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Politics : American Presidential Politics and foreign affairs -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: longnshort who wrote (31333)	1/12/2009 11:30:05 AM
From: Peter Dierks	1 Recommendation Respond to of 71588

Obama's ties to people like her are very scary. Let us hope that is first two years are ineffective and that voters react to evict the idiots in mass in 2010.

To: longnshort who wrote (31333)	1/20/2009 3:34:07 PM
From: Peter Dierks	2 Recommendations Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 71588

1993 All Over Again Phyllis Schlafly Tuesday, January 20, 2009 Faced with 24/7 Obamamania on the media, the 60 million Americans who did not vote for Barack Obama are wondering where we go from here. Will events turn out like 1993, when another liberal president was inaugurated with the support of big majorities in both the House of Representatives and the Senate? Under the direction of the activist first lady, the liberals attempted a government takeover of the massive health care industry, in addition to passing new regulations and tax hikes. Bill Clinton rewarded the feminists by passing Joe Biden's nearly-billion-dollar-a-year Violence Against Women Act. But then came the midterm elections in 1994, and liberals were abruptly reminded how conservative America really is. In a tsunami we hadn't seen since 1946, Republicans won both Houses of Congress by wide margins. The Speaker of the House, Tom Foley, was defeated for re-election, something that hadn't happened in over a century. President Bill Clinton held onto his power because he was not yet up for re-election, and he quickly changed his stripes to govern more middle-of-the-road. The new Congress passed the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA) by big majorities, and Clinton signed it into law. DOMA protects states and the federal government against having to recognize same-sex marriages that are performed in other states. The new Congress passed Welfare Reform to end some of the worst abuses of the system started by Lyndon Johnson's Great Society in the 1960s. After much grumbling, Clinton signed it. The liberals never forgave Bill Clinton for signing those laws, and conservatives were never fooled by his newfound political religion. Bill signing those laws even hurt Hillary Clinton in the 2008 Democratic primary over a decade later. People who gave Obama up to $750 million to bring about "change" surely expect something in return. But will Obama and the Democrats fulfill Obama's very expensive promises and risk what happened in the 1994 elections? Obama's push for imposing an additional trillion dollars in debt will benefit special interests at the expense of working Americans. That translates to many thousands of dollars in new costs for the average worker at a time when we can least afford it. Less than half of Americans support this proposal according to polls, and many view it as yet another bailout like the unpopular one for bankers last fall. Just as New Deal spending programs did nothing to lift the United States out of the Great Depression, Obama's proposed "stimulus" package will simply dig us into a deeper hole. Obama's proposed stimulus promises to create 3 million new jobs, but even if it reached that implausible goal, the price tag would be over $300,000 per job. And would they be short-term government jobs or jobs with a future? The proposed stimulus is not even enough for some Obama supporters, perhaps because so little of it will reach average Americans. It "falls far short" in the words of Terence O'Sullivan, general president of the Laborers' International Union. Of course, it falls short because government spending only bleeds the taxpayers to pay for government jobs, and what we need is private industry jobs. We need the government to stop its overtaxation and micromanagement of the U.S. economy, and to stop the unfair trade agreements and foreign-government policies that invite corporations to move their manufacturing overseas. Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, whose approval rating has sunk to 38 percent, may meet the same fate as the speaker of the house 16 years ago. Ramming through anti-business feminist legislation like the Lilly Ledbetter Act, which invites lawsuits against large and small companies, will hurt instead of helping job creation. Even moderate Republicans are risking the wrath of voters. Sen. Arlen Specter is already hearing the footsteps of a primary challenge from the right. Nearly 50 House Democrats hold seats that were Republican in 2002, and perhaps another dozen seats long held by Democrats have been trending Republican. Nearly all those Democrats have just opened themselves up to challenge by voting to expose companies to new job-ruining lawsuits. There is only one path to economic and social prosperity: less and limited government and enforcing a level playing field for international trade. If Obama and the liberals controlling Congress repeat the Democrats' mistake of 1993, it may be, as Yogi Berra famously said, deja vu all over again. townhall.com

To: longnshort who wrote (31333)	2/9/2009 7:03:22 PM
From: Peter Dierks	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 71588

