* 11/2/09--....In a commentary published Oct. 23, the official news agency IRNA boasted: "If Iran wants to build nuclear weapons, it has no problem with fissile material." Emphasizing the point, it declared that Iran had reached "the threshold or breakout" stage, meaning it has the wherewithal to become a nuclear power. In a speech Thursday, President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad described the latest negotiations as "a diplomatic victory" for his administration. He said he welcomed "nuclear cooperation" with the 5+1 group -- but would not accept the deal in "the form presented to us." Even if Iran had accepted the original deal, the real question would have remained intact: Should Iran comply with Security Council resolutions or not? The true dispute is over forcing Iran to shut down its uranium-enrichment program altogether, not about helping Iran with a higher grade of uranium. By ignoring the UN resolutions, the 5+1 are giving Iran a license to build the bomb.--Amir Taheri, NY Post
* 11/2/09--Hillary Clinton is crowing. An "historic deal!" Yes, we have successfully bullied the Honduran government into returning to power, albeit temporarily, Hugo Chavez’s stooge Manuel Zelaya to the presidency. He, of course, is the one convinced that Israeli agents were bombarding him with rays while he was holed up in the Brazilian embassy. With a proviso (more in a minute), Zelaya will return to the presidency, and then elections will proceed in November. The Obami are delighted with their handiwork. But we are not yet done, because that proviso is approval by the Honduran Congress, which in effect means emasculating the very body that sought to remove Zelaya for his unconstitutional power grab in the first place. The New York Times dryly notes, “It was not clear what would happen if the Honduran Congress rejected the deal.” The lesson should be clear now for small democracies: be prepared to have the Obama administration pressure and cajole you for the sake of … well, of what? It isn’t quite clear what this stunt was all about. Ingratiating ourselves with Chavez? Living down some American liberals’ guilt about past American policy in the region? Or maybe it was pure stubbornness, an unwillingness on the part of the Obama team to admit that it had staked its reputation on a crackpot. Nevertheless, Honduras can join the list of democracies (Poland, the Czech Republic, Israel) that are finding out how uncomfortable it can be to have America as your “ally.”-Commentary Magazine
* 11/4/09--(AP)--WASHINGTON – Independents who swept Barack Obama to a historic 2008 victory broke big for Republicans on Tuesday as the GOP wrested political control from Democrats in Virginia and New Jersey, a troubling sign for the president and his party heading into an important midterm election year. Conservative Republican Bob McDonnell's victory in the Virginia governor's race over Democrat R. Creigh Deeds and moderate Republican Chris Christie's ouster of unpopular New Jersey Gov. Jon Corzine was a double-barreled triumph for a party looking to rebuild after being booted from power in national elections in 2006 and 2008. Elsewhere on Tuesday, Maine voters rejected a state law that would allow same-sex couples to wed. If supporters had prevailed, it would have marked the first time that the electorate in any state endorsed gay marriage. And Democrat Bill Owens captured a GOP-held vacant 23rd Congressional District seat in New York in a race that highlighted fissures in the Republican Party and illustrated hurdles the GOP could face in capitalizing on any voter discontent with Obama and Democrats next fall. California Lt. Gov. John Garamendi, also a Democrat, won a special election to a vacant congressional seat, Ohio voters approved casinos and a slew of cities selected mayors, including New York, which gave Michael Bloomberg a third term. The outcomes of Virginia and New Jersey were sure to feed discussion about the state of the electorate, the status of the diverse coalition that sent Obama to the White House and the limits of the president's influence — on the party's base of support and on moderate current lawmakers he needs to advance his legislative priorities. His signature issue of health care reform was dealt a blow hours before polls closed when Senate Democratic leader Harry Reid signaled that Congress may not complete health care legislation this year, missing Obama's deadline and pushing debate into a congressional election year. Democrats in swing-voting states and moderate-to-conservative districts may be less willing to back Obama on issues like health care after Virginia and New Jersey showed there are limits to how much he can protect his rank and file from fallout back home. The president had personally campaigned for Deeds and Corzine, seeking to ensure that independents and base voters alike turned out even if he wasn't on the ballot — and voters still rejected them. Thus, the losses were blots on Obama's political standing to a certain degree and suggested potential problems ahead as he seeks to achieve his policy goals, protect Democratic majorities in Congress and expand his party's grip on governors' seats next fall. Interviews with voters leaving polling stations in both states were filled with reasons for Democrats to be concerned and for Republicans to be optimistic, particularly about independents — the crown jewel of elections because they often determine outcomes. Independents were a critical part of Obama's victory in Virginia, New Jersey and across the country. But after more than a year of recession, they fled from Democrats in the two states, where the economy trumped all. The Associated Press exit polls showed that nearly a third of voters in Virginia described themselves as independents, and nearly as many in New Jersey did. They preferred McDonnell by almost a 2-1 margin over Deeds in Virginia, and Christie over Corzine by a similar margin. Last year, independents split between Obama and Republican John McCain in both states. In Virginia, McDonnell won by big margins in rapidly growing, far-flung Washington, D.C., suburbs — places like Loudoun and Prince William counties — that Republicans historically have won but where Obama prevailed last fall by winning over independents and swing voters. Republicans swept all three statewide Virginia offices up for election: governor, lieutenant governor and attorney general. "Bob McDonnell's victory gives Republicans tremendous momentum heading into 2010," declared Haley Barbour, chairman of the Republican Governors Association. "His focus on ideas and pocketbook issues will serve as a model for Republicans running next year." Said Tim Kaine, the Democratic National Committee chairman and the term-limited Virginia governor: "We are disappointed." In both states, the surveys also suggested the Democrats had difficulty turning out their base, including the large numbers of first-time minority and youth voters whom Obama attracted. The Virginia electorate was whiter in 2009 than it was in 2008, when blacks and Hispanics voted in droves to elect the country's first black president. Democratic victories in both Virginia, a new swing state, and New Jersey, a Democratic stronghold, in 2005 preceded big Democratic years nationally in 2006 and 2008. Tuesday's impact on Obama's popularity and on the 2010 elections could easily be overstated. Voters are often focused on local issues and local personalities. Yet, national issues, like the recession, were clearly a factor, with voter attitudes shaped to some degree by how people feel about the state of their nation — and their place in it. And, voter attitudes — particularly among independents — could bode ill for Democrats in moderate districts and in swing states like Ohio, Colorado and Nevada, should they remain unchanged when the party seeks to defend its turf next fall. In 2010, most governors, a third of the Senate and all members in the House will be on ballots. It's also difficult to separate Obama from the outcomes after he devoted a significant chunk of time working to persuade voters to elect Deeds in Virginia and re-elect Corzine in New Jersey. More than four in 10 voters in Virginia said their view of Obama factored into their choice on Tuesday, and those voters roughly split between expressing support and opposition for the president. People who said they disapprove of Obama's job performance voted overwhelmingly Republican, and those who approve of the president favored Deeds, the Democrat. The Obama factor was similar in New Jersey, though there were slightly more voters who said the president did not factor into their choice.
* 11/4/09--Big Hollywood has already posted a couple of disturbing videos of young school children singing/speaking praises to President Obama, but when eleven more dropped in our email box it came as quite a shock. What seemed like an aberration now appears to be a troubling pattern. Maybe “epidemic” is a better word. Each one of the videos below is creepier than the last because the further down you go, the younger the children — brace yourself for kindergartners – except for the last and most disturbing video, which you have to see to believe. Young captive minds, easily influenced, eager for direction, enlisted into a cult of personality focused on an individual who, other than being the first black president, has yet to accomplish anything of significance. But Obama’s skin color has nothing to do with this. Does anyone interested in retaining their merit badge for intellectual honesty really want to argue that Condi Rice or J.C. Watts would’ve spawned a dozen-and-counting tribute videos? This is about brainwashing our children into Leftist identity politics. Sure, the schools can argue that they had some kind of parental permission — which, if true, is somehow even more disturbing — but who even considers doing something like this with young minds? That’s a rhetorical question. --Big Hollywood, Breitbart.com
* 11/5/09--WASHINGTON (Reuters) - A key U.S. Senate environment committee approved a Democratic climate change bill on Thursday that would require industry to cut emissions of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases 20 percent by 2020 from 2005 levels. The bill approved by the Environment and Public Works Committee will now become one of several initiatives in the Senate aimed at attacking global warming. But they are unlikely to produce legislation that would be voted on by the full Senate until next year at the earliest. With Republicans boycotting the environment panel's measure, saying more analysis of the legislation was needed, 10 Democrats approved the bill and one Democrat, Senator Max Baucus, voted against it....Democrats in Congress, working on a major plank of President Barack Obama's agenda, have been anxious to show at least some progress on enacting a domestic climate change bill before December 7, when an international global warming summit convenes in Copenhagen.
