Friday, July 31, 2009

Bob's Political Digest for July 31 2009

Teaching on tap at White House confab
A must read: John Kass, Chicago Tribune
http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/columnists/chi-kass-30-jul30,0,915294.column
Excerpt: The beer of choice for the O'Bama White House is Budweiser, which, as I said, is the perfect brew to sip while talking about racism. Several years ago, Rev. Jackson led a boycott against Budweiser, denouncing the company for discriminating against black people. TV cameras flocked to him, excited as puppies, as he poured Bud onto the street with a sneer, pronouncing (I kid you not) "This Bud is a dud!" Budweiser stopped being considered racist by Jackson the moment his sons were given the exclusive Budweiser distributorship for the North Side of Chicago. Then, Bud was not a dud. Bud had experienced its own teachable moment, and Bud passed the test. (It is race hustling like this, by black “leaders” like Jackson, that keeps racism alive in America—and always will.)

Health care reform: What is costly overuse, what is humane?
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2009/07/28/EDV218VMTQ.DTL
Excerpt: My problem, as a physician who has practiced medicine for decades, is that I just can't predict with certainty what is end-of-life care, nor can I determine for another individual the meaning of "quality of life." I recall cases like that of the nonagenarian WWII veteran, comatose for days with multiple organ failure, who with the help of a loving family and dedicated ICU nurses walked out of the hospital, brain intact, to live a few more years.

House Seems To Be Set on Pork-Padded Defense Bill
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/07/29/AR2009072902676.html?wpisrc=newsletter
Excerpt: The Democratic-controlled House is poised to give the Pentagon dozens of new ships, planes, helicopters and armored vehicles that Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates says the military does not need to fund next year, acting in many cases in response to defense industry pressures and campaign contributions under an approach he has decried as "business as usual" and vowed to help end. (But BO is against Pork—surely he’ll veto & call out the bad stuff publically.)

Waxman-Markey Deserves to Die
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970204886304574308771420637620.html
Obama lied and the economy died.

New poll is bad, bad news for Obama, Democrats
http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/opinion/blogs/beltway-confidential/Terrible-new-poll-numbers-for-Obama-Democrats-52062972.html
As they say in Scotland, “Facts are chiels that willna ding!”

Pelosi falls to the back of the pack of speakers
http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/politics/Pelosi-falls-to-the-back-of-the-pack-of-speakers--52005447.html
Excerpt: when historians inspect the record of the lady from California, they will find that hubris and empty talk sealed her fate.

Barbara Boxer Can’t Be a Racist — She’s a Democrat
http://urbangrounds.com/2009/07/17/barbar-boxer-racist/
Yes, Ma’am.

Funny E-mail Making the Rounds
The Perfect Solution to Senior Health Care
While discussing the upcoming Universal Health Care Program with my friend the other day, I think we have found the solution. I am sure you have heard the ideas that if you're a senior you need to suck it up and give up the idea that you need any health care. A new hip? Unheard of. We simply can't afford to take care of you anymore. You don't need any medications for your high blood pressure, diabetes, heart problems, etc. Let's take care of the young people. After all, they will be ruling the world very soon.So here is the solution. When you turn 70, you get a gun and 4 bullets. You are allowed to shoot 2 senators and 2 representatives. Of course, you will be sent to prison where you will get 3 meals a day, a roof over your head and all the health care you need!!! New teeth, great!!! Need glasses, no problem. New hip, knee, kidney, lung, heart? Well bring it on. And who will be paying for all of this. The same government that just told you that you are too old for health care. And, since you are a prisoner, you don't have to pay any income tax.I really think we have a Perfect Solution!!!

(This is forwarded as humor, not an incitement to violence. Besides, we have only 535 Congresscritters, and way more seniors.)

Thursday, July 30, 2009

Bob's Political Digest for July 30 2009

Disaster in the Making? Another must-read from Dr. Sowell.
http://townhall.com/columnists/ThomasSowell/2009/07/28/disaster_in_the_making
Excerpt: Many people are rightly worried about what this administration's reckless spending will do to the economy in our time and to our children and grandchildren, to whom a staggering national debt will be passed on. But if the worst that Barack Obama does is ruin the economy, I will breathe a sigh of relief.

Who Will Tell Michael J. Fox He Needs to Die?
http://spectator.org/archives/2009/07/28/who-will-tell-michael-j-fox-he/print
This is about the harshest thing I’ve seen about the Health Care “Reform” debate, but it raises the question of who decides if you deserve a certain treatment, or if the treatment that will make your life better is worth it, or constitutes “over-utilization.”

Developing shale oil may solve our energy crisis
http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/opinion/columns/OpEd-Contributor/Developing-shale-oil-may-solve-our-energy-crisis-8032159-51919372.html
Excerpt: Fortunately, the U.S. has vast quantities of oil in rocks, including oil shale, which can be converted into fuel. In fact, we have 75 percent of the world's oil shale. There are an estimated 1.5 trillion barrels of oil in shale formations in Colorado, Utah, and Wyoming. (But will Congress let us develop it? Nah.)

The Matter with Myths
http://spectator.org/archives/2009/07/21/the-matter-with-myths
Do we have a free market in health care now? Hardly.

Analysis: Obama facing tough choice on health care
http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5gzA29UeBzhdsVHHKwVlS3LbV8R8gD99NPPK80
BO promised to be bi-partisan. Now we’ll find out.

California Screaming
http://www.ncpa.org/sub/dpd/index.php?Article_ID=18261Excerpt: Nearly three in five public sector workers are unionized, compared to less than two in five public employees in other states. The Democratic Party, which is fully in hock to unions, has controlled the legislature and most statewide posts, with the notable exception of the governor's mansion, for more than decade. That means more government workers, higher salaries and drastically higher pension costs, says Welch….According to public databases, more than 5,000 people are drawing pensions in excess of $100,000 from the state of California each year.

A Health Care Offer We Can't Refuse
http://www.americanthinker.com/printpage/?url=http://www.americanthinker.com/2009/07/a_health_care_offer_we_cant_re.html
So now the hospitals, AMA and insurance companies are visiting President Obama. The President likes to refer to the government's role in health care as a public option. But just like the restaurant owner, they will soon discover that Obama and the federal government will not be a "partner" and his health care plan will never be merely an option. Very soon the American health care system could be controlled 100% by Obama and his friends. Some examples:

Cambridge Police Profiling Still a Grim Reality for Harvard Faculty Assholes
http://iowahawk.typepad.com/iowahawk/2009/07/cambridge-police-profiling-still-a-grim-reality-for-harvard-faculty-assholes.html
Some old jokes, but funny satire.

Exploiting Public Ignorance
http://townhall.com/columnists/WalterEWilliams/2009/07/29/exploiting_public_ignorance
Excerpt: ...credit for a budget surplus or blame for budget deficits rests on the congressional majority at the time.

Planet Bull's Eye
http://townhall.com/columnists/JonahGoldberg/2009/07/29/planet_bulls_eye
We ignore threats that don’t make millions for Al Gore. Scary stuff.

Rushing through legislation—a hoot.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eOnYnIDX0Eg
A radio interview with then-Senator Obama in which he rips the Bush administration for rushing through legislation that is "a foot high" and "14 lbs" before anyone can really read it. And for "intimidating" people into voting for it.

Obama has aura but doesn't know how to legislate
http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/politics/Obama-has-aura-but-doesn_t-know-how-to-legislate-8032142-51922177.html
Give him a break—he was only briefly in the Senate before he ran for President. How would he know much about legislating at the Federal level?

CNN video on the Crowley-Gates flap.
http://www.cnn.com/video/?/video/us/2009/07/26/nr.comrade.in.arms.cnn
Make up your own mind.

Wednesday, July 29, 2009

Random Thoughts

As Dr. Thomas Sowell often points out, bringing the price down doesn’t bring the actually cost down. It shifts the cost to someone else. Wanting something to be “affordable” means you want someone else to bear part of the cost, to bring the price down for you. I want the Government to make a new BMW sports car “affordable” for me. I figure I can afford $5,000 and the taxpayers should pick up the rest. Barack is cool. Shouldn’t being “cool” be a right?

I’ve been the hiring authority in an office for 37 years. I’m still amazed at people who apply for jobs and don’t send all the requested information, or who send resumes and cover letters full of typos, who don’t send thank you notes for an interview, or who show up to interview in flip flops, torn jeans and on females very low cut tops. The technical name for such folks is “the unemployed.” I wish I had time to open a job coaching service on the side, with resume reviews and mock interviews. I’d be worth every penny.