Tension at the White House Press Room by John Gizzi 02/09/2009 “. . . maybe you're already over there. I was JUST about to leave.... Wish they'd get their act together!” That was an e-mail I got from a colleague in the White House press corps last Wednesday informing me that the briefing by Press Secretary Robert Gibbs scheduled for 1:30 was postponed until 2:30. The time of the re-scheduling notice was 1:15 and, yes, my colleague was almost correct: I had already cut short a lunch and hopped on the metro. Upon arriving, I learned the meaning of the old bromide “Hurry up and wait.” With my editors waiting for me to complete my weekly political column for the print edition, I could not wait and had to turn around and leave the James Brady Briefing Room for my office. Others who have additional assignments along with covering the White House were forced to do the same. As one colleague with whom I walked back told me, “I know this is the day after [Cabinet appointee Tom] Daschle withdrew and the stimulus package is coming up. But I’ve got to get work done today.” So we left together and reached the same conclusion: if you don’t have a permanent desk in the back of the briefing room and you are not a full-time White House correspondent, you are going to be at the mercy of what are becoming almost regular—even daily—changes and disruptions in the briefing schedule. “When they do stick to the usual 1:30 briefing, that means you try to find a chair and wait until 1:45 for Gibbs to come out,” a frustrated radio correspondent told me. On enough occasions since January 20th for the correspondents to take notice and starting grousing, what happened Wednesday has happened. The session is postponed and those of us who don’t have the luxury of waiting for have had to move on. Even the storied Goyal of Asia today was spotted shaking his head Wednesday and seemingly in a funk because his inevitable questions about India and Pakistan had to be put off and he had to find something to do for an hour. I know, I know. This is all “inside baseball” again and you really could care less about the things that make my colleagues in the White House Press Corps and me uptight. ( I do read your e-mails). But what is going on is less about my colleagues and me than about the Obama White House and the media in general. Not since John F. Kennedy and Press Secretary Pierrre Salinger set up shop in 1961 has there been a romance between the press corps and the President and his spokesman as there is with Obama and Gibbs today. One can see it in the overflow crowds that have packed Gibbs’ daily briefings since January 20th. Even when he has made us wait the usual fifteen minutes and even when these hour-long delays have come up of late, Gibbs still draws a crowd. (A number of my colleagues are still impressed I actually got a seat and got in two questions to Gibbs on Monday of this week). But the little things and minor irritations are beginning to be noticed and discussed. A number of those who have had to pass on a delayed press conference are from publications and radio and TV outlets considered sympathetic to the new President. In addition, where George W. Bush’s four press secretaries divided up their time with the reporters between a gaggle (early morning session off-camera) and the afternoon briefing, Gibbs does it all in one swoop. The afternoon session, which sometimes goes on for more than hour, is “the whole shooting match.” And this wreaks havoc with a number of us. When Dana Perino or the late Tony Snow had their two-a-day session, I could divide up my time, make one session, and work on other areas of my beat at another time. Not so under the new order. To be sure, Robert Gibbs is a good man. He is pleasant, dismissive to no one, a bit hesitant, but learning the ropes. However, forewarned is forearmed: even reporters have feelings and obligations and accommodating them can go a long way toward surmounting other misuderstandings with the President’s top spokesman. Tony Snow knew this better than most. He could make up for delays and rescheduled briefings with warmth, private talks, and walks with reporters where he sometimes slipped nuggets of news. I hope Robert Gibbs does the same—and soon. humanevents.com

To: longnshort who wrote (31333)	3/11/2009 1:55:12 PM
From: Peter Dierks	Respond to of 71588

Goracular Al Gore, the infallible pope of global warming. MARCH 11, 2009 By JOHN FUND Once again Al Gore has ducked the chance to debate critics of his global warming doomsday predictions. The former vice president loves to lecture others on the need to address global warming, but usually insists on appearing alone and largely unchallenged at conferences. At the Wall Street Journal's ECO:nomics conference in Santa Barbara, California, Mr. Gore was initially scheduled to appear with Czech President Vaclav Klaus, a noted skeptic on global warming. Mr. Gore changed his schedule so he could appear the previous day. President Klaus told me this week that the major reason he agreed to travel from Europe was the chance to interact with Mr. Gore. "I don't understand all of this reluctance to engage with others," he told me. Sounds to me like a case of bologna rejecting the grinder. Mr. Gore knows that the science backing up his calls for dramatic reduction of carbon emissions is increasingly shaky and that even adopting the Kyoto targets for such reductions would do little to address the accumulation of atmospheric carbon dioxide. Several other critics of Mr. Gore also tried to interact with him at the conference -- with little success. Willie Soon, an astrophysicist at Harvard, asked Mr. Gore during the Q-and-A period what exactly he was trying to accomplish in practical terms with his proposals. Mr. Gore ignored the substance of the question and snidely said he was trying to save humanity. The next question came from Bjorn Lomborg, a Danish statistician who has assembled a group of Nobel Prize winners who say many other global problems such as clean drinking water merit attention before futile efforts to deal with an exaggerated fear of global warming. "I don't mean to corner you, or maybe I do mean to corner you, but would you be willing to have a debate with me on that point?" asked Mr. Lomborg. "I want to be polite to you," Mr. Gore replied. He then proceeded to say Mr. Lomborg's work had been discredited. "The scientific community has gone through this chapter and verse. We have long since passed the time when we should pretend this is a 'on the one hand, on the other hand' issue," he said. "It's not a matter of theory or conjecture, for goodness sake." Mr. Soon noted to me that while some scientific journals have challenged Mr. Lomborg's early work, none have disputed his contention that many other problems should be addressed with a higher priority than controlling carbon emissions. "He once again won't engage his critics," he sighs, referring to Mr. Gore. I have a possible explanation. The last time Mr. Gore did debate anyone it was during the 2000 presidential race when he took on George W. Bush, not exactly a stellar orator. Mr. Gore managed to demonstrate enough arrogance and pomposity that he is generally thought to have lost those exchanges and blown his lead in the polls. online.wsj.com