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| Something stinky is afoot this election year. |
...By the way, how's all that hope and change working out for you?
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| Courtesy the Senate Republican Policy Committee. |
"At Obama’s back is a dismayingly anemic recovery, constantly threatening to get worse. He wants credit for “creating” 3 million jobs but insists he be held blameless for millions more workers who’ve left the job market entirely."
Jonah Goldberg
National Review (1)"The ranks of America's poor are on track to climb to levels unseen in nearly half a century, erasing gains from the war on poverty in the 1960s amid a weak economy and fraying government safety net.
Census figures for 2011 will be released this fall in the critical weeks ahead of the November elections.
The Associated Press surveyed more than a dozen economists, think tanks and academics, both nonpartisan and those with known liberal or conservative leanings, and found a broad consensus: The official poverty rate will rise from 15.1 percent in 2010, climbing as high as 15.7 percent. Several predicted a more modest gain, but even a 0.1 percentage point increase would put poverty at the highest since 1965." (emphasis added)
CBS News (2)
"By the end of the third quarter of fiscal 2012, the new debt accumulated in this fiscal year by the federal government had already exceeded $1 trillion, making this fiscal year the fifth straight in which the federal government has increased its debt by more than a trillion dollars, according to official debt numbers published by the U.S. Treasury.
Prior to fiscal 2008, the federal government had never increased its debt by as much as $1 trillion in a single fiscal year. From fiscal 2008 onward, however, the federal government has increased its debt by at least $1 trillion each and every fiscal year."
CNSNews.com (3)
Terrence P. Jeffrey
Of all the lamentations in both pieces, the one that had me in full eye roll was this one in Politico from Drew Westen, an Emory University clinical psychologist who studies the role of messaging and emotion in politics.
Obama’s “fundamental error,” Westen said, was not blaming former President George W. Bush and conservative lawmakers early enough and often enough in his term for creating the country’s economic troubles before he got into office.
Westen either suffers from amnesia or is a resident of the land of Mitt-Believe. Republicans have been hammering Obama for his propensity to blame President George W. Bush for the nation’s problems from almost the beginning of his administration. That’s because Obama has been blaming Bush for that long.
Jonathan Capehart
Following Obama's Own Advice
"If we do not change our politics -- if we do not fundamentally change the way Washington works -- then the problems we've been talking about for the last generation will be the same ones that haunt us for generations to come."
"But let me be clear -- this isn't just about ending the failed policies of the Bush years; it's about ending the failed system in Washington that produces those policies. For far too long, through both Democratic and Republican administrations, Washington has allowed Wall Street to use lobbyists and campaign contributions to rig the system and get its way, no matter what it costs ordinary Americans."
"We are up against the belief that it's all right for lobbyists to dominate our government--that they are just part of the system in Washington. But we know that the undue influence of lobbyists is part of the problem, and this election is our chance to say that we're not going to let them stand in our way anymore. Unless we're willing to challenge the broken system in Washington, and stop letting lobbyists use their clout to get their way, nothing else is going to change."
"If we're not willing to take up that fight, then real change--change that will make a lasting difference in the lives of ordinary Americans--will keep getting blocked by the defenders of the status quo."
2008 Quotes taken from The Atlantic (5)
Freedom of Speech
"I would like to conclude by pointing out that President Obama has made his opposition to faith and Christianity abundantly clear now. Personally, I don't see how a Christian--let alone an informed Catholic--in good conscience could vote for him. His aim seems to be to make it as easy and convenient as possible to destroy the lives of the unborn, served up upon the altar of Moloch."
ObamaCare
"When my wife and I were first married, we were as poor as church mice and living in the northwest corner of Washington State. Some of the worst medical care our family ever received was during a time when we briefly relied upon public aid. My daughter Sarah experienced serious complications at birth, and we will never know whether the poor care of her delivery had lasting consequences for long-term health and well-being. Nearly as frightening: Sarah would have gone blind if we had not left Washington State for Texas, where we able to stay with family and pay for an eye specialist's surgery. The doctor in Washington, paid through the state health safety net, ignored a serious problem, a problem which would have led eventually to Sarah's blindness, according to her Dallas eye surgeon. Assembly-line medicine does not work, and the worst kind of assembly-line medicine of all is where the state or federal government is the overseer."
"History will judge whether Mr. Roberts saved the reputation of the court or lost his nerve. Many conservatives obviously suspect the latter. Resolved: The government cannot make you eat broccoli, though it may levy a non-broccoli-eating tax on any who refuse.
