their self-conscious attempt to create a new Camelot.

That narcissism has led to an increasingly disconnected presidency. Obama holds campaign-style rallies but he preaches about what he desires rather than listening.

When someone hooted during a recent Obama event in St Louis, the President suggested it was a Republican politician because "they don't like it when we're talking the truth". His opponents are not just wrong - they lie.

Perhaps Mr Obama's biggest political flaw is that he seems to view himself as the personification of virtue and right-thinking. If Americans do not want health care reform, it's because they are too stupid to realise they have been hoodwinked by Republicans.

If he is criticised for throwing lavish parties and portraying himself as a glamourous reincarnation of John F. Kennedy without attending to the details then the person to blame is the Social Secretary. With his polls numbers still sinking, however, the chances of voters blaming someone else for this hubris recede by the day.

COMMENT:  The public is not only starting to blame Obama politically, I'm getting the sense that the American people are starting to dislike him personally.  They're doing what they couldn't do during the campaign – they're seeing through the false charm and shallow intellect.

No, this is not a new Camelot.  There really wasn't an old one in the early sixties either.  It was an invention of Jackie Kennedy, after her husband's assassination. 

But Kennedy and Obama are entirely different.  With all his flaws, and his privileged upbringing, Kennedy had paid some serious dues in the Pacific in World War II.  He stuck around the U.S. Senate long enough to learn the job.  He wrote about, or wrote with others about, great themes.  Obama wrote two books primarily celebrating himself.  Kennedy respected the need for military power and for a strong America.  Obama doesn't seem even to identify with his own country.  Kennedy had the ability to inspire young people well into his presidency.  Obama's inspiration ended the day he was elected.

There'll be a presidential election in two years.  We have work to do.  I want to see a replacement in the Oval Office in January of 2013.

March 14,  2010   Permalink

SATURDAY,  MARCH 13,  2010

OBAMA AND THE EUROPEANS – AT 8:56 P.M. ET:  At The Angel's Corner last night I discussed Obama's cultural affinity for countries rather hostile to the U.S., and his indifference to traditional allies.

That theme is carried forward by a first-class column in tomorrow's Times of London, which expresses the dismay that many in the Atlantic alliance feel about the man they saw, in 2008, as something better than the Second Coming:

Unlike George W Bush and Bill Clinton, Obama has made little effort to strike up friendships with European leaders. At the G20 summit in Pittsburgh last year he was pictured walking out with the leaders of China and India, his administration’s evident priorities, along with Russia, at the expense of America’s traditional allies.

“The paradox is Europeans think Obama is one of them, that he ran [for office] on repairing American relations with them — damaged by Bush and the war in Iraq — and now feel he doesn’t care about them,” said Robert Kagan, a fellow at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, who was foreign policy adviser to Senator John McCain, Obama’s election opponent.

“He’s just not emotionally attached to Europe,” agreed Kim Holmes, of the Heritage Foundation, a conservative think tank. “It’s not hostility. It’s just indifference.”

When the Washington Post columnist Jackson Diehl asked White House officials to name a foreign leader with whom Obama had forged a personal relationship, there was “a lot of hemming and hawing”, he said. To his astonishment, no one mentioned Gordon Brown. Instead the name proffered was Dmitry Medvedev, the Russian president.

And...

A senior official from No 10, who was in Washington in December for Obama’s big speech on Afghanistan, was horrified that the president did not once mention Britain in the 45-minute address despite the presence there of 10,000 British troops.

And...

“President Obama seems hugely indifferent to America’s closest ally,” said Nile Gardiner, who runs the Washington-based Margaret Thatcher Centre for Freedom and recently compiled a list of Obama’s top 10 insults against Britain. “I think the special relationship is at its lowest point since Suez in 1956.”

And the East Europeans are miffed as well, and the Israelis are appalled. 

Welcome to the new world order.  Old friends need not apply.

March 13, 2010   Permalink

ONE MORE DUMB APPOINTMENT – AT 8:05 P.M. ET:  I think we're finished wondering how incompetent the vetting process is in the Obama administration.  I'm becoming convinced it really isn't incompetent at all.  The Obamans are actually appointing the people they want – members of the hard left, with strange histories.  Consider this new adventure, as reported by Fox News:

Senate Republicans have slammed the brakes on the confirmation of President Obama's nominee for ambassador to El Salvador over concerns about her ties to Cuba.

Mari Carmen Aponte, who was nominated by Obama in December, withdrew her nomination to another diplomatic post in the Clinton era following questions about her past relationship with someone who had apparently caught the attention of the FBI.

Sen. Jim DeMint, R-S.C., forced the Senate Foreign Relations Committee to delay a hearing scheduled this week on the nomination of Mari Carmen Aponte until next Wednesday.

"Serious concerns about this nominee arose when she was nominated for a different position during the Clinton administration," DeMint said in a written statement to FoxNews.com. "I have asked the committee for additional time to review these matters. So far we have not received all of the information we have requested."