Chicago has had its coldest July on record, with temps never reaching 90. I kind of like how this global warming thing is working out in the summer, but it was hell the last two winters.

If Islam is a “Religion of Peace and Tolerance,” as we are constantly told, the folks who really misunderstand Islam are tens of millions of Muslims, including a large chunk of Islamic scholars and teachers, who use or support violence in behalf of establishing Shari’a law. American commentators spouting the “Religion of Peace” line should go and discuss it with the Taliban or the Mullahs in Iran to get a first hand view. While there, they could attend the stoning of a raped teenage girl charged with adultery, or the hanging of some Gays folks, or at least help throw acid on a girl for going to school. Maybe help with a few “honor killings.”

If reports are true, the Obama Administration has provided a terrific stimulus for one sector of the economy—firearm and ammo sales are reportedly way up.

A Marine friend reports he asked his stockbroker what he was buying. The answer was “canned good and ammo.”

I can’t keep up with e-mail, and my pile of unread books keeps growing. How do people do Facebook and Twitter? (Silly Twitter—Tweets are for Twits!)

The Health Care “Reform” debate seems to me to be a perfect example of the old adage that, “Figures don’t lie—but liars figure.” I read a lot about it, and have reached the point where I don’t believe anyone’s numbers. But experience tells me that government programs ALWAYS cost far more than predicted. (I’ve read that the Government though the steel producers were cheating them during WWI, and that the government could produce steel at 60% of the cost. So they started a steel plant. Which came on line—at twice the predicted cost, a year after the war ended. It delivered one batch of steel, at about twice what private enterprise charged, then closed.)

When politicians make economic decisions, the decisions will be made on the basis of politics, not economics.

We recently dined al fresco at a Bulgarian restaurant. The food was great, but eavesdropping on the conversations at other tables wasn’t much fun.

The Democrats honor Thomas Jefferson for founding their party. Be better if they honored him by following his principles. Not that Republicans always live upp to Lincoln’s standards.

All it would take would be one small asteroid strike or a super eruption of Yellowstone or another large volcano to make all our fretting about global warming, the environment and most everything else meaningless. Not to worry, though, Yellowstone only erupts about every 600,000 years. And the last one was only 640,000 years ago.

The people worrying about Obama’s birth certificate are wasting their time. You could prove he was born on Mars and the courts would find a way to rule he was an American citizen. They aren’t going to overturn an election, especially knowing doing so would result in riots in the major cities, with a lot of deaths and millions in destruction.

But the best new bumper sticker is: “Don’t blame me, I voted for the American.” If I can’t beat my enemies, I like to annoy them.

I’m sure I’m not the only one in America who couldn’t have cared less about Michael Jackson’s death, and had zero interest in his funeral. But it seemed like it.

Looking at the unfunded liability for Medicare and Social Security, I think my being on the leading edge of the Baby Boomers may not be such a bad thing. Good luck to you young ‘ens, who will have to pay for an increasing number of oldsters. (Unless rationing health care gets some great demographic results for you.)

The stimulus bill was intended to use our money—or actually money borrowed from the future—to stimulate favored groups to vote for the Congresscritters who passed it. So, in that respect, we already have public financing of campaigns. If I give you ten bucks out of my pocket to vote for me, it’s a crime. If I give your group ten million in tax dollars so you’ll vote for me, it’s an “investment in the future.”

If the Democrats think BO’s deficits are an investment in the economy, how come they thought Bush’s much smaller deficits were an abomination? Actually, of course, both the 2008 deficit under Bush and the 2009 deficit under Obama had to be passed by the Democrat controlled Congress. But people don’t seem to know that.

Being offended seems to me to be the fastest-growing industry in the country. It can pay well, too, if you can blackmail some one into coughing up.

Much as I’m not a fan of the media, I think the decline of newspapers is a very bad thing. Reading on the Internet is fine, except we tend to read things that reinforce our biases, and also focus in on just things that interest us, thus missing general news and knowledge. I suppose this makes me officially a dinosaur or, better, a curmudgeon.

People don’t seem to be getting any smarter about sex. I’m probably not any smarter myself—just older and too tired to do much stupid.

It will be 45 years on August 16 since I arrived at Parris Island, SC, for the defining three months of my life. No one who hasn’t gone through Parris Island, MCRD San Diego or Quantico will ever really understand that.

I’ve read that old people need less sleep. I must not be old, because I seem to need more the last few years.

On the other hand, when I flirt with young women, they are more likely to think I’m “cute” than dangerous. That’s a revolting development.

If Bush had talked about Hirohito coming down to surrender to McArthur, or the “Austrian” language, the media would never allow us to forget how dumb he was. And Heaven forbid if he’d ever made a snide joke about the Special Olympics. We’d hear about it at least weekly.

The collapse of the housing market hasn’t seemed to teach anything to the people pushing more home ownership for poor people.

When I contemplate the future, with the steady growth of the statist party in government, I’m not entirely unhappy that I won’t be here for too much of it.

I think that too much TV has destroyed people’s reasoning powers. On TV, all problems are solved in 30 or 60 minutes, with a satisfying conclusion. So we expect that all problems in the real world can be neatly solved in that time frame. Bush was pilloried because Katrina wasn’t instantly cleaned up. Now Obama is discovering that the expectations he raised on the economy are hard to meet in the world of instant gratification.

Is a white person who was born in Zimbabwe or South Africa, and became a US Citizen, an “African-American”? How about an Arab born in Egypt? Why not? (It’s a real hoot to hear political correct folks refer to the natives in Africa as “African-Americans” as they sometimes do.)

If the Islamists set off an A-bomb in DC or NYC, remember that Obama’s Department of Homeland Security was watching me and my fellow veterans.

Back in the 70s, very conservative Republicans helped defeat Sen. Ed Brooke. His replacement was Paul Tsongas, followed by John Kerry. How that was an improvement for Republicans, I’ll never understand. But they still want to defeat the “RINOs,” ensuring Democrats control of the Congress.

No matter how much power we give to the statists, they will never achieve equality of outcomes, their dream. Equality of opportunity is possible, but they keep putting their thumb on the scale to try to get the same results for all.

The media has misused the word “hero” so much, most people think it means “celebrity.” We have so many real heroes among us in our military, fire and police services and veterans, and mostly unrecognized by the population they served.

I’m happy to see they are starting to prosecute those sick phonies who claim military medals they didn’t earn, or to have been POWs or on secret missions. I say that as a Marine whose highest personal decoration was a richly-undeserved Good Conduct Medal.

It’s funny that the people who keep saying Bush’s deregulation of financial institutions led to the economic crisis were the same folks who blocked Bush’s efforts to better regulate Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. Or it would be funny if I wasn’t so close to retirement, with a depleted IRA.

I’m sick and tired of being discriminated against by Asians, as a white male. I mean, Asians get accepted into universities at higher rates, and were given mortgages at higher rates than whites, which proves they are discriminating against us. Or at least, when the difference was between blacks and whites, it proved discrimination to the satisfaction of the courts and Congress.

And Jews keep discriminating against blacks and Hispanics, which you can prove because Jews are over represented in good paying jobs, while those minorities are under represented. Of course, the average age of Jews in America is somewhere in the 40s, while for blacks and Hispanics it’s around 18, and older folks tend to be better employed, due to experience and education. But “representation in the population” is the standard for proving discrimination. Which means I have a case against the NBA, which discriminates against old, fat, short white guys, based on their percentage in the population. The fact that I can’t do the job has nothing, legally, to do with it.

Obama may do one thing Bush sure couldn’t—make Bush look good.

As long as there are beeches and sunshine and college girls and bikinis, the world is a sill a pretty good place.

Bob's Political Digest July 29 2009

Real Clear Politics has some interesting poll numbers.
http://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2009/07/28/a_russian_reign_of_terror_97647.html
Obama’s job approval: Approve 54.7% Disapprove 40.7%. Direction of Country: Right Direction 36.3%, Wrong Track 55.8%. Generic Congressional vote: (That is, which party are you likely to vote for for Congress). Democrats: 39.7% Republicans 36%. Congressional Job Approval: Approve 28%, disapprove 62.7%.

So let’s see. So a strong majority thinks we are on the wrong track, and approves of the job the guy taking us on that track is doing. And more than two-thirds of the people disapprove of the job the Democrat-controlled Congress is doing, but more of them are going to vote for continued Democrat control than to change.