--"Last week, the Pew Research Center released a poll showing that belief in, and concern for, climate change is evaporating. Belief in global warming has dropped from 71 percent in April to 57 percent; only 36 percent believe man is mostly responsible for climate change. Only 35 percent of respondents said it's a 'very serious problem,' down from 41 percent. This is after more than a decade of near-relentless fearmongering -- er, sorry, 'education' -- from Al Gore, academia and Hollywood. They can't persuade the American people to spend trillions for less than a degree Celsius of cooling a century from now. No doubt the fact that neither climate models nor doomsday predictions have panned out (there has been no increase in global temperatures since 1998) is a big part of the story. But my hunch is that the bigger reason for the shift is that Democrats are threatening to really do something about it, and the costs no longer seem hypothetical. Throw in a bad economy, and Americans simply balk. And that's Americans -- the notion that China, India and Brazil are going to don carbon handcuffs is just silly. Those countries want to get rich, and they'll gladly sell their carbon to do it. But the anti-global-warming industry seems to be on autopilot, churning out books that only half-jokingly propose eating your pets. Others insist that Americans will have to restrict themselves to only one child, just like in authoritarian China. If those are the costs, free people will not pay them." --National Review editor Jonah Goldberg
* 11/6/09--President Obama didn't wait long after Tuesday's devastating elections to give critics another reason to question his leadership, but this time the subject matter was more grim than a pair of governorships. After news broke out of the shooting at the Fort Hood Army post in Texas, the nation watched in horror as the toll of dead and injured climbed. The White House was notified immediately and by late afternoon, word went out that the president would speak about the incident prior to a previously scheduled appearance. At about 5 p.m., cable stations went to the president. The situation called for not only his trademark eloquence, but also grace and perspective. But instead of a somber chief executive offering reassuring words and expressions of sympathy and compassion, viewers saw a wildly disconnected and inappropriately light president making introductory remarks. At the event, a Tribal Nations Conference hosted by the Department of Interior's Bureau of Indian affairs, the president thanked various staffers and offered a "shout-out" to "Dr. Joe Medicine Crow -- that Congressional Medal of Honor winner." Three minutes in, the president spoke about the shooting, in measured and appropriate terms. Who is advising him? Anyone at home aware of the major news story of the previous hours had to have been stunned. An incident like this requires a scrapping of the early light banter. The president should apologize for the tone of his remarks, explain what has happened, express sympathy for those slain and appeal for calm and patience until all the facts are in. That's the least that should occur. Indeed, an argument could be made that Obama should have canceled the Indian event, out of respect for people having been murdered at an Army post a few hours before. That would have prevented any sort of jarring emotional switch at the event. Did the president's team not realize what sort of image they were presenting to the country at this moment? The disconnect between what Americans at home knew had been going on -- and the initial words coming out of their president's mouth was jolting, if not disturbing. It must have been disappointing for many politically aware Democrats, still reeling from the election two days before. The New Jersey gubernatorial vote had already demonstrated that the president and his political team couldn't produce a winning outcome in a state very friendly to Democrats (and where the president won by 15 points one year ago). And now this? Congressional Democrats must wonder if a White House that has burdened them with a too-heavy policy agenda over the last year has a strong enough political operation to help push that agenda through. If the president's communications apparatus can't inform -- and protect -- their boss during tense moments when the country needs to see a focused commander-in-chief and a compassionate head of state, it has disastrous consequences for that president's party and supporters. All the president's men (and women) fell down on the job Thursday. And Democrats across the country have real reason to panic. --NBCChicago.com
* 11/6/09--THE world burns. We're bogged down. And we're still waiting for anyone in the White House, Congress or the Pentagon to explain clearly why Afghan dirt is worth American deaths while drug-cartel outlaws wage war in our nation's streets. Given its naiveté and malice, the "peacemaking" Obama administration may end up responsible for more deaths, here and abroad, than any "warmongering" presidencies in our time. --Ralph Peters, NY Post
* 11/6/09--WASHINGTON (AP) -- The unemployment rate has surpassed 10 percent for the first time since 1983 -- and is likely to go higher. Nearly 16 million people can't find jobs even though the worst recession since the Great Depression has apparently ended. Many economists worry that persistently high unemployment could undermine the recovery by restraining consumer spending, which accounts for 70 percent of the economy. The Labor Department said Friday that jobless rate rose to 10.2 percent, the highest since April 1983, from 9.8 percent in September. The economy shed a net total of 190,000 jobs in October, less than the downwardly revised 219,000 lost in September, but more than economists expected. The jump in the jobless rate reflects a sharp increase in the tally of unemployed Americans, which rose to 15.7 million from 15.1 million. The net loss of jobs occurred across most industries, from manufacturing and construction to retail and financial. That tally is based on a separate survey of businesses. Economists say the unemployment rate could climb as high as 10.5 percent next year because employers remain reluctant to hire. Counting those who have settled for part-time jobs or stopped looking for work, the unemployment rate would be 17.5 percent, the highest on records dating from 1994.
* 11/6/09--The Department of Labor released its jobs numbers this morning and the news is not good: 10.2 percent unemployment, up 0.4 percent from last month. For some reason, we're reminded of Vice President Joe Biden's Sept. 24 statement: "In my wildest dreams, I never thought [the stimulus] would work this well." Of course, Barack Obama has promised to "save or create" 3.5 million jobs by the end of next year, so he had better start showing some progress. The White House reports that so far this year, 640,000 jobs were "saved or created," but the Associated Press, of all places, didn't buy it. The normally reliable Obama news organ actually reviewed the report and found it to be a little bit off. "An Associated Press review of the latest stimulus reports -- which the White House promised would undergo extensive reviews to ensure accuracy -- found that more than two-thirds of 14,506 jobs credited to the recovery act under spending by just one federal office were overstated because they counted pay increases for existing workers as jobs saved," the AP reports. "The inflated job count is at least partly the product of the administration instructing local community agencies that received money to count the raises as jobs saved." The AP says that White House claims were overstated by more than 9,300 jobs just counting the $323 million in "stimulus" cash passed out by the Health and Human Services' Administration for Children and Families. Furthermore, 250 other community agencies also reported "saved" jobs that in reality were pay raises, training expenses, extended work hours or equipment purchases. HHS spokesman Luis Rosero defended the fuzzy math, saying, "If I give you a raise, it is going to save a portion of your job." Speaking of fuzzy math, Southwest Georgia Community Action in Moultrie, Georgia, which accepts Head Start money, claimed all its existing employees' jobs were saved. Strangely, though, 935 jobs were saved in an agency that employs only 508, though they say they were only following administration guidelines. Coming from the community organizer in the White House this is no surprise -- it's the same way they count Democrat votes in Chicago.--Patriot Post
* 11/6/09--The UN's nuclear watchdog has asked Iran to explain evidence suggesting that Iranian scientists have experimented with an advanced nuclear warhead design, the Guardian has learned. The very existence of the technology, known as a "two-point implosion" device, is officially secret in both the US and Britain, but according to previously unpublished documentation in a dossier compiled by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), Iranian scientists may have tested high-explosive components of the design. The development was today described by nuclear experts as "breathtaking" and has added urgency to the effort to find a diplomatic solution to the Iranian nuclear crisis. The sophisticated technology, once mastered, allows for the production of smaller and simpler warheads than older models. It reduces the diameter of a warhead and makes it easier to put a nuclear warhead on a missile. Documentation referring to experiments testing a two-point detonation design are part of the evidence of nuclear weaponisation gathered by the IAEA and presented to Iran for its response.--Guardian.co.uk
* 11/6/09--Speaker Nancy Pelosi's office tells THE WEEKLY STANDARD that the speaker will not allow the final language of the health care to be posted online for 72 hours before bringing the bill to a vote on the House floor, despite her September 24 statement that she was "absolutely" committed to doing so. House members are still negotiating important issues in the bill--whether it will provide taxpayer-funding for abortions, for example. Pelosi is pushing for a Saturday House vote, and a number of big changes will be introduced, likely less than 24 hours before the vote takes place (if in fact it does). The Rules Committee hasn't yet released its resolution, or rule, that must be passed before the bill can move from committee to the floor. The rule will set the terms of debate and determine what amendments are in order. It seems likely that the rule will allow very few, if any, up-or-down votes on amendments on the House floor. Rather, the rule will include a series of amendments that will all be adopted at once if the rule passes. On September 24, Speaker Nancy Pelosi told THE WEEKLY STANDARD that she was "absolutely" committed to putting the text of the final House bill online for 72 hours before the House votes:
TWS: Madam Speaker, do you support the measure to put the final House bill online for 72 hours before it's voted on at the very end?
PELOSI: Absolutely. Without question.
But tonight, when asked if Speaker Pelosi will leave the bill online for 72 hours after we see what's in the rule, Pelosi spokesman Brendan Daly replied in an email: "No; [the] pledge was to have manager’s amendment online for 72 hours, and we will do that." Apparently Pelosi's agreement to leave the "final" bill online "at the very end" of the process wasn't such a straightforward pledge.--WeeklyStandard.com
* 11/6/09--Up to one-fourth of the 110,000 jobs reported as saved by federal stimulus money in California probably never were in danger, a Bee review has found. California State University officials reported late last week that they saved more jobs with stimulus money than the number of jobs saved in Texas – and in 44 other states. In a required state report to the federal government, the university system said the $268.5 million it received in stimulus funding through October allowed it to retain 26,156 employees. That total represents more than half of CSU's statewide work force. However, university officials confirmed Thursday that half their workers were not going to be laid off without the stimulus dollars. "This is not really a real number of people," CSU spokeswoman Clara Potes-Fellow said. "It's like a budget number." Multiple cases of inflated and underreported job tallies have surfaced since the federal government released detailed stimulus reports last week, said Craig Jennings, a senior policy analyst at OMB Watch, a Washington, D.C.-based nonprofit group that tracks federal spending.--Sacramento Bee
* 11/6/09-- The latest economic news is bleak: Nonfarm payrolls dropped by a seasonally adjusted 190,000 in October, bringing to total number of jobs lost in the recession to 7.3 million. It was the 22nd straight decline in payrolls. Large losses were seen in manufacturing, construction and retail. Health care and temporary-help agencies added jobs. The report was worse than expected. Economists surveyed by MarketWatch were forecasting a rise in the unemployment rate to 10%, with 150,000 lost payroll jobs.
The numbers are staggering in the aggregate: “Unemployment rose by 558,000 to 15.7 million, the government said. Of those, 5.6 million had been out of work longer than six months, representing a record 35.6% of the unemployed.” And the outlook is for continued unemployment at elevated levels, “barring a policy response, for several years into the future.” But the Democrats have a policy response: they are about to vote on hundreds of billions in new taxes, a regimen of new fines and mandates for businesses, and a takeover of the health-care industry. That might make things worse, you say? Indeed. The notion that the Democratic Congress would even contemplate such a vote at this point says volume about the degree to which they are unaware of or simply don’t care about the concerns of voters — and the likely backlash that will ensue.--Contentions, Commentary Magazine
* 11/6/09--The Department of Homeland Security, now under the control of Janet Napolitano, has issued revised 287(g) agreements between DHS's Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) division and state and local law enforcement. Under the new guidelines, ICE must pre-approve any information released regarding the efforts of local police to enforce federal immigration law. In essence, it's a gag order, which DHS says is to protect the privacy of illegal aliens. "The Privacy Act [of 1974] and the privacy policy provide protections for U.S. citizens, legal permanent residents and, in the case of the privacy policy, illegal aliens," said Kelly Nantel, press secretary for ICE. The administration says local law enforcement should focus on illegals arrested for crimes, though not for simply being in the U.S. illegally. We thought that was a crime, too.--Patriot Post
* 11/6/09--Today, Ranking Member of the House Ways and Means Committee Dave Camp (R-MI) released a letter from the non-partisan Joint Committee on Taxation (JCT) confirming that the failure to comply with the individual mandate to buy health insurance contained in the Pelosi health care bill (H.R. 3962, as amended) could land people in jail. The JCT letter makes clear that Americans who do not maintain “acceptable health insurance coverage” and who choose not to pay the bill’s new individual mandate tax (generally 2.5% of income), are subject to numerous civil and criminal penalties, including criminal fines of up to $250,000 and imprisonment of up to five years. In response to the JCT letter, Camp said: “This is the ultimate example of the Democrats’ command-and-control style of governing – buy what we tell you or go to jail. It is outrageous and it should be stopped immediately.” Key excerpts from the JCT letter appear below:
“H.R. 3962 provides that an individual (or a husband and wife in the case of a joint return) who does not, at any time during the taxable year, maintain acceptable health insurance coverage for himself or herself and each of his or her qualifying children is subject to an additional tax.” [page 1]
“If the government determines that the taxpayer’s unpaid tax liability results from willful behavior, the following penalties could apply…” [page 2]
“Criminal penalties:
Prosecution is authorized under the Code for a variety of offenses. Depending on the level of the noncompliance, the following penalties could apply to an individual:
• Section 7203 – misdemeanor willful failure to pay is punishable by a fine of up to $25,000 and/or imprisonment of up to one year.