In 1998, President Clinton's nomination of Aponte for ambassador to the Dominican Republic fizzled after the foreign relations panel questioned her over her past relationship to Roberto Tamayo, who had raised concern at the FBI over "possible ties to the Cuban government" and "repeated trips there," one former official with knowledge of that nomination told FoxNews.com.

Aponte came under scrutiny by the committee after revelations that she attended a party at the Cuban mission to the United Nations in New York City, the former official said.

According to reports at the time, a former Cuban intelligence agent also told a Spanish-language newspaper in Miami in 1993 that Cuban intelligence was trying to recruit her through her boyfriend.

COMMENT:  She is presumed innocent, but you'd think by now the Obamans would get past their leftist obsessions and try to find people without political problems.  This is what happens when 1) we don't know much about a man we put in the White House and, 2) the press doesn't have much interest in telling us.  The Obamans pick these candidates because this is their crowd, which is our misfortune.

March 13,  2010   Permalink

ANOTHER ONE – AT 7:39 P.M. ET:  Another one.  There are more and more identifications of native-born Americans who are suspected of involvement with radical Islamic groups.  And they don't look like terrorists.  From The New York Times:

LEADVILLE, Colo. — An American woman, who family members fear may have become a radicalized Muslim, was detained in Ireland this week in connection with a plot to assassinate a Swedish cartoonist. The Associated Press reported Saturday that the Irish police had released the woman without charge.

The woman, identified by her mother as Jamie Paulin-Ramirez, 31, had become increasingly cut off from her family here and had been spending more time on the Internet since converting to Islam around last Easter, her relatives said.

After dressing in traditional headscarves, praying at a mosque in Denver and befriending fellow Muslims in online chat rooms, Ms. Pauline-Rarimez left Leadville in September with her 5-year-old son, Christian Carreon and moved to Ireland in October, her mother, Christine Mott, said in an interview at her home here on Saturday.

Ms. Mott said that she had been told that her daughter had been detained in Ireland this week, and that her grandson was in the custody of Irish officials.

The Wall Street Journal first reported the arrest of Ms. Paulin-Ramirez on Friday. The newspaper, citing unidentified sources, reported that she was arrested in connection with an alleged plot to murder Lars Vilks, whose 2007 cartoon depicted the head of the Prophet Muhammad on a dog’s body.

COMMENT:  She may or may not be guilty of anything.  However, what strikes me is the false sense of astonishment that any native-born American could possibly be engaged in treasonable activities. 

In fact, while it isn't common, it's hardly unknown.  There were plenty of Nazi sympathizers in America before World War II (and probably afterward, as well).  There was a very large pro-Soviet Communist movement in America, although many members of the MSM have been taught in colleges that this was something of a mirage, an example of "McCarthyism."  It was not a mirage.  McCarthy was a crude guy, but he wasn't entirely wrong. 

But now the prissies in the media are shocked, shocked, that any American, especially someone with nice hair, would join the jihadists. 

Don't be shocked. 

March 13, 2010   Permalink

EXPECT MORE LIKE THIS – AT 11:44 A.M. ET:  Toyota, through its own greed and blunders, has become the butt of jokes.

The company, once the symbol of the Japanese car invasion that was based on quality and cost, is suffering from a serious black eye.  It will take years to repair the damage. 

At the same time, we must be wary of false claims and fast hustles by those seeking quick money, or a way to avoid personal blame for accidents.  There are, after all, millions and millions of Toyotas on the road that apparently have no problems, and are driven without incident.

Consider this story, from Fox News:

The man who became the face of the Toyota gas pedal scandal this week has a troubled financial past that is leading some to question whether he was wholly truthful in his story.

On Monday, James Sikes called 911 to report that he was behind the wheel of an out-of-control Toyota Prius going 94 mph on a freeway near San Diego. Twenty-three minutes later, a California Highway Patrol officer helped guide him to a stop, a rescue that was captured on videotape.

Since then, it's been learned that:

— Sikes filed for bankruptcy in San Diego in 2008. According to documents, he was more than $700,000 in debt and owed roughly $19,000 on his Prius;

— In 2001, Sikes filed a police report with the Merced County Sheriff's Department for $58,000 in stolen property, including jewelry, a digital video camera and equipment and $24,000 in cash;

— Sikes has hired a law firm, though it has indicated he has no plans to sue Toyota;

— Sikes won $55,000 on television's "The Big Spin" in 2006, Fox40.com reports, and the real estate agent has boasted of celebrity clients such as Constance Ramos of "Extreme Home Makeover."

While authorities say they don't doubt Sikes' account, several bloggers and a man who bought a home from Sikes in 2007 question whether the 61-year-old entrepreneur may have concocted the incident for publicity or for monetary gain.

COMMENT:  The rest of the story is equally fascinating.  While it's important for Toyota to acknowledge error and fix cars that are defective, it's equally important for the company to aggressively defend itself against hoaxers.  This is something that another company, Audi, failed to do some years ago when Audis were also said to be plagued by sudden acceleration.  Some of the most prominent cases turned out to be untrue.  It has taken years for Audi to reestablish itself in the United States.

You may be sure that, as you read this, a number of people are planning to get some money from Toyota, and insurance companies, for made-up stories.  That will only raise costs for the rest of us.