Democracy is a device that ensures we shall be governed no better than we deserve. ~George Bernard Shaw

A Post-Racial President? By Dr. Thomas Sowell. A must-read.
http://townhall.com/columnists/ThomasSowell/2009/07/28/a_post-racial_president
Excerpt: Those of us who want to see racism on its way out need to realize that others benefit greatly from crying racism. They benefit politically, financially, and socially.
Barack Obama has been allied with such people for decades. He found it expedient to appeal to a wider electorate as a post-racial candidate, just as he has found it expedient to say a lot of other popular things-- about campaign finance, about transparency in government, about not rushing legislation through Congress without having it first posted on the Internet long enough to be studied-- all of which turned to be the direct opposite of what he actually did after getting elected.

Hoven's Index: Obama's First Six Months
http://www.americanthinker.com/printpage/?url=http://www.americanthinker.com/2009/07/hovens_index_obamas_first_six.html
An interesting scorecard. Must read.

Morality and Charlie Rangel’s Taxes
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970203946904574300013592601036.html#printMode
Excerpt: Ever notice that those who endorse high taxes and those who actually pay them aren’t the same people? Consider the curious case of Ways and Means Chairman Charlie Rangel, who is leading the charge for a new 5.4-percentage point income tax surcharge and recently called it “the moral thing to do.” About his own tax liability he seems less, well, fervent.

Health Care Questions Obama Can’t Answer
http://www.hermancain.com/news/press-opinion-072709.asp
Rather than the lapdog mainstream media doing its job and challenging the president on his assumptions and assertions, they play “run and fetch” with whatever the president says. Since they didn’t do their jobs, here are a few real questions for starters.

US Soldier Demands Apology From Senator Claire McCaskill at Town Hall
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y98HxYbsdBM
Boy been to school.

Has Rodney King Moved to Cambridge? A balanced viewpoint.
http://townhall.com/columnists/HarryRJacksonJr/2009/07/27/has_rodney_king_moved_to_cambridge
Excerpt: First of all, it is obvious that the president overstepped his boundaries in calling the Cambridge policeman “stupid.” As the leader of all the people, he should not have become so partisan or emotionally involved with his comments about his friend, Dr. Gates. Secondly, it is also obvious that the Cambridge police sergeant, a racial profiling trainer, overacted in his response to the world famous professor. There is somehow another subtle overstepping of appropriate boundaries, when a professor is arrested in front of his own house. Thirdly, as I looked at the police report, I could not help but think that the professor spoke in a very haughty, condescending manner to the police officer. Ironically, the professor’s hubris may well have been worse than any racial stereotype that he felt the officer had invoked.

Another on-line poll
http://news.aol.com/article/obama-approval-ratings/578736
Hard to say if these are worth voting in, but I do.

We've Figured Him Out
http://spectator.org/archives/2009/07/24/weve-figured-him-out
Good, short column by Ben stein. You have to scroll down—opens to a blank page.

Jerusalem Protest Against Barack Obama, USA Settlement Policy
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sNI99UBYg0U
Jews against BO. Unfortunately, they don’t vote here.

GOP's teachable moment on the risks of Obamacare
http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/politics/GOP-teachable-moment-on-the-risks-of-Obamacare-8028107-51819127.html
Pick your average member of the House of Representatives, one who has a lot of work to do but hasn't been deeply involved in crafting the massive health care makeover bill. Who knows more about what's in that bill -- Mr. Average Democrat, or Mr. Average Republican? Bet on the Republican. For weeks now, GOP lawmakers have been studying the Democratic health care bill, and for months before that, they studied preliminary Democratic plans. Many rank-and-file Democrats, on the other hand, have been so ill-informed about what their leadership has been doing that it was only last week, when the party offered a five-hour class on the bill's contents, that some members began to grasp the details.

Who’s afraid of the big, bad Chinese aircraft carrier?
http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/politics/Whos-afraid-of-the-big-bad-Chinese-aircraft-carrier_07_28-51819122.html
Excerpt: At the center of the discussion is usually the Chinese purchase of the Varyag, a 65,000-ton carrier. Many analysts draw significance from the reports that the formerly Russian ship has been renamed Shi Lang, after the Ming Dynasty admiral who conquered Taiwan in 1681. The Shi Lang is reputed to be just the start, with the Chinese reportedly planning to build another two aircraft carriers by 2015 and two more by 2020. But a little reality check may be in order. First, their “new” carrier is not all that new. Actually, the Varyag was first laid down back in 1985. Originally planned for the Soviet fleet, it was never completed. Instead, at the Cold War’s end, it was scrapped of all its electronics and engines and sold off to be a floating casino. Even if the Chinese can refurbish it, at best they will be getting an old, untested ship that carries only a third as many planes as a U.S. carrier.

Lessons from Massachusetts
http://www.ncpa.org/sub/dpd/index.php?Article_ID=18251.
Excerpt: The state was able to get the federal government to pay for much of these new costs, but even with that help, state government spending has increased 42 percent since 2006. The Massachusetts program has cost about one-third more than projected when the law was passed. Before the Massachusetts health insurance reform plan was implemented in 2005, total per capita health care spending in the state was 33 percent above the national average. In just two years under the Massachusetts reforms, from 2005 to 2007, health care spending per capita rose an additional 23 percent.

Union Pensions in the Red
http://www.ncpa.org/sub/dpd/index.php?Article_ID=18254
The plans have the funding to pay for the officers, but not the rank and file. Must have learned that trick from Congress!

Venezuela’s Brain Drain
http://blog.newsweek.com/blogs/internationalist/archive/2009/06/27/venezuela-s-brain-drain.aspx
Fleeing leftwing tyranny. Imagine that. What a surprise.

Doctor on Racist Obama Email: "I Sincerely Apologize"
http://tpmmuckraker.talkingpointsmemo.com/2009/07/doctor_on_racist_obama_email_i_sincerely_apologize.php?ref=fpa
While I’m not a fan of the president’s efforts to make government the controlling factor in our lives—more than it already is—but I do not forward things that could be considered racist, including the image this doctor forwarded, which has been sent to me several times. Not only are they wrong, they help the statists by allowing them to picture BO as a victim. My Senate Floor leader, the late Sen. John Parker, used to say that, “It’s always an advantage to a public man to be the victim of an outrage.” Let’s not give them clubs to beat us with.

Tuesday, July 28, 2009

Bob's Political Digest for July 28, 2009

A Short Course in Brain Surgery
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X_Rf42zNl9U
Watch this!

Obama regrets remarks
http://www.comcast.net/articles/news-general/20090723/NEWS-US-OBAMA-RACE/
On race. And on the Special Olympics. And on….

Why Obamacare Is Sinking
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/07/23/AR2009072302723.html
Excerpt: What happened to Obamacare? Rhetoric met reality. As both candidate and president, the master rhetorician could conjure a world in which he bestows upon you health-care nirvana: more coverage, less cost.

Obamacare haunted by unkept promises of stimulus
http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/politics/Obamacare-haunted-by-big-promises-of-stimulus-8012320-51521412.html
Excerpt: If Barack Obama fails to enact national health care, it will be because he sowed the seeds of his own demise last Feb. 17 -- the day the president, surrounded by Democratic leaders, signed the $787 billion economic stimulus bill. In the legislative campaign leading up to that moment, both Obama and congressional Democrats made promises and took actions that are now coming back to haunt them as they pursue their goal of remaking the nation's health care system.

Election 2010: California Senate
http://www.rasmussenreports.com/public_content/politics/elections2/election_2010/election_2010_senate_elections/california/election_2010_california_senate
Down from 9 to 4 points, with 16 months to go. This would be the upset of the century, sending shock waves through the statist establishment.

ObamaCare Dives Into End-Of-Life Debate
http://www.forbes.com/2009/07/24/obamacare-medicare-death-business-healthcare-obamacare.html
Excerpt: It brings to mind Boomsday, a 2007 satirical novel by ForbesLife editor at large Christopher Buckley, in which the government solves its fiscal problems by offering tax breaks to those who kill themselves before retirement age.

Dear Congress, oppose public health care plan
http://www.renewamerica.com/columns/west/090723
Excerpt: I find, through much search, no authority whatsoever for Congress to establish a federal health care plan in Article 1 of the United States Constitution.

House healthcare talks break down in anger
http://thehill.com/leading-the-news/house-healthcare-talks-break-down-in-anger-2009-07-24.html
Excerpt: House healthcare negotiations dissolved in acrimony on Friday, with Blue Dog Democrats saying they were “lied” to by their Democratic leaders. The seven Blue Dogs on the Energy and Commerce Committee stormed out of a Friday meeting with their committee chairman, Henry Waxman (D-Calif.), saying Waxman had been negotiating in bad faith over a number of provisions Blue Dogs demanded be changed in the stalled healthcare bill. “I’ve been lied to,” Blue Dog Coalition Co-Chairman Charlie Melancon (D-La.) said on Friday. “We have not had legitimate negotiations.