• Section 7201 – felony willful evasion is punishable by a fine of up to $250,000 and/or imprisonment of up to five years.” [page 3]
When confronted with this same issue during its consideration of a similar individual mandate tax, the Senate Finance Committee worked on a bipartisan basis to include language in its bill that shielded Americans from civil and criminal penalties. The Pelosi bill, however, contains no similar language protecting American citizens from civil and criminal tax penalties that could include a $250,000 fine and five years in jail. “The Senate Finance Committee had the good sense to eliminate the extreme penalty of incarceration. Speaker Pelosi’s decision to leave in the jail time provision is a threat to every family who cannot afford the $15,000 premium her plan creates. Fortunately, Republicans have an alternative that will lower health insurance costs without raising taxes or cutting Medicare,” said Camp. According to the Congressional Budget Office the lowest cost family non-group plan under the Speaker’s bill would cost $15,000 in 2016.--Republicans.waysandmeans.house.gov
* 11/6/09--The Fort Hood terrorist is being portrayed as an "anomaly," an "aberration," a "lone wolf." Sadly, he's just one of many examples of jihadist traitors in the ranks of the military. Together they form a dangerous Fifth Column, and the Pentagon — thanks to institutionalized political correctness — is doing next to nothing to root them out. Instead, brass are actively recruiting Muslim soldiers — whose ranks have swelled to more than 15,000 — and catering to their faith by erecting mosques even at Marine headquarters in Quantico, Va. More, they're hiring Muslim chaplains endorsed by radical Islamic front groups, who convert and radicalize soldiers. In the wake of the worst domestic military-base massacre in U.S. history, this is an outrage to say the least. And the PC blinders explain how Fort Hood commanders could have failed so horrifically in protecting their force from the internal threat there. The terrorist suspect, an Islamic fanatic, penetrated deep into the Army's officer corps before gunning down, execution-style, more than 40 of his fellow soldiers. Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan allegedly killed 13 at the Texas post, which boasts some 40 Muslims. Witnesses say he shouted "Allahu Akbar" — Allah is great! — before opening fire in a crowded building where troops were sitting ducks, waiting to deploy to Iraq and Afghanistan, both wars that Hasan angrily opposed. "Muslims should stand up and fight the aggressor," he reportedly said earlier this year, referring to the U.S. — the country he swore to protect.--Investor's Business Daily
* 11/7/09--On Thursday afternoon, a radicalized Muslim US Army officer shouting, "Allahu akbar!" ("God is great!") committed the worst act of terror on American soil since 9/11. And no one wants to call it an act of terror or associate it with Islam. What cowards we are. Political correctness killed those patriotic Americans at Fort Hood as surely as the Islamist gunman did. And the media treat it like a case of nondenominational shoplifting. This was a terrorist act. When an extremist plans and executes a murderous plot against our unarmed soldiers to protest our efforts to counter Islamist fanatics, it's an act of terror. Period. When the terrorist posts anti-American hate speech on the Web; apparently praises suicide bombers and uses his own name; loudly criticizes US policies; argues (as a psychiatrist, no less) with his military patients over the worth of their sacrifices; refuses, in the name of Islam, to be photographed with female colleagues; lists his nationality as "Palestinian" in a Muslim spouse-matching program and parades around central Texas in a fundamentalist playsuit -- well, it only seems fair to call this terrorist an "Islamist terrorist." But the president won't. Despite his promise to get to all the facts. Because there's no such thing as "Islamist terrorism" in ObamaWorld.--Ralph Peters, NY Post (He also said that he was "a Muslim first and an American second")
* 11/7/09--WASHINGTON -- President Obama said yesterday the entire nation is grieving for those slain at Fort Hood, and he urged people not to jump to conclusions while law-enforcement officers investigate the shootings. Obama met yesterday morning with FBI Director Robert Mueller and other top officials to get an update on what they've learned. Thirteen people were killed and at least 38 others injured in the shooting rampage at the Texas Army post Thursday. "We don't know all the answers yet. And I would caution against jumping to conclusions until we have all the facts," Obama said in a Rose Garden statement otherwise devoted to the economy. (AP)
* 11/7/09--House Democrats may finally be taking note of voters' fears of ObamaCare. The Dems were planning to pass their bill today, but Speaker Nancy Pelosi & Co. yesterday realized it might fail, and mulled delaying the vote. Here's a better idea: Give it up. There's no reason, after all, for them to follow the White House like lemmings down a path as dangerous to their party's electoral future as it is to the country. Indeed, that their trillion-dollar bill even remains a priority -- while unemployment has hit 10.2 percent, highest in 26 years, as was reported yesterday -- is a fair measure of their tone-deafness. It's no surprise, of course, that Pelosi wants to ram this bill through fast. Tuesday's election sounded alarms about voters' wariness of massive new public-spending programs, like ObamaCare. Voters ousted incumbents in New York, New Jersey and Virginia, the latter two electing Republican governors. Independents voted with the GOP by a 2-1 margin -- exactly opposite their electoral behavior in 2006 and '08. Best get it over with, before opposition solidifies, Pelosi surely figures. But the deadline's repeated slippages point up the resistance within the Democrat's own caucus. "Blue Dog" Dems are contemplating their own re-election prospects a year from now -- and are keenly aware of the voters' wrath. So maybe they'll do themselves a favor and convince their leaders to slow down -- or, better yet, drop the bill altogether. If so, they'd be doing the nation a favor, as well.--NY Post Editorial
* 11/8/09--President Obama says his health-care overhaul -- which squeaked through the House last night -- won't hurt a bit, but taxpayers are going to feel it in their wallet. The $1.2 trillion plan, which passed by a razor-thin 220 to 215, imposes new tax surcharges on Americans who fail to buy insurance as well as businesses that don't provide coverage to their employees. One Republican joined 219 Democrats in voting for the measure in the super-tight vote -- just barely more than the 218 members required to pass it. The legislation, which features a government-run insurance option for people who don't get insurance through work, expands coverage to almost all people under the age of 65 and bans insurance companies from dropping customers because of a pre-existing condition. Democrats cleared a major hurdle to passing the legislation Friday night when they conceded to the demands of pro-choice members to add a provision to the bill banning federal funding for abortions. Obama, who has made the bill one of the centerpieces of his presidency, lauded the landmark achievement, which has eluded Democratic administrations since Harry Truman. "In an historic vote, the House of Representatives passed a bill that would finally make real the promise of quality, affordable health care for the American people," he said in a statement. But before the bill can become law, the Senate has to pass its version and the full Congress has to vote on a compromise. The House chamber looked more like a college basketball arena than government building around 11 p.m., with Democrats exploding into a raucous cheer when they reached the 218 yea votes needed for passage. They then counted down the final 10 seconds of voting in unison like it was New Year's Eve. But the Republicans had their fun as well -- waving a mocking goodbye to their counterparts and chanting "Na na na, hey hey, goodbye" -- suggesting the legislation would lead to electoral defeat. Earlier, the House defeated the GOP's health-reform proposal along mostly party lines. While 39 Democrats broke party ranks to oppose their party's bill, they managed to snag the last-minute support of Rep. Joseph Cao from Louisiana -- the sole Republican to back the legislation. Three New York Dems opposed the bill -- Michael McMahon of Staten Island, Eric Massa, whose district includes Rochester, and Scott Murphy, who represents Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand's former seat in the Hudson Valley region. A jubilant Speaker Nancy Pelosi compared the legislation to other historic Democratic programs from the past like Social Security and Medicare. "What a night," she said. --NY Post
--Furthermore, the bill raises a tax issue. Capital gains taxes will rise from 15 percent to 20 percent when the Bush tax cuts expire in January 2011, and the Democrats' bill raises them again to 25.4 percent with a surtax. That's a 69 percent increase, the result of which will be less investment, lower stock prices, economic turmoil and a drop in tax revenue. Of course, revenue is one of the gimmicks in the bill -- the Senate bill counts on 10 years of new taxes to pay for just seven years of spending. And it includes a government-run long-term insurance program that begins collecting premiums in 2011 but waits until 2016 to pay benefits. One other notable stinker is a tort provision that gives "incentive payments" to states that come up with "alternative medical liability law" that encourages "fair resolution" of disputes and "maintains access to affordable liability insurance." The catch is that states can't "limit attorneys' fees or impose caps on damages." DNC Chair Howard Dean was right: Democrats don't have the guts to stand up to their ambulance-chasing sugar daddies. Meanwhile, some 11 amendments requiring members of Congress to be enrolled in the public plan were rejected by Democrats. What's good for the goose is apparently not so appealing to the gander. And so the unconstitutional attempted takeover of one-sixth of the U.S. economy marches on.--Patriot Post
* 11/9/09--Saturday's vote to create a massive government-run health-insurance program is to Nancy Pelosi and her Democrats what the Battle of Gettysburg was to the South. It will be remembered as the high point of their unswerving efforts to demand government solutions to every big problem. It was their most daring stab, deepest into enemy territory. And the creeks will fill with the political blood of the dead who charged blindly into the angry enemy fire. Long from now, gauzy-eyed liberals will tear up at the memory of those who pressed forward through the mindless carnage despite knowing full well the sure fate staring back at them. For years, they will reminisce about which way who voted and how they were never the same after that. And, like Gettysburg and the Confederacy, the vote will mark the beginning of the end for Pelosi and her doomed crew. It wasn't as if she didn't see it coming. Pelosi watched last week's elections -- in which her party lost two governorships, even one in Blue Jersey -- and, like all her members, saw that no matter how popular President Obama remains even today, he can't protect anybody in trouble back home. Unless he's on the ballot with them. And next year -- when all House members face re-election and Pelosi's majority is put up for a vote -- Obama will not be on the ballot. That's exactly why Pelosi, sensing that her members were getting rabbity, shoved through her health-care scheme near midnight on the first weekend she could.
Look, she probably told her nervous members, the first part of this bill is just tax hikes on small businesses, and I know you don't have a problem with that. The real disaster isn't until we get this thing up and running and turn American medicine into the US postal system. And that, she likely told them, won't be until after next year's elections. That, along with some torturous arm-twisting, got her just the number of votes she needed. The question now is whether Democrats in the notoriously cautious Senate will mount a similar suicidal charge up the hopeless hill.--Charles Hurt, NY Post
--According to a press release from Minority Leader John Boehner (R-OH), "What is even more alarming is that a monthly abortion premium will be charged of all enrollees in the government-run plan. It's right there on line 16, page 96, section 213, under 'Insurance Rating Rules.' The premium will be paid into a U.S. Treasury account -- and these federal funds will be used to pay for the abortion services." The bureaucracy created by the Pelosi bill is also staggering. The House Republican Conference counted 111 new agencies, boards and committees that will be created by this legislation. And you thought there was already too much bureaucracy in your health care. Now we will have grant programs, review boards for specific types of care, review boards for gender and ethnic-specific groups, and technological implementation boards that would intimidate the most die-hard Soviet apparatchik. The Pelosi bill seeks to create what would be the most expensive bureaucratic boondoggle in American history. It puts state-centralized European health care plans to shame, and it eclipses any previous liberal attempt to tear freedom of choice and responsibility away from the American people. There's no mincing words here. Should this bill pass, the bells will ring loudly for the "irate, tireless minority" to set a brushfire that will consume the nation.--Patriot Post
* 11/9/09--VIENNA (Reuters) - The United States is willing to give Iran time to decide whether to accept a U.N.-brokered deal meant to allay suspicions it is after atomic bombs but which has drawn Iranian objections, a U.S. diplomat said on Monday.
