Been a few days since I could get through my e-mail, due to
my usual issues. Lot's of interesting articles in this post, so forward to your
low-information friends. I didn't listen to Obama's SOTU speech. Before you
statists on the list say, "Ah, ha--typical," I never listened to one
of Bush's either. I tend to be interested in the reaction and telling details
(Such as several good pieces on the SOTU by Jennifer Rubin in the Washington Post, linked below), but not
a set-piece speech full of spin, given by either side.
Met a WWII vet at the VA rehab clinic. He'll be 90 in seven
months. told us about landing on Omaha Beech,
fighting through to Belgium,
where his outfit lost 70% of the guys, and he was taken POW. He teared up
several times thinking of those days ("I was only 19!") and the
friends he had lost. His memories were quite clear, though he jumped around a
bit in the stories. ~Bob
SOTU, starting with quotes
POTUS opens his speech touting the recovering economy.
Minutes later he demands extension of unemployment insurance. --Stephen
Hayes
I feel like I'm being lectured by a grad student who has
never set foot outside the teachers lounge for a cigarette. --Greg Gutfeld
Why does Obama need to extend unemployment insurance
benefits if he's created all these jobs? --Dana Loesch
Awful foreign policy served too little and too late.
By Jennifer Rubin
Excerpt: President Obama’s foreign policy remarks last night
remind me of the Woody Allen joke: One woman says about a restaurant, “The food
is terrible.” Another replies, “Yes! And the portions are so small.” In the
case of Obama we can add that the service was awful.
Excerpt: Senate Democrats on the 2014 ballot who were
sitting in the House chamber last night had reason to worry — a lot.. Here are
eight reasons they should be nervous: 1. The president is already a drag on the
ticket in 2014 in swing states.
Gallup
reports that among the twelve states in which Obama is most unpopular
(ranging from 22.5 percent to 35 percent approval) there are four hotly
contested Senate seats where the Republican can lasso his opponent to the
president (e.g. West Virginia, Montana, South Dakota and Alaska).
Excerpt: Sen. Mike Lee (R-Utah) gave the most
interesting
GOP
response to the State of the Union. Although not without flaws, it showed
how far he and the right flank of the GOP have come since the disastrous
government shutdown.
Five Ironic and Hypocritical Statements From Obama's SOTU.
By Katie Pavlich
Excerpt: After speaking for more than an hour, President
Obama has finished his 2014 State of the Union Address. Not surprisingly, his
words and statements didn't come without irony or hypocrisy. Here are the top
five:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/robert-samuelson-the-debate-that-wasnt/2014/01/29/bbede98c-895d-11e3-a5bd-844629433ba3_story.html?wpisrc=nl_opinions
Excerpt: “For several years now, this town has been consumed
by a rancorous argument over the proper size of the
federal government. It’s an important debate.” — President Obama’s 2014 State
of the
Union. Well, there’s a presidential
whopper.
Obama is right that the role of the federal government deserves
an important debate, but he is wrong when he says that we’ve had that debate.
Excerpt: Suppose a president of the United States
delivered a State of the Union address and nobody cared? Isn't that what
happened Tuesday night when the increasingly irrelevant -- and, yes, boring
Barack Obama -- droned on about predictable things in a predictable way?
Excerpt: Obama made the following patently false claim about
the implementation of the interim agreement: ”As we gather here tonight, Iran
has begun to eliminate its stockpile of higher levels of enriched uranium.”
WaPo Fact Checker
Rips Obama's State Of The Union Falsehoods
Excerpt: It is a beautiful thing being President Obama.
You can pretty much say whatever you want and never be held accountable for it.
Sure, a Washington Post fact-checker will
dutifully note the brazen falsehoods. The media dutifully
reports on most everything. But make Obama pay a political price for not
telling the truth in a State of the Union address about the number of jobs
created and number of ObamaCare enrollees? Never
.
WaPo: Fact Checking
the 2014 State of the Union address
Politico: State of
the Union 2014 fact check
Excerpt: With that rare, outsized audience comes the
temptation for the president to put some spin on his arguments that might not
otherwise fly or gain traction in Washington.