Liberal and Conservative Democrats Feud Over Bill
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/07/24/AR2009072403651.html?wpisrc=newsletter
Excerpt: Tensions in the House over the issue reached a boiling point Friday, when, during a back-and-forth day of private huddles, Democrats emerged at times to accuse one another of lying or "empowering the Republicans." (“Empowering Republicans” is the only Capital Crime statists recognize.)

Obama's health plan - too good to be true
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/c/a/2009/07/25/IN3I18SM9O.DTL
Excerpt: So forgive me if I am skeptical when Obama - who called it "painful" to squeeze one half of 1 percent from the gargantuan federal machine - claims, as he did at Wednesday night's news conference, that two-thirds of his plan to provide universal access to health care for Americans "can be paid for by reallocating money that is simply being wasted in federal health care programs." What shocks me is how smart people actually buy into the notion that the administration can expand health coverage and that it will not - indeed, should not - cost most taxpayers a dime. As Kaiser Family Foundation President Drew Altman wrote, "Our polls show that most Americans (60 percent) think that if policymakers made the right moves they could cover the cost of health care reform without spending new money, which is not true."

The Democrats’ Dilemma on Health Reform
http://www.john-goodman-blog.com/the-democrats-dilemma-on-health-reform/#more-4426
Excerpt: I actually feel a bit sorry for them. President Obama and Democratic leaders in Congress got some very, very bad advice from health policy experts they relied on during the past election. It was the same bad advice they have been getting year after year, election after election, for as far back as memory serves. But now that it is time to legislate, these politicians must face real economists who look at evidence over at the Congressional Budget Office (CBO). Although the CBO Director and staff are appointed by Congressional Democrats, they are professionals and they have been willing to stand up to the pressure and essentially say that last year's campaign rhetoric was hogwash.

Stumbling governors signal trouble for Dems
http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/politics/Stumbling-governors-signal-trouble-for-Dems-8016272-51603962.html
Excerpt: With polls showing a drop in Barack Obama's job rating and sinking support for the Democrats' health care plans, there is evidence of collateral damage where you might not expect to find it, in the standing of Democratic governors. Pennsylvania's Ed Rendell is suddenly getting negative job ratings in both the Quinnipiac and the Franklin and Marshall polls -- his lowest marks in seven years as governor. Ohio's Ted Strickland, who has spent most of his first term working amicably with Republican legislators, scores under 50 percent in the latest Quinnipiac poll and has only tenuous leads over two Republicans, John Kasich and Mike DeWine, who may run against him next year.

Mark Steyn: Obama knows 'stupidly' when he doesn't see it
http://www.ocregister.com/articles/gates-professor-black-2506786-racism-sgt
Excerpt: As to the differences between the professor's and the cops' version of events, I confess I've been wary of taking Henry Louis Gates at his word ever since, almost two decades back, the literary scholar compared the lyrics of the rap group 2 Live Crew to those of the Bard of Avon. "It's like Shakespeare's 'My love is like a red, red rose,'" he declared, authoritatively, to a court in Fort Lauderdale. As it happens, "My luv's like a red, red rose" was written by Robbie Burns, a couple of centuries after Shakespeare. Oh, well. 16th century English playwright, 18th century Scottish poet: What's the diff? Evidently being within the same quarter-millennium and right general patch of the North-East Atlantic is close enough for a professor of English and Afro-American Studies appearing as an expert witness in a court case. Certainly no journalist reporting Gates' testimony was boorish enough to point out the misattribution.

Germany: Muslim stabs wife "in the name of the Koran"
http://www.jihadwatch.org/archives/027012.php
This "27-year-old Afghan man" must be some kind of Islamophobe.

"We don't ask other factions to recognize Israel because we in Fatah have never recognized Israel"
http://www.jihadwatch.org/archives/027005.php
Note to BO: "Fatah does not recognize Israel's right to exist," Natsheh said, "nor have we ever asked others to do so." His comments, which appeared in an interview with Al-Quds Al-Arabi, came in response to reports according to which Fatah had asked Hamas to recognize Israel as a precondition for the establishment of a Palestinian unity government. "All these reports about recognizing Israel are false," Natsheh, who is closely associated with PA President Mahmoud Abbas, said. "It's all media nonsense. We don't ask other factions to recognize Israel because we in Fatah have never recognized Israel."

Honor attack in UK: acid poured down lover's throat
http://www.jihadwatch.org/archives/026997.php
Excerpt: Muslim woman fears death in an honor killing after her lover was attacked with sulphuric acid. These killings, as we have documented here, happen again and again in an Islamic context….

Possible honor killing in Canada: Three Muslim sisters murdered; parents and brother arrested
http://www.jihadwatch.org/archives/026996.php
Excerpt: Rona Amir Mohammed's sister, Diba Masoomi, said: "We are convinced that this is a crime of honour." We learn here that "the teenage girls dressed in modern fashion," which may have been part of the problem.

Conyers Sees No Point in Members Reading 1,000-Page Health Care Bill--Unless They Have 2 Lawyers to Interpret It for Them
http://www.cnsnews.com/public/content/article.aspx?RsrcID=51610&print=on
What we’ve suspected

Joys of the single-payer system—funny but scary
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q2jijuj1ysw&eurl=http%3A%2F%2Fwww%2Ebreakdownofamerica%2Ecom%2F%3Fp%3D347&feature=player_embedded
From my friend, Del: This is a nice mini-documentary about what it's like to actually try to get help in the Canadian system. Several years ago I got sick with chest pains while in Canada, and can personally testify to the overcrowding and super delays in the hospital there. Not to mention the inexperienced nurse's aide who thought that for me to have a EKG she needed to scrub my chest with extra rough sandpaper until blood flowed. (Honest, I kid you not, I had scabs for several days.) The bottom line for me is that while we sure need an improvement in the Health Care system in this country to make it more efficient and less costly, setting up a massive federal bureaucracy to do it as proposed is not going to solve very many problems at all, and will absolutely make a lot of new problems and not save any of us a dime, in fact it's pretty much assured that it will cost us all more one way or another. Keep telling your congress people you don't want the Pelosi monster plan to go anywhere but out the door. –Del

Soviet Officer Who Shot Down John McCain in Vietnam Dies
http://georgiandaily.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=9446&Itemid=65
This is a tad old, but I just saw it and thought it interesting—a long-ago example of the gullible left. Excerpt: During that now long-ago war, Moscow repeatedly insisted that no Soviet officers were serving in any capacity on the side of the North Vietnamese, a denial many anti-war groups in the United States and other Western countries accepted as true. And as a result, Trushechkin had to wait many years to receive public recognition of his exploits.

Poll on Obama & the Economy
http://js.polls.yahoo.com/quiz/quiziframe.php?poll_id=46067
Vote early & often.

Petition to require Congress to use the Health Plan they pass
http://fleming.house.gov/index.html
Sign up for fairness

Border agent killed in unusual violence within U.S.
http://www.usatoday.com/news/nation/2009-07-25-border-agent-death_N.htm?csp=24&RM_Exclude=Juno
No comment from BO?

Obama ripped off Seinfeld for health care proposal
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zh3ln3swL7Q&feature=player_embedded
Too funny

Obama vs…..Obama
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s2MjQ17kDng&feature=player_embedded
All things to all people.

The Center Cannot Hold
http://www.ncpa.org/sub/dpd/index.php?Article_ID=18249
According to Boskin, Obama's budget will: Almost triple the deficit. Add $6.5 trillion to the national debt. Leave future U.S. taxpayers (many of whom will make far less than $250,000) with the tab.

Saturday, July 25, 2009

Political Digest for July 25 2009

After Lawsuit, Obama Administration Releases Logs of Private Meetings With Health Care Industry Executives
http://blogs.abcnews.com/politicalpunch/2009/07/after-lawsuit-obama-administration-releases-logs-of-private-meetings-with-health-care-industry-execu.html
The most transparent administration in history….when forced to be by the courts.

Pelosi Puts Onus on Industry
Deals Aside, She Says, Hospital and Drug Firms Can Do More
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/07/23/AR2009072303645.html?wpisrc=newsletter&wpisrc=newsletter&wpisrc=newsletter
Let’s see if the goose has more golden eggs.

Health Reform Deadline in Doubt
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/07/23/AR2009072303929.html?wpisrc=newsletter&wpisrc=newsletter&wpisrc=newsletter
As Oz meets Reality

Health Care Petition
www.freeourhealthcarenow.com
I doubt the effectiveness of Internet petitions, but what the heack.