* 11/10/09--WASHINGTON -- Health-care legislation moving through Congress will create nothing less than a government-run system like that in Canada, according to a study released yesterday. "Regardless of whether a public option is included, the reforms under consideration in Congress would impose such rigid control on private health plans that it amounts to a government-run health-care system -- even if the insurance companies remain technically under private ownership," concludes the report by scholar Robert A. Book of the conservative-oriented Heritage Foundation. The analysis found that both the House and Senate health bills would create a "Health Choices Commissioner" who could decide which plans may be permitted, determine what they must cover, and declare premiums to be excessive. The just-passed House legislation states the commissioner "shall deny excessive premiums and premium increases" without further definition, the study says. Because the commissioner could define an essential health package that is expensive to produce, and also rule the premiums to be excessive, private plans could be forced out of business, according to the report. "In either case, the result would be no private plans," according to the analysis, with a public option being the only plan permitted to operate. "In short, while the House bill does not actually impose a single-payer, Canadian-style health-care system, it does give federal bureaucrats enough power to impose precisely such a system without any further congressional action." The House passed a 2,000-page insurance reform plan by a razor-thin 220-215 margin Saturday night. --NY Post
* 11/10/09--One of the few advantages to the country in having Congress overwhelmingly in the hands of one party is that the lack of need to compromise lets the leaders of that party reveal themselves for what they are-- in this case, people with unbounded arrogance and utter contempt for the right of ordinary people to live their lives as they see fit, much less the right to know as citizens what laws are going to be passed by their government. The question is whether voters will remember on election day in 2010. Even if this country can survive intact and unharmed after the Obama administration-- or, heaven help us, two terms of Obama-- the gullibility that led to his being elected in the first place will still be there for some other slick demagogue to come along and get the power to put the American way of life, and even our physical safety, at risk again.--Thomas Sowell, TownHall.com
* 11/10/09--US efforts to revive the Middle East process floundered Tuesday after President Barack Obama and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu held closed-door talks amid signs of friction. The two went into talks with the United States having renewed its opposition to Israeli settlements in the West Bank. Netanyahu left the White House after spending an hour and 40 minutes, without making the customary public appearance with the US president.--Breitbart.com
* 11/11/09--IF you think the final votes approving the health-care bill came down to concerns over details, you are wrong. The White House and Speaker Nancy Pelosi got their 220 votes, only two more than they needed, by what pols call horse trading. I call it bribery. The Wall Street Journal reports a handful of Democrats and the lone GOP supporter were won over by promises of goodies totally unrelated to health care. Lawmakers from California's Central Valley reportedly traded their votes for drought assistance, with one pushing for lifting endangered-species restrictions so water could be diverted. Rep. Anh Cao, a Louisiana Republican, wanted the government to forgive $1.2 billion in loans related to Hurricane Katrina. Health care? It's enough to make you sick.--Michael Goodwin, NY Post
* 11/11/09--A military setting brings out the best in President Obama's eloquence, and yesterday's Fort Hood memorial was no exception. His moving tribute to the 13 fallen soldiers contained such lines as "In a time of cynicism, they remind us of who we are as Americans" and "We are a nation that endures because of the courage of those who defend it." Yet Obama stopped short of calling the attack what it obviously was: terrorism, even treason, committed by an Army major against defenseless comrades. He hinted, but his disappointing dodge was achieved only through a parade of tortured inconsistencies. He said we are "in a time of war," but called the attack a "tragedy." He mentioned Afghanistan and Pakistan, saying "the same extremists who killed nearly 3,000 Americans continue to endanger America," but never said the same radical Islam led to the massacre. He didn't mention the killer's contacts with al Qaeda, but said, "No faith justifies these murderous and craven acts." He didn't acknowledge that Nidal Malik Hasan had shouted, "Al lahu akbar" (God is great) as he fired his guns, but the president said, "No just and loving God looks upon them with favor." Still, we can at least be grateful Obama didn't mouth the poppycock that the attack was a case of posttraumatic stress disorder. Going down that silly slope would have been a real tragedy. --Michael Goodwin, NY Post
* 11/12/09--WASHINGTON -- The worst is still to come for Democrats hoping to stop election losses, according to two polls released yesterday that found deep and broad discontent with current political leaders nationwide. The surveys suggest that next year's mid-term congressional elections could be disastrous for Democrats, who last week lost control of two governorships, in New Jersey and Virginia. In a nationwide poll by Gallup in which registered voters were asked whether they would prefer to vote for a Republican or a Democrat for Congress next year, they chose Republicans, 48 percent to 44 percent. That's a 10-point swing since July, when Democrats were favored, 50 to 44. Even more alarming for Democrats is that the independent voters who were key to President Obama's sweeping victory in last year's election have swarmed to the Republican side. Republicans now hold a 22-point advantage over Democrats among these voters, according to the latest Gallup survey. In a separate poll released yesterday of voters in the swing state of Ohio, Democratic Gov. Ted Strickland has tumbled to a 40 percent approval rating, and now runs neck-and-neck with his little-known Republican challenger.--NY Post
* 11/13/09--Friday the 13th was indeed an unlucky day for former Rep. William Jefferson (D-LA). It was the day he was sentenced to 13 years in federal prison for his participation in a bribery scheme involving a Nigerian politician -- a scheme which led to additional charges of money laundering and racketeering. U.S. District Judge T.S. Ellis III handed down the sentence, which was less than the 27 years sought by federal prosecutors, after calling the case "the most extensive and pervasive pattern of corruption in the history of Congress" and "a cancer on the body politic." Jefferson was also ordered to repay over $470,000 to the government, but prospects of repayment are slim as the former congressman and his wife recently filed for bankruptcy. Jefferson has 10 days to appeal; otherwise, he'll be movin' on up to a federal corrections facility to begin his sentence. --Patriot Post
(From 2/21/07--U.S. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi defended her appointment of a New Orleans congressman suspected of corruption when he was found with $90,000 in cash in his freezer. Pelosi has appointed Congressman William Jefferson, D-La., to the U.S. House Homeland Security Committee, sparking criticism from Republicans. --Digg.com)
* 11/13/09--When the tall, skinny guy from Illinois was elected president a year ago, many Americans were hoping for another Honest Abe. Ironically, they seem to have gotten George McClellan -- the timorous general Lincoln had to fire for refusing to fight the Civil War. When it came to combat, McClellan just couldn't make up his mind. Nor, it seems, can President Obama. It's been two-plus months and counting since Obama announced he was reconsidering his options for the war in Afghanistan. Now those options are being rewritten yet again -- which likely will delay the president's announcement of a new Afghan strategy until well into December. Last week, word from the White House was that Obama was prepared to give Gen. Stanley McChrystal, the top US commander, about 34,000 of the 40,000 troops he's requested. But now Ambassador Karl Eikenberry is telling Obama not to send any more troops to Afghanistan until President Hamid Karzai proves he will tackle corruption -- a course also favored by Vice President Joe Biden. And the White House publicly warned Karzai that "our commitment is not open-ended" and "governance in Afghanistan must improve in a reasonable period of time." No wonder French Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner has wondered aloud why Obama is leaving his ostensible NATO allies -- who may be called on to provide more troops -- completely in the dark. "Where are the Americans?" he asked. "It begins to be a problem. We need to talk to each other as allies." It isn't any clearer to the American people or to members of Congress -- most of whom are wondering just what's taking the president so long to make a decision. After all, it's been eight months since Obama announced that he'd decided on a "comprehensive new strategy" -- which turned out to be no such thing. As a candidate, Barack Obama vowed to "finish the fight against al Qaeda and the Taliban." But our troops can't finish what the president won't start. As it stands, those troops are fighting a deadly holding action until Obama makes up his mind. They deserve better.--NY Post Editorial
* 11/14/09--The Obama administration's obdurate refusal to accept the reality of Islamist terrorism was underscored yet again yesterday when Attorney General Eric Holder announced that 9/11 architect Khalid Sheik Mohammed will be brought to New York to be tried as a common criminal. What an outrage. Mohammed not only admits his role in the worst terrorist attack in American history but actually boasts about it. He should have been stood up in front of a wall and shot years ago. Never mind that the trial of Mohammed and four terrorist associates is certain to devolve into a propaganda circus. Their acts were committed in furtherance of a perverted holy war against the United States; they are not American citizens -- and thus they have no legitimate claim to the constitutional protections this country affords accused criminals. Indeed, KSM and his co-terrorists -- Ramzi Binalshibh, Waleed bin Attash, Ali Abd al-Aziz Ali and Mustafa Ahmed al-Hawsawi -- all offered to plead guilty last year before a military commission and accept execution. No, the fundamental question is whether such a proceeding will make America safer, or place her at greater risk. Or, as former Attorney General Michael Mukasey put it: "Those moving this process forward should consider whether the main purpose is to protect the citizens of this country or to showcase the country's criminal-justice system -- which has been done before and which failed to impress Khalid Sheik Mohammed." Certainly, the decision represents a return to pre-9/11 sensibilities, when terrorism was seen as a law-enforcement issue, to be fought in the courtroom -- not on the battlefield. That approach yielded, among other bloody acts, the attacks on USS Cole, the World Trade Center, the Pentagon -- and, quite frankly, last week's slaughter at Fort Hood. They were acts of war, plain and simple, whether or not President Obama and Holder want to accept it. It makes no more sense to try those responsible in a civilian court than it would have been to hold a trial for the Japanese who bombed Pearl Harbor. On a purely self-interested note, New Yorkers must be wondering whether it makes sense for their city -- still a high-priority terrorist target -- to have another bull's-eye painted on its buildings. Of course it doesn't. But bringing the world's most notorious terrorists to New York for criminal trials will do just that. Alas, that's the reality of it. So here's hoping that Holder really has his heart in it -- that he will secure convictions across the board, and that he presses hard and successfully for the death penalty he's promising to seek. KSM and his crew deserve to be executed -- not as glorious martyrs, but as murderous thugs -- and the sooner, the better. Certainly America would be the safer for it.--NY Post Editorial
--When my wife and I heard the news that the five admitted 9/11 terrorists would be coming to New York for trial, I wasn't surprised that President Obama made that move. This seems to be the track record for this administration, to undo everything that was done by President Bush. But this was an act of war, and the terrorists should be treated accordingly. I think we've forgotten who the victims are. The victims can't speak -- about 3,000 people can't speak because they're not here to defend themselves. And this administration needs to start paying attention. --Al Santora's son, Christopher, was a 23-year-old probationary firefighter who was killed in the attacks on the Twin Towers.
