Mary Landrieu is the first Red State Senate Democrat to announce a firm “no” on the public option for healthcare. What, she doesn’t think voters in 2010 would reward her for taking over 17% of the economy? The public option could become as toxic as card check — the more people know, the less they like it.
Michael O’Hanlon on defense spending: “After three months of very impressive decisions regarding national security, President Obama made perhaps his first significant mistake. It concerns the defense budget, where his plans are insufficient to support the national security establishment over the next five years. Thankfully, this mistake can be fixed before it causes big harm — either by Congress this year or the administration itself next year.”
Kevin Hassett: “I’ve finally figured out the Obama economic strategy. President Barack Obama and his team have been having so much fun wielding dictatorial power while rescuing ‘failed’ firms, that they have developed a scheme to gain the same power over every business. The plan is to enact policies that are so anticompetitive that every firm needs a bailout.” He focuses on the end of the deferral of multinational taxation. But it’s equally true of cap-and-trade, nationalized healthcare, and the Employee Free Choice Act. Almost like they don’t believe in free market capitalism, huh?
Megan McArdle on a potential plan to regulate non-TARP banks’ compensation: “Maybe Uncle Sam will discover the perfect scheme that has so far eluded everyone else. But we’d probably get a better return on their mental effort if we had them figure out how to turn lead into gold. . . But this feels more like a trial balloon than a fleshed out plan, so for now, I’ll hold off on the capitalist panic.”
The Supreme Court declines to stop Chrysler’s secured creditors from being run over by the Obama and UAW juggernaut.
The New York Times is out to get Michael Bloomberg with some blatant poll massaging.
Marty Peretz finds further proof the Obama administration has thrown in the towel on stopping Iran from acquiring nuclear weapons. Listening to Hillary Clinton’s threats of retaliation should Iran strike Israel with nuclear weapons, Peretz concludes: “So instead of her forcing Iran to look at the consequences of building nuclear weapons she has them thinking about whether, when they have an atomic arsenal– they will really attack the Jewish state. Which the president of Iran has said he would.”
Ron Kampeas (who often seems much more concerned with attacking Republicans’ motives than with covering Israel) is annoyed again: this time it’s about the Republican Jewish Coalition raising the question as to whether the Obama administration is adhering to past understandings regarding Israeli settlements. Let me make it easy: have the Obama administration stop dancing and spell out what its position is with regard to prior commitments made by the Bush administration. As soon as the Obama administration — what is the phrase? — starts saying the same thing in public that it does in private we’ll know if it is reneging on prior agreements, denying they exist or simply seeing how far it can push Israel around as part of its Muslim charm offensive.
Money doesn’t buy you everything: Terry McAuliffe gets whipped, Creigh Deeds is the Democratic nominee in the Virginia gubernatorial race and it will be an interesting battle between Deeds and Republican Bob McDonnell, suggesting that Virginia isn’t very Blue after all: “The Virginia battle also should quiet pundits who thought the commonwealth was turning into a deep blue Democratic state. Both men have conservative credentials — Deeds has in the past been endorsed by the National Rifle Association — and both will have to work to build connections to Northern Virginia, home to most of the state’s voters.”
Camille Paglia: “Within the U.S., the Obama presidency will be mainly measured by the success or failure of his economic policies. And here, I fear, the monstrous stimulus package with which this administration stumbled out of the gate will prove to be Obama’s Waterloo. All the backtracking and spin doctoring in the world will not erase that major blunder, which made the new president seem reckless, naive and out of control of his own party, which was in effect dictating to him from Capitol Hill.”
“Understand that Tim Geithner didn’t draft these contacts with AIG.” – No, Chris Dodd, who received more money from AIG than any other senator, did, Geithner, Treasury Secretary to Obama, who received more money from AIG than any othe presidential candidate, merely “urged” the inclusion for bonus protection in the bill.
And so we add Mr. Greenwald to the fools who think the Constitution of the United States is a “loophole.” Yikes.
So if it was the “STAFF” why was this stated by Mr Gibbs:
Republicans on Tuesday morning lambasted the administration for poor handling of the bailout money, pointing to a March 2 transcript in which White House press secretary Robert Gibbs asserted that Obama knew where the bailout money given to AIG and other financial institutions had been spent.
http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/politics/Dems-call-for-AIG-takeover-GOP-looks-to-ditch-bailout_03_18-41404212.html
The BO administration knew about all of this from the beginning and are playing “outraged” so that they can mitigate any repercussions. This is nothing new in politics, but clearly the duplicity of BO will not help and will add to growing cynicism.