Here’s POLITICO’s analysis of some of the key parts of Obama’s speech, and
where the truth may have been shaped or even stretched in the process:
A Tinge of Sanity
in Chicago
Excerpt: So the GOP gave a State of the Union response. The
Tea Party gave a State of the Union response. Well, hat tip to Rebel
Pundit, for hands down the best SOTU response from Black Chicago grassroots
activists. Memo to GOP and Tea Party, stop using politicians and start using
real everyday Americans to address the faults, failures, and shortcomings of
progressive socialist policies.
Grimm: ‘When you’re wrong,
you’re wrong’
Excerpt: Rep. Michael Grimm (R-N.Y.), who
angrily
confronted a New York television reporter after the State of the
Union Tuesday evening told reporters Wednesday that he
has apologized and regrets his actions. (How do you get to Congress with this
lack of control and lack of sense? What a gift to Democrats--hope they sent him
a nice fruit basket in return. ~Bob)
Dustup could hurt
Michael Grimm’s reelection
Excerpt: New York Rep. Michael Grimm was already facing a
tough reelection. His post-State of the Union blowup could make it even
tougher. A moderate Republican who represents a swing Staten
Island district, Grimm has been atop Democratic target lists for
months.
State of the Union
reviews
This is how bad things are. Kimmel did interviews out on the
street, asking people what they thought of Obama's SOTU address.... the day
before it was given. The link takes you to the video of the results. And a
whole slew of idiots fell for it, assumed it had been the night before, but
went ahead anyhow with their praise of his speech. Even when asked about
details, they smiled and made stuff up. Watching it makes you alternately want
to laugh or cry. These people vote and their friends vote too. Heaven help us.
--Del
Bush speechwriter
accuses Obama of plagiarizing GWB’s 2007 SOTU
Excerpt: Barack Obama and
George Bush have at least one thing in
common when it comes to the second terms they won — the first year of
their encores have been downers when it came to their public images. Both
experienced falloffs in overall job approval and in Americans’ perceptions of
their leadership, ability to get things done and trustworthiness
Ft. Hood Victim Who Will Sit at SOTU Speech Reveals
What He Would Ask Obama: ‘Mr. President, Why Have You…’ By Sara Carter
Excerpt: He would ask Obama why the promises he made more
than five years ago to take care of the 32 survivors and the families of the 14
people killed, including an unborn child, have not been fulfilled. He would ask
his commander-in-chief to stand up for truth and reclassify the shooting as a
terrorist attack. He’d ask him to honor the men, women and families with Purple
Hearts and compensation like those who were honored in the Pentagon terrorist
attacks and Boston Marathon bombings. (I only wish this guy could stand up and
ask Obama his questions. The handling of the Ft Hood shootings has been so much
worse than I ever could have imagined, ever. It's atrocious and why Obama
hasn't fixed it now that the killer has been sentenced is beyond understanding.
Other than it shows he really doesn't care about our military. --Del)
"Thanks to the teachers union,
Chicago public schools are some of the best
in the nation."
#NOTinSOTU
Excerpt: Obama opened his State of the Union address, full
of its old familiar riffs on green energy, education, infrastructure and an end
to war, with unity. Not a call to unity, but a presumption of unity. With his
approval ratings underwater, his sixth State of the Union
was about claiming credit and shifting blame.
Excerpt: President Obama’s State of the Union
gave us a look at the premises driving his foreign policy. It showed that he
believes Islamic terrorists to be driven by frustration over perceived
injustices at the hands of the West, rather than an ideology. It is because of
this frame of mind that he can defend the faulty nuclear deal with Iran and depict the regime as a less threatening
version of the Soviet Union.
Other Political News and Opinion
This is the liberal legacy: killing baby girls in the womb,
no questions asked. By Dominic Lawson
Excerpt: First, The Independent published statistical
analysis of the 2011 National Census, demonstrating that there have been
‘illegal’ sex-selective abortions within communities from the subcontinent,
resulting in the ‘disappearance’ of up to 4,700 girls. A day later, Government
ministers admitted that in more than half of the almost 200,000 abortions that
take place annually, the woman seeking termination had been seen by neither of
the two doctors whose assent and signatures are required.
Excerpt: Two provisions in lengthy
proposed
regulations published by the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid
Services in the Federal Register on January 10 would deprive seniors of vital
drugs and make it more difficult for them to see their doctors.