---The father of slain Wall Street Journal reporter Daniel Pearl slammed the Obama administration's decision to hold a public trial for admitted 9/11 mastermind Khalid Sheik Mohammed -- who boasted of killing his son in Pakistan. Judea Pearl said he was "sick to the stomach" when he heard that the Justice Department decided to prosecute Mohammed in Manhattan federal court. "I don't want to hear every morning in the papers what KSM did," Pearl told The Post last night. "Danny was killed once. Now he will be killed 10 times a day. Leave him alone." His son's beheading in 2002 was caught on a gruesome video that shocked the world. "The 21st century saw three shocks," Pearl said. "The first was 9/11. The second was the killing of my son. And the third was the shock today." The reporter's outraged father, a UCLA professor, said a public trial would allow the admitted mass murderer to "boast about his cruelty" and encourage other terrorists to inflict harm. Pearl said the prosecution of Mohammed should be done in closed session to avoid giving terrorists a platform.--NY Post
--Officials are confident the Manhattan federal courthouse will be a fortress of security for the trials of alleged 9/11 plotters -- but the greater challenge lies in protecting the city from radicals seeking to seize the opportunity to strike elsewhere, sources told The Post. The concentration of law-enforcement agencies protecting the judge, lawyers and jurors could leave an unrelated landmark or symbolic structure vulnerable, said a former federal official who oversaw security at past terror trials. The courthouse is virtually impenetrable, with its thick granite construction, round-the-clock perimeter guards, and high-floor courtrooms. As for protecting the principles, officials plan to use the trial that followed the 1993 World Trade Center bombing as a blueprint. During that trial, cops surrounded the courthouse, nearby roads were closed and helicopters hovered above.--NY Post
--The repeated waterboarding of admitted 9/11 mastermind Khalid Sheik Mohammed could imperil a new effort to convict him in civilian court, experts said yesterday. Mohammed was subjected to the technique -- in which water is poured over one's face to create the sensation of drowning....Defense lawyers could seek to have the case or at least evidence obtained through the since-banned technique tossed out. "I'm sure it will be raised by Mohammed's lawyers," said Gerald Zerkin, the federal defender who represented the so-called "20th hijacker," Zacarias Moussaoui". . . We know the nature of the interrogation is going to create issues." Former Justice Department official Pat Rowan downplayed such concerns, telling The Associated Press that "they won't need to use any coerced confessions in order to demonstrate guilt." (AP)--(Though some report Khalid Sheik Mohammed as being waterboarded 183 times in 2003, by his own admission, he says it only happened five times. The CIA says all it took was once, before he gave up all his valuable intel.)
---"By the time Obama came to office, KSM was ready to go before a military commission, plead guilty and be executed. It's Obama who blocked a process that would have yielded the swiftest and most certain justice. Indeed, the perfect justice. Whenever a jihadist volunteers for martyrdom, we should grant his wish. Instead, this one, the most murderous and unrepentant of all, gets to dance and declaim at the scene of his crime. [Attorney General Eric] Holder himself told The Washington Post that the coming New York trial will be 'the trial of the century.' The last such was the trial of O.J. Simpson." --columnist Charles Krauthammer
* 11/14/09--WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The United States reversed policy on Wednesday and said it would back launching talks on a treaty to regulate arms sales as long as the talks operated by consensus, a stance critics said gave every nation a veto. The decision, announced in a statement released by the U.S. State Department, overturns the position of former President George W. Bush's administration, which had opposed such a treaty on the grounds that national controls were better. U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said the United States would support the talks as long as the negotiating forum, the so-called Conference on the Arms Trade Treaty, "operates under the rules of consensus decision-making." "Consensus is needed to ensure the widest possible support for the Treaty and to avoid loopholes in the Treaty that can be exploited by those wishing to export arms irresponsibly," Clinton said in a written statement....The main opponent of the treaty in the past was the U.S. Bush administration, which said national controls were better. Last year, the United States accounted for more than two-thirds of some $55.2 billion in global arms transfer deals. Arms exporters China, Russia and Israel abstained last year in a U.N. vote on the issue. The proposed treaty is opposed by conservative U.S. think tanks like the Heritage Foundation, which said last month that it would not restrict the access of "dictators and terrorists" to arms but would be used to reduce the ability of democracies such as Israel to defend their people. The U.S. lobbying group the National Rifle Association has also opposed the treaty.
--The Obama administration intends to force gun control and a complete ban on all weapons for US citizens through the signing of international treaties with foreign nations. By signing international treaties on gun control, the Obama administration can use the US State Department to bypass the normal legislative process in Congress. Once the US Government signs these international treaties, all US citizens will be subject to those gun laws created by foreign governments. These are laws that have been developed and promoted by organizations such as the United Nations and individuals such as George Soros and Michael Bloomberg. The laws are designed and intended to lead to the complete ban and confiscation of all firearms.--email circulating on Internet
* 11/16/09--CNN was so sick of Lou Dobbs, it gave him an $8 million severance package to leave, The Post has learned. "They wanted him out," according to a source. Dobbs, who a source said had a year and a half to go on his $12 million contract, shocked viewers last Wednesday by announcing he was quitting. CNN boss Jonathan Klein and Dobbs, 64, had been publicly feuding over the kind of reporting Dobbs was doing on his show -- especially stories about illegal immigration and the anti-Obama "birther" movement, which contends the president was not born in Hawaii and is not an American citizen. But it was not clear until now that CNN was willing to pay Dobbs so much money to leave. --NY Post
* 11/16/09--As he flew to Asia on Saturday, President Obama told the media in Alaska that he opposes a congressional investigation into the Fort Hood massacre, saying that we must "resist the temptation to turn this tragic event into political theater." Yet, even as he was posturing against political theatrics, he had just decided that the prosecution of 9/11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed would proceed on the greatest of public stages -- New York City. With the strict evidentiary rules in force in federal civilian courts, it is easy to see how the prosecution of Mohammed could morph into an indictment of the Bush administration's interrogation techniques and waterboarding. As in rape trials, the magnitude of the underlying crime (masterminding the 9/11 attacks) might well be lost as the defense puts the victim (in this case, the government) on trial. It is not political theater itself to which Obama objects -- but theater that highlights issues that liberals would rather forget. He is quite content to let the Mohammed trial become the theater of the left. Perhaps even eager....The Fort Hood terror attack comes at an awful time for an administration trying to turn the nation's attention away from the terrorist threat. As soon as the killing spree was over, Obama hastened to call it "an act of violence" -- obscuring the obvious fact that it was the most serious terror attack on US soil since 9/11. And, as evidence mounts that the FBI was on to Major Nidal Malik Hasan for years, the president is doing his best to stop Congress from finding out why these warnings went unheeded. Even as Rep. Peter Hoekstra (R-Mich.), the ranking Republican on the House Intelligence Committee confirmed that the government knew of 10 to 20 e-mails between Hasan and a radical imam in Yemen -- who was urging the killing of American troops -- starting last December, Obama hastened to urge Congress to refrain from investigating why the danger signs were ignored. The Obama administration has a clear agenda here:
1) Stop people from focusing in how his administration permitted the worst domestic terror attack in eight years.
2) Avoid a national airing of how liberal policies -- restraints on the intelligence community, political correctness in the armed forces -- might have inhibited the military from reining in Hasan.
3) Re-ignite a firestorm on the left and abroad against the aggressive anti-terror policies of the Bush administration. Making all this particularly important for Obama are his other political needs....A public circus that focuses on waterboarding and interrogations could be just what he wants and needs.--Dick Morris, Eileen McGann
* 11/16/09--News photos of President Barack Obama bowing to Japan's emperor have incensed critics here, who said the US leader should stand tall when representing America overseas. Obama on Monday was in China having wrapped up the Japan leg of his Asia trip two days earlier. But Washington's punditocracy was still weighing whether or not the US president had disgraced his country two days earlier by having taken a deep bow at the waist while meeting Japan's Emperor Akihito. Political Talk shows have played and replayed the moment from the second day of Obama's week-long Asia tour, which set the blogosphere on fire and chat show tongues wagging. "I don't know why President Obama thought that was appropriate. Maybe he thought it would play well in Japan. But it's not appropriate for an American president to bow to a foreign one," said conservative pundit William Kristol speaking on the Fox News Sunday program, adding that the gesture bespoke a United States that has become weak and overly-deferential under Obama. Another conservative voice, Bill Bennett, said on CNN's "State of the Union" program: "It's ugly. I don't want to see it." "We don't defer to emperors. We don't defer to kings or emperors. The president of the United States -- this coupled with so many apologies from the United States -- is just another thing," said Bennett. Some conservative critics juxtaposed the image of Obama with one of former US vice president Dick Cheney, who greeted the emperor in 2007 with a firm handshake but no bow. "I'll bet if you look at pictures of world leaders over 20 years meeting the emperor in Japan, they don't bow," Kristol said. Some said the gesture was particularly grating coming after Obama's bow to Saudi Arabia's King Abdullah at a G20 meeting in April....The gesture appears to have touched a particularly raw nerve among Obama critics who said the president has hastened America's decline as a world superpower by being too apologetic and too deferential in his dealings with other world leaders.--Breitbart.com
* 11/16/09--"Last Saturday [Nov. 7], at 11 o'clock in the evening, the House of Representatives voted by a five vote margin to have the federal government manage the health care of every American at a cost of $1 trillion dollars over the next ten years. For the first time in American history, if this bill becomes law, the Feds will force you to buy insurance you might not want, or may not need, or cannot afford. If you don't purchase what the government tells you to buy, if you don't do so when they tell you to do it, and if you don't buy just what they say is right for you, the government may fine you, prosecute you, and even put you in jail. Freedom of choice and control over your own body will be lost. The privacy of your communications and medical decision making with your physician will be gone. More of your hard earned dollars will be at the disposal of federal bureaucrats. It was not supposed to be this way. We elect the government. It works for us. How did it get so removed, so unbridled, so arrogant that it can tell us how to live our personal lives? Evil rarely comes upon us all at once, and liberty is rarely lost in one stroke. It happens gradually, over the years and decades and even centuries. A little stretch here, a cave in there, powers are slowly taken from the states and the people and before you know it, we have one big monster government that recognizes no restraint on its ability to tell us how to live." --Judge Andrew Napolitano
* 11/17/09--Lou Dobbs said yesterday CNN was eager to show him the door because its top execs didn't want to offend President Obama. Dobbs made the claim last night on Fox News Channel's "The O'Reilly Factor," saying he took on President George W. Bush's immigration policy with equal force but didn't draw any CNN flak then. "I discern more of a difference between then, which was under the Bush administration when I was criticizing, and now, when it is the Obama administration -- and an entirely different tone was taken," said Dobbs. He claims both Bush and Obama are soft on illegal immigration. --NY Post
* 11/17/09--NEW YORK (AP) - The pace at which people fell behind on their mortgages slowed during the summer for the third consecutive quarter, but the overall delinquency rate hit another record, a new report shows. For the three months ended Sept. 30, 6.25 percent of U.S. mortgage loans were 60 or more days past due, according to credit reporting agency TransUnion. That's up 58 percent from 3.96 percent a year ago. Being two months behind is considered a first step toward foreclosure, because it's so hard to catch up with payments at that point.