The real issue is this…the US taxpayer has purchased 80% of AIG for $170 billion. The reason for this is to stabilize the company and return it to profitability. If it works, theoretically we can get our money back. However, with a Congressional lynch mob out there, what talented executive will ever want to work for AIG? If you wanted to return a company to profitability, would insults and the provocation of violence really be the best way to attract the best employees? Why would anyone want to work for AIG if any bad choice they made would incur the concentrated wrath of the government?
This is how fascist countries behave. Is this what we elected last November?
I’m beginning to be convinced that the Obama administration is a master at misdirection, equal to any of the best stage magicians. The Fed just creates over $1 trillion yesterday and we’re talking about a fraction of that.
This new money, by the way, is going to go straight into commodities via a weakening dollar, which is exactly what happened last year when the dollar fell hard. Combined with a president who has an energy policy that was tried and failed 30 years back, it means higher commodity prices, especially oil and gold.
The one advantage from the recession has been the collapse in oil and other commodity prices. Now, that’s set to reverse, so we’re going to have the worst of both worlds.
“This is how fascist countries behave. Is this what we elected last November?”
Just go to barackobama.com and you will have your answer.This is the website, Obama asks his 13 million on his email list to go. As you scroll down the right hand side of the page, imagine if George W. Bush had this site.
For Obama comparing AIG executives as suicide bombers is incomprehensible. Obama is playing dirty politics here. He and his democrats lynch mob knew all of this mess from the beginning.
My God. This guy is not only an idiot but dangerous. What a mess! If Geithner has any ounce of decency, he should resign.
I really feel that Obama is becoming dangerous, too. The Democrats never looked at the stimulus and voted yes. Geithner knew about the bonuses. Yet, here comes the Democratic mob, to find those evil AIG workers. It is such a crazy stage show. Now, Obama is on Leno saying our culture needs to be changed. Does he carry a Bible with him or only Alinsky’s book? What culture? The culture of not looking at legislation before voting? The culture of knowing that bonuses are coming and keep silent for weeks? The culture of a Senator writing in that provision and denying it?
This is just out of control and I am very concerned.
You know, I’ve got to hit the buzzer on this whole “anger” thing. Who is Obama supposed to be, Jesus berating the moneychangers in the Temple?
Anger is not a basis for public policy. A man who talks about channeling anger for the public good is neither honest nor temperate. He’s a charlatan playing on emotions.
In adolescence, we are certain that being angry about things makes us righteous. But then we grow up, and realize that harboring anger is often a consequence of ignorance — and acting on anger produces outcomes that are likely to be worse than whatever it is we may be angry about.
I am very, very unimpressed by almost all self-consciously righteous anger, especially when it is used as a pretext for stirring others to anger, and for proposing, as Lawrence Kramer and others remind us, to act as if we do not have a Constitution, or the rule of law.
Jonas Menchik — Yes.
Community agitators traffic in manufactured outrage.It’s what they do, all in the name of justice.Is it any wonder we are seeing a braying mob when that’s what Barry used to organize??
America thought it was electing a Bill Cosby and instead got Jesse Jackson.
JE Dyer. — I agree. I would add that Obama set the law, the stimulus, the bonus loophole, and is now training the populace to believe that Obama is always above the law.
Jose Faur, in his work “The Horizontal Society” discusses the function of the Rex. I believe the following paragraphs are very relevant to our political situation.
“The two-realm doctrine whereby the Rex’s “governance” is immune from criticism bears on the concept of law. Unlike the God of Israel who complies with the laws of the Covenant(see above, Chapter 5), the Rex “creates laws for others and so imposes legal duties or ‘limitations’ upon them whereas he is said himself to be legally unlimited and illimitable”
“Under the government of a Rex all power is State power. Institutions may be tolerated on condition that they occupy a subordinate position, hierarchically inferior to the ‘superior.’ For this reason, it was imperative to control the flow of ideas and assure that new perspectives and values would not affect the running of the state”
JE Dyer, just read your #10 after posting. Yes, indeed. It is so surreal.