Excerpt: Americans care about mobility — and are baffled by
it. The rags-to-riches story is part of national folklore. And yet, mobility is
said to be declining. Is the United States still a “land of opportunity” where
hard work, talent and good ideas are rewarded? No, say many experts. People
stay stuck in their class of birth. Well, here’s some good news: The
conventional wisdom is wrong, concludes a new study from the National Bureau of
Economic Research (NBER).
For 2016, Hillary
Clinton has commanding lead over Democrats, GOP race wide open
Excerpt: Hillary Rodham Clinton holds a commanding 6 to 1
lead over other Democrats heading into the 2016 presidential campaign, while
the Republican field is deeply divided with no clear front-runner, according
to
a
new Washington Post-ABC News poll. (H. L. Mencken: "Democracy is the
theory that the common people know what they want, and deserve to get it good
and hard." ~Bob)
Excerpt: Support for the health-care law declined among the
uninsured this month, just as many of the program’s key provisions went into
effect, according to a new poll examining Americans’ knowledge and views of the
Affordable Care Act.
Excerpt: Is there a correlation between Iran's nuclear
program and its low fertility rate or, perhaps as well, between the vitality of
Islamic civilization and its shrinking birthrates?
There is, according to David Goldman, a fellow at the
right-wing, US-based think tank the Middle East Forum, and a longtime writer
for Asia Times Online under the moniker Spengler
Surprise: California
Hires Convicted Felons to Administer Obamacare. Guy
Benson
Excerpt: At least 43 convicted criminals are working as
Obamacare navigators in California,
including three individuals with records of significant financial crimes.
Excerpt: Part of the progressive agenda is to create hate
and envy. One component of that agenda is to attack the large differences
between a corporation's chief executive officer's earnings and those of its
average worker.
Excerpt: All presidents at one time have fudged on the
truth. Most politicians pad their resumes and airbrush away their sins. But what
is new about political lying is the present notion that lies are not
necessarily lies anymore -- a reflection of the relativism that infects our
entire culture.
Excerpt: No one in modern America has done more than
President Obama to bring about inequality. His modern utopia is turning
into a queuetopia. Under ObamaCare, Americans have to queue up even
to sign up for health care.
Excerpt: President Obama's executive order raising the
minimum wage from $7.25 to $10.10 an hour covers employees of federal government
contractors who work on federal projects, and applies to new contracts. It
would give some workers as much as a 39 percent raise. But others would lose
jobs, since Congress is unlikely to increase contractors' funding because Obama
has raised the minimum wage by executive order, skirting congressional
authority.
10 Reasons Intermittent Renewables Are A Problem. By Gail Tverberg
Excerpt: Certainly, politicians need something to provide
hope, especially in countries that are obviously losing their supply of oil,
such as the United Kingdom.
Unfortunately, the more I look into the situation, the less intermittent
renewables have to offer. 1. It is doubtful that intermittent renewables
actually reduce carbon dioxide emissions.
Excerpt: More context isn’t the solution to the news; it’s
the barrier to the news. Every media outlet wants to tell you what to think
about an event, instead of telling you what happened. The more sophisticated
organizations do a better job of dressing up their narratives by dropping long reads
on the reader.
Iraqi troops 'end Baghdad hostage crisis'
Excerpt: Iraqi security forces have ended a hostage crisis
at a government building in Baghdad,
but there are conflicting reports about the number of casualties. Officials
said the six men who had stormed the transport ministry facility and taken
several hostages were killed.
Excerpt: Various Turkish accounts indicated that the
military destroyed several vehicles belonging to the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria, a powerful Al Qaeda affiliate operating
in rebel-held parts of Syria.
The attack was apparently in retaliation for shelling or gunfire from Syria that
landed in Turkish territory.
Ukraine protesters defy terms of new amnesty law
Excerpt: Parliament backed an amnesty for detainees if
protesters vacated the government buildings they had occupied and unblocked
streets and squares. The opposition has rejected this and protesters remain
camped out in central Kiev
and still occupy key buildings.
Libyan deputy prime minister survives
attempt on life
Excerpt: Libya's
deputy prime minister survived unhurt after gunmen fired on his car in Tripoli on Wednesday in
an attack reflecting the violent chaos plaguing the North African nation two
years after Muammar Gaddafi's fall. (This is what running an unauthorized,
lead-from-behind war gets you. ~Bob)
Bangladesh police have charged seven students of an
elite university and a cleric over the murder of an allegedly atheist blogger
who was critical of Islam and Islamic groups.