* 11/18/09--Telling women to put off mammograms until age 50 will be a death sentence to younger women whose breast cancer could be detected early and cured, outraged doctors said yesterday. In making its recommendation that most women do not need breast cancer screening in their 40s, a federal task force declared that avoiding unnecessary biopsies and false positives are worth the likely increase in cancer deaths, Dr. David Dershaw, head of breast imaging for Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center told The Post. "Fifteen percent more women in their 40s will die of breast cancer under these recommendations," he said. "Yes, mammograms are uncomfortable and there are false positives and callbacks for biopsies, but those disadvantages to me seem clearly to outweigh the risk of dying of breast cancer." And even though these controversial new guidelines from the U.S. Preventive Services Task Force are not mandatory, the insurance industry is expected to make them official policy, experts said. Currently more than 37 million mammograms are done each year in the United States, each costing roughly $100. By chopping than figure by more than half, billions of dollars in medical costs will be spared. Earlier coverage for mammograms could also be denied, and that in turn could trigger an explosion of malpractice litigation, experts said. The New York Health Plan Association -- the trade group for health insurers -- typically follows the federal government's guidelines, a spokeswoman said. The new guidelines will be included in the HMO handbook of coverage.... Doctors yesterday said they will defy the federal guidelines -- which are advisory -- and continue to screen patients earlier to save lives. At NY Presbyterian Hospital and Health Care system, 25 percent of patients diagnosed with breast cancer are between ages 40 and 50, said breast surgeon Rache Simmons. "You're denying a lot of young, healthy dynamic women the opportunity to be cured," Simmons said. She and other medical specialists worry that once the furor dies down, HMOs will cut back on mammograms. "They will pay for less mammograms. I'm sure they would love it," Simmons said. Brooklyn gynecologist Lisa Eng said doctors worry that pushing back tests for 10 years will open the floodgates for malpractice suits. Late detection of breast cancer is the third top cause of malpractice litigation, she noted. --NY Post
* 11/18/09--Reviewing books and holding public figures accountable is at the core of good journalism, but the Associated Press' treatment of Palin's book seems an unprecedented move at the wire service....When the former Republican vice presidential candidate and former Alaska governor wrote her autobiography, the AP found a copy before its release date and assigned 11 people to fact check all 432 pages. The AP claims Palin misstated her record with regard to travel expenses and taxpayer-funded bailouts, using statements widely reported elsewhere. But it also speculated into Palin's motives for writing "Going Rogue: An American Life," stating as fact that the book "has all the characteristics of a pre-campaign manifesto." Palin quickly hit back on a Facebook post titled "Really? Still Making Things Up?" "Imagine that," the post read. "11 AP reporters dedicating time and resources to tearing up the book, instead of using the time and resources to 'fact check' what's going on with Sheik Mohammed's trial, Pelosi's health care takeover costs, Hasan's associations, etc. Amazing." The AP, an organization with over 4,000 employees and 49 Pulitzer Prizes earned for asking the hard questions, wouldn't comment on their own reporting for this story. Reviewing books and holding public figures accountable is at the core of good journalism, but the treatment Palin's book received appears to be something new for the AP. The organization did not review for accuracy recent books by the late Sen. Ted Kennedy, then-Sen. Joe Biden, either book by Barack Obama released before he was president or autobiographies by Bill or Hillary Clinton. The AP did more traditional news stories on those books. --FoxNews
* 11/19/09--WASHINGTON -- At least the wall is still great. President Obama strolled along the Great Wall yesterday before wrapping up his China trip, while back home his public approval numbers were tanking -- dropping below 50 percent for the first time. Obama's approval rating stands at just 48 percent, with 42 percent disapproval, according to the latest Quinnipiac University poll. And it's been a steady decline. His approval rating was 59 percent in May, 57 percent in July, and 50 percent in October. At the same time, the percentage of those who disapprove of his handling of the economy has spiked, going from a virtual even split in October to 52 to 43 percent disapproval now. --NY Post
* 11/19/09--As experts debate the potential speed of the US recovery, one figure looms large but is often overlooked: nearly 1 in 5 Americans is either out of work or under-employed. According to the government's broadest measure of unemployment, some 17.5 percent are either without a job entirely or underemployed. The so-called U-6 number is at the highest rate since becoming an official labor statistic in 1994. The number dwarfs the statistic most people pay attention to—the U-3 rate—which most recently showed unemployment at 10.2 percent for October, the highest it has been since June 1983. The difference is that what is traditionally referred to as the "unemployment rate" only measures those out of work who are still looking for jobs. Discouraged workers who have quit trying to find a job, as well as those working part-time but looking for full-time work or who are otherwise underemployed, count in the U-6 rate. With such a large portion of Americans experiencing employment struggles, economists worry that an extended period of slow or flat growth lies ahead.--CNBC.com
* 11/19/09--WASHINGTON - The International Atomic Energy Agency and Syria are walking a tightrope and appear to be headed toward a collision over two nuclear sites where undeclared uranium was recently found. The agency found traces of uranium at the Dair Alzour nuclear site that are not included in Syria's declared inventory, according to a just released report. The Syrians said the uranium came from the Israeli missiles used to destroy the nearby al-Kibar reactor in September 2007. The presence of uranium particles was detected at a second site near Damascus -- the Miniature Neutron Source Reactor. Syria said it came from the accumulation of samples and reference materials used in neutron activation analysis. The IAEA is not buying either of the two explanations and is pressing Damascus for more answers and wants to know from where the uranium came. The agency has run its own tests and is certain the Syrian government is not telling the truth. That's where the tightrope act comes in. The IAEA won't comment on what clearly appears to be evasive behavior by the Syrian government because of concern about its tenuous relationship with Syria. --wtop.com
* 11/19/09--Arrests of illegal immigrant workers have dropped precipitously under President Obama, according to figures released Wednesday. Criminal arrests, administrative arrests, indictments and convictions of illegal immigrants at work sites all fell by more than 50 percent from fiscal 2008 to fiscal 2009. The figures show that Mr. Obama has made good on his pledge to shift enforcement away from going after illegal immigrant workers themselves - but at the expense of Americans' jobs, said Rep. Lamar Smith of Texas, the Republican who compiled the numbers from the Department of Homeland Security's U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency (ICE). Mr. Smith, the top Republican on the House Judiciary Committee, said a period of economic turmoil is the wrong time to be cutting enforcement and letting illegal immigrants take jobs that Americans otherwise would hold. "Those stolen jobs should be returned to out-of-work citizens and legal immigrants," he said. "The Obama administration should put citizens and legal immigrants first, especially when it comes to jobs...." The numbers were released just days after Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano said the administration has made such advances on border security that Congress should now work on legalizing illegal immigrants. --Washington Times
* 11/20/09--The Democrat's health-care express is on the move again -- too quickly for Americans to absorb the long-term implications of its potentially devastating impact on the US economy. Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid unveiled his latest bill Wednesday, complete with a Congressional Budget Office analysis suggesting it would cost $849 billion over 10 years -- well below the president's $900 billion ceiling. In fact, the actual cost of the Reid bill is three times that figure. Yet Reid aims to push through a critical procedural vote on the bill this weekend, which will demonstrate whether he has the 60-vote "supermajority" needed to derail a GOP filibuster.... The Reid bill is no improvement over the radical health-care legislation that squeaked through the House two weeks ago. Let's start with its supposed cost: The CBO reached its figure only because the bill front-loads 10 years of revenue -- the taxes that take effect right away -- versus only seven years of expenses, since the plan doesn't kick in until 2014. All gimmicks aside, the 10-year cost of actual implementation of the Reid bill is a staggering $2.5 trillion. Moreover, the CBO figure relies on a 23 percent cut in Medicare reimbursements to physicians that everyone on Capitol Hill admits -- privately, anyway -- will never happen. In fact, the CBO itself acknowledges that "the long-term budgetary impact could be quite different if key provisions of the bill were ultimately changed or not put into effect." And, like House Speaker Nancy Pelosi's bill, it does next to nothing about America's real health-care problem: soaring medical costs. But, like Pelosi's bill, it provides for a "public option" that inevitably would lead to a government takeover of health care, de facto rationing, a massive expansion of Medicaid -- and billions in new taxes and private-sector mandates. No surprise, then, that the new Quinnipiac Poll shows that Americans disapprove of that plan by 51 percent to 35 percent -- with independents opposed by 2-to-1. But is Congress paying attention? The next couple of days will tell.--NY Post
* 11/20/09--Sarah Palin -- the Associated Press wants folks to believe -- is so patently unqualified as a political leader that no one, absolutely no one, could possibly take her seriously. Except, it seems, the Associated Press. Indeed, the latest example -- in which the AP sent 11 (count 'em: 11) reporters to "fact-check" Palin's new book, "Going Rogue" -- suggests that the agency is pathologically obsessed with the former Alaska governor and '08 GOP veep candidate. Gee, what on earth are they afraid of? AP didn't send 11 reporters to fact-check President Obama's two books (it didn't bother to fact-check them at all). Nor did it hold Vice President Joe Biden's books under a microscope. But Sarah Palin, who no longer even holds office, merited a platoon of reporters to dissect her every word. And to yell "Gotcha" for any minor variance from what this hit squad sees as truth. Not that the crack team actually found anything. Their inquiry turned up all of six (count 'em, six) instances of what they consider lapses. (Nearly two reporters for each one!) And what counts as a lapse? Such horrors as Palin's claim that as gov she didn't "often" stay at "high-end, robe-and-slipper" hotels. Ah, Palin just couldn't put that one past those dogged AP sleuths: They found one she did stay at. How about that? In truth, what bothers Palin's critics is not that she's unqualified or an egregious fabricator but that, in fact, she isn't. They're terrified that she's too qualified, in that she comes across as refreshingly candid and down-to-earth, that folks relate to her -- even though (horrors!) she's not an Ivy League Democrat. Well, we suspect that the AP will just have to get used to it. Tsk, tsk.--NY Post Editorial