Peer-Reviewed Study Rocks Climate Debate! 'Nature not man responsible for recent global warming...little or none of late 20th century warming and cooling can be attributed to humans'
http://climatedepot.com/a/2117/PeerReviewed-Study-Rocks-Climate-Debate-Nature-not-man-responsible-for-recent-global-warminglittle-or-none-of-late-20th-century-warming-and-cooling-can-be-attributed-to-humans
Note to Al Gore: Give the $100M you made on GW back.

Government Monopsony Distorts Climate Science
http://www.ncpa.org/sub/dpd/index.php?Article_ID=18244
But Al told me the debate was over….

Detroit: The Triumph of Progressive Public Policy
http://www.ncpa.org/sub/dpd/index.php?Article_ID=18245
Excerpt: In 1950, Detroit was the wealthiest city in America on a per capita income basis. Today, the Census Bureau reports that it is the nation's second poorest major city, just "edging out" Cleveland.

Dems Start To Push Back Hard To Prevent A 'Waterloo'
http://www.nationaljournal.com/congressdaily/hca_20090722_6620.php
A damn near run thing, I believe the Duke said.

DeMint escalates attacks on Obama plan
http://www.thestate.com/local/story/874136.html
Excerpt: DeMint, a Greenville Republican, labeled as "blatantly false" the Democratic National Committee ad's claim he "supports no (health care) plan at all," dispatching lawyers to warn TV stations running it in the Columbia, Greenville and Washington broadcast markets. In unusually pointed terms, DeMint turned the tables on Obama, accusing him of blocking health care reforms while Obama was a U.S. senator.

Democrats Censor Speech: Don't Say "Government Run Health Care"
http://rightwingnews.com/mt331/2009/07/democrats_censor_speech_dont_s.php
Somewhere, George Orwell is smiling…..

BO: 30% strongly approve, 38% strongly disapprove.
http://www.rasmussenreports.com/public_content/politics/obama_administration/obama_approval_index_history
Somewhere George Bush is smiling….

Euro-liberals get big boot in elections - Hello Conservatives!
http://rmcpac.com/blog/euro-liberals-get-big-boot-elections-hello-conservatives
A bit old to be news, but not well reported in the US. I wonder why?

Quote
When a blind man bears the standard, pity those who follow. - French Proverb

Friday, July 24, 2009

Political Digest for July 24 2009

Wishful Thinking and Indecisive Wars
http://www.securityaffairs.org/issues/2009/16/peters.php
If you read nothing else, read this. Great article. We are losing the future.

Concerns Rise Over 2010 Census
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/07/22/AR2009072203695.html?wpisrc=newsletter&wpisrc=newsletter&wpisrc=newsletter
Not to worry. ACORN & BO will be on the job, ensuring a fair count.

Obama: Things stink
http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0709/25315.html
Excerpt: President Obama promises something else: He will soak the rich. Getting rid of waste, fraud and abuse will pay only for two-thirds of his health care plan. The remaining third will be paid for by limiting the “the itemized deductions for the wealthiest Americans.” What about the “s” word? What about “sacrifice” for the rest of us? Happily, the future contains no such need.

Durbin Says No Health Care Vote until September
http://voices.washingtonpost.com/capitol-briefing/2009/07/durbin_says_no_health_care_vot.html?wprss=capitol-briefing
And BO says delay is fatal.

A Massachusetts Model to Fix Health Care?
http://www.ncpa.org/sub/dpd/index.php?Article_ID=18239
Excerpt: The state will spend $595 million more on health insurance this year than it did three years ago, a 42 percent increase. Its latest budget proposal calls for eliminating insurance subsidies for 30,000 legal immigrants in an effort to save money.

China vs. Civil Society
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970203946904574299913158787226.html
Excerpt: The Gongmeng group, or Open Constitution Initiative, was shuttered Friday for allegedly violating laws that govern nonprofits The organization was founded in 2003 and brought together human-rights lawyers and academics to research legal topics and take on politically sensitive pro bono cases. Gongmeng’s work was a rarity in a country where authorities brook little public dissent.

The Small Business Surtax
The Obama Democrats pick income redistribution over job creation and economic
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB124753106668435899.html
Excerpt: Jason Furman owes an apology to Michael Boskin, the Stanford economist who wrote a year ago on these pages that Barack Obama would raise American income tax rates nearly to 60%. Mr. Furman, then in the Obama campaign and now at the White House, claimed this was wrong and that Democrats would merely raise taxes back to their Clinton-era level. House Democrats are now proving that Mr. Boskin had it right, and before it's over even he may have underestimated how high taxes will go. In the middle of a recession and with rising unemployment, Democrats have been letting it leak that they want to raise U.S. tax rates higher than they've been in nearly 30 years in order to finance government health care.

Mexican brothels coming to a neighborhood near you
http://www.examiner.com/x-5919-Norfolk-Crime-Examiner~y2009m7d16-Mexican-brothels-coming-to-a-neighborhood-near-you
Finally, change we can believe in--exploiting illegals.

Osama bin Laden’s Son Thought Killed in Predator Strike
http://www.nationalterroralert.com/updates/2009/07/22/osama-bin-ladens-son-thought-killed-in-predator-strike/
Praise Allah!

Nationally ranked hospital victim of universal healthcare
http://onenewsnow.com/Culture/Default.aspx?id=608422
Coming soon to a hospital near you.

Obama’s Sinking Approval Ratings are Even Worse than They Look
http://www.usnews.com/blogs/peter-roff/2009/07/21/obamas-sinking-approval-ratings-are-even-worse-than-they-look.html
You can fool some of the people….

Take the red pill, Mr. President
http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/opinion/blogs/beltway-confidential/Take-the-red-pill-Mr-President-51473502.html
Excerpt: In last night's press conference, President Obama seemed to be reliving that famous scene from The Matrix. The main character is offered a choice between a red pill that makes him see reality for what it is, and a blue pill that allows him to continue living in a pleasant world of illusions. Last night, President Obama appeared to have taken the blue pill before his press conference. How else could he convince himself, the Congressional Budget Office's numbers notwithstanding, that his health care reform bill will not increase both health care costs and the federal deficit? How else can he continue to make the argument that a massive expansion of government spending on health care will solve rather than exacerbate the current problems? How can he repeatedly express such absolute certainty that such a measure will easily pay for itself several times over in the long run? Why can he not at least acknowledge the possibility that it will become a costly and useless trillion-dollar boondoggle that follows in the footsteps of his stimulus package?

Big drugmakers' secret D.C. meeting
http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/opinion/blogs/beltway-confidential/Big-drugmakers-secret-DC-meeting-51487512.html
Their exec is a former Dem Congressman, who is paid about $2M a year, according to public records. Now we know why.

Gun-Shy
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/07/22/AR2009072203282.html?referrer=emailarticle
Excerpt: How do you outgun the NRA? Very, very carefully. Mark Pryor knows all about that. The Democratic senator from pro-gun Arkansas was nowhere to be seen on the Senate floor during Wednesday's showdown over a proposal, championed by the National Rifle Association, that would have gutted state gun-control laws across the nation. (Gee, the Senate was playing games with the bill. I’m shocked.)

Quote
"Men have been taught that the highest virtue is not to achieve, but to give. Yet one cannot give that which has not been created. Creation comes before distribution -- or there will be nothing to distribute. The need of the creator comes before the need of any possible beneficiary. Yet we are taught to admire the second-hander who dispenses gifts he has not produced above the man who made the gifts possible. We praise an act of charity. We shrug at an act of achievement." -- Ayn Rand

Thursday, July 23, 2009

Political Digest for July 23, 2009

How to Make Health-Care Reform Bipartisan
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970203946904574300482236378974.html
BO promised bi-partisanship, here’s his chance. Problem is, with the League of Leftwing Lawyers in charge of the Congress, there is no interest in saving money on Medical Liability Reform.

Rationing Health Care
http://www.john-goodman-blog.com/rationing-health-care-2/#more-4364
Yup. You can save a lot of money by denying care to Grandpa. Sounds good to me. Oh, wait—I’m Grandpa now!

Joe Biden: ‘We Have to Go Spend Money to Keep From Going Bankrupt’
http://www.cnsnews.com/public/content/article.aspx?RsrcID=51162
I’m thinking of trying this myself. What has being frugal and responsible got me? OK, a good credit rating, what fun is that?