Excerpt: The students are accused of hacking to death Ahmed
Rajib Haider, 35, near his home in Dhaka in
February last year, days after he helped launch a campaign against Islamist
leaders accused of war crimes.
Where are the Syrian
refugees going? The UK government
has agreed to take in 500 Syrian refugees - but where are the rest going?
At the time of writing, the number of Syrian refugees stands
at 2,386,087 - more than double the entire population of
Cyprus. The
crisis is so severe that last year, the United Nations launched the
biggest appeal in its 69-year history.
But the response so far has not matched the scale or nature of the
crisis. (So who made the “open-ended offer” on behalf of the
US.
--Barb)
Excerpt: Two top ranking American bankers working in senior
positions in London have
committed suicide in the space of two days. Gabriel Magee, a 39-year-old JP
Morgan bank executive, died early this morning after he jumped 500ft from the
top of the bank's European headquarters. …Just two days earlier, on
Sunday, fellow American banker, William 'Bill' Broeksmit, 58, was found hanging
in his South Kensington home.
(Metropolitan police find “nothing suspicious.” --Barb)
Obama Step Closer To
Seizing Retirement Accounts: Proposes in SOTU address T-bills for IRA, 401(k)
Excerpt: When you hear, “Hello, I’m from the federal
government and I want to help you manage your retirement savings,” the best
advice is to run away, as fast as you can….Packaged as a new retirement-savers
plan designed for workers whose employers do not offer IRAs or 401(k),
President Obama announced in his State of the Union address Tuesday an
initiative that allows first-time savers to start building up their savings in
Treasury bonds that could eventually be converted into traditional IRAs or
401(k) plans. While it is not as onerous as an Obama administration directive
demanding a certain percentage of individual retirement savings must be
invested in U.S. Treasury bonds, it is a first step in that direction. (WND is
often extreme, with their hair on fire and lots of spin, so take their stuff
for what it is worth. ~Bob)
Who’s ‘godless’
now? Russia says
it’s U.S.
Excerpt: More than two decades on, history has come full
circle, as the Kremlin and its allies in the
Russian Orthodox Church hurl
the same allegation at the West.…In his state of the nation address in
mid-December,
Mr. Putin also portrayed
Russia as a staunch defender of
“traditional values” against what he depicted as the morally bankrupt West.
Social and religious conservatism, the former
KGB officer insisted, is the only way to
prevent the world from slipping into “chaotic darkness.”
Excerpt:….“[The president] has made far less use of his
executive power at this point in his administration than some of his predecessors
have and he will only do so, as I indicated previously, where he is unable to
work with Congress to do things together,” Holder said. Lee said he
“respectfully but forcefully” disagreed with Holder’s assertion. “When you look
at the quality – not just the quantity, but the quality – the nature of the
executive orders that he has issued, he has usurped an extraordinary amount of
authority within the executive branch,” the senator continued.
Man Tricks Girlfriend
Into Getting Abortion; Faced Life Sentence for Murder
Excerpt: Liberals say that an unborn baby is not actually a
person. That’s why we can end an unborn baby’s life “legally.” It’s not murder,
because murder is illegal. Abortion is legal; therefore, it must not be murder.
Q.E.D. If it’s not a person, then why is it that if a pregnant woman is
murdered, and her unborn child also dies, the murderer is charged with a double
homicide?
Israeli Defense
Official Offers Dark Security Assessment
Excerpt:
Israel
is entering an "Era of Fire" in which it is threatened by 170,000
rockets and missiles and in which the Syrian civil war has placed "30,000
global jihad terrorists" at its doorstep,
Israel's defense intelligence
chief
said in a speech Wednesday.
Excerpt: In his State of the Union address Tuesday night,
President Obama repeated one of the biggest lies behind the Affordable Care Act
(ACA), and it wasn’t that you could keep your health-care plan or your current
doctor. In fact, most people don’t even know it’s a lie.