* 11/21/09--President Obama has said it was Attorney General Eric Holder who decided to try Khalid Sheik Mohammed, the self-proclaimed 9/11 mastermind, and four other Guantanamo Bay detainees in civilian federal court in New York City. Yet, as a matter of law, that can't be true. You know, I said to the attorney general, 'make a decision based on the law,' " the president told CNN. In Holder's testimony before the Senate Judiciary Committee, he confirmed that Obama had left it up to him: "This was a tough call, and reasonable people can disagree with my conclusion that these individuals should be tried in federal court rather than a military commission." He reiterated, "I made this decision." If Holder and Obama are telling the truth, they have a problem. The attorney general has no constitutional or statutory authority to unilaterally order the Defense Department to hand over military detainees so they can stand trial in civilian court. He can no more order the military to transfer such prisoners than he can order the Air Force to bomb a particular target. (Similarly, the defense secretary has no authority to order the Justice Department to do anything.) Former Attorney General John Ashcroft noted this problem in an interview on Wednesday: "The attorney general doesn't have the authority to mandate that the secretary of defense turn somebody over to him and yield jurisdiction so that something that would have been done in a military setting is done in a civilian setting." The only one who does have the authority is the superior of both the AG and the defense secretary: President Obama himself. Evidently, this hasn't yet dawned on the administration. For this to be done legally, it can't be Holder's decision alone. Either Obama must step up to the plate and personally order the transfer of the detainees or Defense Secretary Robert Gates must jointly agree with Holder to transfer custody of the detainees. I'm betting it'll be the latter. After all, the public plainly sees the move as a huge misstep that will delay justice for years, endanger New York City and possibly reveal national-security secrets to the enemy. The Rasmussen Poll found that Americans disapprove of the decision 51 percent to 29 percent, with 19 percent uncertain. Holder endured withering criticism for "his" decision in the Senate on Wednesday. Meanwhile, the president continued his parade on the international stage -- appropriately enough, since the only community happy with the decision is that part of the international community that loves to hate the United States. It was at this point, after the well-deserved criticism started rolling in, that observers expected Obama to step up and take the leadership role -- explaining why he ordered Holder to bring the cases in civilian court and ordered Gates to transfer the detainees to Justice's custody. But that didn't happen. Instead, Obama pointed to the attorney general. The president seems to be in no hurry to take responsibility for this decision -- one of the most significant his administration has made to date. Whatever happened to President Harry Truman's principle that "the buck stops here"? --NY Post
11/24/09--On Saturday night, Senators voted to begin “official debate” on a health reform measure, a move that represented a tacit endorsement for health care reforms that have been snaking their way through Congress since the summer. Sixty votes were obtained by Senate Democrats – a supermajority – which prevented Senate Republicans from filibustering the move. The official debate session allows the Senate to hammer out specifics in the bill, including a public option, abortion funding and details of how the bill will be paid for. Each of these options could need another 60 votes for passage, meaning the fights may still get fierce. The basic framework, however, has been laid out: increased federal regulation over the health care market, increased taxes to pay for the bill and potentially some version of a public option. Saturday’s vote was a whopping victory for both Obama and Senate Democrats. The day after the vote, Democracy for America--the Democrat’s largest fundraising arm--made this announcement:…[W]e won a huge victory in the Senate when we broke the first Republican filibuster of healthcare reform. We are only weeks away from passing healthcare reform with a public option. And it's no secret; the final vote is going to be close. Amendments, more filibusters, Republicans and insurance industry Democrats stand in the way of victory. Meanwhile, Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell highlighted the potentially disastrous effects of the proposed reforms: [The bill] imposes punishing taxes on almost everyone. It raises health insurance premiums on the 85 percent of Americans who already have health insurance and, if that were not bad enough, it slashes Medicare by half a trillion dollars. Anyone who votes ‘aye’ tonight, Mr. President, is voting for all of these things. --TownHall.com
* 11/24/09--If you own any shares in alternative energy companies I should start dumping them NOW. The conspiracy behind the Anthropogenic Global Warming myth (aka AGW; aka ManBearPig) has been suddenly, brutally and quite deliciously exposed after a hacker broke into the computers at the University of East Anglia's Climate Research Unit (aka Hadley CRU) and released 61 megabites of confidential files onto the internet. When you read some of those files – including 1079 emails and 72 documents – you realise just why the boffins at Hadley CRU might have preferred to keep them confidential. As Andrew Bolt puts it, this scandal could well be “the greatest in modern science”. These alleged emails – supposedly exchanged by some of the most prominent scientists pushing AGW theory – suggest: Conspiracy, collusion in exaggerating warming data, possibly illegal destruction of embarrassing information, organised resistance to disclosure, manipulation of data, private admissions of flaws in their public claims and much more. One of the alleged emails has a gentle gloat over the death in 2004 of John L Daly (one of the first climate change sceptics), commenting: “In an odd way this is cheering news.” But perhaps the most damaging revelations – the scientific equivalent of the Telegraph’s MPs’ expenses scandal – are those concerning the way Warmist scientists may variously have manipulated or suppressed evidence in order to support their cause. Here are a few tasters. (So far, we can only refer to them as alleged emails because – though Hadley CRU’s director Phil Jones has confirmed the break-in to Ian Wishart at the Briefing Room – he has yet to fess up to any specific contents.) But if genuine, they suggest dubious practices such as:
Manipulation of evidence: "I’ve just completed Mike’s Nature trick of adding in the real temps to each series for the last 20 years (ie from 1981 onwards) amd from 1961 for Keith’s to hide the decline." Private doubts about whether the world really is heating up: "The fact is that we can’t account for the lack of warming at the moment and it is a travesty that we can’t. The CERES data published in the August BAMS 09 supplement on 2008 shows there should be even more warming: but the data are surely wrong. Our observing system is inadequate." Suppression of evidence: Can you delete any emails you may have had with Keith re AR4? Keith will do likewise. He’s not in at the moment – minor family crisis. Can you also email Gene and get him to do the same? I don’t have his new email address. We will be getting Caspar to do likewise. Fantasies of violence against prominent Climate Sceptic scientists: Next time I see Pat Michaels at a scientific meeting, I’ll be tempted to beat the crap out of him. Very tempted. Attempts to disguise the inconvenient truth of the Medieval Warm Period (MWP):……Phil and I have recently submitted a paper using about a dozen NH records that fit this category, and many of which are available nearly 2K back–I think that trying to adopt a timeframe of 2K, rather than the usual 1K, addresses a good earlier point that Peck made w/ regard to the memo, that it would be nice to try to “contain” the putative “MWP”, even if we don’t yet have a hemispheric mean reconstruction available that far back….And, perhaps most reprehensibly, a long series of communications discussing how best to squeeze dissenting scientists out of the peer review process. How, in other words, to create a scientific climate in which anyone who disagrees with AGW can be written off as a crank, whose views do not have a scrap of authority. “This was the danger of always criticising the skeptics for not publishing in the “peer-reviewed literature”. Obviously, they found a solution to that–take over a journal! So what do we do about this? I think we have to stop considering “Climate Research” as a legitimate peer-reviewed journal. Perhaps we should encourage our colleagues in the climate research community to no longer submit to, or cite papers in, this journal. We would also need to consider what we tell or request of our more reasonable colleagues who currently sit on the editorial board…What do others think?” “I will be emailing the journal to tell them I’m having nothing more to do with it until they rid themselves of this troublesome editor.”“It results from this journal having a number of editors. The responsible one for this is a well-known skeptic in NZ. He has let a few papers through by Michaels and Gray in the past. I’ve had words with Hans von Storch about this, but got nowhere. Another thing to discuss in Nice !”
....In the run up to Copenhagen, we will see more and more hysterical (and grotesquely exaggerated) stories in the Mainstream Media. And we will see ever-more-virulent campaigns conducted by eco-fascist activists, such as this risible new advertising campaign by Plane Stupid showing CGI polar bears falling from the sky and exploding because kind of, like, man, that’s sort of what happens whenever you take another trip on an aeroplane. The world is currently cooling; electorates are increasingly reluctant to support eco-policies leading to more oppressive regulation, higher taxes and higher utility bills; the tide is turning against Al Gore’s Anthropogenic Global Warming theory. The so-called “sceptical” view is now also the majority view. Unfortunately, we’ve a long, long way to go before the public mood (and scientific truth) is reflected by our policy makers. There are too many vested interests in AGW, with far too much to lose either in terms of reputation or money, for this to end without a bitter fight. But if the Hadley CRU scandal is true,it’s a blow to the AGW lobby’s credibility which is never likely to recover.--Telegraph.co.uk
* 11/24/09--WASHINGTON (AP) - The economy grew at a 2.8 percent pace last quarter, as the recovery got off to a slower start than first thought. The Commerce Department's new reading on gross domestic product wasn't as energetic as the 3.5 percent growth rate for the July-September period estimated just a month ago. The main factors behind the downgrade: consumers didn't spend as much, commercial construction was weaker and the nation's trade deficit was more of a drag on growth. Businesses also trimmed more of their stockpiles, another restraining factor.
* 11/24/09--The Rasmussen Reports daily Presidential Tracking Poll for Tuesday shows that 27% of the nation's voters Strongly Approve of the way that Barack Obama is performing his role as President. Forty-two percent (42%) Strongly Disapprove giving Obama a Presidential Approval Index rating of -15. This is the lowest Approval Index rating yet measured for President Obama. Fifty-two percent (52%) of Democrats Strongly Approve while 68% of Republicans Strongly Disapprove. Among those not affiliated with either major political party, just 16% Strongly Approve and 51% Strongly Disapprove.