I agree. The deliberate misdirection and outright deceit we’re seeing here, from Obama, Geithner and Dodd as well as many others, the scapegoating, and unseemly haste to ram laws through that amount to confiscations–it is out of the fascist playbook. We have an unprincipled will to power operating here (of course for the “best of motives”) that badly needs to be checked.
on macneil/lehrer tonite (or whatever it’s called now) Judy Woodruff interviewed 3 newspaper editors from around the country. she asked them if their readers’ anger was being directed toward AIG or Congress. only during the last 30 seconds was Obama’s name even mentioned, and all the editors basically felt that of course HE was not the object of any anger.
it’s really amazing what has happened to this country. we are a nation of sheeple. I thank God every day I had the wisdom not to vote for this guy.
michiganruth,
I am watching this whole thing in disbelief. I warned all of my friend and family about Obama’s true political vision. No one listened. Even now, when I ask them to explain the Chas Freeman pick, they just shrug their shoulders. “I really don’t know much about that”
You look at this political maneuver, and you think, ok, America is going to wake up, this is so transparent. Obama and Geithner made the loophole, to now be the heroes taking it back. Amateurs. Isn’t this clear as day?
If it is not, then our cultural/intellecutal decline is.
Jonas Menchik — nice passages from Faur. Very evocative. I’ve gotten to where I can’t really bear to watch Obama or his officials bloviating at us. I’ve found a lot of Rush Limbaugh’s parody and skit stuff over the top in the past, but I have to say he’s really on, with the “President Teleprompter” thread, and the unerring identification of Obama’s handling of everything as if he is still community activatin’, back in Chicago: stalking around expressing anger on cue, rallying mobs, basically performing, in a prescripted series of tricks, like a clown at a kid’s birthday party.
It’s hilarious that Obama told the GOP members of Congress not to listen to Rush so much, because I’ve never listened to him as much before as I do now. You can’t read any identifiable form of moderation or adult judgment — much less respect for American constitutional traditions and the rule of law — into what Obama does; there’s no point in analyzing his actions, or his people’s, from such a perspective. He is so glaringly obvious, all you can do is marvel at the surreality. Rush does THAT much better than the mainstream conservative punditry, which is busy addressing Obama kind of like sweet old Grandma Betty, confidentally advising her stoned-out grandson with the 11 piercings and the facial tatts that “if you don’t stand up straighter, honey, you’ll have a hard time getting a job after you graduate.”
JE Dyer, thank you,
Yes, that is very funny. I have also been listening to Rush every chance I get. When he called himself, the Last Man Standing, I had to laugh. He was right, there was no one else confronting Obama and calling him out on the rug. Rush has never apologized for standing for his own beliefs in the face of “unity” I have a lot of respect for him. Yes, his parodies are hysterical.
I think I will take your advice. Its long past the time of seeking a morsel of moderation in Obama. These tactics are all he knows in political life. He is organizing followers to knock on my door, to bring me into the “unity” He is already “angry” 2 months into his presidency. And, he was about to charge veterans for their own treatment!
Your analysis of the current conservative punditry is hysterical and absolutely correct. “My child, in trouble with the law again? Oh, officer those are not the values he professed to me just 8 weeks ago! I’ll talk to him, and I am sure we will be able to trust him.”
KJG – “Why would anyone want to work for AIG if any bad choice they made would incur the concentrated wrath of the government?”
It’s worse than that. Why would anyone want to work for any of the banks that took TARP money, or the autos for that matter. The hyenas down there have just shown how they’ll tear up execs at any of those companies.
Of course, from Barney, Chris and Barry’s point of view that means lots of new high paid positions opening up in which they can place their buds.
Let’s not get too overwrought. The bad news is that he’s intent on driving over a cliff. The good news is that he’s so erratic and incompetent.
There’s talk about whether he may get rid of Geithner. Who would he replace Geithner with. His screening and vetting process has been pathetic. Or could it be that the clean and vettable people are turning down the chance to ride in the locomotive because they can see where it’s going.
Sully – “The good news is that he’s so erratic and incompetent.”
I can’t believe he made a Special Olympics joke about his bowling score. Yes, without the holy teleprompter he is such a loose cannon. In fact, I think he just sounds like a socially inept college kid. Going to save the world, punish corporate dudes, send 25 DVDs to Brown, and make a Special Olympics joke! cool dude.
Thought that presidential lying and dishonesty were grounds for impeachment?
re: My post above. Just wishful thinking guys! Have my fingers crossed though.
Anger is the grease for the Obama machine. Calm reflection instead of anger would make it seize up.