A month of gloomy Thursdays for health care plan
http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/politics/A-month-of-gloomy-Thursdays-for-health-care-plan-8004466-51347267.html
Excerpt: I suddenly heard the voice of the late Jack Kemp proclaiming at the 1984 Republican National Convention that if you subsidize something you get more of it and if you tax something you get less of it.

Sweden in Grip of Islam
http://vodpod.com/watch/1428923-sweden-in-grip-of-islam
Our future. Jews not welcome.

Using taxpayer money for the Stealth Jihad?
http://refugeeresettlementwatch.wordpress.com/2009/07/22/two-on-tiza-using-taxpayer-money-for-the-stealth-jihad/
Gee, don’t they deserve a bailout too?

US man gave al-Qaida NYC subway information
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20090722/ap_on_re_us/us_american_al_qaida
Just wanted to get to the Staten Island Ferry, probably.

Wednesday, July 22, 2009

Bob's Political Digest for July 22, 2009

I worked through the weekend. Between that and unpacking in our new digs, have had little time to post, and have received a lot of interesting items. So this is long, but pick and choose what interests you.

Book Recommendation
While on vacation I started the best seller Liberty and Tyranny by Mark Levin. Finally had a few minutes to finish the last two chapters Monday night. I highly recommend it. It’s short, clear and very readable. It has excellent, short explanations of the causes of the Great Depression, the current economic meltdown and much else, such as federalism, the Free Market, and the origins and economic challenges of the Welfare State. Put it on the top of your “must read” pile.

Walter Cronkite Dies
A great, highly-experienced military commander and strategist, I understand. Must have been. His pronouncement that the war in Vietnam was lost, led to a loss of public support for the war. That created the political environment where the Democrat-controlled US Congress could break our treaty obligations and eliminate promised financial support for South Vietnam. Which led to the fall of that country, as you can’t fight tanks, planes and bullets with empty hands. Which led to twice as many people in SE Asia being murdered by the Communists in the first two years after the war ended, as died in the course of the war, and a one-party government that doesn’t allow freedom of the press, freedom of speech or freedom of religion, and has been steadily exterminating the Montagnard hill peoples. Thanks Uncle Walter, the most trusted man in America. May you now be paying for the slaughter you did so much to help create.

And we wonder why pro-democracy folks in the Middle East don’t trust America to keep its pledges and stand by them?

Poll Shows Obama Slipping on Key Issues
Approval Rating on Health Care Falls Below 50 Percent
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/07/19/AR2009071902176.html?wpisrc=newsletter
Puppies beginning to open their eyes, as the old political joke goes.

The 2% Solution
http://www.john-goodman-blog.com/the-2-solution/#more-4327
Is Health Care Reform about the uninsured? Or creating vast new federal programs?

Affordable Health Choices Act Approved by Two Key House Committees
http://www.ncpa.org/sub/dpd/index.php?Article_ID=18218
“…this legislation is going to create a financial and medical nightmare for Americans…”

States Hit Hardest by Recession Get Least Stimulus Money
http://www.ncpa.org/sub/dpd/index.php?Article_ID=18220
You don’t suppose politics is involved? Nah, not in this transparent administration.

How the Mighty Have Fallen
http://www.newsweek.com/id/206160
I know! Since people with high incomes spend the most in the economy, will stimulate the economy by taxing them more so they have less to spend!

Let Customers Control the Money and Market Will Cure Health Care
http://www.investors.com/NewsAndAnalysis/Article.aspx?id=482299
Terrible idea. If we let the free market control health care, how will politicians be able to win votes by steering dollars to favored constituent groups?

The Gelded AgeThe mustangs are almost too apt a symbol of where we’re all headed.
http://article.nationalreview.com/?q=ZjRkZDYzYWM5YjJhYzMyNWRjMzE4YTJlM2VhMDFlYzU
Funny, but sickening.

'I wed Iranian girls before execution'
http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?cid=1246443842931&pagename=JPost%2FJPArticle%2FShowFull
Excerpt: In the Islamic Republic it is illegal to execute a young woman, regardless of her crime, if she is a virgin, he explained. Therefore a "wedding" ceremony is conducted the night before the execution: The young girl is forced to have sexual intercourse with a prison guard - essentially raped by her "husband."

Polish anti-Marxist thinker dies
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/8157014.stm
Freedom is dying as well….

The Carbonated Congress
Orszag nails it: The 'largest corporate welfare program' ever.
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB124657758880989227.html
Excerpt: President Obama is calling the climate bill that the House passed last week an "extraordinary" achievement, and so it is. The 1,200-page wonder manages the supreme feat of being both hugely expensive while doing almost nothing to reduce carbon emissions.

Obama Health Plan to Cover 12 Million Illegals
http://www.newsmax.com/headlines/health_care_obama/2009/07/19/237484.html?s=al&promo_code=83A3-1
What the hell. The rich will pay for it.

Cap and Tax Supporting GOPer Booed at Town Hall Meeting
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pyne-KXD6fU&feature=player_embedded
Hope he got the message.

Jewish community's denial about Obama must stop
http://www.jewishworldreview.com/0709/bayefsky072009.php3
Don’t count on it

Democrats' New Worry: Their Own Rich Voters
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB124804459318663479.html
What goes around….

House reverses Obama on car dealerships - they remain open
http://www.examiner.com/examiner/x-3132-Philadelphia-Conservative-Examiner~y2009m7d18-House-reverses-Obama-on-car-dealerships--they-remain-open
Hay, don’t they know BO is in charge of the economy?

Teacher, Can We Leave Now? No.
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/07/19/opinion/19friedman.html
Why we fight. In the NYT!

Industry Cash Flowed To Drafters of Reform
Key Senator Baucus Is a Leading Recipient
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/07/20/AR2009072003363.html?wpisrc=newsletter
Excerpt: Health-related companies and their employees gave Baucus's political committees nearly $1.5 million in 2007 and 2008, when he began holding hearings and making preparations for this year's reform debate. (You are surprised? When government is involved, decisions are made politically, not economically.)

Dodd Looks to Distance Himself from Financial Firms
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/07/20/AR2009072003322.html?wpisrc=newsletter
Excerpt: Sen. Christopher J. Dodd has been a friend to the nation's largest financial firms for nearly three decades, and they have been his most generous donors. But now he finds himself in political trouble, and is trying to prove the relationship is over.

GM is lobbying at 98.6% of its prior levels
http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/opinion/blogs/beltway-confidential/GM-is-lobbying-at-984-of-its-prior-levels-51237602.html
Excerpt: General Motors reduced its lobbying spending in the second quarter by only 1.4% compared to the first quarter, even though the second quarter saw the company go bankrupt, be taken over by the government, and announce it was cancelling its outside lobbying contracts. In April, May, and June, GM spent $2,760,000 on lobbying according to its Q2 lobbying filing, compared to $2,800,000 in the first quarter.

One Giant Leap
http://bighollywood.breitbart.com/myon/2009/07/20/one-giant-leap/
An independent reporter on the wars, who is the real deal. Excerpt: The U.S. Marines are a spectacle for the U.S. Army and also the British Army. The Marines will come in and live like pure animals, and build a base around themselves, whereas the British and American Armies will tend to build at least part of the base before coming in. One
Marine commander told me that during the early part of this war, his men didn't even shower for three months. We talked for a couple of hours and he was proud that his Marines didn't need a shower for three months, and that his Marines killed a lot of Taliban and managed to lose only one good man. That's the Marines. They'll show up in force with no warning, and their reputation with U.S. Army and Brits who have fought alongside them is stellar. A NPR photographer who just spent more than three weeks with the Marines could not praise them enough, saying he'd been with them in Iraq, too, and that when Marines take casualties, their reaction is to continue to attack. They try to stay in contact until they finish the enemy, no matter how long it takes. Truly they are animals when it comes to the fight. Other than that, great guys. Tonight at dinner, a young Marine Lance Corporal sat in front of me at the crowded dining facility. "Good evening, Sir," he said. I asked, "Are you living like animals out there?" "Livin' the dream, Sir!" They are fantastic.

The heavy burden of war, shouldered by the few
http://blogs.usatoday.com/oped/2009/05/the-heavy-burden-of-war-shouldered-by-the-few.html
Excerpt: In a democracy, military duty is the ultimate act of public service. But while America has been waging war on two fronts since 2003, many Americans have left the defense of their way of life to the small group of people who make up this nation's all-volunteer military. These men and women deserve more than just our gratitude…. When America goes to war, Americans ­ all of us ­ should be on a war footing. But with a U.S. military force likely to remain in Iraq for many years and the fighting in Afghanistan about to become more lethal, most Americans treat our involvement in these conflicts like a spectator sport ­ the view for them is just fine from the bleachers.