Yet he may also think—and would not be wrong to think—that ObamaCare is doomed in any case. His opinion makes clearer than ever that ObamaCare is a tax program—throwing more tax dollars at an unreformed health-care system. ObamaCare is a huge new entitlement in a nation laboring under commitments it already can't afford. Those who gripe that he just authorized a vast expansion of the welfare state haven't reckoned with this fiscal reality principle."
Holman W. Jenkins
Abortion
"A woman's ability to decide how many children to have and when, without interference from the government, is one of the most fundamental rights we possess. It is not just an issue of choice, but equality and opportunity for all women."
Barack Obama
GlassBooth.com (9)
"With the topic of abortion being discussed on the airwaves so much lately, I thought it might be a good time to devote a blog entry or two to the issue. When you hear people making statements along the lines of "abortion on demand is a right of all women" or the particularly bewildering whine of "keep your laws off my body," * we're hearing echoes of Margaret Sanger's voice, but who was she?"
"Repeatedly, she refers to her desire for "thoroughbreds" when it comes to the generations to follow. In other words, she is espousing eugenics. This is the same belief which led to the rise to power of a certain German by the name of Hitler. A good article on the September 1957 Mike Wallace interview of Sanger may be found at LifeSite News. Also, I found the interview itself available courtesy the Harry Ransom Center, the University of Texas at Austin. It's fascinating to watch this interview, to have the opportunity to not only analyze her words but also her mannerisms."
A question...for you. As a reader, I'd be interested in your take as to why the Obama campaign does as well as it does with the Hispanic community--given the group's rather conservative social values. Thoughts?
Foreign Policy Blunders
"Since Mr. Obama took office, the opinion of the United States generally has declined in every country surveyed by the Pew Global Attitudes Project, according to a report released in June. Despite the vaunted White House effort to reach out to Muslim-majority countries, U.S. favorability ratings in Egypt, Jordan, Lebanon and Pakistan are below where they were in 2008, when George W. Bush was at the helm. The study notes that “opinion is generally against Obama in most of the predominantly Muslim countries surveyed, with about half or more in Egypt, Jordan, Lebanon and Pakistan saying Obama should not be elected again.”
The Washington Times (12)
"Nonetheless, it is sobering to measure Obama against the goals he set himself when coming into office. His international priorities were clear and ambitious. He intended to solve the Iranian nuclear issue through diplomacy. He wanted to make peace between Israel and Palestine. He would transform America’s image in the Muslim world. The Guantanamo prison camp would be closed and terrorists would be tried in US courts, He would get the US out of Iraq and use the freed-up resources to fix Afghanistan. And he would dramatically improve relations with Russia and China, allowing the world to make progress on issues of common concern, from global warming to global trade."
Gideon Rachman
Business Day (13)
Environmental Incompetence & Shenanigans
"Reviewing the administration's public statements and press conferences on the subject, the picture that emerges is not necessarily one of willful neglect, but of a frustrated White House that did not, perhaps, initially grasp the scope of the disaster, and whose hand was forced on an issue it knew very little about. Whether the terms "Deepwater" and "top kill" continue to haunt Obama in the coming months will be determined in no small part by how much longer the oil continues to seep into the sea, and how forcefully he can convince the American public that he is, in fact, in control of a very uncontrollable situation."
Alex Wagner
Politics Daily (14)
"Quite unbelievably, President Obama put himself in the company of persons related to the 2010 Solyndra energy company scandal, which has sullied the reputation of the White House for the past two years. Not only was Obama in the presence of such individuals again, but he was repeating the same reasoned-method of contact. Obama and the Solyndra-related people were together to raise funds for Obama’s election once again."
"Like Solyndra, Abound's bankruptcy is a bitter echo of the hype generated by President Obama in his weekly radio address exactly two years ago when he touted his push for a clean energy economy. Abound Solar, he said, would manufacture advanced solar panels at two new plants, creating more than 2,000 construction jobs and 1,500 permanent jobs at plants in Indiana and Colorado."
Investors.com (16)
You Didn't Build That
"I would argue that the irony of saying “somebody else” can only come from someone who is confused about the power any individual has and perhaps the extent of their own power. If credit can be given to me for my actions then likewise can I be blamed for them. To deny the freedom and responsibility needed to succeed or fail we run the risk of seeing ourselves and others as victims."
Debra King
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