Excerpt: If I were to reduce to a bumper sticker the way the
left thinks about the world these days, it would read: Inequality happens. If I
were to reduce to a bumper sticker the way the right thinks about the same
subject, it would read: Inequality happens for a reason. This is not a small
distinction. For President Obama, inequality is the public policy issue du
jour. And like lemmings, left wing editorial writers and bloggers can think of
nothing else to write about. But here is something that may surprise you. The
most interesting analyses of the problem are on the right, not the left. For
the most part, all the left does is deplore. They seem to have no interest in
understanding why we have a problem.
Philippines military offensive 'kills 37 rebels'
Excerpt: President Benigno Aquino said the offensive would
protect villages from rebels in Maguindanao province. The insurgents involved
in fighting oppose a recent peace accord between the government and the larger
Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF).
The Broken State of American Health
Insurance Prior to the Affordable Care Act: A Market Rife with Government
Distortion. By Rituparna Basu
Excerpt: A survey of some of the major controls pre-ACA
reveals that health insurance was already one of the most government-controlled
industries in America.
This is the context in which we must assess the causes of our problems in
health insurance. Contrary to proponents of further intervention, evidence
presented in this paper suggests that government regulation plays a major role
in the poor state of health insurance today.
Excerpt: Democrats this week are
trying to claim the populist ground for the
2014 elections, with President Obama's
State of the Union Address as the
centerpiece of this effort. Meanwhile,
Obama and his party are showering corporate
welfare on the likes of
Boeing,
Aetna,
and possibly billionaire Obama fundraiser
Warren Buffett.
Excerpt: Last year I shopped in Target once…about three days
after Christmas. I used my credit card and got caught up in the huge ID theft
caper perpetrated by that Russian teen. My credit card issuer emailed me and
notified me of the breech, canceled my old card, and issued me a new one.
Excerpt: Zawahiri also added that “All those who reject the
Sharia must be executed, and all those belonging to the secular media which
works to disseminate debauchery and helps deviants and Christians to violate
the Sharia, must be executed.”
Forget global
warming!? Earth undergoing global COOLING since 2002! Climate Scientist Dr.
Judith Curry: ‘Attention in the public debate seems to be moving away from the
15-17 year ‘pause’ to the cooling since 2002’
Excerpt: Growing number of scientists are predicting global
cooling: Russia’s
Pulkovo Observatory: ‘We could be in for a cooling period that lasts 200-250
years.’ (SOTU: Obama then declared, "[T]he debate is settled. Climate
change is a fact." Have to say that the climate has been changing since
the Earth was formed; never static. ~Bob)
Rep. Waxman, key
ObamaCare architect, to retire after 20 terms in office
Excerpt: Longtime Democratic Rep. Henry Waxman announced
Thursday he will not seek reelection in the fall, becoming the latest architect
of the Affordable Care Act to announce his retirement.
Chuck Schumer Asks
The IRS To Target And Stop The Tea Party
Excerpt: The IRS scandal is not only not over but is getting
worse, with a call by New York's
senior senator for the already-politicized agency to use its power to tax to
destroy the conservative grass-roots movement. Arguing that the Supreme Court's
2010 Citizens United decision allowed Tea Party groups to "funnel millions
of undisclosed dollars into campaigns with ads that distort the truth and
attack government," Charles Schumer wants the IRS and other government
agencies to take on the Tea Party through their administrative powers. (OK,
here we go, getting to see how a supposed "Liberal" is ready to push
government agencies to go after any kind of group he doesn't
like. Remember when "Liberal" meant you were one of the shock
troops for Freedom of Speech, the right to dissent, all that kind of stuff? --Del)
Excerpt: The warning, while cryptic, may be the result of
direct insider information. Considering he once nearly brought down the Clinton administration by
revealing the President’s indiscretions with a White House intern, one could
make the case that if anyone has legitimate sources pouring in from across the
world it’s Matt Drudge.
Michelle Obama Has a
Rabbi in Her Family
Excerpt: While Barack Obama has struggled to capture the
Jewish vote, it turns out that one of his wife’s cousins is the country’s most
prominent black rabbi — a fact that has gone largely unnoticed. Michelle Obama,
wife of the Democratic presidential nominee, and Rabbi Capers Funnye, spiritual
leader of a mostly black synagogue on Chicago’s
South Side, are first cousins once removed.