March 13, 2010   Permalink

YOU CAN'T FOOL ALL THE PEOPLE ALL THE TIME – AT 11:16 A.M. ET:  A new Harris poll shows that, once again, the American people are a lot smarter than the Washington elites think they are.  They see through the press fluff and the "I'm here to make a difference" crowd:

NEW YORK--(BUSINESS WIRE)--For 44 years, since 1966, The Harris Poll has measured how confident the American people are in the leaders of major U.S. institutions. Based on the responses, Harris calculates an overall Confidence Index. Over the years it has gone up and down. In 2002, it touched 65. In 2008, it fell to 44. This year it stands at 53, one point lower than in early 2009.

However, this lack of movement in the Confidence Index is the result of a number of increases and decreases in confidence in the leaders of different institutions. The biggest change since early 2009 is the substantial drop in public confidence in the White House. Those with a “great deal of confidence” have fallen by 9 points from 36% to 27%.

Gee, I wonder why.  You don't think it has anything to do with The One, do you? 

There have also been declines in those with a great deal of confidence in colleges and universities (from 40% to 35%), organized religion (from 30% to 26%) and television news (from 22% to 17%).

None of that surprises me, including the decline in organized religion.  Many religious groups on the left became cheerleaders for Obama, rather than for their traditional values.

This year there are five institutions that have leaders who inspire a great deal of confidence in more than 30% of Americans:

The military (59%);
Small business (50%);
Major educational institutions, such as colleges and universities (35%);
Medicine (34%); and,
The U.S. Supreme Court (31%).

On the other side of the list, there are five institutions that have leaders who inspire a great deal of confidence in less than 15% of Americans:

Organized labor (14%);
The press (13%);
Law firms (13%);
Congress (8%); and,
Wall Street (8%).

In fact, almost half of Americans say they have hardly any confidence at all in the leaders of both Congress (48%) and Wall Street (45%).

COMMENT:  These things go up and down, but the gap between great confidence in the military (59%) and the press (13%) might give a hint to the barons of journalism as to why so many news outlets are in such trouble.  It ain't the internet.

March 13, 2010   Permalink

BROWN NAILS IT – AT 10:41 A.M. ET:  Newly elected Republican Senator Scott Brown, of Massachusetts, nails it exactly in his comments on the Democratic drive over the cliff on health care:

(AP) -- Newly arrived Republican Sen. Scott Brown of Massachusetts accused President Barack Obama and Democrats on Saturday of a "bitter, destructive and endless" drive to pass health overhaul legislation that Brown warned would be disastrous.

"An entire year has gone to waste," Brown said in the weekly GOP radio and Internet address. "Millions of Americans have lost their jobs, and many more jobs are in danger. Even now, the president still hasn't gotten the message.

"Somehow, the greater the public opposition to the health care bill, the more determined they seem to force it on us anyway."

And...

Brown...campaigned on a promise to be the Republicans' crucial 41st vote against Obama's health plan, and said Saturday that his victory amounted to a message from voters that Washington should "get its priorities right."

"We need to drop this whole scheme of federally controlled health care, start over, and work together on real reforms at the state level that will contain costs and won't leave America trillions of dollars deeper in debt," Brown said.

COMMENT:  Very well said.  I believe this is the first time Brown was asked to give the weekly GOP address.  He did very well, and his phrasing was just right.  He will be looked at as a potential Republican vice presidential candidate in 2012.

March 13, 2010   Permalink

MADNESS – AT 10:23 A.M. ET:  The Democrats in Congress have become completely fanatical on health care.  There is no stopping them.  From the Washington Post:

Democratic leaders on Friday stoked expectations that the year-long debate in Congress over health care may be coming to an end, after President Obama delayed his upcoming trip to the South Pacific and House leaders indicated they could deliver a final bill for his signature by the end of next week.

The House is preparing to vote, perhaps Friday or next Saturday, on the legislation that passed the Senate on Christmas Eve, and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) said she was "delighted that the president will be here for the passage of the bill. It's going to be historic."

COMMENT:  I have never seen anything quite like this – a party hell-bent on passing a piece of legislation that is intensely unpopular with the American people...and claiming it's for the benefit of the people.  This is what tyranny of the majority, the Congressional majority, is about. 

I'm reminded of the story of Admiral Yamamoto, who planned the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor.  He was reported to have promised his government that, after the attack, he could run wild for six months in the Pacific, but could guarantee nothing after that.  He was right.

The Democrats seem to think they can run wild until the November elections, now less than eight months away, but know that they can guarantee nothing after that.  They will shove this poorly conceived monstrosity down our throats, knowing how hard it will be to repeal it while Obama is still in office.  The Dems hope that enough structural change will occur to our health-care system before Obama leaves as to make repeal essentially impossible.

The dream of the militant left has always been to control health care, the jewel in the crown of socialism.   Another dream is to spend so much money that the system is flooded, and overwhelmed, making the populace dependent on the government for any change, and drastically reducing the economic and military power of the United States.

I hope independents and moderate Democrats are seeing what their vote for Obama has brought us. 

March 13,  2010   Permalink