Medical Care Confusion
By Thomas Sowell, PhD
http://townhall.com/columnists/ThomasSowell/2009/07/21/medical_care_confusion
None of the people who are trying to rush government-run medical care through Congress before we have time to think about it are pointing to Medicare, Medicaid or veterans' hospitals as shining examples of how wonderful we can expect government medical care to be when it becomes "universal."

Fiscal ruin of Western world beckons
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/comment/ambroseevans_pritchard/585707...
Excerpt: But the deeper truth is that Britain, Spain, France, Germany, Italy, the US, and Japan are in varying states of fiscal ruin, and those tipping into demographic decline (unlike young Ireland) have an underlying cancer that is even more deadly. The West cannot support its gold-plated state structures from an aging workforce and depleted tax base.

AmeriCorps IG sues government over "unlawful" firing
http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/opinion/blogs/beltway-confidential/AmeriCorps-IG-sues-government-over-unlawful-firing-51094442.html
From my friend Del: I absolutely LOVE this. Mr. Walpin, get some! He'll get his day in court, and they will try to bury him alive with legal BS, but eventually there will be a public hearing, and people will get held to task for whatever the rules really are. If the reason for Walpin being fired boils down to the "acted fuzzy at a meeting once" they'll have to demonstrate he's really senile, and that will be tough because he isn't. If it boils down to "a federal prosecutor filed a complaint against him" that will mean they have to prove he did something wrong, which will be tough since he reported on an undisuputed misuse of federal funds, which was pretty much his job. And since he's only demanding his job back and attorney's fees, nobody can say this is one of the "gimme money" spurious legal actions we see so often. This has a very good chance of embarrassing the hell out of the Obama administration and establishing they really were bullying a good civil servant for doing his job when the guy who actually did something wrong was an Obama buddy.

Inside The Bureaucracy Obama Envisions
http://www.ibdeditorials.com/IBDArticles.aspx?id=332725429530316
"We have not yet estimated the administrative costs to the federal government of implementing the specified policies, nor have we accounted for all of the proposal's likely effects on spending for other federal programs."

Racial Preferences in the Democrats' Health Care Bill
http://www.americanthinker.com/2009/07/racial_preferences_in_the_demo_1.html
Excerpt: The Democrats' health care bill creates a very significant financial incentive for medical schools and other entities to lower admission standards for "individuals who are from underrepresented minority groups" if that is what it takes to have the winning "demonstrated record".

Saturday, July 18, 2009

Bob's Political Digest July 18, 2009

'Indications' Jakarta blasts were suicide bombs
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/07/16/AR2009071604297.html?wpisrc=newsletter
Since Islam is a “religion of Peace,” I suspect crazed Presbyterians.

Conservative Group Calls For Probe Of Conyers
Wife's Case Raises Disclosure Issue
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/07/16/AR2009071603721.html?wpisrc=newsletter
What was it Queen Nancy said about a Republican “Culture of Corruption”?

We Want More Government
Just don't ask us to pay for it.
http://www.newsweek.com/id/206166
Excerpt: What this means is that balancing the budget in 2020 would require a tax increase of almost 50 percent from the past half century's average. To get from 18 to 26 percent of GDP (spending in 2020) would require another 8 percent of GDP in taxes. In today's dollars, that would be about $1.1 trillion, a 44 percent annual tax increase. Even these figures may be optimistic, because the CBO's projections for defense and "nondefense discretionary spending" may be unrealistically low. This last category covers everything from environmental regulation to aid to education to homeland security. (when I was a senator, the rule was that if you wanted to be re-elected, you had to give the public what it wanted—more spending and less taxes.)

DEM HEALTH RX A POI$ON PILL IN NY
http://www.nypost.com/seven/07162009/news/regionalnews/dem_health_rx_a_poion_pill_in_ny_179525.htm
Terrifying 57% Tax Looms For Biggest Earners. (“The power to tax is the power to destroy” --John Marshall)

My son, the Marine
At first, we resisted his decision to join the Corps. We still have doubts, but there's also some pride in his choice.
http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/la-oe-saperstein15-2009jul15,0,4295634.story
I fear for our future as a free people when I read about her “friends’” comments. It was people like them in the 1930s who gave Hitler & the Nazis the opportunity to rise and kill 60M people in the 1940s. I suggest she read Keeping Faith: A Father-Son Story About Love and the United States Marine Corps by a liberal father and his Marine son, who were in that situation.

Bay State Rationing
http://www.ibdeditorials.com/IBDArticles.aspx?id=332638061373621
How’s government health care working out in Massachusetts?

Obama's pals escape transparency rules
http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/opinion/Obama_s-pals-escape-transparency-rules-7975805-50860937.html
Maybe because of the BO Lapdogs in the Media?

Arab Festival 2009: Sharia in the US
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fEPod-hxD7g
A must see.

Pelosi Censors Republicans
by Rep. John Carter
http://www.humanevents.com/article.php?id=32718
Transparency? We don’t need no stinkin’ transparency!

Friday, July 17, 2009

Computers and Best Buy

My computer will be down at home for awhile, thus only posting when I can use another computer. Like my wife’s laptop when she’s not looking.

In April, we finally decided to get an upgrade to our old computer, which was running slow. we took it to the Geek Squad at Best Buy.

They talked us into a new one, as the cost wouldn’t be much more. (It was considerably more with the add-ons, like creating rescue disks, but never mind.)

Last night, while doing e-mail at Gmail on line, my wife called me from the room. When I returned, it had what I believe is technically called the “Blue Screen of Death.”

I rebooted and it worked fine until I went back on line. There it came again.

So I took it to Best Buy. The Geek Squad Agent ran a virus scan and said it was clean. He said he needed to do a diagnostic test, which would take 7-10 days. If the problem was the computer, they’d send it to the manufacturer, for another 3-week turn around.

He said if it was the operating system, they’d need the rescue disks they created for us (I think that cost $100) or we’d have to pay $150 to restore the system.

He said they should be in a Geek Squad envelope, which he showed me. I said we never got such an envelope. He said they were usually out of them (!), so then they put the disks in a folded piece of copy paper (that apparently being their idea of high tech security for important disks). They had not mentioned to us to be careful of such a paper disk holder.

I took it home to back up our docs and pics before they worked on it, and to look for the rescue/restore disks. No disks. I’d think I threw them out with the box, not realizing they were valuable in that copy paper, but we used the box when we moved, and it was empty. No disks in our box of computer stuff where we keep the bits and pieces and program disks. So I conclude Best Buy made the disks, forgot to put them in the box, and will now earn another $150 for their error. But I can’t prove it. I'll do another search again tonight, and update this post if I find them.

We’ve had good luck with Best Buy in the past. A colleague at work says they gave her family such bad service on their computers, they tell everyone not to go to Best Buy.

So, if you have a national company you have good luck with for computers, Best Buy or others, or ones to stay away from, please post in the comments section. It might help us non-geek dinosaurs.

Bob's Political Digest for July 17, 2009

CIA Assassin Program Was Nearing New Phase
Panetta Pulled Plug After Training Was Proposed
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/07/15/AR2009071503856.html?wpisrc=newsletter
Killing bad guys with bombs from planes and drones is good, despite the collateral damage to civilians. Killing bad guys with a gun or knife individually is bad because it’s “Assassination.” Got it? And you have to share security information with the Congresscritters, so they can share it with our enemies while generating self-serving press, never mind if Americans die because of it. Maybe if we called it “Peace Stimulus” and pumped a few million into Dem congressional districts for each kill, the weenies would let us defend ourselves against murders.

CBO Chief Criticizes Democrats' Health Reform Measures
Director Says Proposed Changes Would Weaken Economy
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/07/16/AR2009071602242.html
Courage in a tough job market. He’s history—the Obamaites will silence him.

The Case of the Stumped Jurist
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/07/15/AR2009071503189.html?wpisrc=newsletter
Hard to know if this is for real, or satire. It’s getting so I can’t tell.

Private Insurance is Not an Option
http://www.ncpa.org/sub/dpd/index.php?Article_ID=18208
Excerpt: It didn't take long to run into an "uh-oh" moment when reading the House's "health care for all Americans" bill. Right there on page 16 is a provision making individual private medical insurance illegal, says Investor's Business Daily (IBD). The provision would indeed outlaw individual private coverage.

Obama Frees Iranian Terror MastersThe release of the Irbil Five is a continuation of a shameful policy.
http://article.nationalreview.com/?q=ZjY0MjkwOWVkYTNlYzE2ZjM1N2E5M2M0MTdiYTI3MzM=
What could go wrong? Maybe he talked to them first.