* 11/25/09--President Obama has shattered the budget record for first-year presidents -- spending nearly double what his predecessor did when he came into office and far exceeding the first-year tabs for any other U.S. president in history. In fiscal 2009 the federal government spent $3.52 trillion -- $2.8 trillion in 2000 dollars, which sets a benchmark for comparison. That fiscal year covered the last three-and-a-half months of George W. Bush's term and the first eight-and-a-half months of Obama's. That price tag came with a $1.4 trillion deficit, nearly $1 trillion more than last year. The overall budget was about a half-trillion more than Bush's for 2008, his final full fiscal year in office. That's a big increase. But compared with other presidents' first years in office, Obama is running circles around them. Bush spent $1.8 trillion in 2001, according to government budget figures that have been adjusted for inflation based on 2000 dollars. Using the same formula, former President Bill Clinton spent $1.6 trillion in 1993. The last president to clock in under $1 trillion was Gerald Ford, who logged a $982 billion budget in 1975. Post-war Dwight Eisenhower even brought Uncle Sam's tab down to $556 billion in his first year, 1953. Obama's first-year budget, adjusted for inflation, is about five times that. His 2009 budget is also close to 21 percent of that for Clinton's eight years in office -- Clinton's spending added up to $13.5 trillion over his two full terms. Bush spent $16.8 trillion from 2001-2008.--FoxNews.com
* 11/25/09--(Obama's) slide is prompting some beleaguered supporters to argue that expectations for his presidency were naively high. Laugh out loud at that one. He set those expectations with messianic-like promises, such as the claim his election would mark "the moment when the rise of the oceans began to slow and our planet began to heal." No sign of that yet, but unemployment and the deficit are soaring. And speaking of the planet, some of his climate-change advisers have been cooking the books by hiding inconvenient data and squelching dissent. So much for science and transparency. Oh, and the phony stimulus job stats don't pass the smell test. Recent events perfectly capture his problem. Still undecided after reviewing Afghan policy for over three months, Obama opted for a bowing-and-scraping trip to Asia. The long visit was a waste of time and showed "disturbing amateurishness in managing America's power," writes Leslie Gelb, a foreign-policy expert whose book aims to help guide Obama. Apparently, the president didn't read it. Obama then marked his return home with his 25th golf outing and a promise that "I will not rest until . . . businesses are hiring again and people have work again." He should get his rest. It's the golf he should give up. His choice of words at the Monday photo op was also revealing. His obsession with health-care bills surfaced as he saw an "urgent need for us to get to the finish line," before conceding that most people are focused on "jobs and the economy." Indeed they are. So why isn't he? --Michael Goodwin, NY Post
* 11/25/09--Three Navy SEALs involved in nabbing one of Iraq's most wanted terrorists are reportedly facing criminal charges related to his capture -- all because he claimed he had a bloody lip. The SEALs took down Ahmed Hasim Abed, the alleged mastermind of a ghastly 2004 incident in which four American contractors who worked security for Blackwater USA, were murdered in Fallujah and two of the bodies were hung from a bridge over the Euphrates River. But instead of being praised as heroes, the SEALs are all facing charges and have hired lawyers, FoxNews.com reported. The three enlisted men, Petty Officers Matthew McCabe, Jonathan Keefe and Julio Huertas, got into hot water after Abed, whose military code name was "Objective Amber," said his captors had punched him. To prove it, he showed off the bloody lip. A legal source told Fox News that Abed made the complaint when he was in the hands of Iraqi authorities, causing him to be returned to American custody. An official investigation was launched and led to the three SEALs. McCabe was charged with assault, dereliction of performance of duty for willfully failing to safeguard a detainee as well as making a false official statement. Keefe and Huertas were both charged with dereliction of performance of duty and making a false official statement. Huertas was also charged with impeding an investigation. All three have refused a non-judicial punishment -- called an admiral's mast -- and have requested courts-martial. They will be arraigned on Dec. 7. --NY Post
* 11/25/09--Federal bills aimed at climate change are "on life support," Rep. Peter King said yesterday, as fellow Republicans launched probes into shocking e-mails suggesting that scientists cooked the books to hype global warming. "It will have some impact in slowing down or stopping the cap-and-trade bill," King (Nassau) said yesterday, "especially given the bad economy we have now." He was referring to the bills -- the House version narrowly passed, and the Senate one that hasn't been voted on -- to cap emissions and energy use by hiking the costs of gas and energy. Critics and analysts have pointed out that the new figures would hit Americans hard in the wallet, because energy and fuel companies would likely pass the new costs on to consumers. But fallout from hacked e-mails, which seemed to show that climate-change researchers manipulated data to make global warming appear worse than it is, are likely to impact the cap-and-trade bills, King said. The e-mails were from researchers affiliated with the Climate Research Unit at the University of East Anglia in England. The hacked e-mails also appear to show scientists scheming to try to suppress the analysis of other researchers who are more skeptical about the threat of greenhouse gases. Global-warming skeptics in Congress promptly said fudged data was being used to justify the cap-and-trade legislation.--NY Post
---The (New York Times) Web site showed that its real motto is "All the inconvenient news that's fit to suppress." The Times' top environmental blogger, Andrew Revkin, refused to reprint damning e-mails leaked by a hacker showing a trail of manipulated climate-change data. The Times had no problem exposing national-security secrets to undermine Bush. But shed light on scientific hoaxes that undermine Al Gore? Unethical! --Michelle Malkin
* 11/25/09--Last month, the Obama administration bragged that $160 billion in spending authorized by the $787 billion Recovery Act had "created or saved 640,329 direct jobs" as of Sept. 30. Last week, the Government Accountability Office (GAO) reported that 58,386 of these jobs were tied to projects that had not spent any money yet. Whoops. Meanwhile, newspapers across the country have been digging up one example after another of erroneous job numbers, including premature reporting, double counting, stray zeros, raises counted as new jobs, jobs created in congressional districts that do not exist, phantom jobs attributed to housing assistance for low-income renters and minor purchases that, like the Army Corps' boot order, are implausibly credited with creating several jobs each. David Freddoso and Mark Hemingway of The Washington Examiner are keeping track of these reports, and as of this writing they count 90,489 jobs "not really created or saved." The biggest source of uncertainty about these numbers is the very notion of a job "saved." While "recipients are expected to report accurately on their use of funds," the GAO notes, "what they are less able to say is what they would have done without the benefit of the program." Since the Obama administration mixes the mushy jobs "saved" in with the firmer jobs "created," it's hard to tell which is which. But two-thirds of the jobs are attributed to Education Department spending, and these are overwhelmingly public school positions that allegedly would have been lost to layoffs without federal aid. The New York Times reports that "some school districts said that they might not have actually laid off teachers without the stimulus money." The Times is too polite to add that the rest -- the ones that claim they're sure these jobs would have been cut but for the federal money -- are lying. In the face of uncertainty, recipients of federal money aimed at boosting employment have a powerful incentive to err on the side of reporting more jobs rather than fewer. Even if recipients are honest, diligent and psychic, the jobs they report are not, strictly speaking, jobs. Instead, they are "full-time equivalents": the number of hours in a quarter for which employees are paid with Recovery Act money, divided by a full three months of work. This calculation invites recipients to inflate their numbers by counting all hours on stimulus-funded projects, instead of just the hours worked by people who otherwise would have been unemployed. Even when done correctly, the quarter-by-quarter accounting exaggerates the number of "direct jobs" linked to stimulus spending. When President Obama promised the stimulus would produce 3.5 million jobs, most Americans did not imagine he was talking about three-month gigs. But the biggest flaw in Obama's stimulus hype is the notion that more jobs are always better (which also underlies his claim that global warming will be a boon to the economy as long as we spend lots of money to mitigate it). According to this standard, if the government really did find a supplier who spends 520 man-hours to deliver one pair of work boots, it should buy as many as possible.--Jacob Sullum, NY Post
* 11/27/09--WASHINGTON — The Justice Department has concluded that the Obama administration can lawfully pay the community group ACORN for services provided under contracts signed before Congress banned the government from providing money to the group.--NY Times
* 11/27/09--A top House Republican today blasted a ruling by the Justice Department that allows the Obama administration to pay ACORN for services provided under contracts signed before Congress passed a law banning the community advocacy group from receiving taxpayers money. Republicans have been on the warpath against ACORN since its voter registration efforts came under scrutiny during the 2008 presidential campaign. After conservative activists, who posed as a prostitute and pimp, released videos appearing to show ACORN staffers advising them how to skirt the law, Democrats joined in the outrage, leading to the congressional funding ban that Obama signed on Oct. 1.... The Justice Department asked whether the funding ban applied to prior contracts. In a ruling first reported by the New York Times, a department lawyer said the payments under prior contracts should continue because the language of the law did not expressly wipe them out. But Representative Darrell Issa, the top Republican on the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, said "the bipartisan intent of Congress was clear -- no more federal dollars should flow to ACORN." "It is telling that this administration continues to look for every excuse possible to circumvent the intent of Congress," Issa said in a statement. "Taxpayers should not have to continue subsidizing a criminal enterprise that helped Barack Obama get elected president. The politicization of the Justice Department to payback one of the president’s political allies is shameful and amounts to nothing more than old-fashioned cronyism."--Boston.com
* 11/29/09--SAN FRANCISCO/CHICAGO, Nov 29 (Reuters) - U.S. consumers spent significantly less per person at the start of the holiday season this weekend, dimming hopes for a retail comeback that
would help propel the economy early in 2010. The lackluster spending could pressure retail stocks on Monday as some investors were looking for a stronger showing compared with a year earlier, when consumers were being hammered by the recession and credit crunch.
* 11/29/09--Iran has approved plans to build 10 new uranium enrichments plants, the country's state media has said. The announcement comes two days after the UN demanded Iran halt construction of a newly revealed enrichment facility near the city of Qom.--Sky News
* 11/29/09--SCIENTISTS at the University of East Anglia (UEA) have admitted throwing away much of the raw temperature data on which their predictions of global warming are based. It means that other academics are not able to check basic calculations said to show a long-term rise in temperature over the past 150 years. The UEA’s Climatic Research Unit (CRU) was forced to reveal the loss following requests for the data under Freedom of Information legislation.--Timesonline.co.uk
* 11/30/09--The international "Climategate" scandal is now moving into its third week. And reaction from folks on the scientific and political left -- or is that redundant? -- who treat global warming as a cult in which naysayers must be crushed has been depressing: Total denial. The scandal began when someone hacked into the server at the Climate Research Unit at the University of East Anglia, England, and uncovered a cache of messages between leading warming gurus. These e-mails revealed guys deeply frustrated by planetary temperatures that, stubbornly, had refused to rise in some time. Were they afraid of losing their scientific juice? Or their funding? So, as the e-mails prove, the scientists did something about it. They cooked the books to exaggerate global warming....But while one rival scientist predicted the shocking revelations would blast a "mushroom cloud" over theories of climate change, that has not come to pass. The Obama administration's "climate adviser," Carol Browner, totally ignored the smoking e-mails, and attributed the scandal to "a very small group of people who continue to say this isn't a real problem, that we don't need to do anything." "What am I going to do?" asked Browner. "Side with the couple of naysayers out there, or the 2,500 scientists?" -- (who've drunk the Kool-Aid). "I'm sticking with the 2,500 scientists." No less an authority than The New York Times sought to explain away the most damning e-mail, sent by scientist Phil Jones, who said he employed a "trick" to make temps appear higher than they were. The paper quoted Dr. Michael Mann of Pennsylvania State University as saying he often used the word "trick" to refer to a good way to solve a problem. "And not something secret." --Andrea Peyser, NY Post
* 11/30/09--Five days after the emails were made public, Barack Obama announced a major commitment to cutting greenhouse gas emissions ahead of the UN climate summit in Copenhagen.--Guardian.co.uk
* 11/30/09--"Of somewhat more import was the news last week that a bunch of climate scientists -- in fact THE bunch of climate scientists -- who have been at the center of the global warming movement were found to have cooked the books to make the 'Earth-is-warming' numbers work. According to ... Dr. William Hamilton's weekly 'Central View' column, emails which were hacked and released, 'reveal that climatologists at Penn State, Amherst, the University of Arizona and England's East Anglia University have been engaged in a conspiracy to: hide data that the planet is cooling, apply pressure to scientific journals to exclude studies casting doubt on their theories of global warming, hide data being requested under the Freedom of Information Act that would discredit global warming, and, delete any data in their files that would support the existence of global cooling.' Yikes. The very people who 10 days ago were laughing and pointing at global warming skeptics for hanging on to their position notwithstanding the evidence in support of the man-induced effect on the Earth's climate, are now very quiet. A lot of people have a lot invested in the business of global warming, and the concept of their scientific beards having cheated on the numbers, coerced their opponents, covered-up the data and shredded potential evidence is impossible for them to accept. Notwithstanding the evidence." --political analyst Rich Galen
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