Islam: The Only
Religion That Tells Everyone On EARTH What To Do
Excerpt: The beauty, and envy, of our great nation has
always been that it was a melting pot of cultures and ethnicities. The beauty
of blending and sharing of cultural traditions. People who loved America and
desired to be Americans came here. Not because they were trying to transplant
their nation, but to add their traditions to the great melting pot. (Nor to
fundamentally transform ours. --JB)
Excerpt: While prayers won’t hurt, we had better remember
that God helps those who help themselves.
Given all the problems generated by America’s self-imposed decline, don’t Obama
and his bureaucratic thugs have anything better to do than coerce Catholics to
dole out abortifacients in soul-destroying violation of their faith? Of course
they don’t. Consider their agenda.
German-Israeli
Relations Sliding Downwards. By Joseph Puder
Excerpt:
Germany is eager to throw the Holocaust guilt off its back, and with
encouragement from the European media and academia, it has found the excuses in
Israel’s alleged “bad” treatment of the Palestinians, and construction in the
‘settlements,’ which are in fact, communities and towns within Area C, legally
administered by Israel. Anti-Semitic expressions in Germany are allowed as long as it
is directed towards the Jewish State. According to a 2013 BBC World Service Poll, 8% of Germans view
Israel’s
influence as positive and 67% view it as negative.
Clinton "Regrets" Benghazi. By Arnold Ahlert
Excerpt:
With all due respect to [Ted] Cruz, Clinton
knows what happened. She’s known it for a long time. And it is more than likely
the only regret she truly harbors at this point in time is the reality that,
despite her best efforts, along with those of her fellow Democrats, and a
mainstream media fully invested in her 2016 election, Benghazi is not going to be the irrelevant
issue they are trying to make it.
Excerpt:
The United States
has been taking in a million immigrants a year since 2004. Are a million
immigrants a year really inadequate for the needs of businesses in a country
with less than one hundred million private sector employees and over ninety
million people out of the workforce? Black and Latino unemployment rates are
already far higher than white unemployment rates. The Mexican-American
unemployment rate is between 10 and 12 percent.
Sen. Coburn: I Lost My Preferred Cancer Specialist Under
Obamacare. By Daniel Doherty
Excerpt: On Tuesday, however, he appeared on MSNBC’s morning
flagship program and informed viewers that while he’s “doing well,” he’s lost
his cancer specialist because of Obamacare, and thus will have to pay higher
medical costs out-of-pocket as a result
Excerpt: I’ve got a pen and I’ve got a phone,” Obama boasted
Tuesday as he convened his first cabinet meeting of the year. At least he did
not say he intended to govern by “pen and sword.” If Obama used to sigh to
supporters that he was not a dictator who could just implement progressive
agendas by fiat, he now seems to have done away with the pretense of regret.
House Dem: So It Looks Like Obamacare Won't Attract Enough
Young People. By Guy Benson
Excerpt: Rep. Jim Moran is retiring after his current term
ends, and I'll let Millie Hemingway remind you of
the
many reasons why that's good news. But
perhaps the ticking clock on his career has freed the Virginia Democrat up to
say things that don't necessarily hew the party line. On Obamacare's
demographic struggles, Moran says he fears the
problems
may persist, disrupting the law's financial
framework in the process:
OUTRAGEOUS: Feminazi
Says, ‘I Look Down on Young Women with Husbands and Kids and I’m Not
Sorry. By Amy Glass
Excerpt: Every time I hear someone say that feminism is
about validating every choice a woman makes I have to fight back vomit. Do
people really think that a stay at home mom is really on equal footing with a
woman who works and takes care of herself? There’s no way those two things are
the same. It’s hard for me to believe it’s not just verbally placating these
people so they don’t get in trouble with the mommy bloggers.
Green
Drought: For the sake of the smelt, California
farmland lies fallow. By Charles C. W. Cooke
Excerpt: “We have the greatest factory anywhere on earth,”
Harris Farms’ executive vice president, William Bourdeau, tells me, as our car
bumps rapidly along the dirty, uneven track. “These are pistachio trees,” he
says, sweeping his hand across the horizon. “Over there, we have asparagus.” He
points through the windshield. “And in that facility, we process garlic.” (Yep,
the environmentalists can really mess things up in big ways for really tiny
reasons. This is a great example of how generally good causes can spawn really
not so good results. --Del)