No one gasped in shock when Obama said he was committed to the will of the people
http://ccantoni.blogspot.com/2009/06/no-one-gasped-in-shock-when-obama-said.html
Excerpt: … a moral government is not necessarily a government that reflects the will of the people. Rather, a moral government is one that protects the rights of the individual, especially against the transgressions of the majority.

It's Not an Option
http://www.investors.com/NewsAndAnalysis/Article.aspx?id=482329
Excerpt: It didn't take long to run into an "uh-oh" moment when reading the House's "health care for all Americans" bill. Right there on Page 16 is a provision making individual private medical insurance illegal. (Government: good. Private business: bad. But they assure us it’s not socialism. They may be right—that may be too mild for the government taking over huge sectors of the economy.)

A Ploy to Clip Some Wings
http://townhall.com/columnists/GeorgeWill/2009/07/16/a_ploy_to_clip_some_wings
Excerpt: How does the Obama administration love organized labor? Let us count the ways it uses power to repay unions for helping to put it in power.

Understanding the House Democrats Health Plan
http://docs.house.gov/gopleader/House-Democrats-Health-Plan.pdf
At last some clarity

Only In America: A Communist Czar
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2293064/posts
Excerpt: President Obama is the first president in recent history to appoint a communist to a key government position. It is amazing that Obama would not only choose an admitted communist for this czar position, but someone with a criminal record. (why is that amazing? Did I miss something about BO?)

Two Presidents and the Court: When Bigotry Takes the Bench
http://spectator.org/archives/2009/07/14/when-bigotry-takes-the-bench
Will history repeat?

The Little Scandal that Could
http://spectator.org/archives/2009/07/14/the-little-scandal-that-could/print
A friend wrote: Imagine if G.W. Bush had fired one Inspector General after another!

Quote
I rose by sheer military ability to the rank of corporal. -Thornton Wilder

Thursday, July 16, 2009

Bob's Political Digest July 16, 2009

Some really good/important stuff today.

The Assault on Economic Freedom: Chrysler
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f3YPnTwdeto
Short, clear and scary depiction of what happened with Chrysler, who won & who lost. Hint: Obama contributors the UAW did better than taxpayers. A must see.

Air Force Project Being Probed Is Linked to Murtha
Lawmaker Arranged Earmark for It
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/07/14/AR2009071402251.html?wpisrc=newsletter
Excerpt: The research effort at the Pensacola Air Force base fell apart, however, when investigators found evidence that it was used to improperly pay a series of companies linked to Murtha. A handful of defense firms were paid for work that was never done or not called for in the contracts. Some of the companies involved, based in Wyoming, Florida and Murtha's district in Pennsylvania, had hidden owners, prosecutors allege; one was secretly owned by the Air Force official who helped approve the payments. (To Col. Murtha: Sir. Among the Core Values of our Corps is “Honor,” which it appears you have forgotten, I’m ashamed to say.)

Waxman-Markey Bill Would Raise Electricity Prices $846 Billion
http://www.heartland.org/publications/environment%20climate/article/25653/WaxmanMarkey_Bill_Would_Raise_Electricity_Prices_846_Billion.html
“If I am elected president, people making less than $250,000 a year won’t pay a penny more in taxes.” Freshman Senator Barack Obama. (Unless they smoke. Or use electricity or oil. Or have employer-paid health insurance. Or….)

Press Release, "Global warming: Our best guess is likely wrong," Rice University/University of Hawaii/University of California-Santa Cruz/Nature Geoscience/E! Science News, July 14, 2009.
http://www.ncpa.org/sub/dpd/index.php?Article_ID=18204
Three universities that haven’t gotten the word that the debate is over. If he was wrong, will Al Gore have to give back the $100M he’s made off GW hype?

California vs. Texas: America's Future
http://www.ncpa.org/sub/dpd/index.php?Article_ID=18205
How are those liberal, big-government approaches working out for you, California?

The Cost of Low Fertility in Europe
http://www.ncpa.org/sub/dpd/index.php?Article_ID=18207
The economics of fertility. To think I listened and believed when my professors had me read The Population Bomb, and have no kids of my own. That’s one of the reasons I’m a Global Warming skeptic. And the economics don’t take into account the political problems of a non-assimilating Muslim population, with the coming tyranny of Shari’a Law. The most common baby boy’s name in many large European cities is Muhammad. America Alone by Mark Steyn is a must read.

Russians Snubbed Obama-- Refused to Shake His Hand! (Video)
http://gatewaypundit.blogspot.com/2009/07/wow-russians-snubbed-obama-refused-to.html
Swine Flu fears are everywhere, I suppose.

Climate change: The sun and the oceans do not lie
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/comment/columnists/christopherbooker/5804831/Climate-change-The-sun-and-the-oceans-do-not-lie.html
Excerpt: Faced with a "consensus" view which looks increasingly implausible, a fast-growing body of reputable scientists from many countries has been coming up with a ''counter-consensus'', which holds that their fellow scientists have been looking in wholly the wrong direction to explain what is happening to the world's climate. The two factors which most plausibly explain what temperatures are actually doing are fluctuations in the radiation of the sun and the related shifting of ocean currents.

German brothel offers discounts to cyclists
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstopics/howaboutthat/5821953/German-brothel-offers-discounts-to-cyclists.html
this should be brought to the attention of the powers-that-be in Madison, WI, where the bicycle is an object of veneration.

Obama Booed at All-Star Game
http://www.examiner.com/examiner/x-2304-DC-Republican-Examiner~y2009m7d15-Obama-Booed-at-AllStar-Game-Throws-Sissy-Pitch
Excerpt: The more debatable point from the historic moment was the reception the President was afforded by the self-described "best fans in baseball." Though Obama was roundly cheered by the All-Star fans, his live presence still didn't attract the applause that George W. Bush did during a taped announcement by the four previous Presidents before the game and some boos could even be heard among the cheers.

EPA Cover-Up
by Walter E. Williams
http://townhall.com/columnists/WalterEWilliams/2009/07/15/epa_cover-up
Williams, like Sowell, makes economic sense.

Welfare Costs for Children Of Illegal Aliens in L.A. County Nearly $48 Million in May
http://antonovich.co.la.ca.us/twitter/RELEASE%20Illegal%20Welfare%20(May).htm
No one can figure out why California is in such fiscal trouble. It’s a mystery!

Obama Blocks New Energy Exploration
http://townhall.com/columnists/DocHastings/2009/07/14/obama_blocks_new_energy_exploration?page=full&comments=true
From a Marine buddy: I love this. One more bit of flimflam on the American public... this is the day of the absolute push to energy independence, right? Sure, except NOT if that means things like actually working seriously at it, including more US oil & gas and at long last, the reactivation of drive to build nuclear power plants. Because wind and solar will take care of all of us, and ethanol too.... sure, except all of them combined can't add more than a few percentage points to the national grid, wind and solar are irregular, and it takes more energy to get the ethanol than is in the ethanol. I really wonder how long it will take before reality finally slams home on all this nonsense. Probably for a few years, by which time we'll all be paying for the mistakes being made now. –Del

Jim DeMint's Lonely Quest
http://voices.washingtonpost.com/thefix/the-rising/jim-demints-lonely-quest.html?wprss=thefix
"I will go after Democrats and I will shame Republicans," promised DeMint.

Hamas accuses Israel of sending aphrodisiac gum into Gaza; will Bill Clinton announce a fact-finding mission?
http://www.jihadwatch.org/archives/026928.php
Excerpt: Okay, so the part about Clinton is a joke. But when Hamas accuses Israel of corrupting the young, that is no joke at all. When Hamas levels such a charge, it is aware of the significance it will have for Muslims who know their Qur'an, situating the modern-day Jews as those meriting divinely-mandated retribution.

An American Hero
http://e.blip.tv/scripts/flash/showplayer.swf?file=http%3A%2F%2Fblip.tv/rss/flash/2257594&showplayerpath=http%3A%2F%2Fblip.tv/scripts/flash/showplayer.swf&feedurl=http://repdavis.blip.tv/rss/flash&brandname=blip.tv&brandlink=http://blip.tv/%3Futm_source%3Dbrandlink&enablejs=true
The funeral the media should have covered, instead of the pop child molester. But there are still some Americans—too few compared to the MJ funeral—who honor the right things. This was in Georgia, country disdained by the elites. But a great turnout for this fallen soldier.

Quote:
“I owe those unions ... When their leaders call, I do my best to call them back right away. I don’t mind feeling obligated.”
-- President Barack Obama “The Audacity of Hope”